tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2429560125838989988.post3887657432493344603..comments2024-03-26T23:41:10.319+00:00Comments on Authors Electric: Words, words, words by Bill KirtonKatherine Robertshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17196712319655603442noreply@blogger.comBlogger10125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2429560125838989988.post-34229448763341364092012-07-09T12:36:54.932+01:002012-07-09T12:36:54.932+01:00I love Ionesco - in fact I wrote a flash fiction a...I love Ionesco - in fact I wrote a flash fiction about Rhinoceros for this year's Bridport. <br />i think you're right that language has a greater specificity *for us* but I not necessarily for other cultures - the medieval churches in both the east and west for example. Of course now we're bordering on those ancient chestnuts that preoccupied the sixteenth century so much (and back to Nominalism) to do with the lexicon versus the imagination.Dan Hollowayhttp://danholloway.wordpress.comnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2429560125838989988.post-2754977390281212462012-07-08T15:59:11.836+01:002012-07-08T15:59:11.836+01:00Thanks Dan, for running with it. I’d love to take ...Thanks Dan, for running with it. I’d love to take credit for advocating a (subversive) tell not show approach but the village idiot part of my function prevented me spotting that. I like the readers of novels/readers of life parallel and I agree that both work in the same way. The only difference is that our fictions imply purpose and resolution while life isn’t so accommodating.<br /><br />I accept your second point, too, about the precision of words. I still think their specificity anchors our perceptions more soundly than do musical textures, ballet codes or visual semiotics. I’m certainly not suggesting they have greater emotional or aesthetic impact; it’s just that, when it comes to pinpointing and anchoring something into the nearest to a ‘truth’ we can get, the tyranny of the label is supreme.<br /><br />And that reminded me of that great Ionesco play, The Lesson, in which the professor’s maid warns him that ‘Arithmetic leads to philology and philology leads to crime’. Here’s a quick, loose translation of bit of the professor’s lesson I was thinking of:<br /><br />'If you let out several sounds very quickly, they’ll automatically hang on to one another, to make syllables, words, even sentences at a pinch – groupings of greater or lesser importance, purely irrational sound assemblies, stripped of all sense but, precisely for that reason, able to rise high and float up into the air. It’s only words that are weighed down by what they signify, made heavier by their meaning which end up falling, succumbing, crumbling down into the ears of deaf people.'<br /><br />To jump on a bandwagon, maybe meaning is the Higgs Boson of language.Bill Kirtonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16345949773423764808noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2429560125838989988.post-19902275401480651552012-07-07T23:00:29.960+01:002012-07-07T23:00:29.960+01:00and on your end point - you're saying that lit...and on your end point - you're saying that literature's key lies in that it tells rather than shows? Deliciously devilish of you, Sir. <br /><br />I think I sort of agree and disagree - the precision of words feels as though it gives a concreteness to a statement whereas other forms of art (and words used differently) produce an emotional conviction (the precision won't convince you that what is precisely described is true - which raises questions which matters more of course). I don't think this is actually true - it is more obviously true because the representational symbolism of words is something we're all familiar with. There is just as accurate a representational symbolism in art (from the semiology of the iconographer through paintings of the vanities) and music (think of the complex codes in ballet or the use of instruments in Peter and the Woolf)Dan Hollowayhttp://danholloway.wordpress.comnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2429560125838989988.post-31321972639375813742012-07-07T22:47:26.781+01:002012-07-07T22:47:26.781+01:00Existentialism, of course, produced some of the fe...Existentialism, of course, produced some of the few works of literature (Kundera, slightly later than Camus, does it brilliantly too)that draw explicit attention to this difference between the work of art and real life - that in the latter case context has undefinable limits whilst in the former context is always closed on one level and the limitlessness comes not from a seamlessly blurred reality but from the limitless possibilities in the reader - and of course by throwing context back in this way onto the reader, existentialism forces us to examine what it is that makes context limitless in reality and ofers the possibility that here, too, maybe the endlessly connecting dendrites trailing out of every sense-field come less from "reality" than from our perception of it - in other words, forcing us to examine what we are as readers of novels forces us to examine what we are as readers of life and makes us realise that maybe the two processes are the same.Dan Hollowayhttp://danholloway.wordpress.comnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2429560125838989988.post-62674460802437044842012-07-07T13:43:50.459+01:002012-07-07T13:43:50.459+01:00Your last comment is so ably demonstrated in your ...Your last comment is so ably demonstrated in your wonderful Alternative Dimensions which I'm in the middle of reviewing right now Bill... the meaning of meaning and the reality of reality that's all there is and all you need to know? Is it? To be or not to be? Whatever - folks BUY BILLS BOOK actually you need to look up Alternative Dimensions by Jack LeFebre on amazon. If you ever wondered about virtual worlds (Second Life etc) you will LOVE this book.CallyPhillipshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15481379296340077102noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2429560125838989988.post-28312996990586236082012-07-07T11:13:27.736+01:002012-07-07T11:13:27.736+01:00Thanks Cally, Dennis and Kathleen - I think they m...Thanks Cally, Dennis and Kathleen - I think they must be selling those invisibility cloaks at Lidl's because there are plenty of them around.<br /><br />I now have Chasing Waves, Cally, and, for others who'd like it, it's at http://amzn.to/MQnaEc (UK) and http://amzn.to/NcMDXg (USA).<br /><br />And, in defence of my use of the word 'meaning', I wasn't wanting to suggest that such 'meaning' has any significance. We all want stuff to 'mean' things, otherwise the reality of absurdity can be oppressive (to some). So the completeness of books gives that comforting illusion that there can be reasons for things - despite all the evidence to the contrary.Bill Kirtonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16345949773423764808noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2429560125838989988.post-25715946569163086352012-07-07T11:11:25.800+01:002012-07-07T11:11:25.800+01:00Keeping up the standards, Bill! Great stuff.Keeping up the standards, Bill! Great stuff.Kathleen Joneshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07645566938871914385noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2429560125838989988.post-88501863679828857082012-07-07T10:19:22.706+01:002012-07-07T10:19:22.706+01:00Just read my Kindle stats. That's my cloak of...Just read my Kindle stats. That's my cloak of invisibilty you're wearing, Cally. Bill, I like what you say about character. I often think that if characters in stories knew they were characters in stories they'd behave a damned sight differentlyDennis Hamleyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15781139870037634374noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2429560125838989988.post-20901980427420798982012-07-07T07:38:31.404+01:002012-07-07T07:38:31.404+01:00P.S. I've been bellyaching on about Chasing Wa...P.S. I've been bellyaching on about Chasing Waves since they 'probably' found Higgs Boson on Wednesday and not sold a copy even at the ridiculous slashed price of 99p. Which leads me to conclude either a)no one is that interested in Higgs Boson b) no one dares download a play on an ereader c) no one likes me or my work or d) my cloak of invisibility is working well as usual. You can find out ALL about it on my witty and erudite blog http://callyphillps.wordpress.com <br />It's funny folks. Honestly. (I was told earlier this week by 2 sources that I should be a comic writer - but there you have a comic piece and I can't get it arrested!) Sigh. Back to drawing board.CallyPhillipshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15481379296340077102noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2429560125838989988.post-58173993252565585462012-07-07T07:33:09.264+01:002012-07-07T07:33:09.264+01:00Well hang my particple, that's an interesting ...Well hang my particple, that's an interesting and well worded post for first thing on a saturday morning. And I cheer as the existentialist savant amongst us (I have created you thus) tells me that he believes books have meaning (I suppose really it's narrative which gives the meaning to words in this respect?) In the dim distant reaches of the past when I was teaching English A level I used to stun the class by suggesting that the difference between 'real' people and 'characters' was that characters HAD to have a purpose whereas 'real' people didn't. And subsequently a lot of my creative work has involved playing around with the concept of 'real' characters - what that might mean - what it means when a character doesn't know they are a character or refuses to accept the constraint. Chasing Waves (that Godotesque play with a passing wave at the Higgs Boson story) does just this. The characters refuse to acknowledge that they are not real. This is absurdist drama and a jolly good read even if you can't see it 'live.' It means that I also get a bit hot under the collar when people are described as 'characters' or worse still 'real characters' What does such a thing mean? Listen closely, you'll hear it said all the time on that square box thing in the corner - sorry that rectangular screen blotting out the wall - and mostly about politicians. How can a politician be a character (real or otherwise) Are we to believe they have a 'purpose?' after all! Happy Saturday folks and thanks for the quick brain workout Bill!CallyPhillipshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15481379296340077102noreply@blogger.com