Thursday, April 19, 2007

Thu, 9 Nov 1995 01:16:44 -0500
Reply-To: UB Poetics discussion group
Sender: UB Poetics discussion group
From: Rod Smith
Subject: Re: granted (Jameson) but

Tenney--
Eric Wirth addresses the question you raise re the "power" of the writer &
reader in an essay in _Aerial 6/7_-- basically in agreement w/ your
assertion-- he considers that in the dada text (using Coolidge as example)
there is "a preemptive fusing of relations." I go back & forth on this tho I
don't see how "opacity" is aggressive-- it can be used as such certainly, but so can any other technique. It seems to me the strength of the opaque text is
that it makes no pretense of clarity & leaves the reader free to respond on
their own terms as they will. If the rules are broken in the writing then
certainly they can be broken in the reading. This is where I find validity
in critical claims about reader interaction w/ l.p.-- such writing "honors" the reader's subjectivity by admitting its own.

I have a recollection of Jameson dismissing Cage in one sentence in his _Postmodernism_. Pretty boring. Dan Barbiero addresses "the Perelman issue" at length in a piece in _Aerial 6/7 as well.

I think your remarks abt "euphoria or mania" in the amer tree are important points-- Mayer & Coolidge being exemplars-- Mayer often talking abt exploring states of consciousness. & certainly there's only one Hannah. I think of Ted B. etc. as the hardest partiers. & "Howl" am I remembering it right?-- was written on mushrooms. & the recent visitation of David Ayre certainly made exceptional use of "mania." I'm still tired of grumpy virgins.

--Rod



Tenney Nathanson wrote:
"there are certainly big problems w Jameson's take on Perelman's work
(insurmountable, were it a question of buying or not buying the goods).
Minor point: I think it's worth noting that the

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