Lying Poets

Adorno once famously said that poetry was impossible after Auschwitz. In a letter, Celan lamented on neo-Nazism in Germany after the war and wrote: "some of them even write poems. These men, they write poems! What all don't they write, the liars."
Reading this, very naively I think of all that these sensitive souls had to endure in a supposedly fascism purged society and yet face anti-semitism daily, in all it's obvious and less obvious forms.

Today, one thinks about the cultural racism that Muslims face in Euro-America, almost on a daily basis, in all it's obvious and less obvious forms and yet the perpetrators as Celan would have noted, are liars, they write poems. It seems inevitable that almost all nations and people have their blind spots which are quite noticeable to the those on the outside. In the aftermath of the foundation of the Zionist state of Israel and it's subsequent atrocities against the Palestinians and it's Arab neighbours, including atrocities of a political, human and military nature, these atrocities are almost lost on all Jewish writers, academics and Philosophers except a handful, so much so that the Palestinian catastrophe, properly called nakba, is lost on what Celan should have perhaps noticed as well. We must say that all those who don't recognise these criminal acts against the Palestinians are liars and they write poetry!

In it's present manifestation, the racism and the anti-Islamic stance adopted by those write the narratives of Euro-America are liable to be declared as liars too, and as Celan wrote, only true hands write true poems. It is to be seen that the blatant rejection of the Palestinian nakba can be seen as something that was ignored by all Jewish writers with exception and something which Celan like sufferers could not even point out. Nowadays in Europe on the whole, the politics of the day that revels in banning articles of clothing like the burqa are engaging in a kind of feminist politics that uses this feminist diatribe and perpetuates and reinforces this Muslim-phobic and cultural racism that raises wall after wall against immigrant Muslims on Euro-America and is pushing, day after day, these immigrants into a state, where after the next fifty years perhaps, the new holocausts could begin all over again.

While outwardly these immigrant populations seemingly have certain modicums of freedom and access to instruments of equality which languish in stolid disrepair in their original countries, yet, alas yet, there are clearly as Celan said:
Whichever stone you lift-/ you lay bare/ those who need the protection of stones.

Winter

It's falling Mother, snows in the Ukraine:
The saviour's crown a thousand grains of grief
Here all my tears reach out to you in vain
One proud mute glance is all of my relief....

We're dying now: why won't you sleep, you huts?
Even this wind slinks round in frightened rags.
Are these the ones, freezing in slag-choked ruts-
whose arms are candlesticks, whose hearts are flags?

I stayed the same in darkness forlorn:
Will days heal softly, will they cut too sharp?
Among my stars are drifting now the torn
Strings of a strident and discordant harp....

On it at times a Rose-filled hour is tuned.
Expiring:once.Just once,again....
What would come, Mother:wakening or wound-
if I too sank in snows of the Ukraine?

Paul Celan, 1938

this bitter earth

another evening in tangier

all night he waited for arrival, for the sudden beats of arriving
and felt nothing but the crushing weight of expectation
as his brave plans melted into a dawn unexpectedly clear.
and now with solemn steps he makes his way to the eastern beach,
away from urchins and tourists and lies barebacked on the sand
in the shade of an alcove, waiting to see those big waves later.

she did not give her promise though he waited long enough,
he thought as he lay on the sand all day long.

it is evening again he sits again in cafe paris smoking Kif
as other places beckon, the call of demanding days in uncertain times.
reflection does not bring him any more wisdom
than does looking at the sea or the sky.
she will never know his innermost heart and
he will soon forget her face any way.

his mood has changed from restless agitation to resigned sadness
as he discovers other colours that had lay hidden till then.
the sea and the sky no longer seem intent on meeting
in the old city life is making old noises as
big berber men walk alongside bare feet urchins smoking kif,
and riffian women hide their hennaed palms.
but now he only looks and moves on.

An American Tea Party

Politics in the USA at present? Politics or in the place of politics a space filled by hatred, an ungainly form of market hatred, a capitalist fed ignorance of the "other", a creation of the other, a perpetuation of the notion of the other, of the enemy, an insistence, a loud insistence on difference, and the negation of that loudness, a suffocation of real debate, a thorough insistence on a univocal vision of the now, of the past and the future, the restoration of all previously mellowed prejudices, a resurfacing of a new climate of the fear of the other, for the fear of the fear of the other, a departure from debate, an American insistence on gesture dictated occupation of the political space, a soap-opera type attitude towards realities and of realities, a "Friends" type of structuring of reality, of the structuring of the other, through the now and present, towards the future.

The Tea Party at present, in modern America, the negation of the multicultural model, the affirmation of hidden prejudices, the "greatest" country in the world as is declared every day, the climate of fear, for Muslims in the USA, the new realities of America, the other, the Muslim. The Palinisation of politics, the reduction of Islam to news, as a sound bite, the negation of Islam as a religion, the negation of space for the other, the open declaration of a war against the new pariah, the new Jew as not the old Jew but the old Jew as the Muslim, the Muslim as the enemy, the open lance thrown at the new enemy, the Euro-Americanization of this hatred,this attitude. Europe follows this prescription, this Tea Party redemption, this Anglo-Saxon angst, angst because there was never a real angst, an angst of the angst, fear because the idols of fear are still prescribing the attitude towards the other, the new Jew.


When Europe will open it's gas chambers again, we know now who will be there.

Bernhard: Prose

Thomas Bernhard's Prose, published in German in 1967 and available now in English comprises of sketches and short stories that, to those already familiar with his writings, will recognize the seeds of his future style and wit, which he was successfully to elaborate and develop upon. The themes which we face here, themes which he so masterfully developed later on are still in a rudimentary state but the caustic sometimes seering wit is evident. From middle aged gentlemen walking and thinking of killing themselves to hints of incest, from a critique of nearly everything of his favourite pastimes like art, theatre, and so on, Bernhard writes beautifully though not with the nonchalant ease of later novels. However, some of the stories or sketches have the same themes which he wrote in a longer form in novels such as Frost, Extinction, Cutting Timber and so on.

This new collection to his oeuvre is definitely for the Bernhard enthusiast and adds to the usually read books in English. There are some of the usual Bernhardisms and I found out some new ones, like destruction process, thought particles etc. The rants are not as long as one expects but on the whole, I enjoyed reading Prose. The stories draw from some real incidents especially those that Bernhard used to read avidly from newspapers, stories about crime, deceit and so on which allow him to develop his unique perception of all things human and further allow him to elaborate on sinister themes with that comic angle which makes it all the more sinister.

You and Me

To your reason I will give my silence and make it reasonable
To your caution I will give impulse and restless heart,
To you I give myself, to your hours palpitation,
To your heart restless tread of my feet, my lonely hands, What else?

I cannot think of an hour of repose, I have no peace,
I know no peace, I only wait and wait
and then you come and I have no peace still.
At night I try to read and I think of you, and then I smoke a lot
and cannot sleep and I have no peace or sleep.

To your measured silence I give words, spoken and unspoken alike
To your cautious reserve I give reckless hope
To your affable words I add poetry, some sad poems
To you I give myself, come take me, was that the sea?

Evening in Tangier

In Tangier, a summer evening and the sun sinks into the sea
and the sky turns a mellow red, a sad red.
In the old quarter, along the narrow lanes leading
to the eastern beach that overlooks an old fort
come the noises that life gives,
Berber men, barefeet urchins and
Riffian women with hennaed palms.
He sits in Cafe Paris, in the old quarter, smoking Kif,
and he sits and sighs, he sits and smokes,
planning to abduct the girl he loves,
the girl he thinks he loves.
He hears some drum beats in the distance,
old songs hummed outside the cafe, he feels
the din and bustle and the early melancholy of the hour.
Tough business this love is, he thinks as roguish policemen
accompany poor Riffian women to dark despair.
It is completely dark, his resolve tested, mind decided.
I will wait for her, he decides, smoke more Kif and
listen to the saddest songs.
Tall Berber men in soft hushed tones speak of
revolution and love as he sinks into his chair.
It is going to be a long night.

you should come to me

You should come and take me by surprise, he had been thinking of late, you should catch me by surprise as he allowed himself that thought, he thought, one of those strange light dark evenings, one of those wet evenings when it gets dark quite suddenly, he thought, it has been a long time since we have met and besides the uneasy summer is giving way to autumn and it has been a long time since we have met, he thought, and we could talk about this and that amid some talk of other things on a wet light dark evening. He began to see her now, as if they were standing face to face, in that certain way that they face each other, with an undecided space between each other, with distance that is neither close nor far. He would naturally want her to stand with her back to the window that opens on to the High Street, while he would face her, smoking a silent cigarette, smoking that silent way of his as she would begin to speak about the numerous things that bother her, she being a student of philosophy and he being a person at the margins of philosophy, he thought. Quite naturally, she would start her usual tirade about everything, including how it is possible for truth to remain hidden under disputatious rhetoric and how all her so called friends had drifted away without any leave taking, she would have added.
But all these were mainly his thoughts, he knew, and all that he thought was nothing more than a wish. He knew that such mercies were not granted anymore and that he would have to imagine her facing him, with her back to the window facing the High Street and himself smoking silently, and he would have to imagine her in a disputatious mood, which made her look beautiful and gave her eyes the colour of brown and brandy, he thought and imagine himself in his usual sense of apprehension, for at the moment of truth, he had never known effusiveness. He would have to, he thought, imagine her talking and looking into the distance and ignore the sometimes uncomfortable silences between each long difficult thought of hers, he thought, a gap that neither knew how to fill, or knew but didn't know if the time had come, he thought. But all this was merely an exercise in self-pity, he thought, for in reality their encounters had seldom been positive, she always in the throes of metaphysics, he thought, and he always in the grasp of speechless stupendour. Such were his thoughts as he wished these thoughts, and he could think of nothing else.

if

Mother and Son

Muslim, Muselmann, Concentration Camps

In Homo Sacer, Agamben elucidates on the issue of fact and law, wherein in under sovereign power, fact and law were considered different entities. However, bare life maintains Agamben, is subject to a state wherein this distinction is lost. The loss of this means that fact and law become interchangeable giving rise within normal public life to a state of concentration camps, which was the structure during the Nazi era in these camps but has since then lead to the evolution of camps in our public lives. We are effectively living under the aegis of life within a camp, bare life subject to a sovereign power, law suspended for ever. This has been an evolution in the scheme of things since the camps in Europe and lead to a similar situation in Bosnia and so on. Detention centres for illegal immigrants are the new concentration camps if not camps of extermination, since the immigrants are subject to adhoc laws and sovereign power and will.

Agamben borrows from Foucault's concept of Bio -politics and also makes it quite clear. Within the ambit of bio-politics, the state takes over the body and subjects it to its will, deriving from a loosening of association between fact and law. This is also a factor that eventually helps create a scene where productive and non-productive lives are differentiated and then lets in reign the medical scientists to allow the state to create a space where euthanasia can be debated, for bare life versus fact and law, camps and bio-politics merge together.

It is interesting to consider this conception of camps in our political and social midst as an aporia and also as a sign that needs recognition. In her Precarious Lives and now in her Frames of War, Judith Butler starts with her conception of precarity and precarious lives, focus sing on illegal detention in Guantanamo, and over indefinite detention and then over the distinction between useful and useless lives. Grieving over useless lives will never be an issue and hence the process of mourning and grieving must be considered in reference to grievable lives, lives that matter. Hence, Butler asserts, the American lives lost in New York are grievable under this concept and Iraqi and other Palestinian lives, lives belonging to faces that we don't know and see and hence cannot grieve over. However, Butler asserts that thses people, who are being killed by American- European sovereignty are already dead, faceless and nameless.

Butler scoffs at the idea of her brave writing and goes one step further in saying that the abuses at Abu- Ghraib in Iraq are the culmination of this process of ungrievability, useful and uselessness. She takes on Sontag's assertion that Photography is without narration and does not lead to any resolution and speaks of the frames within which such pictures of abuse and torture must be seen. That photos need an authorial signature and that this author must be considered present even outside the frame of this invisible author must never be forgotten, Butler adds the idea of the lack of mourning over these issues to her fundamental idea of precariousness of life. However, she laments that while all lives should be considered precarious, under the present frame, it is only some lives that are deemed so.

I think about the framework in which both Agamben and Butler work, basing theit thoughts on Foucault's concept of biopolitics and wonder whether the Guantanamo camps must also not be considered as concentration camps if not camps of extermination, for the individuals within this space are subject to a space that does not obey the customary distinction between fact and law. Sovereign power reigns supreme, the individuals are deemed indefinitely detainable and subject to a state of exception, which becomes the norm. Hence, the torture chambers of Abu Ghraib become a camp for this political experimentation, for not only are these people faceless, they are nameless and hence outside any legal status as either subjects or citizens or refugees. Arendt is quite clear about the rights of man in this reference though she does not ever write about bio-ploitics within the camp setting nor does Foucault make any reference to these camps.

Agamben refers to the title given to Jewish inmates of concentration camps as Muselmann, for a Muslim was a term used for these Jews in camps who were in a state of total apathy, devoid of life, will, power, face, name, useless, expendable and using Butler's terms, outside precarity, ungrievable. And now, in and outside Euro- America and under their patronage elsewhere, the Muslim not as Muslim but as Muslim, as Muselmann.

strange days

these are strange days
hot and humid days, sometimes rainy mostly warm
always long days, warm days,
sad and long days, strange and warm, long days.
the neighbourhood diva has left without warning
and another Polish grocery has opened on the high street
these are days made memorable by your absence
crazy days, days of surmise, of longing and dry lips
mostly sad always long days.

in another part of the world
young men throw stones at their oppressors
and have their brains blown apart, their blood spilled
and their mothers wail in vain, beating their chests
in vain, as the fist of time and the indifference of the world
blows a hole in the wailing chests of their mothers,
who wail in vain, as their sons are buried in soil that is burdened
with the blood and tears of wailing mothers.

meanwhile, nearer still, the resident poet walks in the
northern moors in these warm cloudless days,
long and often bare days.
we spend much of the night smoking, waiting as we turn
to previously read love poems, remembered and liked alike
and now read loudly in these mirthless days.
these are days soaked in blood and made memorable
by your absence, days of longing, hot and humid,
sometimes rainy but mostly warm, long days,
strange days.

walking along the shore

There is a certain charm in walking along the shore on a warm balmy afternoon, you said, after you have spent an agonisingly cold winter in the city, cramped between the images of the days and the attire of nights you added, there is a charm in expecting how this afternoon will culminate in vermilion fires across the sky, you said as we walked along the shore of what you described as a simple seaside charming town, bereft, you added from the images of cold days of academia and the incessant slaughter of nights across the city. One must know how to walk along the shores of such seas you pointed out, out must get into the most appropriate cadence and tune in to the most reflective fall and march of feet, while our eyes must never betray the ephemeral life of such moments, our eyes must never tell the tale of our death, you said while we walked at a certain pace along the shore, the afternoon warm and balmy, your eyes hidden by shades and my face reflected in your shades, I thought as I smoked silently, wetting my lips from time to time, looking at you. Philosophy is very boring you said, especially if you are a professional philosopher, you added but most people do not understand that you almost shouted, as children and men and women swarmed along the beach. philosophy is desperate business you added, for those who know, you said but the sky and earth never meet, you added and you looked at me I thought, as I nodded in silence. I do not like the listening type as much as I do the talking type of person you declared, as we watched a bus load of elderly tourists disembark near the beginning of the pier. One must know which beach to walk along, you sounded, as we reached the end of where we could possibly walk, one must walk desolate beaches alone you added as we started to turn back and as i began to light another cigarette, I looked at you and you were looking straight ahead, thinking of something, I thought.we must walk a bit slowly now, you said, the afternoon is still young, and the evening is yet to begin, you said. the sky and earth never meet you said again, I thought and we walked quite slowly back to where we had begun from, but there was something you said and something I didn't say, I thought.

the departure

Standing at his platform while waiting for his train, he could not avoid looking at this woman who was contemplating something, a woman in the train that had just stopped on his platform.And as he was thinking about something just then and also looking at her, and as he realized that this train was about to depart, and that he was not sure what he was thinking about while he was looking at her and was not sure whether she was actually looking at him, her train started to leave, in the sudden decided manner of trains. He could not but notice the uneasy expression in her eyes, he thought and the forlorn smile on her lips, which he thought he had seen just then, just as the train began to leave in earnest, and he refrained from taking a step or two in the direction that the train was departing, and he thought of that pale face and those uneasy eyes and the sad smile on her face, of which he seemed to be sure, as the train was now almost whizzing away and that face, and those eyes that had met his momentarily were departing too and he thought he would never see that woman again, he would never see that beautiful face again, and in that moment of agitation, as the train became a blur, he was not entirely sure whether she had smiled or not and at what but that she had an uneasy forlorn solitariness about her face, of that he was sure, as he now thought again, thinking that smoking was prohibited on the platform, thinking too of the steps he could have taken involuntarily, in the direction of the departing train, of that departing face and that woman.

It was indeed a law of life, he thought, that he would never see her again and that he would never know what she was called, of that he was sure at that moment, and that he would never see her again, never know what she thought of him, if she actually did see him, all these things are never known to us, life never discloses these things to us but what is their importance he thought, he was only sentimentalizing something trivial but he kept on looking in the direction of the departed train, at the departed face that he had now suddenly against all instincts started to forget, the face was so strikingly beautiful he thought, and the hair was so elegantly styled and her eyes had such an uneasy relation with her hair and her smile was solitary in its loneliness, he thought. Quite suddenly, he looked at the familiar shape of his hands and warmed his cold knuckles with his breath, for it was a winter evening, and he would never see her again, of that he was sure, and never know her name, of that he was sure too, and he thought these thoughts, thinking again about her melancholy face, her beautiful hair and her lonely smile, as he waited for his train, which he now realized was running late.

Poor Folk

In its form, Dostoevsky's Poor Folk is an epistolary novel, written in the form of a series of notes and letters between Makar Devushkin and Varvara Dobreselova, two people who live across each other, two poor folk. Devushkin is a copying clerk, he makes it known, very poor, nearly fifty, somewhat reclusive. Varvara is young, inexperienced, very poor and somewhat immature. Both live at the margins of society, impoverished, unhappy, poor folk. In these letters, we get to know them and all exchanges, which begin in winter and end in the autumn, reflect their daily worries. Dostoevsky, while depicting their outer states achieves a penetrating psychological analysis of their mental states and allows the reader to see not only their plight but also their reactions to that plight.

Devushkin is perhaps the forerunner of the later ideologues as it is clear that his thoughts are not yet sufficiently clear or organized for the usual sustained onslaught of thoughts and ideas that is so characteristic of Dostoevsky's more mature writing. Written before the Petrachevsky Circle days, the book was Dostoevsky's very focussed project and allowed him to gain a certain reputation vis a vis his critics notably Belinsky, who later lauded this novel. Devushkin lets Varvara know that while he is true to what he writes to her, he is also maturing his style in writing. The letters he lets her know are also an exercise in stylistics.

Devushkin and Varvara are extremely poor; any union between the two is always unlikely. They do have soft spots for each other but how can these poor folk actually dream together? Under constant threat of eviction, barely managing to meet ends, romance does look very superfluous here. Devushkin is at lengths to examine his thoughts, his thoughts are an answer, as Bakhtin analyses, in response to the thoughts of others. In a penetrating essay on this novel, Bakhtin examines the ground state, as it were, of Devushkin's more philosophical thinking. Devushkin is not a thinker, at least not yet, though he attempts to answer those questions that have not been asked yet, those assumptions which seem paranoid to the reader have been though through by Devushkin, but not sufficiently through. In comparison to the later protagonists, Devushkin is in the process of analyzing and coming forth with his answers, which Ivan Karamazov or Stavrogin are so emphatically clear about. Devushkin is also the first of a series of underground men, men who make their ideologies known in his other works.

Poor Folk is definitely unlike Dostoevsky's later works in that there is a palpable melancholy at work here; comedy and farce are not exaggerated, rhetoric is evident, so is the usual exhortation but the sadness, the sadness of poor folk.The letters are sometimes heart rending and usually very emotive. Towards the end, when Varvara decides to leave, decides to marry against her wishes, decides to leave the neighbourhood, to save herself and save herself from shame, Devushkin's last letter pleads her to reconsider her decision, to change her mind. However, the last sentences reflect that he is not too sure, has my style in writing improved he asks her, he is not sure. Devushkin, while not entirely the ridiculous man is clearly unimportant. In the bigger scheme of things, Devushkin just disappears. We also do not know whether Dobreselova found happiness.

cold and bitter

New year's eve was cold and bitter, it was wet and cold and so we decided to stay indoors, we decided to talk to each other and while away the few hours, instead of going out. You have stopped celebrating the new year, you said and I have stopped marking it, I thought, so we decided to while away some hours, amongst some talk of this and that, amongst some talk of you and perhaps some of me. You said that it was absurd to celebrate the new year, everything is still the same, all this revelry gets on my nerves, you said, it is absurd you repeated again, there is no point, it stays the same. Basically this life, you said, is senseless. We do pointless things and we know we do things pointlessly, you said and yet everyone continues to do and say pointless things, like now, you added, pointless. However, this celebration revelry is nonsense, waiting to jump up and down, waiting to shout at some hour when we know there is nothing to shout and jump about, everything is still the same, you said. I did not say anything, I continued to watch you as you spoke, I kept on looking at you, while you were so animated, pointing at invisible people and things, sometimes pointing at the window, outside, where it was so cold, bitterly cold and wet, I thought.

This taking stock of the old year drives me crazy, you said, this obsession with what we have done in the year gone by when we have done absolutely nothing, you said. This obsession with years, with dates is just crazy you said, nothing has changed. You were playing with the flames of some candles that I had lit, on the mantelpiece, while you were talking, I saw you were not aware of that, mildly singeing your fingers, as you looked here and there. I have done absolutely nothing this last year, you said, and I don't care, you added. You were now looking out of the window, at the High Street, people were rushing home and some were rushing towards the square. People are always going or coming from place to place, that is what happens always you said, nothing else. I did not contradict you, I kept on looking at you, the candle flames were throwing irregular shadows on the wall, near the window and I thought again how cold it was outside, so bitterly cold and wet, I thought.

To even talk about these things is a waste of time, you observed after some time. Everything will go on as it has before, we are merely observing the passing of some hours. Morning always makes me feel ashamed of what I say or even think about, you said. I nodded, as I looked at you, at how beautiful you looked, now that you had murdered the candles and extinguished the flames. Let's talk of something else, you said, thinking about life is such nonsense, everything is so senseless you added. I could not entirely disagree with what you said, I thought, and besides, the hours were passing by, and soon it would be time for you to go. I looked at you again, how listlessly beautiful you were looking, and I looked at the window again and was reminded of the outside, how bitterly cold and wet it was, I thought. And by now, I saw, it had started to snow.

Foma Fomich Opiskin

In Foma Fomich Opiskin we have the grand tyrant, master of the universe, king and audience rolled into one, king in the country of the blind. Dostoevsky's master stroke in The Village of Stepanchikovo sees Foma Fomich tyrannize the household that has given him refuge; from a jester, a court fool to master of his master, Foma Fomich's decree is law. Foma Fomich is a virtual god, Colonel Rostanev must do as he is told. If anything displeases Foma Fomich, he stops eating, punishes the servants and orders everyone around. What have I done to deserve this Foma, asks Rostanev; please Foma, please! The three days that we spend at Stepanchikovo with our narrator are filled with the most outrageous antics possible. It is bedlam but high bedlam. One is reminded of Gogol and those who are aware of the influence of the latter on Dostoevsky identify this Gogolian universe of comedy, farce, melodrama, parody and an insane display of nonsense from everyone in the Rostanev household.

Foma Fomich, a take clearly on Gogol's Akaky Akakevich, is what Bakhtin, in what I feel is the best book of literary criticism possible, Problem of Dostoevsky's Poetics, calls the carnival king. Everything being carnival, mennipean satire and Gogolesque farce, Foma Fomich starts annoying us before we have met him. We are like the narrator: our sensitivities are hurt but by the time the action closes, everyone including the reader feels a kind of tiresome revulsion at the goings on at Stepanchikovo though it cannot be otherwise. This world should be exactly like it is, tears and tragedy and bizarre comedy.

Stepanchikovo, like Poor Folk is from Dostoevsky's pre-Petrashevsky Circle days and we did not yet have the characters from his four famous works. Clearly these are not the days of the grand Inquisitor, these are the days of the carnival king. In Foma Fomich, Dostoevsky has numerous digs at Gogol, who he admired a lot but who he felt represented a certain kind of Slavic representation and beheld him as being responsible for a narrative in the Russian novel that Dostoevsky clearly despised. Foma Fomich, while not entirely Gogol is very nearly Gogol and yet Dostoevsky raise certain issues of social justice and sexual inequality. It can also be read as a piece of pure drama which the critics maintain it was originally intended to be. Foma Fomich is clearly not impressed with his valet's name: Vidoplyasov must find a new name, Falalei the servant must not behave like a villager and the other servant must learn French!

Rostanev is now considered to be first example of the ridiculous man, in comparison to say Turgenev's concept of the superfluous man. Some early Dostoevsky critics consider Rostanev to be a beautiful individual, a hero. However, Foma Fomich, who is the object of this post is a representation of a person who lacks awareness and is not able to understand the disparity between what he actually is and what he believes he is.In this world turned upside down, we retreat like the narrator and watch the action unfold at a safe distance. However, this mad world would not be worth visiting if the court was not held by Foma Fomich.

Unforgivable

I was thinking about the lovesickness of which we spoke last time in the fervent echo or the melancholy wake of the Song of Songs, the Poem of Poems, as if the poetical of the poetical, of all declaration of love had to do with this sickness of the other, if not of the foreigner in me, of another in me, outside of me, of the other who angers me and puts me out of myself, the other who puts me out of myself in me, of the other always both more ancient and more to come than me, whom I thus mourn as a mourning of me, as if I carried with me the mourning of me carried by the other, there where would thus begin an ageless hospitality, or of a hospitality of all ages, a hospitality which could only survive itself before its time, and of which the poem would say, in sum, from one to the other: I love you, I am sick of love from you, sick of love for you, for while wholly wanting, with all my desire, to die before you so that I don't see you die, for you know that one of us will see the other die, well then, while wholly wanting, with all my hopeless desire, to die first, I would also want to survive you, to have at least the time to be there to console you at the time of my death, to assist you so that you would not be alone at the time of my death: I would want to survive you just enough to help you, the time it will take, to bear my death." I love you" would thus signify this impossible grammar, a grammar that one can find at once tragic and comic, as time itself: I would want to survive you at my death, to survive me in you, to guard in me your mourning of me, etc. And this "I love you, and therefore I guard you/keep you in surviving you" is unforgivable, therefore I ask you for forgiveness there where it is possible to ask for and to grant forgiveness, there where only, you recall, it is unforgivable.

from Hospitality: Acts of Religion, Derrida

Kesz az egesz