Old Email Archive

digest 1997-04-16 #001


11:25 PM 4/15/97 -0700
From: "Society for Literature & Science" 

Daily SLS Email Digest
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Date: 15 Apr 1997 06:18:44 -0700
From: Pierre Joris 
Subject: Re: Literature and Science? (x litsci-l@HUMnet.UCLA.EDU)
maybe useful to also remember the second meaning of the French word
"th�orie":
from Greek "the™ria:" meaning procession. It was the
deputation send by
a town to a solemn feast or a great temple. A solemn procession. By
extension, this century: A group of persons walking one behind the
other, single-file, as soldiers, trucks, etc.
Pierre
amato@charlie.cns.iit.edu wrote:
>
> oh i should say i guess that i don't "hate"
"theory" at all... i remain
> convinced in fact of the necessity for theorizing one's claims... i
*do*
> often fret over the way certain sorts of theories (and theorizing)
gain
> ascendancy... just went through this the other day in fact, when a
> colleague told me that they thought so & so's way of handling
things was
> not "properly" theoretical... this is usually a sure sign
that a specific
> discursive orientation is being privileged over others... and as a
poet, i
> feel this pinch at times from more celebrated theories of literary
> production (pleez don't take this as an anti-theoretical claim!)...
but as
> a poet, i feel too the pinch of competing poetries and poetics as
well!...
>
> as i've tried to suggest in these regions, there are more options
'out
> there' than are usually allowed for, and one way to ascertain same
is
> simply to change one's material orientation---have a look at what's
going
> on in other parts of the (publishing) world... of course it might
be
> utopian to imagine that all theories and all theorizing will be
given equal
> 'voice'---same could be said to all poetries and all poetics... but
this is
> no reason not to try to be open to same, and to offer one's claims
with
> corresponding awareness...
>
> best,
>
> joe
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pierre joris   6 madison place   albany ny 12202
tel/fax (518) 426 0433 email:joris@cnsunix.albany.edu
http://www.albany.edu/~joris/
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Everything that allows men to become rooted, through
values or sentiments, in _one_ time, in _one_ history, in
_one_ language, is the principle of alienation which
constitutes man as privileged in so far as he is what he is,
[...] imprisoning him in contentment with his own reality
and encouraging him to offer it as an example or impose
it as a conquering assertion. -- Maurice Blanchot
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