tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20433842.post4426863960551172749..comments2024-03-07T12:57:35.296-05:00Comments on Varieties of Unreligious Experience: The TouristConrad H. Rothhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01916542057749474124noreply@blogger.comBlogger30125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20433842.post-50332381053153746072014-01-28T19:23:57.799-05:002014-01-28T19:23:57.799-05:00Fantasy entirely unmoored from reality would not b...Fantasy entirely unmoored from reality would not be fantasy at all, but rubbish.<br /><br />"Anyone inheriting the fantastic device of human language can say the green sun. Many can then imagine or picture it. But that is not enough -- though it may already be a more potent thing than many a 'thumbnail sketch' or 'transcript of life' that receives literary praise.<br /><br />"To make a Secondary World inside which the green sun will be credible, commanding Secondary Belief, will probably require labour and thought, and will certainly demand a special skill, a kind of elvish craft. Few attempt such difficult tasks. But when they are attempted and in any degree accomplished then we have a rare achievement of Art: indeed narrative art, story-making in its primary and most potent mode."<br /><br />—Tolkien, "On Fairy-Stories"John Cowanhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11452247999156925669noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20433842.post-18894079321003428892012-02-05T15:18:18.240-05:002012-02-05T15:18:18.240-05:00Thanks for this olla podrida of criticism and coun...Thanks for this olla podrida of criticism and counter-sneers. We can immediately separate out a few valueless complaints:<br /><br />First, "if you happen to have written yourself a few novels of a greater quality than Eco"<br /><br />Of course I have not. My sole teenage attempt at writing a novel was laughable and far worse than anything Eco has ever published. But I never had the temerity to send it to a press. Nonetheless, my own lack of a better novel in no way disqualifies me from passing judgement on others' efforts, a broader point which--unless you want to reject 99% of criticism in all fields of human endeavour--you will be forced to agree with.<br /><br />Second, "did you know them before reading the novels, or did you research them afterwards?"<br /><br />In all honesty and humility, I knew them beforehand, at least, the ones I pick up on here. No doubt there are many references I did not get; I am not a mediaevalist, for one thing. Although I have read Otto of Freising, etc.<br /><br />But it is beside the point: I'm sure there are a great many novels full of references unknown to me, so the fact that I got these ones is entirely irrelevant, and not germane to the criticism. (That is, it would still have applied if I had had to look them up.) My complaint was with Eco's creative use of erudition, not the fact of its existence on the page.<br /><br />Now,<br /><br />"I take it you generally prefer fantasy over history?"<br /><br />I am not hugely interested in the notion of fantasy. I would prefer to think about creativity. And I prefer fictional works set in the 'real' past to engage with history more creatively, and, dare I say it, more idiosyncratically. I prefer them to use historical facts to articulate creative ideas or themes, rather than relying on them simply because they happen to be historical.<br /><br />"So instead of the... would you have enjoyed it more?"<br /><br />Only if these inventions were achieved with meaning and beauty. Fantasy entirely unmoored from reality (insofar as it ever cane be) does not interest me. I have no taste at all for the genre known as 'fantasy', in the narrow sense.<br /><br />"Or perhaps you generally dislike historical novels?"<br /><br />Yes, but only as an empirical observation, not a matter of principle. See my earlier comment on this thread: "I agree that the historical novel is difficult to pull off, but I don't think there is an intrinsic impossibility. Flaubert's Salammbo is terrific, or more recently Pynchon's Mason and Dixon and Barth's Sot-Weed Factor did a good job of the erudite historical novel. (I exclude as more ambiguous the modern semi-historical novels like DeLillo's Underworld.)"<br /><br />"what a fine and subtle erudite you must think you are"<br /><br />Reasonably so, but feel free to scoff away from your anonymity.Conrad H. Rothhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01916542057749474124noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20433842.post-16396465774797924212012-02-01T16:08:30.392-05:002012-02-01T16:08:30.392-05:00Wow what a fine and subtle erudite you must think ...Wow what a fine and subtle erudite you must think you are, sir, to claim you know everything about Eco's references and that you even find them cheap! But, one question, did you know them before reading the novels, or did you research them afterwards? ;) <br />So, from your complaints on Eco's lack of original ideas and characters, I take it you generally prefer fantasy over history? So instead of the blemmyaes, panotti, skiapodes and so on, he should have invented monstruous beings of his own and placed them in a novel set in the Middle Ages, and it would've been better? Or, perhaps, if Prester John would've been King *insertacooloriginalnamehere* and he lived in, say, a floating bathtub above the Pacific, all placed in a medieval context, would you have enjoyed it more? (there's no fancy symbol of the floating bathtub, so no need to go research it) Or perhaps you generally dislike historical novels? How do think a contemporary novel with historical themes should be written then? <br />I'm looking forward to hearing your valuable and original opinion about it! (and if you happen to have written yourself a few novels of a greater quality than Eco, as an example of how you believe literature should be written, I'd be more than curious to read them)Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20433842.post-1210707014031847272008-06-11T09:43:00.000-04:002008-06-11T09:43:00.000-04:00I second Mr. Waggish's suggestion: Guy Davenport s...I second Mr. Waggish's suggestion: Guy Davenport strives to wear deep learning lightly, and although I'm not quite convinced, neither have I ever been able to work out the source of my skepticism. If you like Davenport's fiction, you'll win; if you don't and feel compelled to explain why, I'll win.<BR/><BR/>Although I appreciate Eco as an unusually jovial public intellectual, I could never force myself through more than a chapter or two of his novels. Credentials disestablished, I must say your description of the latest reminds me most of Walter Pater's edutainments. Of course Pater didn't work very hard to hide his schoolmasterly side, and that may in the end make his rambling "You Are There" serials a bit better as literature.<BR/><BR/>(As so often happens these days, a very tardy addition. My apologies.)Ray Davishttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15998321016748928251noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20433842.post-89970642647469088302008-06-08T22:10:00.000-04:002008-06-08T22:10:00.000-04:00Sid, no need of course to apologise for your many ...Sid, no need of course to apologise for your many very kind comments!<BR/><BR/>Chris, yes of course! For me the classic example of completely un-erudite, in fact hermetic (modern) literature is late Beckett: but I don't need to say this, because I'm happy to make the more general point that literature succeeds and fails on its own terms, with or without the complement of erudition. The majority of fiction I appreciate is <EM>not</EM> erudite, or only contingently so: but rather essentially imaginative.Conrad H. Rothhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01916542057749474124noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20433842.post-43933070604300666652008-06-08T22:04:00.000-04:002008-06-08T22:04:00.000-04:00And so I'm wondering, Conrad - what about the stu...And so I'm wondering, Conrad - what about the stuff that's not erudite -- that just seems void of specific references to the literature that preceded it.<BR/><BR/><BR/>Has anything like that -- ever won your esteem?chris millerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09575033275184403015noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20433842.post-35408110619712602242008-06-08T12:22:00.000-04:002008-06-08T12:22:00.000-04:00Conrad, I apologize for the number of times I have...Conrad, I apologize for the number of times I have described you solely as 'erudite,' which you are, because you obviously are also imaginative and very good at the game. Best regards.Sid Leavitthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06951643341534170183noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20433842.post-58529984221659051532008-06-04T18:24:00.000-04:002008-06-04T18:24:00.000-04:00I hate detective stories as a rule but loved this ...I hate detective stories as a rule but loved this one. I am not sure it is best consumed young, one should savour it for a time when one has seen more of life!Roberthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00533678970029159873noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20433842.post-36843682623736994212008-06-04T06:36:00.000-04:002008-06-04T06:36:00.000-04:00On Darconville, see my next post. On Sylvie and Br...On <EM>Darconville</EM>, see my next post. On <EM>Sylvie and Bruno</EM>, my opinions have been laid out at length, starting <A HREF="http://vunex.blogspot.com/2006/01/sylvie-and-bruno.html" REL="nofollow">here</A>. I appreciate that I am the only person in the known universe to prefer it to <EM>Alice</EM>, but I suppose we all have our foibles. Perhaps I have a taste for the grotesque; <EM>Sylvie</EM> may be horrible, but it is anything but boring.Conrad H. Rothhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01916542057749474124noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20433842.post-33568286526569955902008-06-03T23:40:00.000-04:002008-06-03T23:40:00.000-04:00I have to agree with your assessment of Baudolino,...I have to agree with your assessment of <I>Baudolino</I>, Conrad. Following as it did the disappointments of <I>The Island of the Day Before</I>, it rather soured my hopes for any future fiction that I might love as much as his first two. It seemed to me that he'd run out of actual stories to tell, and was putting on an empty performance.<BR/><BR/>It's been a number of years since I've reread <I>Rose</I> or <I>Pendulum</I>, and perhaps it's time to find out if they're as appealing to my current tastes as they were to those of my larval self.<BR/><BR/>Regarding William Weaver: his translations are not flashy, but I've always felt that they captured something essential to the Italianness of the work, whether Eco or Calvino. This may just be romantic fancy, though, as I do not, in fact, read Italian.<BR/><BR/>Is <I>Darconville's Cat</I> really worth reading? I picked up a copy a few years back, but lost interest not far in. I happened across it while shuffling my shelves recently, and contemplated giving it another try.<BR/><BR/>But, my dear Mr. Roth...<I>Silvie and Bruno</I> as an exemplar of erudite literature? I am aghast. It's a soppy, maundery, plotless mass of cheerless fairy fantasy larded with thoroughly execrable poetry and tedious moralism. (And I do write this as a lover of Carroll). There is some shallow play of ideas, but it utterly lacks the clever charm of <I>Alice</I> or the wit of the <I>Snark</I>. In truth, its only ray of light is the song of the mad gardener, a thin thread to hold one for the hundreds of painful pages.<BR/><BR/>raminagrobis: For historical novels, you might try Lindsay Davis's Falco mysteries. The period details are well-mobilized in support of the story and provide some mild edification for the reader without ending up as an novel that is erudite only for the sake of erudition.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20433842.post-16523048570408655162008-06-03T12:57:00.000-04:002008-06-03T12:57:00.000-04:00I'd be interested in knowing what you think of Fou...I'd be interested in knowing what you think of Foucault's Pendulum... it had quite an effect on me as well.goofyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14760721504519661112noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20433842.post-58544971256768881902008-06-02T20:22:00.000-04:002008-06-02T20:22:00.000-04:00"The book's division into sections based on the se..."The book's division into sections based on the sephiroth is possibly copied from Wilson's and Shea's earlier occult conspiracy novel "Illuminatus.""<BR/><BR/>Yes, I wondered about that at the time as well.Conrad H. Rothhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01916542057749474124noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20433842.post-61837774560883615702008-06-02T18:02:00.000-04:002008-06-02T18:02:00.000-04:00I found "Name of the Rose" a good story, and found...I found "Name of the Rose" a good story, and found its erudition not too hard to figure out. For example, the murder by poison on the pages' corners is derived from the story of the composition of the Chinese pornographic novel Chin Ping Mei. "Foucault's Pendulum" is not so tightly written. It is evident that Eco has read several of Dame Frances Yates's books. Either Eco or his translator has got the names of several of the degrees of the A.A.S.R. slightly wrong. The book's division into sections based on the sephiroth is possibly copied from Wilson's and Shea's earlier occult conspiracy novel "Illuminatus." <BR/><BR/>My impression is that Eco's erudition is, as the Mississippi river is said to be, broad but shallow.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20433842.post-74893877201285892622008-06-02T16:12:00.000-04:002008-06-02T16:12:00.000-04:00Ashley: "John Crowley"Yes, Mr. Waggish once recomm...Ashley: "John Crowley"<BR/><BR/>Yes, Mr. Waggish once recommended <EM>Little, Big</EM> on these pages in response to <EM>Sylvie and Bruno</EM>. I bought it for my wife's birthday, but she didn't much care for it. I haven't looked at it myself. Raminagrobis was not too flattering about <EM>Aegypt</EM>, either.<BR/><BR/>LH: "Surely you don't expect novelists to do original research!"<BR/><BR/>Very droll.Conrad H. Rothhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01916542057749474124noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20433842.post-45824435251547048132008-06-02T13:40:00.000-04:002008-06-02T13:40:00.000-04:00though the learning is second-handSurely you don't...<I>though the learning is second-hand</I><BR/><BR/>Surely you don't expect novelists to do original research! (Aside from the diversion of energy, could they be expected to be any good at it?)Languagehathttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13285708503881129380noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20433842.post-9392937454036395002008-06-01T19:13:00.000-04:002008-06-01T19:13:00.000-04:00Thank you for the review, Conrad. I read the firs...Thank you for the review, Conrad. I read the first two Eco books about the same time you did, then found myself rather disappointed with The Island of the Day Before and sort of gave up. I guess I'll stay the course. I'm still rather fond of Kant and the Platypus, though, and pick at it every so often (like a dessert, not like a scab). I liked aspects of his book on universal languages, too, but agree with you that it seems a bit phoned in.<BR/><BR/>It's interesting that you picked out The Sotweed Factor for special mention. It would seem to be an example of what Eco could have done in Baudolino but did not manage to pull off -- combine historical detail with a considerable bit of pastiche and a postmodern sensibility.<BR/><BR/>Do you mind if I throw out another name for this discussion? John Crowley uses erudition -- and a good bit of the Frances Yates material -- in his books, but it generally serves his narrative, rather than runs away with it. He is also rather up front in his blogging about not being much of an expert, but rather a bit of a pirate, when it comes to using erudition.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20433842.post-88512002442978316542008-06-01T18:37:00.000-04:002008-06-01T18:37:00.000-04:00Andrew: Good to know I am probably safe with that ...Andrew: Good to know I am probably safe with that one!<BR/><BR/>Waggish: thanks. I actually don't have a problem with later Barth or Coover, having enjoyed both <EM>Tidewater Tales</EM> (well, parts of it at least) and <EM>The Public Burning</EM>.<BR/><BR/>As for your list, I don't know the Latins except Borges. I don't know Davenport either. I like Calasso, but not for his erudition, any more than, say, Beckett. The same goes for the OuLiPo (though I haven't read Roubaud), whose strengths have always been experimental and imaginative rather than learned. I suppose the obvious Queneau novel for erudition is <EM>Children of Clay</EM>, though the learning is second-hand in that. (His source, Brunet, was pretty impressive though.) As for Burton, Humboldt, Vico and Bruno--well, they weren't novelists, or even fictionists, at least not in the traditional sense, as much of what all four writers produced was, admittedly, pure fiction.<BR/><BR/>I didn't intend my original small list to be in any way exhaustive. Perhaps the golden age of erudite literature in England was the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries--I think of Carroll (<EM>Sylvie and Bruno</EM>), Robert Southey (<EM>The Doctor</EM>), Thomas Amory (<EM>John Buncle</EM>), and other novels barely straining to keep the narrative in line with the magnificent and idiosyncratic learning.Conrad H. Rothhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01916542057749474124noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20433842.post-80618721623978542512008-06-01T18:22:00.000-04:002008-06-01T18:22:00.000-04:00I haven't read Baudolino, but my past experiences ...I haven't read Baudolino, but my past experiences with Eco certainly coincide with your expressed viewpoint here. What you call tourism I think of as theory, the inclination of the author to avoid inhabiting his material and instead treating it from a critical viewpoint, something deadly to a novel (see also: post-Sot Weed John Barth, Robert Coover).<BR/><BR/>As for other constellations of erudition, the Latin American boom seems prominent: Cabrera Infante, Lezama Lima, Lins, Fuentes, Cortazar, and obviously Borges. Let me also defend Borges' erudition: anyone who can spin out cogent fantasias involving Lull, Swedenborg, Dante, Akutagawa, Meyrink, Dunne, Berkeley, &c. earns my genuflection. The world could use more dilettantes of his caliber; Guy Davenport is the only other one that strikes me, though some would also claim Calasso. Yes, Borges and Bioy Casares and Ocampo were asses, but we wouldn't have any writers left if that were a criterion for exclusion.<BR/><BR/>The Oulipo writers also qualify, I would say: Mathews, Queneau, Roubaud and Perec more than Calvino.<BR/><BR/>Other random names that occur to me are Robert Burton, Gunter Grass at his best, Robert Musil, Hans Blumenberg, W. Humboldt, Vico himself, and perhaps Giordano Bruno. In poetry, I think of David Jones, Yeats, and Geoffrey Hill.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20433842.post-51369937878219371722008-06-01T11:16:00.000-04:002008-06-01T11:16:00.000-04:00Having recently read Foucault's Pendulum, I would ...Having recently read <I>Foucault's Pendulum</I>, I would say it escapes the bulk of your criticisms, simply because it is not a historical novel in the vein of <I>The Name of the Rose</I> or <I>Baudolino</I>. <BR/><BR/><I>Pendulum</I> is less concerned with erudition than its dangers. However, like the first edition of <I>Werther</I>, the cautionary aspect doesn't come across as clearly as it could, although perhaps this is intentional.<BR/><BR/>And from your analysis, it seems as though Eco has failed to heed his own cautionary tale...anyway, I don't think you would be too traumatized by rereading it!Andrew W.https://www.blogger.com/profile/00071098030747838202noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20433842.post-77553809702960207572008-06-01T11:00:00.000-04:002008-06-01T11:00:00.000-04:00Steven, thanks. #2 is very true, a couple of years...Steven, thanks. #2 is very true, a couple of years ago I completely ruined Henry Miller for myself.<BR/><BR/>R: I agree that the historical novel is difficult to pull off, but I don't think there is an intrinsic impossibility. Flaubert's <EM>Salammbo</EM> is terrific, or more recently Pynchon's <EM>Mason and Dixon</EM> and Barth's <EM>Sot-Weed Factor</EM> did a good job of the erudite historical novel. (I exclude as more ambiguous the modern semi-historical novels like DeLillo's <EM>Underworld</EM>.)Conrad H. Rothhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01916542057749474124noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20433842.post-23952107915520145492008-06-01T10:14:00.000-04:002008-06-01T10:14:00.000-04:00Isn’t the complaint here not so much to do with er...Isn’t the complaint here not so much to do with erudition but specifically to do with the nature of the historical novel? All historical novels are constructed on a framework of erudition, and rely on the careful deployment of <I>significant details</I> intended either to instruct the reader, or to provoke the pleasure of recognition based on shared knowledge. I realize your complaint is that Eco does not do this very well – but I wonder if you can think of any historical novels where it is done well. I’m struggling to think of any myself. Perhaps it’s a problem with the genre itself: I think it’s basically impossible for the historical novel to succeed on artistic terms precisely because it relies on erudition at the expense of imagination.Raminagrobishttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12008850757226541475noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20433842.post-38879156137799236272008-06-01T06:00:00.000-04:002008-06-01T06:00:00.000-04:001. Lovely post... with useful applications in othe...1. Lovely post... with useful applications in other arenas of argument.<BR/><BR/>2. Never re-read a book, as a (wo)man, you loved as a whelp(tress)...A. Ominoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13807400943709124236noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20433842.post-18262116846332306322008-05-31T14:45:00.000-04:002008-05-31T14:45:00.000-04:00Persephone: Borges? I don't know. Great fantasist,...Persephone: Borges? I don't know. Great fantasist, clearly, and anyone who likes Thomas Browne and Thomas de Quincey has got to be worth taking seriously. I'm not sure how erudite he was, and haven't read Bioy Cesares. <EM>Labyrinths</EM> does have a well-deserved place on my shelf, though I didn't much care for his <EM>Book of Imaginary Creatures</EM>.<BR/><BR/>John: Well, I picked Yaguello not because it's great, but because it's light and accessible, and did what Eco did more concisely and with less pretension. Yaguello also has juicy appendices. More sophisticated books would be James Knowlson's <EM>Universal Language Schemes</EM>, to which Eco is heavily indebted, and Couturat's <EM>Histoire de la langue universelle</EM>. But I don't think anyone's written a <EM>masterpiece</EM> on the subject; well, not yet.<BR/><BR/>Aaron and LH: I have to admit, I do feel the same about Stoppard. The Webster joke was pure Eco, I winced. But then, I am biased against drama, and especially modern drama, so perhaps my assessment of Stoppard is not entirely fair.Conrad H. Rothhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01916542057749474124noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20433842.post-82460801979871591912008-05-31T13:27:00.000-04:002008-05-31T13:27:00.000-04:00Anti-refinement is closer to the truth: an inabili...Anti-refinement is closer to the truth: an inability to disentangle, on the spot, my relief in knowing that John Webster wrote remarkably bloody plays from the actual humor in the joke. Even from this distance I'm not quite sure how much of the pleasure I take in the Webster joke is self-congratulation. <BR/><BR/>Which is not to say that comedy must be vulgar, although vulgar is fine; Evelyn Waugh, for instance, provides the wit without the status-seeking.Aaron Haspelhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00527492171280066397noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20433842.post-48356272740814081562008-05-31T11:38:00.000-04:002008-05-31T11:38:00.000-04:00An excellent post, and now I am afeared to reread ...An excellent post, and now I am afeared to reread <I>The Name of the Rose</I>. But I must entirely disagree with Aaron about Stoppard, who is one of the great playwrights of our time and has genuine erudition to boot. If you are too refined to laugh at his jokes, you may be too refined for comedy.Languagehathttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13285708503881129380noreply@blogger.com