From odos.fanourios at gmail.com  Mon Apr 28 06:36:52 2008
From: odos.fanourios at gmail.com (James Gifford)
Date: Mon, 28 Apr 2008 07:36:52 -0600
Subject: [ilds] [ILDS] CFP for MSA X in Nashville - 13-16 Nov 2008
In-Reply-To: <481532FD.1090401@gmail.com>
References: <481532FD.1090401@gmail.com>
Message-ID: <4815D2F4.5030508@gmail.com>

Hello all,

I should have added, this would be in the Modernist Studies 
Association's conference in Nashville, 13-16 November 2008.  We had a 
number of Durrell scholars turn out last year for a seminar, which I 
think was a great success, and I'd enjoy seeing more again this year. 
If you're interested in coming but are not interested in this panel, 
take a look at some of the others:

http://www.vanderbilt.edu/msax/CFPs_Participants.html

The seminars will be posted soon too, and they are on a first come first 
served basis for registrants.

Best,
James

James Gifford wrote:
> "Networks of Late Modernism"
> 
> Despite attempts to revisit our critical canons, the thirties remain the 
> Auden Generation, as charted by Bergonzi, Hynes, and Cunningham. Yet, 
> other groups and other movements have been repeatedly proposed to 
> broaden this perspective, ranging from the notion of Late Modernism, the 
> New Apocalypse, the Neo-Romantics, and so forth.  This panel seeks to 
> contextualize such debates through the literary and artistic networks of 
> the 1930s and the decade after the war, including how they developed 
> both from and beside their high modernist forebears.  Proposals are 
> particularly welcome on the artists whose careers were launched on the 
> cusp of the war or in its aftermath, in many cases protracting their 
> development or stifling recognition of vital and active international 
> movements.
> 
> Potential topics might include but are not limited to
> 
> - poets of the New Apocalypse
> - English Surrealism & the London Exhibition
> - Late Modernism
> - The Freedom Press & Anarchist networks
> - Theatre of the Absurd
> - The Villa Seurat, Circle, and the Black Mountain poets
> - Scandinavian Modernisms
> - Mediterranean Modernisms
> - the Cairo Poets of WWII (and North Africa)
> - "Where are the War Poets?": WWII
> - the Scottish Renaissance
> - Poetry London and Fitrovia
> - the Freedom Defence Committee
> 
> Global, international, or inter-cultural approaches to artistic networks 
> are particularly encouraged, although networks or movements centred on 
> individuals, specific locations, and events are also welcome.
> 
> Please send a short abstract (maximum one page, double spaced) and brief 
> scholarly biography (2-3 sentences) to James Gifford (gifford at uvic.ca) 
> by 5 May 2008.
> 

From bredwine1968 at earthlink.net  Mon Apr 28 09:32:14 2008
From: bredwine1968 at earthlink.net (Bruce Redwine)
Date: Mon, 28 Apr 2008 09:32:14 -0700 (GMT-07:00)
Subject: [ilds] Genesis of the Quartet
Message-ID: <26715105.1209400334803.JavaMail.root@elwamui-norfolk.atl.sa.earthlink.net>

No need to wait for the next issue of Deus Loci.  Re from 1 to 4, Michael Haag in Alexandria:  City of Memory (London & Cairo, 2004) gives his proof of how Durrell came to conceive the Quartet (pp. 320ff).  Durrell would later claim that he had initially "planned four books," but "this was untrue," as Haag states and demonstrates (p. 326).  QED.  Claude Vincendon's intervention was both fortuitous and crucial -- and another great story, as Haag tells it, in a book full of great stories.


Bruce

-----Original Message-----
>From: Bruce Redwine <bredwine1968 at earthlink.net>
>Sent: Apr 27, 2008 12:02 PM
>To: ilds at lists.uvic.ca
>Subject: Ambron Villa and Quartet
>
>Re the genesis of the Quartet, from single novel to tetralogy, Michael Haag has pretty much solved that problem in great detail, at least to my satisfaction, if not to others.  Haag delivered his argument at the last meeting of OMG meeting in Victoria, 2006.  That talk should appear as an essay in a forthcoming issue of Deus Loci, although I have no idea when that will be.  Since my memory about such things is rather faulty, I shall not attempt to summarize Haag's argument, except to provide the following tidbit, which I hope is accurate enough.  Durrell originally conceived of Justine as a single novel, but after he met and hooked up with Claude Vincendon on Cyprus, she, a native Alexandrian, proved him with enough new material to expand one novel into four.  So, you might say, the "heightened emotional involvement of the reader" parallels the same involvement of the author as he discovers himself or, at least, his excitement over the discovery of a long, unfolding project.
>
>
>Bruce
>
>-----Original Message-----
>>From: PETER BALDWIN <delospeter at hotmail.com>
>>Sent: Apr 27, 2008 9:45 AM
>>To: Bruce Redwine <bredwine1968 at earthlink.net>, Durrell list <ilds at lists.uvic.ca>
>>Subject: Re: [ilds] One-Volume Alexandria Quartet
>>
>>
>>The single volume ed of the Q which Fabers put out in 1986 as a reprint had Gentleman's watercolour of D's writing Tower at the Villa Ambron on the cover. Has the villa now been demolished?
>> 
>>I am trying to work out the chronology of Justine's ceasing to be the single novel originally planned and becoming the first of the Quartet because to read J as a single stand - alone novel published without the anticipation of the next three heightens, I think, the readers emotional engagement
>> 
>>I can't find a date in Brewster Chamberlin's Chronology for the delivery of the ts. to fabers, nor indeed a date for publication
>> 
>>In D - M Letters we have D in c1/56 [ p 279 ] making no ref to a series tho by late '57 he envisages 'three more cuttings'


From slighcl at wfu.edu  Mon Apr 28 11:47:48 2008
From: slighcl at wfu.edu (slighcl)
Date: Mon, 28 Apr 2008 14:47:48 -0400
Subject: [ilds] Genesis of the Quartet
In-Reply-To: <26715105.1209400334803.JavaMail.root@elwamui-norfolk.atl.sa.earthlink.net>
References: <26715105.1209400334803.JavaMail.root@elwamui-norfolk.atl.sa.earthlink.net>
Message-ID: <48161BD4.90402@wfu.edu>

On 4/28/2008 12:32 PM, Bruce Redwine wrote:
> No need to wait for the next issue of Deus Loci.  Re from 1 to 4, Michael Haag in Alexandria:  City of Memory (London & Cairo, 2004) gives his proof of how Durrell came to conceive the Quartet (pp. 320ff).  Durrell would later claim that he had initially "planned four books," but "this was untrue," as Haag states and demonstrates (p. 326).  
I agree with Michael's case as set forth in his provocative paper at OMG 
Victoria.  The genesis of the literary work that we now refer to as /The 
Alexandria Quartet/ is most curious, and I think that if anything it 
demonstrates Durrell's facility with spinning out fictions, whether 
literary or autobiographical.  In a significant way, when Durrell looks 
back on the completed /Quartet /and claims that the four-part series had 
been planned out for a period of time as a coherent piece of 
architecture, he is taking up his own highly-recursive, 
backward-glancing literary methods from /Balthazar /&c. and applying 
them to the composition history of his tetralogy.   Durrell's printed 
and recorded interviews are intriguing this way.  He really did have an 
impressive, eloquent gift for elaboration.  (Translate that last term 
according to your own delights or discontents.)

Having said that, I find myself still imagining /Balthazar /somehow 
renamed as Durrell 'originally' titled it in his working notebooks, 
"Echoes of /Justine/."  All in all, I prefer to read /Justine/, 
/Balthazar/, /Mountolive/, and /Clea /as something ongoing, something 
still to be discovered.  Knowing that the author who wrote them was also 
nosing his way forward and still discovering his crucial form adds to 
the aesthetic of the novels.  And calling them in a corporate fashion 
/The Alexandria Quartet/ seems to bind the books down in a way that I 
favor less and less.

Charles

-- 
**********************
Charles L. Sligh
Department of English
Wake Forest University
slighcl at wfu.edu
**********************

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From bredwine1968 at earthlink.net  Mon Apr 28 16:54:47 2008
From: bredwine1968 at earthlink.net (Bruce Redwine)
Date: Mon, 28 Apr 2008 16:54:47 -0700 (GMT-07:00)
Subject: [ilds] Grand Designs
Message-ID: <14811110.1209426887752.JavaMail.root@elwamui-milano.atl.sa.earthlink.net>

Yes, the overarching title Alexandria Quartet probably overreaches and distorts.  Durrell was not writing a Ulysses in which he made sure everything fit, as near as possible.  In fact, Durrell seems to have had little interest in revising and putting together the "perfect" masterpiece.  Consistency is not one of its virtues.  If you look at the little things, you notice inconsistencies.  I'm reminded of Herbert Muller's Uses of the Past (1952) and his introductory essay on Hagia Sophia in Istanbul/Constantinople and how he describes getting up close and noticing all the flaws in its construction, despite the fact the overall impression of the church is absolutely stupendous.  The AQ is like that.  One very minor example.  Durrell's Corniche resonates as the Grand Corniche, which, as has been noted before is inaccurate.  But I always remember "Grand Corniche," although most of his references are simply to the Corniche.  My memory prefers the grand design and discounts his inconsistencies.

Charles is being very kind when he says Durrell had an "eloquent gift for elaboration."  Not for nothing did he make a very good press officer, a spinmeister.


Bruce

-----Original Message-----
>From: slighcl <slighcl at wfu.edu>
>Sent: Apr 28, 2008 11:47 AM
>To: Bruce Redwine <bredwine1968 at earthlink.net>, ilds at lists.uvic.ca
>Subject: Re: [ilds] Genesis of the Quartet
>
>On 4/28/2008 12:32 PM, Bruce Redwine wrote:
>> No need to wait for the next issue of Deus Loci.  Re from 1 to 4, Michael Haag in Alexandria:  City of Memory (London & Cairo, 2004) gives his proof of how Durrell came to conceive the Quartet (pp. 320ff).  Durrell would later claim that he had initially "planned four books," but "this was untrue," as Haag states and demonstrates (p. 326).  
>I agree with Michael's case as set forth in his provocative paper at OMG 
>Victoria.  The genesis of the literary work that we now refer to as /The 
>Alexandria Quartet/ is most curious, and I think that if anything it 
>demonstrates Durrell's facility with spinning out fictions, whether 
>literary or autobiographical.  In a significant way, when Durrell looks 
>back on the completed /Quartet /and claims that the four-part series had 
>been planned out for a period of time as a coherent piece of 
>architecture, he is taking up his own highly-recursive, 
>backward-glancing literary methods from /Balthazar /&c. and applying 
>them to the composition history of his tetralogy.   Durrell's printed 
>and recorded interviews are intriguing this way.  He really did have an 
>impressive, eloquent gift for elaboration.  (Translate that last term 
>according to your own delights or discontents.)
>
>Having said that, I find myself still imagining /Balthazar /somehow 
>renamed as Durrell 'originally' titled it in his working notebooks, 
>"Echoes of /Justine/."  All in all, I prefer to read /Justine/, 
>/Balthazar/, /Mountolive/, and /Clea /as something ongoing, something 
>still to be discovered.  Knowing that the author who wrote them was also 
>nosing his way forward and still discovering his crucial form adds to 
>the aesthetic of the novels.  And calling them in a corporate fashion 
>/The Alexandria Quartet/ seems to bind the books down in a way that I 
>favor less and less.
>
>Charles



From dtart at bigpond.net.au  Mon Apr 28 23:57:13 2008
From: dtart at bigpond.net.au (Denise Tart & David Green)
Date: Tue, 29 Apr 2008 16:57:13 +1000
Subject: [ilds] wine, writers and work
Message-ID: <01f301c8a9c6$412658b0$0201a8c0@MumandDad>

Charles is being very kind when he says Durrell had an "eloquent gift for elaboration."  Not for nothing did he make a very good press officer, a spinmeister.

It says on the back of my Durrell Biography that "wine and sun inspired him" - and perhaps women too, amonst other interests. Writing may have served these interests, rather than the other way around, in which case elaborating and spinning out a theme over 4 volumes instead of one pays for a lot of drinks, time in the sun and holidays with convivial wenches - as well as more erudite activities. I have come across several references in Durrell's own words to his pragmatism towards his writing. Durrell was raised as a colonial gentlemen. To live even vaguely like that - and we know that on one level Durrell embraced the 'simple life' - one needs money!

DG






Denise Tart
Civil Celebrant - A8807
16 William Street
Marrickville NSW  2204
+61 2 9564 6165
0412 707 625
dtart at bigpond.net.au
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From carrie.t at virgin.net  Tue Apr 29 12:52:49 2008
From: carrie.t at virgin.net (Carrie)
Date: Tue, 29 Apr 2008 20:52:49 +0100
Subject: [ilds] wine, writers and work
In-Reply-To: <01f301c8a9c6$412658b0$0201a8c0@MumandDad>
References: <01f301c8a9c6$412658b0$0201a8c0@MumandDad>
Message-ID: <FBA9327F-BDBA-43AC-A0D2-AF64A07A01CE@virgin.net>


I recently joined the ILDS mailing list, and immediately realized I  
had made a mistake, not being a scholarly sort myself.  I am drowning  
in all that I read, trying to find the Lawrence Durrell I knew for 25  
years.  I had, in the first instance, been hoping to know more about  
Larry's work of course, but I hadn't realized that the contributions  
were to be an exercise in carefully combing through the minutiae of  
every word.  This isn't a criticism, rather an observation.  I  
wouldn't be up to the standards necessary to engage in your literary  
forum, and I guess by now you are all relieved to know that.

However, I would like to say that David Green's contribution is one  
ILDS mailing list offering that I feel Larry would have enjoyed.  I  
think Larry would say that David Green has hit the nail on its head.   
Larry was not Gerry, he did like a simple life, complete with the few  
luxuries he enjoyed.  I'm not being hard on Gerry, but he did not  
embrace the simple life, anything but.

My connection with Larry is my mother, Shirley, who married Larry's  
good friend, and archivist, my stepfather Alan Thomas.  It was through  
my mother and Alan that I got to know and spend time with Larry.  It  
was an uncomplicated relationship, which set it apart from most of  
Larry's relationships, especially with women.  Larry, as DG suggests,  
loved women, but I think it's fair to say he was hard on them, with  
few exceptions.  Claude was Larry's soul mate, had she not died  
prematurely they would almost certainly have stayed together.  Larry  
would appreciate DG's apt perception, though he might not entirely  
agree.

I also wondered what, if anything, any of you thought of Larry's  
artwork.  I refer to his paintings and drawings, which were exhibited  
under his pseudonym Oscar Epps.  Larry loved to paint, and I was  
concerned when presenting the L Durrell archives to the British  
Library that they were surprised to receive Larry's paintings, having  
not realized that he was an artist as well as an author.  I felt quite  
sad after handing the portfolio over wondering how these paintings  
would be treated in terms of access by interested readers/scholars.  I  
felt there was a lack of interest to the extent that their disinterest  
was apparent.  Quite sad really!

Carrie

On 29 Apr 2008, at 07:57, Denise Tart & David Green wrote:

> Charles is being very kind when he says Durrell had an "eloquent  
> gift for elaboration."  Not for nothing did he make a very good  
> press officer, a spinmeister.
>
> It says on the back of my Durrell Biography that "wine and sun  
> inspired him" - and perhaps women too, amonst other interests.  
> Writing may have served these interests, rather than the other way  
> around, in which case elaborating and spinning out a theme over 4  
> volumes instead of one pays for a lot of drinks, time in the sun and  
> holidays with convivial wenches - as well as more erudite  
> activities. I have come across several references in Durrell's own  
> words to his pragmatism towards his writing. Durrell was raised as a  
> colonial gentlemen. To live even vaguely like that - and we know  
> that on one level Durrell embraced the 'simple life' - one needs  
> money!
>
> DG
>
>
>
>
>
> Denise Tart
> Civil Celebrant - A8807
> 16 William Street
> Marrickville NSW  2204
> +61 2 9564 6165
> 0412 707 625
> dtart at bigpond.net.au
> _______________________________________________
> ILDS mailing list
> ILDS at lists.uvic.ca
> https://lists.uvic.ca/mailman/listinfo/ilds

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From slighcl at wfu.edu  Tue Apr 29 16:34:13 2008
From: slighcl at wfu.edu (slighcl)
Date: Tue, 29 Apr 2008 19:34:13 -0400
Subject: [ilds] wine, writers and work
In-Reply-To: <01f301c8a9c6$412658b0$0201a8c0@MumandDad>
References: <01f301c8a9c6$412658b0$0201a8c0@MumandDad>
Message-ID: <4817B075.1070505@wfu.edu>

On 4/29/2008 2:57 AM, Denise Tart & David Green wrote:

>         Writing may have served these interests, rather than the other
>         way around, in which case elaborating and spinning out a theme
>         over 4 volumes instead of one pays for a lot of drinks, time
>         in the sun and holidays with convivial wenches - as well as
>         more erudite activities. I have come across several references
>         in Durrell's own words to his pragmatism towards his writing.

The point is well made, David.  As I said sometime ago in an exchange 
here on the list with Michael, I think that it is more accurate, more 
helpful, and more revealing to speak of Lawrence Durrell as a "Man of 
Letters" than as an Artist with that big Romantic "A" following behind 
him.  Durrell would make something of that big fat Romantic A***.   
Indeed, Durrell did address the corpulent ego of the Artist in a 1959 
interview:
>
>         D:  In fact, I think that the best regimen is to get up early,
>         insult yourself a bit in the shaving mirror, and then pretend
>         you're cutting wood, which is really just about all the hell
>         you are doing--if you see what I mean.  But all the Jungian
>         guilt about the importance of one's message, and all that sort
>         of thing--well, you get a nice corpulent ego standing in the
>         way there, telling you that you're so damn clever that you're
>         almost afraid to write it down, it's so wonderful.  And the
>         minute you get that, where are your checks coming from for
>         next month's gas, light, and heat?  You can't afford it.
>
>         I: What a splendidly pragmatic view of writing.
>
>         D:  I'm forced to it, you see; I'm writing for a living.
>>         (/Lawrence Durrell: Conversations/ 32)
>
Read his letters.  Read his interviews.  Take those letters and 
interviews with a grain of salt certainly because he laid it on thick 
for gullible and attentive audiences like he threw back the cups.  But 
listen closely and you will hear something in Durrell's verbs--he seems 
at his truest and most interested when he talks of cutting wood and 
wall-building and cobbling his works together. 

Charles

-- 
**********************
Charles L. Sligh
Department of English
Wake Forest University
slighcl at wfu.edu
**********************

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From durrell at bigpond.com  Tue Apr 29 21:03:25 2008
From: durrell at bigpond.com (durrell at bigpond.com)
Date: Wed, 30 Apr 2008 14:03:25 +1000
Subject: [ilds] wine, writers and work
Message-ID: <31957547.1209528205787.JavaMail.root@nskntwebs02p>

Dear Carrie....i noted your email on the dils list server....thanks for the injection of sincerity and for raising the epfs artwork which i am very interested in seeing....i wonder if you collated a copy of the drawings and paintings before the dysphoric handover?....a sample of this LD artwork collection would provide a great centrepiece for our upcoming Australian Durrell Society meeting this Nov08....perhaps you may be interested in sharing some of those 25yrs of memories of LD's antics and habits with the ADS which is far more experiential and pragmatic then the dils ennui....best wishes Anthony Durrell.....sydney,australia
---- Carrie <carrie.t at virgin.net> wrote: 
> 
> I recently joined the ILDS mailing list, and immediately realized I  
> had made a mistake, not being a scholarly sort myself.  I am drowning  
> in all that I read, trying to find the Lawrence Durrell I knew for 25  
> years.  I had, in the first instance, been hoping to know more about  
> Larry's work of course, but I hadn't realized that the contributions  
> were to be an exercise in carefully combing through the minutiae of  
> every word.  This isn't a criticism, rather an observation.  I  
> wouldn't be up to the standards necessary to engage in your literary  
> forum, and I guess by now you are all relieved to know that.
> 
> However, I would like to say that David Green's contribution is one  
> ILDS mailing list offering that I feel Larry would have enjoyed.  I  
> think Larry would say that David Green has hit the nail on its head.   
> Larry was not Gerry, he did like a simple life, complete with the few  
> luxuries he enjoyed.  I'm not being hard on Gerry, but he did not  
> embrace the simple life, anything but.
> 
> My connection with Larry is my mother, Shirley, who married Larry's  
> good friend, and archivist, my stepfather Alan Thomas.  It was through  
> my mother and Alan that I got to know and spend time with Larry.  It  
> was an uncomplicated relationship, which set it apart from most of  
> Larry's relationships, especially with women.  Larry, as DG suggests,  
> loved women, but I think it's fair to say he was hard on them, with  
> few exceptions.  Claude was Larry's soul mate, had she not died  
> prematurely they would almost certainly have stayed together.  Larry  
> would appreciate DG's apt perception, though he might not entirely  
> agree.
> 
> I also wondered what, if anything, any of you thought of Larry's  
> artwork.  I refer to his paintings and drawings, which were exhibited  
> under his pseudonym Oscar Epps.  Larry loved to paint, and I was  
> concerned when presenting the L Durrell archives to the British  
> Library that they were surprised to receive Larry's paintings, having  
> not realized that he was an artist as well as an author.  I felt quite  
> sad after handing the portfolio over wondering how these paintings  
> would be treated in terms of access by interested readers/scholars.  I  
> felt there was a lack of interest to the extent that their disinterest  
> was apparent.  Quite sad really!
> 
> Carrie
> 
> On 29 Apr 2008, at 07:57, Denise Tart & David Green wrote:
> 
> > Charles is being very kind when he says Durrell had an "eloquent  
> > gift for elaboration."  Not for nothing did he make a very good  
> > press officer, a spinmeister.
> >
> > It says on the back of my Durrell Biography that "wine and sun  
> > inspired him" - and perhaps women too, amonst other interests.  
> > Writing may have served these interests, rather than the other way  
> > around, in which case elaborating and spinning out a theme over 4  
> > volumes instead of one pays for a lot of drinks, time in the sun and  
> > holidays with convivial wenches - as well as more erudite  
> > activities. I have come across several references in Durrell's own  
> > words to his pragmatism towards his writing. Durrell was raised as a  
> > colonial gentlemen. To live even vaguely like that - and we know  
> > that on one level Durrell embraced the 'simple life' - one needs  
> > money!
> >
> > DG
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> > Denise Tart
> > Civil Celebrant - A8807
> > 16 William Street
> > Marrickville NSW  2204
> > +61 2 9564 6165
> > 0412 707 625
> > dtart at bigpond.net.au
> > _______________________________________________
> > ILDS mailing list
> > ILDS at lists.uvic.ca
> > https://lists.uvic.ca/mailman/listinfo/ilds
> 


From odos.fanourios at gmail.com  Wed Apr 30 07:31:14 2008
From: odos.fanourios at gmail.com (James Gifford)
Date: Wed, 30 Apr 2008 08:31:14 -0600
Subject: [ilds] wine, writers and work
In-Reply-To: <FBA9327F-BDBA-43AC-A0D2-AF64A07A01CE@virgin.net>
References: <01f301c8a9c6$412658b0$0201a8c0@MumandDad>
	<FBA9327F-BDBA-43AC-A0D2-AF64A07A01CE@virgin.net>
Message-ID: <481882B2.3090802@gmail.com>

Welcome, Carrie, and please don't think you've made a mistake!  We're 
glad to host any kind of discussion, and while a goodly portion of the 
list is made up of academics, there's certainly no monopoly on 
discussion topics or interests.

As for Mr. Epfs, he is a topic of conversation too long neglected...  I 
have two of his images sitting over my home desk at the moment, and 
there are a few more to put up some time, but I'm afraid I don't have 
anything original, nor do I have very much.  Still, they seem to be very 
much a collaboration with the more famous writer, cut from the same 
cloth.  (I have an image of a veiled woman who is perhaps shopping, but 
with coloured bars crossing the canvas, but interlaced with the figure, 
to me always suggesting that there's another wall between the observer 
and observed -- the other image repeats the trick but with a town, which 
I imagine to be Cypriot, but I can't say for certain).

Although it's not penned by Mr. Epfs, there's a particularly good essay 
at the beginning of /The Paintings of Henry Miller/, which I've always 
turned to for guidance on Durrell's visual work.  I believe it's 
forthcoming in the Delos Press's /From the Elephant's Back/ as well.

Many thanks for your interesting posting.  Please keep them coming!

Best,
James

Carrie wrote:
> 
> I recently joined the ILDS mailing list, and immediately realized I had 
> made a mistake, not being a scholarly sort myself.  I am drowning in all 
> that I read, trying to find the Lawrence Durrell I knew for 25 years.  I 
> had, in the first instance, been hoping to know more about Larry's work 
> of course, but I hadn't realized that the contributions were to be an 
> exercise in carefully combing through the minutiae of every word.  This 
> isn't a criticism, rather an observation.  I wouldn't be up to the 
> standards necessary to engage in your literary forum, and I guess by now 
> you are all relieved to know that.
> 
> However, I would like to say that David Green's contribution is one ILDS 
> mailing list offering that I feel Larry would have enjoyed.  I think 
> Larry would say that David Green has hit the nail on its head.  Larry 
> was not Gerry, he did like a simple life, complete with the few luxuries 
> he enjoyed.  I'm not being hard on Gerry, but he did not embrace the 
> simple life, anything but.
> 
> My connection with Larry is my mother, Shirley, who married Larry's good 
> friend, and archivist, my stepfather Alan Thomas.  It was through my 
> mother and Alan that I got to know and spend time with Larry.  It was an 
> uncomplicated relationship, which set it apart from most of Larry's 
> relationships, especially with women.  Larry, as DG suggests, loved 
> women, but I think it's fair to say he was hard on them, with few 
> exceptions.  Claude was Larry's soul mate, had she not died prematurely 
> they would almost certainly have stayed together.  Larry would 
> appreciate DG's apt perception, though he might not entirely agree.
> 
> I also wondered what, if anything, any of you thought of Larry's 
> artwork.  I refer to his paintings and drawings, which were exhibited 
> under his pseudonym Oscar Epps.  Larry loved to paint, and I was 
> concerned when presenting the L Durrell archives to the British Library 
> that they were surprised to receive Larry's paintings, having not 
> realized that he was an artist as well as an author.  I felt quite sad 
> after handing the portfolio over wondering how these paintings would be 
> treated in terms of access by interested readers/scholars.  I felt there 
> was a lack of interest to the extent that their disinterest was 
> apparent.  Quite sad really! 
> 
> Carrie
> 
> On 29 Apr 2008, at 07:57, Denise Tart & David Green wrote:
> 
>> Charles is being very kind when he says Durrell had an "eloquent gift 
>> for elaboration."  Not for nothing did he make a very good press 
>> officer, a spinmeister.
>>  
>> It says on the back of my Durrell Biography that "wine and sun 
>> inspired him" - and perhaps women too, amonst other interests. Writing 
>> may have served these interests, rather than the other way around, in 
>> which case elaborating and spinning out a theme over 4 volumes instead 
>> of one pays for a lot of drinks, time in the sun and holidays with 
>> convivial wenches - as well as more erudite activities. I have come 
>> across several references in Durrell's own words to his pragmatism 
>> towards his writing. Durrell was raised as a colonial gentlemen. To 
>> live even vaguely like that - and we know that on one level Durrell 
>> embraced the 'simple life' - one needs money!
>>  
>> DG
>>
>>
>>  
>>  
>>  
>> Denise Tart
>> Civil Celebrant - A8807
>> 16 William Street
>> Marrickville NSW  2204
>> +61 2 9564 6165
>> 0412 707 625
>> dtart at bigpond.net.au <mailto:dtart at bigpond.net.au>
>> _______________________________________________
>> ILDS mailing list
>> ILDS at lists.uvic.ca <mailto:ILDS at lists.uvic.ca>
>> https://lists.uvic.ca/mailman/listinfo/ilds
> 
> 
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
> 
> _______________________________________________
> ILDS mailing list
> ILDS at lists.uvic.ca
> https://lists.uvic.ca/mailman/listinfo/ilds

From ilyas.khan at crosby.com  Wed Apr 30 07:48:49 2008
From: ilyas.khan at crosby.com (Ilyas)
Date: Wed, 30 Apr 2008 15:48:49 +0100
Subject: [ilds] wine, writers and work
In-Reply-To: <481882B2.3090802@gmail.com>
Message-ID: <C43E4561.E12%ilyas.khan@crosby.com>

Carrie, you are not the only "non academic". Trust me, there are quite a few
of us out there, and I echo James' comments about your not having made a
mistake. I can also attest to the fact that I have raised a number of
distinctively unacademic topics on the list, and they have all elicted a
robust and embracing response.



On 30/04/2008 15:31, "James Gifford" <odos.fanourios at gmail.com> wrote:

> Welcome, Carrie, and please don't think you've made a mistake!  We're
> glad to host any kind of discussion, and while a goodly portion of the
> list is made up of academics, there's certainly no monopoly on
> discussion topics or interests.
> 
> As for Mr. Epfs, he is a topic of conversation too long neglected...  I
> have two of his images sitting over my home desk at the moment, and
> there are a few more to put up some time, but I'm afraid I don't have
> anything original, nor do I have very much.  Still, they seem to be very
> much a collaboration with the more famous writer, cut from the same
> cloth.  (I have an image of a veiled woman who is perhaps shopping, but
> with coloured bars crossing the canvas, but interlaced with the figure,
> to me always suggesting that there's another wall between the observer
> and observed -- the other image repeats the trick but with a town, which
> I imagine to be Cypriot, but I can't say for certain).
> 
> Although it's not penned by Mr. Epfs, there's a particularly good essay
> at the beginning of /The Paintings of Henry Miller/, which I've always
> turned to for guidance on Durrell's visual work.  I believe it's
> forthcoming in the Delos Press's /From the Elephant's Back/ as well.
> 
> Many thanks for your interesting posting.  Please keep them coming!
> 
> Best,
> James
> 
> Carrie wrote:
>> 
>> I recently joined the ILDS mailing list, and immediately realized I had
>> made a mistake, not being a scholarly sort myself.  I am drowning in all
>> that I read, trying to find the Lawrence Durrell I knew for 25 years.  I
>> had, in the first instance, been hoping to know more about Larry's work
>> of course, but I hadn't realized that the contributions were to be an
>> exercise in carefully combing through the minutiae of every word.  This
>> isn't a criticism, rather an observation.  I wouldn't be up to the
>> standards necessary to engage in your literary forum, and I guess by now
>> you are all relieved to know that.
>> 
>> However, I would like to say that David Green's contribution is one ILDS
>> mailing list offering that I feel Larry would have enjoyed.  I think
>> Larry would say that David Green has hit the nail on its head.  Larry
>> was not Gerry, he did like a simple life, complete with the few luxuries
>> he enjoyed.  I'm not being hard on Gerry, but he did not embrace the
>> simple life, anything but.
>> 
>> My connection with Larry is my mother, Shirley, who married Larry's good
>> friend, and archivist, my stepfather Alan Thomas.  It was through my
>> mother and Alan that I got to know and spend time with Larry.  It was an
>> uncomplicated relationship, which set it apart from most of Larry's
>> relationships, especially with women.  Larry, as DG suggests, loved
>> women, but I think it's fair to say he was hard on them, with few
>> exceptions.  Claude was Larry's soul mate, had she not died prematurely
>> they would almost certainly have stayed together.  Larry would
>> appreciate DG's apt perception, though he might not entirely agree.
>> 
>> I also wondered what, if anything, any of you thought of Larry's
>> artwork.  I refer to his paintings and drawings, which were exhibited
>> under his pseudonym Oscar Epps.  Larry loved to paint, and I was
>> concerned when presenting the L Durrell archives to the British Library
>> that they were surprised to receive Larry's paintings, having not
>> realized that he was an artist as well as an author.  I felt quite sad
>> after handing the portfolio over wondering how these paintings would be
>> treated in terms of access by interested readers/scholars.  I felt there
>> was a lack of interest to the extent that their disinterest was
>> apparent.  Quite sad really!
>> 
>> Carrie
>> 
>> On 29 Apr 2008, at 07:57, Denise Tart & David Green wrote:
>> 
>>> Charles is being very kind when he says Durrell had an "eloquent gift
>>> for elaboration."  Not for nothing did he make a very good press
>>> officer, a spinmeister.
>>>  
>>> It says on the back of my Durrell Biography that "wine and sun
>>> inspired him" - and perhaps women too, amonst other interests. Writing
>>> may have served these interests, rather than the other way around, in
>>> which case elaborating and spinning out a theme over 4 volumes instead
>>> of one pays for a lot of drinks, time in the sun and holidays with
>>> convivial wenches - as well as more erudite activities. I have come
>>> across several references in Durrell's own words to his pragmatism
>>> towards his writing. Durrell was raised as a colonial gentlemen. To
>>> live even vaguely like that - and we know that on one level Durrell
>>> embraced the 'simple life' - one needs money!
>>>  
>>> DG
>>> 
>>> 
>>>  
>>>  
>>>  
>>> Denise Tart
>>> Civil Celebrant - A8807
>>> 16 William Street
>>> Marrickville NSW  2204
>>> +61 2 9564 6165
>>> 0412 707 625
>>> dtart at bigpond.net.au <mailto:dtart at bigpond.net.au>
>>> _______________________________________________
>>> ILDS mailing list
>>> ILDS at lists.uvic.ca <mailto:ILDS at lists.uvic.ca>
>>> https://lists.uvic.ca/mailman/listinfo/ilds
>> 
>> 
>> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
>> 
>> _______________________________________________
>> ILDS mailing list
>> ILDS at lists.uvic.ca
>> https://lists.uvic.ca/mailman/listinfo/ilds
> _______________________________________________
> ILDS mailing list
> ILDS at lists.uvic.ca
> https://lists.uvic.ca/mailman/listinfo/ilds



From slighcl at wfu.edu  Wed Apr 30 08:47:57 2008
From: slighcl at wfu.edu (slighcl)
Date: Wed, 30 Apr 2008 11:47:57 -0400
Subject: [ilds] the occasional angel & the ladder of alcohol
In-Reply-To: <C43E4561.E12%ilyas.khan@crosby.com>
References: <C43E4561.E12%ilyas.khan@crosby.com>
Message-ID: <481894AD.2070202@wfu.edu>

Given my sense that we are groping along in a blind fog, trying locate 
and glimpse some 'Durrell as he really was,' I will make a few posts in 
the cause of recalling the very different ways other poets have 
recollected Lawrence Durrell. 

Durrell would have said it, and did say it, I think, via Pursewarden:  
Durrell is our Yorick, and his books are the teasing skull left for us 
to flesh out with with memory and passions and desires and doubts.

I hope that the list enjoys this little anthology of Durrelliana, and I 
look forward to reading your responses.

C&c.

***


Fraser, G. S.
Monologue for a Cairo Evening
[excerpted from /Poems of G. S. Fraser/ (1981) -- I have taken this from 
the LION database and have tried to clean up the errors]
(To John Waller)


***
Cario was full of characters. I shall
Remember Larry stocky against a bar,
The round face and the tartan scarf, looking
Like a jovial commercial traveller,

Talking like the occasional angel who descends
By the ladder of alcohol to the banal rocks
Of the wars we do not start: and cannot justify
But how the psyche cushions all its shocks,

Benign euphoria above the glasses,
A whiff of whiskey and a melody,
Vanishing up into another country:
O, what rough beast crawls to the Embassy?

Leaving a plot for a story: leaving a shocker
To sell for sixpence at the chemist's stores,
Describing six neuroses at six a penny
Seeking in one labyrinth six minotaurs ...

The flowers that grew out of my brandy-glass
Were all a gully-gully trick. The faces
That looked at me with sideways sliding eyes
The bar's perspective kept within their places.
***




-- 
**********************
Charles L. Sligh
Department of English
Wake Forest University
slighcl at wfu.edu
**********************

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From slighcl at wfu.edu  Wed Apr 30 09:16:57 2008
From: slighcl at wfu.edu (slighcl)
Date: Wed, 30 Apr 2008 12:16:57 -0400
Subject: [ilds] someone had heard tell of Larry Durrell
In-Reply-To: <481894AD.2070202@wfu.edu>
References: <C43E4561.E12%ilyas.khan@crosby.com> <481894AD.2070202@wfu.edu>
Message-ID: <48189B79.3000708@wfu.edu>


Paul Muldoon
Armageddon
[excerpted from /Mules /(1977)]

 I

At last, someone had heard tell of Larry Durrell.
We leaned round headland after headland
When there it was, his Snow-White Villa.
Wasn't it dazzling?
                             Well, it was rather white.
The orange and lemon groves, the olives,
Are wicked for this purity of light.
In a while now we will go ashore, to Mouse Island.

The light is failing. Our mouths are numb with aniseed,
Her little breasts are sour as Jeanne Duval's.
And darknesses weigh down further the burgeoning trees
Where she kneels in her skimpy dress
To gather armful after armful.
Nuzzling the deep blues, the purples. Spitting the stars.

***


-- 
**********************
Charles L. Sligh
Department of English
Wake Forest University
slighcl at wfu.edu
**********************

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From slighcl at wfu.edu  Wed Apr 30 09:21:18 2008
From: slighcl at wfu.edu (slighcl)
Date: Wed, 30 Apr 2008 12:21:18 -0400
Subject: [ilds] particularly that Black Book
In-Reply-To: <481894AD.2070202@wfu.edu>
References: <C43E4561.E12%ilyas.khan@crosby.com> <481894AD.2070202@wfu.edu>
Message-ID: <48189C7E.7070805@wfu.edu>

William Carlos Williams
TO THE DEAN
[from /The Collected Poems of William Carlos Williams/ Volume II 
1939-1962 (1986)]


What should I say of Henry Miller:
a fantastic true-story of Dijon remembered,
black palaces, warted, on streets
of three levels, tilted, winding through
the full moon and out and
down again, worn-casts of men: Chambertin---
This for a head


The feet riding a ferry
waiting under the river side by side
and between. No body. The feet
dogging the head, the head bombing the feet
while food drops into and
through the severed gullet, makes clouds
and women gabbling and smoking, throwing
lighted butts on carpets in department stores,
sweating and going to it like men


Miller, Miller, Miller, Miller
I like those who like you and dislike
nothing that imitates you, I like
particularly that Black Book with its
red sporran by the Englishman that does you
so much honor. I think we should
all be praising you, you are a very good
influence.


-- 
**********************
Charles L. Sligh
Department of English
Wake Forest University
slighcl at wfu.edu
**********************

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From ilyas.khan at crosby.com  Wed Apr 30 09:26:36 2008
From: ilyas.khan at crosby.com (Ilyas)
Date: Wed, 30 Apr 2008 17:26:36 +0100
Subject: [ilds] particularly that Black Book
In-Reply-To: <48189C7E.7070805@wfu.edu>
Message-ID: <C43E5C4C.E36%ilyas.khan@crosby.com>

Charles, as you know, I have the distinct pleasure of owning THE typescript
of the Black Book. I think you saw it when you were in London last year.


On 30/04/2008 17:21, "slighcl" <slighcl at wfu.edu> wrote:

> William Carlos Williams
> TO THE DEAN 
> [from The Collected Poems of William Carlos Williams Volume II 1939-1962
> (1986)]
> 
> 
> What should I say of Henry Miller:
> a fantastic true-story of Dijon remembered,
> black palaces, warted, on streets
> of three levels, tilted, winding through
> the full moon and out and
> down again, worn-casts of men: Chambertin---
> This for a head
> 
> 
> The feet riding a ferry
> waiting under the river side by side
> and between. No body. The feet
> dogging the head, the head bombing the feet
> while food drops into and
> through the severed gullet, makes clouds
> and women gabbling and smoking, throwing
> lighted butts on carpets in department stores,
> sweating and going to it like men
> 
> 
> Miller, Miller, Miller, Miller
> I like those who like you and dislike
> nothing that imitates you, I like
> particularly that Black Book with its
> red sporran by the Englishman that does you
> so much honor. I think we should
> all be praising you, you are a very good
> influence.
> 

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From slighcl at wfu.edu  Wed Apr 30 09:28:46 2008
From: slighcl at wfu.edu (slighcl)
Date: Wed, 30 Apr 2008 12:28:46 -0400
Subject: [ilds] She was reading Justine that spring
In-Reply-To: <48189C7E.7070805@wfu.edu>
References: <C43E4561.E12%ilyas.khan@crosby.com> <481894AD.2070202@wfu.edu>
	<48189C7E.7070805@wfu.edu>
Message-ID: <48189E3E.6080108@wfu.edu>

Olga Broumas
Domesticity 
[excerpted from /Black Holes/, /Black Stockings/ (1985)]

***


She was reading /Justine  /that spring, and slowly, as she began to
stop fantasizing the manner in which her success would come to
her, understood Durrell marking insecurity a haunting quality.
Slowly because unpracticed; carefully, in that she saw how even a
great artist who postulates a narrator different from himself
reveals a political faux pas; she knew Justine had been overly
prized for her shrewdness---not by possessing it but by manip-
ulating her lack. She was becoming the woman she wanted to
know. Was proud; did not cling to it. Braided in the Swedish
style her hair revealed a specific great beauty; circled by thick
coils, she became surprisingly boyish; was not, was languid and
controlled; passionate slowly like her reading, thorough, light.
Under the fig tree, which gave out onto a ridge of pine and
olive, you photographed her self-consciousness and then, finally,
directly, her gaze, large, Mediterranean dark, blue. Without
birds, without their whistling over the music of the creek, though
she laughed like a flute none would have caught it, clung to it,
played it back much later in other southern but never so fair, fair
even but never so perfumed, countries.

___

-- 
**********************
Charles L. Sligh
Department of English
Wake Forest University
slighcl at wfu.edu
**********************

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From slighcl at wfu.edu  Wed Apr 30 09:34:37 2008
From: slighcl at wfu.edu (slighcl)
Date: Wed, 30 Apr 2008 12:34:37 -0400
Subject: [ilds] particularly that Black Book
In-Reply-To: <C43E5C4C.E36%ilyas.khan@crosby.com>
References: <C43E5C4C.E36%ilyas.khan@crosby.com>
Message-ID: <48189F9D.3040003@wfu.edu>

Yes, Ilyas, I once had the distinct pleasure of looking over that 
amazing document.  And now I imagine that this poem by Williams might 
find a home some place close to Nancy's copy of /The Black Book/ TS.

Every collection of books and manuscripts might also include the books 
and manuscripts that have been written about those books and 
manuscripts. . . .

Enjoy!

Charles

On 4/30/2008 12:26 PM, Ilyas wrote:
> Charles, as you know, I have the distinct pleasure of owning THE 
> typescript of the Black Book. I think you saw it when you were in 
> London last year.
>
>
>
>
>     Miller, Miller, Miller, Miller
>     I like those who like you and dislike
>     nothing that imitates you, I like
>     particularly that Black Book with its
>     red sporran by the Englishman that does you
>     so much honor. I think we should
>     all be praising you, you are a very good
>     influence.
>

-- 
**********************
Charles L. Sligh
Department of English
Wake Forest University
slighcl at wfu.edu
**********************

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From slighcl at wfu.edu  Wed Apr 30 09:44:30 2008
From: slighcl at wfu.edu (slighcl)
Date: Wed, 30 Apr 2008 12:44:30 -0400
Subject: [ilds] manipulating her lack
In-Reply-To: <48189E3E.6080108@wfu.edu>
References: <C43E4561.E12%ilyas.khan@crosby.com>
	<481894AD.2070202@wfu.edu>	<48189C7E.7070805@wfu.edu>
	<48189E3E.6080108@wfu.edu>
Message-ID: <4818A1EE.6020004@wfu.edu>

By the way, could someone confirm that Broumas writes <<understood 
Durrell /marking /insecurity a haunting quality>>?  Thanks!

I only have an electronic edition of the text, and I am wondering if it 
should correctly be making] marking.

And I think that Broumas's observation about how "Justine had been 
overly prized for her shrewdness---not by possessing it but by 
manipulating her lack" is insightful.

But then, there I go, supposing that Broumas is thinking of the 
character "Justine," not the novel /Justine/.

Many thanks--

C&c.

***

On 4/30/2008 12:28 PM, slighcl wrote:
> Olga Broumas
> Domesticity 
> [excerpted from /Black Holes/, /Black Stockings/ (1985)]
>
> ***
>
>
> She was reading /Justine  /that spring, and slowly, as she began to
> stop fantasizing the manner in which her success would come to
> her, understood Durrell marking insecurity a haunting quality.
> Slowly because unpracticed; carefully, in that she saw how even a
> great artist who postulates a narrator different from himself
> reveals a political faux pas; she knew Justine had been overly
> prized for her shrewdness---not by possessing it but by manip-
> ulating her lack. She was becoming the woman she wanted to
> know. Was proud; did not cling to it. Braided in the Swedish
> style her hair revealed a specific great beauty; circled by thick
> coils, she became surprisingly boyish; was not, was languid and
> controlled; passionate slowly like her reading, thorough, light.
> Under the fig tree, which gave out onto a ridge of pine and
> olive, you photographed her self-consciousness and then, finally,
> directly, her gaze, large, Mediterranean dark, blue. Without
> birds, without their whistling over the music of the creek, though
> she laughed like a flute none would have caught it, clung to it,
> played it back much later in other southern but never so fair, fair
> even but never so perfumed, countries.
>
> ___
> -- 
> **********************
> Charles L. Sligh
> Department of English
> Wake Forest University
> slighcl at wfu.edu
> **********************
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> _______________________________________________
> ILDS mailing list
> ILDS at lists.uvic.ca
> https://lists.uvic.ca/mailman/listinfo/ilds
>   

-- 
**********************
Charles L. Sligh
Department of English
Wake Forest University
slighcl at wfu.edu
**********************

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From vcel at ix.netcom.com  Tue Apr 29 09:16:02 2008
From: vcel at ix.netcom.com (Vittorio Celentano)
Date: Tue, 29 Apr 2008 12:16:02 -0400
Subject: [ilds] the occasional angel & the ladder of alcohol
References: <C43E4561.E12%ilyas.khan@crosby.com> <481894AD.2070202@wfu.edu>
Message-ID: <001101c8aa14$520694d0$bcd978d0@vittoriohx7smy>

Yorick reminds me of one episode (Top Billing) in the tv series "Tales from the Crypt"

Vittorio
  ----- Original Message ----- 
  From: slighcl 
  To: ilds at lists.uvic.ca 
  Sent: Wednesday, April 30, 2008 11:47 AM
  Subject: [ilds] the occasional angel & the ladder of alcohol


  Given my sense that we are groping along in a blind fog, trying locate and glimpse some 'Durrell as he really was,' I will make a few posts in the cause of recalling the very different ways other poets have recollected Lawrence Durrell.  

  Durrell would have said it, and did say it, I think, via Pursewarden:  Durrell is our Yorick, and his books are the teasing skull left for us to flesh out with with memory and passions and desires and doubts.

  I hope that the list enjoys this little anthology of Durrelliana, and I look forward to reading your responses.

  C&c.

  ***


  Fraser, G. S.
  Monologue for a Cairo Evening 
  [excerpted from Poems of G. S. Fraser (1981) -- I have taken this from the LION database and have tried to clean up the errors]
  (To John Waller)


  ***
  Cario was full of characters. I shall
  Remember Larry stocky against a bar,
  The round face and the tartan scarf, looking
  Like a jovial commercial traveller,

  Talking like the occasional angel who descends
  By the ladder of alcohol to the banal rocks
  Of the wars we do not start: and cannot justify
  But how the psyche cushions all its shocks,

  Benign euphoria above the glasses,
  A whiff of whiskey and a melody,
  Vanishing up into another country:
  O, what rough beast crawls to the Embassy? 

  Leaving a plot for a story: leaving a shocker
  To sell for sixpence at the chemist's stores,
  Describing six neuroses at six a penny
  Seeking in one labyrinth six minotaurs ...

  The flowers that grew out of my brandy-glass
  Were all a gully-gully trick. The faces
  That looked at me with sideways sliding eyes
  The bar's perspective kept within their places. 
  ***





-- 
**********************
Charles L. Sligh
Department of English
Wake Forest University
slighcl at wfu.edu
**********************

------------------------------------------------------------------------------


  _______________________________________________
  ILDS mailing list
  ILDS at lists.uvic.ca
  https://lists.uvic.ca/mailman/listinfo/ilds
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From slighcl at wfu.edu  Wed Apr 30 10:41:48 2008
From: slighcl at wfu.edu (slighcl)
Date: Wed, 30 Apr 2008 13:41:48 -0400
Subject: [ilds] the occasional angel & the ladder of alcohol
In-Reply-To: <001101c8aa14$520694d0$bcd978d0@vittoriohx7smy>
References: <C43E4561.E12%ilyas.khan@crosby.com> <481894AD.2070202@wfu.edu>
	<001101c8aa14$520694d0$bcd978d0@vittoriohx7smy>
Message-ID: <4818AF5C.4030806@wfu.edu>

On 4/29/2008 12:16 PM, Vittorio Celentano wrote:
> Yorick reminds me of one episode (Top Billing) in the tv series "Tales 
> from the Crypt"
>  
> Vittorio
I don't know that series, Vittorio.  Feel free to explain.

I had Pursewarden in mind as a Yorick figure because Pursewarden is 
profoundly posthumous.  Even when Pursewarden is alive, the other 
characters discuss him as if he has already become a name and not a 
person. 

And then once Pursewarden heads off to the undiscovered country Darley 
and the rest of the living are left to puzzle out who he was, what he 
did, and what it meant.  And their answers are ultimately insufficient, 
as are our own efforts.

That is curious and most ghostly, I think.  Durrell imagining 
Pursewarden in 1957 - 1960 is able to imagine some aspect of his own 
posthumous moment 1990. 

The Yorick figure also works because Durrell's idea of a writer is very 
much shaped by his idea of Shakespeare, the Man of Letters--Shakespeare 
whose works eclipse the small bits of knowledge that we can glean about 
his life.

I will let Bill talk more about any of this once he wakes from his 
afternoon nap.

Puzzling on--

Charles

-- 
**********************
Charles L. Sligh
Department of English
Wake Forest University
slighcl at wfu.edu
**********************

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From bredwine1968 at earthlink.net  Wed Apr 30 11:56:18 2008
From: bredwine1968 at earthlink.net (Bruce Redwine)
Date: Wed, 30 Apr 2008 11:56:18 -0700 (GMT-07:00)
Subject: [ilds] Sweetness and darkness
Message-ID: <14303622.1209581778877.JavaMail.root@elwamui-cypress.atl.sa.earthlink.net>

1.  Pursewarden commits suicide, so does Piers.  Durrell kills himself with alcohol.

2.  Why would Durrell/Pursewarden be interested in his posthumous press?  Isn't this the height of conceit?

3.  Durrell holds an interview and says he slaps himself in the mirror every morning and tells himself he's just a worthless shit making a living.  In the Quartet and "Loeb's Horace," he (i.e., Durrell/Pursewarden) displays an ego big enough to take on and beat the likes of Keats, Milton, Horace, and any other writer who might threaten his supremacy of "fine writing." (After all, this is the man dubbed by Miller the next Shakespeare.)  At times LD acts like Hemingway -- both make claims, direct or indirect, to boxing champion of the world of belles-lettres.

4.  Durrell is the poet of blue water and Greek light, but he also finds darkness in that "dark crystal" of Prospero's Cell.  Nancy Myers, wife #1, did not take kindly to her portrayal in PC.

So, which Durrell do you prefer?  He's not all sweetness and light.


Bruce

-----Original Message-----
>From: slighcl <slighcl at wfu.edu>
>Sent: Apr 30, 2008 10:41 AM
>To: ilds at lists.uvic.ca
>Subject: Re: [ilds] the occasional angel & the ladder of alcohol
>
>On 4/29/2008 12:16 PM, Vittorio Celentano wrote:
>> Yorick reminds me of one episode (Top Billing) in the tv series "Tales 
>> from the Crypt"
>>  
>> Vittorio
>I don't know that series, Vittorio.  Feel free to explain.
>
>I had Pursewarden in mind as a Yorick figure because Pursewarden is 
>profoundly posthumous.  Even when Pursewarden is alive, the other 
>characters discuss him as if he has already become a name and not a 
>person. 
>
>And then once Pursewarden heads off to the undiscovered country Darley 
>and the rest of the living are left to puzzle out who he was, what he 
>did, and what it meant.  And their answers are ultimately insufficient, 
>as are our own efforts.
>
>That is curious and most ghostly, I think.  Durrell imagining 
>Pursewarden in 1957 - 1960 is able to imagine some aspect of his own 
>posthumous moment 1990. 
>
>The Yorick figure also works because Durrell's idea of a writer is very 
>much shaped by his idea of Shakespeare, the Man of Letters--Shakespeare 
>whose works eclipse the small bits of knowledge that we can glean about 
>his life.
>
>I will let Bill talk more about any of this once he wakes from his 
>afternoon nap.
>
>Puzzling on--
>
>Charles



From dtart at bigpond.net.au  Wed Apr 30 02:27:29 2008
From: dtart at bigpond.net.au (Denise Tart & David Green)
Date: Wed, 30 Apr 2008 19:27:29 +1000
Subject: [ilds] academic minutae
Message-ID: <007701c8aaa4$699c7980$0201a8c0@MumandDad>

but I hadn't realized that the contributions were to be an exercise in carefully combing through the minutiae of every word.  This isn't a criticism, rather an observation.  I wouldn't be up to the standards necessary to engage in your literary forum, and I guess by now you are all relieved to know that.  - Carrie


Carrie, this particular list is open to all LD fans, whether through the literary appreciation of his work - even down to the last minutae of every word, or those, like me, who simply enjoy his writing and the sub text of the scallywag writer behind them. I often feel that LD should be made an honourary Australian - for his drinking ability, his sense of humour, his pragmatism in many areas and his sense of not quite being deemed proper by the Brits - as many colonials feel even though we have the same or more often better acheivements. Durrell was a rascal, a likeable rogue, a spinmeister, a sometimes charletan, a womaniser..... so what!. what I like is the guy behind the writing. when I read LD I sometimes feel that I become the author. I could drinks jugs of vino in Clito's Cave (and have), no probs. There are many parts of the life he painted at Bellapaix on Cyprus that I could just lap up. For some of us  LD is not just a writer, but a man we connect to; an intellect and a lifeforce!

As for the painting side of his life - tell us more! I, for one am intrigued by the French Fart, Oscar Epfs.

I am really delighted that, as one who knew Larry, you feel that he would have connected with some of my thoughts - because I have always felt connected to a lot of his, as he wrote them, especially in the island books and in other places like his poems.

..and as someone who has done freelance writing, well, sometimes stories do have to be hacked out like splinters from a log.

Hope you write more...

David Green



Denise Tart & David Green
16 William Street, Marrickville NSW 2204

+61 2 9564 6165
0412 707 625
dtart at bigpond.net.au
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From slighcl at wfu.edu  Wed Apr 30 14:27:26 2008
From: slighcl at wfu.edu (slighcl)
Date: Wed, 30 Apr 2008 17:27:26 -0400
Subject: [ilds] Sweetness and darkness
In-Reply-To: <14303622.1209581778877.JavaMail.root@elwamui-cypress.atl.sa.earthlink.net>
References: <14303622.1209581778877.JavaMail.root@elwamui-cypress.atl.sa.earthlink.net>
Message-ID: <4818E43E.5090403@wfu.edu>

On 4/30/2008 2:56 PM, Bruce Redwine wrote:
>
> 2.  Why would Durrell/Pursewarden be interested in his posthumous press?  Isn't this the height of conceit?
I can't take on all that you offer, but I will throw what I can at 
number two, Bruce.

I had not been thinking of press or publicity, really.  Of course, 
Johnny Keats gathering up Pursewarden's Obiter Dicta (cf. last pages of 
/Balthazar/) is a part of it.  Just as this listserv is made up of 
various sorts of people with various sorts of fancies, beliefs, 
theories, doubts about, and--sometimes, it seems--agons with Durrell, 
Purswarden's reading audience is made up of many different types.

A funny things I recall from Carbondale that perhaps Bill or Richard 
will help me to recall more clearly:  In one notebook there are a whole 
series of imaginary letters written to Durrell or Pursewarden from 
imaginary readers.  What was that?  A wonderful, funny conceit, I think.

But when I brought all of this up, I really was thinking of the cluster 
of associates and accidental lovers who gather together after 
Pursewarden's death and stare in amazed unknowing at the empty space 
left between them, the empty space he left between his books and his 
sentences and his words.  What holds them all together?  Where did it 
come from?  Where did it go? 

If any realization or truth comes to Darley or Justine &c. about 
Pursewarden, it is that Pursewarden really was already /not there/ when 
they assumed he was there.  Or at least that they had all assumed far 
too much about Pursewarden's and thought they had known him while never 
even getting close.  And I have to think that somehow Durrell is poking 
us, reminding us about what conceit lies under any of our claims to know 
"Lawrence Durrell."

"The height of conceit"--yes, if you mean "conceit" in the other, older 
way--height of imagination--imagining what happens after your 
death--true conceit to think that you could ever know that.

W.S. Merwin read me a poem while he was here in North Carolina a week or 
two ago.  Merwin's poem was addressed to the Whales in their Coming 
Extinction, but as all things like it it was really addressed to you and 
to me and to everything conceited and human and mortal and soon to be 
extinct:

>         I write as though you could understand
>         And I could say it
>         One must always pretend something
>         Among the dying

"On seeming to presume," as Durrell says. . . .

Really, that "seeming to presume" phrase seems a wellspring for the 
ironic Cheshire cat smile of Durrell and his Pursewarden.  They are both 
operating with an Epicurean's awareness of mortality and the limits of 
what part of their experience they could ever really communicate to 
anyone else.  Presuming one could be understood.  Presuming that you 
understand anyone else.  Presuming that your life or your words matter 
or will last beyond some set point.  Desire checked by physics.  Not 
much past /Hamlet/, in the end. . . . .

As Durrell said, he was a /Greek/, not a Christian.

Yet faced with the unknowing Pursewarden and his maker Durrell still 
presumed to write, and that once seemed a paradox but now is found 
true.  Sometimes Durrell and Pursewarden wrote to pay for the gas and 
the lights and the plonk.  Sometimes they wrote because they found 
themselves inexplicably moved by beauty or by absurdity. 

And still something Durrell has written has somehow lasted this long.  
And then, many many miles away, in a place I have never been and Durrell 
never went, David Green reads and feels something, presumes something, 
seems to become something else, something wonderful.  I cheer David's 
presumption because that presumption cheers me and restores me.  It may 
or may not be "Lawrence Durrell"--that "occasional angel" came to us 
down his ladder of alcohol who is eighteen years vanished forever and we 
will never know which way nor where he went.  But in the meantime, on 
this short day of frost and sun, David Green on Lawrence Durrell is good 
enough for me.  /

Salud/, David.  It is good to find other Greeks.

C&c.

-- 
**********************
Charles L. Sligh
Department of English
Wake Forest University
slighcl at wfu.edu
**********************

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From odos.fanourios at gmail.com  Wed Apr 30 16:46:41 2008
From: odos.fanourios at gmail.com (James Gifford)
Date: Wed, 30 Apr 2008 17:46:41 -0600
Subject: [ilds] The snake has his snowy way...
In-Reply-To: <C43E5C4C.E36%ilyas.khan@crosby.com>
References: <C43E5C4C.E36%ilyas.khan@crosby.com>
Message-ID: <481904E1.9010007@gmail.com>

Robert Duncan
-- from /The Years as Catches: First Poems (1939-46)/, 1966


"An Ark for Lawrence Durrell"

If we are to cross the barriers of snow
into the cave-home of our childhood, dark
among darkened lights, telling our beads,
if we are to cross over the roots of sorrow--
let us take with us the fox,
for he is quicker than our sickness;
let us take the cock, for he remembers the day
and leaps for light. And let us take
the white-haired ass who is gentle
and bows his head.

The snake has his own way among us.


(from 1940)

From odos.fanourios at gmail.com  Wed Apr 30 17:01:09 2008
From: odos.fanourios at gmail.com (James Gifford)
Date: Wed, 30 Apr 2008 18:01:09 -0600
Subject: [ilds] particularly that Black Book
In-Reply-To: <C43E5C4C.E36%ilyas.khan@crosby.com>
References: <C43E5C4C.E36%ilyas.khan@crosby.com>
Message-ID: <48190845.4030206@gmail.com>

Henry Treece
-- from /The Black Seasons/, 1945

"The Black Book"

for Conroy Maddox

Pacing the pages of the midnight book
I see the pale man fingering a skull,
And the old dog snuffling at his heels.

A bleeding hand probes underneath the vetch,
Violates the garb of gothic for a prize,
And comes to light clutching five black eggs.

A sneering eye is staring through the pane:
It is a future come to mock a past;
The Landseer turns towards the wall for shame.

Under the roof a cripple carves a bowl;
No cough can keep him from swarming roads,
Touching his cap for alms from riding lords.

Beneath the floor a lime-dried corpse sits up
And, listening to the after-dinner talk,
Fumbles the dagger in his linen cloak.

Hidden by trees, the boy engraves a stone
With threats as old as mountains in the West.
He sees the white head crumble from his wrath.

Where the grey monuments are set in rows
A faceless figure chuckles in no hand.
No cock shall crow before this deed is done!

Orgiastic emblems flute across the winds,
Seven seasons wind the tired globe along:
The page blows over -- and the poem ends.




Ilyas wrote:
> Charles, as you know, I have the distinct pleasure of owning THE 
> typescript of the Black Book. I think you saw it when you were in London 
> last year.
> 
> 
> On 30/04/2008 17:21, "slighcl" <slighcl at wfu.edu> wrote:
> 
>     William Carlos Williams
>     TO THE DEAN
>     [from /The Collected Poems of William Carlos Williams/ Volume II
>     1939-1962 (1986)]
> 
> 
>     What should I say of Henry Miller:
>     a fantastic true-story of Dijon remembered,
>     black palaces, warted, on streets
>     of three levels, tilted, winding through
>     the full moon and out and
>     down again, worn-casts of men: Chambertin---
>     This for a head
> 
> 
>     The feet riding a ferry
>     waiting under the river side by side
>     and between. No body. The feet
>     dogging the head, the head bombing the feet
>     while food drops into and
>     through the severed gullet, makes clouds
>     and women gabbling and smoking, throwing
>     lighted butts on carpets in department stores,
>     sweating and going to it like men
> 
> 
>     Miller, Miller, Miller, Miller
>     I like those who like you and dislike
>     nothing that imitates you, I like
>     particularly that Black Book with its
>     red sporran by the Englishman that does you
>     so much honor. I think we should
>     all be praising you, you are a very good
>     influence.
> 
> 
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
> 
> _______________________________________________
> ILDS mailing list
> ILDS at lists.uvic.ca
> https://lists.uvic.ca/mailman/listinfo/ilds

From odos.fanourios at gmail.com  Wed Apr 30 17:23:21 2008
From: odos.fanourios at gmail.com (James Gifford)
Date: Wed, 30 Apr 2008 18:23:21 -0600
Subject: [ilds] Sweetness and darkness
In-Reply-To: <14303622.1209581778877.JavaMail.root@elwamui-cypress.atl.sa.earthlink.net>
References: <14303622.1209581778877.JavaMail.root@elwamui-cypress.atl.sa.earthlink.net>
Message-ID: <48190D79.5020606@gmail.com>

Bruce, I look forward to this chat!

This is a slippery slope, though I can certainly see the temptations of it:

1. Pursewarden and Piers have incestuous affairs with their sisters...

2. I read "Loeb's Horace" as a comment on Durrell's "strong" poets, 
those who's influence he feels most profoundly, and perhaps Keats more 
than any other.  I don't think the ego in those poems places the poet on 
par with with Keats or Horace, but he certainly sees himself as capable 
of 'playing ball' with them.  There are many singers far, far better 
than I, but I'd still fell comfortable on the same stage as them...  I 
just wouldn't steal the show!

3. Darkness is indeed a major trope, and I see it as there from the 
beginning.  Take "The Egg" for example, or in the novels, even /Pied 
Piper/ or /Panic Spring/, in which mortality and limitedness plays major 
roles.  Both have beauty, yet et in Arcadia ego...

4. To run with the figure of the author slapping his face in the mirror 
in the morning, what else does Pursewarden do with mirrors?

As an author, Durrell certainly had an egotistical and a journeyman side 
to his literary character.  I just don't think either was particularly 
unusual, even if they are overlooked in many readings.  I recall seeing 
Derek Walcott on a few recent occasions...

But, I do see much, much more to be said for the creation of a public 
face here and also playing with the literary media.  What else comes to 
mind for you?  "Press Marked Urgent" and Sutcliffe in /Monsieur/ come to 
mind.  After all, what's funnier than the "great man" arriving in Venice 
in /Monsieur/ when the reader only sees a fat, ageing author of dubious 
means and inflated self-worth?

What else comes to mind for you?  Personally, I prefer the sweet & sour 
Durrell, so to speak...

Best,
James

Bruce Redwine wrote:
> 1.  Pursewarden commits suicide, so does Piers.  Durrell kills himself with alcohol.
> 
> 2.  Why would Durrell/Pursewarden be interested in his posthumous press?  Isn't this the height of conceit?
> 
> 3.  Durrell holds an interview and says he slaps himself in the mirror every morning and tells himself he's just a worthless shit making a living.  In the Quartet and "Loeb's Horace," he (i.e., Durrell/Pursewarden) displays an ego big enough to take on and beat the likes of Keats, Milton, Horace, and any other writer who might threaten his supremacy of "fine writing." (After all, this is the man dubbed by Miller the next Shakespeare.)  At times LD acts like Hemingway -- both make claims, direct or indirect, to boxing champion of the world of belles-lettres.
> 
> 4.  Durrell is the poet of blue water and Greek light, but he also finds darkness in that "dark crystal" of Prospero's Cell.  Nancy Myers, wife #1, did not take kindly to her portrayal in PC.
> 
> So, which Durrell do you prefer?  He's not all sweetness and light.
> 
> 
> Bruce
> 
> -----Original Message-----
>> From: slighcl <slighcl at wfu.edu>
>> Sent: Apr 30, 2008 10:41 AM
>> To: ilds at lists.uvic.ca
>> Subject: Re: [ilds] the occasional angel & the ladder of alcohol
>>
>> On 4/29/2008 12:16 PM, Vittorio Celentano wrote:
>>> Yorick reminds me of one episode (Top Billing) in the tv series "Tales 
>>> from the Crypt"
>>>  
>>> Vittorio
>> I don't know that series, Vittorio.  Feel free to explain.
>>
>> I had Pursewarden in mind as a Yorick figure because Pursewarden is 
>> profoundly posthumous.  Even when Pursewarden is alive, the other 
>> characters discuss him as if he has already become a name and not a 
>> person. 
>>
>> And then once Pursewarden heads off to the undiscovered country Darley 
>> and the rest of the living are left to puzzle out who he was, what he 
>> did, and what it meant.  And their answers are ultimately insufficient, 
>> as are our own efforts.
>>
>> That is curious and most ghostly, I think.  Durrell imagining 
>> Pursewarden in 1957 - 1960 is able to imagine some aspect of his own 
>> posthumous moment 1990. 
>>
>> The Yorick figure also works because Durrell's idea of a writer is very 
>> much shaped by his idea of Shakespeare, the Man of Letters--Shakespeare 
>> whose works eclipse the small bits of knowledge that we can glean about 
>> his life.
>>
>> I will let Bill talk more about any of this once he wakes from his 
>> afternoon nap.
>>
>> Puzzling on--
>>
>> Charles
> 
> 
> _______________________________________________
> ILDS mailing list
> ILDS at lists.uvic.ca
> https://lists.uvic.ca/mailman/listinfo/ilds
> 

From slighcl at wfu.edu  Wed Apr 30 19:18:21 2008
From: slighcl at wfu.edu (slighcl)
Date: Wed, 30 Apr 2008 22:18:21 -0400
Subject: [ilds] a different version of the truth
In-Reply-To: <4818A1EE.6020004@wfu.edu>
References: <C43E4561.E12%ilyas.khan@crosby.com>	<481894AD.2070202@wfu.edu>	<48189C7E.7070805@wfu.edu>	<48189E3E.6080108@wfu.edu>
	<4818A1EE.6020004@wfu.edu>
Message-ID: <4819286D.5080003@wfu.edu>

http://www.stltoday.com/stltoday/entertainment/stories.nsf/music/story/91A826C78B06411B8625743A007CFA40?OpenDocument
 
Songwriter Randy Newman's show is about irony
By Daniel Durchholz
SPECIAL TO THE POST-DISPATCH
05/01/2008

Q: You usually write characters, not straight-up commentary. Could you put
yourself in the head of Condoleezza Rice or Dick Cheney? What would that 
song
be like?

A: I don't know if they know they're liars. I'm sure Cheney still thinks 
he's
right about his whole (Middle East) philosophy. And Condoleezza Rice may 
think
she's told the truth. But, no, I couldn't make a song out of that.

Q: Where did your interest in characters and unreliable narrators come from?

A: I got bored writing regular lyrics, love songs. I was writing a song in
1965, and I was looking for a rhyme with an "air" sound, and wrote "bear." I
ended up writing "Simon Smith and the Amazing Dancing Bear." It wasn't a
"Eureka!" moment. But I figured, I love it when you get a narrator. You know
"The Alexandria Quartet," the (Lawrence) Durrell books? You think you're
getting the truth in the first one, and in the second one, it's a different
version of the truth. It's like the old "Rashomon" kind of thing.



-- 
**********************
Charles L. Sligh
Department of English
Wake Forest University
slighcl at wfu.edu
**********************



From bredwine1968 at earthlink.net  Thu May  1 11:03:30 2008
From: bredwine1968 at earthlink.net (Bruce Redwine)
Date: Thu, 1 May 2008 14:03:30 -0400 (EDT)
Subject: [ilds] Sweet and Sour
Message-ID: <24945260.1209665010484.JavaMail.root@elwamui-muscovy.atl.sa.earthlink.net>

Charles and James,

Thank you both for your long, thoughtful, and informative responses.  I'll just make a few general comments and not try to answer point for point.  David's and Carrie's recent emails highlight the reasons Lawrence Durrell will last and be enjoyed for as long as readers enjoy sun, water, beauty, wine, and the magical words that make those things so.  That's what first drew me to him, but that's not what now interests me about the man.  I find the "dark crystal" image at the beginning and end of Prospero's Cell paradigmatic.  At the heart of Durrell's Greek world of brilliant light is not more light but darkness.  It's a black hole which was always there from the beginning and into which he himself got sucked in the end.  The image isn't accurate -- black holes are invisible -- but it serves its purpose.  Durrell is like D. H. Lawrence's "dark sun."

I find Durrell's ego troubling.  He makes fun of himself and admits he was once as "jaunty as a god of bullfrogs" in "Le cercle referme."  James cites other examples of self-mockery.  But I still find his egoism troubling.  Charles said somewhere that Pursewarden was a way for Durrell to view his own epitaph.  Maybe Charles meant something else, but that's the way I remember it.  I think this observation is correct and telling.  Durrell is like grand, silver-tongued Othello, who makes the beautiful speeches but who also can't get past his own heroic self-image and consequently destroys himself.  Too many mirrors in Durrell's world -- too much concern about one's various appearances.  True, it's a fashionable comment on multiple personalities and DHL's overturning of the "old stable ego."  But I just find it too egocentric.  It's obsessive.  It's sick.

"Loeb's Horace" is, in part, an inexcusable attack on another great poet.  Durrell's John Keats in the Quartet is an example of childish name calling, and Durrell's other attacks on English poets equally juvenile.  I don't attribute this to the usual cattiness among great writers competing for acclaim.  It seems to me far more fundamental, something similar to Hemingway's emotional problems, which, as Kenneth Lynn's biography has shown, were very big indeed.  I think Durrell was not always the cheerful exponent of the sunny life -- rather he was often on the brink of madness and was only able to survive through his art.  Hence, the conclusion to that interview in the Paris Review, which Charles quoted, the one where Durrell says, "I find art easy.  I find life difficult."  And when the art stopped, so did the life.


Bruce

From odos.fanourios at gmail.com  Thu May  1 10:58:55 2008
From: odos.fanourios at gmail.com (James Gifford)
Date: Thu, 01 May 2008 11:58:55 -0600
Subject: [ilds] Sweetness and darkness
In-Reply-To: <4818E43E.5090403@wfu.edu>
References: <14303622.1209581778877.JavaMail.root@elwamui-cypress.atl.sa.earthlink.net>
	<4818E43E.5090403@wfu.edu>
Message-ID: <481A04DF.2060004@gmail.com>

> A funny things I recall from Carbondale that perhaps
 > Bill or Richard will help me to recall more clearly:
 > In one notebook there are a whole series of imaginary
 > letters written to Durrell or Pursewarden from
 > imaginary readers.  What was that?  A wonderful,
 > funny conceit, I think.

"The Price of Glory: Gleanings from a Writer's In-tray" is the title, I 
believe.  If it's the same one I have, it is very funny...

My personal favourite from it is:

"Dear Sir
      I am writing to you because it is clear that an artist of such 
great humanity and such a close knowledge of life in general and women 
in particular cannot be indifferent to the fate of Irish horses shipped 
over to Belgium to be murdered and eaten by Belgians.  I am sure that..."

Also,

"Dear Mr Durble : my teacher has sent me a poem by you for my exam. I 
don't understand it..."

I think Durrell either liked that first one so much or really had such a 
letter, such that he felt inspired to repeat it in 1960 in the opening 
paragraph of "No Clue to Living"

Best,
Jamie

From slighcl at wfu.edu  Thu May  1 11:33:08 2008
From: slighcl at wfu.edu (slighcl)
Date: Thu, 01 May 2008 14:33:08 -0400
Subject: [ilds] Sweetness and darkness
In-Reply-To: <481A04DF.2060004@gmail.com>
References: <14303622.1209581778877.JavaMail.root@elwamui-cypress.atl.sa.earthlink.net>	<4818E43E.5090403@wfu.edu>
	<481A04DF.2060004@gmail.com>
Message-ID: <481A0CE4.9050109@wfu.edu>

On 5/1/2008 1:58 PM, James Gifford wrote:
>> A funny things I recall from Carbondale that perhaps
>>     
>  > Bill or Richard will help me to recall more clearly:
>  > In one notebook there are a whole series of imaginary
>  > letters written to Durrell or Pursewarden from
>  > imaginary readers.  What was that?  A wonderful,
>  > funny conceit, I think.
>
> "The Price of Glory: Gleanings from a Writer's In-tray" is the title, I 
> believe.  If it's the same one I have, it is very funny...
Thanks, Jamie.  Is that particular notebook at Carbondale, as I am 
recalling?

Those imaginary letters from imaginary fans are very, very funny.  He 
mocks all of our conceits and illusions very well.  I think that sort of 
needy response from reader who saw him as the "Man with the Message" 
made him feel very lonely and isolated and inadequate.  Really, how 
could he respond?  I think the loneliness and isolation of Pursewarden 
is true to what was deep inside--maybe to what Bruce calls the "dark 
crystal,' but I am not certain.  A good friend to many, yet always 
terribly alone in some way, always haunted by "the space between."

I just wish Durrell had set his pack of satyrs upon the spoor trail of 
all of those pesky American academics who never tire of picking his 
works apart. . . . .

But then he does make that kind of satirical response:
Durrell, Lawrence :  THE CRITICS [from Collected Poems: 1931-1974 (1985) 
, Faber and Faber ]
>
>
>
> They never credit us
> With being bad enough
> The boys that come to edit us:
> Of simply not caring when a prize,
> Something for nothing, comes our way,
> A wife, a mistress, or a holiday
> From People living neckfast in their lies.
>
> No: Shakespear's household bills
> Could never be responsible, they say,
> For all the heartbreak and the 1,000 ills
> His work is heir to, poem, sonnet, play ...
> Emended readings give the real reason:
> The times were out of joint, the loves, the season.
>
> Man With A Message---how could you forget
> To read your proofs, the heartache and the fret?
> The copier or the printer
> Must take the blame for it in all
> The variants they will publish by the winter.
>
> 'By elision we quarter suffering.' Too true.
> 'From images and scansion can be learned.' ...
> Yet under it perhaps may be discerned
> A something else afoot---a Thing
> Lacking both precedent and name and gender:
> An uncreated Weight which left its clue,
> Making him run up bills,
> Making him violent or distrait or tender:
> Leaving for Stratford might have heard It say:
> 'Tell them I won't be back on Saturday.
> My wife will understand I'm on a bender.'
>
> And to himself muttering, muttering: 'Words
> Added to words multiply the space
> Between this feeling and my expressing It.
> The wires get far too hot. Time smoulders
> Like a burning rug. I /will/ be free.' ...
>
> And all the time from the donkey's head
> The lover is whispering: 'This is not
> What I imagined as Reality.
> /If truth were needles surely eyes would see?'/
>
> 1948/ /1948/
>


Charles

-- 
**********************
Charles L. Sligh
Department of English
Wake Forest University
slighcl at wfu.edu
**********************

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From vcel at ix.netcom.com  Wed Apr 30 19:47:27 2008
From: vcel at ix.netcom.com (Vittorio Celentano)
Date: Wed, 30 Apr 2008 22:47:27 -0400
Subject: [ilds] the occasional angel & the ladder of alcohol
References: <C43E4561.E12%ilyas.khan@crosby.com>
	<481894AD.2070202@wfu.edu><001101c8aa14$520694d0$bcd978d0@vittoriohx7smy>
	<4818AF5C.4030806@wfu.edu>
Message-ID: <001101c8ab35$b1821d90$bcd978d0@vittoriohx7smy>

Charles,

 

Barry Blye can also be considered a posthumous actor or person In Top Billing from Tales from the Crypt.

 

"Barry Blye is a frustrated actor who will do anything to get a part. He's been rejected by every acting company because he doesn't have the right look. Bad luck follows him all over. First his girlfriend breaks up with him. Then he's kicked out of his apartment. Then his old rival Winton Robins, who has the look, gets a part in a weird theater's production of Hamlet. Barry goes into a frustrated rage and strangles him to death to take the part. He is shocked when he learns that the theater is really a home for the criminally insane. Barry thought he was auditioning for Hamlet whereas his part was that of Yorick. The insane stage director wanted to produce a Hamlet so real that he needed a real skull for the part of Yorick."

 

Vittorio

  ----- Original Message ----- 
  From: slighcl 
  To: ilds at lists.uvic.ca 
  Sent: Wednesday, April 30, 2008 1:41 PM
  Subject: Re: [ilds] the occasional angel & the ladder of alcohol


  On 4/29/2008 12:16 PM, Vittorio Celentano wrote: 
    Yorick reminds me of one episode (Top Billing) in the tv series "Tales from the Crypt"

    Vittorio
  I don't know that series, Vittorio.  Feel free to explain.

  I had Pursewarden in mind as a Yorick figure because Pursewarden is profoundly posthumous.  Even when Pursewarden is alive, the other characters discuss him as if he has already become a name and not a person.  

  And then once Pursewarden heads off to the undiscovered country Darley and the rest of the living are left to puzzle out who he was, what he did, and what it meant.  And their answers are ultimately insufficient, as are our own efforts.

  That is curious and most ghostly, I think.  Durrell imagining Pursewarden in 1957 - 1960 is able to imagine some aspect of his own posthumous moment 1990.  

  The Yorick figure also works because Durrell's idea of a writer is very much shaped by his idea of Shakespeare, the Man of Letters--Shakespeare whose works eclipse the small bits of knowledge that we can glean about his life.

  I will let Bill talk more about any of this once he wakes from his afternoon nap.

  Puzzling on--

  Charles

-- 
**********************
Charles L. Sligh
Department of English
Wake Forest University
slighcl at wfu.edu
**********************

------------------------------------------------------------------------------


  _______________________________________________
  ILDS mailing list
  ILDS at lists.uvic.ca
  https://lists.uvic.ca/mailman/listinfo/ilds
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From slighcl at wfu.edu  Fri May  2 07:13:47 2008
From: slighcl at wfu.edu (slighcl)
Date: Fri, 02 May 2008 10:13:47 -0400
Subject: [ilds] the occasional angel & the ladder of alcohol
In-Reply-To: <001101c8ab35$b1821d90$bcd978d0@vittoriohx7smy>
References: <C43E4561.E12%ilyas.khan@crosby.com>	<481894AD.2070202@wfu.edu><001101c8aa14$520694d0$bcd978d0@vittoriohx7smy>	<4818AF5C.4030806@wfu.edu>
	<001101c8ab35$b1821d90$bcd978d0@vittoriohx7smy>
Message-ID: <481B219B.4000101@wfu.edu>

On 4/30/2008 10:47 PM, Vittorio Celentano wrote:
>
> Charles,
>
>  
>
> Barry Blye can also be considered a posthumous actor or person In Top 
> Billing from Tales from the Crypt.
>
>  
>
> "Barry Blye is a frustrated actor who will do anything to get a part. 
> He's been rejected by every acting company because he doesn't have the 
> right look. Bad luck follows him all over. First his girlfriend breaks 
> up with him. Then he's kicked out of his apartment. Then his old rival 
> Winton Robins, who has the look, gets a part in a weird theater's 
> production of Hamlet. Barry goes into a frustrated rage and strangles 
> him to death to take the part. He is shocked when he learns that the 
> theater is really a home for the criminally insane. Barry thought he 
> was auditioning for Hamlet whereas his part was that of Yorick. The 
> insane stage director wanted to produce a Hamlet so real that he 
> needed a real skull for the part of Yorick."
>
That is an interesting example of acting posthumously, Vittorrio.  
Pursewarden's difference rests with his acceptance of his mortality and 
his acceptance of the vagaries of literary fame and fashion.  
Pursewarden walks knowingly towards his death.  You might even say that 
he scripts the plot, directs, designs the set, and acts the player's 
part.  And Pursewarden leaves behind his enigmas for the "survivors" in 
his audience to puzzle out.  Oh, what a wounded name.  (Staged deaths 
abound in the fiction, really.)

And so with Durrell, I think.  His works and the record of witness to 
his life are not easy to take with confidence.  Some readers seems to 
find sunny Mediterranean Larry.  Others seem to find something greyer, 
something more gnostic.  And others still insist that his life was 
rather sad, for himself or for those whom he may or may not have damaged. 

I only mistrust a reading that insists on any of these as the singular, 
final diagnosis.  Durrell has left us writings and a biography which 
have an uncanny kinship with Pursewarden's asterisk, that typographical 
will o' the wisp which misleads the reader to a blank page, throwing the 
reader "back upon his own resources--which is where every reader 
ultimately belongs."   I have said it before here.  We are all Durrell's 
Brother Ass.  (The second person address of that posthumous document 
pulls us in.)

In the end, I am most curious about Durrell's creation of Pursewarden in 
the 1950s, during a moment in which he was somewhat known but nowhere 
nearly as celebrated as Pursewarden is within the imagined world of the 
/Quartet /or as Durrell would be after /Justine/'s appearance.  I think 
that there is much to mull over in that act of imagination.  In a way, 
Pursewarden is Durrell's /memento mori/, a voice of mortality set to 
check romantic ambitions and hopes for a lasting fame just as the Romans 
set a slave behind their triumphant generals to check their delusions of 
godhood, whispering "look behind you and recollect that you are only a 
mortal." 

Maybe Antony's demise is coloring my reading, making me read like an 
'antique Roman.' 

Charles

-- 
**********************
Charles L. Sligh
Department of English
Wake Forest University
slighcl at wfu.edu
**********************

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From dtart at bigpond.net.au  Fri May  2 00:24:33 2008
From: dtart at bigpond.net.au (Denise Tart & David Green)
Date: Fri, 2 May 2008 17:24:33 +1000
Subject: [ilds] light and dark
Message-ID: <004501c8ac25$9244d0d0$0201a8c0@MumandDad>

Bruce

sun, water, beauty, wine, and the magical words that make those things so.  That's what first drew me to him, but that's not what now interests me about the man.  I find the "dark crystal" image at the beginning and end of Prospero's Cell paradigmatic.

You hit. Isn't the Greek world (any world) of brilliant light and the inner darkness, the dark labyrinth, as it were, what draws us to Durrell. The man behind the words as I mentioned. We are all, to some extent, there. LD just does it so well. I have my own dark labyrinths, but  wine, sun, women, sea breezes and that strange space between heaven and earth that I can see as I sit on the garden wall as the evening sky grows dim, glass of wine in hand, will keep me going 'till they get out pine box. LD writes this contrast very well; the bright exterior, including his own personality, the dark interior; ours and his.

Today, as I drove home from work, Sydney harbour held the deep blue of winter and the sun, shining from a low angle laid a golden glow on the buildings tall - and last night six people died on Sydney harbour when a big fishing trawler smashed into a pleasure launch off Bradley's Head.

DG

Denise Tart & David Green
16 William Street, Marrickville NSW 2204

+61 2 9564 6165
0412 707 625
dtart at bigpond.net.au
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From slighcl at wfu.edu  Fri May  2 09:05:17 2008
From: slighcl at wfu.edu (slighcl)
Date: Fri, 02 May 2008 12:05:17 -0400
Subject: [ilds] light and dark
In-Reply-To: <004501c8ac25$9244d0d0$0201a8c0@MumandDad>
References: <004501c8ac25$9244d0d0$0201a8c0@MumandDad>
Message-ID: <481B3BBD.8010703@wfu.edu>

On 5/2/2008 3:24 AM, Denise Tart & David Green wrote:
> LD writes this contrast very well; the bright exterior, including his 
> own personality, the dark interior; ours and his.
>  
> Today, as I drove home from work, Sydney harbour held the deep blue of 
> winter and the sun, shining from a low angle laid a golden glow on the 
> buildings tall - and last night six people died on Sydney harbour when 
> a big fishing trawler smashed into a pleasure launch off Bradley's Head.
>  
That is good testimony, I think.  Thank you, David!

C&c.

-- 
**********************
Charles L. Sligh
Department of English
Wake Forest University
slighcl at wfu.edu
**********************

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From odos.fanourios at gmail.com  Fri May  2 11:29:50 2008
From: odos.fanourios at gmail.com (James Gifford)
Date: Fri, 02 May 2008 12:29:50 -0600
Subject: [ilds] Genesis of the Quartet
In-Reply-To: <48161BD4.90402@wfu.edu>
References: <26715105.1209400334803.JavaMail.root@elwamui-norfolk.atl.sa.earthlink.net>
	<48161BD4.90402@wfu.edu>
Message-ID: <481B5D9E.7080607@gmail.com>

> Knowing that the author who wrote them was also 
> nosing his way forward and still discovering his crucial form adds to 
> the aesthetic of the novels.  And calling them in a corporate fashion 
> /The Alexandria Quartet/ seems to bind the books down in a way that I 
> favor less and less.

I agree very much here, Charles.  Out of curiosity, what if we were to 
insist on having all the variants of Joyce's /Dubliners/ or /Ulysses/ on 
the table at the same time, or for that matter, even /finengans wake/. 
Just because the author eventually endorsed a single edition (kinda...) 
doesn't meant that we should send every other state to the trash bin of 
history -- I think that Durrell delights me, even if only in part, 
because it's so terribly difficult to hold to such fictions of unity 
with him.

I'm reminded of LD's attempt to revise /Tunc/ and /Nunquam/, which 
didn't appear -- would that have made a distinct /Revolt/ (albeit under 
another title)?  I'm still terribly caught by my first reading of the 
Quintet, in which I think the author's discovery of the book during the 
process of writing is hard to ignore.  It's part of what makes the work 
interesting.

Charles, I'm guessing here, but would you like to have each of the four 
volumes *and* /The Alexandria Quartet/ in addition?  Hmmm.

I was asked by a student earlier this term during a presentation for a 
course that was not my own (I spread out the 1922 'Ulysseses' and 'Waste 
Lands' among their compatriots in the library) why bibliographers want 
the first version of the work rather than the last -- I said that's an 
old lie.  Bibliographers want /all/ versions at the same time.  Durrell 
is one who makes me want the first vision, the final revision, the 
in-between, and yet at no point do I feel as though I'm entering into 
some Kundera-esque censorship of history, no matter how much he 
"elaborates"...  Each change stays on the table as an option.

Best,
James

slighcl wrote:
> On 4/28/2008 12:32 PM, Bruce Redwine wrote:
>> No need to wait for the next issue of Deus Loci.  Re from 1 to 4, Michael Haag in Alexandria:  City of Memory (London & Cairo, 2004) gives his proof of how Durrell came to conceive the Quartet (pp. 320ff).  Durrell would later claim that he had initially "planned four books," but "this was untrue," as Haag states and demonstrates (p. 326).  
> I agree with Michael's case as set forth in his provocative paper at OMG 
> Victoria.  The genesis of the literary work that we now refer to as /The 
> Alexandria Quartet/ is most curious, and I think that if anything it 
> demonstrates Durrell's facility with spinning out fictions, whether 
> literary or autobiographical.  In a significant way, when Durrell looks 
> back on the completed /Quartet /and claims that the four-part series had 
> been planned out for a period of time as a coherent piece of 
> architecture, he is taking up his own highly-recursive, 
> backward-glancing literary methods from /Balthazar /&c. and applying 
> them to the composition history of his tetralogy.   Durrell's printed 
> and recorded interviews are intriguing this way.  He really did have an 
> impressive, eloquent gift for elaboration.  (Translate that last term 
> according to your own delights or discontents.)
> 
> Having said that, I find myself still imagining /Balthazar /somehow 
> renamed as Durrell 'originally' titled it in his working notebooks, 
> "Echoes of /Justine/."  All in all, I prefer to read /Justine/, 
> /Balthazar/, /Mountolive/, and /Clea /as something ongoing, something 
> still to be discovered.  Knowing that the author who wrote them was also 
> nosing his way forward and still discovering his crucial form adds to 
> the aesthetic of the novels.  And calling them in a corporate fashion 
> /The Alexandria Quartet/ seems to bind the books down in a way that I 
> favor less and less.
> 
> Charles
> 
> -- 
> **********************
> Charles L. Sligh
> Department of English
> Wake Forest University
> slighcl at wfu.edu
> **********************
> 
> 
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
> 
> _______________________________________________
> ILDS mailing list
> ILDS at lists.uvic.ca
> https://lists.uvic.ca/mailman/listinfo/ilds

From delospeter at hotmail.com  Fri May  2 13:03:09 2008
From: delospeter at hotmail.com (PETER BALDWIN)
Date: Fri, 2 May 2008 20:03:09 +0000
Subject: [ilds] Genesis of the Quartet
In-Reply-To: <481B5D9E.7080607@gmail.com>
References: <26715105.1209400334803.JavaMail.root@elwamui-norfolk.atl.sa.earthlink.net>
	<48161BD4.90402@wfu.edu>  <481B5D9E.7080607@gmail.com>
Message-ID: <BLU102-W356C08C37E3CF81F4EC1A9C8DA0@phx.gbl>


I'm not for nailing down text but I think the structural and emotional impact of Justine if considered as D expected it as a single novel and is read thus is different from what later evolved as the Quartet
 
Now I'm one of the non-academics but I try to read Justine as the highly skilled and considered work of a man who had already lost so much [ his mother, Nancy, Penelope and was losing Eve/Yvette ] 
 
The construction of the Q was informed by a different process perhaps prompted by Claude
 
I am prompted by this in having reread Haag's wonderful book.I am trying to reread Justine but get slower and slower as I stop to write passages in my own pocket book!!
 
Peter Baldwin> Date: Fri, 2 May 2008 12:29:50 -0600> From: odos.fanourios at gmail.com> To: ilds at lists.uvic.ca> Subject: Re: [ilds] Genesis of the Quartet> > > Knowing that the author who wrote them was also > > nosing his way forward and still discovering his crucial form adds to > > the aesthetic of the novels. And calling them in a corporate fashion > > /The Alexandria Quartet/ seems to bind the books down in a way that I > > favor less and less.> > I agree very much here, Charles. Out of curiosity, what if we were to > insist on having all the variants of Joyce's /Dubliners/ or /Ulysses/ on > the table at the same time, or for that matter, even /finengans wake/. > Just because the author eventually endorsed a single edition (kinda...) > doesn't meant that we should send every other state to the trash bin of > history -- I think that Durrell delights me, even if only in part, > because it's so terribly difficult to hold to such fictions of unity > with him.> > I'm reminded of LD's attempt to revise /Tunc/ and /Nunquam/, which > didn't appear -- would that have made a distinct /Revolt/ (albeit under > another title)? I'm still terribly caught by my first reading of the > Quintet, in which I think the author's discovery of the book during the > process of writing is hard to ignore. It's part of what makes the work > interesting.> > Charles, I'm guessing here, but would you like to have each of the four > volumes *and* /The Alexandria Quartet/ in addition? Hmmm.> > I was asked by a student earlier this term during a presentation for a > course that was not my own (I spread out the 1922 'Ulysseses' and 'Waste > Lands' among their compatriots in the library) why bibliographers want > the first version of the work rather than the last -- I said that's an > old lie. Bibliographers want /all/ versions at the same time. Durrell > is one who makes me want the first vision, the final revision, the > in-between, and yet at no point do I feel as though I'm entering into > some Kundera-esque censorship of history, no matter how much he > "elaborates"... Each change stays on the table as an option.> > Best,> James> > slighcl wrote:> > On 4/28/2008 12:32 PM, Bruce Redwine wrote:> >> No need to wait for the next issue of Deus Loci. Re from 1 to 4, Michael Haag in Alexandria: City of Memory (London & Cairo, 2004) gives his proof of how Durrell came to conceive the Quartet (pp. 320ff). Durrell would later claim that he had initially "planned four books," but "this was untrue," as Haag states and demonstrates (p. 326). > > I agree with Michael's case as set forth in his provocative paper at OMG > > Victoria. The genesis of the literary work that we now refer to as /The > > Alexandria Quartet/ is most curious, and I think that if anything it > > demonstrates Durrell's facility with spinning out fictions, whether > > literary or autobiographical. In a significant way, when Durrell looks > > back on the completed /Quartet /and claims that the four-part series had > > been planned out for a period of time as a coherent piece of > > architecture, he is taking up his own highly-recursive, > > backward-glancing literary methods from /Balthazar /&c. and applying > > them to the composition history of his tetralogy. Durrell's printed > > and recorded interviews are intriguing this way. He really did have an > > impressive, eloquent gift for elaboration. (Translate that last term > > according to your own delights or discontents.)> > > > Having said that, I find myself still imagining /Balthazar /somehow > > renamed as Durrell 'originally' titled it in his working notebooks, > > "Echoes of /Justine/." All in all, I prefer to read /Justine/, > > /Balthazar/, /Mountolive/, and /Clea /as something ongoing, something > > still to be discovered. Knowing that the author who wrote them was also > > nosing his way forward and still discovering his crucial form adds to > > the aesthetic of the novels. And calling them in a corporate fashion > > /The Alexandria Quartet/ seems to bind the books down in a way that I > > favor less and less.> > > > Charles> > > > -- > > **********************> > Charles L. Sligh> > Department of English> > Wake Forest University> > slighcl at wfu.edu> > **********************> > > > > > ------------------------------------------------------------------------> > > > _______________________________________________> > ILDS mailing list> > ILDS at lists.uvic.ca> > https://lists.uvic.ca/mailman/listinfo/ilds> _______________________________________________> ILDS mailing list> ILDS at lists.uvic.ca> https://lists.uvic.ca/mailman/listinfo/ilds
_________________________________________________________________
Be a Hero and Win with Iron Man
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From slighcl at wfu.edu  Fri May  2 13:28:37 2008
From: slighcl at wfu.edu (slighcl)
Date: Fri, 02 May 2008 16:28:37 -0400
Subject: [ilds] Genesis of the Quartet
In-Reply-To: <481B5D9E.7080607@gmail.com>
References: <26715105.1209400334803.JavaMail.root@elwamui-norfolk.atl.sa.earthlink.net>	<48161BD4.90402@wfu.edu>
	<481B5D9E.7080607@gmail.com>
Message-ID: <481B7975.2050602@wfu.edu>

On 5/2/2008 2:29 PM, James Gifford wrote:
> Charles, I'm guessing here, but would you like to have each of the four 
> volumes *and* /The Alexandria Quartet/ in addition?  Hmmm.
Yes, you got me, Jamie.  I like reading /Justine /&c. the separately 
issued volumes because they physically recall the experience of reading 
Durrell's notebooks--with all sorts of other documents and "data" packed 
away inside them--or even because reading the separate volumes 
highlights the way I have to shuttle back and forth between distinct 
documents, moving along with Darley as he sits at his table sorting 
things out.

But I also respect Durrell's decision later to collect the books into 
one corporate or omnibus volume.  That shows that Durrell and/or Faber 
was hoping the book would be seen as a hefty and elaborately contrived  
modernist "project," post-Joyce &c.  That is not the Durrell I prefer, 
but it is an important aspect of Durrell.

And Peter:  Don't worry about slowing down.  I hardly ever read /Justine 
/straight through anymore.  I really enjoy dipping out the choice 
morsels, savoring smaller bits and digesting them as needed.  What a book!

Charles

-- 
**********************
Charles L. Sligh
Department of English
Wake Forest University
slighcl at wfu.edu
**********************

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From bredwine1968 at earthlink.net  Fri May  2 14:39:54 2008
From: bredwine1968 at earthlink.net (Bruce Redwine)
Date: Fri, 2 May 2008 14:39:54 -0700 (GMT-07:00)
Subject: [ilds] Genesis of the Quartet
Message-ID: <1128800.1209764394627.JavaMail.root@elwamui-hybrid.atl.sa.earthlink.net>

Putting every stage or state of an author's work "on the table" is an interesting idea -- for critics -- but not one, I think, that most writers would want to allow.  Perhaps Durrell believed this was desirable, but I question his seriousness.  I like to think that works have a final form and that most authors prefer to see theirs finalized.  Openendedness is a nice idea, but I don't give equal weight to all versions, mutatis mutandis, of course.


Bruce


-----Original Message-----
>From: James Gifford <odos.fanourios at gmail.com>
>Sent: May 2, 2008 11:29 AM
>To: ilds at lists.uvic.ca
>Subject: Re: [ilds] Genesis of the Quartet
>
>> Knowing that the author who wrote them was also 
>> nosing his way forward and still discovering his crucial form adds to 
>> the aesthetic of the novels.  And calling them in a corporate fashion 
>> /The Alexandria Quartet/ seems to bind the books down in a way that I 
>> favor less and less.
>
>I agree very much here, Charles.  Out of curiosity, what if we were to 
>insist on having all the variants of Joyce's /Dubliners/ or /Ulysses/ on 
>the table at the same time, or for that matter, even /finengans wake/. 
>Just because the author eventually endorsed a single edition (kinda...) 
>doesn't meant that we should send every other state to the trash bin of 
>history -- I think that Durrell delights me, even if only in part, 
>because it's so terribly difficult to hold to such fictions of unity 
>with him.
>
>I'm reminded of LD's attempt to revise /Tunc/ and /Nunquam/, which 
>didn't appear -- would that have made a distinct /Revolt/ (albeit under 
>another title)?  I'm still terribly caught by my first reading of the 
>Quintet, in which I think the author's discovery of the book during the 
>process of writing is hard to ignore.  It's part of what makes the work 
>interesting.
>
>Charles, I'm guessing here, but would you like to have each of the four 
>volumes *and* /The Alexandria Quartet/ in addition?  Hmmm.
>
>I was asked by a student earlier this term during a presentation for a 
>course that was not my own (I spread out the 1922 'Ulysseses' and 'Waste 
>Lands' among their compatriots in the library) why bibliographers want 
>the first version of the work rather than the last -- I said that's an 
>old lie.  Bibliographers want /all/ versions at the same time.  Durrell 
>is one who makes me want the first vision, the final revision, the 
>in-between, and yet at no point do I feel as though I'm entering into 
>some Kundera-esque censorship of history, no matter how much he 
>"elaborates"...  Each change stays on the table as an option.
>
>Best,
>James


From bredwine1968 at earthlink.net  Fri May  2 15:44:57 2008
From: bredwine1968 at earthlink.net (Bruce Redwine)
Date: Fri, 2 May 2008 15:44:57 -0700 (GMT-07:00)
Subject: [ilds] Pearls
Message-ID: <1152730.1209768297914.JavaMail.root@elwamui-lapwing.atl.sa.earthlink.net>

Charles the Just.  You're always fair and just, Charles, and it's good and necessary to be reminded of that, being balanced.

Pursewarden as LD's memento mori -- now that is an interesting idea.  I still see Durrell as more of an Othello than an Antony, however.  It's Othello who "threw a pearl away" and that reminds me of that sky of "hot nude pearl" and the language that gets squandered.


Bruce

-----Original Message-----
>From: slighcl <slighcl at wfu.edu>
>Sent: May 2, 2008 7:13 AM
>To: ilds at lists.uvic.ca
>Subject: Re: [ilds] the occasional angel & the ladder of alcohol
>
>That is an interesting example of acting posthumously, Vittorrio.  
>Pursewarden's difference rests with his acceptance of his mortality and 
>his acceptance of the vagaries of literary fame and fashion.  
>Pursewarden walks knowingly towards his death.  You might even say that 
>he scripts the plot, directs, designs the set, and acts the player's 
>part.  And Pursewarden leaves behind his enigmas for the "survivors" in 
>his audience to puzzle out.  Oh, what a wounded name.  (Staged deaths 
>abound in the fiction, really.)
>
>And so with Durrell, I think.  His works and the record of witness to 
>his life are not easy to take with confidence.  Some readers seems to 
>find sunny Mediterranean Larry.  Others seem to find something greyer, 
>something more gnostic.  And others still insist that his life was 
>rather sad, for himself or for those whom he may or may not have damaged. 
>
>I only mistrust a reading that insists on any of these as the singular, 
>final diagnosis.  Durrell has left us writings and a biography which 
>have an uncanny kinship with Pursewarden's asterisk, that typographical 
>will o' the wisp which misleads the reader to a blank page, throwing the 
>reader "back upon his own resources--which is where every reader 
>ultimately belongs."   I have said it before here.  We are all Durrell's 
>Brother Ass.  (The second person address of that posthumous document 
>pulls us in.)
>
>In the end, I am most curious about Durrell's creation of Pursewarden in 
>the 1950s, during a moment in which he was somewhat known but nowhere 
>nearly as celebrated as Pursewarden is within the imagined world of the 
>/Quartet /or as Durrell would be after /Justine/'s appearance.  I think 
>that there is much to mull over in that act of imagination.  In a way, 
>Pursewarden is Durrell's /memento mori/, a voice of mortality set to 
>check romantic ambitions and hopes for a lasting fame just as the Romans 
>set a slave behind their triumphant generals to check their delusions of 
>godhood, whispering "look behind you and recollect that you are only a 
>mortal." 
>
>Maybe Antony's demise is coloring my reading, making me read like an 
>'antique Roman.' 
>
>Charles


From bredwine1968 at earthlink.net  Fri May  2 17:14:27 2008
From: bredwine1968 at earthlink.net (Bruce Redwine)
Date: Fri, 2 May 2008 17:14:27 -0700 (GMT-07:00)
Subject: [ilds] light and dark
Message-ID: <19323829.1209773668251.JavaMail.root@elwamui-milano.atl.sa.earthlink.net>

Well said, David.


Bruce


-----Original Message-----
>From: Denise Tart & David Green <dtart at bigpond.net.au>
>Sent: May 2, 2008 12:24 AM
>To: Durrel <ilds at lists.uvic.ca>
>Subject: [ilds] light and dark
>
>Bruce
>
>sun, water, beauty, wine, and the magical words that make those things so.  That's what first drew me to him, but that's not what now interests me about the man.  I find the "dark crystal" image at the beginning and end of Prospero's Cell paradigmatic.
>
>You hit. Isn't the Greek world (any world) of brilliant light and the inner darkness, the dark labyrinth, as it were, what draws us to Durrell. The man behind the words as I mentioned. We are all, to some extent, there. LD just does it so well. I have my own dark labyrinths, but  wine, sun, women, sea breezes and that strange space between heaven and earth that I can see as I sit on the garden wall as the evening sky grows dim, glass of wine in hand, will keep me going 'till they get out pine box. LD writes this contrast very well; the bright exterior, including his own personality, the dark interior; ours and his.
>
>Today, as I drove home from work, Sydney harbour held the deep blue of winter and the sun, shining from a low angle laid a golden glow on the buildings tall - and last night six people died on Sydney harbour when a big fishing trawler smashed into a pleasure launch off Bradley's Head.
>
>DG
>
>Denise Tart & David Green
>16 William Street, Marrickville NSW 2204


From delospeter at hotmail.com  Sat May  3 04:15:05 2008
From: delospeter at hotmail.com (PETER BALDWIN)
Date: Sat, 3 May 2008 11:15:05 +0000
Subject: [ilds] Genesis of the Quartet
In-Reply-To: <1128800.1209764394627.JavaMail.root@elwamui-hybrid.atl.sa.earthlink.net>
References: <1128800.1209764394627.JavaMail.root@elwamui-hybrid.atl.sa.earthlink.net>
Message-ID: <BLU102-W494111BBC159D459E59A50C8D50@phx.gbl>


There may be no final state because for each of us our interpretaion relies on the state of mind as we read. Auden revised and we lose, I think, the edge of his 30's beliefs in the later revisions.
 
I have just finished Justine and query the ultimate structure of the Q against the n-dimensions we see defined by P in the Consequential Data in Justine and which must reflect the thinking behind this single novel.And I am wondering if much of it reflects D's grief at the loss of Nancy; are the feelings he reflects on the departure of Justine a mirror of his own feelings as Nancy left?
 
I have a couple of original Durrell - sorry, Epfs - paintings.
 
Does the moderator, James, authorise pictorial attachments to these emails?
 
In which case I can photograph a couple in their frames an attachment
 
Are readers aware of : The Writers Brush:Paintings, Drawings and Sculpture by Writers. Ed Donald Friedman. Minneapolis, Mid-list Press. ISBN - 978 - 0 -922811 - 76 - 2 . US $40. Contains two colour reproductions of Durrell paintings C'est LUI! (sic) and Music. I have seen neither before. They are attributed to the Artinian Collection.
 
A Google Search takes me to the Library collection at Austin, Artinian being a colector of 20th cent French writers - but the library catalogue reveals nothing of these paintings.
 
There is a review of the book, but no ref to LD, in the London Guardian Review sectionj for 29th Dec 2007.
 
Peter/Delos> Date: Fri, 2 May 2008 14:39:54 -0700> From: bredwine1968 at earthlink.net> To: ilds at lists.uvic.ca> Subject: Re: [ilds] Genesis of the Quartet> > Putting every stage or state of an author's work "on the table" is an interesting idea -- for critics -- but not one, I think, that most writers would want to allow. Perhaps Durrell believed this was desirable, but I question his seriousness. I like to think that works have a final form and that most authors prefer to see theirs finalized. Openendedness is a nice idea, but I don't give equal weight to all versions, mutatis mutandis, of course.> > > Bruce> > > -----Original Message-----> >From: James Gifford <odos.fanourios at gmail.com>> >Sent: May 2, 2008 11:29 AM> >To: ilds at lists.uvic.ca> >Subject: Re: [ilds] Genesis of the Quartet> >> >> Knowing that the author who wrote them was also > >> nosing his way forward and still discovering his crucial form adds to > >> the aesthetic of the novels. And calling them in a corporate fashion > >> /The Alexandria Quartet/ seems to bind the books down in a way that I > >> favor less and less.> >> >I agree very much here, Charles. Out of curiosity, what if we were to > >insist on having all the variants of Joyce's /Dubliners/ or /Ulysses/ on > >the table at the same time, or for that matter, even /finengans wake/. > >Just because the author eventually endorsed a single edition (kinda...) > >doesn't meant that we should send every other state to the trash bin of > >history -- I think that Durrell delights me, even if only in part, > >because it's so terribly difficult to hold to such fictions of unity > >with him.> >> >I'm reminded of LD's attempt to revise /Tunc/ and /Nunquam/, which > >didn't appear -- would that have made a distinct /Revolt/ (albeit under > >another title)? I'm still terribly caught by my first reading of the > >Quintet, in which I think the author's discovery of the book during the > >process of writing is hard to ignore. It's part of what makes the work > >interesting.> >> >Charles, I'm guessing here, but would you like to have each of the four > >volumes *and* /The Alexandria Quartet/ in addition? Hmmm.> >> >I was asked by a student earlier this term during a presentation for a > >course that was not my own (I spread out the 1922 'Ulysseses' and 'Waste > >Lands' among their compatriots in the library) why bibliographers want > >the first version of the work rather than the last -- I said that's an > >old lie. Bibliographers want /all/ versions at the same time. Durrell > >is one who makes me want the first vision, the final revision, the > >in-between, and yet at no point do I feel as though I'm entering into > >some Kundera-esque censorship of history, no matter how much he > >"elaborates"... Each change stays on the table as an option.> >> >Best,> >James> > _______________________________________________> ILDS mailing list> ILDS at lists.uvic.ca> https://lists.uvic.ca/mailman/listinfo/ilds
_________________________________________________________________

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From odos.fanourios at gmail.com  Sat May  3 08:46:34 2008
From: odos.fanourios at gmail.com (James Gifford)
Date: Sat, 03 May 2008 09:46:34 -0600
Subject: [ilds] Genesis of the Quartet
In-Reply-To: <BLU102-W494111BBC159D459E59A50C8D50@phx.gbl>
References: <1128800.1209764394627.JavaMail.root@elwamui-hybrid.atl.sa.earthlink.net>
	<BLU102-W494111BBC159D459E59A50C8D50@phx.gbl>
Message-ID: <481C88DA.5010707@gmail.com>

Hello Peter,

As a moderator, I am powerless to contain your enthusiasms for 
attachments, though I must formally note that copyright is a respectable 
if quaint notion with many social privileges I lack, being merely a 
person.  Ahem.  What do your Epfses look like?

That said, /The Writer's Brush/ is in my local library, and I recall the 
images being quite nice.  Perhaps I'll jaunt up there this afternoon and 
report further.

As for Justine (and Auden), I agree, although in Durrell's case, I don't 
think the revisions diminish the artwork.  I like to have each 
publication of a poem too, though this makes my shelves swell 
increasingly...  I think I previously noted that James Brigham kept a 
very good tally of the poetic variants in his drafts for Durrell's 
/Collected Poems/, and a significant portion of his typescript includes 
variant typed on Durrell's typewriter, though it's impossible to know 
which of them whacked the keys.  Perhaps someone out there knows if LD 
was chummy about allowing others to use his machine?

But for /Justine/, given the context of multiplicity and the persistence 
of multiple editions, I tend to view this as just another indication of 
the shifting ground upon which the work rests.  For instance, apart from 
Beatrice Skordili's brilliant reading through Freud and Russell, I can 
see little reason for the movement of the objects that precipitate drama 
around themselves at the end of /Justine/ (should be the last page, 3rd 
to last paragraph, I believe).  Their enthusiastic contribution to the 
book is quite different in the omnibus, and I can't properly say why 
unless I privilege the revision process as another opportunity for 
Durrell to play his game of contradictory narratives and revolving 
doors.  They change because change is the norm an permanence the 
masquerade, and such an idea is better shown than said.

Despite his penchant for waxing philosophical, I think a major part of 
Durrell's appeal is his ability to show rather than tell at the right 
moment.  I read enough material that tells me -- when I turn to fiction, 
I'd rather be shown...

My best,
James

PETER BALDWIN wrote:
> There may be no final state because for each of us our interpretaion 
> relies on the state of mind as we read. Auden revised and we lose, I 
> think, the edge of his 30's beliefs in the later revisions.
>  
> I have just finished /Justine /and query the ultimate structure of the Q 
> against the n-dimensions we see defined by P in the Consequential Data 
> in /Justine /and which must reflect the thinking behind this single 
> novel.And I am wondering if much of it reflects D's grief at the loss of 
> Nancy; are the feelings he reflects on the departure of Justine a mirror 
> of his own feelings as Nancy left?
>  
> I have a couple of original Durrell - sorry, Epfs - paintings.
>  
> Does the moderator, James, authorise pictorial attachments to these emails?
>  
> In which case I can photograph a couple in their frames an attachment
>  
> Are readers aware of : /The Writers Brush:Paintings, Drawings and 
> Sculpture by Writers. /Ed Donald Friedman. Minneapolis, Mid-list Press. 
> ISBN - 978 - 0 -922811 - 76 - 2 . US $40. Contains two colour 
> reproductions of Durrell paintings /C'est LUI! /(sic) and /Music./ I 
> have seen neither before. They are attributed to the Artinian Collection.
>  
> A Google Search takes me to the Library collection at Austin, Artinian 
> being a colector of 20th cent French writers - but the library catalogue 
> reveals nothing of these paintings.
>  
> There is a review of the book, but no ref to LD, in the London Guardian 
> Review sectionj for 29th Dec 2007.
>  
> Peter/Delos
> 
>  > Date: Fri, 2 May 2008 14:39:54 -0700
>  > From: bredwine1968 at earthlink.net
>  > To: ilds at lists.uvic.ca
>  > Subject: Re: [ilds] Genesis of the Quartet
>  >
>  > Putting every stage or state of an author's work "on the table" is an 
> interesting idea -- for critics -- but not one, I think, that most 
> writers would want to allow. Perhaps Durrell believed this was 
> desirable, but I question his seriousness. I like to think that works 
> have a final form and that most authors prefer to see theirs finalized. 
> Openendedness is a nice idea, but I don't give equal weight to all 
> versions, mutatis mutandis, of course.
>  >
>  >
>  > Bruce
>  >
>  >
>  > -----Original Message-----
>  > >From: James Gifford <odos.fanourios at gmail.com>
>  > >Sent: May 2, 2008 11:29 AM
>  > >To: ilds at lists.uvic.ca
>  > >Subject: Re: [ilds] Genesis of the Quartet
>  > >
>  > >> Knowing that the author who wrote them was also
>  > >> nosing his way forward and still discovering his crucial form adds to
>  > >> the aesthetic of the novels. And calling them in a corporate fashion
>  > >> /The Alexandria Quartet/ seems to bind the books down in a way that I
>  > >> favor less and less.
>  > >
>  > >I agree very much here, Charles. Out of curiosity, what if we were to
>  > >insist on having all the variants of Joyce's /Dubliners/ or 
> /Ulysses/ on
>  > >the table at the same time, or for that matter, even /finengans wake/.
>  > >Just because the author eventually endorsed a single edition (kinda...)
>  > >doesn't meant that we should send every other state to the trash bin of
>  > >history -- I think that Durrell delights me, even if only in part,
>  > >because it's so terribly difficult to hold to such fictions of unity
>  > >with him.
>  > >
>  > >I'm reminded of LD's attempt to revise /Tunc/ and /Nunquam/, which
>  > >didn't appear -- would that have made a distinct /Revolt/ (albeit under
>  > >another title)? I'm still terribly caught by my first reading of the
>  > >Quintet, in which I think the author's discovery of the book during the
>  > >process of writing is hard to ignore. It's part of what makes the work
>  > >interesting.
>  > >
>  > >Charles, I'm guessing here, but would you like to have each of the four
>  > >volumes *and* /The Alexandria Quartet/ in addition? Hmmm.
>  > >
>  > >I was asked by a student earlier this term during a presentation for a
>  > >course that was not my own (I spread out the 1922 'Ulysseses' and 
> 'Waste
>  > >Lands' among their compatriots in the library) why bibliographers want
>  > >the first version of the work rather than the last -- I said that's an
>  > >old lie. Bibliographers want /all/ versions at the same time. Durrell
>  > >is one who makes me want the first vision, the final revision, the
>  > >in-between, and yet at no point do I feel as though I'm entering into
>  > >some Kundera-esque censorship of history, no matter how much he
>  > >"elaborates"... Each change stays on the table as an option.
>  > >
>  > >Best,
>  > >James
>  >
>  > _______________________________________________
>  > ILDS mailing list
>  > ILDS at lists.uvic.ca
>  > https://lists.uvic.ca/mailman/listinfo/ilds
> 
> 
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
> Messenger's gone Mobile! Get it now! 
> <http://clk.atdmt.com/UKM/go/msnnkmgl0010000001ukm/direct/01/>
> 
> 
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
> 
> _______________________________________________
> ILDS mailing list
> ILDS at lists.uvic.ca
> https://lists.uvic.ca/mailman/listinfo/ilds

From bredwine1968 at earthlink.net  Sat May  3 09:22:36 2008
From: bredwine1968 at earthlink.net (Bruce Redwine)
Date: Sat, 3 May 2008 09:22:36 -0700 (GMT-07:00)
Subject: [ilds] Author v. Reader
Message-ID: <25169584.1209831756276.JavaMail.root@elwamui-cypress.atl.sa.earthlink.net>

This debate has been going on for sometime.  Barthes and the Deconstructionists made a big deal out of the primacy of the reader over the author, to wit, Barthes's formulation that "the birth of the reader must be requited by the death of the Author" (in the "Death of the Author").  All a matter of taste, I suppose, but I'm more interested in authors than readers.  I know of great authors, but don't know of any great readers, and my notion of great critics isn't what Barthes probably had in mind. 


Bruce


-----Original Message-----
>From: PETER BALDWIN <delospeter at hotmail.com>
>Sent: May 3, 2008 4:15 AM
>To: Bruce Redwine <bredwine1968 at earthlink.net>, ilds at lists.uvic.ca
>Subject: Re: [ilds] Genesis of the Quartet
>
>
>There may be no final state because for each of us our interpretaion relies on the state of mind as we read. Auden revised and we lose, I think, the edge of his 30's beliefs in the later revisions.
> 
>I have just finished Justine and query the ultimate structure of the Q against the n-dimensions we see defined by P in the Consequential Data in Justine and which must reflect the thinking behind this single novel.And I am wondering if much of it reflects D's grief at the loss of Nancy; are the feelings he reflects on the departure of Justine a mirror of his own feelings as Nancy left?
> 
>I have a couple of original Durrell - sorry, Epfs - paintings.
> 
>Does the moderator, James, authorise pictorial attachments to these emails?
> 
>In which case I can photograph a couple in their frames an attachment
> 
>Are readers aware of : The Writers Brush:Paintings, Drawings and Sculpture by Writers. Ed Donald Friedman. Minneapolis, Mid-list Press. ISBN - 978 - 0 -922811 - 76 - 2 . US $40. Contains two colour reproductions of Durrell paintings C'est LUI! (sic) and Music. I have seen neither before. They are attributed to the Artinian Collection.
> 
>A Google Search takes me to the Library collection at Austin, Artinian being a colector of 20th cent French writers - but the library catalogue reveals nothing of these paintings.
> 
>There is a review of the book, but no ref to LD, in the London Guardian Review sectionj for 29th Dec 2007.


From lillios at mail.ucf.edu  Sat May  3 09:12:22 2008
From: lillios at mail.ucf.edu (Anna Lillios)
Date: Sat, 03 May 2008 12:12:22 -0400
Subject: [ilds] Genesis of the Quartet
Message-ID: <481C56A60200004D00031B4E@mail.ucf.edu>

I can't help but think how remarkably ahead of his time Durrell was in thinking of life and art as n-dimensionality.  Tools on the internet, such as blogs, wikis, etc. allow writers continually to alter/rewrite/reinvent texts.  Variants are part of the multiplicity of consciousness today as we move away from the intense focus on one thing or the concept of an ultimate, final text.

                                                                                     --Anna

Dr. Anna Lillios
Associate Professor of English
Department of English
University of Central Florida
P.O. Box 161346
Orlando, Florida 32816-1346

Phone: (407) 823-5161
FAX: (407) 823-6582
>>> James Gifford <odos.fanourios at gmail.com> 05/03/08 11:46 AM >>>
Hello Peter,

As a moderator, I am powerless to contain your enthusiasms for 
attachments, though I must formally note that copyright is a respectable 
if quaint notion with many social privileges I lack, being merely a 
person.  Ahem.  What do your Epfses look like?

That said, /The Writer's Brush/ is in my local library, and I recall the 
images being quite nice.  Perhaps I'll jaunt up there this afternoon and 
report further.

As for Justine (and Auden), I agree, although in Durrell's case, I don't 
think the revisions diminish the artwork.  I like to have each 
publication of a poem too, though this makes my shelves swell 
increasingly...  I think I previously noted that James Brigham kept a 
very good tally of the poetic variants in his drafts for Durrell's 
/Collected Poems/, and a significant portion of his typescript includes 
variant typed on Durrell's typewriter, though it's impossible to know 
which of them whacked the keys.  Perhaps someone out there knows if LD 
was chummy about allowing others to use his machine?

But for /Justine/, given the context of multiplicity and the persistence 
of multiple editions, I tend to view this as just another indication of 
the shifting ground upon which the work rests.  For instance, apart from 
Beatrice Skordili's brilliant reading through Freud and Russell, I can 
see little reason for the movement of the objects that precipitate drama 
around themselves at the end of /Justine/ (should be the last page, 3rd 
to last paragraph, I believe).  Their enthusiastic contribution to the 
book is quite different in the omnibus, and I can't properly say why 
unless I privilege the revision process as another opportunity for 
Durrell to play his game of contradictory narratives and revolving 
doors.  They change because change is the norm an permanence the 
masquerade, and such an idea is better shown than said.

Despite his penchant for waxing philosophical, I think a major part of 
Durrell's appeal is his ability to show rather than tell at the right 
moment.  I read enough material that tells me -- when I turn to fiction, 
I'd rather be shown...

My best,
James

PETER BALDWIN wrote:
> There may be no final state because for each of us our interpretaion 
> relies on the state of mind as we read. Auden revised and we lose, I 
> think, the edge of his 30's beliefs in the later revisions.
>  
> I have just finished /Justine /and query the ultimate structure of the Q 
> against the n-dimensions we see defined by P in the Consequential Data 
> in /Justine /and which must reflect the thinking behind this single 
> novel.And I am wondering if much of it reflects D's grief at the loss of 
> Nancy; are the feelings he reflects on the departure of Justine a mirror 
> of his own feelings as Nancy left?
>  
> I have a couple of original Durrell - sorry, Epfs - paintings.
>  
> Does the moderator, James, authorise pictorial attachments to these emails?
>  
> In which case I can photograph a couple in their frames an attachment
>  
> Are readers aware of : /The Writers Brush:Paintings, Drawings and 
> Sculpture by Writers. /Ed Donald Friedman. Minneapolis, Mid-list Press. 
> ISBN - 978 - 0 -922811 - 76 - 2 . US $40. Contains two colour 
> reproductions of Durrell paintings /C'est LUI! /(sic) and /Music./ I 
> have seen neither before. They are attributed to the Artinian Collection.
>  
> A Google Search takes me to the Library collection at Austin, Artinian 
> being a colector of 20th cent French writers - but the library catalogue 
> reveals nothing of these paintings.
>  
> There is a review of the book, but no ref to LD, in the London Guardian 
> Review sectionj for 29th Dec 2007.
>  
> Peter/Delos
> 
>  > Date: Fri, 2 May 2008 14:39:54 -0700
>  > From: bredwine1968 at earthlink.net
>  > To: ilds at lists.uvic.ca
>  > Subject: Re: [ilds] Genesis of the Quartet
>  >
>  > Putting every stage or state of an author's work "on the table" is an 
> interesting idea -- for critics -- but not one, I think, that most 
> writers would want to allow. Perhaps Durrell believed this was 
> desirable, but I question his seriousness. I like to think that works 
> have a final form and that most authors prefer to see theirs finalized. 
> Openendedness is a nice idea, but I don't give equal weight to all 
> versions, mutatis mutandis, of course.
>  >
>  >
>  > Bruce
>  >
>  >
>  > -----Original Message-----
>  > >From: James Gifford <odos.fanourios at gmail.com>
>  > >Sent: May 2, 2008 11:29 AM
>  > >To: ilds at lists.uvic.ca
>  > >Subject: Re: [ilds] Genesis of the Quartet
>  > >
>  > >> Knowing that the author who wrote them was also
>  > >> nosing his way forward and still discovering his crucial form adds to
>  > >> the aesthetic of the novels. And calling them in a corporate fashion
>  > >> /The Alexandria Quartet/ seems to bind the books down in a way that I
>  > >> favor less and less.
>  > >
>  > >I agree very much here, Charles. Out of curiosity, what if we were to
>  > >insist on having all the variants of Joyce's /Dubliners/ or 
> /Ulysses/ on
>  > >the table at the same time, or for that matter, even /finengans wake/.
>  > >Just because the author eventually endorsed a single edition (kinda...)
>  > >doesn't meant that we should send every other state to the trash bin of
>  > >history -- I think that Durrell delights me, even if only in part,
>  > >because it's so terribly difficult to hold to such fictions of unity
>  > >with him.
>  > >
>  > >I'm reminded of LD's attempt to revise /Tunc/ and /Nunquam/, which
>  > >didn't appear -- would that have made a distinct /Revolt/ (albeit under
>  > >another title)? I'm still terribly caught by my first reading of the
>  > >Quintet, in which I think the author's discovery of the book during the
>  > >process of writing is hard to ignore. It's part of what makes the work
>  > >interesting.
>  > >
>  > >Charles, I'm guessing here, but would you like to have each of the four
>  > >volumes *and* /The Alexandria Quartet/ in addition? Hmmm.
>  > >
>  > >I was asked by a student earlier this term during a presentation for a
>  > >course that was not my own (I spread out the 1922 'Ulysseses' and 
> 'Waste
>  > >Lands' among their compatriots in the library) why bibliographers want
>  > >the first version of the work rather than the last -- I said that's an
>  > >old lie. Bibliographers want /all/ versions at the same time. Durrell
>  > >is one who makes me want the first vision, the final revision, the
>  > >in-between, and yet at no point do I feel as though I'm entering into
>  > >some Kundera-esque censorship of history, no matter how much he
>  > >"elaborates"... Each change stays on the table as an option.
>  > >
>  > >Best,
>  > >James
>  >
>  > _______________________________________________
>  > ILDS mailing list
>  > ILDS at lists.uvic.ca
>  > https://lists.uvic.ca/mailman/listinfo/ilds
> 
> 
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
> Messenger's gone Mobile! Get it now! 
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From godshawl at email.uc.edu  Sat May  3 10:01:25 2008
From: godshawl at email.uc.edu (william godshalk)
Date: Sat, 03 May 2008 13:01:25 -0400
Subject: [ilds] Author v. Reader
In-Reply-To: <25169584.1209831756276.JavaMail.root@elwamui-cypress.atl.s
	a.earthlink.net>
References: <25169584.1209831756276.JavaMail.root@elwamui-cypress.atl.sa.earthlink.net>
Message-ID: <CA.52.13383.F5A9C184@gwout1>

Bruce,

Durrell is dead, gone, kaput.

What remains?

Words.

Who must read the words?

Readers.
***************************************
W. L. Godshalk		*
Department of English         *
University of Cincinnati            Stellar disorder  *
Cincinnati OH 45221-0069      *
513-281-5927
***************************************



From bredwine1968 at earthlink.net  Sat May  3 10:05:13 2008
From: bredwine1968 at earthlink.net (Bruce Redwine)
Date: Sat, 3 May 2008 10:05:13 -0700 (GMT-07:00)
Subject: [ilds] Author v. Reader
Message-ID: <12225056.1209834313619.JavaMail.root@elwamui-royal.atl.sa.earthlink.net>

Bill,

I'm reading the words of authors.  I'm not reading readers who read words.


Bruce


-----Original Message-----
>From: william godshalk <godshawl at email.uc.edu>
>Sent: May 3, 2008 10:01 AM
>To: Bruce Redwine <bredwine1968 at earthlink.net>, ilds at lists.uvic.ca
>Subject: Re: [ilds] Author v. Reader
>
>Bruce,
>
>Durrell is dead, gone, kaput.
>
>What remains?
>
>Words.
>
>Who must read the words?
>
>Readers.
>***************************************
>W. L. Godshalk		*
>Department of English         *
>University of Cincinnati            Stellar disorder  *
>Cincinnati OH 45221-0069      *
>513-281-5927
>***************************************
>
>
>_______________________________________________
>ILDS mailing list
>ILDS at lists.uvic.ca
>https://lists.uvic.ca/mailman/listinfo/ilds


From godshawl at email.uc.edu  Sat May  3 10:15:30 2008
From: godshawl at email.uc.edu (william godshalk)
Date: Sat, 03 May 2008 13:15:30 -0400
Subject: [ilds] words written and read and shared
In-Reply-To: <12225056.1209834313619.JavaMail.root@elwamui-royal.atl.sa.
	earthlink.net>
References: <12225056.1209834313619.JavaMail.root@elwamui-royal.atl.sa.earthlink.net>
Message-ID: <24.47.06210.CAD9C184@gwout2>

Actually, Bruce, you are reading the words contained in the OED. 
These words do not belong to any particular reader or writer.

Durrell took these words and put them in to form.

But he's dead.

And all you have is words, words, words.

If you admire the form of the words, good.

But a dead author is a dead author -- whether you like to read her or 
him, or not.

You can't share a beer with Larry and ask him what he thinks. And 
listen to him lie.

At 01:05 PM 5/3/2008, you wrote:
>Bill,
>
>I'm reading the words of authors.  I'm not reading readers who read words.
>
>
>Bruce
>
>
>-----Original Message-----
> >From: william godshalk <godshawl at email.uc.edu>
> >Sent: May 3, 2008 10:01 AM
> >To: Bruce Redwine <bredwine1968 at earthlink.net>, ilds at lists.uvic.ca
> >Subject: Re: [ilds] Author v. Reader
> >
> >Bruce,
> >
> >Durrell is dead, gone, kaput.
> >
> >What remains?
> >
> >Words.
> >
> >Who must read the words?
> >
> >Readers.
> >***************************************
> >W. L. Godshalk         *
> >Department of English         *
> >University of Cincinnati            Stellar disorder  *
> >Cincinnati OH 45221-0069      *
> >513-281-5927
> >***************************************
> >
> >
> >_______________________________________________
> >ILDS mailing list
> >ILDS at lists.uvic.ca
> >https://lists.uvic.ca/mailman/listinfo/ilds
>
>_______________________________________________
>ILDS mailing list
>ILDS at lists.uvic.ca
>https://lists.uvic.ca/mailman/listinfo/ilds

***************************************
W. L. Godshalk		*
Department of English         *
University of Cincinnati            Stellar disorder  *
Cincinnati OH 45221-0069      *
513-281-5927
***************************************



From slighcl at wfu.edu  Sat May  3 14:14:42 2008
From: slighcl at wfu.edu (slighcl)
Date: Sat, 03 May 2008 17:14:42 -0400
Subject: [ilds] words written and read and shared
In-Reply-To: <24.47.06210.CAD9C184@gwout2>
References: <12225056.1209834313619.JavaMail.root@elwamui-royal.atl.sa.earthlink.net>
	<24.47.06210.CAD9C184@gwout2>
Message-ID: <481CD5C2.2020908@wfu.edu>

> On 5/3/2008 1:15 PM, william godshalk wrote:
>> Actually, Bruce, you are reading the words contained in the OED. 
>> These words do not belong to any particular reader or writer.
>>
>> Durrell took these words and put them in to form.
>>
>> But he's dead.
>>
>> And all you have is words, words, words.
>>
>> If you admire the form of the words, good.
>>
>> But a dead author is a dead author -- whether you like to read her or 
>> him, or not.
>>
>> You can't share a beer with Larry and ask him what he thinks. And 
>> listen to him lie.
>>     
I find Bill's explanation of our dilemma to be consistent with what I 
understand to be the mater and the spirit of /Hamlet /and with what I 
understand to be the matter and the spirit of /The Alexandria Quartet/.  

That Bill's explanation holds up when set to the touchstone of /Hamlet 
/and the /Quartet /means something, I think.

I would not worry about Barthes & co., Bruce.  I do not believe anyone 
else has brought up any esoteric terms or continental theories of 
writing and reading and understanding that are not already apart of what 
Durrell or Shax or Montaigne each understood to be the case.  So let us 
just work with the materials at hand.  Durrell and Shax and Montaigne 
were all steeped in skepticism.  I look to /Hamlet /and to the /Quartet 
/for my formative ideas about literature and about reading.  They are 
dark, difficult pleasures, indeed.

Charles

-- 
**********************
Charles L. Sligh
Department of English
Wake Forest University
slighcl at wfu.edu
**********************

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From bredwine1968 at earthlink.net  Sat May  3 16:05:53 2008
From: bredwine1968 at earthlink.net (Bruce Redwine)
Date: Sat, 3 May 2008 16:05:53 -0700 (GMT-07:00)
Subject: [ilds] words written and read and shared
Message-ID: <20220198.1209855953915.JavaMail.root@elwamui-mouette.atl.sa.earthlink.net>

Sorry, Bill, but I'm just dense.  I don't understand what you're saying or the point you're trying to make, which you don't elaborate on.  I will, however, make a wild guess loosely based on Saussure's formulation.  I.e., language exists as arbitrary symbols with unstable referents.  Words have variable meanings within a synchronic system, and they also change diachronically.  Meaning is inherently unstable.  Authors use words, and their intent in using those words is unknowable.  Since words belong to all speakers of a language, an author's words are up for grabs, and the readers who seize and interpret them as they choose  have an equal status with the guy who wrote them.

I see the conclusion to this crude syllogism as fallacious and do not agree with anything that follows "authors."

It amazes me that some literary critics no longer credit authors with their own words, which is what I see you, Bill, doing.  On the other hand, I guess (again) that you're amazed that I have the hubris to assume I can possibly know what Lawrence Durrell was up to.  My response to that -- careful inferences can be made and intentions recovered, within reasonable expectations.  Understanding one another in everyday circumstances is usually about making inferences based on a host of factors, linguistic and extralinguistic, and no one seems bothered by that.  We as speaking beings stumble along from day to day, communication and understanding often occur, and it seems to me criticism should strive to do the same.


Bruce



-----Original Message-----
>From: william godshalk <godshawl at email.uc.edu>
>Sent: May 3, 2008 10:15 AM
>To: Bruce Redwine <bredwine1968 at earthlink.net>, ilds at lists.uvic.ca
>Subject: words written and read and shared
>
>Actually, Bruce, you are reading the words contained in the OED. 
>These words do not belong to any particular reader or writer.
>
>Durrell took these words and put them in to form.
>
>But he's dead.
>
>And all you have is words, words, words.
>
>If you admire the form of the words, good.
>
>But a dead author is a dead author -- whether you like to read her or 
>him, or not.
>
>You can't share a beer with Larry and ask him what he thinks. And 
>listen to him lie.
>
>At 01:05 PM 5/3/2008, you wrote:
>>Bill,
>>
>>I'm reading the words of authors.  I'm not reading readers who read words.
>>
>>
>>Bruce
>>
>>
>>-----Original Message-----
>> >From: william godshalk <godshawl at email.uc.edu>
>> >Sent: May 3, 2008 10:01 AM
>> >To: Bruce Redwine <bredwine1968 at earthlink.net>, ilds at lists.uvic.ca
>> >Subject: Re: [ilds] Author v. Reader
>> >
>> >Bruce,
>> >
>> >Durrell is dead, gone, kaput.
>> >
>> >What remains?
>> >
>> >Words.
>> >
>> >Who must read the words?
>> >
>> >Readers.


From slighcl at wfu.edu  Sat May  3 16:46:27 2008
From: slighcl at wfu.edu (slighcl)
Date: Sat, 03 May 2008 19:46:27 -0400
Subject: [ilds] words written and read and shared
In-Reply-To: <20220198.1209855953915.JavaMail.root@elwamui-mouette.atl.sa.earthlink.net>
References: <20220198.1209855953915.JavaMail.root@elwamui-mouette.atl.sa.earthlink.net>
Message-ID: <481CF953.8050204@wfu.edu>

On 5/3/2008 7:05 PM, Bruce Redwine wrote:
> Sorry, Bill, but I'm just dense.  I don't understand what you're saying or the point you're trying to make, which you don't elaborate on.  I will, however, make a wild guess loosely based on Saussure's formulation.  
I will not speak for Bill.  But I have no need of any other source 
beyond Lawrence Durrell and his Pursewarden for noting the severe 
skepticism about language and meaning that run through the /Quartet/.  
Cf. especially the posthumous reports on Pursewarden in /Balthazar 
/regarding Pursewarden's letting the read "sink or skim" or throwing the 
reader back upon his resources. 

Why trot out Guy Fawkeses or bug-bears or Aunt Sally's like Saussure or 
Barthes &c.?  No need to throw sand, I think.  Surely Durrell's works 
provide ample evidence for us all to weigh and to consider 
and--yes--about which to disagree.

While at the library the other night I thought again of what you said 
about the poet Lawrence Durrell and the poet John Keats, Bruce, and I 
thank you for drawing my thoughts toward those two. In his essay in /The 
Windmill /from the 1940s Durrell writes the following:


>
> "Each great man builds a cocoon out his work which finally swallows 
> not only his life but also his death.  Could Homer be anything but 
> delighted to see Schliemann dig up his Iliad bodily out of the 
> ground?  I have hunted through every museum in Greece looking for 
> Keats' Grecian Urn."
By the way, in this same essay, Durrell--or whichever persona utters 
these gnomic "Significant Data"-like fragments--recalls another persona 
("V.") as saying "All poetry partakes of the epitaph."  Mighty food for 
thought in that line.

Does anyone know if "V." refers to a particular or to an imagined someone?

Charles

-- 
**********************
Charles L. Sligh
Department of English
Wake Forest University
slighcl at wfu.edu
**********************

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From bredwine1968 at earthlink.net  Sat May  3 17:34:54 2008
From: bredwine1968 at earthlink.net (Bruce Redwine)
Date: Sat, 3 May 2008 17:34:54 -0700 (GMT-07:00)
Subject: [ilds] words written and read and shared
Message-ID: <22134102.1209861294792.JavaMail.root@elwamui-polski.atl.sa.earthlink.net>

Charles, this reminds me of sitting at the dinner table among polite company and forswearing to talk about religion or politics.  Behind assertions lie theories, theories shape views, and that's what I've brought up.  But if this is considered impolite, I won't pursue.

Re Keats's Grecian urn, Durrell should have gone to the British Museum and looked at the Elgin marbles, as every good school boy knows.


Bruce


-----Original Message-----
>From: slighcl <slighcl at wfu.edu>
>Sent: May 3, 2008 4:46 PM
>To: Bruce Redwine <bredwine1968 at earthlink.net>, ilds at lists.uvic.ca
>Subject: Re: [ilds] words written and read and shared
>
>On 5/3/2008 7:05 PM, Bruce Redwine wrote:
>> Sorry, Bill, but I'm just dense.  I don't understand what you're saying or the point you're trying to make, which you don't elaborate on.  I will, however, make a wild guess loosely based on Saussure's formulation.  
>I will not speak for Bill.  But I have no need of any other source 
>beyond Lawrence Durrell and his Pursewarden for noting the severe 
>skepticism about language and meaning that run through the /Quartet/.  
>Cf. especially the posthumous reports on Pursewarden in /Balthazar 
>/regarding Pursewarden's letting the read "sink or skim" or throwing the 
>reader back upon his resources. 
>
>Why trot out Guy Fawkeses or bug-bears or Aunt Sally's like Saussure or 
>Barthes &c.?  No need to throw sand, I think.  Surely Durrell's works 
>provide ample evidence for us all to weigh and to consider 
>and--yes--about which to disagree.
>
>While at the library the other night I thought again of what you said 
>about the poet Lawrence Durrell and the poet John Keats, Bruce, and I 
>thank you for drawing my thoughts toward those two. In his essay in /The 
>Windmill /from the 1940s Durrell writes the following:
>
>
>>
>> "Each great man builds a cocoon out his work which finally swallows 
>> not only his life but also his death.  Could Homer be anything but 
>> delighted to see Schliemann dig up his Iliad bodily out of the 
>> ground?  I have hunted through every museum in Greece looking for 
>> Keats' Grecian Urn."
>By the way, in this same essay, Durrell--or whichever persona utters 
>these gnomic "Significant Data"-like fragments--recalls another persona 
>("V.") as saying "All poetry partakes of the epitaph."  Mighty food for 
>thought in that line.
>
>Does anyone know if "V." refers to a particular or to an imagined someone?
>
>Charles
>
>-- 
>**********************
>Charles L. Sligh
>Department of English
>Wake Forest University
>slighcl at wfu.edu
>**********************
>


From hungerist at hotmail.com  Sat May  3 21:32:01 2008
From: hungerist at hotmail.com (Alejandro Adams)
Date: Sat, 3 May 2008 21:32:01 -0700
Subject: [ilds] Author v. Reader
References: <mailman.3.1209841204.6041718.ilds@lists.uvic.ca>
Message-ID: <BAY123-DAV2CD71C8AC29B7633003DBA2D40@phx.gbl>

Every contribution to this list is a brick in the altar to one of the gods 
of world literature (and merely to subscribe to this list is to meditate 
before that altar).  To place one of these bricks while insisting that one 
is not, in fact, a worshipper seems a quibbling, untenable rejection of the 
primal urge to worship--or, more neutrally, to follow a leader--or, more 
neutrally still, to recognize and honor a standard, to say one thing is 
better than the rest.

We fear the unspoken accusations of elitism because they are accurate. 
There is no way to proletarianize Durrell, I fear.  When they come for the 
decadent elite, we will be the first to face the wall.

As a Mr. Godshalk attempts to suffocate our deity, a Mr. Redwine rushes to 
revive him.  Given the playfully tenuous relationship of the academy to 
reality, metaphorical murder--death by interpretation--should qualify as a 
graver, more heinous act than the taking of an actual human life ("human" 
and "life" are precisely the sort of terms which stimulate our 
deconstructionlust!).  Thus this happy practice of god-killing baffles me 
more than do all the other badges of dubious honor which gleam in the dim 
hallways of our universities.

However...I am unable to deduce the of the nuances of Mr. Godshalk's 
reasoning from his terse, smug, pungently elitist assertions.  He does not 
deign to reveal the the scaffolding and wet paint which surely are required, 
in his profession, between such formidable lines.  We may forego footnotes 
in such a refreshingly casual forum, but let's not forego ideas altogether.

Duly insulted on behalf of the casual reader,
Alejandro Adams


From ilyas.khan at crosby.com  Sun May  4 07:04:05 2008
From: ilyas.khan at crosby.com (Ilyas)
Date: Sun, 04 May 2008 15:04:05 +0100
Subject: [ilds] Author v. Reader
In-Reply-To: <BAY123-DAV2CD71C8AC29B7633003DBA2D40@phx.gbl>
Message-ID: <C44380E5.1013%ilyas.khan@crosby.com>

Senor Adams

You may well have some interesting ideas, but you sure as hell can't express
them in written form. What on earth are you talking about and what are you
trying to say ? Ever thought of plain English ? I think you dislike
something that may have been written by "Mr Godshalk", but more than that
remains a mystery.

I am a casual reader, and you certainly did not reply "on my behalf".




On 04/05/2008 05:32, "Alejandro Adams" <hungerist at hotmail.com> wrote:

> Every contribution to this list is a brick in the altar to one of the gods
> of world literature (and merely to subscribe to this list is to meditate
> before that altar).  To place one of these bricks while insisting that one
> is not, in fact, a worshipper seems a quibbling, untenable rejection of the
> primal urge to worship--or, more neutrally, to follow a leader--or, more
> neutrally still, to recognize and honor a standard, to say one thing is
> better than the rest.
> 
> We fear the unspoken accusations of elitism because they are accurate.
> There is no way to proletarianize Durrell, I fear.  When they come for the
> decadent elite, we will be the first to face the wall.
> 
> As a Mr. Godshalk attempts to suffocate our deity, a Mr. Redwine rushes to
> revive him.  Given the playfully tenuous relationship of the academy to
> reality, metaphorical murder--death by interpretation--should qualify as a
> graver, more heinous act than the taking of an actual human life ("human"
> and "life" are precisely the sort of terms which stimulate our
> deconstructionlust!).  Thus this happy practice of god-killing baffles me
> more than do all the other badges of dubious honor which gleam in the dim
> hallways of our universities.
> 
> However...I am unable to deduce the of the nuances of Mr. Godshalk's
> reasoning from his terse, smug, pungently elitist assertions.  He does not
> deign to reveal the the scaffolding and wet paint which surely are required,
> in his profession, between such formidable lines.  We may forego footnotes
> in such a refreshingly casual forum, but let's not forego ideas altogether.
> 
> Duly insulted on behalf of the casual reader,
> Alejandro Adams
> 
> _______________________________________________
> ILDS mailing list
> ILDS at lists.uvic.ca
> https://lists.uvic.ca/mailman/listinfo/ilds



From bredwine1968 at earthlink.net  Sun May  4 09:32:43 2008
From: bredwine1968 at earthlink.net (Bruce Redwine)
Date: Sun, 4 May 2008 09:32:43 -0700 (GMT-07:00)
Subject: [ilds] "The Windmill"
Message-ID: <23929670.1209918763504.JavaMail.root@elwamui-muscovy.atl.sa.earthlink.net>

Charles, what's the source for the essay, "The Windmill?"  Do you have a citation?


Bruce


>-----Original Message-----
>>From: slighcl <slighcl at wfu.edu>
>>Sent: May 3, 2008 4:46 PM
>>To: Bruce Redwine <bredwine1968 at earthlink.net>, ilds at lists.uvic.ca
>>Subject: Re: [ilds] words written and read and shared

>>While at the library the other night I thought again of what you said 
>>about the poet Lawrence Durrell and the poet John Keats, Bruce, and I 
>>thank you for drawing my thoughts toward those two. In his essay in /The 
>>Windmill /from the 1940s Durrell writes the following:
>>

>>> "Each great man builds a cocoon out his work which finally swallows 
>>> not only his life but also his death.  Could Homer be anything but 
>>> delighted to see Schliemann dig up his Iliad bodily out of the 
>>> ground?  I have hunted through every museum in Greece looking for 
>>> Keats' Grecian Urn."
>>By the way, in this same essay, Durrell--or whichever persona utters 
>>these gnomic "Significant Data"-like fragments--recalls another persona 
>>("V.") as saying "All poetry partakes of the epitaph."  Mighty food for 
>>thought in that line.
>>
>>Does anyone know if "V." refers to a particular or to an imagined someone?
>>
>>Charles
>>
>>-- 
>>**********************
>>Charles L. Sligh
>>Department of English
>>Wake Forest University
>>slighcl at wfu.edu
>>**********************
>>


From odos.fanourios at gmail.com  Sun May  4 09:48:12 2008
From: odos.fanourios at gmail.com (James Gifford)
Date: Sun, 04 May 2008 10:48:12 -0600
Subject: [ilds] "The Windmill"
In-Reply-To: <23929670.1209918763504.JavaMail.root@elwamui-muscovy.atl.sa.earthlink.net>
References: <23929670.1209918763504.JavaMail.root@elwamui-muscovy.atl.sa.earthlink.net>
Message-ID: <481DE8CC.5090406@gmail.com>

Durrell, Lawrence. "From a Writer's Journal." /The Windmill (London)/ 
2.6 (1947): 50-58.

A fascinating collection of materials, though as usual, Durrell's 
published 'diaries' are heavily edited, much like the later "Endpapers 
and Inklings," from this the protagonist is removed from the pages...

Bruce Redwine wrote:
> Charles, what's the source for the essay, "The
>  Windmill?"  Do you have a citation?


From odos.fanourios at gmail.com  Sun May  4 09:49:29 2008
From: odos.fanourios at gmail.com (James Gifford)
Date: Sun, 04 May 2008 10:49:29 -0600
Subject: [ilds] "The Windmill"
In-Reply-To: <23929670.1209918763504.JavaMail.root@elwamui-muscovy.atl.sa.earthlink.net>
References: <23929670.1209918763504.JavaMail.root@elwamui-muscovy.atl.sa.earthlink.net>
Message-ID: <481DE919.4010301@gmail.com>

I should have added:

http://www.durrell-school-corfu.org/bibliog/

Best,
James

ps: I need to do some extensive updates on that soon...

Bruce Redwine wrote:
> Charles, what's the source for the essay, "The
 > Windmill?"  Do you have a citation?
> 
> 
> Bruce

From odos.fanourios at gmail.com  Sun May  4 09:52:09 2008
From: odos.fanourios at gmail.com (James Gifford)
Date: Sun, 04 May 2008 10:52:09 -0600
Subject: [ilds] words written and read and shared
In-Reply-To: <22134102.1209861294792.JavaMail.root@elwamui-polski.atl.sa.earthlink.net>
References: <22134102.1209861294792.JavaMail.root@elwamui-polski.atl.sa.earthlink.net>
Message-ID: <481DE9B9.4050508@gmail.com>

> Charles, this reminds me of sitting at the dinner
> table among polite company and forswearing to talk 
> about religion or politics. 

I, for one, don't mind if mixed company sits down at the table.  I think 
I may be part of the mixed company myself, and I like the shift from 
serving the food to sharing it.  As for forswearing the most interesting 
topics of conversation, /that/ implies a very strong presence indeed, 
one that is already rife with theories and interpretive demands.

But, for the troop of casual readers out there, I have to agree with 
Ilyas that we should not foreclose on such readers' interests or 
attentiveness to the book in hand.  I had a nice chat last night in a 
pub known for mixed company (and actors, oh my), and that turned to the 
problem of which book we read, how we privilege the author (by 
'intentions' or as a function or figure, etc.), and how we agree that a 
given book is the same book in its various appearances and guises.

I found myself arguing that if I had two different copies of /Justine/, 
they are two different books, even though both have an author behind 
them who likely had intentions and maybe even wrote or lied about them, 
and even though a reader would find the book to be the same book if I 
were to reprint it on a series of cereal boxes.  Yet, does that sameness 
depend upon some 'emergent property' of the book (the marks indicating 
words), or does it rely on the reader's interpretive activities?

Personally, I'm not comfortable going too far into a book's 'emergent 
properties' because it sounds too much like metaphysics for my tastes. 
Just how many emergent properties can fit into the last period of 
/Ulysses/?  For that reason, I'm interested in the differences between 
my various books and the things different readers do with them.  I don't 
want to deify any author, though I acknowledge the demiurge in the 
creator -- I like my authors to mind their proper place in mixed 
company: on the table on the back of the dustcover, preferably face 
down.  I'd expect the same treatment for myself.

So, by way of query:

Bruce, you've held that Durrell is astonishingly adept at hiding himself 
in his works, essentially keeping 'ur-Durrell' masked and perpetually 
out of sight, obfuscated.  Yet, you'd like to keep the author in the 
text.  I can see the appeal of both ideas (and I regularly feel their 
faint impulse), but how do you reconcile them without taking on the garb 
of a reader yourself, the greatest reader you've likely ever seen in 
action?  I agree that Durrell was a masterful writer, but I wonder just 
how far I can trust my speculations on him.

Bill, Durrell's dead, and I think you mean a broader authorial death in 
that statement.  Personally, I like the koans you drop in our midst like 
pebbles, even if the ripples make a few folks seasick, but I'm curious 
if you put the Durrell books together in your library, and if so, why? 
Are you a fan of some kind of author function if not an author hirself?

Ilyas -- the mystery man...  Even if you're a self-styled casual reader, 
I don't think I'd call your chosen repertoire casual in any way.  I'm 
still very intrigued to see a reading in action.  For instance, what can 
you tell me about your Tarquin?  I'm in a personal hunt after his 
emergence in /Panic Spring/ and the rumour that he made a brief 
appearance in California under George Leite's influence in what is a 
very mixed Circle indeed.  Any thoughts?

Best of Sunday mornings to everyone,
James

Bruce Redwine wrote:
> Charles, this reminds me of sitting at the dinner table among polite company and forswearing to talk about religion or politics.  Behind assertions lie theories, theories shape views, and that's what I've brought up.  But if this is considered impolite, I won't pursue.
> 
> Re Keats's Grecian urn, Durrell should have gone to the British Museum and looked at the Elgin marbles, as every good school boy knows.
> 
> 
> Bruce
> 
> 
> -----Original Message-----
>> From: slighcl <slighcl at wfu.edu>
>> Sent: May 3, 2008 4:46 PM
>> To: Bruce Redwine <bredwine1968 at earthlink.net>, ilds at lists.uvic.ca
>> Subject: Re: [ilds] words written and read and shared
>>
>> On 5/3/2008 7:05 PM, Bruce Redwine wrote:
>>> Sorry, Bill, but I'm just dense.  I don't understand what you're saying or the point you're trying to make, which you don't elaborate on.  I will, however, make a wild guess loosely based on Saussure's formulation.  
>> I will not speak for Bill.  But I have no need of any other source 
>> beyond Lawrence Durrell and his Pursewarden for noting the severe 
>> skepticism about language and meaning that run through the /Quartet/.  
>> Cf. especially the posthumous reports on Pursewarden in /Balthazar 
>> /regarding Pursewarden's letting the read "sink or skim" or throwing the 
>> reader back upon his resources. 
>>
>> Why trot out Guy Fawkeses or bug-bears or Aunt Sally's like Saussure or 
>> Barthes &c.?  No need to throw sand, I think.  Surely Durrell's works 
>> provide ample evidence for us all to weigh and to consider 
>> and--yes--about which to disagree.
>>
>> While at the library the other night I thought again of what you said 
>> about the poet Lawrence Durrell and the poet John Keats, Bruce, and I 
>> thank you for drawing my thoughts toward those two. In his essay in /The 
>> Windmill /from the 1940s Durrell writes the following:
>>
>>
>>> "Each great man builds a cocoon out his work which finally swallows 
>>> not only his life but also his death.  Could Homer be anything but 
>>> delighted to see Schliemann dig up his Iliad bodily out of the 
>>> ground?  I have hunted through every museum in Greece looking for 
>>> Keats' Grecian Urn."
>> By the way, in this same essay, Durrell--or whichever persona utters 
>> these gnomic "Significant Data"-like fragments--recalls another persona 
>> ("V.") as saying "All poetry partakes of the epitaph."  Mighty food for 
>> thought in that line.
>>
>> Does anyone know if "V." refers to a particular or to an imagined someone?
>>
>> Charles
>>
>> -- 
>> **********************
>> Charles L. Sligh
>> Department of English
>> Wake Forest University
>> slighcl at wfu.edu
>> **********************
>>
> 
> _______________________________________________
> ILDS mailing list
> ILDS at lists.uvic.ca
> https://lists.uvic.ca/mailman/listinfo/ilds
> 

From odos.fanourios at gmail.com  Sun May  4 10:16:03 2008
From: odos.fanourios at gmail.com (James Gifford)
Date: Sun, 04 May 2008 11:16:03 -0600
Subject: [ilds] words written and read and shared
In-Reply-To: <20220198.1209855953915.JavaMail.root@elwamui-mouette.atl.sa.earthlink.net>
References: <20220198.1209855953915.JavaMail.root@elwamui-mouette.atl.sa.earthlink.net>
Message-ID: <481DEF53.4080708@gmail.com>

> It amazes me that some literary critics no
> longer credit authors with their own words, 
> which is what I see you, Bill, doing.  On 
> the other hand, I guess (again) that you're 
> amazed that I have the hubris to assume I 
> can possibly know what Lawrence Durrell was 
> up to.  My response to that -- careful i
> inferences can be made and intentions 
> recovered, within reasonable expectations.  
> Understanding one another in everyday 
> circumstances is usually about making 
> inferences based on a host of factors, 
> linguistic and extralinguistic, and no one 
> seems bothered by that.  We as speaking 
> beings stumble along from day to day, 
> communication and understanding often occur, 
> and it seems to me criticism should strive 
> to do the same.

Nice put, Bruce.  While I regularly rely on inferences within reasonable 
expectations (as you put it), I'm certain not convinced that I should 
label those inferences anything other than my own 'reading.'  I suppose 
what I mean is, insofar as the author is privileged with copyright, 
alphabetization in the library, and a shocking array of cover photos, I 
see a need for a balance: the reader.  We are creatures that play a 
marvellous language game, and while I wouldn't call it hubris to guess 
at what Lawrence Durrell was up to as an author, I'd likely go weak in 
my knees if I called that guess something other than a reading -- after 
all, who is doing the guessing, reasonable or otherwise?

After all, when I go to a concert, as I hope to do this evening, I don't 
actually "hear Chopin" even though I might say that -- I hear a 
performance by an interpreter of something Chopin wrote.  Chopin gets 
intellectual rights, alphabetization, and expired copyright, but I'm 
still listening to Rafal Blechacz, much like when I pick up a book 
(among many) with Durrell's name on the spine, *I'm* reading.  And, as a 
writer, how many people would know that I'd originally written 
"Beethoven" rather than "Chopin," and who would reasonably guess why I'd 
changed it (much like the shifts from "Keats" to "Blake" in 
/Balthazar/'s corrected proofs).

But I suggest that Bill really means (intends...) for his expired author 
to be much like Barthes': polemical.  Barthes' still wanted copyright 
and tenure based on his books -- he just wanted us to attend to readers 
as well.  There are risks in mind-reading dead people, and a s?ance 
might be as close as many readers' interpretations, so despite 
reasonable inferences, why not add readers to the pot as well.  Without 
the reader, reading becomes passive voice, and we all know what Orwell 
thought of that!

At least, I must admit I want both, though Bill may think I've made an 
unreasonable inference...  Will he correct me, or does this author 
prefer to leave his text out there in the world, to make its way on its own?

Best,
James

ps: Bruce, is the "bre(a)dwine" in your email address an intentional 
sacrament, or is that just my reading?  I'll continue to choose to read 
your postings as body & blood offered up to us...  Still, reasonable 
inferences with regard to some authors come with material risks, so if 
we want to get into hermeneutics of /that/ book, I'd really prefer the 
author remain dead, in Nietzsche's sense, and we focus on the readers.

From odos.fanourios at gmail.com  Sun May  4 10:44:32 2008
From: odos.fanourios at gmail.com (James Gifford)
Date: Sun, 04 May 2008 11:44:32 -0600
Subject: [ilds] Genesis of the Quartet
In-Reply-To: <481C56A60200004D00031B4E@mail.ucf.edu>
References: <481C56A60200004D00031B4E@mail.ucf.edu>
Message-ID: <481DF600.1000602@gmail.com>

> I can't help but think how remarkably ahead 
> of his time Durrell was in thinking of life 
> and art as n-dimensionality.  Tools on the 
> internet, such as blogs, wikis, etc. allow 
> writers continually to alter/rewrite/reinvent 
> texts.  Variants are part of the multiplicity 
> of consciousness today as we move away from 
> the intense focus on one thing or the concept 
> of an ultimate, final text.

Nicely put, Anna.  I can only imagine what Durrell's blog might be and 
how many times he'd revise it, though I suspect he'd leave a goodly 
record of his revisions in the wiki...  The Durrellian wikipedia entries 
could bear some expansion, and I note several authors now edit their own 
descriptions.

But, this notion sends me back to a rather problematic article by Milan 
Kundera from last year, in which he attacks the archive as a limitation 
of his authorial powers of continual revisions: it's a delusion of 
equality in a mass grave to think I can read /Justine/ 1957 instead of 
/The Alexandria Quartet/, or so he tells me.  In his vision, there's no 
equality between those books, and I ought to bury my first edition, 
third impression in the backyard.  In other words, Kundera will revise 
his book any time he wants, and the readers will read what he tells them 
to.  Personally, I think it's a ploy to get more cash from copyright... 
  As he phrases it:

> I will go still further: "the work" is what the writer will 
> approve in his own final assessment. For life is short, 
> reading is long, and literature is in the process of killing 
> itself off through an insane proliferation. Every novelist, 
> starting with his own work, should eliminate whatever is 
> secondary, lay out for himself and for everyone else the 
> ethic of the essential 
> 
> But it is not only the writers, the hundreds and thousands 
> of writers; there are also the researchers, the armies of 
> researchers who, guided by some opposite ethic, 
> accumulate everything they can find to embrace the 
> Whole, a supreme goal. The Whole, which includes a 
> mountain of drafts, deleted paragraphs, chapters rejected 
> by the author but published by researchers, in what are 
> called "critical editions", under the perfidious title 
> "variants", which means, if words still have meaning, 
> that anything the author wrote is worth as much as 
> anything else, that it would be similarly approved by 
> him. 
> 
> The ethic of the essential has given way to the ethic of the 
> archive. (The archive's ideal: the sweet equality that 
> reigns in an enormous common grave.)

My hesitation with Kundera here is that I worry he'll start sneaking 
into my house, replacing my copies of his books with fresh ones, and 
perhaps he'll throw out all of my copies of /Dubliners/ while he's at 
it, since none are "the work."  I suspect he'd do the same thing with 
his own blog.  As I said in my last post, I prefer my authors stay on 
the back of the book and leave the interior to me, even if they like to 
continue generating new books.  Kundera may see my equality as purchased 
at the cost of his own grave, but I'm not willing to let him revise 
history and consign the variants that critics have chaffed him over to 
its dustbin.  I like Durrell's approach better -- the book can keep 
changing, but the variants float about as well.  The variants carry on 
living, even if the author has expired and become one their readers.  I 
don't think there's any record of Durrell suppressing a variant or 
previous edition, such as the US printings that likely earned him the 
most cash.  I suspect he'd rather like the variety, much as he liked it 
in Shakespeare, and said so.

I suppose, in Kundera's terms, as a reader and bibliographer, I'm not 
interested in the ur-text or "the work," but neither am I going to 
construct some metaphysics of "THE WHOLE," since there's always a 
supposed HOLE in that, a lack...  He's just setting up a straw man, in 
this case because he's made itchy by the notion of genetic criticism, 
hence the use of Flaubert as his example.

Personally, I'm interested in every different version I can get.  If my 
authors don't like that, they can tell me so in a letter, which I will 
then promptly donate to the archive for my modest tax relief.  He can 
worry about spectres rising from that grave, but I'll be engaged in a 
lively reading.

Best,
James

From bredwine1968 at earthlink.net  Sun May  4 12:00:29 2008
From: bredwine1968 at earthlink.net (Bruce Redwine)
Date: Sun, 4 May 2008 12:00:29 -0700 (GMT-07:00)
Subject: [ilds] Readings
Message-ID: <30260415.1209927629486.JavaMail.root@elwamui-lapwing.atl.sa.earthlink.net>

James,

A "reading" of a literary text can be an enjoyable pastime, as we're doing now.  Some "readings" are better or more definitive than others, and authors and composers couldn't exist very well without readers and performers.  Which "reading" you prefer is a matter of personal preference.  It seems necessary to state the obvious.  But the creators of art stand above their admirers, and no "reading" has equal standing with its ultimate source, which I think some criticism advocates or is in danger of advocating.  Another obvious point.  Great works of art will last, and everything else related to them is derivative, transitory, and at best deserving of a footnote in history.  A hundred years from now, I like to think, The Alexandria Quartet will still be read and enjoyed, and all the present "readings" and writings about the Quartet will be considered deadwood by a new group of scholars who are supremely confident they hold the key to interpretation.

Being the author of "bredwine," I state unequivocally that I had no intention of insinuating the Blessed Sacrament.  Although considering the ingenuity of your reading, perhaps I should have.  This does not, by the way, prove your point, for I don't consider anything I write "literature."

Your Chopin example is interesting.  Musicians are considered artists but art critics are not.  I think this disparity has led literary critics to invent Deconstruction and even the score. 


Bruce


-----Original Message-----
>From: James Gifford <odos.fanourios at gmail.com>
>Sent: May 4, 2008 10:16 AM
>To: ilds at lists.uvic.ca
>Subject: Re: [ilds] words written and read and shared
>

>Nice put, Bruce.  While I regularly rely on inferences within reasonable 
>expectations (as you put it), I'm certain not convinced that I should 
>label those inferences anything other than my own 'reading.'  I suppose 
>what I mean is, insofar as the author is privileged with copyright, 
>alphabetization in the library, and a shocking array of cover photos, I 
>see a need for a balance: the reader.  We are creatures that play a 
>marvellous language game, and while I wouldn't call it hubris to guess 
>at what Lawrence Durrell was up to as an author, I'd likely go weak in 
>my knees if I called that guess something other than a reading -- after 
>all, who is doing the guessing, reasonable or otherwise?
>
>After all, when I go to a concert, as I hope to do this evening, I don't 
>actually "hear Chopin" even though I might say that -- I hear a 
>performance by an interpreter of something Chopin wrote.  Chopin gets 
>intellectual rights, alphabetization, and expired copyright, but I'm 
>still listening to Rafal Blechacz, much like when I pick up a book 
>(among many) with Durrell's name on the spine, *I'm* reading.  And, as a 
>writer, how many people would know that I'd originally written 
>"Beethoven" rather than "Chopin," and who would reasonably guess why I'd 
>changed it (much like the shifts from "Keats" to "Blake" in 
>/Balthazar/'s corrected proofs).
>
>But I suggest that Bill really means (intends...) for his expired author 
>to be much like Barthes': polemical.  Barthes' still wanted copyright 
>and tenure based on his books -- he just wanted us to attend to readers 
>as well.  There are risks in mind-reading dead people, and a s?ance 
>might be as close as many readers' interpretations, so despite 
>reasonable inferences, why not add readers to the pot as well.  Without 
>the reader, reading becomes passive voice, and we all know what Orwell 
>thought of that!
>
>At least, I must admit I want both, though Bill may think I've made an 
>unreasonable inference...  Will he correct me, or does this author 
>prefer to leave his text out there in the world, to make its way on its own?
>
>Best,
>James
>
>ps: Bruce, is the "bre(a)dwine" in your email address an intentional 
>sacrament, or is that just my reading?  I'll continue to choose to read 
>your postings as body & blood offered up to us...  Still, reasonable 
>inferences with regard to some authors come with material risks, so if 
>we want to get into hermeneutics of /that/ book, I'd really prefer the 
>author remain dead, in Nietzsche's sense, and we focus on the readers.



From bredwine1968 at earthlink.net  Sun May  4 12:03:34 2008
From: bredwine1968 at earthlink.net (Bruce Redwine)
Date: Sun, 4 May 2008 12:03:34 -0700 (GMT-07:00)
Subject: [ilds] (no subject)
Message-ID: <4298639.1209927814801.JavaMail.root@elwamui-lapwing.atl.sa.earthlink.net>

Thanks for the citation, James.


Bruce


-----Original Message-----
>From: James Gifford <odos.fanourios at gmail.com>
>Sent: May 4, 2008 9:48 AM
>To: ilds at lists.uvic.ca
>Subject: Re: [ilds] "The Windmill"
>
>Durrell, Lawrence. "From a Writer's Journal." /The Windmill (London)/ 
>2.6 (1947): 50-58.
>
>A fascinating collection of materials, though as usual, Durrell's 
>published 'diaries' are heavily edited, much like the later "Endpapers 
>and Inklings," from this the protagonist is removed from the pages...
>
>Bruce Redwine wrote:
>> Charles, what's the source for the essay, "The
>>  Windmill?"  Do you have a citation?
>
>_______________________________________________
>ILDS mailing list
>ILDS at lists.uvic.ca
>https://lists.uvic.ca/mailman/listinfo/ilds


From odos.fanourios at gmail.com  Sun May  4 13:11:14 2008
From: odos.fanourios at gmail.com (James Gifford)
Date: Sun, 04 May 2008 14:11:14 -0600
Subject: [ilds] Readings
In-Reply-To: <30260415.1209927629486.JavaMail.root@elwamui-lapwing.atl.sa.earthlink.net>
References: <30260415.1209927629486.JavaMail.root@elwamui-lapwing.atl.sa.earthlink.net>
Message-ID: <481E1862.6000107@gmail.com>

Hey Bruce,

I'll go along with that, especially about my own mortality as a reader, 
though I must admit that I'm still far more confident of my reading than 
I am the author's intentions.

But, perhaps this is the rub:

> Being the author of "bredwine," I state unequivocally 
> that I had no intention of insinuating the Blessed 
> Sacrament.  Although considering the ingenuity of 
> your reading, perhaps I should have.  This does not, 
> by the way, prove your point, for I don't consider 
> anything I write "literature."

Well now, what if my reading has become so persuasive that you, the 
author, choose to revise your supposed intentions?  I think the texts we 
all tend to find interesting enough to discuss in this venue (apart from 
email addresses) are sufficiently flexible and open to complex 
interpretive activities that the author's own views, reviews, and 
revisions to supposed intentions are possible.  Which intention, then, 
do I accept as a reader?  The author's first intention, final writing of 
the work, or final revised intention?  Should I skip one, bury some 
others, or are they all different texts I can read in a variety of 
responsible and reckless ways?

But, more problematic for me is the potential for my reading of 
"bre(a)dwine" (or, now it's hubris, of /Hamlet/) to become so prominent 
and persuasive that it forces a revision of the supposed nature of the 
text.  Eliot is perhaps the greatest exponent of this, and Bloom does a 
fine job of revising Eliot as per his own instructions -- the strong 
reader writes a new text (including essays...) that lead to a revision 
of how we collectively perceive past texts.  Bill may comment with more 
insight, but I believe the interpretation that the Epilogue to /The 
Tempest/ is Shakespeare's farewell to the theatre is fallacious, yet 
it's probably the most popular, sustained, and used interpretation out 
there.  I like it a great deal, and I doubt I can make any responsible 
decision on its "truth" value.  We also can't read Marlowe without the 
rosy glass of Shax standing in the way, and while Bloom might privilege 
authors in this regard above readers, these authors only come to these 
positions through erroneous misprisions /as/ readers.  Can I ever find 
irony in Anonymous' works?

So, do readings live on when readers die?  I think they exert some 
influence, though I don't know how I'd interpret it.  Did Durrell want 
to change how we read Eliot?  Dunno, but his book seems to accomplish 
that goal for me regardless of Durrell's potential intentions.  Either 
way, but the time I get the book, the author's intentions are lost in 
history, and I have only this shadow or fragment of his/her intentions 
with which to work, blurred through the chaos of multiple possibilities 
and random choices or even errors.  I can point to the text and I can 
demonstrate a reading, but the author seems to have faded away, just 
like Nietzsche's God, leaving us only the cathedrals of the text.

Is the positing of providence and a divine creator shaping every 
beautiful thing I see part of our collective wish to avoid reading 
something that wasn't authored?  If Durrell found beauty in a printer's 
error and decided to keep it, am I wrong in reading that error 
beautifully in the first edition yet correct in reading it beautifully 
in the second?

Responsible readings that foreclose the range of potential 
interpretations to those within a plausible scope of possibility defined 
by the constructed notion of the author are great (like reading god's 
mind to know god's will), and I use them in my classroom, but the 
reckless and lively readings that dispense with the limits of the author 
and embrace the text in hand are also exciting and productive.  What 
does the existential reader do?  As a reader, and as usual, I want both 
options and any others too.

> Musicians are considered artists but art 
> critics are not.  I think this disparity has 
> led literary critics to invent Deconstruction 
> and even the score. 

Okay, I'll buy that, but I think there is an artistry in fine readings 
and criticism.  Yet, may I read your comment on that disparity as the 
critics inventing Deconstruction and also the score?  Derrida had much 
to say about his desire to write, but even creative individuals are able 
to write literary criticism -- Durrell did, and he did it well.  I doubt 
  he gave a fig if Eliot wrote him to say "That is not what I meant at 
all.  That is not it at all."

I find in LD's interviews that when asked about his intentions, the 
bafflegab pours out.  He comments in one interview with Lyn Goldman that 
his characters, after he creates them, going on to live lives of their 
own among readers independent of him, which I rather like:

http://epe.lac-bac.gc.ca/100/202/300/agora/2004/v3n01/209.htm

It's just past the mid-point.

Best,
James

From slighcl at wfu.edu  Sun May  4 14:50:02 2008
From: slighcl at wfu.edu (slighcl)
Date: Sun, 04 May 2008 17:50:02 -0400
Subject: [ilds] "The Windmill"
In-Reply-To: <481DE8CC.5090406@gmail.com>
References: <23929670.1209918763504.JavaMail.root@elwamui-muscovy.atl.sa.earthlink.net>
	<481DE8CC.5090406@gmail.com>
Message-ID: <481E2F8A.9070908@wfu.edu>

On 5/4/2008 12:48 PM, James Gifford wrote:
> Durrell, Lawrence. "From a Writer's Journal." /The Windmill (London)/ 
> 2.6 (1947): 50-58.

Thanks, James.  I am once again writing to the listserv while traveling 
across the country, so I appreciate your attention and your resources.

Did Durrell harvest and re-use any of that "Journal" material?  Perhaps 
for an island book?  I am recalling some mentions of Rhodes in this 
"Journal."

And if anyone can tell me whether or not Durrell's "V." is a screen 
persona or a real person, I would appreciate it. 

Charles, abroad

-- 
**********************
Charles L. Sligh
Department of English
Wake Forest University
slighcl at wfu.edu
**********************



From hungerist at hotmail.com  Sun May  4 21:36:20 2008
From: hungerist at hotmail.com (Alejandro Adams)
Date: Sun, 4 May 2008 21:36:20 -0700
Subject: [ilds] Author v. Reader
References: <mailman.1.1209927604.12685328.ilds@lists.uvic.ca>
Message-ID: <BAY123-DAV126D95FFBB96E9510C8CEA2D70@phx.gbl>

Ilyas,

I intended to express that I felt INSULTED on behalf of certain lovers of 
Durrell whom I have known and who would never subscribe to a list such as 
this one because they don't feel "qualified" to express themselves on the 
subject.  But to suggest that I'm SPEAKING on their behalf, or on yours? 
That would be rather presumptuous.

I often feel that Bruce is speaking on my behalf (unwittingly of course, as 
we haven't yet formed the Quaint Layman's Brigade), which is a placating 
sensation.  He is quicker and sharper and better-informed than I and manages 
to put his ideas into palatable form.  Thus, I hardly ever feel the urge to 
speak up.  But sometimes the pelting condescension thoroughly erodes my 
respect for decorum at all costs.  If this list is intended to function as 
an exclusive clique, why not screen credentials?

Clearly anyone on this list could wipe the floor with me, but it seems vital 
that we brook dissent, no matter how impuissant the voice or unplain the 
English.

Alejandro



> Message: 6
> Date: Sun, 04 May 2008 15:04:05 +0100
> From: Ilyas <ilyas.khan at crosby.com>
> Subject: Re: [ilds] Author v. Reader
> To: <ilds at lists.uvic.ca>
> Message-ID: <C44380E5.1013%ilyas.khan at crosby.com>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="US-ASCII"
>
> Senor Adams
>
> You may well have some interesting ideas, but you sure as hell can't 
> express
> them in written form. What on earth are you talking about and what are you
> trying to say ? Ever thought of plain English ? I think you dislike
> something that may have been written by "Mr Godshalk", but more than that
> remains a mystery.
>
> I am a casual reader, and you certainly did not reply "on my behalf".
>
>