'One Sec'

The human race continues it's free fall into extinction. Good.

Above you can see an image from Gizmodo.com, entitled 'One Sec' (click image for link). I saw this image a while ago as it appeared on my friends "Google Buzz" thread through gmail. While the image encapsulates present day discussion and controversy regarding technology and the role it plays in our daily lives (especially when discussing naturalism, transcendentalism, post modernism, etc), it also is a clear comic display.

I found this description of gizmodo.com: "Gizmodo.com is a "technology weblog about consumer electronics...It's known for up-to-date coverage of the technology industry and the personal, humorous, sometimes very inappropriate writing style of the contributors." (thank you Wikipedia...)

From this description, it seems that gizmodo.com is making fun of themselves by posting this picture.

When looking at this picture, I thought back on our discussions on so many texts and authors (naturalism writers from the beginning of the course, Amy Lowell's "The Captured Goddess", Williams' "The Red Wheelbarrow," Robert Frost's poems, various writers during the New Negro movement as they reminisce on their homeland (Africa), Dos Passos's piece of newspaper headlines, Proulx's Postcards, and the list goes on). The freedom found in nature vs. the poisonous captivity (so it seems) of industrial and technological advancement is conquered time and time again in literature, particularly in literary movements before and during post-modernism. I'm interested to see how nature and the natural world is going to creep into the "time of terror" movement (or whatever movement comes after post-modernism), or even if it will be worth noting, as we begin to reading Zigzagger this weekend.

Snapshots

As I read Postcards and listen to the class's discussion about the possible importance of the messages written on the backs of the postcards in the novel I can't help but wonder how they interact with the photographs on the front. It seemed as though a lot of you agreed with the notion that the postcards' messages provided the narrative with a level of truth. They give you the date and insight into the events which occur in the novel. While this analysis might be a bit shaky (maybe the postcards aren't this cut and dry), if the text is the truth then what are the photographs?

I think the photographs are in contrast with the the text because they are unrealistic snapshots that hide the truth behind their beauty. Though it isn't clear how exactly the bear was captured in the photograph, it surely doesn't tell the truth about him. It makes me wonder about all of the snapshots we take of our lives and how much they say about what we really did. What about the photos that all of those darn tourists took at the Cherry Blossom Festival? Does someone's smiling face in front of the tidal basin tell any truth about that person, or even that day? I understand wanting to remember a good time, but I don't think that years later a person will look at their smiling face and remember the truth: that it was a hot day, they were blistered and tired, and all they really wanted was to get out of that zoo.

So then what is Proulx saying about communication? I think maybe she is suggesting that it's difficult to understand another person's life by communicating with snapshots because it's fragmented and often misrepresents reality. What do you guys think?

"My giant goes with me wherever I go"

Today in class while we were talking about Loyal Blood as he traveled away from his family farm I couldn't help but remember back to this quote by Emerson . . .

"When we're being men, we feel a call to duty. The soul is no traveler; the wise man stays at home. When his necessities, his duties, on any occasion call him from his house, or into foreign lands, he's still at home, and lets people know by the expression on his face that he goes as the missionary of wisdom and virtue, visiting cities and people like a sovereign, not like an intruder or a valet.

I have no cranky objection to world travel for the purposes of art, of study, and goodwill, as long as the individual is first domesticated, or doesn't go abroad with the hope of finding something greater than what he knows. He who travels to be amused, or to get something he doesn't have within, travels away from himself, and gets old among old things while he's still young. In Thebes, in Palmyra, his will and mind have become as old and run-down as they have. He carries ruins to ruins.

Traveling is a fool's paradise. Our first journeys show us how little difference places make. At home I dream that at Naples, at Rome, I can be intoxicated with beauty and lose my sadness. I pack my bags, hug my friends, get on the plane, and wake up in Naples, and there next to me is the cruel fact, the sad self, unrelenting, identical, that I fled from. I look for the Vatican and the palaces. I pretend to be intoxicated with sights and suggestions, but I am not intoxicated. My giant goes with me wherever I go." ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson "Self-Reliance"

I feel as though Emerson would judge Loyal as a fool for thinking that he could escape from himself and the murder he committed by mere change of place. It will be interesting as we read further into the novel to see if Loyal's "giant" really does go with him wherever he goes. In the first portion we read, the scenes with Loyal's odd sexual encounters might as some suggested in class, be a sign that he feels guilty for what he did to Billy. So it would seem that one of the critical questions of the novel is does Loyal carry around his "giant" when he leaves? And if so how does he learn to live with the "giant"?

I'm also curious about whether or not the rest of you agree with Emerson's assessment on travel. Do you feel there's any truth to his claim that those who travel to escape will only be disappointed to find that they cannot?