Wednesday, April 29, 2009
BlakeBlog party!
Hey! There's gonna be a blogging party in the library today at five. If anyone wants to join in, you can meet us in the front of the library. If we aren't there we've probably just moved on to the place where we'll be blogging. Probably one of those cool rooms on the second floor. Just look around a bit and you should find us^_^
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12 comments:
First may I say, poor Los. :( I feel so bad for the dude.
Secondly, I would like to also comment that the textual arrangement in Blake appears to be really telling of what Urizen is trying to portray. In chapter one, line 16-17: "Of beast, bird, fish, serpent & element,/Combustion, blast, vapour and cloud."
Within the lines there are various divisions of beast from bird from fish,etc. These are the "unseen conflictions with shapes" that is referenced in line 14. The commas themselves represent divisions between the individual beings yet the two lines are also divided into a greater division perhaps suggesting a categorization of these things. If one looks at them, the first four names go together and the last five go together. I suppose that perhaps there is a little discrepancy since element seems to go more with the last four which is on a different line. The two lines seem to also suggest a sort of symmetry that is ruined by the number of items in each line. Could this perhaps be Urizen's struggle not being able to fit everything into categories?
I spent a lot of time on just two lines... but they're COOL!
Okay, I'll start things out with something I was thinking about in class just a bit before we ran out of time. In Chapter II Part 1 of The Book of Urizen, the narration mentions "Death was not, but eternal life sprung." In part 4, Urizen laments "Why will you die O Eternals? Why live in unquenchable burnings?" Humanity has not yet come into existence, yet death has been introduced.
Does Urizen perceive the Eternals' separation from him as death? Absence as death? Does his formation of an identity lead inevitably to the contemplation of death? Does he create death by conceiving of it? Urizen "dies" before the first "mortal death" (if that term isn't completely idiotic) occurs. Death is already in the world later, when humanity "forg[ets] their eternal life." Why are there these different incarnations of something that seems so immutable?
P.S. if anyone is reading and wants to join, we are in the room across from the red room with all the comfy chairs and rugs and couches!
RE: Carolyn's Two Lines of Doom:
You can get a lot out of two lines with Blake. I was kind of struck by the way later, when the first born human is being formed, he emits/becomes "Many sorrows and dismal throes./Many forms of fish, bird & beast." His formation is similar to Urizen's in that way, but it is marked by hissing, howling, crying, etc. (Well, we can't exactly expect him to be quiet.)
And if we go with the idea that they're being categorized by line, would that mean Orc's brith privileges the more abstract, non animal forms, since they're put first? Or should this be regarded as a transformation, with the last section as the most recent step?
Hmm... It seems to me that Urizen can't die because he is not mortal. He comes from one of the Eternals. It's interesting that if Urizen is the first one who creates death, then he's also the first one who creates resurrections, which makes me think that he resembles Christ, but Christ is reflected in just about everyone....
Well is death a mortal thing? Could Urizen die? He for all appearances just goes to sleep for a really, really long time. His life is described as "prolific" and yet is he really creating life? Does he actually live? What is death to Urizen?
Sarah, your question only leaves me with more questions... :(
When he "dies" he's also described as sleeping, and though his sleep is described as dreamless he seems to be effecting change in the world around him, as Enitharmon did in Europe. Then when Orc's cry awakes him, he's again described as dead. I guess...he's...both...? (Like Cthulhu.)
Is he creating life? Does he live? Those are a couple of interesting questions. Hmmm... Well, maybe the answer there is in Chapters 8 and 9. When Urizen forms the Net or Religion it is out of sorrow and pity for, among other things, the presence of death. ("For he saw that life liv'd upon death." p.128) And yet it is only *after* this net is formed that physical bodies as we understand them, material life and death come into being. Bones harden, senses shrink, eyes "gr[o]w small like the eyes of a man," and gravity binds people to the ground.
And only then is the human lifespan talked about as if this is the *introduction* of death "They lived a period of years/Then left a noisome body/to the jaws of devouring darkness." The "fall" isn't so much a casting out as a limitation. But this still points to the question, how is this new death different from the death previously mentioned, and why did Blake include these two ideas of death?
I think that the sorrows/throes/fish/bird/beast aren't being emitted by the baby being born because line 35 says that these things "[bring] forth an Infant form" which makes me think that these things are causing the birth. Why though he uses these beings to describe the things bringing for this infant is kind of beyond me. The sorrows and throes make sense in terms of labor being intense, but I'm not quite sure how the bird, fish and beast fit in.
Although I'm not sure that Orc is begetting (although he is kind of the cause of Enitharmon's sorrow and dismal throes who is laboring with him) these things in anyway, there does seem to be some sort of a transformation since Orc goes from being a serpent to an Infant. Obviously the serpent is the symbol of the loss from Eden.
Hmmm... well, given the role Orc plays later (or earlier...or whatevs...) as a revolutionary figure, the serpent is maybe here by the more Promethean interpretation than the "fallen" one. S'my thinking.
Hmm, Promethean? Hey hey hey, Orc is chained to a mountain! How about that? Also--is it just me or does the "they" imply that Enitharmon participates in binding him? Does she have feelings similar to Los's? Are they different in some way too? Maybe?
P.S. I think then that the Blake Party should, due various expansions on the conversation on the last post, be named "The Blake Family Romance... with Bondage!"
This decision also involved a vigorous game of rock paper scissors, where Carolyn and I threw the SAME OBJECT I think something like nine or ten times in a row. It was eerie.
...I mention this to draw attention to the presence of the infinite in our lives, of course. It's very relevant.
Anyways, I think we've started something here. I have to go eat, but the conversation will continue onnnnnnn.... Also Flunk Day is tomorrow.
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