Dear Allen, I will follow up on your suggestion to read LIFE AGAINST DEATH by Norman O. Brown, though I had (temporarily it seems) given up thinking about Gods, Life and Death. Those subjects are like riding a carousel... even if you change horse and carriage you still go round in circles... The deeper you search the more futile it gets... I cannot resign myself to believe in a Biblical divinity, nor accept any amount of brainwashing theologies... I figure belief in gods comes truly through - Blind Faith...- because the - truth - can neither be seen, felt or proved.
I am here, I live... I am not here, I am dead... There may be a - separate even spiritual reality - but why concern myself with that when right now I exist in this...
Norman O. Brown chose a good title for his work. "LIFE AGAINST DEATH A Psychoanalytical Meaning of History "is intriguing, though I doubt my humble under-educated intellect can rise to understand theories expounded by such heavy weights as Freud, Nietzsche and Marx.
What I know of Freud is that he is the Father Christmus of Psycoanalysis,- the guy who ties up Oedipus' marriage to Jocasta with the rest of us anal neuroticos... I know Nietzsche because in - Also Sprach Zarathustra - "The Madman" states that God is Dead. Karl Marx = the Commusnist State...
We struggle to make sense of Life, Death, God, Devil, Religion, Politics, Sex... Myth, Theory, Fact, Fiction, Communism, Democracy and everything in between, above or below, but as long as we remain cut-outs - human beings, the carousel will not stop. We may as well enjoy the ride for what it is... a ride...
2 comments:
Della, Everything you say makes me feel you will enjoy LIFE AGAINST DEATH all the more when you finally do have a read! It is not what you think, and as for the "psychoanalytical meaning of history" and all those heavyweights, don't worry, Brown is very articulate and quite down to earth about EVERYTHING. That's one of the book's many appeals, at least to me. A suggest once you find a copy, you needn't read it straight through, just look at the chapter titles and start with one you find interesting. That's the way I read it last Spring, and it worked better than previous attempts where I started on page one. I hope my enthusiastic recommendations do not have the adverse affect of making you expect too much and be too easily dismissive of what he writes before having a chance to absorb it. Anyway, even to search for a book can be an adventure! Keep me posted. I'm rereading it at present so we can talk about whatever whenever. I finally have a few days off but extra energy did not arrive with the holiday I'm afraid. If you send me an address where you'll be I can mail off a copy of WORDSWORLD to you in Vancouver and you can read it down by English Bay or in Stanley Park! Enjoy. Allen
Well, if you feel that way it is right for you. If you want my opinion, and in Taipei it rains heavy, between the ground and the sky, tink about it!
Rina
Post a Comment