open text

18 June 2005 at 17:31

turns out I'm not a fundamentalist after all

 Hotboy said...

!00% idealist; 100% postmodernist (what's that?) and 88% existentialist. Night have guessed I'd be 100% of something, but I didn't know what it was. Hotboy  

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 onan the bavarian said...

If you want to impress your literary agents, you'll really need to acquire a smattering of pomo (as we academics call it) terminology. I'm able to help you out here.

An important concept is the idea of "play". In postmodernism, play means changing the framework which connects ideas, and thus allows the troping,
or turning, of a metaphor or word from one context to another, or from one frame of reference to another. I know, I don't understand it either, I copied it from here.

But here's what I do understand, and I think you'll find it relevant to your own body of work. In postmodern thought, the "text" (e.g. one of your novels) is a series of "markings" whose meaning is imputed by the reader, and not by the author (my emphasis). This means that the reader constructs or interprets the text, and there's no such thing as a good book or a good writer - the creative process takes place in the mind of the reader.

Furthermore, anything is a text, so that you get Ph.D. students writing literary analysis of e.g. the steps into the gents toilet at Kelvinbridge.

If this was true anywhere outside academia, it would mean that you can relax about your novel, forget about re-writes, since it's the reader who will be doing all the genius-work for you.

I hope this helps.  

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 Hotboy said...

Because the reader constructs or interprets the text, doesn't mean that there's no such thing as a good book, or text. It's a two way street. Obviously. Is postmodernism saying that people can read?
I like things that are true and not true, and maybe even not not true. How about not not not true? Hotboy
So I'm a hundred percent what?  

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 Hotboy said...

The postmodern folk working out that people interpret the alphabet has really opened my eyes. I think I'd like a grant to investigate further. Have you any suggestions? Hotboy  

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 onan the bavarian said...

About getting a grant. I think your card is already marked at the Scottish Arts Council, after your Australian junket. As is mine at the Science Research Council after my windsurfing research at taxpayers' expense.

If I get the gig at the college's Tourism and Hospitality Department, I may be able to swing a visiting fellowship for you. Failing that, Tourism Ralwin's colleagues may want your input.

I hope this helps.  

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 Hotboy said...

Is it a blue healer or not? hotboy  

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 Hotboy said...

Yon Michi person did the quiz. Now, that really is a coincidence. Hotboy  

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 onan the bavarian said...

This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.  

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 onan the bavarian said...

"Blue healer" - that could be a name for my new brew, and that really is a coincidence. You seem to engender them all around you, it must be the spiritual vibrations.

And there's more coincidences: both Michi and I are rated Culturally Creative. And it was for Michi that I posted the dog photo, it seems she can't get enough of anything connected with me. robmcj.

PS veterinary note: she's not a blue heeler, she's a kelpie. The dog, not Michi.  

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