Today's Topics:
Re: Blake & Buddhism (more)
Re: Blake discography, was Re: Something different
Remove
Re: Blake discography, was Re: Something different
Re: Blake & Buddhism (more)
Re: BLAKE AND SARTRE?
Re: Blake & Buddhism (more) -Reply
Re: Blake & Buddhism (more)
"Wow!! Wodda revelayshun!"
Re: "Wow!! Wodda revelayshun!"
Re: Blake&Buddhism? -Reply
Re: Blake&Buddhism? -Reply
Re: "Wow!! Wodda revelayshun!"
Re: Blake&Buddhism? -Reply
Re: CHRISTOPHER HAMPTON'S RADICAL BLAKE
"He whose face gives no light shall never become a star."
Re: BLAKE AND SARTRE?
Don Ralph Quixote
the gratuitous act?
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Date: Thu, 27 Aug 1998 10:16:50 -0400
From: albright@world.std.com (R.H. Albright)
To: blake@albion.com
Subject: Re: Blake & Buddhism (more)
Message-Id:
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Thanks to both Izak and Pam for discussing the intertextuality of Blake and
Buddhism, where they converge and diverge, and to Tom Dillingham for
pointing out that Blake most probably had no knowledge of that religion
when he wrote. It reminds me of the beginning of _Visions of the Daughters
of Albion_:
"The Eye sees more than the Heart knows."
And disagrees more, at times, too. (I think it is important to see points
of convergence and divergence between Blake and those he DID know, too,
such as Isaiah.)
Another poem of Blake's that reminds me of Buddhism discusses the need to
not cling to the ephemeral. (Or am I misinterpreting Buddhism or Blake,
here?)-----
ETERNITY
by William Blake
He who binds to himself a joy
Does the winged life destroy
But he who kisses the joy as it flies
Lives in eternity's sun rise.
~~~~~~~~
I also must say that I enjoyed Pam and Izak's brief discussion of the man
known to Blake as "Jacob Behmen" in MHH, also spelled Jakob Bohme in one of
my encyclopedias, who makes an interesting compare and contrast to
Heraclitus, himself. In _The Visionary D.H. Lawrence, Beyond Philosophy and
Art_ by Robert E. Montgomery (CUP, 1994), there are many references to
Blake, but an entire chapter devoted to Bohme.
I am sure that the eternal David Hume forgives the historical William Blake
for his lambasting of Hume on numerous occasions, considering that Hume's
defense of what may be reductively called "civil rights" has been used to
protect what are clearly heretical views by Blake on Christianity.
I am also interested to hear that Ralph Dumain sees no points of
convergence between Blake's devouring versus the prolific concern, compared
with Nietzsche's herd versus people who can will themselves to become
"natural aristocrats", who go beyond mere concepts of "good and evil" but
not beyond "good and bad" to hopefully become Giants that protect
underdogs, fight nationalism, totalitarianism, and... as Jurgen Habermas
points out in _The Philosophical Discourse of Modernity_ (1987, MIT) in his
"The Entry Into Postmodernity: Nietzsche", says that "The god of the future
will renew the lost, primordial forces; and the approaching god makes his
arrival sensible through his absence." I am sure this has no correlation
with what Blake had in mind when he was "Endeavor[ing] to Restore what the
Ancients called the Golden Age", or what is a sympathetic concern for evil
= energy in "The Marriage of Heaven and Hell".
Although many "existentialists" (a rather broad-based term for people who
want to put themselves in that box) sometimes trace their roots to
Kierkegaard, I believe that our often lonely poet, William Blake, could be
called one, too. If George Stack can show how that seemingly ever-optimist
Emerson has Kierkegaardian-like traits in his book, if there have not yet
been studies in this regard on Blake, well... what is now only imagined
will undoubtedly one day be proved.
-----Randall Albright
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Date: Thu, 27 Aug 1998 08:57:15 -0700 (PDT)
From: James Jay
To: blake@albion.com
Subject: Re: Blake discography, was Re: Something different
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On Thu, 27 Aug 1998, Ralph Dumain wrote:
> Is there only one Blake-related CD from Jah Wobble? Is it any
> good? could somebody provide the complete information so that I can look
> for it?
Jah Wobble, "The Inspiration of William Blake"
Thirsty Ear Recordings, under license from All Saints Records
mixed at 30 Hertz studios, whose address is listed for more information:
PO Box 11177, London E2 OTY
Amazon.com sells it for $14.39. Search their catalog for Jah Wobble and
look at the various reviews of his half-dozen records for a sense of where
he's coming from. I find it a little too much in the British techno-pop
style for my taste, though I'm glad I got it. I really like the "Tyger
Tyger" track; the setting of Blake to reggae feels (nicely) strange.
>From looking through Amazon, this seems to be the only Blake-related
recording. But, as you might guess from his name, he seems to be focused
around religious themes.
--Jay
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Date: Thu, 27 Aug 1998 09:03:36 -0700
From: Patrick Young
To: "blake@albion.com"
Subject: Remove
Message-Id: <35E58358.AE8934D4@serv.net>
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Date: Thu, 27 Aug 1998 14:09:10 -0500
From: tomdill@wc.stephens.edu (TOM DILLINGHAM)
To: blake@albion.com
Subject: Re: Blake discography, was Re: Something different
Message-Id: <98082714091005@wc.stephens.edu>
Thanks, Ralph, for the information about the Robeson recording; I guess
our local stores just never had thta particular tape/cd when I was
looking. Tom
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Date: Thu, 27 Aug 1998 14:18:44 -0500
From: tomdill@wc.stephens.edu (TOM DILLINGHAM)
To: blake@albion.com
Subject: Re: Blake & Buddhism (more)
Message-Id: <98082714184462@wc.stephens.edu>
The practice of observing surface similarities between or among
different expressions or modes of thought has nothing to do with
"intertextuality," but hey, why sweat such small stuff as concern
for definitions of terms or the accurate application of concepts.
In order to be comfortably confident that one "understands"
everything, the easiest course is just to assert that everything
is really fundamentally "the same." Right? It's the pudding
approach to the history of thought or of the arts. Collect
together all the ideas or images that one likes (or just whatever
happens to be sitting around--marthastewart style) and then
smoosh them all together into one big undifferentiated mess
and bake (mentally?) until done. Then when one sees the
pudding that comes out, one can exclaim "Why, they may have
looked different and confusing before, but now I see that they
really are all the same. It's a wonder!!!" And sure enough,
after sufficient contemplation of the big pudding, the cook
is likely to discover that it is identical to the contents
of his or her own brain--at which point the cook can be
superconfident that everything is understood!!
"Wow!! Wodda revelayshun!"
And what's more, one may very well find that the pudding has
all sorts of health benefits--sort of a combination spiritual
multivitamin and laxative, in which case it can be offered to
one and all as an antidote or an anti-depressant or whatever
is needed to cure the ills of the wayward soul. Mmmmmm, good!
Tom Dillingham
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Date: Fri, 28 Aug 1998 07:01:13 +0100
From: timli@controls.eurotherm.co.uk (Tim Linnell)
To: blake@albion.com
Subject: Re: BLAKE AND SARTRE?
Message-Id: <199808280602.HAA31019@merlot.controls.eurotherm.co.uk>
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>the ways that Sartre and Beauvoir fill in the proverbial blanks. The points on
>which Sartre and Blake agree seem to me the major points of each man's system
>(albeit the issue of imagination). There is no God in either man's cosmology
>which is a somewhat trite observation, but fascinating nevertheless
(Everlasting
(Thanks for a very interesting and thought provoking post)
While Blake certainly felt the Urizenic Judeo-Christian God to be an
arbitrary lawmaker, out of tune with the infinite(1), I don't think you can
infer from that a removal of God from Blake's universe, nor a lack of any
consistent moral framework. Those who are all 'virtue' will do impulsively
what is right, not merely obey rules (to paraphrase TMHH). The ideal of
redemption, and forgiveness of Sin(2) are also important to Blake. There
really can be no place for essentially Christian concepts such as virtue or
sin in Existentialism's shifting moral perspectives.
None of this detracts from your questions about what happens when the
'rules' of the net of religion are removed (by whatever means) from the
equation though. I just think that although some of the conclusions are the
same, Blake's philosophy and Existentialism are poles apart. Existentialism
is, after all, a very 'natural religion' which denies the infinite.
Tim Linnell
(1) This is perhaps very understandable position for a religious dissenter,
as was Blake, being as much a reaction to earthly priestly domination as
anything else.
(2) Sin in this sense is not as defined by the (Urizenic) Church, but harks
back to a more truly Christian 'love thy neighbour'. This, I think, is an
important point in understanding Blake's theology and the split between
Urizen and Christ - the established Church traditionally denied access to
the Bible to the populace, allowing them to interpret the 'word of God' to
suit its own ends (the Pope still does this). One key goal of religious
dissenters was to provide English language Bibles to everyone so that they
could make their own judgements, and this was continuing well into the 19th
Century via various Bible societies. Anyone reading the Gospels for
themselves (as Blake did) would have been astonished by the differences
between the Church's fire and brimstone, with the simple teachings of Christ.
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Date: Fri, 28 Aug 1998 09:47:11 +0200
From: P Van Schaik
To: blake@albion.com
Subject: Re: Blake & Buddhism (more) -Reply
Message-Id:
Thanks, Mister Dillingsham, for your sustained conceit, beginning with
the patently conceited and arrogant assumption that EVERYTHING that
anyone has said in these postings re intertextuality is `shallow'. English
III students here, who are taught by more than me, write intertextaul
essays on "Hamlet" and plays such as Stoppard's "Rosencrantz and
Guildenstern", "Waiting for Godot", and Fugard's "Boesman and Lena",
each of whom comes forward with individual responses which are far
from shallow. In their exams, marked by external examiners, they
perform equally well ... so your predictable insulting dismissal , or
demonising and trivialising, of everything anyone else says on-line
certainly says more about your brain than those of the people whom you
think you have a right to mock because somewhere you are under the
mistaken apprehension that you are the keeper of the gates of wisdom.
Pam
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Date: Fri, 28 Aug 98 10:23:04 +0100 ( + )
From: Paul Tarry
To: Blake Group
Subject: Re: Blake & Buddhism (more)
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Whilst there may be more than one way to bake a fruitcake, and
whilst some may prefer to soak it in whiskey and others rum, there
remains the fact that you need an oven and some heat. Different
recipes but the proinciples are the same, I'd like to meet the chef
who reckons he knew every recipe inside out.
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Date: Fri, 28 Aug 98 11:36:11 +0100 ( + )
From: Paul Tarry
To: Blake Group
Subject: "Wow!! Wodda revelayshun!"
Message-Id:
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ALL RELIGIONS are ONE
The Arguement As the true method of knowledge is experiment
the true faculty of knowing must be the faculty which
experiences.This faculty I treat of.
PRINCIPLE 1st That the Poetic Genius is the true man and that
the body or outward form of Man is derived from the Poetic Genius.
Likewise that the forms of all things are derived from their Genius.
which by ancients was called an Angel & Spirit & Demon.
PRINCIPLE 2d As all men are alike in outward form, So (and with
the same infinite variety) all are alike in the Poetic Genius.
PRINCIPLE 3d No