Diana wrote:
D> Tom isn't it obvious that Eugenides has to adopt new personae
D> as he travels around from culture to culture? I hardly think that
D> needs explication; it's right there in Eliot's lines:
D> the change in languages, the misjudgement of a stranger's
D> interest on spending a weekend with him,
D> possibly as a failure of adaptation, everything about Eugenides
D> says he is displaced and trying to prevail in a foreign culture.
It's not obvious to me. And if I didn't think it needed explication, I wouldn't have asked the question.
Why do you say there is a "misjudgement" of a stranger's interest on spending a weekend with the narrator? What in the text says that Mr. Eugenides is not propositioning the narrator when he asks him to lunch at the Cannon Street Hotel followed by a weekend at the Metropole?
By the way, did you notice that the Eugenides lines are placed immediately _after_ the lines "So rudely forc'd/ Tereu" (alluding to the rape of Philomela) and right _before_ the lines about the rape of the typist by the young man carbuncular?
Lines about a sexual proposition (where the reader is left in the dark about the outcome) sandwiched between two passages dealing with rape? What a strange coincidence . . .
-- Tom --
Date: Fri, 7 May 2010 19:06:15 -0400
From: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: TS Eliot: The Metaphysical Poets
To: [log in to unmask]
Tom isn't it obvious that Eugenides has to adopt new personae as he travels around from culture to culture? I hardly think that needs explication; it's right there in Eliot's lines: the change in languages, the misjudgement of a stranger's interest on spending a weekend with him, possibly as a failure of adaptation, everything about Eugenides says he is displaced and trying to prevail in a foreign culture.Diana
Sent from my iPodDiana wrote:
> Displaced persons in Europe at that time had to quickly
> adapt to new cultures, language, tastes and mores, in fact
> being required to quickly develop personae in keeping with
> the societies in which they found themselves. Marie is
> only one example. Eugenides is another.
Can you elaborate on why Mr. Eugenides is an example of someone developing a personae in keeping with the societies in which they found themselves?
-- Tom --
> Date: Fri, 7 May 2010 08:20:03 -0400
> From: [log in to unmask]
> Subject: Re: TS Eliot: The Metaphysical Poets
> To: [log in to unmask]
>
> I neglected to add the quotes around 'dissociated' my original post to
> which Ken responded with his quip about Pound psychoanalyzing Eliot. I
> used quotes because in the same post I said I agreed with Nancy that
> dissociated is a problematic term.
>
> The Wasteland more than any poem of it's time shows how personae serve
> survival. Displaced persons in Europe at that time had to quickly
> adapt to new cultures, language, tastes and mores, in fact being
> required to quickly develop personae in keeping with the societies in
> which they found themselves. Marie is only one example. Eugenides is
> another. But in fact the entire European population was changed by the
> war in having to adapt to new national boundaries, and loss of friends
> and family. Professional identities were often lost, as we see now to
> a lesser extent when we meet immigrant doctors and scientists who are
> driving cabs. This is an existential condition of dissociation, and
> not mental illness.
>
> Diana
>
> Sent from my iPod
>
> On May 7, 2010, at 8:01 AM, Diana Manister <[log in to unmask]>
> wrote:
>
> > Ken apparently you missed Rick's post in which he said he found the
> > notion of Pound psychoanalyzing Eliot amusing. He wrote that in
> > response to my claim that Pound took TWL on its own terms as the
> > expression of a dissociated personality and did not try to have
> > Eliot "unify" it.
> >
> > That's what Rick wrote, and prompting me to waste my time to correct
> > your false statement is irresponsible on your part.
> >
> > Diana
> > Sent from my iPod
> >
> > On May 6, 2010, at 10:40 PM, Nancy Gish <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
> >
> >> In fact, it is a commonly recognized psychological term used by
> >> many psychologists/philosophers (not, when Eliot was at Harvard,
> >> clearly separate) with a specific meaning. Eliot had read and
> >> commented on some of them (for example, William James), and he knew
> >> the meanings. He uses them explicitly in many of his writings--
> >> especially many not collected.
> >>
> >> What someone now just thinks it means without any of that context
> >> is really not an answer to Diana.
> >> Nancy
> >>
> >> >>> Ken Armstrong <[log in to unmask]> 05/06/10 10:10 PM >>>
> >> DIana Manister wrote:
> >> > Nonetheless, I agreed with Nancy's opinion that dissociation is a
> >> > misleading term.
> >> No one ever said there is either association or dissociation, black
> >> and white. It's a relative term, which way I suspect most people
> >> take it
> >> and Eliot meant it in talking about sensibility. I see no problem
> >> using
> >> it this way.
> >>
> >> > My post in no way indicated that Pound was psychoanalyzing Eliot.
> >> > That's a ridiculous interpretation of my comment.
> >> But it must be entirely your own, as no one else, recently at least,
> >> made any such statement.
> >>
> >> Ken A
> >
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