Is modernity to be greeted or opposed?
Hi all,
I’ve got a department meeting this Wednesday at 3:15 pm, so my office hours will be from 2-3:15 and then from 4:45 – 6:15. Sound good?
Enjoy Walter Benjamin! “The Work of Art…” is a highly influential essay. The full text is available here.
– Prof. Steer
I was just talking to a non-GBLS student about the interesting nature of Sartre’s existentialist text. We reflected that it, like other existentialist works, is a highly personal and subjective account of the main character’s search for meaning and significance in the world. In this way, Sartre’s diary format is so appropriate because it is so personal. Instead of relying on external belief systems or philosophies to find meaning in the world he lives in, he finds significance (and/or exposes the insignificance) in the objects he encounters, the people he interacts with, and his perception of past events. His narrative seems haphazard, nonlinear, almost insane — and yet, how much of our perception is really linear? When you are inside a moment, you don’t notice everything, you don’t make connections to past events or ponder the implications of the things you see and do. You’re focused on the physical world around you, on the conversation you’re having, on the random memories recalled by something that catches your attention. Most of this happens in a random fashion as objects and people ebb in and out of our consciousness. While Nausea is disconcerting to read, it is also true to life. Part of its brilliance is that it puts into words a phenomenon that most of us are not aware of: the truly random nature of our own experience. It is only afterwards, in retrospect, that we arrange the events of our lives into coherent stories, or find meaning in those events and reject others as meaningless.
I found last week’s discussion really interesting because that, in a way, epitomized the random, fleeting nature of the text itself. Different readers focused on different things and tried to form connections based on what they saw. I focused on the main character’s personal life, his intimte (or not-so-intimate) encounters with the women in his life, his relationship withAnny, the woman of his memories who still haunts his thoughts. Other people focused on the sensual data surrounding him: his reaction to soothing jazz music, his obsession with the texture of fine paper, his analysis of a stone. Still others questioned his mental state. Why did he react to people the way he did? Why is he so dissatisfied, even disgusted, by what is around him? Why does he accuse strangers of having “lobster thoughts”? In this way, the text extends itself within our discussion by revealing our own existentialist grappling with (sur)reality as Sartre presents it. Each of us found meaning in the text, not necessarily through outside agencies, but through our own perception of the objects, the people, the miscellany of life.
I was thinking about the idea I was trying to express in class. The person exists, but the essence of that person only exists because of the interaction with others. The essence of that person becomes determined by others, which means that the”soul” of that person is completely subjective. A person who has their essence determined by others would, I think, be constantly looking out for what others think, and how they are perceived. This would mean that their notion of identity is determined by the ‘audience’ as well. So since all of these things that can be said to make up such a large part of our humanity are determined by others, how can we decide who we really are?
I think this is where I lose all grasp of what Sartre is trying to put across in Nausea. That we are only able to determine who we are in relation to others is a concept I can understand. Everything is relative, and there is so much in our lives that is only able to be understood by comparison to other things. Even when we look within ourselves to find meaning, we are comparing ourselves to others. But to say that our lives have no meaning without an audience is a concept that I have trouble with. I don’t feel I need to have others justify my existence.
Annaliese
Sartre’s use of a diary method of writing becomes a valuable tool, as does any journal, for accessing the inner thoughts of its writer, which in this case is Antoine Roquentin. We are able to journey along side the protagonist through his process of making sense of his world; a late 1930s world which was in a current state of turmoil. Through his fascination in observing the roles of those around him he, himself, takes on the role of an audience member watching a production of his reality. He studies the detail of the acts, gestures, and behaviours of people. As we briefly discussed tonight, this raises the question of the performanity of our own identities. Just like the couple in the cafe, we too “offer [their] spectacle of [their] ritual, mechanical dances.” (pg.111). Everyday I perform the act of a roomate, a student, an employee, a daughter, a teammate, etc each of which are dependent on the appropriate codes surrounding each role. Having recently studied this idea of identity as performance, I came across a quote in a Judith Butler reading from “Gender Trouble: Feminism and the Subversion of Identity:”
“Such acts, gestures, enactments, generally construed, are performative in the sense that the essence or identity that they otherwise purport to express are fabrications manufactured and sustained through corporeal signs and other discursive means.”
I not only agree that there is a performativity to our various identities but that these identities, returning to Foucoult, are also constucted. It is the constant supervision and co-ersion of micro relationships (not macro, or ideological power) that continually control and manipulate us to keep our identities safetly within the appropriate boundaries. For example, when i perform the role of a student, I am constantly keeping in mind the appropriate codes of the environment so not to cross the lines of the role of a student. I believe this makes me a docile body? One who does not resist? Perhaps we’ll save that for another day.
Sartre was fascinating and really made me question the world I know. I am becoming more and more aware that I am not as free as I may have once imagined. So much of my world makes me, influences me, even forces me to live the way I do.
Heather
If nothing else, Sartre made me realize just how temporary we all are or how temporary I am myself.
One day, I’ll die, and cease to care. leaving my memories to a few loved ones, who in their memories will think of me as hero or villian, and the memories that support their point of view will strengthen and those that do not will weaken. When they die, so will a great part of the record of my existance; who I was, and who I was remembered as distorted as it may be will cease to exist except in my writings that may never be given a second thought.
Perhaps this is good and perhaps it is bad. While disturbing, there are many people who would not want to live forever. I joke of child molesters in class, but I imagine that such an offender once exposed would like nothing more than to be forgotten; the shame of what they had done making the memory of their existence agonizing. While I have done nothing that wrong, the prospect of being posthumously judged and my mind dissected for all eternity as we do so often in Great Books Liberal Studies does not seem a happy prospect hypocritical though such a position may be. I have no desire to be clumsily interpreted by a bunch of first years who try to figure out whether I’m good or bad.
Then again, perhaps it is truly the prospect of my own mortality that dissuades me from finding pleasure in such a position.
What is unquestionable is that better people than myself have walked this earth, and are forgotten to the sands of time. Aristophanes and Livy both have large gaps in their libraries. Not to mention all of the great thinkers who could not write, or those who were not educated to share their ingenious thoughts with us but rather held them selfishly. All the moments we’ve experienced, all the pleasures and pains we recieve in this world are temporary, and when we’re dead there is nothing that we can give to others that can adequately convey the meaning it gave us.
But this is not nearly so disturbing as the fact that we can’t even convey that meaning it once gave us to us in the future, so these experiences are not only confined to us but to those moments as they are experienced. All those trials and tribulations that I’ve undergone; the pleasures and pains, great undertakings in personal development; none of these things am I able to re-live as I lived them the first time, only an inkling is retained by my memory and with every passing day I fear it is becoming more and more distorted.
It is not the great moments I regret forgetting most of all but rather the most painful moments. Happiness is fleeting and common, it may happen every day, but it is in pain that the most formative times of our lives occur. In forgetting painful moments, it seems that we lose a bit of ourselves while we are still alive and that seems greater a pervsersion than the idea that we will eventually be forgotten.
I would have at least hoped that would not happen until after our death, but it seems we must experience it in an agonizingly slow fasion.
Perhaps it is because the idea that we are alienated from our labours or each other is not nearly as distasteful as the idea that we are inevitably and unavoidably alienated from our selves.
-Josh
Reading Sartre I really started to think about my individual existence and how I have essence, and if I do then who or what determines that essence. I believe I exist through the everyday interactions I have with other people and the impact my actions have on them that will change their routine, thoughts, or ideas they have that day or the days following that. The larger impact or change my actions have on those decisions or thoughts they more essence I have. I think that is the essence of humans in general, the effects that they have on another individual constitutes their existence and works on both ends of the spectrum. In Buddhist terminology it is called Samsara basically meaning the World Cycle, every action has a reaction and it is a never -ending circle constantly changing, existing, and continuing. I hope I’m wording that correctly for you to understand.
I think we put meaning to words because not only do we want to have existence but we want to have purpose and when I think in terms of what we were discussing in class that my existence is just as significant to that of a rock it is threatening because the capabilities that I have over something as miniscule as a fragment of earth are insignificant. That is my Nausea, because as an artist my goal or purpose (I think) is to leave a mark in history and my name to be remembered in any way for future generations and to think of the world in these terms defeats my purpose.
In terms of the reading I don’t think I would have gotten some of these understanding or thoughts without having this discussion in seminar, because although the thoughts behind the reading are quite dismal and depressing for me the writing is very beautiful and thought provoking. Sartre’s descriptions of futile objects, such as the paper, and the rock, are so beautifully written instead of attempting to say that these objects do nothing but exist and nothing more he seems to put more value to them by describing them in this way.
“But as my eyes fell on the pad of white sheets, I was struck by its look and I stayed, pen raised, studying this dazzling paper: so hard and far seeing, so present. The letters I had just inscribed on it were not even dry yet and already they belonged to the past.”pp.96. This for me was not only commenting on the importance of living in the present and how quickly time arises and passes by us but also and again the value Sartre puts into a unadorned piece of paper and moist ink.
On an off note, but still relating to todays discussion, I thought this image by Rene magritte suited itself well with Sartre, Focault, and the overall understanding of semiotics.
-Jessica Hay
P.S. I tried to post the image, I dont think it worked but the painting is by Rene Magritte and is titled Ceci n’est pas une pipe, for those who are interested in checking it out.
“Suspicious: that’s what they were, the sounds, the smells, the tastes … you might believe that there was real blue in the world, real red … But as soon as you held on to them for an instant, this feeling of comfort and security gave way to a deep uneasiness: colours, tastes, and smells were never real, never themselves and nothing but themselves” (130).
“To exist is simply to be there; those who exist let themselves be encountered, but you can never deduce anything from them. I believe there are people who have understood this. Only they tried to over come this contingency by inventing a necessary, causal being” (131).
Here we have Sartre’s contribution to modernity. In these quotes existence is understood and with it the nausea. Existence is being, nothing more. To describe something is only to fabricate, it does not have to do with a thing’s existence. The nausea experienced by Antoine is the suspicion that this is true. He experiences nausea when he suspects that things are not what they are defined as; the hand of the Self Taught Man is not a hand that can be described or felt, it simply exists.
In these two quotes we also have Sartre’s departure from Enlightenment thinking and Faith based thinking. In Sartre’s description of the world, words, which describe things, tell us nothing about the being or existence of things and therefore Science can tell us nothing about the being of a thing. Furthermore, I think Sartre is referring to God when he mentions an invented “necessary, causal being.” God would give meaning to objects because he would have caused their existence. God would be the unchanging object which all beings “measure [their] changes in relation to,” in the words of Anny (143). But Sartre is saying this being –God- does not exist and therefore only existence is necessary. There is no such thing as absolute meaning because nothing absolute exists except for existence. What’s more, there is no meaning for a thing’s existence for “every existing thing is born without reason” (133).
This makes sense to me. Tonight we talked about the idea of the essence of an existing thing being defined by the observer. God would be the ultimate observer. Moreover, the Christian God would be outside of all existing things since he would have created all things from nothing. He therefore would be the only thing that could give an ultimate essence to a thing and allow a thing to have an essence in and of itself; since one would no longer need a human observer to have essence that essence would come from God. Saying that God is fabricated therefore removes the opportunity for an essence that is independent of human observers, or in other words, removes any essence that is external to humans. Since essence can no longer be external to humans, it therefore is completely subjective and defined by changing beings meaning the essence of any given thing will always be changing. There are no external, absolute truths.
Jason DeRoche
The absurdity of existence – seeing how meaningless existence is, why doesn’t a rational person simply end his life? According to the Existentialists, the fact that we are sitting around pondering this gives us a reason to exist. And I suppose that pardons us from the death sentence that we would have other wise handed to ourselves.
I really don’t know how that sits with me. I am happy that no one is urging me to end my life, but acknowledging that mass suicide has not occurred is not the foundation for philosophical school of thought. Sartre takes our Modern malaise and just rubs our noses in it like puppies yet to be house-broken.
The tone of the novel “Nausea” is that of a sardonic narration of an autopsy of a child. It is just horrific. Whatever philosophical substance there is to be absorbed is shrouded in the perpetual feeling of dread and hopelessness. It was a novel that I found difficult making the emotional investment in that is required to fully appreciate a work of art; I kept the emotional distance that was required to make the work bearable, but it was too distant to get swept up in the story.
Contrast this with the other French Existentialist giant, Albert Camus. Camus’ works held the message of the apparent absurdity of life, but his warmth and (gasp) humanism made for very rewarding works. They brought up issues of mortality and morality, but never as an assault. Rather I feel that he provided insightful commentary that made me feel like the absurdity was OK and was a necessary precondition for a fulfilled life.
To quote Jon Lovitz from the Simpson’s episode where Springfield has a film festival, “Well, Sartre is smart-tra, but Camus can-do!”
Sean
We left this evening on a note of hope – does the novel find its protagonist in an uplifting position at its finale? I think the general consensus within the class (it does) is accurate. We have to remember though that this is simply a character, and not Sartre himself. I wish I had raised this point within the discussion, but didn’t find a time to. I think we may, in our interesting digressions, have been confusing Sartre with Roquentin. It’s easy to, I’ll admit.
Why write this novel in the form of diary entries? I think the very form negates the meaning of the book, in some way. Why should we ponder over the existence of meaning (essence) in the world when the “protagonist” (maybe Sartre himself) has clearly indicated that there is an essence in things that needs to be recorded. The act of WRITING IT DOWN demonstrates that there must be something else to what the hero is viewing. Writing, as we briefly discussed in the form of semiology, is a largely useless act in the physical world (putting a pen to paper does not leave one with any more than … a pen and paper at the end). Yet it means everything as soon as we communicate, make our essence known to others. A book means something. The act of Roquentin viewing a tree root is nothing in itself – but recording it in a diary is everything. Perhaps Roquentin is unable to view his actions as actions in themselves. Like Josh said, he lives too much in the present – waiting for something to happen while things are happening all the time.
So yes, there is hope in the novel, if only from the wellspring of meaning that we can draw as scholars. I think Sartre, if not Roquentin, ackowledges that this “diary entry” must be doing some kind of work, ultimately.
Reading the first half of Nausea reminded me of the few instances in my life when my mind has been altered, through sleep deprivation or through substances. The world takes on a different cast. It can be either malevolent or blissful, but usually the former, full of grotesque shapes glimpsed through the corner of the eye, or ideas dawning not with the slow surety of a realization, but with the stab of fear that is paranoia.
I recognize the state that Nausea’s narrator is in. I can appreciate it. It is amazing, how well that feeling comes through, even though the text has been translated from another language. Sartre succeeds in explaining something that is almost impossible to explain in words as you’re feeling it, much less through the written text of a novel.
Nausea’s unreliable narrator ambles through life, seeing human relationships, objects, other people and his own life from a skewed perspective. Even his memories of the past can’t be trusted; “My memories are like the coins in the devil’s purse: when it was opened, nothing was found in it but dead leaves.” The narrator admits that his interpretation of the world is insubstantial, not to be trusted. What, then, can we infer of his reality?
To paraphrase what was said in last night’s discussion, with modernity came the idea that reality is subjective, flexible, that one’s experiences were not solid, unalterable truth but instead open to a variety of interpretations. This “modern” awareness of the world is both comforting and terrifying. It is positive in the sense that one is free to shape his or her own reality, without limitation, with or without the sanction of the outside world. But that is also what is so frightening about it. Where, when, do we stop? How can we ever trust that anything is real? How is it possible to make judgments about anything, to know anything, when the basis of those judgments might well be as slippery and unreliable as our memory?
In some ways, this view of human lives gives dignity and importance to the experiences of the individual. It means that one does not have to use the yardstick of any particular arbitrary standard or canon or “expert opinion” to validate and qualify his or her own existence. This is freeing. I think, as well, this is something we all take for granted as inhabitants of a truly modern age. And yet, it makes the world such a precarious place to be. It means that, when we are stumbling around in a nauseated haze, like Sartre’s protagonist, there will be nothing solid to grab hold of, no anchor.
– Aly
To quote Jason quoting Andre Breton: “The imagination is perhaps on the point of reasserting itself, of reclaiming its rights.”
The very idea of ‘surrealism’ is surreal in itself. The paintings, videos, photos and displays I viewed seemed in some ways meaningful, at least to the artist if not to me. In other ways, they seemed totally random, a hodgepodge of ideas, things, images, that may or may not have been related. Some seemed like they were not surreal at all, but almost conventional and recognizable (ie. the painting of Bush holding Saddam’s disembodied head in one hand, a machete in the other) while others seemed totally random and without purpose (ie. repeated photos of a faucet, a computer, some birth control pills, etc etc, in a line on the wall).
As well, there were some exhibits that seemed random at first, but the artist’s statement gave it meaning and showed the relationship between object and thought. Being aware of that relationship allowed to examine the relationship between objects in a different way. I am thinking specifically of the pig’s ear exhibit, which at first glance seemed meaningless to me; the artist saw in the shapes a reflection of sex and fetishism, which I could understand and began to see the longer I thought about it. Part of it meant examining my own ideas of the subject, and part of it was being allowed to see the artist’s view on it in a very removed and yet concrete way. I was forced to consider connotations concerning others’ view of my sex life, and my view of my own desires. All this in the form of some dried pork and a bucket. Amazing!
I found Stuart Ross’s poetry reading at the end of the night to be another interesting part of the evening. I think the most intriguing part about it was the experience of being able to visualize as he read aloud. Words that seem incongruous on the page transformed themselves into whimsical, dreamlike images as I listened. I was able to see connotations, connections in the images that perhaps might not have been apparent if seen visually. Because I was visualizing his spoken words, they came together in my head in such a way that, if not particularly meaningful, was at least coherent. To me, that sums up the importance of the imagination that Andre Breton describes in his Surrealist Manifesto. He discusses the relationship between insanity and the imagination, concluding at one point that insanity is merely honesty; those we call “insane” merely enjoy their own imaginations so much that they do not attempt to restrain it, while most of us attempt to repress and “normalize” ourselves into a tamed, socially acceptable version. In contrast, the so-called “realistic attitude” is “hostile to any intellectual or moral advancement”.
I don’t remember the name of Ross’s poem that affected me the most. He spoke about a swimming pool (right in his own living room!), his neighbours, a watch, the home shopping network. Sounds ridiculous, and yet it reminded me of those times when I’ve woken up in the dark and my clock says 6:00 and I can’t figure out whether it’s six am or six pm. Or those days when things that seem so insane in my head are taken for granted and accepted by everyone else, and I’m the only one who’s overwhelmed.
The one “modern” theme I see in all of these readings so far is individual self-awareness – seeing the relationship between the self and others, the self and society, the self and established laws, codes, rules, the self and material goods, the overt self and the secret, repressed self of the Id. The Beaver Ball, Andre Breton and Stuart Ross showed me another relationship – the self vs. reality. Or the accepted reality, agreed upon by everyone else, versus one’s own private reality, one’s own interpretation of objects, events and images, one’s own narrative of what life is about and what in it is meaningful.
aly
I thought some of you might be interested in this. University students across Canada are staying outdoors to raise awareness and $$$ for homelessness. There is a Brock contingent.
– Prof. Steer
