Following Robert Archambeau's "modernity is disinterest" thread. Sceptical about the distinction between Western & Middle Eastern (Islamic) thinking. The idea of some kind of M-E unitary or indivisible mentality sounds suspiciously like earlier Western imaginings of the "noble savage". The Other is always greener on the other side of the fence.

The divisions & splits between (ethical) self and (social) role seem inherent to moral dilemmas of every kind, in every culture. One could just as easily talk about the traditionalist-tribal fathers who kill their own daughters in order to maintain archaic Arab "honor" codes. One can imagine quite a psychic split there between self & social role.

Mazzotta's book on Vico, which I've mentioned previously here, is focused on Vico's challenge to modernity (in the shape of Descartes, Bacon, Machiavelli, Hobbes). The argument of The New Science (to oversimplify) is that poetry, as imaginative (re)making, presents an image of world-renewal, based on wonder & creativity, which is at odds with the disenchanted, utilitarian, and arrogant realpolitik/scientism presented by those avatars of Modern "disinterest" & detachment. At odds with them - but aligned with Dante (Mazzotta's other hero).

Have been sort of busy/distracted lately, not much bloggin'.

Interesting juxtaposition in this week's New Yorker : excellent review of the "Bush dynasty" books, talks about how George W. views the current situation as a religious war; then in article about contemporary Egypt, quoting confident young Islamist who has the same opinion. Feel like we're regressing to Middle Ages, when there is no distinction between faith and politics, theology and ideology. Where is Roger Williams? Help, Rog!!

latest sketch (from Shakespeare's Head):

16

 
Hobo hides his head in the sumac shade
of deep July.  Way overhead, titanium scouts
penetrate the misty rings of Saturn.  Motes
of moons shepherd the circling parade

 
while Hobo doodles his own star-map, out
beyond Babylon – talking in his sleep beside
the iron railroad tracks, before time was.
Before the golden Cyprus oak was rooted

 
(quercus alnifolia), before Venus turned
and tumbled beneath its limbs, before
the pantheon was knit (the yarns of yore);
when his iron heart (spurned) yearned

 
(magnetic) for the light of those eyes
more gold than golden (slow surprise).

      
                *

   
On a curtain-sleeve (painted in Paradise-
Byzantium) the adamantine letters

   
will not be effaced.  Through shadow
of death and laughter of jackals,
through snarling gods, sheep-killers,
armies of neighbors, they go

   
on shining, they go on shining
through derision, through the dark.
Until that day – Hist! Hark!
I have it! – you grasp their meaning:

   
on that benevolent summer day
in the heart of July, when you know
the bowl cannot be broken:  Love’s vow
rings Time itself with titanic mastery.

         
                                       7.7.04

Antonio Savoradin writes:

I'll quote Christopher Hitchens: "It was on September 11 1683 that the
conquering armies of Islam were met, held, and thrown back at the gates of
Vienna."

Jonathan yesterday, on "tolerance." & speaking of Beauty & Tolerance, the flap in Paris over Muslim veils in school will surely be one for the history books. Si francais! A thousand Mata Haris, au centre d'haute couture, using their coy Oriental veils as a wedge for political Islam!

Tolerance in governance, oh, it must be the key. A public space of universal equal rights requires, paradoxically, a generous hospitable attitude toward ethnic pride. Finding the balance between group interests and the interest of each & all : civilization - life itself - based on wisdom & mutual acceptance among "others".

Have been reading lengthy entries on Islam in my old Enc. Britannica.

Curious analogies drifting through on coffee break. Poets up in arms over war. Muhammad (founder of Islam) like the ultimate "acknowledged legislator". Surahs of Q'uran came to him from Allah transmitted by angel Gabriel while he was in a sweat-trance. Analogy (very distant) to previous speculations here about poetry as epileptic response to crisis - main crisis being transition from adolescence to adulthood ("mystical wedding").

Analogies between Muhammad & David (poet-warrior) & prophets (bearers of God's Word) & Messiah. "a sword issued from his mouth". Islam emerging out of, & distinguishing itself from, Judaism & Christianity.

Monotheism as opposed to pagan polytheism. Like a lens in the desert coming into focus. How it becomes (in the prophetic word) a governing principle or gyroscopic mechanism. Governance of crisis & charismatic poetic "ejaculation". Governance. Mandelstam & Akhmatova on the counter-authority of poetry. Akhmatova & Stalin die on the same day (March 5th). (Dostoevsky both epileptic & prophetic.)

Epilepsy or charismatic possession. Power transferred to or emanating from divinity, rather than humanity. Religio = "binding". Black Stone of Mecca; black stone in Jerusalem where Abraham bound Isaac & where Muhammad ascended into heaven (leaving his footprint).

Meteoric stone carried in small covered "ark" on the back of a camel in pre-Islamic Arabia. Possible origin of tablets of the law in Ark of the Covenant. Theme of William Blackstone & the pebble-boomerang in Forth of July.

Henry & Bluejay in the garden behind Shakespeare's Head. Images of Gulf War & Presidency in Stubborn Grew.

Mandelstam:

"The poem is a stone fallen from heaven.
No one will judge it."

Adolescence and paternal authority. Song & Dionysius & panic. in the "bull's eye". (Blackstone & his white bull.)

Islam faced questions about human reason & autonomy from the beginning. The Sunni emphasis on peaceful consensus was in part a reaction against earlier developments; & the Wahhabite radical purism (akin to Qutb & Al Qaeda ideology) had its precursors from very early on. Dynamics internal to Islam.

William Blackstone, upon leaving his Boston home & going into Rhode Island: "I left England to get from under the power of the Lord Bishops, & here I am fallen into the hands of the ministers."

Roger Williams & "soul liberty".

Unable to focus on poetry.

Forsythia budding against wall on Prospect St. outside Rochambeau House.

Fascinating NY Times mag article on Sayyid Qutb, Islamic thinker/revolutionary, influence on Al Qaeda et al. According to Qutb one of the roots of Western corruption is separation of religion & state. I live in Providence, home of "separation of church & state" (Roger Williams). Some of my Gould ancestors came here in 1630s, with Anne Hutchinson, driven out by Boston theocracy. Others were Quakers. Gr-gr-etc-grandpa Zaccheus Gould, expelled from his Massachusetts church for "harboring Indians & Quakers" (one was his nephew). When he was finally re-admitted, he sat in his pew with his back to the pulpit.