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I have been so preoccupied since April with the precipitous decline, death, and funeral arrangements for my mother that I have paid little attention to Rodak Riffs. It must also be admitted that the instant gratification of Facebook has played a major role in the precipitous decline of this blog. Mea culpa.
That said, I came across a passage this morning in The Bridge to Nothingness that I thought worthy to share, and I offer it up as a Quote du Jour:
…Parents are programmed metaphysically and biologically, conditioned psychologically, and indoctrinated culturally to reproduce and rear offspring, so that their loss is tantamount to the destruction of their ontological raison d’etre. The loss of a parent for an adult child is many times painful, but it is ultimately accepted as the natural course of life. The loss of a young child, on the other hand, is inevitably experienced by the parents as a catastrophic blow, usually resulting in a permanent emotional handicap and, in many cases, in mental incapacitation. The death of a child causes for most parents a traumatic change of their weltanschauung, and in some cases a radical change in their order of priorities, meanings, and even the course of their lives. “There is no armistice for bereaved mothers,” and the patriotic glee of victories in wars is rarely shared by bereaved parents whose sons were killed in these wars. They feel cheated and experience rage at themselves for having either actively or tacitly participated in the sacrifice of their ontological sequel and embodiment to the mirage of patriotism--to abstract notions of glories, ideologies and creeds reinforced by the waving of colored rags, the shouting of slogans by bemedaled marionettes, and the self-important verbosity of hypocritical politicians. Worse still, their pain can never be communicated to anybody who has not experienced the same loss, and even communication with their partners in bereavement cannot dull the pain.
Dick frickin’ Cheney -- this man has your number. Parents--examine your priorities. It seems almost certain to me that a new universal draft is on the way; a draft to feed a global war, designed by our super-rich overlords to arrest the economic decline before it reaches the private beaches and tennis courts, the ballrooms and plush parlors of their loot embellished palaces.
Prepare yourself now to resist the evil, so that when it comes you will be ready with a plan.
X
Showing posts with label War. Show all posts
Showing posts with label War. Show all posts
Sunday, August 28, 2011
Friday, October 31, 2008
Readings: Rumble in the Jungle
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In J.M.G. le Clézio’s novel War (see below) we see everything through the overwrought eyes, or from within the chaotic psychic depths, of the central personage (not to say “character”), Bea B., who is perhaps insane, or, perhaps more accurately, hyper-sane. Bea B. seems to see everything, every item in the catalog of the ten thousand things, from multiple perspectives: everything is terrifying; everything is beautiful; all is a roaring city of huge towers of gleaming white stone, glittering metal, swift, dark rivers of asphalt, floors of colorful plastic, walls of windows like watchful eyes; or everything is a jungle, teeming with an awesome over-abundance of thrilling, terrifying, flora and fauna. Whether Bea B. sees a city or imagines a jungle, all that she sees, imagines, or projects is in constant motion, accompanied by an avalanche of sound. Everything that exists is presented to her as words. She feels that she must understand it all, and that time is running out. Her name – “Bea B.” – suggests, perhaps ironically, the French word “bébé”—“baby.” Her observations, musings, dreams, as words, which flow endlessly, and are sometimes jotted down in a little blue notebook, are directed to an occasional interlocutor, sometimes companion, named “Monsieur X”:
That’s what I am seeking, Monsieur X. I am seeking words and signs capable of helping me survive. In the matted forest I am seeking friendly plants, and boulders, and snakes, and friendly birds. I want to rediscover the ancient legends and tell them to you, so that you in turn can tell them to others.
For example: …
THE MYTH OF MONOPOL
It is he who runs everything. He has armies of leather-jacketed cops patrolling the town, armies of cops who carry big rubber truncheons and keep fierce dogs on the leash. No-one knows precisely who MONOPOL is. He lives in fortress-palaces of a sort, by the side of the sea, or on the tops of mountains. He also lives in town centres, and he has huge glass and concrete structures built, and people are obliged to go there and buy. He has hordes of slaves, all dressed exactly alike; he has fleets of new ships and planes and cars that sparkle; he lives with a lot of very young and very beautiful women who have green eyes framed in black mascara, and long slim legs. No-one has ever seen MONOPOL, because he stays hidden behind his concrete walls, and then he is never in the same place twice. He simply spends his whole time putting up these palatial buildings, and handing out orders to his army of cops and slaves. He owns factories where millions of people work, but his riches never suffice. He loves gold and silver, hoarding it in great silent vaults guarded by cops. He loves war, too, because his slaves kill each other with the guns he manufactures. And he loves power, because he is the only one who knows what he wants and how to get it. There are people who want to slay MONOPOL, and so they hurl grenades through his shop windows and under the wheels of his cars. But MONOPOL is invincible. He has many bodies, many lives. He is everywhere at once, behind the plate-glass mirrors, listening in to telephone conversations, on the other side of the television screens. He knows everything that is going on. Maybe, one day, MONOPOL will cease to exist. But not until every stone, every window-pane of his gigantic warehouses has been ground to dust. Not until the whole earth has burned fiercely for a year on end, so that everything is destroyed, down to the very roots.
All such myths are there, around me. …
That is the “war.” And I—so I assume—am Monsieur X.
X
In J.M.G. le Clézio’s novel War (see below) we see everything through the overwrought eyes, or from within the chaotic psychic depths, of the central personage (not to say “character”), Bea B., who is perhaps insane, or, perhaps more accurately, hyper-sane. Bea B. seems to see everything, every item in the catalog of the ten thousand things, from multiple perspectives: everything is terrifying; everything is beautiful; all is a roaring city of huge towers of gleaming white stone, glittering metal, swift, dark rivers of asphalt, floors of colorful plastic, walls of windows like watchful eyes; or everything is a jungle, teeming with an awesome over-abundance of thrilling, terrifying, flora and fauna. Whether Bea B. sees a city or imagines a jungle, all that she sees, imagines, or projects is in constant motion, accompanied by an avalanche of sound. Everything that exists is presented to her as words. She feels that she must understand it all, and that time is running out. Her name – “Bea B.” – suggests, perhaps ironically, the French word “bébé”—“baby.” Her observations, musings, dreams, as words, which flow endlessly, and are sometimes jotted down in a little blue notebook, are directed to an occasional interlocutor, sometimes companion, named “Monsieur X”:
That’s what I am seeking, Monsieur X. I am seeking words and signs capable of helping me survive. In the matted forest I am seeking friendly plants, and boulders, and snakes, and friendly birds. I want to rediscover the ancient legends and tell them to you, so that you in turn can tell them to others.
For example: …
THE MYTH OF MONOPOL
It is he who runs everything. He has armies of leather-jacketed cops patrolling the town, armies of cops who carry big rubber truncheons and keep fierce dogs on the leash. No-one knows precisely who MONOPOL is. He lives in fortress-palaces of a sort, by the side of the sea, or on the tops of mountains. He also lives in town centres, and he has huge glass and concrete structures built, and people are obliged to go there and buy. He has hordes of slaves, all dressed exactly alike; he has fleets of new ships and planes and cars that sparkle; he lives with a lot of very young and very beautiful women who have green eyes framed in black mascara, and long slim legs. No-one has ever seen MONOPOL, because he stays hidden behind his concrete walls, and then he is never in the same place twice. He simply spends his whole time putting up these palatial buildings, and handing out orders to his army of cops and slaves. He owns factories where millions of people work, but his riches never suffice. He loves gold and silver, hoarding it in great silent vaults guarded by cops. He loves war, too, because his slaves kill each other with the guns he manufactures. And he loves power, because he is the only one who knows what he wants and how to get it. There are people who want to slay MONOPOL, and so they hurl grenades through his shop windows and under the wheels of his cars. But MONOPOL is invincible. He has many bodies, many lives. He is everywhere at once, behind the plate-glass mirrors, listening in to telephone conversations, on the other side of the television screens. He knows everything that is going on. Maybe, one day, MONOPOL will cease to exist. But not until every stone, every window-pane of his gigantic warehouses has been ground to dust. Not until the whole earth has burned fiercely for a year on end, so that everything is destroyed, down to the very roots.
All such myths are there, around me. …
That is the “war.” And I—so I assume—am Monsieur X.
X
Friday, October 17, 2008
Readings: Dyn-O-Mite!
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When J.M.G. le Clézio won the Nobel Prize for Literature, I had never heard of him. That very fact piqued my interest. I therefore borrowed his 1973 novel, War, from the library. That will be my next reading project. Here is the opening paragraph of War:
War has broken out. Where or how, nobody knows any longer. But the fact remains. By now it is behind each person’s head, its mouth agape and panting. War of crimes and insults, of hate-filled eyes, of thoughts exploding from skulls. It is there, reared up over the world, casting its network of electric wires over the earth’s surface. Each second, as it rolls on, it uproots all things in its path, reduces them to dust. It strikes indiscriminately with its bristling array of hooks, claws, beaks. Nobody will survive unscathed. Nobody will be spared. That is what war is: the eye of truth.
Hmm. Outside of the fact that war has gone wireless since 1973, that sounds about right, I’m afraid.
X
When J.M.G. le Clézio won the Nobel Prize for Literature, I had never heard of him. That very fact piqued my interest. I therefore borrowed his 1973 novel, War, from the library. That will be my next reading project. Here is the opening paragraph of War:
War has broken out. Where or how, nobody knows any longer. But the fact remains. By now it is behind each person’s head, its mouth agape and panting. War of crimes and insults, of hate-filled eyes, of thoughts exploding from skulls. It is there, reared up over the world, casting its network of electric wires over the earth’s surface. Each second, as it rolls on, it uproots all things in its path, reduces them to dust. It strikes indiscriminately with its bristling array of hooks, claws, beaks. Nobody will survive unscathed. Nobody will be spared. That is what war is: the eye of truth.
Hmm. Outside of the fact that war has gone wireless since 1973, that sounds about right, I’m afraid.
X
Thursday, May 1, 2008
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