tell_room:Caliban leaves east.
say:Caliban enters.
say:Caliban seems to disappear.
say:Caliban enters.
tell_room:Caliban leaves east.
say:Caliban enters.
say:Caliban says: 2/27/96
tell_room:Caliban leaves east.
say:Guest enters.
tell_room:Guest leaves east.
say:Mambrose enters.
say:Guest enters.
say:Mambrose says: Mary Fluhart is attending tonight as guest
say:Bekas enters.
say:Lattanzio enters.
say:Lattanzio left the game.
say:Mambrose says: Hello from Ft. Myers
say:Luber enters.
say:Sipiora enters.
say:Luber says: where shall we begin?
say:Karon enters.
say:Mambrose says: shall we begin with a trope? I was intrigued with the
recurrance of "the green eyes."
say:Karon says: Interesting image, of course, but how is this a trope?
say:Guest says: what about the eyes, specifically
say:Mambrose says: WE might want to look at that trope as a connection between
the erotic and the political.
tell_room:Sipiora leaves east.
say:Kingery enters.
say:Bekas says: One master trope that might be considered is the trope of being.
In the novel ontology is a metaphor that is created within the language
of the text. In this text the being of Cruz is not something
established with any degree of certainty. It is a shifting force the
defies attempts by the narration at confining it to an originary
moment. Fuentes plays with the idea of being as language.
say:Karon says: Guest: do you want to elaborate on your question?
say:Zangla enters.
say:Mambrose says: Fuentes also used language as an interplay between historical
and individual forces.
say:Bekas says: eyes are trope in the sense of Cruz's visual recounting of his
life which is blind yet allows us to see.
say:Luber says: i am interested in the trope of memory - on pg 57 AC says
"Memory is satisfied desire. Survive through momory before it's too
late. Before chaos keeps you from remembering? This idea of memory
activated, as a way of self survival (and a way of keeping the novel
alive) and as a way of keeping the several AC's from being alive is
interesting. any comments
say:Guest says: I have forgotten the question, Karon
say:Karon says: Bekas (Nick): Your suggestion is an interesting one (my own
nomination would be "pain"), but what about Mambrose's original
question, coming from, as it does our "leader" tonight?
say:Karon says: So OK, how are we to decide on which trope to discuss? LEADER,
LEADER?
say:Bekas says: Choose one and proceed. This is the diaspora.
say:Mambrose says: why don't we continue with the eye that Bekas elaborated on.
Could we also connect it with the pronoun "yo" as the I.
say:Lane enters.
say:Guest says: memory if fragmented , however, creates chaos and at times AC's
memory is questionable as to whether it is conscious or a part of his
subconscious memory
say:Kingery says: Fuentes seems obsessed with the color of peoples' eyes. AC's
green eyes, Catalina's amber eyes, regina's dark eyes, etc.
say:Karon says: Well, the phonological connection between "I" and "eye" works
(and has been over-worked) in English, but doesn't seem to me to be
that useful in a Spanish work.
say:Bekas says: I was intrigued by memory as satisfied desire. Isn't this an
impossible position to reach? Isn't memory a sort of artifice of
being? Or perhaps all being is memory especially for Cruz? IU life
could be satisfied through the desire of remembering certain events in
a certain way
say:Karon says: There's the obvious old saw about eyes as mirrors of the sould,
and all that, though Fuentes is crafty enough to frustrate such a
facile reading.
say:Guest says: what is Fuentes suggesting by referring to the different colored
eyes of the different characters?
say:Luber says: on a tangent with nick's question read borges' "Funes the
Memorious"
say:Mambrose says: the green eyes also suggest Cruz's personal magnetism which
related to his pride, power, and arrogance.
say:Karon says: Nick: I was intrigued by that particular quote about satisfied
desire. I wonder, however, whether we can ever figure out what desires
in the novel are ever satisfied. That is, is this a dishonest maxim?
say:Karon says: Luber: How about expanding on your comment so that we can react?
say:Bekas says: Eye is necessarily an imitation, Fuentes uses the word
simulacrum. In the sense that what we see is not visual, is not a
mechanical funcxtiuon of seeing. It is a n interpretation of language.
We see through language but we are literally blind to these image
forming within us.
say:Guest says: how would jealousy fit into that eye scenario in rgards to Cruz?
say:Mambrose says: Cruz seems to pursue his "desires" in many ways--through his
deals and his relationships, but he is never satisfied.
say:Janice enters.
say:Luber says: AC's desire to stay alive is sustained solely through his
remembrances, the narrator needs to remember so the book will live, so
the 3+ AC's willlive
say:Karon says: Nick: what do you make of all that physiological description of
nerves and such?
say:Guest says: the only desires fulfilled were between Reginia and Cruz
say:Guest says: hi janice
say:Mambrose says: And his desire creates his use of future perfect tense to
suggest that the past is his future in his moment of death.
say:Janice looks at Guest.
say:Luber says: but we don't get regina's memory of the affair - only AC's
say:Guest says: he does seem that the progression of the book, through memory,
is what sustains the last hours of Cruz' life
say:Janice says: Hi, Guest! (How come you don't have a character?--you won't
get credit for being here!)
say:Mambrose says: AC's memory of REgina seems glossed with the Romanticism of
first love.
say:Karon says: Mambrose: He certainly enjoys making Catalina and Teresa root
through his things looking for a will--this is close to some
"satisfaction," perhaps? It just isn't very deep or glamorous.
say:Bekas says: I agree. I think there are no satisfied desires, but Cruz wishes
there to be. He creates the desire in others. For instance, with
Catalina. He misunderstands her physical desire as something other than
what it is. In fact Catalina cannot reconcile her physical desire with
her emotional desires for revenge.
say:Mambrose says: Janice--guest is Mary Fluharty--she forgot her
password--AGAIN
say:Sipiora enters.
say:Janice laughs at Mambrose.
say:-> Janice spanks Mary
say:Bekas says: Memory originates in the desire for what? Isn't this the
problem" we don't know where this desire from memory will proceed to
or from.
say:Mambrose says: That's an interesting point, Bekas. Is is she also fragment
by frustrated desire?
say:Lane says: Bekas, I was also fascinated with the idea of memory as desire.
Perhaps it is satisfied desire in its attempt at regeneration, in its
desire for understanding, even repentance. Perhaps remembrance seeks a
new perspective. Yet, Fuentes complicates Cruz's desire for
remembrance with the oppositional desire to forget. Maybe that "open
window" reveals a desire to escape the memories.
say:Karon says: On Nick's note: I note that AC's physical desires start to
splinter when--through agin--he feels physical pain on a constant
basis, notices physical abilities (even digestion) for the first time
when he notices they are gone.
say:Mambrose says: Do we see any internal validity in Cruz's memories of his
desires?
say:Bekas says: No I think her ruptured desire creates her being gives her life
in difference to the life Cruz has captured her in
say:Luber says: it is not so much that the book takes place in 12 hours - but
that AC is able to suspend the duration of memory by jumping back in
his own time perhaps in an effort to stall his death - and maybe his
last attempt to tell his story - to be understood, this maybe his only
desire- to be understood
say:Guest says: I question if he understands himself
say:Mambrose says: Or is Cruz using his subconscious to reshape his memory
through the fragments?
tell_room:Sipiora leaves east.
say:Bekas says: Lane: Doesn't nostalgia have this opposing force of smoothing
yet erasing memory,of making it coherent but also incoherent
say:Luber says: i would agree that he does not understand himself and his
predicament - he scorns god because he has no recourse - he tries to
understand just something
say:Karon says: Here's the rest of my note: AC never notices the physical pain
of others when HE is young. His desires get all screwed up when pain
becomes a constant companion.
say:Guest says: not only smoothing or erasing memory but using a very selective
process in what events, et cetera to remember
say:Bekas says: luber: Is his attempt at autobiography aan attempt to understand
his life?
say:Mambrose says: Benjamin says in "Theses on the Philosophy of History" that
"to seize hold of a memory as it glashes up at a moment of danger" is a
way to recontextualize the past. Is that what Cruz is doing?
say:Luber says: yes, but also (more importantly) his death
say:Zangla says: I think that AC realizes that he has
say:Karon says: Luber: I would say rather that the book questions this notion of
"knowing oneself." Actually, I think that AC doesn't do a bad job of
trying--maybe the best one could hope for! You may be yearning for a
particular sort of revelation, but that's a different matter.
say:Guest says: AC's Cruz attempt at autobiography also a way to accept himself
and his life
say:Bekas says: Karon: almost like in the Metamorphosis when Gregor begins to
recount his life, begins to see from an new perspective when as a roach
he has this pain from a rotting fruiot growing into his back.
say:Luber says: well, maybe he is looking for a pattern that has led to his
dying, especially when we consider the people around him in the room
say:Lane says: Bekas, yes, as in Derrida's process of recollection, erasure,
expansion?
say:Mambrose says: the trope of rotting fruit is another recurring metaphor.
say:Karon says: Nick: you bring up an interesting example, one I used in a
presentation several years ago about pain (and Frankenstein, if you can
believe it). Gregor, as I recall, was actually pretty OK on being a
cockroach.
say:Bekas says: lane: Yeah. I think Cruz erases through memory but can we ever
know what hasd been erased. In his recollection he has define3d an
origin that is not there and proceeds to build around this foundation
a bricolage of life in memory in fragmentation, in parts re3moved from.
say:Mambrose says: Are we supposed to recodify the events through Cruz's eyes?
say:Bekas says: Yes, but the pain gnawed at him. It seems that once we accept
our being an outside force remionds us that it is there in contrast to
somethingelse.
say:Karon says: I sense that a few people tonight cling to a notion of
"self-knowledge" rooted in a heroic image, one of pulling everything
together in an act of satisfying fusion. That ain't going to happen,
my skeptical voice says. AC's gig is the gig most of us have to play.
say:Kingery says: we don't only get Cruz's POV, though. Some of it is
relatively objective.
say:Luber says: sip was very right in citing synecdoche as a master trope here,
the part represents the whole but what abt the other parts - maybe he
was a drag queen at sometime - we will never know
say:Bekas says: mambrose: We do codify but that codification is momentary
say:Lane says: I was also interested in the trope of mirroring. Cruz, at least
in his illness, seems always to visualize through a reflection, a
distorted reflection, at that, which reveals a distorted vision (and
life). Does his distorted visionreflect a distorted mind? an
obscurity or opaqueness, as in the metaphor of the
say:Karon says: Kingery: Thanks for providing a note of humor here--we need it!
That's very witty, talking about "relatively objective"!
say:Mambrose says: But the codification helps the reader to also redefine the
relation between the personal and the historical.
say:Bekas says: Isn't the gig always postponed due to technical difficulties yet
we play within our mind in infinite variations.
say:Mambrose says: does Cruz's fascination with mirrors illustrate his awareness
of his fragmentation?
say:Luber says: maybe AC's project is toward - as Karon says - towards the
heroic, or a striving on AC's part to make him seem heroic, it doesn't
always work but this may be a factor
say:Kingery says: Or does his need for mirrors show his need for external
validation?
say:Bekas says: Mambrose: Sure. Isn't this necessary and unavoidavble. Cruz
cannot avoid searching for a way out of the tunnel just as he can't
avoid returning to his present position.
say:Karon says: Nick: I think I want to say YES. I feel like the little engine
that could (an obscure joke, if you're not into the Mister Rogers
stuff). Anyway, I like that "postponed due to technical
difficulties"--always.
say:Guest says: the mirror reflections seem to demonstrate that perhaps Cruz'
life is blurred not clear
say:Karon says: Kingery: how could a mirror NOT be a need for "external
validation"?
say:Mambrose says: I get the sense of Byron in Childe Harold where he discusses
the "fragmented self" that continues to fragment, but finds a "vitality
of despair"--as he beholds his own fragmentation.
say:Guest says: the mirror images deal with the reflections of self through
others
say:Bekas says: Karon: I'm into Mr. Rogers but through Eddie Murphy's persona.
Sometyhing always goin on the neighborhood but noone can ever agree on
whose neighborhood it's goin on in
say:Kingery says: I refer to his _need_ for mirrors.
say:Lane says: Bekas, Yes- and then does Cruz's almost unbearable recollection
of his life, although fragmented, offer him redemption? I think so.
say:Sipiora enters.
say:Bekas says: Lane: Redemption from who or what? Perhaps himself from his own
life?
say:Guest says: the fragmented recollection of his life through his memory
offers him perhaps final acceptance of himself
say:Karon says: Guest: all we've got are mirrors, but they are paradoxical.
They are our "guides" to how we look (and "are"), but I've never found
a mirror that I trusted. Don't you (sometimes) think that, when you
look into a mirror, that it doesn't show you the way you look? But how
is that possible?
say:Luber says: a good example - pg 138 - of AC and his mirrored desire for love
"Oh mystery, oh illusion, oh mirage: you think that with her you will
walk forward, you affirm yourself: to which future?"
say:Lane says: Maybe there is redemption in waking up through death, renewal
through suffering and self-understanding.
say:Kingery says: evrytime I look in a mirror, I hope that the reflection isn't
right.
say:Mambrose says: Shall we move on to the second question: The three narrative
voices, Tu, as cruz addresses himself, "el" = he Cruz in the past, and
"yo" Cruz in present. We might want to look at the multiple narration
through mixed pronoun number creates "split selves."
say:Guest says: one's perception affects the information revealed from looking
in the mirror
say:Karon says: Lane: Nada on the redemption line. That's the resolution to the
heroic narrtive I alluded to already.
say:Luber says: didnt mean to leave off - but this affirm that AC saw a conflict
with his other, and ultimately at his death saw himself not only
betrayed but utterlky alone
say:Bekas says: Mirrors illuminate the side of our self that memory continually
effaces. Cruz distorted image his reliance on looking upon himself in
a other view may be his attempt to forgo memory to escape time
say:Karon says: Re multiple selves: I think that the "multiple factions"
interpretation is SO BORING. I'm glad that we haven't pursued it. Of
course the truth may turn out to be boring. God may turn out to be
boring, too. So the universe might actually be constituted.
say:Guest says: the "split selves" concept then would place Cruz in different
time intervals as well as different beings
tell_room:Sipiora leaves east.
say:Mambrose says: So does his pronoun switching illustrate a mental process of
distancing and/or connecting with his past?
say:Karon says: Nick: Well, maybe. But I found the mirror-anxiety thing of the
aging AC to be psychologically plausible. But then, I shaved this
morning.
say:Lane says: Mambrose Yes, I think Cruz is certainly aware of the
fragmentation of his life and memories. I think he also realizes
(maybe in the metaphor of the "yellow" color) his own distorted vision,
an obscurity, an opaqueness, the ambiguity of life, language, etc.
say:Bekas says: I think these different uses of voices are an aestetic attempt
to display the restrictions involved in narration. These multiple says
are multiple but levelled within the strictures of language. Fuentes
adresses the selves that have to be there but are not there.
say:Guest says: perhaps both, a back and forth process sort of like his memory
fading in and out
say:Mambrose says: Fuentes said he wanted to "create a new language" in an
interview--and that all language must subvert traditional material. Is
this what he is doing with the multiple pronoun shifts?
say:Bekas says: These multiple says should read "these multiple voices are not
multiple
say:Bekas says: He can't create new language.
say:Karon says: Guest "good" or "god" is not here?
say:Guest says: perhaps he also is pointing to multiple personalities of Cruz
say:Luber says: I would argue (both for and against myself) that there is only
one AC and he is the only one ever present, it is the same man at the
same time that is present at all times simply because he is telling a
story
say:Zangla says: Luber: I think that is why AC has split himself into three
people. In this way he can achieve a greater awareness of himself. In
effect, AC has torn himself into three realities, and cannot say
which of the three represents him.
say:Bekas says: Luber: Good argument, but who are you?
say:Kingery says: I think the multiple POV thing is just a symptom of the
fragmentation symbolised throughout.
say:Mambrose says: his use of pronoun shifting suggests that language can adapt
to our shifting views of self. And it can also move into his
juxtaposition of tenses--grammar therefore becomes a tool for the self
to manipulate
say:Karon says: Luber: easy, there. No one is going to oppose you. Now put
down the sentence slowly, and come out of there with your hands down.
say:Luber says: zangla: yes, but they co-exist, this is what causes tension, but
as fuentes said earlier "chaos has no plural"
say:Lane says: Bekas Yes, doesn't Cruz desire redemption? I think so. I can
remember the an early brief moment when he is talking with the priest
in his bedroom. He seems to think that the priest is the only one who
understands and listens to him. The priest brings him tapes to
cooperate with A.C.'s desire for remembrance of his past life.
say:Lane says: Also, yes, redemption from himself, his sins, etc.
say:Bekas says: Lane: Is it the priest or Padilla?
say:Kingery says: Padilla brings the tapes.
say:Kingery says: AC doesn't seem to like the priest AT ALL.
say:Guest says: but Cruz doesn't seem to like or bond with anyone
say:Karon says: Luber: do you have a license for those sentences? Sure, Nick
throws around "memory is satisfied desire," but when you hold up "Chaos
has no plural," we need to see some ID (didn't Nick just ask you for
some?).
say:Kingery says: Indeed.
say:Lane says: Karon, why not some redemptive unity to waking up and dying?
say:Mambrose says: Mary: He bonded at one time with Regina--
say:Zangla says: Lane: If AC desires redemption, why does he decide that "I
shall die" rather than I will die. I think AC feels that he chose his
life and he will choose when he will die.
say:Luber says: pg 56 karon
say:Karon says: Lane: could you expand on the waking and dying redemption?
say:Guest says: right except Regina, what would his life had been like had the
two of them remained together
say:Bekas says: lane: If he does want redemption, it is the redemption of
remembering the past as his continual presence within it. He wants
nothing changed; he wants no forgiveness; perhaps displacement i.e. in
his son's case; he may feel guilt but it is a guilt of remembering, and
I don't think he wants those memories expunged from his life.
say:Karon says: Luber: yeah, I had the page number. Check out 308.
say:Luber says: low blow
say:Luber says: leave it alone for now
say:Mambrose says: ARen't the memories keeping his alive at this point--they
create an illusion of a future?
say:Guest says: Zangla: perhaps this is just another one of Cruz' attempts to
control
say:Lane says: Don't both priest and Padilla cooperate with those tapes!?
say:Janice laughs at Guest.
say:Janice says: Oops, sorry, wrong key
say:Bekas says: If Cruz is redemptive than he is corrupt to his memory to his
remembering of his narrative. Redemption implies a belief in a moment
of transgession. of error to something; Cruz is too pure in his
narrative to be corrupt or tobe redemptive
say:Karon says: Mambrose: but how are "memories" so different from everything
else? How can we distinguish his "real" time line from a remembered
one? Reminds me of John Locke's view that memory is what binds a
person together.
say:Mambrose says: You could look at it in the Blakean sense that time has no
relevancy when one is perceiving the self.
say:Karon says: I think I agree with Nick, maybe. Viz: I don't see
redemption-baggage sitting on THIS novelist's platform.
say:Bekas says: The tapes are the novel played by Cruz in jest to our
interpretation
say:Guest says: I like that Mambrose
say:Lane says: Karon Sorry, the issue has become "watered down," for me at
least. On to other topics?
say:Luber says: I dont think there is a time line - i think the whole novel, all
the action takes place in 12 hours, these flashbacks, for all we know
could be purely fictive - the only evidence to who Ac really is is the
tapes, and we arent 100% sure if they anent fictive
say:Karon says: Oh, for someone who could be linear and stay on task, tsk, tsk.
say:Mambrose says: What about the discussion question that Cruz is corrupt? Is
he inherently corrupt?
say:Guest says: Cruz is totally corrupt
say:Karon says: Luber: I agree, we can't tell--as you say, we have no purchase
to verify "evidence."
say:Kingery says: anyone actually have a definition of corrupt?
say:Lane says: Bekas Good one on those "novel" tapes!
say:Bekas says: Cruz is annoyed byt he priest and his attempts at ablution, Cruz
is not a man into the symbolism of the abstract. He is concrete i.e.
His home is a former monastery filled with Mexico but it is not mexico
nor is it cruz. There is no trancendence in Cruz's description of
objects
say:Guest says: permanent alteration caused by a breach of fidelity --
definition according tot he computer next door
say:Luber says: I couldn't separate the bodliy orruption/denigration of AC and
the bodily corruption of beckett's Molloy - anybody else?
say:Karon says: Kingery: visual images spring to mind (oddly, the corruption of
the "body," very religious, in one sense). Physical corruption is the
one way to trace time's arrow--no other corruption need go in this
direction. But it provides a pwerful model for all other "sorts"
corruption.
say:Guest says: Cruz' body deteriorating perhaps reflects the corruption of his
life
say:Bekas says: How san Cruz be corrupt within his own world, his memory, Are we
not the corruption?
say:Zangla says: Mambrose: Out of the three selfs AC represents, the only part
that probes the past is the "I." AC then moves through the other two,
distancing himself from the self by self-identification in the first
person and then to a projection of himself in the second. This is the
only way he could possibly try to achievesome understanding of himself.
say:Mambrose says: In considering the concept of corruption, I think Fuentes
approaches it complexly. He draws on Paz's idea that all Mexicans are
"hijos de la chingada"__sons of a violated mother. Cruz seems to use
this ethnic memory when he tells himself he "knew how to f---- them
without letting them f---- you." The idea that as a son of a violated
mother, metaphorically and literally, he has to f----everyone else
before they can do it to him.
say:Bekas says: Cruz's naarration and his memory, history, this novel, Fuentes,
Catalina, MacAdam are all pure.
say:Lane says: Regarding those multiple voices, Surely they seem to reflect
Cruz's multiple selves - a self who desires and engages corruption, a
self who desires redemption through memory and understanding? a self
who who is in "flux" continually.
say:Luber says: what does f------ mean?
say:Karon says: There's physical corruption, whether we work to stave it off or
not. So maybe there's other corruptions--in the world of the
novel--that occur without there being a precipitating event or cause.
A religious view would be the opposiite--but AC rejects religion. No,
we have in AC a naturalist in the fullist, brutish sense.
say:Zangla says: Guest: Maybe that is why Fuentes deals with many smells. The
more he relates to smell the more AC realizes what kind of life he has
led.
say:Mambrose says: I didn't think we could use the actual "taboo word" on the
internet
say:Luber says: why the fuck not?
say:Bekas says: Isn't the word f--- a corruption of fuck and isn't fuck a
corruption of language
say:Sipiora enters.
say:Karon says: It means, "For unlawful carnal knowledge."
say:Mambrose says: I refuse to answer on the grounds that I might incriminate
myself....
tell_room:Sipiora leaves east.
say:Luber says: for unlawful carnal knowledge? isn't this what AC sought in his
own body (just kidding)
say:-> Janice uses 4-letter words in protest of the silly law--LOVE, HATE,
HOPE, OTHER DISGUSTING THINGS!
say:Karon says: Mambrose: you shouldn't have used "taboo."
say:Mambrose says: I see I'm in hot water all around
say:Bekas says: Karon: This would figure into Cruz's love3 of all things
contingent to fucking
say:Karon says: Janice: sometimes you're so gutsy in a gummy bears sort of way.
say:Luber says: shall i wash my fingers out with soap
say:Janice grins at Karon.
say:Janice blushes.
say:Guest says: Mambrose: you will the most interesting comment for the evening
say:Guest says: Mambrose: you WIN the
say:Bekas says: all humanity has been reduced to . . .
say:Bekas has gone net-dead.
say:Karon says: Let's get the devil out of here soon, we are winding (in several
senses) down.
say:Luber has gone net-dead.
say:Karon has gone net-dead.
say:Janice left the game.
say:Mambrose says: Bi from Ft. Myers'
say:Guest says: Janice did you answer my question of how I can find out who I am
for real?
say:Zangla has gone net-dead.
say:Guest says: Adios Amigos
say:Lane says: In terms of Marxism, we could see Cruz as corrupt, as an
industrialist, a capitalist, a man in isolation from community, an
abuser of women. But, maybe we could also see him as a noble man, too.
say:Sipiora enters.
tell_room:Sipiora leaves east.
say:Guest left the game.
say:Mambrose has gone net-dead.
say:Lane says: Lane says good-night.
say:Kingery says: I'm gone.
say:Kingery left the game.
say:Caliban disintegrates A Scribe