My writing career spans forty years. From one perspective I am developing a Jewish and kabbalistic vision of the world, the mind, and the soul. From another perspective, I am composing long narrative poems that explore the clash between the real and the ideal, in the lives of historical figures and people I have known. From yet a third perspective, I am developing a new, more versatile language in which the complexity and multi-dimensionality of quantum mechanics is carved into the lens of language itself.
Or let me put it this way: I have spent the last 40 years writing poetry that re-visions and re-models not just the world we live in, but the language with which we see, describe, and understand that world. In the process I have created a new grammar to represent the fundamental indeterminacies at the horizons of thought. This has been a slow process requiring much persistence, not only because of its own inherent difficulties, but because of the difficulties it creates for readers, who have a challenging enough job deciphering the experiments and non-linearities of modern and post-modern writing. The result, though a challenge to many readers, allows my work to achieve layered and faceted perspectives that a traditional use of language inherently prohibits.
It seems that I am almost alone in spearheading the development of a language that can reflect and express the nature of quantum mechanics, both in physics and in consciousness. But I am not entirely alone. In 1980 David Bohm, the renowned physicist, published his last book, Wholeness and the Implicate Order. It is about the need to develop a new language in response to quantum mechanics! In 1980 I was already six years into my project to recreate English.
Showing posts with label altered spelling. Show all posts
Showing posts with label altered spelling. Show all posts
Wednesday, November 02, 2011
Sunday, February 14, 2010
Quantum Mechanics and Language
Upon reading David Bohm's Wholeness and the Implicate Order.
From the first paragraph of Bohm's introduction to Wholeness and the Implicate Order, I realized that what he was theorizing about in this book, published in 1980, I was concurrently developing in my poetry since the mid 70's. You can find many of my short essays on language and consciousness on this blog or at my website, shivvetee.com. If you are unfamiliar with my thoughts on this topic, I suggest you begin with a pleasant and easy little essay, “Wy I Rite So Funnee” at:
Wy I Rite So Funnee
If you want to then go deeper, you can explore some of the labels on this blog, such as 'complexity,' 'phenomenology,' and 'poetics,' or you can jump right to this link which is a partial summary of my various posts:
Literary Complexity
Bohm's path emerged from quantum mechanics; mine from phenomenology and consciousness, but both of us realized the necessity of interdisciplinary analysis. My ideas have been greatly influenced by the development of quantum mechanics over the 20th century, as Bohm's have been by phenomenology and the philosophy of consciousness.
Consider this statement by Bohm, who is widely regarded one of the Illuminati of quantum mechanics:
"It is clear that in reflecting on and pondering the nature of movement, both in thought and in the object of thought, one comes inevitably to the question of wholeness or totality. The notion that the one who thinks (the Ego) is at least in principle completely separate from and independent of the reality that he thinks about is of course firmly embedded in our entire tradition.... But this confronts us with a very difficult challenge: How are we to think coherently of a single, unbroken, flowing actuality of existence as a whole, containing both thought (consciousness) and external reality as we experience it?" (Bohm, p. x of Introduction, 1981 paperback, Routledge, Kegan, Paul Ltd.)
He then goes on two pages later:
"In chapter 2 we go into the role of language in bringing about fragmentation of thought.... We then inquire whether it is possible to experiment with new language forms in which the basic role will be given to the verb rather than the noun. Such forms will have as their content a series of actions that flow and merge into each other, without sharp separations or breaks." (ibid, p. xii)
Now consider this excerpt from my mid-80's essay, “Wy I Rite so Funnee”:
"My second intention with stevespell was more ambitious and radical. I wanted to develop a grammar in which subject and predicate, object and action were merged. I had heard that this was possible in Sanskrit, and it seemed intuitively right to me. Surely, the actor and the action are not two separate things, but aspects of one thing.... Perhaps our language was creating unnatural distinctions between actor and action, or between past, present, and future."
In chapter 1, p. 9, Bohm explores his first love, quantum mechanics.
"In a more detailed description the atom is, in many ways, seen to behave as much like a wave as a particle. It can perhaps best be regarded as a poorly defined cloud, dependent for its particular form on the whole environment, including the observing instruments. Thus, one can no longer maintain the division between the observer and observed (which is implicit in the atomistic view that regards each of these as separate aggregates of atoms)."
Here we see the confluence of quantum mechanics and consciousness in two important areas.
First, Bohm, working from Heisenberg, says that, in atomic spaces, the act of observation affects what is observed. We see this in precisely the same way phenomenologically. The act of self observation modifies what is observed (our thoughts). The closer we observe ourselves, the more completely our act of observation is what we see, obscuring and obstructing a free flow of thought. This is a precise corollary to Heisenberg's principle that when we observe phenomena at the atomic level, the more accurately we desire to know where a given object is, the more inaccurate our understanding of where it is going.
Second, just as at atomic level observation we see the breakdown of the “division between the observer and observed,” so we see in consciousness that there is no clear division between individuals. This is quite obvious by observing the transmission of emotion from one person to another. An individual shouting angrily at another causes an immediate and visceral reaction, usually either anger or fear in like measure. This transmission is not based on proximity, and can be verbal or non-verbal. Two people shouting at each other will each become increasingly disturbed, while an onlooker, to whom their anger is not directed, can observe dispassionately. I have also often observed in myself, when sitting silently with someone who is extremely anxious, that although I am not consciously aware of their anxiety, I will find myself inexplicably anxious, inexplicable, that is, until I ask them, “are you anxious or nervous?” Their answer almost always confirms that what I am feeling is their emotion!
I will offer one more example of the confluence between quantum mechanics and consciousness using Bohm's observations as a starting point. On pp. 9-10 he says:
"What is needed in a relativistic theory is to give up altogether the notion that the world is constituted of basic objects or 'building blocks.' Rather, one has to view the world in terms of universal flux of events and processes. Thus,... instead of thinking of a particle, one is to think of a 'world tube.'
This world tube represents an infinitely complex process of a structure in movement and development which is centred in a region indicated by the boundaries of the tube. However, even outside the tube, each 'particle' has a field that extends through space and merges with the fields of other particles."
Let me now rewrite the second paragraph, speaking of human beings rather than atomic particles:
"This human body represents an infinitely complex process of a structure in movement and development which is centred in a region indicated by the boundaries of the body. However, even outside the body, each 'ego' has a field that extends through space and merges with the fields of other egos."
These overlapping fields are not limited to atomic and subatomic particles and emotional sensitivities. I would posit that the very nature of consciousness is represented better by behaviors described by quantum mechanics than by any Euclidean or Newtonian model. Therefore, time, also must be understood in a quantum mechanical way, since time is a product of consciousness. While the ego is focused into a present moment, that looks back into a past and forward to a future, human consciousness itself is not so bounded. Events of the past can have a profound effect on present behavior without there being any direct series of causal connections. Consciousness connects past, present, and future into a single interactive continuum with multiple, direct causalities.
Our language is structured to make concrete distinctions between objects, between objects and the actions that connect them, and between moments in time. These distinctions can be a helpful artifice, but they misrepresent the true behavior of objects in motion (events in time), and thought (consciousness). Bohm postulates a more active, fluid, verb-based language, but that is insufficient. Stevespell attempts a more comprehensive interleaving of objects, events, and time periods. I would call it a quantum mechanical language, which attempts to represent the more complex, non-Euclidean, interactive causalities operating in the human observation of the mental and physical worlds.
In sum, as we begin to peer into the atomic world, where matter “sublimates” into energy and energy “condenses” into matter, we are also observing the workings of consciousness as it articulates the foundations of space-time. This more accurate observational ability that evolved in the 20th century, shattered our ancient world-views (Aristotelian, Euclidean, Newtonian). Now we are beginning to understand that our further development is inhibited by our language, which also needs to evolve to represent this new, subtler understanding of our world.
From the first paragraph of Bohm's introduction to Wholeness and the Implicate Order, I realized that what he was theorizing about in this book, published in 1980, I was concurrently developing in my poetry since the mid 70's. You can find many of my short essays on language and consciousness on this blog or at my website, shivvetee.com. If you are unfamiliar with my thoughts on this topic, I suggest you begin with a pleasant and easy little essay, “Wy I Rite So Funnee” at:
Wy I Rite So Funnee
If you want to then go deeper, you can explore some of the labels on this blog, such as 'complexity,' 'phenomenology,' and 'poetics,' or you can jump right to this link which is a partial summary of my various posts:
Literary Complexity
Bohm's path emerged from quantum mechanics; mine from phenomenology and consciousness, but both of us realized the necessity of interdisciplinary analysis. My ideas have been greatly influenced by the development of quantum mechanics over the 20th century, as Bohm's have been by phenomenology and the philosophy of consciousness.
Consider this statement by Bohm, who is widely regarded one of the Illuminati of quantum mechanics:
"It is clear that in reflecting on and pondering the nature of movement, both in thought and in the object of thought, one comes inevitably to the question of wholeness or totality. The notion that the one who thinks (the Ego) is at least in principle completely separate from and independent of the reality that he thinks about is of course firmly embedded in our entire tradition.... But this confronts us with a very difficult challenge: How are we to think coherently of a single, unbroken, flowing actuality of existence as a whole, containing both thought (consciousness) and external reality as we experience it?" (Bohm, p. x of Introduction, 1981 paperback, Routledge, Kegan, Paul Ltd.)
He then goes on two pages later:
"In chapter 2 we go into the role of language in bringing about fragmentation of thought.... We then inquire whether it is possible to experiment with new language forms in which the basic role will be given to the verb rather than the noun. Such forms will have as their content a series of actions that flow and merge into each other, without sharp separations or breaks." (ibid, p. xii)
Now consider this excerpt from my mid-80's essay, “Wy I Rite so Funnee”:
"My second intention with stevespell was more ambitious and radical. I wanted to develop a grammar in which subject and predicate, object and action were merged. I had heard that this was possible in Sanskrit, and it seemed intuitively right to me. Surely, the actor and the action are not two separate things, but aspects of one thing.... Perhaps our language was creating unnatural distinctions between actor and action, or between past, present, and future."
In chapter 1, p. 9, Bohm explores his first love, quantum mechanics.
"In a more detailed description the atom is, in many ways, seen to behave as much like a wave as a particle. It can perhaps best be regarded as a poorly defined cloud, dependent for its particular form on the whole environment, including the observing instruments. Thus, one can no longer maintain the division between the observer and observed (which is implicit in the atomistic view that regards each of these as separate aggregates of atoms)."
Here we see the confluence of quantum mechanics and consciousness in two important areas.
First, Bohm, working from Heisenberg, says that, in atomic spaces, the act of observation affects what is observed. We see this in precisely the same way phenomenologically. The act of self observation modifies what is observed (our thoughts). The closer we observe ourselves, the more completely our act of observation is what we see, obscuring and obstructing a free flow of thought. This is a precise corollary to Heisenberg's principle that when we observe phenomena at the atomic level, the more accurately we desire to know where a given object is, the more inaccurate our understanding of where it is going.
Second, just as at atomic level observation we see the breakdown of the “division between the observer and observed,” so we see in consciousness that there is no clear division between individuals. This is quite obvious by observing the transmission of emotion from one person to another. An individual shouting angrily at another causes an immediate and visceral reaction, usually either anger or fear in like measure. This transmission is not based on proximity, and can be verbal or non-verbal. Two people shouting at each other will each become increasingly disturbed, while an onlooker, to whom their anger is not directed, can observe dispassionately. I have also often observed in myself, when sitting silently with someone who is extremely anxious, that although I am not consciously aware of their anxiety, I will find myself inexplicably anxious, inexplicable, that is, until I ask them, “are you anxious or nervous?” Their answer almost always confirms that what I am feeling is their emotion!
I will offer one more example of the confluence between quantum mechanics and consciousness using Bohm's observations as a starting point. On pp. 9-10 he says:
"What is needed in a relativistic theory is to give up altogether the notion that the world is constituted of basic objects or 'building blocks.' Rather, one has to view the world in terms of universal flux of events and processes. Thus,... instead of thinking of a particle, one is to think of a 'world tube.'
This world tube represents an infinitely complex process of a structure in movement and development which is centred in a region indicated by the boundaries of the tube. However, even outside the tube, each 'particle' has a field that extends through space and merges with the fields of other particles."
Let me now rewrite the second paragraph, speaking of human beings rather than atomic particles:
"This human body represents an infinitely complex process of a structure in movement and development which is centred in a region indicated by the boundaries of the body. However, even outside the body, each 'ego' has a field that extends through space and merges with the fields of other egos."
These overlapping fields are not limited to atomic and subatomic particles and emotional sensitivities. I would posit that the very nature of consciousness is represented better by behaviors described by quantum mechanics than by any Euclidean or Newtonian model. Therefore, time, also must be understood in a quantum mechanical way, since time is a product of consciousness. While the ego is focused into a present moment, that looks back into a past and forward to a future, human consciousness itself is not so bounded. Events of the past can have a profound effect on present behavior without there being any direct series of causal connections. Consciousness connects past, present, and future into a single interactive continuum with multiple, direct causalities.
Our language is structured to make concrete distinctions between objects, between objects and the actions that connect them, and between moments in time. These distinctions can be a helpful artifice, but they misrepresent the true behavior of objects in motion (events in time), and thought (consciousness). Bohm postulates a more active, fluid, verb-based language, but that is insufficient. Stevespell attempts a more comprehensive interleaving of objects, events, and time periods. I would call it a quantum mechanical language, which attempts to represent the more complex, non-Euclidean, interactive causalities operating in the human observation of the mental and physical worlds.
In sum, as we begin to peer into the atomic world, where matter “sublimates” into energy and energy “condenses” into matter, we are also observing the workings of consciousness as it articulates the foundations of space-time. This more accurate observational ability that evolved in the 20th century, shattered our ancient world-views (Aristotelian, Euclidean, Newtonian). Now we are beginning to understand that our further development is inhibited by our language, which also needs to evolve to represent this new, subtler understanding of our world.
Saturday, February 13, 2010
Wy I Rite So Funnee
This pleasant little essay, entitled "Wy I Rite So Funnee" was my first statement about the transformations I'm applying to the English language, and was written sometime in the mid 1980's. You can find it on my website, www.shivvetee.com, but since I'm reorganizing that site, I thought I'd post it here too, because I'm going to make reference to it in my next post.
Wy du I rite so funnee?
This question has been asked of me consistently, since I began altering standard spelling and grammar back in the mid 1970's. It has been asked politely and it has been asked with expletives undeleted. Readers and editors have been offended and confused by it, as well as delighted by it. A friendly but critical colleague from the Pittsburgh Poetry Exchange dubbed it “stevespell” many years ago, and that has become my preferred name for it.
Sometimes I feel I am hewing the words out of wood or stone, rough approximations to a deeper, more accurate language. Sometimes I feel like I am taking the “found art” of English, and refining and polishing it. Sometimes the words are like very soft clay in my hands, oozing through my fingers. Sometimes the words are like nuggets of gold discovered as I sift through gravel and fast running water. Stevespell has allowed me to discover new words, new meanings in words, and new relationships between words, and it has become one of the modalities of my creativity.
I realize that to many readers, my language appears idiosyncratic, obscure, and nearly impenetrable. Yet, when I am writing, I feel like I am speaking in an “English” that underlays the infinite variations and personal morphologies that are illusorily lumped together into a single language. People question stevespell, as if “English” were a pre-existing, complete, and unalterable phenomenon in nature, and I am breaking the rules. I am not breaking the rules; I am discovering them; I am extending them.
Here’s the metaphor that I keep coming back to: most people think of words as if they were bricks. They think of words as hard, clearly shaped, baked clay units. They’re made in some factory somewhere – doesn’t matter where or with what clay – to be used to build permanent things. I think of words as soft clay, easily shaped and re-shaped, mostly used to build impermanent things in impermanent and poorly designed ways. It is the rare structure, indeed, that survives these harsh conditions that we build in.
I have two friends in Provincetown, Conrad and Anne, who are among the most beautiful people in the world. One of the tricks Conrad likes to play on the world is to sculpt in brick, in ways that appear to defy gravity. When you see these sculptures, you are forced to wonder: are these “bricks” really styrofoam, or are they real bricks somehow being held up with invisible wires? You bricklayers, when was the last time you made a brick float in air?
Stevespell evolved organically. You can find two relatively early examples of it in the Reading Room on my website, shivvetee: the poem In the Harvest ov Nations and the story “A Pilgrimmage to Mecca.” Compare those writings to In the Ruwenz ov the Tempel, I Herd...! At least to me, the language in them seems so normal, so unadventurous. To my eyes they also lack a certain sparkle and intensity. And yet, those writings, too, generated questions and controversy not unlike what I hear regarding my most recent work.
My earliest intention was two-fold. First, I wanted to normalize English spelling to spoken English. This seemed easy to accomplish, in my naivete. I soon discovered that I wasn’t the first to try such a project. For example, the Chicago Tribune attempted to partially normalize English, only to be booed into submission. On top of that, normalization presented all kinds of new problems. Conjugational and etymological continuities often had to be stretched or abandoned. And what was I to do with regional and national accents? If a written-spoken normalization had been my only motive, I too would have quit the project. But that is not the case. By the way, if you study the evolution of my spellings you will see that I have progressively moved towards a normalization that reflects my accent.
My second intention with stevespell was more ambitious and radical. I wanted to develop a grammar in which subject and predicate, object and action were merged. I had heard that this was possible in Sanskrit, and it seemed intuitively right to me. Surely, the actor and the action are not two separate things, but aspects of one thing. Later, when I began to learn Hebrew, I saw how root words and the absence of written vowels were used to create dynamic, interweaving structures of sound, meaning, and perspective. But English, and most European languages, don’t have (or don’t focus on) these kinds of conceptual tools. Perhaps our language was creating unnatural distinctions between actor and action, or between past, present, and future. So I began to work the clay, and I found that the possibility of merging noun and verb in English was waiting patiently just below the surface. Actually we are doing it all the time! Colloquial usage commonly slurs the “ing” verb form into “in,” as in “I’m goin’ to the store.” Superimpose this on the form that converts a verb into a noun using “-ence” (as in “transcend” to “transcendence”), and, presto, yu ar the transenden ov normel Eenglish!
Critics pointed out to me two other inter-related and important effects of stevespell. First, it forced them to read more slowly. This really annoys a lot of people. We have so much to do, and so much to read, we don’t have time to crawl along, actually paying attention to individual words. But just a second. That’s precisely what poetry is about! It’s about paying attention to each word; hearing them, considering them, going back and reading phrases again and maybe even again, slowly proceeding, and ohmigosh, actually enjoying the sensuality of language. I hope you speed demons don’t have sex the way you read, trying to get done as quickly as possible. I much prefer to read slowly, sensuously, seductively engaged with each word.
The other complaint I got, a complaint by another poet, mind you, was that my poetry forced him to read my work aloud if he wanted to understand it. Darn, that annoyed him. Say what?? That too is exactly what poetry is about: hearing the words, speaking the words, creating not a fleeting shadow of a thought as you rush on through a zillion words a minute, but resonating the words through the very bones of your body, from the chest outward. I remember a wicked northeaster on Cape Cod one February. I was living alone in my parent’s cottage on the beach. The waves were thundering, battering the seawall mercilessly; the wind was howling furiously and pummeling the walls. The curtains were swaying and the cracks in the walls were whistling, and me, I was reading Blake’s Jerusalem, screaming it at the top of my lungs, for hours, until the storm faded around dawn. It was one of the most glorious nights of my life. And I swear, Willy B. was right there with me belting it out, the two of us laughing till we could hardly breathe, then reading on.
So, you’re not breaking my heart if you have to read slowly, and if you even have to read my poetry aloud to get it. That’s what you’re supposed to do with poetry.
There is at least one more effect intended by stevespell. Poetic language has ebbed and flowed for thousands of years between the use of heightened, formal language, and the use of colloquial, simplified language. Often, when language is used to convey a sense of the sacred, it tends towards the formal, and this may easily become awkward or stilted. Nonetheless, I want to separate my poetry from mundane and secular literature. Whether or not I succeed and achieve a sense of the sacred in my poetry is for you to decide, but that, too, is part of my intention.
Wy du I rite so funnee?
This question has been asked of me consistently, since I began altering standard spelling and grammar back in the mid 1970's. It has been asked politely and it has been asked with expletives undeleted. Readers and editors have been offended and confused by it, as well as delighted by it. A friendly but critical colleague from the Pittsburgh Poetry Exchange dubbed it “stevespell” many years ago, and that has become my preferred name for it.
Sometimes I feel I am hewing the words out of wood or stone, rough approximations to a deeper, more accurate language. Sometimes I feel like I am taking the “found art” of English, and refining and polishing it. Sometimes the words are like very soft clay in my hands, oozing through my fingers. Sometimes the words are like nuggets of gold discovered as I sift through gravel and fast running water. Stevespell has allowed me to discover new words, new meanings in words, and new relationships between words, and it has become one of the modalities of my creativity.
I realize that to many readers, my language appears idiosyncratic, obscure, and nearly impenetrable. Yet, when I am writing, I feel like I am speaking in an “English” that underlays the infinite variations and personal morphologies that are illusorily lumped together into a single language. People question stevespell, as if “English” were a pre-existing, complete, and unalterable phenomenon in nature, and I am breaking the rules. I am not breaking the rules; I am discovering them; I am extending them.
Here’s the metaphor that I keep coming back to: most people think of words as if they were bricks. They think of words as hard, clearly shaped, baked clay units. They’re made in some factory somewhere – doesn’t matter where or with what clay – to be used to build permanent things. I think of words as soft clay, easily shaped and re-shaped, mostly used to build impermanent things in impermanent and poorly designed ways. It is the rare structure, indeed, that survives these harsh conditions that we build in.
I have two friends in Provincetown, Conrad and Anne, who are among the most beautiful people in the world. One of the tricks Conrad likes to play on the world is to sculpt in brick, in ways that appear to defy gravity. When you see these sculptures, you are forced to wonder: are these “bricks” really styrofoam, or are they real bricks somehow being held up with invisible wires? You bricklayers, when was the last time you made a brick float in air?
Stevespell evolved organically. You can find two relatively early examples of it in the Reading Room on my website, shivvetee: the poem In the Harvest ov Nations and the story “A Pilgrimmage to Mecca.” Compare those writings to In the Ruwenz ov the Tempel, I Herd...! At least to me, the language in them seems so normal, so unadventurous. To my eyes they also lack a certain sparkle and intensity. And yet, those writings, too, generated questions and controversy not unlike what I hear regarding my most recent work.
My earliest intention was two-fold. First, I wanted to normalize English spelling to spoken English. This seemed easy to accomplish, in my naivete. I soon discovered that I wasn’t the first to try such a project. For example, the Chicago Tribune attempted to partially normalize English, only to be booed into submission. On top of that, normalization presented all kinds of new problems. Conjugational and etymological continuities often had to be stretched or abandoned. And what was I to do with regional and national accents? If a written-spoken normalization had been my only motive, I too would have quit the project. But that is not the case. By the way, if you study the evolution of my spellings you will see that I have progressively moved towards a normalization that reflects my accent.
My second intention with stevespell was more ambitious and radical. I wanted to develop a grammar in which subject and predicate, object and action were merged. I had heard that this was possible in Sanskrit, and it seemed intuitively right to me. Surely, the actor and the action are not two separate things, but aspects of one thing. Later, when I began to learn Hebrew, I saw how root words and the absence of written vowels were used to create dynamic, interweaving structures of sound, meaning, and perspective. But English, and most European languages, don’t have (or don’t focus on) these kinds of conceptual tools. Perhaps our language was creating unnatural distinctions between actor and action, or between past, present, and future. So I began to work the clay, and I found that the possibility of merging noun and verb in English was waiting patiently just below the surface. Actually we are doing it all the time! Colloquial usage commonly slurs the “ing” verb form into “in,” as in “I’m goin’ to the store.” Superimpose this on the form that converts a verb into a noun using “-ence” (as in “transcend” to “transcendence”), and, presto, yu ar the transenden ov normel Eenglish!
Critics pointed out to me two other inter-related and important effects of stevespell. First, it forced them to read more slowly. This really annoys a lot of people. We have so much to do, and so much to read, we don’t have time to crawl along, actually paying attention to individual words. But just a second. That’s precisely what poetry is about! It’s about paying attention to each word; hearing them, considering them, going back and reading phrases again and maybe even again, slowly proceeding, and ohmigosh, actually enjoying the sensuality of language. I hope you speed demons don’t have sex the way you read, trying to get done as quickly as possible. I much prefer to read slowly, sensuously, seductively engaged with each word.
The other complaint I got, a complaint by another poet, mind you, was that my poetry forced him to read my work aloud if he wanted to understand it. Darn, that annoyed him. Say what?? That too is exactly what poetry is about: hearing the words, speaking the words, creating not a fleeting shadow of a thought as you rush on through a zillion words a minute, but resonating the words through the very bones of your body, from the chest outward. I remember a wicked northeaster on Cape Cod one February. I was living alone in my parent’s cottage on the beach. The waves were thundering, battering the seawall mercilessly; the wind was howling furiously and pummeling the walls. The curtains were swaying and the cracks in the walls were whistling, and me, I was reading Blake’s Jerusalem, screaming it at the top of my lungs, for hours, until the storm faded around dawn. It was one of the most glorious nights of my life. And I swear, Willy B. was right there with me belting it out, the two of us laughing till we could hardly breathe, then reading on.
So, you’re not breaking my heart if you have to read slowly, and if you even have to read my poetry aloud to get it. That’s what you’re supposed to do with poetry.
There is at least one more effect intended by stevespell. Poetic language has ebbed and flowed for thousands of years between the use of heightened, formal language, and the use of colloquial, simplified language. Often, when language is used to convey a sense of the sacred, it tends towards the formal, and this may easily become awkward or stilted. Nonetheless, I want to separate my poetry from mundane and secular literature. Whether or not I succeed and achieve a sense of the sacred in my poetry is for you to decide, but that, too, is part of my intention.
Friday, July 27, 2007
Blog talk (blogtok) and stevespell
In September of 2004 my very good friend, and Shivvetee webmaster, Steven Toleikis, had the following brilliant insight. He wrote:
Was reading the paper ystrdy 'bout blogs. (If by some small chance you don't know what they are see: http://www.blogger.com )
They were going on about how they're changing how people communicate, report on news, yadda, yadda and how they also seem to be leading to an evolution in ........ SPELLING! Bingo - I thought, the perfect arena to use SteveSpell! Whatdoyouthink. It might just catch on!
My response:
Well, blogtalk (blogtok?) has definitely caught on. Both my 19 and 9 year olds are teaching me new "words," acronyms, and abbreviations all the time. Perhaps it will indeed open a door of acceptance for stevespell. In that case, stevespell might take on the status of the (dare I say) priestly and "high" form of the language, while blogtok will be the cockney or bronx dialect (or "dialects" assuming the evolution of variants). On the other hand, perhaps blogtok, as the organic form that is evolving in a communal arena, will ultimately become the canonical form, while stevespell will be rejected as a contrived and academic aberration.
There are some important similarities in the origins of blogtok and stevespell, that's for sure. I began with the dual impetuses of normalizing English and breaking open its grammar to allow the infusion of new rhythmic and conceptual energy. Blogtok seems to have a similar, tho less articulated dual impetus: to speed up (and maybe also normalize) spelling, and to allow, or promote, an "individualized" voice (or more accurately, a counter-cultural voice, since there's nothing terribly individual about it). Not so different, eh? Blogtok has the virtue of being organic, grass roots, and interactively evolving. Stevespell has the virtue of being more conceptually articulated and purposeful in its evolutions.
I'd like to say that this proves that popular culture (blogtok) follows art (stevespell). Or more personally, "see, I told you so!" But given how well-known I am (burn!), I think this really suggests something quite different: that both art and popular culture originate (and bifurcate) from the same sources. Artists may hear it or see it or feel it first, but they don't create it. They just try to represent it.
Now a question for you, Steven. Are you suggesting I do something to promote stevespell in the blogtok arena??? If so, please enlighten me to the opportunities and venues.
Note from 8/2006:
It took me 2 years to get enlightened and create this blog, but here I am blogging tokking on my bloggie tokkee.
Was reading the paper ystrdy 'bout blogs. (If by some small chance you don't know what they are see: http://www.blogger.com )
They were going on about how they're changing how people communicate, report on news, yadda, yadda and how they also seem to be leading to an evolution in ........ SPELLING! Bingo - I thought, the perfect arena to use SteveSpell! Whatdoyouthink. It might just catch on!
My response:
Well, blogtalk (blogtok?) has definitely caught on. Both my 19 and 9 year olds are teaching me new "words," acronyms, and abbreviations all the time. Perhaps it will indeed open a door of acceptance for stevespell. In that case, stevespell might take on the status of the (dare I say) priestly and "high" form of the language, while blogtok will be the cockney or bronx dialect (or "dialects" assuming the evolution of variants). On the other hand, perhaps blogtok, as the organic form that is evolving in a communal arena, will ultimately become the canonical form, while stevespell will be rejected as a contrived and academic aberration.
There are some important similarities in the origins of blogtok and stevespell, that's for sure. I began with the dual impetuses of normalizing English and breaking open its grammar to allow the infusion of new rhythmic and conceptual energy. Blogtok seems to have a similar, tho less articulated dual impetus: to speed up (and maybe also normalize) spelling, and to allow, or promote, an "individualized" voice (or more accurately, a counter-cultural voice, since there's nothing terribly individual about it). Not so different, eh? Blogtok has the virtue of being organic, grass roots, and interactively evolving. Stevespell has the virtue of being more conceptually articulated and purposeful in its evolutions.
I'd like to say that this proves that popular culture (blogtok) follows art (stevespell). Or more personally, "see, I told you so!"
Now a question for you, Steven. Are you suggesting I do something to promote stevespell in the blogtok arena??? If so, please enlighten me to the opportunities and venues.
Note from 8/2006:
It took me 2 years to get enlightened and create this blog, but here I am blogging tokking on my bloggie tokkee.
Sunday, June 03, 2007
Literary Complexity and its Antithesis, Ambiguity
This relatively short essay is part of an on-going series of musings concerning language in the service of clearer and more insightful modes of thought. The interested reader who is, as yet, unfamiliar with my poetry and my program to restructure English, might want to read the following, to put this essay in context. I would suggest beginning with:
Why I Rite So Funnee [Feb 13, 2010 on this blog].
This essay is also on my website, which contains a number of book-length poems, plus some of my art and manuscripts.
Then I would search this blog for the following posts:
A docent’s tour of my poetry, Part 1. [July 10, 2006]
Part 2 of a docent's tour of my poetry. [July 10, 2006]
The definitive function of true art. [August 29, 2006]
Musings on a Non-linear Narrative Poetics. [July 20, 2006]
RE: the poem: Guerden ov Addomz (see 10/26/06) [November 10, 2006]
So...
There are many ways to be accurate in thinking and writing. A marvelous statement on “traditional” understandings about literary accuracy can be found in Richard Moore’s essay, “Seven Types of Accuracy” in his book The Rule that Liberates. However, we have made enormous gains in science that are not reflected in our arts, and especially in poetry. Our language and our use of language have not kept pace with our ability to See. We still measure the accuracy of language by our ability to say one thing clearly, unambiguously.
Sadly for the traditionalists, we have passed beyond a world of one dimension. We realize (or must realize) now, that we live in a highly superimposed world. There are many ways of seeing, many ways of feeling, many ways of knowing, all coexisting, each with its own particular value. There are many competing, and often co-equal truths, that point to a higher truth or truths. An educated, and more importantly, an ethical individual must become aware of them all. This is the job of literature in this era. We must implement these ways of thinking, and not merely theorize about them.
To this end, in my poetry I sacrifice accuracy in one dimension (one level of meaning) to gain accuracy in multiple dimensions (multiple levels of meaning). For some people it makes my writing too difficult to penetrate. I truly regret this, but I will persist in my vision. Perhaps if I explain how it works (how I think and compose), I might be able to make my poetry a bit more approachable. What follows are two common examples of superimposed meanings that can be found in my writing. The first involves modifications of spelling. The second involves modifications of grammar and verb tense, as well as spelling.
On September 25, 2006, you can find a poem entitled “Kinder, Prepare Yurselz.” We will go no further than the title, which contains two variant spellings representing superimposed ideas. The first is the word “Kinder,” which is intended to have two meanings: 1) “to be more compassionate,” which, if I didn’t intend a second meaning, I would have spelled “kiender” to indicate the long “i” in pronunciation, and 2) “children,” from the German and Yiddish. The second variant in spelling that signals multiple meanings is “Yurselz.” The word refers directly to the word “yourselves,” but I have substituted “-selz” for “-selves” to show that this is not simply a psychological process related to the self, but a process that must penetrate all the way into our bodies, into our cells. We children must prepare ourselves profoundly, physically and mentally. And we must prepare ourselves to be kinder, more compassionate. I could delve further into the implications, but I hope that gives a sufficient taste.
The second example can be found on November 2, 2006, in the poem “Plowmen with Taelz.” In the second stanza I write:
"I meet a plowman a reternen frum feelz.
"He will say, ‘For jennerratenz I am plow this expanz.
‘My lingz ar groen frum its oxxide dust.
There’s a lot going on here! We have the clashing present tense of “meet” with the future tense of “will say.” I did this for a number of reasons. The simplest is that often our experiences are not understood until much later, so that what we hear now, we will re-hear differently in the future. Secondly, time is purely a function of consciousness. I have come to believe that past, present, and future all coexist, but our experience is limited, as Blake says, “by our senses five... which are the inlets to the Soul in this age.” “For jenneratenz I am plow” suggests another aspect of the time-consciousness unity. The moment of consciousness in this statement spans generations. Such a claim has important implications, both for the definition of “self,” and for our understanding of how experience and belief are culturally transmitted. Finally, “lingz ar groen” is fraught with meaning. “Lingz” are both “lungs” and “languages” and “groen” is both “grown” and “groan.” And all the possible combinations of meanings coexist and amplify each other.
Understanding how I write may not make reading my poetry any easier, but perhaps you may be comforted to know that there’s reason, purpose, and intention in it. Perhaps it is only cold comfort.
However, I think it is very important to make this distinction: what I’m trying to do is the opposite of what I see as an overwhelming tendency in modern poetry, that is, the creating of intentional ambiguity, the purpose of which is to create the illusion of deeper meaning(s) without the author’s intentionality of what that meaning is. We know this kind of ambiguity creates merely an illusion of depth, because a byword of modern poetics is that “the reader must create the meaning,” thus absolving the author of that responsibility. I reject this perspective entirely. It is the author’s job to create meaning, and to convey it clearly.
Now, the search for multi-dimensional accuracy is not a matter of (mere) rationalism and logic. Often the choices one makes are intuitive, or based on feeling and sensuality. Depending on the author’s success, the accuracy and richness of the language may be deteriorated or amplified. The author is guided, to one degree or another, by personal, transpersonal, and/or transcendent (dare I say Divine) knowledge, and the literary outcome is dependent on the quality, authority, and genuineness of that knowledge.
In pursuit of the scientific method, modern language has evolved to strip ambiguity, at the cost of reduction in levels of meaning. English has been the leader in this enterprise, thereby becoming enormously powerful (and by the way, a highly intimidating carrier of dangerous culture to those who resist this process). I have tried to break the mold of English, not as an act of resistence, but in an effort to regain complexity of knowledge and efficiency of expression, while holding onto accuracy of language. This is not a strange or unique or aberrant goal. Mathematical notation epitomizes this process. One need only read a modern physics text (say Feynman, who speaks to expert and layman alike) to experience the efficient complexity of thought embedded in mathematical language.
In sum, our art and language have the ability to evolve, and to evolve us, into higher levels of consciousness, but that requires new kinds of language and language tools. Failing that, our art will remain mired in Aristotelian one-dimensionality, and we will, with impotent romanticism, look back on the literature of “ancient” languages, such as Hebrew/Arabic and Sanskrit, as the last bastions of holy ambiguity.
Why I Rite So Funnee [Feb 13, 2010 on this blog].
This essay is also on my website, which contains a number of book-length poems, plus some of my art and manuscripts.
Then I would search this blog for the following posts:
A docent’s tour of my poetry, Part 1. [July 10, 2006]
Part 2 of a docent's tour of my poetry. [July 10, 2006]
The definitive function of true art. [August 29, 2006]
Musings on a Non-linear Narrative Poetics. [July 20, 2006]
RE: the poem: Guerden ov Addomz (see 10/26/06) [November 10, 2006]
So...
There are many ways to be accurate in thinking and writing. A marvelous statement on “traditional” understandings about literary accuracy can be found in Richard Moore’s essay, “Seven Types of Accuracy” in his book The Rule that Liberates. However, we have made enormous gains in science that are not reflected in our arts, and especially in poetry. Our language and our use of language have not kept pace with our ability to See. We still measure the accuracy of language by our ability to say one thing clearly, unambiguously.
Sadly for the traditionalists, we have passed beyond a world of one dimension. We realize (or must realize) now, that we live in a highly superimposed world. There are many ways of seeing, many ways of feeling, many ways of knowing, all coexisting, each with its own particular value. There are many competing, and often co-equal truths, that point to a higher truth or truths. An educated, and more importantly, an ethical individual must become aware of them all. This is the job of literature in this era. We must implement these ways of thinking, and not merely theorize about them.
To this end, in my poetry I sacrifice accuracy in one dimension (one level of meaning) to gain accuracy in multiple dimensions (multiple levels of meaning). For some people it makes my writing too difficult to penetrate. I truly regret this, but I will persist in my vision. Perhaps if I explain how it works (how I think and compose), I might be able to make my poetry a bit more approachable. What follows are two common examples of superimposed meanings that can be found in my writing. The first involves modifications of spelling. The second involves modifications of grammar and verb tense, as well as spelling.
On September 25, 2006, you can find a poem entitled “Kinder, Prepare Yurselz.” We will go no further than the title, which contains two variant spellings representing superimposed ideas. The first is the word “Kinder,” which is intended to have two meanings: 1) “to be more compassionate,” which, if I didn’t intend a second meaning, I would have spelled “kiender” to indicate the long “i” in pronunciation, and 2) “children,” from the German and Yiddish. The second variant in spelling that signals multiple meanings is “Yurselz.” The word refers directly to the word “yourselves,” but I have substituted “-selz” for “-selves” to show that this is not simply a psychological process related to the self, but a process that must penetrate all the way into our bodies, into our cells. We children must prepare ourselves profoundly, physically and mentally. And we must prepare ourselves to be kinder, more compassionate. I could delve further into the implications, but I hope that gives a sufficient taste.
The second example can be found on November 2, 2006, in the poem “Plowmen with Taelz.” In the second stanza I write:
"I meet a plowman a reternen frum feelz.
"He will say, ‘For jennerratenz I am plow this expanz.
‘My lingz ar groen frum its oxxide dust.
There’s a lot going on here! We have the clashing present tense of “meet” with the future tense of “will say.” I did this for a number of reasons. The simplest is that often our experiences are not understood until much later, so that what we hear now, we will re-hear differently in the future. Secondly, time is purely a function of consciousness. I have come to believe that past, present, and future all coexist, but our experience is limited, as Blake says, “by our senses five... which are the inlets to the Soul in this age.” “For jenneratenz I am plow” suggests another aspect of the time-consciousness unity. The moment of consciousness in this statement spans generations. Such a claim has important implications, both for the definition of “self,” and for our understanding of how experience and belief are culturally transmitted. Finally, “lingz ar groen” is fraught with meaning. “Lingz” are both “lungs” and “languages” and “groen” is both “grown” and “groan.” And all the possible combinations of meanings coexist and amplify each other.
Understanding how I write may not make reading my poetry any easier, but perhaps you may be comforted to know that there’s reason, purpose, and intention in it. Perhaps it is only cold comfort.
However, I think it is very important to make this distinction: what I’m trying to do is the opposite of what I see as an overwhelming tendency in modern poetry, that is, the creating of intentional ambiguity, the purpose of which is to create the illusion of deeper meaning(s) without the author’s intentionality of what that meaning is. We know this kind of ambiguity creates merely an illusion of depth, because a byword of modern poetics is that “the reader must create the meaning,” thus absolving the author of that responsibility. I reject this perspective entirely. It is the author’s job to create meaning, and to convey it clearly.
Now, the search for multi-dimensional accuracy is not a matter of (mere) rationalism and logic. Often the choices one makes are intuitive, or based on feeling and sensuality. Depending on the author’s success, the accuracy and richness of the language may be deteriorated or amplified. The author is guided, to one degree or another, by personal, transpersonal, and/or transcendent (dare I say Divine) knowledge, and the literary outcome is dependent on the quality, authority, and genuineness of that knowledge.
In pursuit of the scientific method, modern language has evolved to strip ambiguity, at the cost of reduction in levels of meaning. English has been the leader in this enterprise, thereby becoming enormously powerful (and by the way, a highly intimidating carrier of dangerous culture to those who resist this process). I have tried to break the mold of English, not as an act of resistence, but in an effort to regain complexity of knowledge and efficiency of expression, while holding onto accuracy of language. This is not a strange or unique or aberrant goal. Mathematical notation epitomizes this process. One need only read a modern physics text (say Feynman, who speaks to expert and layman alike) to experience the efficient complexity of thought embedded in mathematical language.
In sum, our art and language have the ability to evolve, and to evolve us, into higher levels of consciousness, but that requires new kinds of language and language tools. Failing that, our art will remain mired in Aristotelian one-dimensionality, and we will, with impotent romanticism, look back on the literature of “ancient” languages, such as Hebrew/Arabic and Sanskrit, as the last bastions of holy ambiguity.
Tuesday, July 11, 2006
A docent’s tour of my poetry, Part 1
I sent the following out to a few friends in Dec, 2002, so imagine it’s a cold winter night...
Deer Wunz,
Writing has a certain archaeological component to it. If you're like me -- somewhere between a caveman and a computer nerd -- insisting on partaking of the sensuality of writing, you always face the archaeological task of recovering your writings from notebooks (or the occasional paper napkin, scrap of paper, or inside of some book cover). The historical ages are piling up over my recent writing, and alas, I have withheld from you the deep pleasures of piecing together my shards and broken words.
In consideration of that, I thought you might like to read this retrospective, really a little help file for the uninitiated who wander into my website. It might provide a context for the strange things that I occasionally intrude you with (I doubt you'll find that usage in the OED). So, settle back with your sauterne or your port, and a fire crackling in the old wood stove, and mosey down a crooked path.
May the new year bring you all the good things you hope for, and none of the troubled things you hope for.
Where to begin with my writing?
The texts available on my website, shivvetee.com, span over 25 years of writing. They document the long evolution of my thinking. I would guess that the earlier pieces are more accessible than the later poetry, since my poetry was visioned step by step, with each succeeding piece built on earlier concepts and explorations.
Ottoman Beachcombings is a prose work, easy to read. It is a travelogue of my live adventures, beginning in the former Yugoslavia, and proceeding around the eastern Mediterranean. Mostly, it describes scenes far from the beaten tourist paths, at a time (the early 1980's) when travel in this region was safe, easy, and cheap. I was in high spirits on this five month trip, and my tales are told with wide eyes and many a grin.
The only other prose writing in the Shivvetee Reading Room is a slightly more challenging piece. My wife and I spent two months in Turkey in 1977. She was doing groundwork for her graduate degree in Islamic Art History, and I was her mostly-fearless travel guide, and occasional nemesis. In 1977 Turkey was still off the edge of the world for most Western travelers. Like the Bible-belt of the US, the interior of Turkey was, and is, deeply devout, but of course, it is Muslim, not Christian. I had never really come across religious fundamentalism before, so what I found in Turkey was fascinating, but hard to understand. My story, A Pilgrimmage to Mecca is an attempt to explore the issues of faith, experience, and scepticism, without committing to any position. It is written in a style I would liken to Gerard de Nerval's: lush and personal. I have deeply religious friends who have criticized the piece for falling clearly to the sceptic's side. Other friends, who are rationalists, have criticized it for falling clearly to the religious side. From that I have concluded that I have done my job well. I believe it's a memorable story.
For the fearless, my poetry is meant to take you on a journey that will reshape your world-view. It is not light reading, but I certainly hope it is not oppressive or ponderous either. My early teachers and guides were Shelley, Blake, Milton, Nietzsche, and the Prophetic Writings of the Hebrew Bible. I have learned from, and loved Greek and Sumerian literature, and Dante, as well. Further down the road I found new life and awe in the writings of Chaim Bialik, John Neihardt and Fred Turner. As for Pound and Eliot, may they rot in oblivion.
In the Harvest ov Nations is a narrative poem in three books, about a nuclear war and the building of a new society. Book One is named Old Wirld; Book Two is Passij; and Book Three is Nu Wirld. As you can see from these subtitles, I have already embarked on my journey of transforming English (for more on that subject, see my little essay, "Wy I Rite So Funnee"). I confess with some happiness, that upon preparing this poem for the Shivvetee Reading Room, I reread it for the first time in many years, and it brought me great pleasure and amazement. I hope it does the same for you.
I sent the following out to a few friends in Dec, 2002, so imagine it’s a cold winter night...
Deer Wunz,
Writing has a certain archaeological component to it. If you're like me -- somewhere between a caveman and a computer nerd -- insisting on partaking of the sensuality of writing, you always face the archaeological task of recovering your writings from notebooks (or the occasional paper napkin, scrap of paper, or inside of some book cover). The historical ages are piling up over my recent writing, and alas, I have withheld from you the deep pleasures of piecing together my shards and broken words.
In consideration of that, I thought you might like to read this retrospective, really a little help file for the uninitiated who wander into my website. It might provide a context for the strange things that I occasionally intrude you with (I doubt you'll find that usage in the OED). So, settle back with your sauterne or your port, and a fire crackling in the old wood stove, and mosey down a crooked path.
May the new year bring you all the good things you hope for, and none of the troubled things you hope for.
Where to begin with my writing?
The texts available on my website, shivvetee.com, span over 25 years of writing. They document the long evolution of my thinking. I would guess that the earlier pieces are more accessible than the later poetry, since my poetry was visioned step by step, with each succeeding piece built on earlier concepts and explorations.
Ottoman Beachcombings is a prose work, easy to read. It is a travelogue of my live adventures, beginning in the former Yugoslavia, and proceeding around the eastern Mediterranean. Mostly, it describes scenes far from the beaten tourist paths, at a time (the early 1980's) when travel in this region was safe, easy, and cheap. I was in high spirits on this five month trip, and my tales are told with wide eyes and many a grin.
The only other prose writing in the Shivvetee Reading Room is a slightly more challenging piece. My wife and I spent two months in Turkey in 1977. She was doing groundwork for her graduate degree in Islamic Art History, and I was her mostly-fearless travel guide, and occasional nemesis. In 1977 Turkey was still off the edge of the world for most Western travelers. Like the Bible-belt of the US, the interior of Turkey was, and is, deeply devout, but of course, it is Muslim, not Christian. I had never really come across religious fundamentalism before, so what I found in Turkey was fascinating, but hard to understand. My story, A Pilgrimmage to Mecca is an attempt to explore the issues of faith, experience, and scepticism, without committing to any position. It is written in a style I would liken to Gerard de Nerval's: lush and personal. I have deeply religious friends who have criticized the piece for falling clearly to the sceptic's side. Other friends, who are rationalists, have criticized it for falling clearly to the religious side. From that I have concluded that I have done my job well. I believe it's a memorable story.
For the fearless, my poetry is meant to take you on a journey that will reshape your world-view. It is not light reading, but I certainly hope it is not oppressive or ponderous either. My early teachers and guides were Shelley, Blake, Milton, Nietzsche, and the Prophetic Writings of the Hebrew Bible. I have learned from, and loved Greek and Sumerian literature, and Dante, as well. Further down the road I found new life and awe in the writings of Chaim Bialik, John Neihardt and Fred Turner. As for Pound and Eliot, may they rot in oblivion.
In the Harvest ov Nations is a narrative poem in three books, about a nuclear war and the building of a new society. Book One is named Old Wirld; Book Two is Passij; and Book Three is Nu Wirld. As you can see from these subtitles, I have already embarked on my journey of transforming English (for more on that subject, see my little essay, "Wy I Rite So Funnee"). I confess with some happiness, that upon preparing this poem for the Shivvetee Reading Room, I reread it for the first time in many years, and it brought me great pleasure and amazement. I hope it does the same for you.
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