Rand through a Nietzsche filter


Recommended Posts

selene - on Rand and Lacan

A treasure trove is here on gender ambiguity. PhD dissertations until the cows come home. Mooo moooo. And her aphoristic writing in Fountainhead particularly - fantastic.

The only comparisons on WTL I have made are in Merrill's book which Sciabarra also used, the particular passages about Nietzsche on the masses of people like dumb sheep (paraphrasing) stupid, forget about them when Kira is talking to Andrei. The 59 edition just inverted those sentences and turned positive nasty statements into negative nice ones. Typical of journalism, and the advice give to Georges Duroy in Bel Ami by the author Guy de Maupassant.

http://moviesandfilm.blogspot.com/2011/12/reading-bel-ami-through-marx-foucault.html

And: Following Baudrillard in the instructions given to him for his journalism:

Things should be hinted at in such a manner as to allow of any construction being placed on them, refuted in a manner that confirms the rumor, or affirmed in such a way that no one believes them. (BA 120 1910 ed)

http://focusfree.blogspot.com/2011/06/reading-bel-ami-through-symbolic.html?zx=c2e3831424a8c9c0

I think most of you will see a lot of Rand's influence in anything I write or review.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Replies 785
  • Created
  • Last Reply

Top Posters In This Topic

selene - a reply to my above comment:

The journalism advice gives what Lacanian "floating signs" which can emphasize, deny, indicate an empty referent, pretend the opposite, assert the opposite - the purpose being to confuse. For the person who can read "floating signs" the all clear is given. Rand and the Brandens used to assert how to read political info in the mass media by its opposite. Now it's much more subtle and complicated than that.

"Floating Signs" of gender in Rand: Dominiques shiny, hard, helmet hair. Roarks's unruly waving red hair which Stephenie Meyer has taken for her Edward Cullen, made it bronze, and turned Rob Pattinson's hair into "sex hair" for fangirls. Lots of Roark "floating sings" in Meyer's character of Edward Cullen in Twilight.

Toohey is straight out of Nietasche's Genealogy: weak; toes turned in; simpering voice; Nowadays the evil character would be handsome, buff, beautiful face all "floating signs" asserting the opposite of what he is instead of affirming his character like Toohey.

There's more. Reading Rand through Lacan would be informative and fun. Zizek in his book on Lacan reads Lacan through Hitchcock films.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

selene - One of my goals is to place Rand alongside other post modern layers. Cronenberg is a post modernphilosopher who makes films. Zizek is a philosopher who is pure theatre. Baudrillard read his poetry in Vegas in a gold lame jump suit. Foucault went to the bathhouses when he was at Berkeley. Rand is also pure theatre. As Susan Sontag says, she is Camp.

Rand is a philosopher but not because of Objectivism, but because of her fiction. Her characters are Nietzschean strategists, not psychological studies. They create Events. She is an intellectual terrorist and so are her characters.

DeLillo is the same and so are some of his characters. Which brings me to Eric Packer of Cosmopolis.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

brant - Thanks for that orange rind quote. Perfect.

Your other questions are comparative lit questions and I try not to think that way anymore. Me, I personally favor Fountainhead. In the early 60's I knew Atlas by heart. I tried to read it again in the mid 70's but I couldn't. Her clunky style got in my way so much of the time. But now I see that that is perfectly Nietzschean through Baudrillard. Her style is a mirror of what she is writing about: bureaucracy all rusty, clunky, breaking down, unworkable, obstructionist, deceptive......

Fountainhead is most like Nietzsche's style because so much of it is aphoristic. At the moment I think it is her best, but that doesn't mean anything. I am not poling for a vote. I haven't read WTL for 50 years, except for those passages by Merrill and Sciabarra. I remember loving it but I was such a dope then I don't trust anything I remember from that time. I do remember the ending which I thought was wonderful and film like. I still do. When I did the screenplay of Victor Herman's coming Out of the Ice, his autobiography of that time in the Soviet Union, his torturer always made me think of the stupid red neck peasant type that shot Kira.

I had a wonderful patient once who was named Kira after Rand's Kira. This is what psychoanalysis does to you.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

DeLillo is the same and so are some of his characters. Which brings me to Eric Packer of Cosmopolis.

DeLillo's Underground, now that I know what it is about, is truly intriguing for me.

41EA0%2B4OwhL.jpg

I know exactly where in my beloved city this cover shot was taken from.

The premise of weaving the epic of the cold war, the economic collapse of America and other memes to the baseball caught by the shot heard round the world, or also sometimes known as the "Miracle of Coogan's Bluff," off Ralph Branca,

Thomson_19511003.JPG

is brilliant. To follow the ball from that catch to each owner while weaving the context of America around the American game is extremely attractive to me.

The World Series which followed was the last time Joe DiMaggio played baseball. Joltin Joe! Simon and Garfunkel [Tom and Jerry] who played in the back cafeteria to a cadre of Randians when I was at the same college.

The fact that my father took me in 1951, to Yankee Stadium, at the age of five (5) and pointed to center field and said, "That's Joe DiMaggio." Being Italian that made me a life long Yankee fanatic.

DeLillo also ties that game to the Soviet Communist savages detonation of an atomic bomb on the same day as the game [which is inaccurate, it was on On October 18, 1951, a 41.2 kiloton device was detonated, a boosted weapon using a composite construction of levitated plutonium core and a uranium-235 shell. Code named Joe-3 in the USA, this was the first Soviet air-dropped bomb test. Released at an altitude of 10 km, it detonated 400 meters above the ground.

So this is a fascinating plot mechanism and it will be a great read!

Adam

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Underground is so wonderful. DeLillo picked the cover illustration. Look at it: the bird flying toward the Twin Towers. Looks like a plane now doesn't it. He is clairvoyant even in his cover illustrations. His Libra is about Oswald. Incredible. Since you live in Jersey you might be able to come to the conference on DeLillo April 20-21st. Here's a link as I am promoting it on my cosmopolis blog:

http://cosmopolisfilm2.blogspot.com/2012/01/cosmopolis-literary-conference-delillo.html

Here's another one on Underworld and the Twin Towers and clairvoyance:

http://guerrillablog2.blogspot.com/2011/09/remembering-9-11-memorial-on-10th.html?zx=b6a9dd8ebec9687e

Link to comment
Share on other sites

His Libra is about Oswald. Incredible.

Ms. Abbey:

Lol. I was just about to mention Libra.

I, with five (5) of my friends and team mates [we self organized a team that played for five (5) years in an unlimited weight, money football league in NY City] went to the Kennedy funeral in NY City. Now, being a Randian and a Goldwater operative in 1963, I opposed Kennedy's policies, but loved his oratorical skills.

Additionally, I took offense to someone killing my President and we all wanted to be personally part of a historic event. We were very political.

I also worked on the assassination investigation for two and half years with other volunteers, heavily comprised of the left wing.

I would bet that we were in close physical proximity at some point, since I was attending NBI lectures also at that time.

As to the conference, I already got the info and am going to do my best to attend.

Adam

coincidence, when traced back far enough, becomes inevitable...

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I've also read some of the assassination books. I like Mailer's also. I went to the Freedom School in Colorado the summer of 1964, which was also the summer I went to Rothbard's apartment once with a friend. At the Freedom School was George Boardman, who taught the afternoon class as Le Fevre(sp?) did the morning lecture. Boardman changed my life BTW. In that class was a guy that I later read about who was just about the only friend Oswald ever had. they were on Guam together talking about Marx. He later wrote a post on Boardman's death. Boardman wrote a column for the Santa Ana Resister that I have always wanted to collect for a book. He taught me authoritarianism at the minute level. Within the interstices of the power/knowledge grid that Foucault describes so perfectly. Taking it out of the political realm and putting it in your daily life. He lived in Chloride AZ and had bought an old motel that he called My Motel. It had a water tower with the John Galt/Rand dollar sign on the top of it. He wasn't just a poser, nor was he a Randian, Objectivist or Libertarian. No label Boardman and he influenced Oswald's friend who testified in the hearings, which were a laugh.

I'm going to be on the Cosmopolis panel discussing my paper on Packer, Rand and Jesus on Baudrillardian implosion. I expect to be trashed in that deadly way academics do it.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

He lived in Chloride AZ and had bought an old motel that he called My Motel. It had a water tower with the John Galt/Rand dollar sign on the top of it. He wasn't just a poser, nor was he a Randian, Objectivist or Libertarian.

I expect to be trashed in that deadly way academics do it.

Ms. Abbey:

Ok, Now I am convinced. Perhaps you and I are the only two (2) that have ever known about Chloride, Arizona and the water tower!

My parents and my uncle and aunt were out west in the '60's and were quite aware of my fanatic exposition of Randian ideas. They took a picture of that water tower and the Chloride Arizona sign and sent it back to me with the note that they were looking for Galt's Gulch for me.

My parents were remarkably open individuals who taught me and led their lives learning, thinking and questioning. Their were no sacred cows. My father was excommunicated from the Catholic Church in the 1930's for being a Mason and refusing to reject his membership.

As to your being trashed, don't drink too much before the presentation. If I am able to attend, I will watch your back lol.

Adam

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Unbelievable. Want to do a book on Boardman's columns? Boardman was the one called in to do the calendar shot of Monroe but he begged off that day. He loved Marilyn. He hated Bobby Kennedy and blamed him for her death. I blame her psychoanalyst Greene.

A few years back My Motel was going for one mil on the RE market. I shuddered. I wonder where his young wife went after he died. He's buried there.It's an artists' community sort of now. I stayed there a couple of times with them. Interesting stories......

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Bob LeFevre! Never met him, but Rampart College, Rampart Journal of Individualistic Thought! Good stuff.

Was he involved with the League of Non-Voters because we were in NY?

Damn, just noticed that Charles G. Koch, one of the Koch brothers graduated from Ramparts College!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I've also read some of the assassination books. I like Mailer's also. I went to the Freedom School in Colorado the summer of 1964, which was also the summer I went to Rothbard's apartment once with a friend. At the Freedom School was George Boardman, who taught the afternoon class as Le Fevre(sp?) did the morning lecture. Boardman changed my life BTW. In that class was a guy that I later read about who was just about the only friend Oswald ever had. they were on Guam together talking about Marx. He later wrote a post on Boardman's death. Boardman wrote a column for the Santa Ana Resister that I have always wanted to collect for a book. He taught me authoritarianism at the minute level. Within the interstices of the power/knowledge grid that Foucault describes so perfectly. Taking it out of the political realm and putting it in your daily life. He lived in Chloride AZ and had bought an old motel that he called My Motel. It had a water tower with the John Galt/Rand dollar sign on the top of it. He wasn't just a poser, nor was he a Randian, Objectivist or Libertarian. No label Boardman and he influenced Oswald's friend who testified in the hearings, which were a laugh.

I'm going to be on the Cosmopolis panel discussing my paper on Packer, Rand and Jesus on Baudrillardian implosion. I expect to be trashed in that deadly way academics do it.

Who lived in Chloride? Boardman? I guess so, now seeing your post #61.

--Brant

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Seymourblogger,

In your profile, you write: "I consider Rand Nietzsche's heir, at least one of them." and speak of her "deep absorption of Nietzsche".

Has Rand ever been directly asked if, and if yes, to what degree Nietzsche's thoughts influenced her own?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Damn! I was hoping the table would display...here is the link...http://www.atlassociety.org/nietzsche-and-ayn-rand

"After the table, I’ve added some comments on the significance of the tabulated results.

I have given references for Nietzsche’s works; but I’ve assumed that we are all familiar enough with Rand’s works to know where to look for her view on any given issue. In the references to Nietzsche’s works, I’ve used the following abbreviations:

A Antichrist

BGE Beyond Good and Evil

D Dawn

EH Ecce Homo

GM Genealogy of Morals

GS Gay Science

HA Human All-too-Human

TI Twilight of the Idols

WP Will to Power

Z Thus Spake Zarathustra

Comparing Nietzsche's and Rand's Philosophies

Issue

Nietzsche's position

Rand's position

Metaphysical

Entity or process

Process (GM I:13; WP 552, 1067; BGE 54)

Entities as objective; be wary of armchair physics

Monism, dualism, or pluralism

Monism (WP 1067)

Naturalism: no armchair physics

Identity

No (WP 507-517)

Yes

Identity and change compatible

No (WP 520)

Yes

Causality

No (WP 497, 545-552)

Yes

Teleology

No (WP 552, 1067, Postcard to Overbeck)

Yes for organisms

Direction to evolution

Yes (GM II.24)

No armchair physics or biology

Existence of God

No (GS 125)

No

Consciousness as identification

No (WP 507, 511, 513; GM II.16)

Yes

Consciousness as functional/useful

Yes (WP 505)

Yes

Consciousness as causal

No (WP 477-478, 524)

Yes

Epistemological

Consciousness as identification

No (BGE 211; WP 473, 479, 481, 516, 521)

Yes

Sensations as awareness of reality

No (WP 479)

Yes

Sensations as value laden

Yes (WP 505)

No

Concepts as awareness of reality

No (WP 507, 513)

Yes

Logic as reality-based

No (WP 477, 512)

Yes

Sensations, concepts, and theories as impositions upon reality

Always (WP 515-516)

Sensations never; false conceptions only

Truth

As functional only (WP 487), as a useful error (WP 493)

Both as identification and as functional

Reason as efficacious

Weakly at best

Yes

Reason as primary cognitive tool

No (GS 354)

Yes

Instinct as cognitively efficacious

Yes (GM II.16)

No

Philosophy as systematic

Yes (GM, Preface, 2)

Yes

Intrinsicism

False (GM III.12; BGE 207)

False

Objectivism

False (GM III.12)

True

Subjectivism

True (BGE 211), but not in the dualistic sense (WP 481)

False

Perspectivalism/ Relativism

True (GM III.12; WP 540)

False

Human Nature

Reduction of morality to psychology

Yes (BGE 6; GM I.10?)

No

Reduction of psychology to biology

Yes (TI 33; WP 529)

No

Individual as real

No (TI 33)

Yes

Will as primary

Yes (WP 1067)

No

Free will

No (BGE 21; GM II.10: no "guilt," only sickness; Postcard to Overbeck)

Yes

Reason and passion/emotion priority

Passion/emotion has priority (BGE 36, 68, 158, 191)

Reason primary

Reason and Passion/emotion relationship

Conflict (EH: "The Birth of Tragedy" 1: "'Rationality' against instinct")

Should be harmony

Tabula rasa or nativism

Strong nativism (BGE 231, 264)

Cognitive and moral tabula rasa

Science as ennobling

No (GM III.25)

Yes

Ethics

Morality in the service of life

Yes (BGE; GM)

Yes

Psychological egoism

Yes (BGE)

No

Conflict of interest the fundamental social fact

Yes (BGE 259)

No

Values as intrinsic

No (GM I.10)

No

Values as objective

No

Yes

Values as subjective

Yes (BGE 260?)

No

Individuals as ends in themselves

No (WP 287), yes (BGE 287)

Yes

Individuals responsible for their characters

No (BGE 264)

Yes

Individuals responsible for their actions

No and yes

Yes

Sacrificing self to others

Yes, if a weakling (TI 33)

No

Sacrificing others to self

Yes, if strong (BGE 265; WP 369, 982)

No

Individual life as the standard

No (BGE 188)

Yes

The improvement of the species as the end

Yes (BGE 126; Z Prologue 4)

No

Sacrificing some for the sake of the species

Yes (BGE 62, 258; WP 246; GM II.12)

No

Power as the end

As means and end (WP 1067)

As means only

Survival as standard

No (BGE 13)

Yes

Happiness as the end

No

Yes

Egoism as good

Depends (TI 33). "[T]he subject--the striving individual bent on furthering his egoistic purposes--can be thought of only as the enemy of art, never its source" (BT)

Yes

Altruism as bad

Yes; depends (TI 33)

Yes

Altruism as the egoism of the weak

Yes (GM I.8, III.14)

No

Rationality as a virtue

No (EH: "Birth of Tragedy" 1)

Primary virtue

War as good

Yes (GS 283; HA 477)

No

Morality as relative to psychological type

Yes (BGE 221)

No

Social and Political

Individual rights

No. "For the preservation of society, for making possible higher and highest types--the inequality of rights is the condition"

Yes

On equality

False and destructive (WP 246)

Before the law

On democracy

Bad (BGE 202)

Secondary to rights

On socialism

Bad

Bad

On the welfare state

Bad

Bad

On aristocracy

Good (BGE 257, 258)

Bad

On slavery

Sometimes good (BGE 188)

Evil

On the role of government

Limited (D 179)

Limited

On capitalism

Dehumanizing for most (D 2 6)

Moral, productive

Civilization as ascending or declining

Dec|ining (BGE 202; GM I.11,12); but Zarathustra will come (GM II.24)

Currently declining; future could go either way

Sense of Life

Exalted sense of human potential

Yes (GM I.12)

Yes

Engaged in a cosmic battle

Yes

Yes

Struggle as good

Yes (BGE 262)

Yes?

On Others

On Christianity

"A rebellion of everything that crawls on the ground against that which has height" (A 43)

Ditto

On Plato

"A coward before reality" (TI 2)

Ditto

On Kant

"A catastrophic spider" (A 11)

Ditto"

Link to comment
Share on other sites

DeLillo is the same and so are some of his characters. Which brings me to Eric Packer of Cosmopolis.

DeLillo's Underground, now that I know what it is about, is truly intriguing for me.

41EA0%2B4OwhL.jpg

I know exactly where in my beloved city this cover shot was taken from.

The premise of weaving the epic of the cold war, the economic collapse of America and other memes to the baseball caught by the shot heard round the world, or also sometimes known as the "Miracle of Coogan's Bluff," off Ralph Branca,

Thomson_19511003.JPG

is brilliant. To follow the ball from that catch to each owner while weaving the context of America around the American game is extremely attractive to me.

The World Series which followed was the last time Joe DiMaggio played baseball. Joltin Joe! Simon and Garfunkel [Tom and Jerry] who played in the back cafeteria to a cadre of Randians when I was at the same college.

The fact that my father took me in 1951, to Yankee Stadium, at the age of five (5) and pointed to center field and said, "That's Joe DiMaggio." Being Italian that made me a life long Yankee fanatic.

DeLillo also ties that game to the Soviet Communist savages detonation of an atomic bomb on the same day as the game [which is inaccurate, it was on On October 18, 1951, a 41.2 kiloton device was detonated, a boosted weapon using a composite construction of levitated plutonium core and a uranium-235 shell. Code named Joe-3 in the USA, this was the first Soviet air-dropped bomb test. Released at an altitude of 10 km, it detonated 400 meters above the ground.

So this is a fascinating plot mechanism and it will be a great read!

Adam

I saw DiMaggio play. And Satchel APaige, Bobby Feller and many many more. I adored baseball for almost 6 years. The last time I played was in 1967 and I hit a triple, the first of my life.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Angela:

http://aynrandnovels.org/learning-more/the-fountainhead/fountainhead_milgram_lecture.html

In her course, instructor Shoshana Milgram, Associate Professor of English at Virginia Tech, will present some of what she has learned from many years of teaching The Fountainhead in courses on American Literature, Freshman Writing, and other areas. She will consider the essence of Ayn Rand’s literary technique in this novel, as well as specific issues such as the inclusion of The Fountainhead within a course syllabus, reading and writing assignments, the use of class time, and methods for encouraging and addressing difficult questions.

"But I can recommend Shoshana Milgram's paper, found in 'Essays on Ayn Rand's The Fountainhead', entilted 'From Notebook to Novel'. It contains a section on Frederich Nietzsche, on the admiration Ayn Rand expressed for his ideas, early on in her life and around the time of writing The Fountainhead. It also shows how she came to reject his ideas, as inconsistent with her understanding of individualism and selfishness, and how this showed in the changes she made to 'The Fountainhead'.

Something I thought to add, upon returning to this after a while: people who ask about the connection often have not actually read one or the other of Nietzsche or Ayn Rand. Brian Leiter, an academic philosopher, has done a lot of good work exposing the common misconceptions of Nietzsche. His ideas, through and through, just are not the kind Ayn Rand would assent to. They were superficial statements she liked, expressing a certain spirit which she admired. As far as any actual study goes Rand had more in common with Hegel than Nietzsche.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Something I thought to add, upon returning to this after a while: people who ask about the connection often have not actually read one or the other of Nietzsche or Ayn Rand. Brian Leiter, an academic philosopher, has done a lot of good work exposing the common misconceptions of Nietzsche. His ideas, through and through, just are not the kind Ayn Rand would assent to. They were superficial statements she liked, expressing a certain spirit which she admired. As far as any actual study goes Rand had more in common with Hegel than Nietzsche.

Rand definitely argued within the dialectic, in her non-fiction and in her Q & A at the NBI lectures. What I am getting at is best described by Baudrillard on his long apprenticeship to Nietzsche.

Here: http://intellectualterrorism2.blogspot.com/2011/10/is-terrorist-model-to-bring-about.html

Nietzsche is in me in the mode of the unzeitgemass as he puts it himself, the mode of the untimely. - Baudrillard

And I think this is exactly the way he was IN Rand. They are the only 2 I know that took Nietzsche in at a very young age. Almost as young Catholic children learn their catechism. The difference between Baudrillard and Rand is that Baudrillard was a lifelong scholar. Rand came here as a 21 year old girl. She did not have the leisure to do this, nor did she have a scholarly ambition. She was here to write fiction.

The Nietzschean scholar today is Babette Babich at Fordham.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

The Nietzschean scholar today is Babette Babich at Fordham.

http://www.furious.c...ect/kdlang.html

Performing Desire and 'Recording Consciousness' on Facebook and YouTube

by Babette Babich

(October 2011)

The Hallelujah Effect on the Internet

The initial focus of this essay, apart from important preliminary references to Leonard Cohen is on kd lang, not as composer (although she is one) but musical performer and not as guitarist (although she is one) but as a singer and although her live performances have to make all the difference, very specifically, for the sake of any analysis, specifically as her singing is available in video format on YouTube. Of course there are many readings of kd lang and popular music, and of course most of them focus on the way she dresses, others look at her sexuality,1 and here, just for a bit, I consider her musicality.

Radio Physiognomy, Facebook Contexts, YouTube Poker

I first heard Leonard Cohen's "Hallelujah" -- rather improbably, given the sheer number of recording artists who have interpreted his song -- as 'sung' by Cohen himself, not in person of course, but and this will be the point and the heart of what follows especially as it bears on musical practice, on the radio. And with referring to radio, as we shall see, I am already referring to Adorno's notion of radio physiognomics as indeed to the sociology of music practice as well as philosophical aesthetics, just because hearing anything on the radio is always a matter of acoustics and often the reproduction of a reproduction, listening to a recording. Thus radio transmits music as we "consume" music today in the age of mechanical, electronic, virtual reproduction, so many species of digital dissemination.

Given the sheer coverage of the song, Leonard Cohen's "Hallelujah" manifestly captivates singers but it's fair to say that I couldn't have guessed that from that first acquaintance and not being too much of a fan of Cohen or much pop music in general (apart that is from listening to the radio), I could, as we say, take it or leave it.

That was until what I call 'dueling video-posts' on Facebook.

bich

(October 2011)

The Hallelujah Effect on the Internet

The initial focus of this essay, apart from important preliminary references to Leonard Cohen is on kd lang, not as composer (although she is one) but musical performer and not as guitarist (although she is one) but as a singer and although her live performances have to make all the difference, very specifically, for the sake of any analysis, specifically as her singing is available in video format on YouTube. Of course there are many readings of kd lang and popular music, and of course most of them focus on the way she dresses, others look at her sexuality,1 and here, just for a bit, I consider her musicality.

Radio Physiognomy, Facebook Contexts, YouTube Poker

I first heard Leonard Cohen's "Hallelujah" -- rather improbably, given the sheer number of recording artists who have interpreted his song -- as 'sung' by Cohen himself, not in person of course, but and this will be the point and the heart of what follows especially as it bears on musical practice, on the radio. And with referring to radio, as we shall see, I am already referring to Adorno's notion of radio physiognomics as indeed to the sociology of music practice as well as philosophical aesthetics, just because hearing anything on the radio is always a matter of acoustics and often the reproduction of a reproduction, listening to a recording. Thus radio transmits music as we "consume" music today in the age of mechanical, electronic, virtual reproduction, so many species of digital dissemination.

Given the sheer coverage of the song, Leonard Cohen's "Hallelujah" manifestly captivates singers but it's fair to say that I couldn't have guessed that from that first acquaintance and not being too much of a fan of Cohen or much pop music in general (apart that is from listening to the radio), I could, as we say, take it or leave it.

That was until what I call 'dueling video-posts' on Facebook.

I guess we can say that the "Bich" is back!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

The Nietzschean scholar today is Babette Babich at Fordham.

http://www.furious.c...ect/kdlang.html

Performing Desire and 'Recording Consciousness' on Facebook and YouTube

by Babette Babich

(October 2011)

The Hallelujah Effect on the Internet

The initial focus of this essay, apart from important preliminary references to Leonard Cohen is on kd lang, not as composer (although she is one) but musical performer and not as guitarist (although she is one) but as a singer and although her live performances have to make all the difference, very specifically, for the sake of any analysis, specifically as her singing is available in video format on YouTube. Of course there are many readings of kd lang and popular music, and of course most of them focus on the way she dresses, others look at her sexuality,1 and here, just for a bit, I consider her musicality.

Radio Physiognomy, Facebook Contexts, YouTube Poker

I first heard Leonard Cohen's "Hallelujah" -- rather improbably, given the sheer number of recording artists who have interpreted his song -- as 'sung' by Cohen himself, not in person of course, but and this will be the point and the heart of what follows especially as it bears on musical practice, on the radio. And with referring to radio, as we shall see, I am already referring to Adorno's notion of radio physiognomics as indeed to the sociology of music practice as well as philosophical aesthetics, just because hearing anything on the radio is always a matter of acoustics and often the reproduction of a reproduction, listening to a recording. Thus radio transmits music as we "consume" music today in the age of mechanical, electronic, virtual reproduction, so many species of digital dissemination.

Given the sheer coverage of the song, Leonard Cohen's "Hallelujah" manifestly captivates singers but it's fair to say that I couldn't have guessed that from that first acquaintance and not being too much of a fan of Cohen or much pop music in general (apart that is from listening to the radio), I could, as we say, take it or leave it.

That was until what I call 'dueling video-posts' on Facebook.

bich

(October 2011)

The Hallelujah Effect on the Internet

The initial focus of this essay, apart from important preliminary references to Leonard Cohen is on kd lang, not as composer (although she is one) but musical performer and not as guitarist (although she is one) but as a singer and although her live performances have to make all the difference, very specifically, for the sake of any analysis, specifically as her singing is available in video format on YouTube. Of course there are many readings of kd lang and popular music, and of course most of them focus on the way she dresses, others look at her sexuality,1 and here, just for a bit, I consider her musicality.

Radio Physiognomy, Facebook Contexts, YouTube Poker

I first heard Leonard Cohen's "Hallelujah" -- rather improbably, given the sheer number of recording artists who have interpreted his song -- as 'sung' by Cohen himself, not in person of course, but and this will be the point and the heart of what follows especially as it bears on musical practice, on the radio. And with referring to radio, as we shall see, I am already referring to Adorno's notion of radio physiognomics as indeed to the sociology of music practice as well as philosophical aesthetics, just because hearing anything on the radio is always a matter of acoustics and often the reproduction of a reproduction, listening to a recording. Thus radio transmits music as we "consume" music today in the age of mechanical, electronic, virtual reproduction, so many species of digital dissemination.

Given the sheer coverage of the song, Leonard Cohen's "Hallelujah" manifestly captivates singers but it's fair to say that I couldn't have guessed that from that first acquaintance and not being too much of a fan of Cohen or much pop music in general (apart that is from listening to the radio), I could, as we say, take it or leave it.

That was until what I call 'dueling video-posts' on Facebook.

I guess we can say that the "Bich" is back!

She left out the transcendent performance of Shae Lynn Bourne and her partner on Battle of the Blades! this was the most postmodern crashcultural of all. I'm not kidding.

And isn't it significant that Cohen and lang are both Canadians? Does Babich address this?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

She left out the transcendent performance of Shae Lynn Bourne and her partner on Battle of the Blades! this was the most postmodern crashcultural of all. I'm not kidding.

And isn't it significant that Cohen and lang are both Canadians? Does Babich address this?

Claude Lemieux! Geez!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

She left out the transcendent performance of Shae Lynn Bourne and her partner on Battle of the Blades! this was the most postmodern crashcultural of all. I'm not kidding.

And isn't it significant that Cohen and lang are both Canadians? Does Babich address this?

Claude Lemieux! Geez!

Lemieux sang "hallelujah" for the music. Damn well too.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Just beautiful. Cosmopolis: Nancy Babich is the code name for the smart gun. Babette is the wife of Jack Gladney in White Noise. Jack Gladney is the authoritative source on Hitler studies. Babich's first name is Babette. Babich has done post graduate work in Germany on Nietzsche, and has written papers on Heidgger, Nietzsche et al in German. So she is fluent in German, and thinks in German, meaning that she needs no one to translate and add their interpretation of Nietzsche for her. And of course, Nietzsche is permanently linked to Hitler.

DeLillo's names. Very important and Lacanian.

I love the KD Lang variation the best, but then I am prejudiced.

Shall we go on to Benno Levin? DeLillo droped a hint on him on his youtube interview with Krasny. I think I'm the only one who caught it. It's in BHL and Houellebecq's letters: Dueling Enemies.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Nietzsche is in me in the mode of the unzeitgemass as he puts it himself, the mode of the untimely.

Yes, but this apothegm reads much better translated -- with intermediate steps at Catalan, Hebrew, Farsi, German and finally back to English:

  • Nietzsche és en mi en el camí de unzeitgemass com ell diu, com el intempestiu.
  • ניטשה הוא unzeitgemass הדרך שלי כמו שהוא אומר, כמו intempestiu.
  • آیا منظورتان این بود : نیچه است unzeitgemass راه من به عنوان او می گوید، مانند intempestif.
  • Unzeitgemass Nietzsche ist mein Weg, wie er sagt, wie intempestif.
  • Nietzsche is my way out of date, as he says, as intempestif.

Speaking of Baudrillard, this video from an affiliated studio captures, for me, the shining clarity of his prose. As one wag said, "The abstract structure of relationships which a particular language imposes on the underlying substance shared by all." That is just so true! I want to bathe in it, but it is a grid, and I cannot.

As Baudrillard's niece says in the video, "Maggle on my shit!"

Edited by william.scherk
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now