tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21999805.post4762144978475149662..comments2024-03-28T11:28:31.364-05:00Comments on Anecdotal Evidence: `A Measure of the Personal'Patrick Kurphttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08436175583386298032noreply@blogger.comBlogger2125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21999805.post-90721557434715998222009-06-11T13:11:14.995-05:002009-06-11T13:11:14.995-05:00I'm struck by the way Justice unpacks Pound...I'm struck by the way Justice unpacks Pound's imagist program via Percy Lubbock's quote on James: "the image escapes and evades like a cloud." The process of "objects taking the place of perceptions", as Justice puts it, is of course a key concern of Santayana in <i>The Sense of Beauty</i>, whose central thesis is "beauty is constituted by the objectification of pleasure." By pleasure, he means aesthetic pleasure, the "aesthetic blush" that can, 112 years on, encompass things undreamed of in the old philosopher in Rome's philosophy:<br /><br />"Apprehension, doubt, isolation, are things which come upon us keenly when we reflect upon our lives; they cannot easily become qualities of any object. If by chance they can, they acquire a great aesthetic value."<br /><br />I wonder what Santayana would make of blogs. I sense a clue in one of Justice's poems, "Last Days of Prospero." Sounding more like Stevens than Shakespeare, the <i>Tempest</i> wizard here gives new meaning to the term surfing the web:<br /><br />"Some change in the wording of the charm,<br />Some slight reshuffling of negative<br />And verb, perhaps - that should suffice.<br />But meanwhile he will pace the strand,<br />Debating, as old men will, with himself<br />Or with the waves, and still the waves<br />Come back at him always with the same<br />Low chucklings or grand, indifferent sighs."WAShttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10403669322174979974noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-21999805.post-69300366052487015412009-06-11T09:15:52.973-05:002009-06-11T09:15:52.973-05:00"Time that with this strange excuse/Pardoned ..."Time that with this strange excuse/Pardoned Kipling and his views,/And will pardon Paul Claudel,/Pardons him for writing well."Unknownhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16184096128095811923noreply@blogger.com