The graveness of literary theory

I have in recent time been discussing the rather dry and sometimes closed society of literary theorists. This is a group of people, most often students in my case, who think that literature is a field of science which is to be taken so serious that even academic practices like law and economics sound like a walk in the park. These students, together with philosophers, feel that it is their responsibility to always comment on everything that might be elevated to an academic level. But it is also these people who tend to see that only serious pieces of literature may be regarded as "high art". So every time a text is written about such as sex or violence it is either feminism or a tragedy. This I find most frustration since through the history of literature the ones that really stand out is drunks and idealists. So, today I want to cite a poem by Yeats, who dealt with rebellion and mysticism among other things, which clearly shows my feeling towards this strange breed of people.



THE SCHOLARS

BALD heads forgetful of their sins,
Old, learned, respectable bald heads
Edit and annotate the lines
That young men, tossing on their beds,
Rhymed out in love's despair
To flatter beauty's ignorant ear.

They'll cough in the ink to the world's end;
Wear out the carpet with their shoes
Earning respect; have no strange friend;
If they have sinned nobody knows.
Lord, what would they say
Should their Catullus walk that way?

WBY

The day after yesterday

Since the day before this was devoted to the drinking of beer and wine this day should be all about contemplation, since I rarely contemplate and rather start the day with yet another bottle of beer, this day should be all about praising the wonderful liquid we call beer. And I want to do this by using the words of a well known drinker: John Wilmot.


Upon his drinking bowl

Vulcan, contrive me such a cup
As Nestor used of old;
Show all thy skill to trim it up,
Damask it round with gold.

Make it so large that, filled with sack
Up to the swelling brim,
Vast toasts on the delicious lake
Like ships at sea may swim.

Engrave not battle on its cheek:
With war I've nought to do;
I'm none of those that took Maastricht,
Nor Yarmouth leaguer knew.

Let it no name of planets tell,
Fixed stars, or constellations;
For I am no Sir Sidrophel,
Nor none of his relations.

But carve theron a spreading vine,
Then add two lovely boys;
Their limbs in amorous folds intwine,
The type of future joys.

Cupid and Bacchus my saints are,
May drink and love still reign,
With wine I wash away my cares,
And then to cunt again.

JW

Day of Fielding

Today Henry Fielding would have been 299 years. Born on this day in 1707 he became one of the major satirists during the first half of the 18th century. His works include such as Joseph Andrews, Shamela and his most famous novel Tom Jones.



“LOVE: A word properly applied to our delight in particular kinds of food; sometimes metaphorically spoken of the favorite objects of all our appetites.”
HF

Word of the day

CONVERSATION,n
A fair for the display of the minor mental
commodities, each exhibitor being too
intent upon the arrangement of his own
wares to observe those of his neighbor.

Ambrose Bierce

Hate?

I just saw a documentary on tv about "Hate -music" and the neo-nazi movement, I was a bit sad but most of all I was shocked by all the extreme hate these people posess. These people support the slaughter done by the nazis during the war and every other action done to kill people different from themselves. This might sound like a cliché but I do not think I care, when people start killing people who do not look like themselves how will the killing end?


Lo ! Death has reared himself a throne
In a strange city lying alone
Far down within the dim West,
Where the good and the bad and the worst and the best
Have gone to their eternal rest.
There shrines and palaces and towers
(Time-eaten towers that tremble not !)
Resemble nothing that is ours.
Around, by lifting winds forgot,
Resignedly beneath the sky
The melancholy waters lie.

EAP

A new start

How better to start off a blog than by the words of Lord B? The lines which so perfectly describe the almost permanent state of being for a student of classical literature. The use of poems to give insight to my days of reading, drinking and wellbeing will be excessive on this blog. I will try to say something with a bit of hold and meaing now and then, when in the mood... But for now I think B's lines will do.

Lines Inscribed Upon A Cup Formed From A Skull

Start not - nor deem my spirit fled;
In me behold the only skull
From which, unlike a living head,
Whatever flows is never dull.

I lived, I loved, I quaffed, like thee:
I died: let earth my bones resign;
Fill up - thou canst not injure me;
The worm hath fouler lips than thine.

Better to hold the sparkling grape,
Than nurse the earth-worm's slimy
brood;
And circle in the goblet's shape
The drink of gods, than reptile's food.

Where once my wit, perchance, hath shone,
In aid of others' let me shine;
And when, alas! our brains are gone,
What nobler substitute than wine?

Quaff while thou canst: another race,
When thou and thine, like me, are sped,
May rescue thee from earth's embrace,
And rhyme and revel with the dead.

Why not? since through life's little day
Our heads such sad effects produce;
Redeemed from worms and wasting clay,
This chance is theirs, to be of use.

LB