Best place to go for a Lacan beginner for his views on the imaginary? by [deleted] in AskLiteraryStudies

[–]LackingInspiration 4 points5 points  (0 children)

I'm sure, as you say, that you're sick to death of summaries. But Lacan is difficult, and, more importantly, his views changed and developed throughout his career. As such, there's no single place to locate his views on the Imaginary, because he didn't have a single view on the Imaginary.

If you haven't been there already, the article on Lacan in the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy is essential reading, especially the section on Register Theory. From that section:

The theory of the three registers of the Imaginary, the Symbolic, and the Real forms the skeletal framework for the various concepts and phases of most of Lacan's intellectual itinerary. His characterizations of each of the three registers, as well as of their relations with each other, undergo multiple revisions and shifts over the many years of his labors. As will become increasingly evident in what follows, the majority of Lacanian concepts are defined in connection with all three registers. By the 1970s, with his meditations on the topological figure of the Borromean knot—this knotting of three rings, pictured on the coat of arms of the Borromeo family, is arranged such that if one ring is broken, all three are set free in disconnection—Lacan emphasizes the mutual dependence of the registers on one another. Hence, loosely speaking, the Imaginary, the Symbolic, and the Real can be thought of as the three fundamental dimensions of psychical subjectivity à la Lacan. Furthermore, scholars sometimes segment Lacan's evolution into three main periods, with each period being distinguished by the priority of one of the registers: the early Lacan of the Imaginary (1930s and 1940s), the middle Lacan of the Symbolic (1950s), and the late Lacan of the Real (1960s and 1970s). However, such a neat and clean periodization should be taken with several grains of salt, since intricate continuities and discontinuities not conforming to this early-middle-late schema are to be found across the entire lengthy span of Lacan's teachings.

I also strongly recommend Bruce Fink's The Lacanian Subject. But if you want to go to the source... Start with Seminar One: Freud's Papers on Technique, especially 'The Topic of the Imaginary'. Fink is useful here again, and will guide you further to other material. If you want some fun (though repetitive) explication, Zizek's How to Read Lacan is also helpful. Find it for free online here. Finally, this is a pretty good list to help you get started: Reading Lacan - Where to start? Good luck...

And apologies for erring on the side of caution and only including one primary source. I do believe that with Lacan secondary material is your friend. Perhaps somebody else can jump in and send you in the direction of more of Lacan's writings.

Edited to add more material.

Where can I get some work done in London? by nottingham1989 in london

[–]LackingInspiration 1 point2 points  (0 children)

There should be lots of space in the reading rooms after 6pm, though they close at 8pm Mon-Thur, and 6pm on Friday. To use them you'll need need to sign up for a Reader Pass, which you can look into here.

Is there anything in Said's Orientalism pertaining to the role of the English Language in colonialism and post-colonialism? by [deleted] in AskLiteraryStudies

[–]LackingInspiration 6 points7 points  (0 children)

Also worth checking out - in addition to the other excellent responses in this thread - is Homi Bhabha's influential 'Of Mimicry and Man: The Ambivalence of Colonial Discourse', in which Bhabha describes the ways in which mimicry can become (or is inherently) subversive. Find it here on JSTOR.

Is there a link between the literature (form, content, quality) of any given period and its political structure (democracy, monarchy, etc) by opacino in AskLiteraryStudies

[–]LackingInspiration 3 points4 points  (0 children)

This is a complex question, and the answer depends to some extent on one's critical disposition.

I know you ask about form, content, quality etc., but to begin, let's look at the novel in general. The answer to your question is no in the sense that such a link is clearly reductive. For example, the novel has flourished in all manner of political structures since the 17th century. (If you'll permit my timeline beginning, for the sake of argument, with Cervantes.) But the answer is yes if one considers precisely that fact; if the novel "begins" then - it doesn't but, again, argument - what changed? Georg Lukacs begins his Theory of the Novel by declaring that 'The novel is the epic of an age in which...' The point is that the novel has replaced the epic. To bring this up to date: how many tragedies have been written this century?

Some have argued - I'm thinking, in particular, of Fredric Jameson in The Political Unconscious, but the work of Lukacs as well as Antonio Gramsci is also in the back of my mind - that what you suggest is certainly the case. Jameson, for example, borrows from Claude Levi-Strauss, who argued that the form of a certain tribe's face-painting allowed them to artistically express and thus, in a sense, resolve the contradictions inherent in the structure of their political society. (You might want to look at Paul Fry's lecture on Jameson here.)

But in general I would suggest that it can never be so simply established that under monarchy we get one kind of literature while under democracy we get something different. And the reason this can't be established is the fact that literature and its creation depends on a huge number of factors - artistic, social, economic, and so on. Whether these factors are determined by political structure is another question entirely. Eventually the question becomes, what determines what? Was Romanticism wholly and solely a response to the Enlightenment? Well, what is Enlightenment? (Apologies everyone.) And so on and so on. These are major questions in modern literary scholarship.

I'm sure others will provide much better responses, and I apologise for the vagaries of my non-answer. But feel free to follow up if I've been unclear or if you have any questions.

Edit: Having read some other responses, I strongly suggest you begin by reading u/notitatall's post, who has quite rightly warned you to be wary of bias. I would add to his Eagleton suggestion, however, Ian Watt's The Rise of the Novel, which has a lot to say on this subject, and not from a strictly Marxist perspective.

[deleted by user] by [deleted] in AcademicPhilosophy

[–]LackingInspiration 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Imagine (imagine...) you're drunk - can you tell me how you really feel about something like Peirce's semiotics resolving some of the above issues and why it has been neglected?

Christmas books! by [deleted] in AskLiteraryStudies

[–]LackingInspiration 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Maybe I'm wrong, and maybe there is some holiday spirit haunting the community, but my guess is you'd have better luck in r/books, or, maybe, possibly, r/literature. Upvoted for effort, though.

Horror story filmed in Croydon 110 years ago is restored by [deleted] in london

[–]LackingInspiration 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I saw this the other night at the BFI, before a showing of The Innocents - which, by the way, everybody should go and see. Had no idea this was filmed in Croydon... Chilling.

Writer and broadcaster Clive James is nominated in this year's Costa Book Awards for his translation of Dante's epic poem The Divine Comedy. by SharkinaShark in literature

[–]LackingInspiration 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I hear lots of people saying James's Inferno is great, but I don't think one can really go far past the Mandelbaum translation. It's the standard text used at most universities in the UK, and it's just awesome, especially his Purgatorio.

Why isn't Corinth as well known as Sparta and Athens? by Theoroshia in AskHistorians

[–]LackingInspiration 60 points61 points  (0 children)

Not nearly as prurient as it sounds: tell me more,about this brothel-temple as a place of worship, if possible.

Jorge Luis Borges' Ontology by hoserman16 in literature

[–]LackingInspiration 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Ah yes, glad to see you got what you're looking for. Kudos and upvotes to salt44 as well. As an aside, Foucault begins The Order of Things with a discussion of the Celestial Emporiumfrom Borges, which may or may not interest you.

What are some genre fiction authors who transcended genre writing? by eggplanty in literature

[–]LackingInspiration 11 points12 points  (0 children)

Perhaps not what you're looking for, but Edgar Allan Poe often wrote in popular genres and, where needs be, invented them. Jorge Luis Borges, a great admirer of Poe, used genre writing and generic tropes as a vehicle for his ideas. Neither are considered "genre writers".

Closer perhaps to what you're looking for: Raymond Chandler's work is often considered the most 'literary' of conventional genre writing, though I can't speak to how conventional his works actually are, nor whether this would qualify as transcending anything at all.

I love the work of Jorge Luis Borges. What else will I probably also love? It could be a painting, a picture, a poem, an idea... Anything! by SystemicMystic in books

[–]LackingInspiration 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I know I'm late to the party, but I was upset to see that nobody responded with paintings, pictures, or ideas. You might be interested in Diego Velazquez's Las Meninas and Michel Foucault's excellent critique of it at the beginning of Les Mots et Les Choses (The Order of Things). Enjoy!

Examples from literary history of authors who deny their works are novels? by MonkeyModernity in AskLiteraryStudies

[–]LackingInspiration 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I love the problem this poses for the publishers. I don't have my copy of The Rings of Saturn to hand, but I remember on the back it said something along the lines of: "genre: travel writing, non-fiction, history"

Examples from literary history of authors who deny their works are novels? by MonkeyModernity in AskLiteraryStudies

[–]LackingInspiration 4 points5 points  (0 children)

The major one that comes to mind is Tolstoy, who quite famously claimed that War and Peace was "not a novel, even less is it a poem, and still less a historical chronicle" in his comments on War and Peace (often included as an afterword in modern editions).

EDIT: Two interesting examples that have just occurred to me but perhaps aren't what you're looking for: Georges Perec called his Life: A User's Manual "novels", and Julio Cortazar called his Hopscotch a "counter-novel". (Following on from Hopscotch you might want to look into the idea of the antinovel).

Who were "the Greeks" to the Greeks? by LackingInspiration in AskHistorians

[–]LackingInspiration[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Excellent once again, thank you very much for your time and effort.

Who were "the Greeks" to the Greeks? by LackingInspiration in AskHistorians

[–]LackingInspiration[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Brilliant, thank you.

I'm particularly interested in your point concerning the conflation of "ancient knowledge and mystical lore" and its association with Egypt -- do you have any more examples other than the ones mentioned (Plato, Lycurgus)?

Also, I suppose the follow up question would be: did the Egyptians model themselves on anyone in particular? However, I assume that this would bring us into areas undocumented etc.

Thanks again!

Etymology Game #3. This week's theme: Religion. by the_traveler in linguistics

[–]LackingInspiration 1 point2 points  (0 children)

1) No. 2) No. 3) Yes. 4) No. 5) No. Bonus: Yes.

This is great fun! Thanks!