Say no more
So I punted commentary on Gombrowicz and Bacacay, which is up there with Ferdydurke, superior to Pornografia & Cosmos where the conceit falls short of extension to novella length. (a recent oeuvreview)
So I continued without pause to fill an important lacuna (not a much-needed gap) in my reading with late Beckett: Nohow On (Company, Ill Seen Ill Said, Worstward Ho). A radical reduction, the mover now unmoved, but a progression nonetheless as even more is pared away. These texts have the uncanny property of reading you as you read them. The eye tears. The page tears. I had the most difficulty with the central term of the progression, where most seem to find the last hardest, but Worstward Ho seems to me more straightforward, working towards a climax encapsulating all:
Worse less. By no stretch more. Worse for want of better less. Less best. No. Naught best. Best worse. No. Not best worse. Naught not best worse. Less best worse. No. Least. Least best worse. Least never to be naught. Never to naught be brought. Never by naught be nulled. Unnullable least. Say that best worse. With leastening words say least best worse. For want of worser worst. Unlessenable least best worse.
Everything that follows this is the unsaying of all that preceded it, ending with the missaid unsaid.
It also led me to ponder how Sam might have rewritten something completely different: Evening. She's a goer. No. What I mean? Say no more. Nudge. Nudge. Does she go? Bet she does. Follow me. That's good. A nod good as a wink to a blind bat. Very good. Wicked. Say no more. Wicket? A sport? Bet she does. Likes games. Knew she would. Been around. No. What I mean? Asked knowingly. Snaps. Could be taken on holiday. Still. Insinuating? No. No. Yes. Been around. Done it. Slept. No. No more.
So I continued without pause to fill an important lacuna (not a much-needed gap) in my reading with late Beckett: Nohow On (Company, Ill Seen Ill Said, Worstward Ho). A radical reduction, the mover now unmoved, but a progression nonetheless as even more is pared away. These texts have the uncanny property of reading you as you read them. The eye tears. The page tears. I had the most difficulty with the central term of the progression, where most seem to find the last hardest, but Worstward Ho seems to me more straightforward, working towards a climax encapsulating all:
Worse less. By no stretch more. Worse for want of better less. Less best. No. Naught best. Best worse. No. Not best worse. Naught not best worse. Less best worse. No. Least. Least best worse. Least never to be naught. Never to naught be brought. Never by naught be nulled. Unnullable least. Say that best worse. With leastening words say least best worse. For want of worser worst. Unlessenable least best worse.
Everything that follows this is the unsaying of all that preceded it, ending with the missaid unsaid.
It also led me to ponder how Sam might have rewritten something completely different: Evening. She's a goer. No. What I mean? Say no more. Nudge. Nudge. Does she go? Bet she does. Follow me. That's good. A nod good as a wink to a blind bat. Very good. Wicked. Say no more. Wicket? A sport? Bet she does. Likes games. Knew she would. Been around. No. What I mean? Asked knowingly. Snaps. Could be taken on holiday. Still. Insinuating? No. No. Yes. Been around. Done it. Slept. No. No more.
posted by nnyhav | 12:39
9 Comments:
I haven't read Gombrowicz's Bacacay and I am a bit disappointed by your punting, esp. when you compare it to Ferdydurke. Come on, 25 words or less, if you like!!!
His Diaries are very worthy also, even better than Ferdydurke perhaps.
Really enjoying your blog, please keep it going!
25 words or less would be less than two per story. The best review (and links) is here, as usual -- there's even alternate online translation to be had downscroll, but not for the story that would most interest you, "The Events on the Banbury", which put me in mind of A. Gordon Pym, but which aligns with your project quite well (and the enjoyment is reciprocal!). But "An Adventure" is also in the vicinity, and available online, above link, below.
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At 10.6 21:20, 'touchstein' said: "Can't help but note you chiming in [at thevalve] in regards to the Duke scandal. [...] Excuse the following rant (and delete it if you find it offensive):"
I will, not so much for offense given or taken, but on proper venue grounds. I've left (your) similar Valveward swipes alone before as incidental, but I'm neither satellite nor conduit: If there's an issue with them, please take it up with them (as I did with one of them in what occasioned this; it's no monolith); if 'moderators' close down that avenue, there are more effective alternate routes.
""""if 'moderators' close down that avenue, there are more effective alternate routes."""""
Such as ? I think it's quite amusing how Club Valve permits some loudmouthed vulgar moralist like Puchalsky to prattle at will, and nearly all intelligent dissent has been eliminated. Your own tame responses to that sort of corp-blog-o-cracy are mostly futile.
The Valve apparatchiks go on each day about their rational liberalism, or some Jeffersonian- BS, or analytical philosophy-lite, and yet when someone starts to call them on their endless bureaucratic apologies, their sentimentality (i.e. the D-Ho thread), the centralization, cronyism, they simply prevent the messages from ever appearing on the board, or stamp "troll" on the offenders. Holblo himself used to allude to Hume, and like the fact-value distinction, problems of secular ethics, yada yada yada. Hah. Valve is now the blog for the anti-Humeans.
It's a sad state of affairs when talentless paudeens like Puchalsky and Kwatsko rule a lot of literary or "philosophical" blog discussion.
Yeah, well, you know, yada mo, yada beddah ...
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Yada no more.
You've become a bit spineless, SB--especially for a supposed fan of chess-dueling and so forth.
The Valve is an ugly, hack-controlled pseudo-blog--sort of a dylexic Nabakov.com. Even the PoMo cretins like Long Sunday have more class than those bureaucrats and mommy's boys.
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