10-20-2013, 09:19 PM
Dale,
I gave it a few days to respond. I had to dig deep and into some uncomfortable territory within myself to muster up the balls for this, so if you find yourself somewhere similar in reading it, that should come as no surprise.
I think you've gotten a bit caught up in the "intentional fallacy." Which is to say, what you as self-conscious author intend is, at least in some sense, besides the point as to what your writing ultimately means -- particularly when you've not considered the other meanings that protrude to the eye of your reader. This is not necessarily owing to any shortcoming unique to you or any author, for that matter: it is simply very difficult, when reading our own work, to get out of the egocentric predicament. (That's not to say that you are behaving "egocentrically", per se -- just that it's impossible for you to see, beyond what you imagine you intend, what your writing means to others).
So, if you don't mind, I'm going to examine a bit of your gist below.
"To let you see Dido's pain and so forth would defeat the purpose of showing the hypocrisy of Love."
How is that so? Am I to believe, thereby, that love is essentially hypocritical? Evidently, we are talking about romantic love or eros. There is a powerful precedent in the Western tradition that allies itself with you, at least, on the surface. And yet, I wonder if hypocrisy isn't the wrong word entirely here. Hypocrisy would seem to entail a self-conscious attitude with a certain degree of transparency. However, when people are caught up in the throes of love's madness, most of them are hardly thematically aware of the extent of their own folly.
"The point is for Venus, the speaker, to be aloof and derisive, because this is what her actions in this situation suggest of her outlook, not just on Dido, but on all humans. Humanity is the plaything of Love."
And yet, if humanity is indeed the plaything of Love, what does that say, again, about love being "essentially hypocritical"? Such language seems to indicate that Dido is not entirely to blame for his predicament.
"There are some other levels operative here, but that is the gist. To make it the poem you want, would be to make it a different poem. However, your comments, along with others makes me think I need to reevaluate how I am coming across. Evidently not the way I intend."
In all honesty, I don't want your poem to be "the poem I want." I certainly do want it to be your poem; I just think that, as written, it contains a certain amount of cynicism that poses as irony, and this from some unexamined presuppositions on the part of its author. Whether such cynicism is warranted or unwarranted is another question entirely, which I will leave you to explore without further provocation.
I do hope that my remarks are useful to you, and that I put that delicately enough to not seem presumptuous.
Best,
James
I gave it a few days to respond. I had to dig deep and into some uncomfortable territory within myself to muster up the balls for this, so if you find yourself somewhere similar in reading it, that should come as no surprise.
I think you've gotten a bit caught up in the "intentional fallacy." Which is to say, what you as self-conscious author intend is, at least in some sense, besides the point as to what your writing ultimately means -- particularly when you've not considered the other meanings that protrude to the eye of your reader. This is not necessarily owing to any shortcoming unique to you or any author, for that matter: it is simply very difficult, when reading our own work, to get out of the egocentric predicament. (That's not to say that you are behaving "egocentrically", per se -- just that it's impossible for you to see, beyond what you imagine you intend, what your writing means to others).
So, if you don't mind, I'm going to examine a bit of your gist below.
"To let you see Dido's pain and so forth would defeat the purpose of showing the hypocrisy of Love."
How is that so? Am I to believe, thereby, that love is essentially hypocritical? Evidently, we are talking about romantic love or eros. There is a powerful precedent in the Western tradition that allies itself with you, at least, on the surface. And yet, I wonder if hypocrisy isn't the wrong word entirely here. Hypocrisy would seem to entail a self-conscious attitude with a certain degree of transparency. However, when people are caught up in the throes of love's madness, most of them are hardly thematically aware of the extent of their own folly.
"The point is for Venus, the speaker, to be aloof and derisive, because this is what her actions in this situation suggest of her outlook, not just on Dido, but on all humans. Humanity is the plaything of Love."
And yet, if humanity is indeed the plaything of Love, what does that say, again, about love being "essentially hypocritical"? Such language seems to indicate that Dido is not entirely to blame for his predicament.
"There are some other levels operative here, but that is the gist. To make it the poem you want, would be to make it a different poem. However, your comments, along with others makes me think I need to reevaluate how I am coming across. Evidently not the way I intend."
In all honesty, I don't want your poem to be "the poem I want." I certainly do want it to be your poem; I just think that, as written, it contains a certain amount of cynicism that poses as irony, and this from some unexamined presuppositions on the part of its author. Whether such cynicism is warranted or unwarranted is another question entirely, which I will leave you to explore without further provocation.
I do hope that my remarks are useful to you, and that I put that delicately enough to not seem presumptuous.
Best,
James