GUTTING MR. GUDDING
While I agree that Mr. Gabriel Gudding does a very thorough job of pointing out what the habitual pot-stirrer is up to, I am concerned about where legitimate dissent is allowed to present itself (after all, it can always be branded as "bad behavior" by those firmly ensconced in the group ethos).
Quite honestly, I get tired of those who are so quick to use the label of "bad" rather than "complex" about behavior. Mr. Gudding's piece reads like a primer of how to deal rhetorically with those who dare to dissent. [It's not always to draw attention to oneself. Some people actually have ideas of their own these days. Might there be a difference?] In this age of deep and scary conformity, I am concerned about how totalizing norms work their magic.
I suspect this is why some people are always a little bit shy of those people whose name creates a little cloud of community along with them. One can usually smell the blind alignment to the cause which is always present within the cult of personality.
Furthermore, I've always understood it to be the literary responsibility of "those outside" to comment (many times unfavorably) on the inner machinations of majority groups. I would go further in saying that there are many people whose radar is finely tuned to the poisons lurking as groupthink within any community. Those who champion "community above everything else" seem to me to forget how repressive groups can be.
That Ginsberg may have had some rough spots on his emotional profile, I don't doubt. However, in my discussions with Bei Dao, he was always grateful that when Ginsberg went to China, he publicly recognized him as opposed to the official state-sanctioned poets. I'm sure Mr. Gudding would accuse Ginsberg of mugging for the camera. Perhaps, though, he was naturally inclined to acknowledge dissidence. The attacks on Ginsberg now (years after his death) are probably due to the fact that we in the States don't do dissidence very well now. ESPECIALLY in academia [Where I presume Mr. Gudding resides as he identifies himself as a "semicolon specialist"].
Apparently, in Mr Gudding's book, all those who seek to inscribe their own individuality are narcissists. Let us be helped by the God of good manners when these said "individuals" are expunged from the realm of the artistic corps.
Quite honestly, I get tired of those who are so quick to use the label of "bad" rather than "complex" about behavior. Mr. Gudding's piece reads like a primer of how to deal rhetorically with those who dare to dissent. [It's not always to draw attention to oneself. Some people actually have ideas of their own these days. Might there be a difference?] In this age of deep and scary conformity, I am concerned about how totalizing norms work their magic.
I suspect this is why some people are always a little bit shy of those people whose name creates a little cloud of community along with them. One can usually smell the blind alignment to the cause which is always present within the cult of personality.
Furthermore, I've always understood it to be the literary responsibility of "those outside" to comment (many times unfavorably) on the inner machinations of majority groups. I would go further in saying that there are many people whose radar is finely tuned to the poisons lurking as groupthink within any community. Those who champion "community above everything else" seem to me to forget how repressive groups can be.
That Ginsberg may have had some rough spots on his emotional profile, I don't doubt. However, in my discussions with Bei Dao, he was always grateful that when Ginsberg went to China, he publicly recognized him as opposed to the official state-sanctioned poets. I'm sure Mr. Gudding would accuse Ginsberg of mugging for the camera. Perhaps, though, he was naturally inclined to acknowledge dissidence. The attacks on Ginsberg now (years after his death) are probably due to the fact that we in the States don't do dissidence very well now. ESPECIALLY in academia [Where I presume Mr. Gudding resides as he identifies himself as a "semicolon specialist"].
Apparently, in Mr Gudding's book, all those who seek to inscribe their own individuality are narcissists. Let us be helped by the God of good manners when these said "individuals" are expunged from the realm of the artistic corps.
posted by Victor Schnickelfritz at 10:16 PM
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