SET THEORY IN THREE ACTS
ACT I
XIX
If you so wish to construe this, I’ll say this
only: the Jew is not beholden
to forgiveness, of pity. You will have to
go forward block by block, for pity’s sake
irresolute as granite. Now move
to the next section.
(Geoffrey Hill, The Triumph of Love)
XXXV
Even now, I tell myself, there is a language
to which I might speak and which
would rightly hear me;
responding with eloquence; in its turn,
negotiating sense without insult
given or injury taken.
Familiar to those who already know it
elsewhere as justice,
it is met also in the form of silence.
(Geoffrey Hill, The Triumph of Love)
~~~
ACT II
In the Faust legend, Faust is able, with Mephistopheles’ help, to take nocturnal voyages, flying through the air to other times and places and summoning scenes and personages from them to his study. He is permitted to gaze on them – to have them as sights – but other interaction is impossible, including, explicitly, speech. In the face of knowledge, Faust is silenced.
Sheherazade’s position is the reverse of this. “Be silent then, for danger is in words.” (V.i.27), says Marlowe’s Faust to some companions before whom he is exhibiting Helen of Troy. But for Sheherazade danger lies in silence, death hovers at the edge of dawn on the horizon of light when all stories come to an end, inscribing her as well. Where Faust sells his soul for knowledge, Sheherazade saves her life by offering it.
(Lyn Hejinian, “La Faustienne”, from The Language of Inquiry)
Authority over being is thus dispersed, not because of the boundlessness, but in the boundlessness. We don’t – as writers or as persons – go beyond “all limitations” and “all boundaries” – we enter and inhabit them. Faced with the notorious gap in meaning, we may ask, “What should we do?” But we already know what to do. And this knowing what to do is neither derived from, nor does it produce guidelines – either prescriptive, proscriptive, or even descriptive. It is, rather, intrinsic to living in context.
(Lyn Hejinian, “Reason” from The Language of Inquiry)
~~~
ACT III
A little knowledge is dangerous. So is a lot.
(From the TV program Eureka, 2006)
So, one has to make up one’s mind and have both, a little knowledge and a lot. Both this and that.
(Camelia Elias, on top of a mountain in Norway, 2008)
But who says that either one of us has a winning strategy? The law of the excluded middle says so.
(Jaakko Hintikka, The Game of Language, 1983)
Really?
(Anonymous, c/o Curia)
XIX
If you so wish to construe this, I’ll say this
only: the Jew is not beholden
to forgiveness, of pity. You will have to
go forward block by block, for pity’s sake
irresolute as granite. Now move
to the next section.
(Geoffrey Hill, The Triumph of Love)
XXXV
Even now, I tell myself, there is a language
to which I might speak and which
would rightly hear me;
responding with eloquence; in its turn,
negotiating sense without insult
given or injury taken.
Familiar to those who already know it
elsewhere as justice,
it is met also in the form of silence.
(Geoffrey Hill, The Triumph of Love)
~~~
ACT II
In the Faust legend, Faust is able, with Mephistopheles’ help, to take nocturnal voyages, flying through the air to other times and places and summoning scenes and personages from them to his study. He is permitted to gaze on them – to have them as sights – but other interaction is impossible, including, explicitly, speech. In the face of knowledge, Faust is silenced.
Sheherazade’s position is the reverse of this. “Be silent then, for danger is in words.” (V.i.27), says Marlowe’s Faust to some companions before whom he is exhibiting Helen of Troy. But for Sheherazade danger lies in silence, death hovers at the edge of dawn on the horizon of light when all stories come to an end, inscribing her as well. Where Faust sells his soul for knowledge, Sheherazade saves her life by offering it.
(Lyn Hejinian, “La Faustienne”, from The Language of Inquiry)
Authority over being is thus dispersed, not because of the boundlessness, but in the boundlessness. We don’t – as writers or as persons – go beyond “all limitations” and “all boundaries” – we enter and inhabit them. Faced with the notorious gap in meaning, we may ask, “What should we do?” But we already know what to do. And this knowing what to do is neither derived from, nor does it produce guidelines – either prescriptive, proscriptive, or even descriptive. It is, rather, intrinsic to living in context.
(Lyn Hejinian, “Reason” from The Language of Inquiry)
~~~
ACT III
A little knowledge is dangerous. So is a lot.
(From the TV program Eureka, 2006)
So, one has to make up one’s mind and have both, a little knowledge and a lot. Both this and that.
(Camelia Elias, on top of a mountain in Norway, 2008)
But who says that either one of us has a winning strategy? The law of the excluded middle says so.
(Jaakko Hintikka, The Game of Language, 1983)
Really?
(Anonymous, c/o Curia)
§
Comments
And honestly, was rather impressed to see that you quoted Hintikka. Not many have even heard of him.
About a union between Faust and Sheherazada – yes, but I prefer it to happen in Schrödinger’s box devoid of quantum decoherence. What the logicians have tried to grapple with for centuries, Schrödinger’s cat demonstrated: it is still neither dead, nor alive. Isn’t it just brilliant? Imagine that: to be or not to be? Both. To have or not to have? Both. Here or there? Both. In love or not in love? Both.
Applied to knowledge it would be something like this: you can know that you are uncertain about something, but you can never measure exactly how uncertain you are. On the other hand if you do know exactly how uncertain or inadequate you are, you’ll never go anywhere! :-)