(no subject)

[eruthros]

So I was reading a New Yorker article about Krystian Bala, a Polish author accused of murder, and I came across the following paragraph and was just -- boggled. One of these sentences is not like the others, guys:

Bala cast himself as an enfant terrible who sought out what Foucault had called a "limit-experience": he wanted to push the boundaries of language and human existence, to break free of what he deemed to be the hypocritical and oppressive "truths" of Western society, including taboos on sex and drugs. Foucault himself was drawn to homosexual sadomasochism. Bala devoured the work of Georges Bataille, who vowed to "brutally oppose all systems" and who once contemplated carrying out human sacrifices; and William Burroughs, who swore to use language to "rub out the word"; and the Marquis de Sade, who demanded, "O man! Is it for you to say what is good or what is evil?" Bala boasted about his drunken visits to brothels and his submission to temptations of the flesh. He told friends that he hated "conventions" and was "capable of anything," and he insisted, "I will not live long but I will live furiously!"

Now, okay, I'd like to smack the author of this article for other reasons, yes, but the sentence there that begins "Foucault himself?" Dude, what does that have to do with this paragraph, which is about things-Bala-read-that-he-liked? Did he READ about Foucault's sex life? No evidence of same here! What then does Foucault's sex life have to do with Bala reading about limit-experiences? Nothing, except that this is already an article about the ways Bala was influenced by postmodernism to ignore "truth" and "morality" and only do language games and thus kill people, and sadomasochism seems similarly edgey, dubious, and weird.

Comments

[cathexys.livejournal.com]

But aren't all the examples writers who imagined and tried to *live* limit experiences? So, I read it as "Bala was influenced by Foucault, Bataille, de Sade. All of these guys theorized and wrotre about limit experiences. All of them experimented with it in RL. Bala did the same." ???

[I mean, that still make the underlying argument deeply suspicious, bc Foucault playing in the dungeons is a far cry from Bala killing someone (I'm assuming that's where the analogy's headed, right? The RL/fiction excessiveness thingy?]

[eruthros]

Well, except that the guy who writes this article doesn't make that analogy -- this part of the article is all about things that influenced Bala, which included Foucault, Bataille, and in preceding paragraphs Derrida and Rorty. This particular paragraph is intended as the transition between Wittgenstein and Bala's reading to the section of the article about Bala's language-game proclamations -- so, yeah, I can see where you're going with your reading, except that I don't see why the author inserts the "all of them experimented with it in RL" -- the argument here could easily be "Bala was influenced by these dudes who wrote about limit experiences. Then he tried some." Which is what it was when it was about language games; the argument there was "Wittgenstein wrote about language games. Bala tried that." Or when it was Derrida: "Derrida destabilized identity. Bala played with that." But when it's limit experiences, Foucault's own experiences are apparently relevant, from this author's POV, even though (as far as we know reading the article) BALA didn't know about them.

So I guess my point is: the way theory in this article works is "Philosopher says things. Bala tries to practice them." EXCEPT here, where it's "Philosophere says things. Philosopher tries to practice them. Bala tries to practice them." So my question is: why is it relevant here (when it's about sex), and why is it relevant to the story of Bala (when we don't know he knew that). Etc.

I don't know if I'm making any sense, here, but that's why it jumped out at me in context!

And yes, the underlying argument is trying to draw from the postmodernists and limit-experiences and no real truth --> Bala killing somebody and then writing about it in a novel. The article is titled "True crime: A postmodern murder mystery." Among other things, there's a brief attempted parallel between Leopold and Loeb.

[cathexys.livejournal.com]

Ah, no. That makes sense then. Bc in this paragraph the wrote about/tried in RL analogy made sense (though, again, given that he's accused of murder there are other false analogy issues at work!), but ifd all other analogies remain on the fiction/language level?

Bah!

[eruthros]

Yeah, I think I probably needed more context there to get at the break in the parallelism -- but it's a really long section of an article.

And yes, absolutely, there is sort of a FUNDAMENTAL false analogy here.

[toft-froggy.livejournal.com]

*blinks*. Um. That sentence totally brought me up short too. How bizarre.

[eruthros]

It's just so "... what?"

[graycastle.livejournal.com]

wow, it just JUMPS right off the page, doesn't it? Fuck off, New Yorker writer.

[eruthros]

I shall have to lend you the article. It is AMAZING. I am awestruck. I dunno the author's background, 'cause of how he's a staff writer and thus doesn't get a bio here, but it really is an astonishing job of describing the ways in which postmodernism --> no morals --> jealousy --> murder, a la the Leopold and Loeb trials and Nietzsche.

*agrees with the FUCK OFF*

(ps your icon is hot) (also, perfect for posts about homosexual sadomasochism.)