william kent

Well-known member
I'm not saying he wasn't open, I'm just distinguishing it from the original point about the Sun Ra, Joni, Jimi types. It's a different type of open. One can't help it, the other is more in control

Even the controlled one can't seem to help it though. Beckett was clearly a very self-contained person, but he still felt the pull to tell people about himself.
 

william kent

Well-known member
Yeah, I know. I'm not saying there's one type of artist or one style of being open, I'm saying a closed off artist is something of a paradox because it's a fundamentally open activity. You have to put something out there in order to do it.
 

william kent

Well-known member
No, but I think it's interesting when people are pulled in different directions like that. He was constantly reducing things, withdrawing, but kept putting the stuff out there.
 

Mr. Tea

Let's Talk About Ceps
Yeah, I know. I'm not saying there's one type of artist or one style of being open, I'm saying a closed off artist is something of a paradox because it's a fundamentally open activity. You have to put something out there in order to do it.
I suppose an exception would be a true 'outsider artist' whose house is found to be full of crazy sculptures or paintings after they die, which nobody else even knew about. But they're obviously very few and far between.
 

william kent

Well-known member
I suppose an exception would be a true 'outsider artist' whose house is found to be full of crazy sculptures or paintings after they die, which nobody else even knew about. But they're obviously very few and far between.

That artist is still creating something though. They're still running the risk of acquiring an audience.
 

pattycakes_

Can turn naughty
No, but I think it's interesting when people are pulled in different directions like that. He was constantly reducing things, withdrawing, but kept putting the stuff out there.

Right and you could easily imagine the ultimate act of withdrawal would be to not put anything out there. Well shit, looks like I've out Becketted Becket. Eat my dust, Sam!
 

william kent

Well-known member
Right and you could easily imagine the ultimate act of withdrawal would be to not put anything out there. Well shit, looks like I've out Becketted Becket. Eat my dust, Sam!

Clarice Lispector seemed quite similar to Beckett, similar suspicion of language and inclination for reduction:

Lispector was phobic about the dilution of language through overuse: “Writing too much and too often can contaminate the word.” Indeed, the obligation of having to write—together with the pervasive sense of the inadequacy of words—is an idée fixe in the crônicas, and Lispector repeatedly harangued herself for it: “If I could, I would leave my place on this page blank: replete with a resounding silence,” marks a May 1971 entry. The distrust of the merely documentary function of writing also reflects a wider anxiety about language’s sense-making abilities. “I don’t know how to ‘clothe an idea in words,’” she wrote in a piece a year earlier. “When I am writing, I feel again what is apparently the only paradoxical certainty: that what gets in the way of writing is having to use words.”
 

Mr. Tea

Let's Talk About Ceps
Right and you could easily imagine the ultimate act of withdrawal would be to not put anything out there. Well shit, looks like I've out Becketted Becket. Eat my dust, Sam!
You must have put some tunes on SoundCloud or similar at some point though, right?

At any rate, I've got some of your MP3s on my laptop. So there!
 

william kent

Well-known member
Clarice Lispector seemed quite similar to Beckett, similar suspicion of language and inclination for reduction:

Lispector was phobic about the dilution of language through overuse: “Writing too much and too often can contaminate the word.” Indeed, the obligation of having to write—together with the pervasive sense of the inadequacy of words—is an idée fixe in the crônicas, and Lispector repeatedly harangued herself for it: “If I could, I would leave my place on this page blank: replete with a resounding silence,” marks a May 1971 entry. The distrust of the merely documentary function of writing also reflects a wider anxiety about language’s sense-making abilities. “I don’t know how to ‘clothe an idea in words,’” she wrote in a piece a year earlier. “When I am writing, I feel again what is apparently the only paradoxical certainty: that what gets in the way of writing is having to use words.”

I suppose with those two you could actually flip it and argue they weren't closed off, they felt language wasn't open enough for them to fully express themselves. What looks like a retreat is in fact an advance. They're attacking the language in an effort to reach what's beyond it.
 

Murphy

cat malogen
Coil would talk music but never openly discuss magic. Who wants to reveal their muse too much to any old inquirer?

You can look at openness as a psychological metric ie as a trait. You can look at borders, eg conservative levels of disgust at perceived levels where immigration’s role in changing a body-politic‘s ethnic spectrum through border policy is front and centre being just one

You can meet people who depict themselves as open minded but who’ll prove more and more conservative as you actually get to know them. *Puts on Jordan Peterson’s voice* and talk about psychedelics and moving a personality trait one % point further towards more openness but you’ll find psychedelic totalitarianism too

People can appear open but only by getting to know them irl will you get a true register of where they’re at
 

Murphy

cat malogen
It’s how you make friends

Last thing you need are friends alongside you in life who dither. Pause for thought = yes, dither endlessly because a new console game is out = get tae fuck
 

pattycakes_

Can turn naughty
Burroughs was definitely on the Beckett end of the spectrum but very occasionally hinted at wishing he could be more open. I wonder with that type of demeanour, like you ended up like that one way or another, does it ever feel like a cage or whatever.
 

pattycakes_

Can turn naughty
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he wrote this close to the end
 

Murphy

cat malogen
Being a parent can change degrees of openness

Admit I’ve never scrutinised anyone in a supervisory role as fully since the kids arrived. I think any other approach is grossly naive with so many threats around but you can’t be a human gatekeeping mono-fort either. Then one will invariably mention a sleepover at a “mate’s”, cue who the fuck is this step-Dad sketchy overseeing owt?

Toughest balancing act of all, cue “Jimmy!!!” getting fried rescuing frisbees from a pylon public information film flashback styles
 
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