from the Archives: Famished Craving - Part 66

Mentioned in this excerpt, Crossing the Threshold of Hope by John Paul II

from the Archives: Famished Craving - Part 65

the Imitation of Christ...

from the Archives: Famished Craving - Part 64

“My heart laments that virtue cannot live out of the teeth of emulation”
Artemidorus in Shakespeare's Julius Caesar - Act 2 scene 3

From the Archives: Famished Craving - Pt 63

Continuing with Robespierre in the role of the martyr as his own sacred executioner; and also continuing "What happens when there are too many 'Alexanders'?"

from the Archives: Famished Craving - Part 62

Post-modern nihilism's distant mirror - the French Revolution

In this excerpt Gil Bailie references the following texts:




The Sorrows of Young Werther - by Goethe
(this is a public web version from Project Gutenberg)

from the Archives: Famished Craving - Part 61

Can there be an exception to the rule that finds no basis in the unanchored, self-validating human mind for shared social norms? Carl Schmitt and decisionism.

from the Archives: Famished Craving - Part 60

Is it true that much as one may appeal to universal rationality as supplying the content of ethics, universally shared norms cannot be distilled from the unanchored, self-validating human mind?

from the Archives: Famished Craving - Part 59

With this excerpt the Famished Craving series begins tape #9 - so Gil starts with a bit of a review and then picks up where he left off at the end of tape #8 with Leo Braudy's comments:

"Alexander was bent on defying any order that he had not created himself"

"What happens when there are too many Alexanders?"

Referenced in this excerpt and the one to follow is a W H Auden poem, Law, Like Love:

Law, say the gardeners, is the sun,
Law is the one
All gardeners obey
To-morrow, yesterday, to-day.

Law is the wisdom of the old,
The impotent grandfathers feebly scold;
The grandchildren put out a treble tongue,
Law is the senses of the young.

Law, says the priest with a priestly look,
Expounding to an unpriestly people,
Law is the words in my priestly book,
Law is my pulpit and my steeple.

Law, says the judge as he looks down his nose,
Speaking clearly and most severely,
Law is as I've told you before,
Law is as you know I suppose,
Law is but let me explain it once more,
Law is The Law.

Yet law-abiding scholars write:
Law is neither wrong nor right,
Law is only crimes
Punished by places and by times,
Law is the clothes men wear
Anytime, anywhere,
Law is Good morning and Good night.

Others say, Law is our Fate;
Others say, Law is our State;
Others say, others say
Law is no more,
Law has gone away.

And always the loud angry crowd,
Very angry and very loud,
Law is We,
And always the soft idiot softly Me.

If we, dear, know we know no more
Than they about the Law,
If I no more than you
Know what we should and should not do
Except that all agree
Gladly or miserably
That the Law is
And that all know this
If therefore thinking it absurd
To identify Law with some other word,
Unlike so many men
I cannot say Law is again,

No more than they can we suppress
The universal wish to guess
Or slip out of our own position
Into an unconcerned condition.
Although I can at least confine
Your vanity and mine
To stating timidly
A timid similarity,
We shall boast anyway:
Like love I say.

Like love we don't know where or why,
Like love we can't compel or fly,
Like love we often weep,
Like love we seldom keep.

from the Archives: Famished Craving - Part 58

What happens when there are too many 'Alexanders'?

Being Scene - the Self and the sound of two hands clapping...

We have recently posted on the home page of our public website the video of Gil Bailie and Ron Austin's presentation at the Dominican School of Philosophy and Theology last month of 'Being Scene: the self and the sound of two hands clapping'. The presentation is split into two approximately 30 minute video clips; the first featuring Gil and the second Ron. I am posting the video here as well.

Also, the 5th CD/MP3 in the Famished Craving series being excerpted here is now available for purchase on our webstore.

The Being Scene videos are a serendipitous companion to the Famished Craving series of archival audio excerpts as they both deal with the analysis of fame using the anthropological interpretive tools provided by René Girard and Christian theology. Ron Austin brings an enlightening overview of his experience in Hollywood working with the fame industry.

Over the past months of postings to the blog a number of items have come to my attention that in much the same fashion as Gil used in his original presentation in 1995 illustrate some of the themes being examined. Here are two that I would like to share with our blog visitors:

Lady Gaga (Stefani Germanotta)

A few months ago this pop music superstar phenomenon was interviewed on the 60 Minutes television news magazine. In this interview Ms. Germanotta states that she is a student of the art and sociology of fame. Her 2008 debut CD was entitled "The Fame". She is obviously a talented and smart young woman who seems to understand the game she has chosen to play, as Gil says of Ulysses in Shakespeare's Troilus and Cressida, on the level of 'chess' as opposed to 'checkers'. Again from the 60 Minutes interview, she states unequivocally that an important aspect of the famous person's relationship with her fans is their desire to see the famous one fall, especially to see her die. Also, the ability to redirect attention to what the famous person wants to have the audience see is essential, she says, for her to maintain some modicum of privacy in a world dominated by the paparazzi. In her case it seems all of the attention is directed at her body and how it is displayed. She says one of the characteristics that make her unique among the famous is that she is completely open and truthful with the media and her fans; no lies to hide behind.

Lady Gaga is viewed both by herself and by many of her fans as a kind of icon of empowered individualism, giving them the inspiration to break the chains of whatever it is that holds them in bondage. She believes everyone has a destiny to become a superstar. It is of interest that much of the motivation for this seems to come from a sense of having been made to feel 'different' and 'disrespected' in her Catholic all girl high school.

Bob Dylan (Robert Zimmerman)

In 2004 60 Minutes' correspondent Ed Bradley interviewed Bob Dylan around the time of the publication of the first volume of Dylan's autobiography entitled Chronicles. Bradley says of Dylan that he "retreated from fame":

At his peak (ca 1970's), fame was taking its toll on Dylan. He was heading toward a divorce from his wife, Sara. And in concerts, he wore white makeup to mask himself.

In the 1960's Dylan was often called the 'voice of his generation' yet he resisted this title. Again from the 60 Minutes interview:

"If the common perception of me out there in the public was that I was either a drunk, or I was a sicko, or a Zionist, or a Buddhist, or a Catholic, or a Mormon - all of this was better than 'Archbishop of Anarchy,'" says Dylan, referring to being considered the voice of a generation opposed to everything.

Dylan was especially opposed to the media, which he says were always trying to pin him down. He wrote, "The press, I figured, you lied to it." Why?

"I realized at the time that the press, the media, they're not the judge - God's the judge," says Dylan. "The only person you have to think about lying twice to is either yourself or to God. The press isn't either of them. And I just figured they're irrelevant."

On the topic of Dylan's many musical awards:

"That must be good to have as part of your legacy," says Bradley.

"Oh, maybe this week. But you know, the list, they change names, and you know, quite frequently, really. I don't really pay much attention to that," says Dylan.

"But it's a pat on the back," says Bradley.

"This week it is," Dylan replies. "But who's to say how long that's gonna last?"

His success, however, has lasted a long time. Dylan is still performing all of his songs on tour, and he says he doesn't take any of it for granted.

So why is he still out there?

"It goes back to that destiny thing. I mean, I made a bargain with it, you know, long time ago. And I'm holding up my end ... to get where I am now," says Dylan.

And with whom did he make the bargain? "With the chief commander," says Dylan, laughing. "In this earth and in the world we can't see."

Some people believe that in this last comment Dylan admits to having sold his soul to the devil to achieve his success. In his 1980's song "Gotta Serve Somebody" he wrote in the refrain:

But you're gonna have to serve somebody, yes indeed
You're gonna have to serve somebody
Well, it may be the devil or it may be the Lord
But you're gonna have to serve somebody


Finally, Ron Austin mentions how the changes in Hollywood film stars beginning in the 1950's began to appeal more to the fantasies of adolescents, so that a viewer might actually imagine oneself being someone like Elvis Presley. Here Bradley asked Dylan about how he dealt with the image the public had of him:

"It was like being in an Edgar Allan Poe story. And you're just not that person everybody thinks you are, though they call you that all the time," says Dylan. "'You're the prophet. You're the savior.' I never wanted to be a prophet or savior. Elvis maybe. I could easily see myself becoming him. But prophet? No."

from the Archives: Famished Craving - Part 57

Shakespeare's Troilus and Cressida Act 3 scene 3

That no man is the lord of any thing,
Though in and of him there be much consisting,
Till he communicate his parts to others:
Nor doth he of himself know them for aught
Till he behold them form'd in the applause
Where they're extended; who, like an arch,reverberates
The voice again, or, like a gate of steel
Fronting the sun, receives and renders back
His figure and his heat.

from the Archives: Famished Craving - Part 56

A strange fellow here
Writes me: 'That man, how dearly ever parted,
How much in having, or without or in,
Cannot make boast to have that which he hath,
Nor feels not what he owes, but by reflection;
As when his virtues shining upon others
Heat them and they retort that heat again
To the first giver.

Shakespeare's Troilus and Cressida Act 3 scene 3

Jesus is Risen - ترنيمة: المسيح قام

At lunch today Kathleen and I were talking about the people of Lebanon. My departed wife Liz was Lebanese and her family retains many ties to that troubled land. When I got home, I saw the link to this marvelous video from Beirut, posted by my dear friend Athos at Four Mass'keteers. What a hope-filled video it is.

If you go to the YouTube version (click below), you can use the up-arrow on the lower right and click on CC for the translation.

from the Archives: Famished Craving - Part 55

Alexander the Great and the emulation of the Homeric heroes

Easter - Oh, first to her...

OF THE RESURRECTION OF CHRIST OUR LORD
OF HIS FIRST APPARITION
- St. Ignatius Loyola

He appeared to the Virgin Mary. This, although it is not said in Scripture, is included in saying that "He appeared to many others", because Scripture supposes that we have understanding, as it is written: "Are you also without understanding?"

The Quieting of Mary with the Resurrected One

What they felt then: is it not
above all other mysteries the sweetest
and yet still earthly:
when he, pale from the grave,
his burdens laid down, went to her:
risen in all places.
Oh, first to her. How they
inexpressibly began to heal.
Yes heal: that simple. They felt no need
to touch each other strongly.
He placed his hand, which next
would be eternal, for scarcely
a second on her womanly shoulder.
And they began
quietly as trees in spring
in infinite simultaneity
their season
of ultimate communing.

- Rainer Maria Rilke

Good Friday

From The Four Quartets by T. S. Eliot

East Coker

IV

The wounded surgeon plies the steel
That quesions the distempered part;
Beneath the bleeding hands we feel
The sharp compassion of the healer's art
Resolving the enigma of the fever chart.

Our only health is the disease
If we obey the dying nurse
Whose constant care is not to please
But to remind us of our, and Adam's curse,
And that, to be restored, our sickness must grow worse.

The whole earth is our hospital
Endowed by the ruined millionaire,
Wherein, if we do well, we shall
Die of the absolute paternal care
That will not leave us, but prevents us everywhere.

The chill ascends from feet to knees,
The fever sings in mental wires.
If to be warmed, then I must freeze
And quake in frigid purgatorial fires
Of which the flame is roses, and the smoke is briars.

The dripping blood our only drink,
The bloody flesh our only food:
In spite of which we like to think
That we are sound, substantial flesh and blood-
Again, in spite of that, we call this Friday good.

from the Archives: Famished Craving - Part 54

Get out of my light...

Diogenes to Alexander

from the Archives: Famished Craving - Part 53

Alexander of Macedonia
the world's first famous person...

from the Archives: Famished Craving Pt 52

Jules Feiffer again:

Ever since I was a little kid, I didn't want to be me. I wanted to be like Billy Whitteton, and Billy didn't even like me. I walked like he walked; I talked liked he talked. I signed up for the same high school he signed up for, which was when Billy Whittleton changed. He began to hang out around with Herbie Vanderman. He walked like Herbie Vanderman; he talked like Herbie Vanderman. And it dawned on me that Herbie Vanderman walked and talked like Joey Hamerlin. And Joey Hamerlin walked and talked like Corky Fabinson. So here I am, walking and talking like Billy Whittleton's imitation of Herbie Vanderman's version of Joey Hamelin trying to walk and talk like Corky Fabinson. And who do you think Corky Fabinson is always walking and talking like? Of all people, dopey Kenny Wellington-that little pest who walks and talks like me!

Gil Bailie at DSPT April 13th....