hammerhead rabbits

Archive for the ‘literature’ Category

Max Frisch’s questionnaires

Tuesday, March 3rd, 2009

I’ve found a very useful piece of context for my questionnaire. It’s a book by the playwright Max Frisch called
'Sketchbook 1966-1971'. It features a series of questionnaires that pose some quite challenging questions. There are nine or ten of these questionnaires in the book and each one takes on a different theme. These questionnaires were quite highly acclaimed when the book was released. I can’t help but feel a lot of them are quite reductive though. A lot of it seems to be a Socratic form of argument with Frisch bullying people into sharing his beliefs.

Each questionnaire consists of twenty five questions. Here’s a sample of questions from the different questionnaires:

The human condition in general

• Are you sure you are really interested in the preservation of the human race once you and all the people you know are no longer alive? State briefly why.
• If you had the power to put into effect things you consider right, would you do so against the wishes of the majority (yes or no) Why not if you think they are right?
• What in your opinion do others dislike about you, and what do you dislike about yourself? If not the same thing, which do you find it easier to excuse?

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Void #13 by Anish Kapoor

Saturday, September 13th, 2008

I was going to put this picture in the big bang post I wrote earlier but it looked weird and out of place so I’m giving it its own post. The picture below is of Void #13 by Anish Kapoor. Here’s a link explaining a thing or two about it: Queensland Art Gallery

I’m very fond of Anish Kapoor. I love the way he uses materials to create a sense of either weight or lightness. He also manages to make things look like light is being sucked in to them. That’s a bit of an achievement in my book. His work makes me look again, and inexplicably. It’s very meditative. This is a good way of representing that void I’ve been on about. As good as any other I’ve seen anyway.

Hmm, I Wonder if there are any zen koans or poems about the void.
A quick web search throws up the old tradition of death poems, when a zen master would express his insights into the process of dying to his disciple. I just remembered this one, which I’ve loved for years:

Magnificent! Magnificent!
The Ocean bed’s aflame,
Out of the void leap wooden lambs

I may well end up buying this very interesting looking book about zen poetry: Triumph of the Sparrow.

Ginnungagap and Audhumla

Saturday, September 13th, 2008

Part of the reason for writing the blog below regarding the big bang is the comparison with the Old Norse version of the creation and their subsequent view of existence. At the beginning of the Prose Edda, one of the first things we read the following account of the universe’s beginnings.
(By the way, I’ve cut and pasted most of this from here: www.sacred-texts.com For those parts of the text which come from older poetic sources (The Sibyl’s Prophecy) I’ve added the newer Penguin version as an alternative. This is because the newer text is more readable and the meaning feels slightly different. The older one has a poetic power, though. This distinction in use of language is significant in itself, with regard to my project, I think. The bits from the Penguin edition are in italics.
The older translation is from 1916 and is by Arthur Gilchrist Brodeur
The newer one is from 2005 and is by Jesse L. Byock)

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I like Hugin and Munin

Tuesday, September 9th, 2008

I drew Hugin and Munin on the walls as I wanted them looking over everything that was going on in the gallery. I quite like the idea of them making a similar appearance in the final piece. They could hover round the edges of the action.

The scratchiness of the drawings appeals to me too. I think I’m going to start out with a similarly scratchy approach when I work on making the finished thing.

Hugin and Munin

Thursday, May 22nd, 2008

I’ve been enjoying the Prose Edda, so here’s a bit more from that.

Two ravens sit on Odin’s shoulders, and into his shoulders tell all the news they see or hear. their names are Hugin (Thought) and Munin (Memory). At sunrise he sends them off to fly throughout the whole world, and they return in time for the first meal. Thus he gathers knowledge about many things that are happening, and so people call him the raven god. As is said:

Hugin and Munin
fly each day
over the wide world.
I fear for Hugin
that he may not return,
though I worry more for Munin.

Hugin and Munin are Odin’s (The All-Father) route to seeing all of creation. They carry all. They’re probably the single most relevant part of the Prose Edda to my project.

The Prose Edda and the ‘World Tree’

Tuesday, May 20th, 2008

I recently finished reading the Prose Edda which is one of the major sources of information about Norse mythology. All has its roots in Germanic/Danish languages. I thought Norse myth would be a useful insight in to the way the Vikings saw the world and ‘all’. Indeed it was. Below is an excerpt from the Penguin edition, concerning itself largely with the ‘Yggdrasil’, or, the ‘World Tree’.

In describing different places in the cosmos, the Edda often employs the imprecise word heimr, meaning ‘home’, ‘world’ or ‘land’, and we must guess at the locations of many of the described areas. In addition to the realms of the gods, men and giants, the Edda speaks of geographically disparate regions such as Ginnungagap in the north, an empty place filled with ice, and Muspell, a burning place of intense heat to the south. So also there are several heavens; one is called Andlang and another, ‘further up’ is where light elves live.

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