In an earlier post, I mentioned that Pierre Séguier owned the French collection (Paris) of the Oxford-Paris-Londres Bible. Pierre Séguier was one of a handful of individuals who ruled France in the seventeenth century. He purchased the Paris selection of the Bible moralisée. However, he also conducted the trial of Nicolas Fouquet, France’s Superintendant of Finances (1653-1661). (See RELATED ARTICLES.)
In the same post, I described our four Bibles as paradox literature. That paragraph is no longer part of my post. I may have erased it mistakenly or it may have been removed. It could wait. Paradox literature is defined as follows:
In literature, the paradox is an anomalous juxtaposition of incongruous ideas for the sake of striking exposition or unexpected insight. It functions as a method of literary composition and analysis that involves examining apparently contradictory statements and drawing conclusions either to reconcile them or to explain their presence.
Yes, there is a paradox. God used an instrument that man would create: the compass. The artists who illuminated the Creation depicted tools that would make sense to their contemporaries, not to mention the artists themselves. In fact, these examples showed that man was creative. God Himself had to be recognizable. The four depictions of God we have seen could be understood by the humblest among us. Northrop Frye writes that:
Present things are related to past things in such a way that cognition becomes the same thing as re-cognition, awareness that a present effect is a past cause in another form.
Northrop Frye [2]
So, we have created myths, stories (mythoi) of causality.
_________________________ [1] Rescher, Nicholas. Paradoxes:Their Roots, Range, and Resolution. Open Court: Chicago, 2001. [2] Northrop Frye, Creation and Recreation (University of Toronto Press, 1980), p. 59.
Love to everyone 💕
Haydn: Die Schöpfung Hob. XXI:2 / Erster Teil – 1A. Einleitung: “Die Vorstellung des Chaos”
Covid remains. It is the new reality and it will remain the new reality. Protesters who have taken to the streets are likely to catch the virus and spread it. Moreover, as I wrote in my last post, Mr Trump is seeing the protesters as thugs. He is not seeing them as individuals protesting an unjust death and asking that racial tensions in the United States come to an end.
I wasn’t well yesterday, and could not post anything, but I saw pictures that told a long story. The police was not allowing journalists to cover the events, which is their role. It is therefore difficult to know events precisely. We will not know who is destroying personal property. However, fatigue did not prevent me from reading.
As I feared, protesters had again taken to the streets, where no one is safe. Mr. Trump is a racist. Therefore, he wants the public to see that the protesters are thugs and will not let anyone see otherwise. This is authoritarianism, repression, bigotry and other evils I will not name. Not now. However, yesterday, The Washington Post reported that former defence secretary Jim Mattis has stated that:
“Donald Trump is the first president in my lifetime who does not try to unite the American people — does not even pretend to try. Instead, he tries to divide us,” Mattis wrote in a statement published by the Atlantic.
“We are witnessing the consequences of three years of this deliberate effort. We are witnessing the consequences of three years without mature leadership,” he continued. “We can unite without him, drawing on the strengths inherent in our civil society. This will not be easy, as the past few days have shown, but we owe it to our fellow citizens; to past generations that bled to defend our promise; and to our children.”
Mr Matis is right. This president wants to put protesters in the wrong and has the press pushed away so he is the only witness and divides Americans.
Mr Floyd’s murderer is in custody, and so are his fellow officers. When Mr Floyd said that he could not breathe, fellow officers didn’t pull Derek Chauvin away from George Floyd. I wrote that a heavy foot killed Mr Floyd, but it was a merciless knee and fellow officers did not intervene. They could have prevented George Floyd’s death.
All Officers Arrested
I have now read that all officers had been arrested. As for protesters, Mr Trump will not ever see them as protesters. As noted above, however legitimate the protest, the protesters will be seen as thugs. Moreover, it has also been reported that Mr. Floyd had been infected by Covid-19. Will this be used to explain away a genuine homicide? Mr Floyd died of Covid-19. How convenient! But we know the truth.
I will close by repeating that Donald Trump should not have been elected to the Presidency of the United States. He is not sufficiently educated. A good education is a source of freedom. It broadens the mind. One sees what one had not seen before and one can wrap one’s thoughts in words. But what Mr Trump reads is fake news, and he thinks he is under attack. He has also learned to lie.
In short, Derek Chauvin killed Mr Floyd and President Trump is failing Americans abysmally. There could be new outbreaks of Covid-19 and President Trump is distorting the truth. To this effect, he is not allowing the press from chronicling events. Fortunately, Americans can see.
The protest must be peaceful and Americans must elect to the Presidency of the United States a person who will be accountable and will not divide the United States.
The archetype of the Creator is a familiar image in Blake’s work. Here, the demiurgic figure Urizen prays before the world he has forged. The Song of Losis the third in a series of illuminated books painted by Blake and his wife, collectively known as the Continental Prophecies. (Photo and caption credit: Wikipedia)
Covid-19
As Quebec was starting to reopen, Premier, lePremier Ministre, François Legault urged the population of Quebec to wear face masks. His audience was not entirely patient with him. Was this a change of policy?
Let’s see. Two months ago, after the Government of Quebec announced a lockdown. I saw residents of my building huddling by the mailboxes, less than two feet apart. As I was rushing down the hallway to safety, I walked past a woman who was saying that she didn’t believe in this virus. To my knowledge, take-out restaurants, such as McDonalds, were locked down, but I knew about the remains of a chicken that were thrown down the garbage chute, naked. As you know, my neighbours are mostly perfect, but these particular neighbours are not. The remains of a chicken should had been put in a bag and then dropped into one of the composting bins.
After two months of isolation, one may be confused. So, I phoned the authorities in order to ask if a policy was in place regarding the delivery of food to persons living in a condominium or an apartment building. I explained that sons and daughters, holding bags filled with groceries and other supplies, were ringing mother’s apartment and waiting for her in the lobby. Mother came down and picked up the bag or bags. However, delivery men were riding up and down elevators and walking along corridors carrying take-outs. If they came to my building, they also went to other buildings and various houses. They could spread the virus during a lockdown.
The authorities, or the person who took my call, did not know whether a policy existed, but she felt that social distancing precluded the delivery of meals to an individual’s apartment. Owners were to go to the lobby and pick up what they had ordered. I therefore suggested to the Committee that, during a lockdown, it seemed somewhat risky to let people circulate in the hallways. In fact, I wondered why we did not have a concierge monitoring access to apartments. The telephone and television system did not go the distance. Could we presume individual owners would be cautious? No, I thought, not if they threw down the chute, unwrapped, the greasy remains of a chicken. These neighbours must be newcomers.
We now return to Quebec’s Premier. I reflected that if François Legault was urging people to wear a mask, it was not a change of policy, but altogether consistent with lifting the lockdown when the coronavirus remained a genuine threat. The government feared that allowing untested people to return to work may lead to flareups, hence the Premier asking, but not dictating, the wearing of a mask. This led to more impatience. Why wasn’t the wearing of masks compulsory (“obligatory” said monsieur Legault)? He explained that it was not “obligatory” because masks were not easily available. Canada had ordered masks from China, which had arrived, but which were defective. They were not approved by Health Canada. Ironically, Canadian-approved N95 masks were being sought by Chinese counterfeiters. In short, some Quebecers do not have access to masks.
As you know, Covid-19 caught everyone unawares. For instance, the novel coronavirus hit Montreal like a bomb. It was a Canadian version of the “tsunami” Milan’s doctor Giacomo Grasselli had described so aptly. (See The Coronavirus. 3). The outbreak of Covid-19 surprised Italians just as it surprised Canada’s doctors, in Montreal especially.
The outbreak has therefore led to decisions, some of which were revisited and reversed. I should tell you that the Quebec government will not reopen schools, Montreal schools, in particular, until September. Some daycares remained open during the lockdown. Given flareups, reopening schools on May 19th was not appropriate. Flareups herald a second wave of Covid-19 that could be the same as the second wave of the Spanish flu of 1918, deadlier than the initial outbreak.
In Quebec, Muslims cannot wear the burqa, but the government was approving the wearing of facemasks. Was this another contradiction? A burqa conceals the face and the body. It can therefore be used to conceal a weapon. Masks cover the nose and mouth as do certain Islamic veils, but the purpose of masks is protection from a virus one can inhale. The virus is a weapon.
No, it was not a contradiction. The coronavirus enters one’s nose and mouth. Coughing has therefore become a potentially lethal weapon. If one is infected with the virus and coughs without wearing a mask, one may inadvertently spread the highly transmissible coronavirus to a person who does not wear personal protective equipment. If everyone wears a mask, everyone is protected to a significant extent. The mask is not a violation of a person’s privacy, but protective personal equipment, which explains why Premier Legault is urging Quebecers who are re-entering the workplace to wear a mask. The virus may be with us for a very long time and it is coriace, tough, coriace as coriace can be.
Distancing saves lives. It would therefore be my opinion that until our top doctors and scientists find a vaccine or a cure, good masks are our only protection.
I agree with Premier Legault. If one re-enters the workplace, one wears a mask. A mask could allow us to revive our hope and let us rebuild our economy. We can now see the Himalayas, not to mention the stars. The new economy should be a different economy, one that does not pollute the air and cause global warming. However, Premier Legault linked the wearing of a mask to a revival of the economy we know. The two are inextricably linked:
Opening up businesses could hinge on Montrealers wearing masks in public — something Legault has been pushing for several days.
“We will still give ourselves a few days to take a decision on retail businesses,” Legault said. “A crucial element that would help us to reopen is for the majority of people to wear a mask in public.” (The National Gazette)
It may be years before the coronavirus is defeated. Scientists may find a vaccine and a cure, but this may not happen in the near future. Working from home can be extremely difficult and it is at times impossible. So if masks can protect us, let us wear masks.
(Please allow me to allude to the United States in my praise of Nelson Mandela.)
We often use the word “hero” somewhat frivolously. But Nelson Mandela was a hero, a genuine hero. He rose above years of imprisonment serene and forgiving. Nelson Mandela served 27 years of a life sentence because he could not accept the domination of one race over another race. He fought Apartheid, or the segregation of the Black population of South Africa from its White population. There was no equality, which means there could be no justice.
“The archetype of the Creator is a familiar image in Blake’s work. Here, the demiurgic figure Urizen prays before the world he has forged. The Song of Los is the third in a series of illuminated books painted by Blake and his wife, collectively known as the Continental Prophecies.” (Caption and photo credit: Wikipedia)
Apartheid remains an evil. It is the plight African-Americans had to endure after they were ‘freed’ and it is a plight they still endure. Slavery ended 148 years ago, officially, and segregation has also ended, officially. However, all too often African-Americans are considered by many as an inferior race. United States citizens do not even spare President Obama, a good man. They claim wrongly that he impoverished America. They also claim that he does not know the Constitution. President Obama knows the Constitution. Because they are false, such accusations suggest a degree of racism.
Whatever the color of their skin, human beings are “created equal” and they constitute a ‘brotherhood.’ Yet, 148 years after the abolition of slavery, there are voter purges and white supremacists. The Ku Klux Klan is still active. That is Apartheid. So, did the Union win the war? Well, it did and it didn’t. Winning a Civil War is not easy. The issues that underlie the war stem from within. But the Civil War freed the Black and that was just, despite the losses suffered by slave owners. Therefore, it is everyone’s duty to abide by the principles the Civil War upheld: freedom and genuine equality, not a mere facade.
Fortunately, many descendants of individuals who ‘lost’ the war have since ‘won’ the war. They have grown to realize that human beings cannot be sold like cattle, tortured, executed and raped because they are a possession. We are born free. Racism is a form of Apartheid.
Ready to Die, but not to Kill
When Nelson Mandela left prison, he did not bear a grudge. I am sure there were times when the past leaped from behind, causing him anger and pain. But he retained his princely conduct. He was a royal among his people, the Thembu people, and a prince among humans. He was a good person and goodness is the supreme achievement. Nelson Mandela did not blame anyone in particular for being convicted of treason. He attacked a wrong: Apartheid. He was ready to die for his cause, but he was not ready to kill.
In this respect, he resembled Mahatma Ghandi. He battled an injustice choosing a passive form of resistance. Like Ghandi, Nelson Mandela sought equality, without recourse to violence. He sought respect for colonized Africans, but he was not disrespectful of white Africans. That would have been wrong.
Values
The garments one wears may show difference: a different culture or a different religion. But values are not garment-deep and they are not skin-deep. They come from the heart and from the soul.
The people I honour do not bear grudges. They treat others as they wish others to treat them. They remain compassionate despite the pain they have suffered. They see humankind as a brotherhood. They are not warriors or terrorists. They are not arrogant. On the contrary, they are humble. And they most certainly do not shutdown a government at a price that could feed millions and do so in an unjustifiable attempt not to pay taxes. If paying higher taxes allows the implementation of a safety net for a nation, one pays higher taxes.
Revenge is not justice
Revenge is not justice. We seek justice because there has to be justice. Human beings have rights and the attendant duties. There has to be justice and there has to be a degree of equality. We cannot possess another human being. And if one has caused great losses, one’s duty is to undo the wrong that has been perpetrated to the extent that it can be undone. But there cannot be revenge. It mustn’t be an “eye for an eye.” If it is, hatred persists. It passes down from generation to generation and efforts at reconciliation are forever futile. Bad faith sets in.
Nelson Mandela did not seek to be avenged. He did not seek to punish those who had caused him to be imprisoned for 27 years for seeking justice for his people, which was his crime. He was much too caring a man to strike back in an ignoble manner. But he had a just cause. After leaving prison, he led his country. He was elected President of South Africa. He served one term and then lived in privacy.
—ooo—
When he died, Nelson Mandela was a “shadow of himself.” But not that he has left his earthy robe, he stands tall again and he smiles. This is how he will be remembered.
The archetype of the Creator is a familiar image in Blake’s work. Here, the demiurgic figure Urizen prays before the world he has forged. The Song of Los is the third in a series of illuminated books painted by Blake and his wife, collectively known as the Continental Prophecies. (Caption and Photo credit: Wikipedia)
In the area of literary criticism, few books have inspired me as much as Canadian literary critic Northrop Frye’s Anatomy of Criticism.[i]
Northrop Frye
Anatomy of Criticism: Four Essays was published by Northrop Frye in 1957. In his Polemical Introduction, Frye notes the importance of approaching literature with “a conceptual framework,”[ii] so one can uncover a literary work’s organizing principles. In this regard, he refers to Aristotle’s Poetics.
“A Conceptual framework”
Of course! So I started examining how archetypes were used in the various works of Jean-Baptiste Poquelin, or Molière, France’s foremost comic dramatist.
Comedy: the characters as archetypes
Frye describes comedy as a genre where a young couple, or young couples, have to overcome obstacles, in order to marry. They are usually opposed by a pater familias, a descendent of the heavy father of Roman New Comedy (Plautus [c. 254–184 BCE] and Terence [195/185–159 BCE]) to the more buffoon-like stock characters of the commedia dell’arte. Usually the young lovers are helped by servants, suivant-e-s, valets, confident-e-s, friends, and, at times, a mother or an avuncular (good uncle) figure.
The Plot: all’s well that ends well
Comedy has its archetypal figures and it is an “all’s-well-that-ends-well” narrative, but theories can be reductive. We require “a conceptual framework,” but must also acquire a degree of eclecticism and develop personal theories. In the case of Molière, one has to analyze if and how he uses the “all’s-well-that-ends-well,” rather than simply state that he does or does not use customary narrative and archetypal characters.
Molière’s Tartuffe: the hypocrite
For instance, in Molière’s Tartuffe, Tartuffe who feigns piety, has so bewitched a vulnerable Orgon, the heavy father, that members of his family have to put on a little play-within-the-play to show Orgon that Tartuffe is a hypocrite and that, far from turning his back on the pleasures of the flesh, he in fact covets Orgon’s wife Elmire.
Hidden under a table, Orgon, the pater familias is made to see his “friend” trying to seduce his wife and realizes, too late, that he has been fooled. Orgon’s daughter will not have to marry Tartuffe, but Orgon cannot get rid of the impostor, because Tartuffe is privy to knowledge that could cause Orgon to be thrown in jail.
The Deus ex machina or divine intervention
Fortunately, an exempt or deus ex machina arrives just in time, an instance of kairos as in fairy tales, to tell the family that Tartuffe is a villain and save Orgon. So, here is a play, where characters opposing the traditional marriage of comedy have very little power. It is therefore a problematical play because it stretches the “all’s-well-that-ends-well” to its limits. Molière’s problematical plays are the ones I analyzed.
I am thankful to Northrop Frye because he gave me my starting-point: “The pharmakos is neither innocent nor guilty.”[iii]Pharmakos is the Greek word for scapegoat, the characters who are vilified but somewhat unjustly, which is, to a certain extent, Tartuffe’s case.
Herman (“Norrie”) Northrop Frye, CC, FRSC (14 July 1912 – 23January 1991) was born in Sherbrooke, Quebec, my hometown. He was raised in New Brunswick, studied in Toronto (Victoria College, University of Toronto) and at Oxford (Merton College), became a minister in the United Church, and then spent most of his life teaching at the University of Toronto (Victoria College), where he was an inspiration to his students as he had been to me.
Frye is the author of The Anatomy of Criticism.[i]
He wrote his thesis on William Blake (28 November 1757 – 12 August 1827), one of English literature’s most fascinating figures. Entitled Fearful Symmetry, Frye’s thesis was published in 1947, but he has published numerous other studies, all of which are listed in Wikipedia’s entry on Northrop Frye.
Needless to say, literary critics often find their own personal path to analysing a work of literature. In my own humble writings, I have strayed from early mentors, but I would still recommend Anatomy of Criticism as compulsory reading to students of literature. Where Canadian literature is concerned, Frye’s Bush Garden, a short book, is an excellent way to enter the domain, particularly if one also reads Margaret Atwood‘s Survival, another short book.
© Micheline Walker
8 December 2013
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