Tags
a novel of sylvia plath, art, autodidact, autodidactism, camera lucida, kate moses, philosophy, poems, poetry, rainer maria rilke, review, roland barthes, sylvia plath, the soft machine, theory, william burroughs, wintering
This week’s books:
Selected Poems by Rainer Maria Rilke
Camera Lucida by Roland Barthes
The Soft Machine by William Burroughs
Wintering: A novel of Sylvia Plath by Kate Moses
This week has been busy! I read three of the books on the train, as this weekend I have been in Manchester for the annual Rethink Mental Illness Conference. It is the first year I have ever been (I’ve only been volunteering for them for less than a year, so I have an excuse!), and it was amazingly enjoyable. I can’t claim I maintained attention for the entirety of the AGM, but meeting new people and the workshops were really good. I felt like I was finally amongst MY PEOPLE (the only other time I have experienced this is at art college).
Again a very poetry-focused week, despite reading only one book of actual poems. Wintering and The Soft Machine use poetic prose to an extent that some critics may consider them a poetry-prose hybrid. I’m hoping that a little bit of both will feed into my writing- Moses’ lyrical prose that tends to lift lines directly from Plath’s poems; and Burroughs’ lurid eroticism. My own work is somewhere in the middle of these two. My poems are not necessarily sexual (though many are about rape or infertility), but they are brash.
Camera Lucidia was another book from my art course reading list. It is a philosophical look at the phenomenology and ontological aspects of photography. Photography is something I am entirely new to, so the language of existential philosophy helped me along a little. Essentially the book looks at the links between the operator (the photographer), the spectator and the target of the photograph. Part One is very subjective and Part Two is slightly less so. The book shows its age when it discusses the essential truth of photographs- that they always have a realism based contact with the real world- which can now be argued against easily due to the invention of Photoshop. It was interesting to read the book and relate it to my own photography project- photographing my self-harm marked arms. I do not want to glorify my self-harm, but I do want to look at it as something I have to live with. I will only be taking photos of scars, and not open cuts or burns for this reason. So in these photos I will be not only the Operator, but also the Target of the photos. Using them I want to relate the simple truth that people do self-harm, and yes, they have scars, to the Spectator. I already know that people are interested in scars on at least one level, from the reaction I get whenever I roll my sleeves up.
LINKS:
Two of my poems on bullying and mental health have been published by Jotter’s United here: http://jottersutd.wix.com/jotters-united#!Messages/c1awr/BlankListItem0_i1oy02ni3_0
Review of if p then q’s latest- ENCYCLOPS- http://imaseriousjournalistyouknow.wordpress.com/2014/11/03/encyclops/
Luna Luna– the latest in my “Maintaining Creativity Despite Psychiatric Medication” series- http://lunalunamag.com/2014/11/05/medication-2/
The Cadaverine- Review of White Horse by Yan Ge- http://www.thecadaverine.com/?p=9207
The Diary of an Autodidact 