Author: Sysadmin

On Roethke

Just had in mind today a villanelle that I particularly liked when young. I like the villanelle form because it has an almost musical repetition of lines. Theodore Roethke was a Pulitzer Prize-winning, 20th-century poet who was also a professor at the University of Washington. He was a heavy drinker and suffered bouts of mental illness. He died of  a heart attack in his mid-fifties.

Below is his 1953 villanelle, “The Waking,” perhaps his best-known poem. I think it is a profound poem about depression and resignation to one’s fate.  It is difficult for some people to get out of bed in the morning, and the poem acutely captures that feeling. The line, “This shaking keeps me steady. I should know,” is one of my favorite poetic paradoxes.

Just a few more entries from Bierce’s Devil’s Dictionary

“Guilt, n. The condition of one who is known to have committed an indiscretion, as distinguished from the state of him who has covered his tracks… Gull, v.t. To tell sovereign people that if elected you will not steal… Gum, n. A substance greatly used by young women in place of a contented spirit and religious consolation.”

On guilt, I think some people admit to have made serious mistakes, and others are so psychologically “strong” that they don’t care about their mistakes. “We all think we are right.”

On “gull” as being about corrupt politicians, I think after having been through the U.S. Civil War as a soldier, Bierce had a right to be cynical about political authority.

On “gum,” well I think men can be attracted to young women with childish nervous habits . It brings to mind the mind the novel Lolita, but I think most people agree that Lolita was really a girl and not a young woman. It was a novel about child abuse.

On repressed memory

I read a novel a few years back by Dan Chaon, a creative writing professor at Oberlin College. It is called Ill Will and deals with a psychologist caught up in a familial drama involving repressed memory of youthful violence and devil worship. Here are some lines from the book: “Back in the late eighties and early nineties… my professor, Dr. Raskoph, was an an authority on recovered-memory syndrome, dissociative identity disorder… There had been doubt that Satanic Ritual Abuse… was real and true phenomenon… If the memories were not literally true, then they represented distorted versions of traumas that had truly occurred.”

The novel’s narrator goes on to say an eminent university professor argued repressed-memory theory was a myth. I read a bit about it, including a book by a Harvard professor who said basically the same thing: that, if anything, trauma victims are more likely to sharply remember what happened to them than to forget it.

I am not a psychiatrist but disagree. I think some people with a certain psychological condition who are lied to by their communities can block memories of what happened to them for a very long time. Communities can lie.

On officialdom

I had a court date earlier today. My joke is that is the only real date I have these days.

I think most people are decent. The police did not hurt me and directed me properly to the court. The judge seemed intelligent and kind.  Hamlet spoke of “the law’s delay/And the insolence of office.” It does feel like that, and it may take me until summer to get over my legal problems, if I ever do.

But authorities hurt me. And they should admit it. I am probably sure they will not. I think the Oedipal complex boils down to the fact that the father often does not want to admit he was wrong. But sometimes the son is wrong too. I know.

In the 1970s, Stephen King published a short story called “The Boogeyman” about a psychiatric session where the patient discovers at the end of his appointment that his doctor is actually a monster that was wearing a human mask.

The story came to mind because I have recently been disenchanted with both psychiatry and the therapists. It is different for different people, but recently I have decided religion, asceticism, and good nutrition and exercise are best for me. There is a pretty good TV series called In Treatment with Gabrielle Byrne playing a therapist who meets with one or two clients in each episode. Byrne’s character is basically just a good listener, which I think any counsellor should be.

I understand that many therapists and psychiatrists now focus on Cognitive Behavioral Therapy, which, as I understand, focuses on a person’s present and future rather than their past. But I am also a Freudian in the sense that for some people past trauma or emotional/physical disturbance needs to be addressed. Yes, a counsellor cannot alter someone’s past, but if that past isn’t acknowledged, it is difficult for some to move on.

Happy Easter Sunday.

If you are not Christian you may consider Christ’s story to be a myth about resilience. In any case, I think it is a powerful story about how communities and authorities can persecute decent or even great people. “Everyone thinks they are right.” Right.

Even if you are totally atheist, this is the seasonal time of year when vegetation  “comes back to life” by blossoming. Enjoy the flowers.

Just a brief comment on literary criticism and maybe religion too ahead of Easter Sunday.

I recall a critic saying something of S. Beckett, my dissertation subject, like that “for him, it was always Easter Saturday.”

Happy Easter.

Thoughts today on disappointment.

Everyone has some disappointment in life, and part of maturity is accepting and dealing with it without irritating other people as a result. I usually use art and anti-anxiety medication right now to deal with it. When I was under 14, I sometimes used violence, which was bad. I think music helps a lot. Some say music is mainly about seduction. Well, maybe so. I don’t think it really matters, as long as it helps you. Plato also did not like most poetry. He thought it stirred up emotions that are not good for people, making them ecstatic.

It brings to mind a Nine Inch Nails song. I know some people find Trent Reznor to be too angry, but I find him to be very honest as well. One of the purposes of art is to turn pain into a kind of beauty, and I think he did it, even if his work has a lot of rage in it. Here are the song’s lyrics.

If I were you I wouldn’t trust
A single word I say
Think by now you should know
That nothing’s gonna change

Can I ask you something; what did you expect
So disappointed with what you get
Do you ever want to just get outta here
So disappointed; just disappear

Look at you, Superman
With all the world to change
Think by now you’d figure out
That nothing’s gonna change
And I am part of the reason

Can I ask you something; what did you expect
So disappointed with what you get
Do you ever want to just get outta here
So disappointed; just disappear

Just two odd jokes today.

“As your psychiatrist, I have concluded that the origin of your persecution complex is that you are being persecuted. It’s not very complex. My prescription is to say, ‘Good luck with that.’ My exorbitant bill will be in the mail.”

“Are you Mr. Man or Mr. Bill? Make up your mind!”