So I have lots of notes about her quotes, which are endlessly quotable-- I feel like I'm copying down favorite passages from a self-help book or something. But she is, and I saw many parallels between this text and The Cloud of Unknowing... we are separated, we must try to achieve unity by not trying to achieve unity but by accepting that we are nothing, by loving our suffering, by accepting it because it is, by turning to art?? She says quite a bit about art, specifically poetry, and it's interesting when the two collide-- she reminds me a bit of Spicer--we possess everything and divine inspiration (choose yr term here) works with what you've got-- keep yr attention on the inexpressible, etc.
There seems to be some alignment (maybe not much) with Bataille on this point
decreation (28) brought back to God-- away from solitude (29) renunciation
with the renunciation of self, which seems to be part of our animalistic natures, maybe-- to achieve a 'higher' state.
Introduction: 'The real way of writing is to write as we translate. When we translate a text written in some foreign language, we do not seek to add anything to it; on the contrary, we are scrupulously careful not to add anything to it. That is how we have to try to translate a text which is not written down.'
(11) Man only escapes from the laws of this world in lightning flashes. Instants when everything stands still, instants of contemplation, of pure intuition, of mental void, of acceptance of the moral void. It is through such instants that he is capable of the supernatural.
(13) We must not believe in immortality ('sweetens what's bitter') and accept the void; shun the consolations of providence, utility of sin, etc.
(14) Attachment is no more or less than an insufficiency in our sense of reality. We are attached to the possession of a thing because we think that if we cease to possess it, it will cease to exist. (many people believe destruction of town = to their exile from that town)
(18) The future is a filler of void places. Sometimes the past also plays this part ('I used to be,' or 'I once did this or that') But there are other cases where affliction makes the thought of happiness intolerable; then it robs the sufferer of his past
The present does not attain finality. Nor does the future, for it is only what will be present.
(19) We want the future to be there without ceasing to be the future. This is an absurdity of which eternity alone is the cure.
(20) If we go down into ourselves we find that we possess exactly what we desire. ... In such cases of suffering, [death or hunger] emptiness are the mode of existence of the objects of our desire. We only have to draw aside the veil of unreality and we shall see that they are given to us in this way. When we see that, we still suffer, but we are happy.
(21) To lose someone: we suffer because the departed, the absent, has become something imaginary and unreal. But our desire for him is not imaginary. We have to go down into ourselves to the abode of the desire which is not imaginary... The presence of the dead person is imaginary, but his absence is very real: henceforward it is his way of appearing.
(23) We possess nothing in the world-- a mere chance can strip us of everything-- except the power to say 'I'. ...There is absolutely no other free act which is given us to accomplish-- only the destruction of the 'I'.
(27) Perfect joy excludes even the very feeling of joy, for in the soul filled by the object no corner is left for saying 'I'
(28) It is God who in love withdraws from us so that we can love him. For if we were exposed to the direct radiance of his love, without the protection of space, of time, and of matter, we should be evaporated like water in the sun; there would not be enough 'I' in us to make it possible to surrender the 'I' for love's sake. Necessity is the screen set between God and us so that we can be. It is for us to pierce through the screen so that we cease to be.
(30) May that which is low in us go downwards so that what is high can go upwards. For we are wrong side upward. We are born thus. To re-establish order is to undo the creature in us.
(35) Humility is the refusal to exist outside God. It is the queen of virtues.
(41) With all things, it is always what comes to us from outside, freely and by surprise as a gift from heaven, without our having sought it, that brings us pure joy. In the same way real good can only come from outside ourselves, never from our own effort. We cannot under any circumstances manufacture something which is better than ourselves.
(45) The image of the cave refers to values... We accept the false values which appear to us and when we think we are acting we are in reality motionless, for we are still confined in the same system of values.
(47) We must prefer a real hell to an imaginary paradise.
(54) We do not have to acquire humility. There is humility in us-- only we humiliate ourselves before false gods.
(55) To love a stranger as oneself implies the reverse: to love oneself as a stranger. [For this reason [[God]] loves all creatures equally, itself included.]
(58) It is an act of cowardice to seek from (or to wish to give) the people we love any other consolation that that which works of art give us. These help us through the mere fact that they exist...To love purely is to consent to distance, it is to adore the distance between ourselves and that which we love. ... Thus in love there is chastity or the lack of chastity according to whether the desire is or is not directed toward the future.
love-- not possession but contemplation
(62) Creation: good broken up into pieces and scattered throughout evil.
decreation (28) brought back to God-- away from solitude (29) renunciation
(68) evil: We have to love GOd through evil as such: to love God through the evil we hate, while hating this evil: to love God as the author of the evil which we are actually hating.
(70) truth: The presence of illusions which we have abandoned but which are still present in the mind is perhaps the criterion of truth.
(72) evil: I should not love suffering because it is useful. I should love it because it is.
(78) war: to keep the love of life intact within us; never to inflict death without accepting it for ourselves.
(82) Cloud of Unknowing: There are people for whom everything is salutary which brings God nearer to them. For me it is everything which keeps him at a distance. Between me and him there is the thickness of the universe-- and that of the cross is added to it.
(88) on poetry: The beautiful poem is the one which is composed while attention is kept directed toward inexpressible inspiration, in so far as it is inexpressible.
(108) writing like birth: Writing is like giving birth: we cannot help making the supreme effort. But we also act in like fashion. I need have no fear of not making the supreme effort-- provided only that I am honest with myself and that I pay attention.
(109) interpreting symbols: Method for understanding images, symbols, etc. Not to try to interpret them, but to look at them till the light suddenly dawns.
(121-2) reading defined: We read, but also we are read by, others. Interferences in these readings. Forcing someone to read himself as we read him (slavery). Forcing others to read us as we read ourselves (conquest). A mechanical process. More often than not a dialogue between deaf people.
(128) We have to feel the universe through each sensation. What does it matter then whether it be pleasure or pain? If our hand is shaken by a beloved friend when we meet again after a long separation, what does it matter that he squeezes the hand and hurts us?
There is a degree of pain on reaching which we lose the world. But afterwards peace comes.
(132) The world is a closed door. It is a barrier. And at the same time it is the way through.
(136) Beauty eat: The beautiful is a carnal attraction which keeps us at a distance and implies a renunciation. This includes the renunciation of that which is most deep-seated, the imagination. We want to eat all the other objects of desire. The beautiful is that which we desire without wishing to eat it. The desire that it should be.
(139) sign/signifier/signified: The relation of the sign to the thing signified is being destroyed, the game of exchanges between signs is being multiplied of itself and for itself. And the increasing complication demands that there should be signs for signs...
(154) art & inspiration: The eternal alone is invulnerable to time. In order that a works of art should be admired for all time, that a love, a friendship should last throughout a life (even stay pure for an entire day, perhaps), in order that a conception of the human condition should remain constant despite the manifold experiences and vicissitudes of fortune-- there must be an inspiration from on high.
(159) revolution not religion people's opiate maybe because it ignores necessity?: Deprivation of this poetry explains all forms of demoralization.
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