Imagining a geometry of the soul

Název: Imagining a geometry of the soul
Autor: Hale, Amanda
Zdrojový dokument: Brno studies in English. 2010, roč. 36, č. 2, s. [61]-79
Rozsah
[61]-79
  • ISSN
    0524-6881 (print)
    1805-0867 (online)
Type: Článek
Jazyk
Licence: Neurčená licence
 

Upozornění: Tyto citace jsou generovány automaticky. Nemusí být zcela správně podle citačních pravidel.

Abstrakt(y)
My essay tracks a process whereby, through the interplay of questing and creative activity in my own life I have discovered what I can only call an inner geometry – a kind of constellation of the soul – which mirrors the outer universe. I begin by establishing a sense of time and place, then move back through memory to enduring images which have echoed, or to which I have been magnetized, throughout my life. The significance of family stories is explored – stories filtered through the magical thinking of childhood, and which later seem impossible to verify. The dynamic between fact and fiction, biography and autobiography, and the mixing and weaving of these genres, is examined throughout, exemplified in part by the works of Franz Kafka, W. G. Sebald, and Primo Levi. The roles of imagination and of research are discussed in the context of my own novels, and of travel seen as soul retrieval journeys to places of irresistible inspiration. A contrast between the virtual and the actual runs through the essay, ultimately suggesting a paradoxical and irreconcilable universe fraught with bewildering concepts which crumble in the face of human experience, and recognized partly as a legacy of World War II, and partly as a consequence of the manifestation of technology in everyday life. The concept of a "geometry of the soul" is discussed, suggesting a dual process of soul-making and soul-guidance as a collaboration between the temporal self and an enduring part of the self. (For the technologically minded, soul-guidance can equally be seen as a GPS [global positioning system], plugged into one's car). The historical span of the essay runs from the European Renaissance, focusing primarily on the post WWII period, in which I grew up, with its increasingly rapid rate of change. The nascent 21st century is revealed as a time of intense inquiry wherein the mixing of literary genres mirrors a global dialectic which struggles eternally towards the ideal of unification.
Reference
[1] Abraham, Ralph (1991) 'The Geometry of the Soul'. January 2010. http://www.ralph-abraham.org/talks/transcripts/stanford2n.pdf.

[2] Atwood, Margaret (2002) Negotiating with the Dead: A Writer on Writing. New York: Cambridge University Press.

[3] Beckett, Samuel (1954) Waiting for Godot. New York: Grove Press.

[4] Cohen, Leonard (1992) 'Waiting for the Miracle to Come'. Robinhill Music, Leonard Cohen Stranger Music, Inc.

[5] 'Definition of Geometry'. January 2010. http://www.dictionary.com.

[6] Frank, Anne (1993) The Diary of Anne Frank. New York: Bantam Books.

[7] Hegel, Georg Wilhelm Friedrich (2001) Philosophy of History. Kitchener: Batoche Books.

[8] Kafka, Franz (1995) In the Penal Colony. New York: Schocken Books.

[9] Kafka, Franz (1998) The Trial. New York: Schocken Books.

[10] Lanyon, Anna (1999) Malinche's Conquest. St. Leonards, N.S.W.: Allen & Unwin.

[11] LeGuin, Ursula (1998) Steering the Craft. Portland, Oregon: Eighth Mountain Press.

[12] Levi, Primo (1979) If This Is a Man. New York: Penguin.

[13] Levi, Primo (1979) The Truce. New York: Penguin.

[14] Moore, Thomas (1992) Care of the Soul. New York: Harper Collins.

[15] Penfield, Wilder (1978) Mystery of the Mind: A Critical Study of Consciousness and the Human Brain. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.

[16] Pinter, Harold (1977 [1962]) 'Writing for the Theatre'. Complete Works: One. New York: Grove Press, 9–16.

[17] Sebald, Winfried Georg (1996) The Emigrants. Trans. Michael Hulse. London: Harvill Press.

[18] Sebald, Winfried Georg (1999) The Rings of Saturn. Trans. Michael Hulse. New York: New Directions.

[19] Sebald, Winfried Georg (1999) Vertigo. Trans. Michael Hulse. London: Harvill Press.

[20] Sebald, Winfried Georg (2001) Austerlitz. Trans. Anthea Bell. New York: Random House.

[21] Sebald, Winfried Georg (2003) On The Natural History of Destruction. Trans. Anthea Bell. New York: Random House.

[22] Sís, Peter (2007) The Wall: Growing up Behind the Iron Curtain. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux.