grgr: overcoming of metaphysics

[Paul Mackin]

On Tue, 27 Jun 2000, Otto Sell wrote:
> 
> Sorry, but I like it that simple and I like it when text passages are given
> in discussing a book. Forget Heidegger. Take Weisenburger.


Weisenburger forgets Heideggar--no listing for him in the index--which
says nothing about whether P has ever read Being and Time. I'd be
surprised if he hadn't at least dipped into it and profitted from it 
in his novels. (Who could resist, even I did once)

I agree, Weisenburger is very useful. Whenever a reference to something
that can be identified as factual occurs in GR W tries to point it out and
briefly explain it. Always struck me as a carefully thought out and
well prepared book.  

Nobody expects novelists to be philosophers any more than philosophers are
expected to be novelists. I've been reading Ravelstein by Saul Bellow a
theme of which is the difference between the philosopher and the
artist. It's almost as if Bellow is saying that the artist (Bellow)
doesn't WANT to be involved in philosopy in the same way as the deep
thinker   Ravelstein--because it would require judgements that could
hamper the art. Here's an illustrative passages (I believe):

"Of course my needs were different from Ravelsteins's. In my trade you
have to make more allowances, taking all sorts of ambiguities into
account--to avoid hard-edged judgements. All this refraining may remsemble
naivete. But it isn't quite that. In art you become familiar with due
process. You can't simple write people off or send them to hell." 

P.S. Personally I didn't think R (or his real-life counterpart) that
DEEP a thinker, but within the terms of the novel . . .

			P.