J R / IV

[Erik T. Burns]

Foax: maybe this has been mentioned before, but in case it hasn't:

In William Gaddis' _J R_, on page 571 of the current paperback edition, Jack
Gibbs is reading from / editing out loud his ever-unfinished MS. of _Agapé
Agape_, his book about the player piano and art and mechanical reproduction
(not to be confused, or not entirely, with Gaddis own book later of the same
name, on the same theme), and says the following:

"Roused by the steam whistle, democracy claimed technology's promise to
banish failure to inherent vice, where in painting it survives today, and
America sprang full in the face of that dead philospher's reproach to be
always seeking after the useful does not become free and exalted souls."
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