Anyone else read House of Leaves , Danielewski? edited
Mark Thibodeau
jerkyleboeuf at gmail.com
Mon Oct 6 21:56:24 CDT 2014
Very interesting, thanks!
YOPJerky
On Mon, Oct 6, 2014 at 6:03 PM, alice malice <alicewmalice at gmail.com> wrote:
> http://www.uh.edu/engines/epi2967.htm
>
>
>
> On Saturday, October 4, 2014, Joseph Tracy <brook7 at sover.net> wrote:
>>
>> Here is an edited version
>> I'm just finishing House of Leaves, Mark Daniellewski. A dark provocative,
>> skillfully written and structurally intriguing work of literary fiction,
>> simulated literary and film criticism, poetry, and myth.
>>
>> What I come back to as the theme that captures my own interest is the
>> question of what is journalism or scientific research and what establishes
>> the credibility of a valid record. It is harder than we admit. Does film
>> prove that what a camera records is real? Couching the quest for reliable
>> stories or even reliable data as science can be as problematic as submitting
>> the difficulties to religious or political or scholastic authority. Again
>> and again, pre-existing prejudices, and imbibed mythic models built over a
>> life or career, along with personal baggage serve both to enlighten and
>> prejudice one's understanding of an event. Social pressures are potent
>> enough that you can easily end up confirming something you don't seriously
>> believe rather than live with your questions and perhaps lose security.
>> People line up as skeptics concerning anything suggesting a spiritual
>> mystery and mount their outraged scientific arguments, but often their
>> seeming confidence in scientism is eroded by the ambiguities of actual
>> science, by uncooperative data, and the unanticipated consequences of
>> logical scientific solutions. Inquisitors want to test but not be tested.
>> But In fact horrors approach as much from modern physics and chemistry as
>> religious and political invocations of evil or heroism.
>>
>> This is not to say that there is not a large appetite for alternate
>> explanations of just about everything, from wall street scandals to extra
>> terrestrials or the shroud of Turin. Where this appetite comes from is its
>> own worthwhile question. There are certainly gullables and con men galore,
>> but is it so very unthinkable to suggest that many people and scientists and
>> researchers have experiences that defy psychological interpretation, that
>> make them curious and open minded? And isn't it possible that there are very
>> sincere and properly skeptical and careful investigators of odd phenomena
>> who also stir this pot of human inquiry.
>>
>> Most people seem to acquire a limiting sense of what can be real and draw
>> sharp lines of defense around that sense. But darkness eats at every limit,
>> as nothingness is the negative ground that allows every substance. Mr
>> Danielewski follows the nothingness and disintegration palpably and in
>> layers of experience and of interpretations of those experiences and
>> interpretations of the photographic and filmed records of the experience. To
>> read House of Leaves was for me to continue to renew a long abandoned
>> interest in horror as an artful cauldron. Sadness and danger, terror, fear,
>> violence, loss and death seem the most real commonality of our time. Again
>> and again the airwaves bend toward anger or war though for seemingly
>> opposite reasons, but mistrust and fear abounds, death multiplies. It cannot
>> help but touch us all. Ordinary pleasures are tainted by distant but
>> constant violence and disaster.
>>
>> Danielewski invokes these and more personal existential fears as a house
>> which inhabits and invades a seemingly normal house, doors open, hallways
>> lengthen, closets lead to endless stone passageways of cavernous darkness
>> and bone chilling cold.. The photo journalist who has bought the house as a
>> refuge from a marriage-fraying career sets about with all his acumen to
>> document these experiences. The filmed documentary ( the Navidson Records)
>> is interpreted by critics and writers from many disciplines, some real
>> contemporary writers. But not only is the movie fiction to us the readers,
>> it is fiction to the fictional narrator and discoverer of a messy
>> disconnected manuscript that summarizes the reviews and offers its own POV.
>> Johnnie Truant, who recovers the manuscript from a blind writer when he
>> dies, then adds his own biographic and autobiographic notes as he assembles
>> the bits and pieces of the House of Leaves. This despite his discovery that
>> there is no Navidson Records and no reviews. Truant's creation by
>> Danielewski is a work of sublime intensity, his voice note-perfect from the
>> streets of urban America.
>>
>> There is something about multidimensional fiction that overlaps with real
>> people, events and ideas that few writers beside Thomas Pynchon do really
>> well. This is one.
>>
>> On Oct 4, 2014, at 8:42 PM, Joseph Tracy wrote:
>>
>> > I'm just finishing House of Leaves. A dark provocative and structurally
>> > intriguing work of literary fiction, simulated literary and film criticism,
>> > poetry, and myth.
>> >
>> > What I come back to as the theme that captures my own interest is the
>> > question of what is journalism or scientific research and what establishes
>> > the credibility of a valid record. It is harder than we admit. Couching the
>> > quest for reliable stories or even reliable data as science can be as
>> > problematic as submitting the difficulties to religious or political or
>> > scholastic authority. Again and again, pre-existing prejudices, and imbibed
>> > mythic models built over a life or career serve both to enlighten and
>> > prejudice our understanding of an event. We can easily end up confirming
>> > something we don't seriously believe rather than live with our questions and
>> > perhaps lose security. People line up as skeptics concerning anything
>> > suggesting and mount their outraged scientific arguments, but their seeming
>> > confidence in scientism is eroded by the ambiguities of actual science, by
>> > uncooperative data, and the unanticipated consequences of logical scientific
>> > solutions. In fact horrors approach as much from modern physics and
>> > chemistry as religious and political invocations of evil or heroism.
>> >
>> > Most people seem to acquire a limiting sense of what can be real and
>> > draw sharp lines of defense. But darkness eats at every limit, as
>> > nothingness is the negative ground that allows every substance . Mr
>> > Danielewski follows the nothingness and disintegration palpably and in
>> > layers of experience and of interpretations of those experiences and
>> > interpretations of the photographic records of the experience. To read House
>> > of Leaves was for me to continue to renew a long abandoned interest in
>> > horror as an artful cauldron. Sadness and danger, terror, fear, violence,
>> > loss and death seem the most real commonality of our time. Again and again
>> > the airwaves bend toward anger or war though for seemingly opposite reasons,
>> > but mistrust and fear abounds, death multiplies. It cannot help but touch us
>> > all. Ordinary pleasures are tainted by distant but constant violence and
>> > disaster.
>> >
>> > Danielewski invokes these and more personal existential fears as a
>> > house which inhabits and invades a seemingly normal house, doors open,
>> > hallways lengthen, closets lead to endless passageways. The photo
>> > journalist who has bought the house as a refuge from a marriage-fraying
>> > career tries to document these experiences. The filmed documentary ( the
>> > Navidson Records)is interpreted by critics and writers from many
>> > disciplines, some real contemporary writers. But not only is the movie
>> > fiction to us the readers, it is fiction to the discoverer of a disconnected
>> > manuscript that summarizes the reviews and offers its own POV. Johnnie
>> > Truant, who recovers the manuscript from a blind writer when he dies, then
>> > adds his own biographic and autobiographic notes as he assembles the bits
>> > and pieces of the House of Leaves.
>> >
>> > There is something about multidimensional fiction that overlaps with
>> > real people, events and ideas that few writers beside Pynchon do really
>> > well. This is one.
>> >
>> >
>> >
>> >
>>
>> -
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