Lars Iyer's Blog, page 95

Out now: Sinead Murphy's The Art Kettle. Want a review copy? Email me.

2.3.1971, Grand Hotel Imperial, Dubrovnik

Dear Honorable Dr Spiel,

I promised you a contribution for your Ver Sacrum – You wrote, "something about Ludwig Wittgenstein," and I've been considering the topic for a couple of weeks, since the day, in fact, I returned from Brussels – now I'm on the road again, Ragusa, Belgrade, Rome, etc., and I've concluded that to write something about Wittgenstein's philosophy and above all his poetry, since for me the question concerns Wittgenstein's utterly poetic mindset (MIND), his philosophical MIND, not Wittgenstein as a philosopher, is too difficult. I might as well have been asked to write something (sentences!) about myself, which is not possible. One cannot describe a state of culture and mind-history. The question is not: shall I write about Wittgenstein. The question is: am I Wittgenstein for even one moment without destroying him (W.) or myself (B.). I cannot answer this question and therefore cannot write about Wittgenstein. – In Austria, philosophy and poetry (mathematical-musical) are entombed in mausoleums, we perceive history vertically. On one hand it is terrifying, on the other, progressive – her fate: philosophy and art do not exist in the consciousness of her people, as they exist elsewhere, but in the consciousness of her philosophy and art(culture) etc.; Austria already knows what her philosophers and poets have yet to discover.

As for Wittgenstein: [er ist die Reinheit Stifters, Klarheit Kants in einem und seit (und mit ihm) Stifter der Größte. – Note: translation of this sentence temporarily abandoned] What we, the Germans, lacked in NOVALIS we now have in Wittgenstein – and a final word: W. is a question that cannot be answered – he is working on a level that excludes answers (and an answer).

Our contemporary culture, in all its unbearable manifestations, is such that its questions would be solved easily, where answers were always at hand – Wittgenstein alone is different.

And the world is forever to remain too stupid to grasp its own stupidity, a world utterly and forever without ideas – where ideas stand for themselves as ideas. This is fatal for the MAJORITY, but the majority is not worthy of consideration. So I do not write about Wittgenstein because I cannot, but because I cannot answer him, which is self-explanatory.

Best regards and all best wishes,

Yours, Thomas Bernhard

translated by Greg Baxter

Adam Kosko reviews Dogma at An Und Fur Sich.

Drew Nellins reviews Dogma for The Millions. 

Dogma out today. Buy it at Amazon UK or USA. 

Dogma reviewed by Lakis Fourouklas, at his blog, Fiction & More. 

Dogma reviewed by Lakis Fourouklas (in Greek).

Google translate renders the review thus:

Dogma, unlike the first novel by the author Spurious, divided the critics. While welcomed by an overwhelming majority as a masterpiece, took another positive and negative comments. But when I read that the Dogma does not catch one in front of the Spurious, then my curiosity spurs (or perhaps to impale not know). That's because for me the present book is pure dime. Excellent. In philosophical mood, wandering, deafening, and subcutaneous humor, this is one of those novels that reaching the end of reading the one left speechless and with a wide smile.
     Although the Dogma is the second part of an informal trilogy that will conclude next year with Exodus, is read comfortably without following one in the first volume.
     The main protagonists in this story is two friends: the W. who is an atheist Jew and Catholic, and Lars, who is somewhat Hindu. The very first think, philosophize everything prepares two big jobs to grapple with Capitalism and Religion - "Capitalism is the evil twin brother religion", he says, while the second simply live or rather survive in the shadow of his friend. We would say that these two are one of the strangest couples of friends who never meet in world literature. It's as opposed to perhaps the only thing that brings a close to each other, is that nobody else would tolerate them. The W. does not stop talking and thinking ever, often densely mocks Lars - "You're not thinking," he says, throwing the quotes one after another, angry, revolts, takes decisions of the moment, which sometimes made and sometimes not is that a man of thought and action. On his part, Lars, who has the role of the narrator appears to be a container. He listens to his friend, endure the whims of, the next in each adventure, learns it, and every now and then, when needed, and he opens his mouth to say something - something to restore peace to the soul of W., stories from Hindu mythology and excerpts from the Vedas.
     The dialogues between them or rather monologue W. is at least enjoyable: "I never have to learn from our mistakes", "(... U.S.) are in exile from within," "must read if you want to live," "The philosophy is like an unrequited love" "Always be foisted the ideas of others as your own," "Maybe Lars is the name of his own failure," "The Doctrine must always be drunk," "Only the desperate can really understand the everyday ".
     The W. looks like a prophet of the end. All waiting for the evil, whatever it is, who will come and destroy the world. And this feels more strongly than anywhere else in America, where the ignorant natives, not only did they sell Gin from Plymouth, but have already built "the Disneyland of Armageddon." "The time of death," he says eventually, "but death does not come." And fortunately, that is, because if you come lose the opportunity to enjoy more of his adventures.
     Highly recommended to every friend of good literature.

Richard muses on Dogma at The Existence Machine.

Continuing to blog the new novel, Wittgenstein Jr.

Don't let grief vex you. You should let it into your heart. Nor should you be afraid of madness. It comes to you perhaps as a friend and not as an enemy, and the only thing that is bad is your resistance. Let grief into your heart. Don't lock the door on it. Standing outside the door, in the mind, it is frightening, but in the heart it is not.

Wittgenstein, diary entry