Reading 1001 discussion

think about ways in which the novel’s form offers connections to intellectual and critical issues. Think about these issues and how the novel might use them to get at its own production.
a. Modernism critiques the idea that there is a common truth (seen in the multiple perspectives of modernist art and narrative. Postmodernism, however, claims there are competing realities. But postmodernism goes further by using the form of pastiche, that is, the mixing of genres, media, forms. This isn’t parody, since parody assumes something real that can be copied. Rather, postmodernism is about dissolving boundaries.
b. Again like modernism, postmodernism foregrounds medium of production (like language), but postmodernism goes a step further by suggesting that language (like all media) is fragmented into competing discourses.
c. Undecidability. If there is no underlying truth, or overarching reality, or absolute values, then we don’t have easy access to frameworks that make the world easily understandable. This doesn’t mean that we can’t decide, only that our judgments are contingent on the assumptions we bring with us.
d. Simulation (the simulacrum). Postmodernism tells us that a copy is not a copy of something “real,” but that the real is inextricable from the significance and effects of the copy. The car you see on TV is more exciting and “real” than your car; and, contrarily, when you drive your car, you’re also driving all the images of cars that exist in our world.
e. Surfaces. In a modernist, cubist painting, surfaces were put together to create the sense of depth. In postmodernism, surfaces are all we really get.
f. The Compression of Time & Space. Modernism was international, postmodernism is global, at least in the sense that it is part of our ability to compress time and space. Often the compression occurs through different media (Iraq may only seem a room away at times). Modernism tended to emphasize time (in the form of progress or modernization), while Postmodernism tends to emphasize different kinds of space.

Remember, Michel Foucault has the concept of heterotopia (as opposed to utopia), which is the coexistence in what he calls “an impossible space” of a “large number of fragmentary possible worlds,” or more simply, incommensurable spaces that are juxtaposed or superimposed upon each other.

Also from Mark Patterson, and not a question, but perhaps some help. Feel free to comment.

OK so the book is postmodernist as it has dissolved the traditional boundaries of a book...

In a way, that's the problem with postmodernism (and free verse poetry, for that matter): from an intellectual perspective, these are probably brilliant ideas, but mainly for the initiated. For the hoi polloi, it is so incomprehensible that they quickly give up on it. If we want to make art and literature a bit more accessible to the masses, maybe it needs to be a bit simpler (perhaps modernist). I don't think that the millions voting for Trump would be the first to rush out and read the next Danielewski novel....

Hahaha!

Patrick wrote: "In a way, that's the problem with postmodernism (and free verse poetry, for that matter): from an intellectual perspective, these are probably brilliant ideas, but mainly for the initiated. For the..."

interesting. I think many can enjoy this book without necessarily having the background (social deconstructionism, etc) but there is truth in what you say about postmodernism being directed to an intellectual crowd in that meaning making is largely contingent on an ability to understand postmodernist constructs.

I went to a graduate school that was very heavy on integrating theory into practice and we read a lot of Derrida and Foucault. As a result of such readings, I feel like I can appreciate post-modernism more than I would have been able to prior to reading and analyzing their works.

That said, I have a friend who LOVES both House of Leaves and Trump. She does not have a philosophy or academic background.

Jen wrote: "Patrick wrote: "In a way, that's the problem with postmodernism (and free verse poetry, for that matter): from an intellectual perspective, these are probably brilliant ideas, but mainly for the in..." Ha! Ha! So true

House of Leaves and Trump? They seem utterly incompatible to me - from the bottom of the world! I feel ignorant about post- modernist constructs. Is Trump post-modern? Maybe that is why I find his appeal incomprehensible!