Il y a 1 anSignaler ce commentaire . He's in that panel; it's his paper (and the reader's too, quite poissbly). I don't know what Clowes had in his head, of course, but I know how he figures himself in the text and I can do a reading based on that.You seem to think that you're performing some sort of advanced literary technique by refusing to think about the self-reflexivity of the text. That's characteristic; you tend to be fairly uncomfortable with readings that aren't straightforward. But Clowes is very much a pomo writer; he's playing games with the intentionality you want to put off limits.I don't think Clowes wanted to jump the characters necessarily, or only, by the by. It's about inhabiting them too. Sadism is not just lust; it's control.There are lots of older men in Ghost World, incidentally. Clowes himself shows up, but there are various other figures wandering around the edges. And of course Enid's name is Clowes' name. Seeing her as and Becky as doppelgangers (doppelmeyers?) is hardly a counter-intuitive reading. But you haven't done a reading yourself, Jeet, serious or otherwise. If you want to take on the panel and respond to my criticism (other than with ad hominem petulance) it seems like you'd need to try to deal with the following: the reason that that title was chosen on the newspaper; the reason the panel is framed so as to suggest that the paper is the reader's (or Clowes'); the role of knowledge in the panel, and how it accounts for both Isaac's reading (Enid doesn't know) and the other readings here (Enid does know) — and ideally also you should account for the hints throughout that Enid and Becky are Clowes.I presume you'll just indulge in more indignation and then punt, but I'll live in hope.Isaac, in terms of what's more interesting in the text, morality or jumping bones. Do you really see Clowes' moral vision as especially serious or insightful compared to folks who actually care about that stuff — George Eliot, Tolstoy, Jane Austen, even Dickens? It all just seems pretty thin gruel by those standards to me — the characterization is thin, the morals such as they are boil down to don't be a prick — I just don't see it as an especially powerful or interesting moral vision. Do we really need someone to tell us that it's cruel to prank call people? I mean, this isn't Lydgate being tempted here. The moral questions aren't what's interesting; what's interesting is watching Enid be taught A Lesson.To me, that's because the energy of the book is not invested in morality as morality; rather it's invested in morality as a lever of desire and power, about the experience of condemnation and wanting to be condemned. That's why you're reading of this panel isn't really about morality. It's about knowledge, and it's about contempt. And about Clowes, of course.
. He's in that panel; it's his paper (and the reader's too, quite poissbly). I don't know what Clowes had in his head, of course, but I know how he figures himself in the text and I can do a reading based on that.You seem to think that you're performing some sort of advanced literary technique by refusing to think about the self-reflexivity of the text. That's characteristic; you tend to be fairly uncomfortable with readings that aren't straightforward. But Clowes is very much a pomo writer; he's playing games with the intentionality you want to put off limits.I don't think Clowes wanted to jump the characters necessarily, or only, by the by. It's about inhabiting them too. Sadism is not just lust; it's control.There are lots of older men in Ghost World, incidentally. Clowes himself shows up, but there are various other figures wandering around the edges. And of course Enid's name is Clowes' name. Seeing her as and Becky as doppelgangers (doppelmeyers?) is hardly a counter-intuitive reading. But you haven't done a reading yourself, Jeet, serious or otherwise. If you want to take on the panel and respond to my criticism (other than with ad hominem petulance) it seems like you'd need to try to deal with the following: the reason that that title was chosen on the newspaper; the reason the panel is framed so as to suggest that the paper is the reader's (or Clowes'); the role of knowledge in the panel, and how it accounts for both Isaac's reading (Enid doesn't know) and the other readings here (Enid does know) — and ideally also you should account for the hints throughout that Enid and Becky are Clowes.I presume you'll just indulge in more indignation and then punt, but I'll live in hope.Isaac, in terms of what's more interesting in the text, morality or jumping bones. Do you really see Clowes' moral vision as especially serious or insightful compared to folks who actually care about that stuff — George Eliot, Tolstoy, Jane Austen, even Dickens? It all just seems pretty thin gruel by those standards to me — the characterization is thin, the morals such as they are boil down to don't be a prick — I just don't see it as an especially powerful or interesting moral vision. Do we really need someone to tell us that it's cruel to prank call people? I mean, this isn't Lydgate being tempted here. The moral questions aren't what's interesting; what's interesting is watching Enid be taught A Lesson.To me, that's because the energy of the book is not invested in morality as morality; rather it's invested in morality as a lever of desire and power, about the experience of condemnation and wanting to be condemned. That's why you're reading of this panel isn't really about morality. It's about knowledge, and it's about contempt. And about Clowes, of course.