[FRIAM] Burroughsian vs. Sontagian

[Steve Smith]

from this book
review: https://www.bookforum.com/print/2702/searching-for-prophecy-in-the-midst-of-a-pandemic-24017

    /Whenever an incurable disease mounts a body count, there’s a
    corresponding linguistic crisis that can be expressed in these
    Burroughsian vs. Sontagian terms: Is language a metaphoric virus or
    a metaphoric antibody? Is language the proliferation of falsity or
    the protection against it, or can it be both, and what of its
    function is conscious?
    /

and for those who aren't hooked by the linguistic aspects of it, there
is a tidbit in here to feed those more hooked by morbid fascination:

    /this was a thing that still happened, a hazing that was also an
    homage: You scooped the bit of Einstein’s brain out of the jar and
    shook off the excess formaldehyde; then, you put some salt in the
    crook of your thumb and licked it, after which you took down a shot
    of cheap room-temperature tequila and sucked on the brain-bit until
    your mouth went numb—until the formaldehyde paralyzed your lips and
    tongue and you couldn’t be understood, you couldn’t even feel
    yourself trying to make language./



//

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://redfish.com/pipermail/friam_redfish.com/attachments/20200520/c2f4b7fe/attachment.html>