Killing humour? Reading Shirley Jackson’s We Have Always Lived in the Castle

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Photo by Nikki Fraunhofer shows architectural detail from St Stephen Walbrook church, London EC4

Merricat, Constance and Uncle Julian Blackwood live in a grand, eccentric house which they call the Castle. The rambling mansion itself forms a powerful character within the novel and sits on the edge of an unnamed American village. Within the Blackwood wire fence, eighteen-year-old Merricat roves the estate, burying magical charms to conjure an illusion of safety. Twice a week however, she must venture out into a world of petty, spiteful villagers. They stare and whisper, whilst local children hound Merricat, chanting a mocking rhyme about her older sister.

When Jackson introduces us to the Castle any ordinary writer would buckle under the weight of laboured tropes about mayhem, magic and madness. Yet from the start, Jackson’s spare, taut prose signals this is no mere work of folkloric, gothic froth. Her narrative is pierced by acute observations about the kinds of small-town prejudices which leave the Blackwoods marginalised and marooned at the edge of their community. She weaves a sardonic thread of social commentary throughout the story, but her genius lies in one skill above all others: the way she touches, oh so lightly, on the fact that one of the sisters is a poisoner.

Constance was once tried and acquitted for poisoning her family, but years later she remains imprisoned by choice, never leaving the grounds of the Blackwood home. Defined by a world which prizes a clean house and well-cooked food as the paradigm of feminine virtue, Constance produces a stream of jewel-like preserves with an almost magical ease. As readers, we are left to wonder why nearly everyone in the Blackwood family died after sharing the meal which she cooked. Merricat, our narrator seems to neither know nor care, but when Cousin Charles arrives hoping to charm Constance and her fortune away with him, the question gains new urgency.

Jackson’s book is rich with astute perceptions about the murky depths below our paper-thin layers of civilisation. Her novella defies classification, fitting none of the conventional murder-mystery, feminist polemic, or teenage ‘coming of age’ categories. Whilst Castle has resonances with Jackson’s short-story The Lottery, here Jackson fleshes out the end results of community-enforced rules of ‘normality’ and their effects on social order. Set in 1950s America, the novella provides a savage commentary on the Cold War paranoia, as well as rigidly enforced, gender-specific expectations of the times. It is a tale of many kinds of poisoning and yet the book is also strangely funny. Were Jackson alive today, one has to wonder whether her intelligent, incisive humour would be published. Could it be that our contemporary ‘norms of civilisation’ are now too poisonous to be funny?

You can join Nikki Fraunhofer to read We Have Always Lived in the Castle over three two hour meetings on Zoom, Thursday 29 August, 5 & 12 September, 5.00-7.00pm UK time.

Bloomsday 2024!

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“Stately, plump Buck Mulligan came from the stairhead, bearing a bowl of lather on which a mirror and a razor lay crossed . . .”

For many of us the opening lines of Ulysses, which usher in the one day (16 June 1904) on which Leopold Bloom takes his long perambulation around Dublin, are so familiar they scarcely need repeating. And yet, there are always people who have yet to read – or re-read – James Joyce’s monumental work of art. For anyone contemplating this journey through time we are planning a new Ulysses study starting early in 2025, details will be announced here on the website and in our newsletter soon (please make sure you are subscribed).

We have some incredible readers who are just in the process of completing Ulysses with Toby, after six months of what she describes as: “mad reading, struggling for understanding, deep probing of textual complexity, gender roles and identifications, the awful weight of history, antisemitism, the haunting of grief and the meaning of the lemon soap – a lovely group of readers have triumphed in their work with Joyce – their final meeting happens this week.” 

Unusually, we are not celebrating Bloomsday formally this year, BUT the gallery above is a reminder of Bloomsday and other Joyce-related events the Salon has enjoyed in recent years (and there will be more in the future). Meanwhile, here are a few things going on if you are keen to find a last minute opportunity:

  • The London Balloonatics, who can normally be found on Bloomsday re-enacting Bloom’s Dublin walk on the streets of London, are instead walking in Dublin this year (find them on the Bloomsday Festival website link below) but offer this audio for those of us who are not in Dublin with them!
  • Our friends at Audrey are offering a ‘listen-along’ Ulysses opportunity.
  • For anyone in Dublin the James Joyce Centre’s annual Bloomsday Festival has lots going on this weekend, as does the Derry-based YES Festival celebrating female creativity with a focus on Molly Bloom’s soliloquy.
  • In London the Irish Cultural Centre in Hammersmith is offering a play Norah & Jim and an art exhibition based on Ulysses.

Happy Bloomsday!

In Search of Mrs Dalloway!

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Karina, Toby & David
Sharon & Toby
Toby by the Pyports lawn
David describes the Lushington Archive

The inimitable Sharon Bylenga, long-time supporter of the London LitSalon and Virginia Woolf devotee, recently discovered the depth of the links between Woolf and the Lushington family, three generations of whom lived in Pyports, a handsome residence in Cobham, Surrey. Sharon introduced us to Cobham-based historian and archivist David Taylor, author of The Remarkable Lushington Family, and the idea for a unique ‘in-person’ event was born.

On a sunny June Saturday, a group of enthusiastic Woolf readers joined us in the main hall and garden of Pyports (a private house, generously opened to us by the current owners) to hear David Taylor and Karina Jakubowicz, Woolf scholar, LitSalon facilitator and presenter of the Virginia Woolf Podcast, ‘in conversation’ with the Salon’s founding director and lead facilitator Toby Brothers.

Virginia Woolf herself admitted that Mrs Dalloway, a recurring character in several of her works of fiction, most notably the eponymous Mrs Dalloway, was based on Kitty Lushington. Over the years there has been much speculation about the life of Kitty (who, on marriage to the writer and journalist Leopold Maxse, became a celebrated socialite) and her untimely death. The panel discussed the extent to which they believe Kitty’s life was accurately represented in Woolf’s writing and, more broadly, the differences between the approach of the historian and the writer of literary fiction. Thought-provoking questions and observations from the audience about historical record and works of imagination completed a fascinating exploration of life and art, followed by drinks on the Pyports lawn where Virginia Woolf and Kitty Lushington once gathered beneath the ancient cedar tree that remains standing today.

For information about forthcoming LitSalon studies (including reading Woolf in Cornwall this autumn) please make sure you are subscribed to our newsletter and do check out Karina’s wonderful Virginia Woolf podcast for Literature Cambridge!

To Agistri by land and sea . . .

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“Strolling the decks in the morning sun as the ship cruises past the islands of Cephalonia and Ithaca is the nicest part of the trip”

The Man in Seat 61

That sentence sold me the idea of travelling to The Iliad study by train and ferry rather than plane. And it turned out to be worth every jot of the extra time, planning and money.

I started with The Man in Seat 61 website, which recommended Day 1: Paris-Zurich-Milan. Day 2 Milan-Bari then overnight ferry to Patras. Day 3 Patras-Piraeus-Agistri. Looks daunting, doesn’t it? And to begin with it was. But once I started booking the trains, it fell into place and the trip itself went very smoothly and was fascinating.

Day 1: The Eurostar London to Paris. The schedule doesn’t dictate taking a night in Paris but, since I abhor early starts and have two nephews living there, I did. This enabled me to see the breath-taking Brancusi retrospective at the Pompidou Centre and visit the Musee de la Vie Romantique in Pigalle, a gem of a mansion-museum whose charming courtyard cafe is worth it alone. But you can go straight on to Milan that day. Typical timings: London 08.01-11.18 Paris; Paris 12.22-16.26 Zurich; Zurich 17.33-20.50 Milan.

Musee de la Vie Romantique, Paris

Normally there is a direct train Paris-Milan but, following a landslide in 2023, that route is closed until 2025. Going via Zurich lengthens the journey, but you get to see views of the Alps and travel alongside the Zürichsee and Lake Lugano for long stretches. Deeply enjoyable. I stayed at the functional but comfortable Mythos Hotel, 4 minutes from Milan Centrale Station (which is a stunning example of Mussolini-era grand architecture).

Architectural detail, Milan Centrale Station

Day 2: A train all the way down the East coast of Italy to Bari leaving Milan at 08.05, arriving 15.27. Try to sit on the left for beautiful views of the Adriatic. I paid an extra €20 for business class, giving very comfy seats and a little snack. Once in Bari, you could get a taxi to the ferry terminal, which would mean driving along the perimeter fence, entering by the vehicle gate and doubling all the way back. This is the walking route Google maps will show. But you can walk there more directly in about 30 minutes: go in a straight line from the station towards the port. Weave your way through the charming old town, bearing right around the impressive Castello Normanno-Svevo until you join the last stretch of the road route. Keep walking to your right (as you face the sea) until you get to the gate, then follow signs for Terminal Crociere. Don’t be deterred! The terminal is set up for cars not pedestrians and sometimes it looks like you are walking through a building site, but you eventually reach the big blue check-in building. Boarding starts at 17.00 for a 19.30 departure. The ferry is a huge modern complex so not as romantic as a Greek trireme, but the skies, the Ionian wind and the wine-dark sea are the same. I love sleeping on trains and boats, the motion providing a gentle lolling. You can get 1-4 berth cabins, a reclining seat or, as some brave souls were doing, just bed down in a corridor or on deck. In the morning you sail past Ithaca and into the Gulf of Patras, with marvellous sea and island views.

Bari Old Town

Day 3: The ferry lands at 13.00 at Patras on the West coast of Greece, so you need to get a bus/train combo to Piraeus. This was quite challenging, but that great technological aid of asking the people around you still works pretty well. Follow the lorries to find your way out of the port. You might be able to pick up a taxi here, but it was rather deserted. I teamed up with three youngsters from Zurich, Paris and Boston and walked 20 mins along the coast to the old station. The trains no longer run from here or from Patras at all – you have to get a substitute bus for the first leg, but a very friendly women inside sold us the tickets and told us where to get the bus to Kiato (a further 20 minute walk). It leaves at 14.25 so you have plenty of time. It travels mainly along the south side of the Gulf of Corinth, with mountains visible over the water. Beautiful. From Kiato you pick up the regular train to Piraeus (though be alert: at one point it was “all change” and we had to get a train on the adjacent platform to continue). Arrival in Piraeus is 17.41 so you can get straight on a ferry to Agistri (though you would miss part of the first evening session), but I stayed overnight (Hotel Lilia, another simple and welcoming hotel) and had a lovely Italian meal in Restaurant Parmigiano overlooking Zeas Harbour in Pasamilani. This also gave me the next morning in Piraeus to explore its many charms such as the Kastella district, the Archaeological Museum or the Hellenic Maritime Museum before hopping on a ferry around lunchtime.

Zeas Harbour restaurant in Piraeus

The reckoning? A flight would have taken a full day door-to-door and cost £100-200. My trip could be done in 3 days and the cost for transport plus Milan hotel was £700. Clearly overland options are only for those with budget to spare or who can cut down on expenditure elsewhere to make it possible. But what price do you put on the glory of seeing the Swiss Alps outside your window, feeling the evening vibe of Milan Centrale, strolling through the old town of Bari, meeting other foot passengers on the ferry, each on their own odysseys, eating a breakfast coffee and croissant as you sail past Ithaca and engaging with the local people of the country you are in. It beats the inside of an airport and plane!

We loved reading Night and Day in Alfriston!

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Each travel study is its own epic experience. We work hard to put together the text, the group, a special site, unique eating experiences, relevant gallery or museum visits, outdoor adventures and of course, a wild swim or two, but still I experience a healthy anxiety in hoping that all the planning will result yet again in the magical coming together of minds, words and ideas that makes these times so unique. 

The study of a book that I have not previously worked through makes this pre-trip tension even greater. For our latest big Woolf read, Night and Day in Alfriston earlier this month, I had the great privilege of working with Dr. Karina Jakubowicz, whose deep knowledge, great energy and humour made the facilitation electric. She also makes a fine fire!

Added to this, we had a core group of dedicated Woolfians – some of whom are in the ongoing diary study of Woolf – who had prepared reflections from that work that informed our reading of Night and Day. 

We were also truly enriched by our contact and meeting with the brilliant folks at Much Ado Books in Alfriston. The space they have created, with such love for books and art, welcomes all readers into the bright and illuminating world of beautiful books. They have a wonderful variety of rooms and extra buildings dedicated to different aspects of literary art, and they kindly hosted one of our sessions in the barn that houses their collection of Book Art – a vibrant response to the meeting of word and material. I value this connection greatly and was inspired by their embracing space and passion for books. We plan to be back in Alfriston next April and look forward to more events and exchanges with this very special location.

On first diving-in, Night and Day can seem like a conventional late nineteenth century novel of romantic entanglements, but our time around the work introduced new understanding as we were guided by Woolf’s probing – and at times ironic – gaze into family life, women’s work and social relationships in the late Edwardian era. In his literary theories, Mikhail Bakhtin developed the proposal that social situation and relationships determine the structure of utterance. Night and Day, positioned at a moment of immense change in the world, as portrayed in Woolf’s later novels, captures this change by using traditional language to address the rigid values around marriage, love and the position of women. But into this (teetering) order, Woolf inserts dreams, darknesses, gaps in language and volition that reflect the difficulty of resistance to a system in which one is embedded. By the novel’s end, some of the characters are stepping out towards a new world, just as Woolf herself will move towards more experimental forms of language and complex understanding of character in all her subsequent works. 

During our time in Alfriston, some of us would venture to Seaford early in the mornings for a dip in the sea to get our minds moving. As we drove to the beach on 13 April, we learned of the Iranian missile attack on Israel (particularly relevant to one of our participants, a political journalist whose radio interview that morning was abruptly cancelled). Suddenly, war and global conflict invaded our idyll, giving us a different understanding of how Woolf could have written this most domestic of novels in the midst of the Great War (a concern voiced by many critics, especially in her immediate group). We realised that with the threat of war around us (and I believe that awareness of our global position means we are all implicated in war anywhere in the world) we might turn purposefully to the drama of human relationships, where conflict can spark and glow to destruction. We also reflected that, in the chaos of the news around us, the generation of hope in human potential for progressive change is an ember that must be nurtured. 

There were so many moments of glittering insight and pleasure during our time together engrossed in this lesser-known Woolf work. I became aware of how the great privilege of time dedicated to this process of exploration results in an expanded space in the mind. Like swimming in fresh waters, the flotsam is softened and made fluid. With time spent focusing on a narrative, away from the needs of home, work and family, my mind gains strength as I move towards a healthy kind of attention. 

The study of great literature gives me an envelope within which to manage the disparate struggles of being human. There is no absolute truth to learn, but always a greater understanding of who we are in relationship to others and the world around us.

Reading Virginia Woolf’s Night and Day in Alfriston

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Just over one hundred years ago a group of artists, writers and intellectuals changed how we think of a special corner of Sussex – and a lot else besides. Here, beneath the South Downs and between the Ouse and Cuckmere valleys, is Bloomsbury’s country heartland. The Bloomsbury Group, as they became known for their London base, adopted this part of Sussex as their place of escape, to live their own lives in the way they wanted – independence, sexual freedom and a rural existence. 

Salonista and Woolf devotee Sharon Bylenga

For our forthcoming study of Virginia Woolf’s novel Night and Day we will be staying at Wingrove House, in the high street of Alfriston, East Sussex, a 19th century colonial-style country house hotel, with roaring log fires and rustic-chic rooms, located just a few miles from Charleston House on the banks of the Cuckmere River. Here we will be perfectly located for exploring Alfriston and the South Downs that Woolf and her family and friends loved so dearly (the photos above were taken on a recent research visit so I write from experience).  We will use the Lodge at Wingrove House for our meetings – a perfect Salon environment complete with fireplace! – and I’m thrilled that my fellow facilitator Karina Jakubowicz will be joining us.

These long weekends away give us the opportunity to stretch into a book; finding together a rich weave of insights, ideas and connections between the text and our contemporary experience. As one of Virginia Woolf’s lesser-known works, Night and Day (1919) is a bridge between traditional fictional forms and her more radical explorations. The characters in Night and Day  probe and push against social conventions, but ultimately both text and the characters remain confined within the social expectations of Edwardian England. 

However, both on the surface and just submerged, there is another register of questioning and resistance. There is an opening out towards wider spaces, there is a pushing against the weight of the past. While the book offers us a variety of romantic situations that are not typical Woolfian fare, these relationships show fractures in the gendered spaces of the time. I find the tension that the book barely contains, the daydreams that threaten to overtake the social performances; give a vision towards the possibilities that Woolf would later expand into. It is an absorbing link in the ever fascinating chain of Woolf’s work. 

Why read Fernando Pessoa?

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Fernando Pessoa by unknown photographer, Public Domain via Wikimedia Commons

Fernando Pessoa (1888-1935) was, quipped one critic, Portugal’s three greatest modern poets. It is certainly true that to read Pessoa is not just to read one poet but to enter into a whole literature. 

Pessoa’s attempt to forge a new literary modernism for Portugal took shape through his creation of different literary personas. He called these personas ‘heteronyms’, to distinguish them from pseudonyms, as essentially distinct personalities, all with biographies, literary styles and philosophical and political ideas as different from each other as from Pessoa himself.

Pessoa authored works under at least 72 different names throughout his life, and this compulsion seems to have been both an aesthetic and a psychological necessity. But at the centre of his most important and accomplished literary achievements is the poetry authored by the three main heteronyms: Alberto Caiero, Alvaro de Campos and Ricardo Reis; by Pessoa himself as one of that company of heteronyms; and his great prose masterpiece The Book of Disquiet, authored by the semi-heteronym Bernardo Soares.

As readers of the poetry of Fernando Pessoa we encounter the works of four unmistakably distinct poets: Alberto Caeiro, Zen-like nature poet; Alvaro de Campos, avant-garde author of futurist odes; Ricardo Reis, melancholic classicist and philosophical stoic; and Pessoa himself, whose poetry restlessly explores questions of identity and self.

In The Book of Disquiet readers encounter something utterly unique in world literature.  Described by Pessoa as ‘a fact-less autobiography’, this text is fragmentary, circular, without beginning end or middle, without narrative, plot or conclusion. Almost impossible to categorise, this work may be regarded as (among other things) one of the greatest literary/philosophical studies in mood, in melancholy, in existential ennui, and their relation to meaning and existence.

What we find in Pessoa’s oeuvre is the radical co-existence of seemingly disparate and contradictory ideas; we find bold experiments of avant-garde-ism and quiet accomplishments of form and tone; we find the perennial themes of art, philosophy, identity, the nature of the self, the sense we have of our place in the cosmos. For me, Pessoa’s work captures a psychological truth of the modern age – one which by its nature resists reductionism, but in which we might recognise ourselves and our contemporary struggles for meaning. We find that in these preoccupations, Pessoa is our contemporary.

If you have not yet read Pessoa I can promise you an extraordinary literary experience. If you are intrigued, we are offering an introduction to his work starting in March.

A focus on long reads

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One of the challenges we face in the Salon is the viability of ‘Long’ or ‘Slow Read’ studies. These are designed to offer a more in-depth consideration of a text. Instead of visiting a few significant passages, the ‘Long Read’ studies give time and attention to all the richness of the writing, we move slowly enough through the text to address greater complexity and the quieter moments of revelation.

The challenge is that while there is enthusiasm for these studies — and participants find them immensely satisfying — over time people’s circumstances may change, forcing them to drop out or take a break. The good news is that there are some extended studies — for example the Ulysses Slow Read, Ovid’s Metamorphoses, Finnegans’ Wake, The Iliad Unhurried — that it is quite possible to join part way through. The groups immersed in these huge texts will support and help new recruits to enjoy the meditative rhythm of the experience. Some (Ulysses and Iliad) do require you to have read the work once, but for others this is not necessary and in all cases the facilitator can advise you and suggest ways of getting up to speed before you decide whether or not to join. You can see what’s currently available to book (including more typically-paced readings of Ulysses and the Iliad, with more to be announced soon) on our study calendar.

So why not take a chance? You may find the pay-off to be increased attention and focus, a practice of consciousness that is, as Iain McGilchrist describes below, ‘the ultimate creative act.’ I also encourage you to widen your perspective by choosing a study outside of your comfort zone — dip into the classics for a new perspective, see what George Eliot is exploring in her portrayal of tensions in the social relationships and gender roles of nineteenth-century England, check out the distilled power of poetry or short stories — and, if you find you have benefited from your work in the Salon, do please tell a few friends (you could even gift them a Salon study for the New Year).

One recent Proust participant described the Salon experience like this: “ . . . thoroughly enjoying the Proust. Exactly what I anticipated and wanted. It’s the stimulus of the discussion I find motivating. I’m not that interested in the reading round it. The group is warm and tolerant enough for me to utter things that I quickly realise are wrong (a long-standing way of learning with me) and I can readjust. I guess the dialectic approach has always appealed to me and it is great to be in a rich environment in which I can indulge it without irritating people (too much anyway!) and deepen my understanding. Basically a blast! “

Another gift of the Salon: receiving reading recommendations galore! Thanks to a Salonista I am just discovering the wisdom of Iain McGilchrist, this really speaks to me of what I gain in the ongoing practice of deep reading and broadening discussion:

“The world we know cannot be wholly mind-independent, and it cannot be wholly mind-dependent. Once again, this leaves no room for a philosophy of ‘anything goes’. What is required is an attentive response to something real and other than ourselves, of which we have only inklings at first, but which comes more and more into being through our response to it—if we are truly responsive to it. We nurture it into being; or not. In this it has something of the structure of love.

“The best way I can put it is that it is the manner in which our consciousness is disposed towards whatever else exists. The choice we make of how we dispose our consciousness is the ultimate creative act: it renders the world what it is. It is, therefore, a moral act: it has consequences. ‘Love’, said the French philosopher Louis Lavelle, ‘is a pure attention to the existence of the other’.”

Iain MacGilchrist The Matter with Things

On reading: long reading, slow reading, hard reading, reading that tickles . . .

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“I just don’t know where the time goes” I overheard this morning in the changing room at the pond where I swim. I nodded ruefully — a day slips away in the simple doing of modern life: emails to answer, writing and research to be done, plans to be made, food to prepare, bills to pay, dogs to be walked, the needs of ageing parents and the young — and underlying it all, the constant aching worry at wars being waged and the environment collapsing.

My mind feels crowded and noisy in the face of so many demands on my attention. It is easy — so easy — to be caught up in the movement of the day and reach the twilight moments of reflection to wonder: what have I done? With this day? With my life?

I step into a Salon session with lists and undone tasks still buzzing in my head, I worry that I will not be able to settle . . . and then, it happens. People enter the virtual space and something shifts as we all arrive, take a collective breath and slip into the words on the page. For the next few hours we are utterly attendant on the realm of words and ideas. It is not so much that the loud world goes away, rather that the book provides a space for contemplation that orders the overwhelming discord of the mind.

Perhaps it is the struggle with time that the book asks us to consider: how to understand its relentlessness, how to manage the unbearable weight of memory, how to live with flux. In other studies (or even later in the same book) we are considering the mystery of human motivation, how we ourselves often don’t recognise — or try not to — the true reason we treat another person a certain way. On another page, we are digging beneath the surface of racism, finding the complex entanglements within our self-perception that may evolve into a kind of tribalism.

I emerge from the Salon with gratitude for the wonderful minds I have engaged with, for the willingness of each person to go deeply into the work, to offer their ideas, to try out a reading of a difficult passage, sometimes to stumble, and to learn.

I am particularly grateful for the commitment and patience of those who take up one of the longer studies — whether it is a six month Ulysses odyssey, a two-and-a-half-year Proust project, or delving into Finnegans Wake (for however long it takes), or the ‘Slow Read’ of Ulysses or the Proust ‘Rebounders’ — these are all opportunities for a deeper engagement with the book, with each other, and to TAKE OUR TIME.  N.B. If you are interested, some of the longer studies can be joined along the way, not just at the beginning (although for the Ulysses Slow Read and the Proust Rebounders there is an expectation of having gone through the text previously).

I found this article by Christine Seifert (in the unlikely space of the Harvard Business Review) to give empirical support to what I have felt in my own work in the Salon and what I have observed in the experience of others. To quote:

“Research suggests that reading literary fiction is an effective way to enhance the brain’s ability to keep an open mind while processing information, a necessary skill for effective decision-making. In a 2013 study, researchers examined something called the need for cognitive closure, or the desire to “reach a quick conclusion in decision-making and an aversion to ambiguity and confusion.” Individuals with a strong need for cognitive closure rely heavily on “early information cues,” meaning they struggle to change their minds as new information becomes available. They also produce fewer individual hypotheses about alternative explanations, which makes them more confident in their own initial (and potentially flawed) beliefs. A high need for cognitive closure also means individuals gravitate toward smaller bits of information and fewer viewpoints. Individuals who resist the need for cognitive closure tend to be more thoughtful, more creative, and more comfortable with competing narratives—all characteristics of high EQ.

“University of Toronto researchers discovered that individuals in their study who read short stories (as opposed to essays) demonstrated a lower need for cognitive closure. That result is not surprising given that reading literature requires us to slow down, take in volumes of information, and then change our minds as we read. There’s no easy answer in literature; instead, there’s only perspective-taking.”

Christine Seifert, The Case for Reading Fiction (Harvard Business Review, March 06, 2020)

Below I have gathered a few poems that speak of the moment we are in and help me to be within the cataclysm of war in my imagination, helping me to not turn away but to be part of human experience empathically. As the study already quoted cites: “no easy answer . . . instead, there’s only perspective-taking.” I hope you too may find them helpful.

Every Morning by Mary Oliver

Things You May Find Hidden in My Ear by Mosab Abu Toha

What is a ‘text’?

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Angelus Novus by Paul Klee, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

When I thought about an image to illustrate Philosophy & Literature, Paul Klee’s Angelus Novus immediately came to mind. Benjamin, the German Jewish philosopher, was a literary critic known for his work on Proust, Baudelaire, Goethe, Kafka, theatre, storytelling, libraries and more. I felt that a salon reflecting on ‘text’ should somehow pay homage to this great critic who was interested in the truth found not just in books but in objects, advertisements, technology, arcades . . .  A monoprint of Klee’s Angel was one of Benjamin’s most cherished possessions and was found among his sparse belongings when he committed suicide in 1940, at the French/Spanish border he needed to cross to escape Nazism in France and which had just closed.

For Benjamin, the Angelus Novus is the Angel of History. “His face is turned towards the past. Where we perceive a chain of events he sees one single catastrophe which keeps piling wreckage upon wreckage and hurls it in front of his feet”. The pile of debris only grows higher as a storm pushes him backwards towards the future. This storm, says Benjamin “is what we call progress”, I wanted the Klee image to “quote” Benjamin, to remind us of his dedicated search for truth in all forms – from the smallest object to the most scholarly treatise. Unfortunately, with the horrendous attack on Israel by Hamas and the suffering of the Palestinian people, the Klee image brings back to our minds the despair suffered before, the pile of debris, the wreckage of human folly that we call progress and which surrounds us at this moment.

The philosophical work of Benjamin is inspiring and his search for truth in all objects and texts is worth pursuing. We are keen readers who, like Benjamin, love stories and books, and we ponder over them. Is Ulysses telling the ‘truth’ when he recounts his adventures to the Phaeacian king? Is Ishmael telling the truth when he weaves a story about Moby Dick to some Spanish gentlemen in Lima? What is the ‘truth’ of these narratives? Who is Mrs Dalloway? Who is the ‘real’ Clarissa? Reading Proust’s Search, we wonder, who is telling the story? What is that story about? Is there only one way of reading a text? What is a ‘text’? Who speaks what, to whom and with what effect? Can we speak of truth, reality or knowledge when we read? Can we speak of pleasure?

These questions do not have straight answers but, as a philosopher by training, I think they deserve a space of their own. Not that I believe philosophy can resolve them: nowadays we have become suspicious of the idea of a ‘foundation’ of knowledge.  Indeed, often we believe that philosophy is just one possible narrative among others. Still, as philosophy has traditionally addressed many of these questions, it will be interesting to see if, by reading excerpts of some well-known philosophical texts we can enrich our discussion.

Participants joining the Philosophy & Literature salon do not need to have had any previous acquaintance with philosophical texts. As readers who enjoy reading and discussing texts using our own experiences, we are ready to start. I will provide notes with background information on the authors, concepts and ideas, as well as some further reading for those who want to pursue those ideas. In the sessions we will be reading the texts and discussing how they present ideas of reality, truth, art and experience, seeking to integrate these ideas with our own understanding of books we have read and our own lived experience. Contributions from participants from all areas of knowledge will be very welcome. ‘Text’ as Barthes suggests, encompasses more than just the written word.   

We will start with Aristotle, who defined the art of ‘poetics’ as ‘imitation’: copying, representing reality. We will try to see how those ideas influenced the way we understand language, knowledge and art. From there we will move to Nietzsche, a big leap no doubt, but one that opens the space for modernist – and postmodern – literature. Wittgenstein will bring to the fore the horizon of shared practices, values and customs that surround language, writing, speaking and reading. Finally, we will ‘visit’ Paris and possibly find ‘pleasure’ amidst the multi-layered texts of Barthes, who in many ways and forms reminds us, once again, of Benjamin.

Philosophy & Literature, a four week study, begins on 25 January 2024. I invite you to join the journey.

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