Evelyn Waugh's 'Decline and Fall'

This week we discussed Evelyn Waugh’s ‘Decline and Fall’. This short novel tells the story of Paul Pennyfeather. This was a bit more easy-going than what I am used to from the theory lectures, and I enjoyed how quickly I could read it! The main part of the book discussed on Friday was that on Silenus, Margot’s architect. Silenus resembles Le Corbusier, and his modernist viewpoint. His attitude towards most things in life can be summed up in his approach to assessing a beautiful woman, which is by rating the efficiency of her digestive system.

Le Corbusier was obsessed with truth and order, which he tried to place on everything. Every decision made in the design process needed solid reasoning behind it - this approach led to the 5 points of modern architecture, which derived from the use of concrete in building.

Le Corbusier’s modernist perception did not allow for human needs. For his designs to remain pure, there would be no room for individual character – everyone would have the same of everything, and everything that existed would be designed to do a specific job, there would be no variation. The problem with this attitude towards design is that humans need more than the bare minimum – to bring the excitement and life to the things around us, there needs to be a higher level of stimulation. When everything is reduced to its functional form, it can mean it does not have its own unique character, and it becomes soulless.

I think that there are great rewards taken from the design process of form following function, and looking for purity in every day objects. However, it cannot be taken to the point that it neglects human nature. Homes and cars are designed for people, and so fulfilling people’s needs should be the main objective in designing them. This includes psychological needs and goes beyond the purely functional.

'Howl' and 'The Job'

This week we were asked to read ‘Howl’ by Allen Ginsberg. For the first time, I decided to wait until after the lecture to write anything about it for my blog, purely because I wanted to have a better understanding of it before I wrote this.

Firstly, I’m glad I now know something about this poem, as it is an important classic, so I feel like I should know about it! It has lead me to find out more about Beat Poetry, and the 50’s and 60’s in general. It seems strange that I already knew quite a bit about the history of this era, but didn’t really think about why the changes happened the way they did. The 50’s / 60’s were full of new discoveries - space exploration being hugely influential. More and more people’s minds were thinking beyond the conventional and they were questioning and objecting to their previous generations’ ways of thinking. LSD was being used to experience new things and think outside the box. People were thinking and acting freely about sex, music and language, and these people were the children that came from the end of the second world war.

Times were changing dramatically, and this meant that the way people wrote needed to change with it. ‘Howl’ is an important poem as it stated a debate as to what was acceptable to write about, and gave new ideas to how it could be written about, it essentially expanded creativity. Ginsberg writes a continuous flow of thoughts, feelings and impressions of what he sees happening around him. He tells it like it is. His attitude to what he sees and how he writes about it was the starting point for a revolution in writing.

Briefly looking at William Burroughs in ‘The Job’, the main thing that I took from this was his idea of images and words being used as an instrument of control. He believed that to get to the origin we must scrutinise the instrument itself. This ‘suspicious’ attitude towards words lead him to use his ‘cut-up’ technique, which would undermine the power structures that control language. By rearranging the words he was given on a page, he believed that he could start to understand what the message that these words were being used for really meant. It’s an interesting idea, and a fascinating attempt to looking beyond what we all accept as truth in the way we communicate, but if words are not an accurate tool to understanding the truth, I don’t think that randomly rearranging them is the answer. To me, I think that a whole new method of communicating would be needed, but I have no idea what that could be!

Some more on Hickney

Friday’s lecture actually made me feel quite positive about things. Our discussions about Hickney’s ‘At home in the neon’ left me asking myself the question; what happens when you stop scrutinising and looking to uncover the mythologies of our time, and just enjoy it? We discussed how the bad points of Vegas exist everywhere, but are just hidden in other places, and how Hickney makes you understand his connection to Vegas by referring to it as home, and then defining home itself.

Unfortunately, it seems that Las Vegas has been gobbled up by major corporations, and is not the same place that it used to be, certainly for Hickney who longer sees it as his home.

The main point that I took from this was that Las Vegas, as a place became the perfect tool to liberate writing. The values that fit in with traditional writing just don’t fit with Vegas - it has become the vehicle for writers to evolve. It is the sort of place that inspires people to feel liberated of social ‘normality’, and do what they want to do.

Maybe we should stop and simply enjoy the world around us, instead of desperately trying to undermine it. Or maybe the struggle to understand what is around us, and the purpose of all of this, can be much more enjoyable than just accepting without deeper thinking.

Dave Hickney's 'At Home with the Neon'

This week I have read ‘At home with the neon’ from the book ‘Air Guitar’ by Dave Hickney.

Before reading this, my opinion on Las Vegas was probably the same as most of the people in the class (I’d imagine). I felt that it was tacky, tasteless, and a place that exploited peoples’ greed. I now feel slightly bad about feeling that way, although I can’t say that I suddenly really want to go there now.

Hickney writes how Las Vegas has become the only place where he feels at home. He raises a lot of positives about the place – Vegas presents a flat-line social hierarchy. Money is just money. Vegas is about stakes, not status. It is about real action, not connections. All of these points made me re-think my attitude to the place. Las Vegas actually sounds quite appealing when you look at this way. Nowhere else has this level-headed attitude to society. To be in a place that treats everybody as equals, and escapes the pretentious nature of our culture must be amazing! Of course, there will still be people there who are making judgments on status, and turning their nose up at appearances, but I suppose those are the people that are not really experiencing Vegas. When you go to Vegas, you leave that behind, you escape the real world, where sadly everyone is judged by everyone.

One of the things that bugs me about Vegas is the exploitation of the people that go there to risk their money on the possibility of winning more. Hickney writes that it is essentially their own fault, which in reality is true! People are so un-used to regulating their own behaviour, that when they visit Las Vegas they go too far and end up broke and in jail. However, I still feel that even though everyone is responsible for their own behaviour, the Casino’s obviously do know peoples’ weaknesses, and they do exploit them. I really am being swayed both ways with this one, hopefully tomorrow’s lecture will help again.

Finally, I do feel that in accepting that I find the décor of Vegas tacky, I am accepting that I am pretentious, and see myself as ‘having better taste’, and therefore ‘above’ those who do not find it tacky. I obviously don’t want to think of myself as pretentious!

Maybe I need to accept Vegas as being what it is, and stop comparing it to what I see as better places. It is a one-off, which gives hope and pleasure to a lot of people. I think we could all do with adopting a more laid back, open, Vegas attitude. We are so caught up in our materialistic society, which pushes us into doing things that we feel we simply have to do, that we don’t even realise what it is that we want to do. This wacky place could in some respects keep us more level headed that anywhere else!

Revisiting Eagleton

I want to briefly revisit Eagleton’s ‘After Theory’.

I am now feeling more sympathetic towards Eagleton’s nostalgia of a time where thinking was deeper and moving forward. Today there isn’t the depth of thinking that there was in the past. Everything is quick and concerned with everyday life, the here and now. This is causing us to ignore the real questions like famine and poverty – we distract ourselves with investigations into ‘Friends’ and ‘S&M’, and we are ignoring the real.

I still feel that everyone has the right to look closely into the topics that they personally find interesting, but I agree with Eagleton that it is sad that many people immerse themselves in these studies.

We are too happy to accept what has been put in front of us as the truth and only way to operate. We need to keep moving forward and we cannot settle. We need to get underneath the surface and discover what are the myths that we live under.