Daniil Kharms anyone? Or just the absurd in literature

[Mr Endon]

Any fans of Daniil Kharms? Such a fascinating character. Apparently he kept a machine at home which didn't do anything. That's so like him.

In my opinion his best 'incident' is 'The Blue Notebook #10'. Do you have a favourite?


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Also, do you have any recommendations of literature that deals with the absurd? So far I've only read Kharms, Kafka, Camus, Beckett and O'Brien, what should I read next?

[Epistemophile]

I have read some of his stories. there was this story that i really liked. can't recall the name. was it blue notebook no. 2? it's about a man who didn't have eyes, ears, hair, nose, mouth, in fact a man who didn't have anything didn't have himself; in other words, he was not there; therefore, it's pointless for us to talk about a person who simply wasn't there! brilliant! for me its a story about the difficulty of writing a story. the writer, in a way unwrites the story by questioning the ontological status of its hero.

[Mr Endon]

That's actually my own favourite as well, 'The Blue Notebook no.10'! It was also the first one I read. First I just thought it was a solid comedy gem, it really made me laugh. Then I started reading some criticism about it. I was already aware of its subversion, but got an insight of how complex it really is. His texts look simple, yet are so challenging!

(One of the readings which I found particularly interesting was that it had to do with the disappearance of people under the new Russian regime, though I'm always very wary of political readings. But hush, no more about it)

Just like Beckett, he absorbed almost all Western philosophy just to undermine it. On the margin of that text Kharms wrote 'against Kant'. Now my philosophy lore is very sadly almost inexistent. Which particular axiom of his philosophy was he railing against, can you hazard a guess?

[Mr Endon]

I'm bumping this.
I refuse to believe that there's no one else with whom I can talk about Kharms et al!

[billl]

On the margin of that text Kharms wrote 'against Kant'. Now my philosophy lore is very sadly almost inexistent. Which particular axiom of his philosophy was he railing against, can you hazard a guess?

Hi Mr. Endon, I read some of the Kharms at the link you pointed me too (it's easy to read a lot of it in pretty short order!), and I also liked the one you guys are talking about (but it wasn't my favorite, I'll have to look thru them again for that...).

Regarding why he might have considered it (seriously or not) as being against Kant:

Well, Kant included in his philosophy the idea of something called the noumenal world, which is the world of things as they actually are. ACCORDING TO KANT, We can't perceive the noumenal world, because our sense organs are limited. The nature of the information provided by our sense organs 'shapes' our reality, leaving out all that is not within the purview of our senses. Actually, our senses are a mere distortion of it. It's been a while since I studied this topic, so I've probably already misrepresented it enough to get smacked around by someone more expert on the subject, but that's the basic idea I think. The world we see/hear/feel/taste/smell is not the real world, it is at a remove characterized by the nature of the sensory data we get.

From this idea of the noumenal world, Kant draws up his conception of mind and reality, and it isn't so simple. It's interesting that this story might be a critique of Kant, but I can't figure out if it would be a good critique or not. It maybe hinges on whether the "There's no reason to think about this guy!" line is sarcastic or not. Clearly, the character in the story is missing out on the sensory world, but Kant didn't hold that that was ALL there is going on in the mind (he believed there was a priori knowledge, as well, for example mathematics). But maybe Kharm is working on the assumption that objects of thought would be necessary for thought to occur (Kant believed this, or something very similar to it), and with no senses, there could be no objects of thought. Or maybe Kharm is anti-that.

I reviewed the summary of Kant's philosophy at Wikipedia, and it goes at it from a different angle, and it's a MUCH better, and much more thorough explanation if you have the time.

So, anyhow, this story reminds me of a famous book I never read called Johnny Got His Gun (about a soldier who suffers injuries that render him nearly analagous to the protagonist of the Kharms story). It's an anti-war book, but I've also heard it used as an attack on Behaviorism. I thought of that before I though of Kant.

[Mr Endon]

Billl, thank you very much for the very thorough reply, and for having gone through the trouble of giving me an outline of Kant's philospohy. Upon your recommendation I skimmed through the wiki article as well.

It's hard for me to tell where exactly he is defying Kant's views, but that may be because I still know so little about them. In The Absurd in Literature Neil Cornwell talks about this Neil Carrick fellow who apparently wrote extensively on this short story. Unfortunately Cornwell doesn't give the briefest outline of what it was that Carrick wrote on the 'against Kant' note, but he does explain his theory that '#10' is a parody of Negative Theology (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Negative_theology), and thus The Red-haired Man could be God. This, I think, is a fascinating interpretation, and very plausible.

However, there are all sorts of other theories: that this red-haired man is a clown, a political dissenter, or even an allegory for the act of writing a narrative. Incredible how many interpretations this tiny, seemingly vapid story gives rise to!


I know this was more a non-post than an informative piece of writing, but next time I'm going to the British Library I'll look up this Carrick fellow and will actually have something relevant to say. In the meantime, why don't you share with us (me?) your favourite story?

[billl]

Regarding the "against Kant" thing again: I really wonder what the actual intent is at the end of the story. Are we supposed to think "Yes, such a man doesn't really exist OR at least isn't worth thinking about..."? Or did Kharms want us to be offended at the narrator's dismissal of the protagonist's very existence, owing simply to his lack of sensory capacity? Whichever was his intent would be the one which would then be in opposition to Kant in some way. Further complicating matters is the fact that Kant believes that conception requires an object AND he also believes that there is such a thing as a priori knowledge, which is not the result of perception by the physical senses. SO, would Kharms be addressing (pro or possibly con) Kant's belief in a priori knowledge OR Kant's belief that, without the perception of an object, conception (thought?) is not possible?

Well, that's my best description of where I get stuck regarding the issue, but, I must admit, a fresher and more complete understanding of Kant's views might very well do a lot to narrow the scope of my confusion. And, adding to my own hesitancy to declare expertise in Kant's philosophy, I think it might be worth adding the possibility that Kharms might possibly have failed to appreciate some essential subtlety that might have applied in Kant's position, regarding the situation described in the story. In the end, my best guess is that he thought that Kant's position was that thought requires perceived objects of thought, and that Kant was wrong about that. But I don't know... :)

Anyhow, regarding the portion of the collection that I read (about 70% so far):

I really like the fact that Kharms's stuff is more funny than absurd. My favorite thus far is the shortest one in the collection, because of its efficiency and the fact that it doesn't have anything that could be construed as uncomfortable or 'negative' in it. I'll just paste the whole two sentences here:

(19) An Encounter

On one occasion a man went off to work and on the way he met another man who, having bought a loaf of Polish bread, was going his way home.
And that's just about all there is to it.

[Mr Endon]

I think that's a very plausible interpretation. Regarding objects, you might want to know that for Kharms ideas were objects themselves, and when put into words it became something you could actually throw at a window and break it. Written word was an action, an event. This led him to throw nothing away: he'd write "so-so" on the margin of some stories, "terrible" on others, but would never edit them.

Also, "his writing moves toward silence - toward the impossibility of writing, toward self-negation and oblivion" (Matvei Yankelevich, Today I Wrote Nothing). The intent at the end of the story is to simply deconstruct the character in a way opposite to the one we're used to; instead of starting from nothing and ending up with something elaborate (a good example of this would be, say, Leopold Bloom in Ulysses), we start with something but claw our way back to nothing, to "self-negation and oblivion". This is in tune with his defiant stance toward technology and progress in general: "Go and stop progress", he wrote to a friend once; his digressions and interruptions "save the story from enslavement to progress".

I'm not even kidding: that's my second favourite story! I swear it is, I always show it to friends and take great pleasure at their reaction: "uh? that's it?"

I must contest your claim 'that it doesn't have anything that could be construed as uncomfortable or 'negative' in it'. I think it most certainly does, and you'll feel that much once you read it aloud to friends. Very unconfortable in two senses: it's awkward (if they don't have the right sense of humour an embarrassing silence ensues) and most importantly it completely frustrates the readers' expectations. In that sense it's very much negative, very subversive. There's 'an encounter', alright, but no 'happening' to speak of, nothing really happens. It's the ultimate non-story, nay, anti-story! It's like a 'shaggy dog' joke: there's a set up but no punchline. What we take for granted is shamelessly taken from us, and we're left with our own lofty, almost classical expectations for a story turned to nothing.

My third favourite story has to be 'Symphony no. 2' (http://www.sevaj.dk/kharms/stories/symphon2.htm). Its start,


'Anton Mikhailovich spat, said "yuck", spat again, said "yuck" again, spat again, said "yuck" again and left. To Hell with him. Instead, let me tell about Ilya Pavlovich.'

is just terrific. Not happy with just crushing our expectations right from the beginning, he goes on to disrupt our belief in the omnipotence of the writer, and thus destroy our 'suspension of disbelief', and he ends up steering his story into a narcissistic account of himself:


But it is not so easy to tell about Anna Ignatievna. Firstly, I know almost nothing about her, and secondly, I have just fallen of my chair, and have forgotten what I was about to say. So let me instead tell about myself.

Pure genius!

[Demogorgon]

The absurd, disective and sometimes even anarchistic and destructive artistique of pre-revolutionary russia and the eastern europe is well known and much apreciated in Europe, especially in the former eastern eurpean countries.

Usually the name is spelled "Daniil Charms" in europe. If you try that in a search engine you might find some more information and publications of his works, hopefully in a languege you can read and understand.

If you like Daniil Charms you might want to check out some other interesting eastern europe writers like Karel Chapek (who coined the word "robot" in one of his plays) and Stanislav Lem to name a few. Stanislav Lem is best known for the novel "Solaris" which is somewhat boring, not very typical of his writing style in general and a bit overrated if you ask me. Try to find some of the other stuff he wrote.

Have fun!
D

[Mr Endon]

Wow, thanks for the input, Demogorgon! Yeah don't worry about Kharms (or Charms), that one I've got covered, but thanks for the recommendations, will definitely read this Chapek's R.U.R..

Two questions:
- were they part of the OBERIU?
- was that Solaris the source of Tarkovsky's film?

[Tantalus]

You could also read Eugene Ionesco, in particular "The Chairs". He is a romanian writer. :)

[Mr Endon]

Oh that's a nice suggestion Tantalus! I haven't read him yet, but from what I understand he, like Beckett, is part of Esslin's 'Theatre of the Absurd'. I'm sure to read him, and thanks for recommending a particular play, as I had no idea where to start.

[Tantalus]

You are welcome! Another good one could be Boris Vian. he is considered as one the most important authors of the second generation of absurd theatre.
I don't know if you have read some books by him... anyway you could start with "the foam of days".

By the way, i will definitely read something by Charms. his books seems very interesting! :)