Canon statement [Archive] - Literature Network Forums

stlukesguild

09-24-2011, 01:08 PM

Your list is also biased with just Epics, plays or novels ... why does great works need to be these genres? Unless by great you also mean long ...

J.L. Borges explored this question in one of his essays. He noted, for example, that Cervantes' novel, Don Quixote, is laden with flaws. The poetry the author inserted into the novel is not merely mediocre, but actually bad... horrible at times. In contrast, he notes that there are endless examples of the exquisite and perfect lyric poem... the sonnet or ballad, etc... By way of example, he sites a rather unknown Spanish poet whose fame rests upon a single perfect sonnet. Why then, he asks, should Cervantes' flawed novel be considered "greater" than this perfect sonnet.

Ultimately, he recognizes that for a work of art to attain the highest level of canonic status it is necessary that it be something more than a perfect flawless gem. The scale and scope of the work... and its subsequent impact upon all that follows it... must be taken into consideration. This painting by Manet is absolutely exquisite:

http://farm7.static.flickr.com/6170/6178488752_516ea0676a_b.jpg

It is considered a "painter's painting"... a perfect little gem that displays an absolute mastery of touch and handling of paint. Yet obviously it cannot rival this painting that is far more ambitious, innovative, ground-breaking, and influential:

http://farm7.static.flickr.com/6176/6178488786_8b9e7c95ae_b.jpg

Neither of these paintings can rival a truly immense achievement such as Giotto's Arena Chapel:

http://farm7.static.flickr.com/6153/6178488958_52feb11da8_b.jpg

By the same token, this is a brilliant gem of music:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KpOtuoHL45Y

But it cannot rival Bach's St. Matthew Passion, Beethoven's 9th Symphony, or Wagner's Ring des Nibelungens.

Scale... breadth and depth... is certainly something considered in evaluating a work of art or an artist. Michelangelo would not have been seen as such a towering figure had his paintings been miniatures and his sculpture mere figurines. The superhuman scale and the degree of achievement within this scale is essential to his reputation. The reputation of a painter like Van Gogh, a writer like Kafka or Borges, and a composer like Schumann and Schubert may rest largely upon smaller works... but the number... the breadth and scale of these accumulated works... is enough to place them with the highest echelon of artists... even if no single work by them stands along side a towering achievement like Dante's Comedia, Wagner's Ring, or Michelangelo's Last Judgment.

Very very very true. Now most books, prizes, awards are totally dominated by the west. There are of course the greater books than what the west can give in the east.

Here you are expressing no less of a bias than those who ignore the achievements outside of Europe and America.

JBI

09-24-2011, 01:18 PM

So you don't think that
1.The Iliad
2.The Odyssey
3.The Divine Comedy
4.The Plays of Shakespeare
5.The Shahnameh
6.The Mahabharata
7.War and Peace
8.The Dream of the Red Chamber
9.The Aeneid
or
10. The Ramayana
stand out prominently even amongst great works of literature? Past a certain level, no books distinguish themselves especially and any one of a hundred would be interchangeable with each other and balanced in terms of artistry? Is there no pinnacle of achievement in your reckoning?

Until you throw in other great texts, and it destabilizes the list. Why The Odyssey and not Genji, why the Aeneid and not Ovid? Why isn't Goethe on there? Why is War and Peace and not Eugene Onegin? I would change the Dream for the Jade Terrace Poems, or the Wenxuan selection. Likewise, it's hard to understand the book properly without a canon behind it - the book is a sustained allegory - how do you understand the allegory without looking at religious texts behind it? how to understand books discussed within the books - romancing on plays by authors outside the books, quoting poems, Confucian classics - the world is far messier than 10 books - the Bible should be on the list too, should it not? What of the Koran?

Very very very true. Now most books, prizes, awards are totally dominated by the west. There are of course the greater books than what the west can give in the east.

Here you are expressing no less of a bias than those who ignore the achievements outside of Europe and America.

Or the fact that there are many, many book awards in non-Western countries that nobody knows about. Lets be honest, it would make sense that "Western" award only have "Western" winners as they are discussing the values of authors in the west, by the west, for the west.

A pack of Swedes don't make up all of the academies of the world.

OPTiiMUM

09-24-2011, 02:43 PM

By way of example, he sites a rather unknown Spanish poet whose fame rests upon a single perfect sonnet.

May I ask who this is?

PeterL

09-24-2011, 03:22 PM

If you think that more than two of the top 10 texts of all time are writen in the same language, you're biased.

True or false?

Yes, either true or false, it makes no difference.

Any such list would be completely a matter of personal opinion, which is completely a matter od bias, if one calls it that. Such opinions are either completely unbiased or perfectly biased, depending one one's perspective.

mortalterror

09-24-2011, 07:53 PM

Why The Odyssey and not Genji,
Because I love The Odyssey and am not crazy about Genji. I read the first 250 pages and the hero turns out to be a pedophile serial rapist kidnapper, but the author insists on painting him in the most flattering colors as the ideal man and a bodhisattva, some kind of modern day saint who glows and can do no wrong. That just turned my stomach when I read it. I hear he even screws his step mother later because she reminds him of his mom.

why the Aeneid and not Ovid?
Personally, I would go with the Metamorphoses over the Aeneid if it were just a matter of my opinion, but history has made it's opinion more than clear on this point, and I can see a few spots in the Metamorphoses that drag or aren't up to snuff.

Why isn't Goethe on there?
Because it should probably be a top 15 or 20 to get all of the really big hitters on it. Besides, I think Goethe is a little below the ranks of Shakespeare and Dante. Not alot. Just about as much as Milton or Tasso or Ovid. The difference in the talent level is slight, but I think it's still perceptible to a keen observer.

Why is War and Peace and not Eugene Onegin?
Because War and Peace is a much better work than Eugene Onegin, and though Onegin is hugely influential in Russia it wasn't very influential on the world stage.

I would change the Dream for the Jade Terrace Poems, or the Wenxuan selection.
I like the Jade Terrace Poems but from the couple of hundred pages I've read of The Dream, and from it's reputation as the greatest novel in the entire Chinese canon, I stand by that choice. I chose the Dream not just because it's generally considered their best novel, but because it's the only one of their classic novels with a prose style I actually enjoy.

the Bible should be on the list too, should it not? What of the Koran?
I generally try to separate religious works from secular works in such lists.

Your list is also biased with just Epics, plays or novels ... why does great works need to be these genres? Unless by great you also mean long ...
Yes, that is so. I believe that longer forms are more difficult and give the artist more opportunity to display his talent than shorter forms. I don't think you can reach the very greatest of literary effects or play on the most awesome of human emotions in just a page or two. The greatest artists, your Homers, your Dantes, your Shakespeares can create all of the great experiences which other artists do with a line, a paragraph, or a page, but they arrange a series of these moments in a sequence and the whole is greater than the sum of it's parts.

lawpark

09-24-2011, 09:12 PM

Mr.lucifer

09-24-2011, 10:07 PM

Isn't it actually debated on which one of tolstoy's epics is better? What about Don Quixote?

cafolini

09-24-2011, 10:57 PM

Great is strictly a matter of preference. But important could be just a one-liner if the moment lends enough to the interpreter. Famous works are just pure propaganda as fame always made people read a lot more than what could be important to them. Fame is a marketting proposition. Sticking to the classics in a bountiful world like today's is a sad aberration.

Mutatis-Mutandis

09-24-2011, 11:25 PM

stlukesguild

09-25-2011, 02:40 PM

So many variables go into making these lists that the lists becomes irrelevant. Mortalterror is indicating that he is factoring in historical "importance" in the ranking, giving that as one of the reasons Onegin is not on the list. But, why should historical importance matter? Because a work isn't as recognized as being good or impactful, it therefore isn't? Of course, there are arguments for both answers, but it is just an example of how these lists are pretty much solely subjective opinions clouded by declaratives.

Obviously, judgments of art are all opinion... but some opinions, you will probably agree, are better than others. When you go to the doctor with certain symptoms, he or she commonly bases the treatment upon an educated opinion. If the treatment fails to improve the symptoms then tests may be ordered that will identify the cause more objectively ("Yes, the throat culture proved positive for Strep"). Even though I recognize that the doctor's opinion with regard to my sore throat and running nose is simply an opinion, I recognize that his or her opinion is probably worth more than that of a plumber or college literature professor. The value of the opinion has nothing to do with intelligence and everything to do with the experience of the individual.

I would suggest the same applies to the valuation of art. Some opinions are worth more than others. Some individuals have invested far more time and effort in the study, understanding, appreciation, preservation, and creation of art: scholars withing the given field: historians, critics, other artists, and ultimately the informed art lover. Just as two doctors may differ with regard to their opinion and subsequent treatment of my symptoms, so there is no guarantee that the opinions of two well-read individuals, or scholars, or critics will always me the same. There will be disagreements. It is the nature of opinion.

The closest we may come to subjective opinion regarding art is to consider something of the collective opinion of the informed art lovers/experts. According to such opinion, Shakespeare, Bach, Mozart, Dante, Michelangelo, Rubens, Rembrandt, Homer, Tolstoy, Beethoven... are among the most towering figures of Western culture. Their reputation has nothing to do with marketing (although such thinking is quite popular among mediocre academics and quickly picked up on by the usual sophomore as a means of justifying the fact that they don't like this or that artist that ranks among the "greats"). It would seem that the mechanics behind what art works and what artists enter an imagined pantheon or canon is complex... but it certainly includes "influence", scale and breadth of the work, continued relevance, formal innovation, etc...

When dismissing the work of a canonical artist, the individual must recognize that personal opinion is not enough. This is likely to be challenged by others of a different opinion. Ultimately, all such comments are just as pointless as absolute statements as to the superiority of this or that artist over all others. While I may agree with the proposition that Bach is the single greatest composer ever, I recognize strong arguments may be made for Beethoven, Mozart, Handel, Wagner... perhaps even Duke Ellington or Miles Davis. At the same time, I recognize that while I may not particularly like James Joyce (I don't) my opinion is not likely to affect his canonical status which is well deserved considering the opinions of others who do quite admire... love his work.

If you think there are ten top texts, you are biased

I like JBI's take on such lists. I certainly think there are ten top texts... but I am biased... and I recognize that others may make strong arguments for ten alternative texts to my own. Mortalterror's list contains a brilliant body of literature... but for every book on his list, one might name a worthy alternative:

1.The Iliad- The Bible
2.The Odyssey- The Oresteia
3.The Divine Comedy- The Qur'an
4.The Plays of Shakespeare- The Collected Works of Goethe
5.The Shahnameh- The Arabian Nights
6.The Mahabharata- The Manyoshu or the Kokin Wakashū
7.War and Peace- The Rise and Fall of the Roman Empire
8.The Dream of the Red Chamber- Don Quixote
9.The Aeneid- The Metamorphoses of Ovid
10. The Ramayana-The Essay of Michel de Montaigne

Mr.lucifer

09-25-2011, 05:08 PM

I have next to zilch experience with the top tier masterworks of literature, and I that lists are for mostly fun and make for a good discussion, but why not make just a list of all the greatest books with no specific number just for the sake of not missing any?

When it comes to great writers, I will only care about them if they move me. I won't dismiss this quality just because I don't like them though.

lawpark

09-25-2011, 05:21 PM

I just recalled I have posted my top 10 before, actually one that favors shorter works ...

http://www.online-literature.com/forums/showthread.php?p=1056638#post1056638

With the simple reason that shorter works are probably actually more read than longer works!

Mutatis-Mutandis

09-25-2011, 09:53 PM

Obviously, judgments of art are all opinion... but some opinions, you will probably agree, are better than others. When you go to the doctor with certain symptoms, he or she commonly bases the treatment upon an educated opinion. If the treatment fails to improve the symptoms then tests may be ordered that will identify the cause more objectively ("Yes, the throat culture proved positive for Strep"). Even though I recognize that the doctor's opinion with regard to my sore throat and running nose is simply an opinion, I recognize that his or her opinion is probably worth more than that of a plumber or college literature professor. The value of the opinion has nothing to do with intelligence and everything to do with the experience of the individual.

I would suggest the same applies to the valuation of art. Some opinions are worth more than others. Some individuals have invested far more time and effort in the study, understanding, appreciation, preservation, and creation of art: scholars withing the given field: historians, critics, other artists, and ultimately the informed art lover. Just as two doctors may differ with regard to their opinion and subsequent treatment of my symptoms, so there is no guarantee that the opinions of two well-read individuals, or scholars, or critics will always me the same. There will be disagreements. It is the nature of opinion.
I agree with your statement, but I think the nature of art is so completely different from the nature of science (in which a doctor works in), that the lines between "good" and "bad" opinion become much more blurred. A doctor works in a field with results and research, facts and calculations. Artists work in a field dealing with emotion and aesthetics, words and sound. One is much harder to value than the other. It is usually clear who a good doctor is--he knows his stuff, he makes you feel better, he helps cure you of your illnesses. If he doesn't, one looks for a better doctor. Not many will argue who is a good doctor when concrete associations to the results of that doctor's work can be made.

Now, an artist can make one feel better and know his stuff, and many will love his work, and many will hate it. How does one value these opinions? We can assume our (as people who are more familiar with art than the average man) opinion is better than the every-man's (and, in all honesty, I think it is) . . . but still, who is to say that just because we can't find sublimity in something like Twilight that someone else can't? How can we say, assuredly, that it is trash when so many people love it? We can point to syntax and themes and diction and all the horrible metaphors, but that doesn't change the happiness it gives to so many.

cafolini

09-25-2011, 10:57 PM

I think you contradict your own argument throughout. Plus I don't think there are any canonical works that stand as such since the postmodern age started in the 20th century.
Besides I'll defend marketting against the so-called canons, since their studies are based precisely on opinion and the inertiae of todays media. There is nothing cheap about marketting, and I say that without being associated in any direct way with that field. I am a writer and recognize my ability in that field as an ability to buy marketting as they buy my stuff.
This is not just a matter of opinion, but a more complete view of what's actually going on today.

stlukesguild

09-26-2011, 12:43 AM

I think you contradict your own argument throughout.

Really? Where? Blanket statements call for proof... examples.

Plus I don't think there are any canonical works that stand as such since the postmodern age started in the 20th century.

There is no canonical work that still stands since the start of the "postmodern age" (however you define that)... or no new canonical work since the start of the 20th century? I would question both. Again... such ideas sound like the regurgitation of Lit Crit 101. It seems that Dante and Shakespeare still fill our bookstores and universities. Mozart and Bach continue to sell out concert halls and recordings, and were a major Rembrandt to come upon the auction block, it would surely fetch a price tag equal to the GNP of many smaller nations.

Besides I'll defend marketting against the so-called canons, since their studies are based precisely on opinion and the inertiae of todays media.

What has marketing to do with any canon? The majority of the works of art that exist in any imagined canon were absorbed into said canon well before the mass media marketing. A good majority of the canonical works of art are far from meeting some ideal suited to meet the lowest common denominator/largest possible audience. Indeed, a good majority of the artists and art works absorbed into the canon challenge the very values of those in power (albeit subtly) in such a way that one cannot argue that they were chosen to reinforce the values of those in power. If one considers Shakespeare's amorality (recognized and hated by Tolstoy), his probable bisexuality, and his possible love affair with a black (or mulatto) woman he becomes the least obvious candidate to promote as the "greatest writer in English" just as Michelangelo with his blatant homoeroticism... his doubts and his frustrations is far from the ideal voice of the Renaissance or the Catholic Church. Their reputations stand upon the opinions of later artists, art lovers, critics, etc... not "marketing."

The popularity of a work of art or an artist during their lifetime is irrelevant to the question of artistic merit. It says nothing for nor against. There have been artists who were incredibly popular and successful in their time who faded into obscurity... and others who remain recognized as major figures. As you suggest, popularity... sales... financial success is the result of many complex realities... the least important being merit. Marketing can only manipulate the market to a given degree. The vast majority of the popular songs of our parent's generation will die out and disappear along with them. Only certain works/artist will survive: that which continues to resonate with later audiences and later artists. A book like Jonathan Livingston Seagull sold hundreds of millions of copies in its time. Today it is all but forgotten... and those who once sang its praises as a "masterpiece" are now embarrassed to admit they ever even read the book.

cafolini

09-26-2011, 12:48 PM

Will see. Marketting is today's merit in action. Expanding and promoting evolution with the largest multiplicity ever seen.

mortalterror

09-27-2011, 03:59 AM

If scale is needed, then the question is how much scale is enough? On that count, the top one in the world should clearly be Mahabharata.

Shakespeare's works are also quite short ... and unless you force them into a collection, they wouldn't really have the scale to compete it seems.

I actually feel like the preference for scale is somewhat "Western" ... but I could be mistaken. In any case, it is a convenient reasons to get rid of Persian ghazals, Japanese Haikus, Chinese poems, Indian bhakti hymns ...

The question of scale is an important one. I've never seen an artist hit those really high notes in less than 40 or 50 pages. Usually, it takes at least 100. On the short end, you have masterpieces like The Book of Job, The Bhagavadgita, Oedipus Rex, Antigone, or Hamlet. This gives the artist room to work and show off his skills in ways a shorter work of a few lines does not.

As far as Shakespeare goes, the reason I say a collection of his plays would be best is because I don't think you see everything he can do in any one of his plays. He is so multi-talented that you need Hamlet, Romeo and Juliet, King Lear, Julius Caesar, Macbeth, Henry IV part I, The Tempest or Twelfth Night, and Richard III to get an accurate reading on the scope of his abilities. Tolstoy shows you everything he is famous for in War and Peace or Anna Karenina, so a single novel works for him.

You ask about the Mahabharata, and say that if all I'm judging works by is scale then clearly it should be the greatest. That is not so. There are many works as long or longer than the Mahabharata. The Epic of Manas, The Epic of King Gesar, Nanso Satomi Hakkenden, In Search of Lost Time, Romance of the Three Kingdoms, Devta, Les Rougon-Macquart, or La Comedie Humaine. There are many long novels which are not written by the very greatest artists which do not reach their full potential, or for one reason or another are not as good as the works I've listed previously. I am not favoring War and Peace, Dream of the Red Chamber, or The Mahabharata because they are so lengthy. I approve of them because they represent the greatest achievements we've yet to make in the field of literature.

The Iroha is a beautiful and interesting poem, but it cannot match the intensity, or the complexity, the depth of thought present in Firdawsi's Shahnameh. There are many hundreds of such Iroha experiences in Firdawsi's long poem. You simply cannot express in detail a really big idea with a very small poem. Michelangelo needed the entire Sistine Chapel to express his ideas about Man, God, Love, Beauty, Life, and Death. He couldn't say all he wanted to say in just a small 12" by 10" frame. Likewise, Wagner couldn't say everything he needed to say in The Ring of the Nibelung if it were a three minute pop song. Did they need every bit of space they used? Probably not. They could probably edit bits here or there to some slight improvement, but they needed most of it.

Furthermore, I don't think that a preference for longer works is a Western value. Sonnets, Villanelles, Limericks, Epigrams, Sestinas, short Lyrics, and Short Stories are all very popular in the west.

You give your list as:

1. Confucius' Analects
2. Three Hundred Tang Poems
3. Bhagavadgita
4. Shakespeare's Hamlet
5. Bible
6. Quran
7. Buddha's Samyutta Nikaya (and its corresponding northern recension)
8. Cervante's Don Quixote
9. Marx's Communist Manisfesto
10. Illiad

I happen to have a collection of Three Hundred Tang Poems beside me and the poems run to 180 pages. When I read Confucius' Analects that was about 200 pages as well. My Bhagavadgita is 97 pages long. Hamlet in a regular text and volume is over 100 pages easily. The Bible, the Quran, and the sayings of Buddha, I don't count because they aren't primarily literature. There is stuff in the Bible that doesn't work as literature but does work as theology, which makes that kind of work very difficult to categorize or judge. Also, Marx's Manifesto isn't literature. It's non-fiction, which is why I didn't include StLuke's suggestion of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire or the Essays of Montaigne. Beautifully written, secular, intelligent, thoughtful, at many points exciting... still not literature. Don Quixote is 800 pages and the Iliad is about 600.

I don't see you championing any super short texts yourself Lawpark. At best, you champion collections of short works. I expected you to claim that Li Bai's poem "Tianmu Mountain Ascended in a Dream" was every bit the artistic achievement as Luo Guanzhong's Romance of the Three Kingdoms or that Basho's "Frog Haiku" was the equal of Murasaki Shikibu's Tale of Genji.

JCamilo

09-27-2011, 10:28 AM

mortalterror

09-27-2011, 01:47 PM

You mean, not fiction, because as literature goes, Montaigne or Gibbon have nothing to fear. As far as we know, any piece of ancient literature was not build as literature. (The claim of lack religiousity of Homer for example is a clearly christian bias. In accient oral societies such as his greece, that kind of oral perform is clearly religious, his calling to the goddess not a style as would be to the Virgils, Camoes, etc, but rather a normal religious procedure.)
I'll give you that. The Iliad and the Odyssey are probably as religiously oriented as say Aeschylus plays. But that is almost on the level of Herbert and Donne's religious poetry, more entertainment than dogma. The Dhammapada is something different. As revered as Homer was, nobody used his poetry for scripture.

I would agree for the bible too. It quite easy to throw the bible as if all work is really an unity, not a collected work. If you are going by collected works, it would be the same as saying "Collected works of Tchekhov" or "Sonnets of portuguese", as they give on some breath to build a considerable work of literature, which would be no different from Homer, was we know he was a short poem singer, not a long poem writer. He was not nodding, he was a dead when his books got so bigger.

Yes and no. The Bible is definitely a work of accretion, and Homer's work was certainly redacted, but I think you can ascribe about 95% of it to the work of just one rhapsodist.

The model I use for Homer is Chaucer. Chaucer wrote The Canterbury Tales about 1400. He left it incomplete, cut the scale to half the size of his originally planned poem by the time he was done, left entire chapters in prose, and others unfinished. Then about ten or twenty years after he dies guys like John Lydgate and other anonymous poets added stories in the style of Chaucer to make it more complete and finished looking. Chaucer still wrote about 95% of the book as written, with inconsistencies and all, and nobody says there was no such person as Chaucer. However, we are close enough in time to realize, "Hey, John Lydgate wrote that section. Let's take it out the next time we publish a copy of the Canterbury Tales."

Homer's books don't receive that kind of close academic scrutiny until the third century BC in the library of Alexandria, more than 4 centuries after he's written them, so some things are left in. For instance, there is that spurious section at the beginning of Book 2 where a long list of ships and officers is rattled off. The quality of the writing is far beneath Homer's elsewhere in the poem, and if you check the length of the books they usually fall into groups of about 500-700 lines per incident. Book 2 is over 1000 and the numbering starts at around line 570. Also, right after all of that comes Book 3 when Priam asks Helen to point out the notable Greek commanders from their assembled army, making the previous section redundant. Going back to your Biblical comparison, this section reads a lot like the section of Genesis which names all of Adam's progeny, their progeny, and how long each lived. Both are totally unnecessary to the larger narrative and obviously added at a later date.

One reason I consider Chaucer as a modern day Homer is because he mostly worked from previous sources. All of his stories are taken from earlier writers such as Boccaccio, Petrarch, Ovid, Dante, or The Bible and reworked in his own style and language. There were many earlier tales of Troy but none as masterful as what he turned them into.

When you say that Homer wrote a short song that grew and grew as others added to it, I don't entirely agree. I think most of the poem is as he wrote it with a few notable exceptions. For instance, in the embassy to Achilles the number of people changes at times in the text. This is a little like the section of Job where a later writer inserted another character when Job's friends remonstrate with him about his calamities. I don't think the relative size of the story has changed too much. But it is clear that the poem was originally 8 or so interlocking poems, each singable in a three hour period, say at a festival feast. And the poet probably continued his song day to day, or would single out favorite sections by request or as the occasion required.

Now, some people claim that since The Odyssey came approximately 20 years after The Iliad they may be by different authors. But I find it to be more likely that the differences are all ascribable to age and experience. Chaucer's Troilus and Cressida is so different from The Canterbury Tales that unless you knew who Chaucer was you would have a hard time guessing they were by the same author. Furthermore, it probably took Homer about 20 years to write The Odyssey after his early work on The Iliad. The alternative is too ludicrous to even consider. Within the space of 20 years, in the same city or thereabouts, in a practically illiterate society, the two greatest poets of all time, both bearing the same name, wrote nearly identical works, using the same language, style, imagery, characters etc. I just don't buy that. To me, Homer wrote Homer and Shakespeare wrote Shakespeare.

cafolini

09-27-2011, 02:43 PM

To me, as a historian, is obvious that the books of the Greeks were orally transmitted through many generations and were actually written much much later and to fake history so as to fit more the times they were written and it's lore than the actual historical times. I can't comprehend how someone could get so precisely imprecise as to claim that one of the oldest books is 20 years younger or older than another one.

JCamilo

09-27-2011, 04:00 PM

I'll give you that. The Iliad and the Odyssey are probably as religiously oriented as say Aeschylus plays. But that is almost on the level of Herbert and Donne's religious poetry, more entertainment than dogma. The Dhammapada is something different. As revered as Homer was, nobody used his poetry for scripture.

But then, the concept of scripture could not even exists on a oral tradition, such as homer and maybe, Hesiod. But the concept of holy word, was. Of course, the fact we are in blank about Homer, makes hard, but when we study the oral societies in africa, we see the position of oral storyteller which was Homer position was considered sacred. Pretty much, predating for example the position of sacred writer such as John, Mark, etc. Latter Muhammad will be the same, the oral word is sacred, from God. He is not a writer, he is a storyteller. Those "bards" had the near position as a priest, even allwoed to perform rituals such as wedding or funerals.

I would think we can see how different is Homer in Greece (he was still "canonical" and somehow a guide that even Plato didnt attack) to Virgil. We see Virgil is style derivated from Homer, he is formal, statal poetry. The more Octavio facribated the emperor divinity, the more we see it is more close to the medieval divine right of kings than the relation we see in oral socieities. Or in Prose Edda, a chronicle, even if we Snori pointed those stories about gods had origem in cults.

It seems rather unlikely to me to religious people like the greeks to have a venerable author or text and not a venerable religion tied to it, considering how close they are from their original myths.

Yes and no. The Bible is definitely a work of accretion, and Homer's work was certainly redacted, but I think you can ascribe about 95% of it to the work of just one rhapsodist.

I was more on the complete works case. It is mostly likely that Homer didnt wrote the entire iliad or odissey together, rather separeted chapters unified latter. It would be much similar to we get (similar as not quality, just an example), The complete Stories of Father Brown. Over 600 pages. Several short stories put together which unity and length was a latter editorial product. You can pretty much do it with every short story writer or small poems collection and say it is an work of length. Because that is what is done with Homer.

The model I use for Homer is Chaucer. Chaucer wrote The Canterbury Tales about 1400. He left it incomplete, cut the scale to half the size of his originally planned poem by the time he was done, left entire chapters in prose, and others unfinished. Then about ten or twenty years after he dies guys like John Lydgate and other anonymous poets added stories in the style of Chaucer to make it more complete and finished looking. Chaucer still wrote about 95% of the book as written, with inconsistencies and all, and nobody says there was no such person as Chaucer. However, we are close enough in time to realize, "Hey, John Lydgate wrote that section. Let's take it out the next time we publish a copy of the Canterbury Tales."

Oh, I am not much worried with Homer Question. If the odissey was not wrote by Homer but by another guy named Homer, does not matter much. I agree both works seems much like a single author work, but I think my opinion is a reflex of having read editions that threated him as such.

Homer's books don't receive that kind of close academic scrutiny until the third century BC in the library of Alexandria, more than 4 centuries after he's written them, so some things are left in. For instance, there is that spurious section at the beginning of Book 2 where a long list of ships and officers is rattled off. The quality of the writing is far beneath Homer's elsewhere in the poem, and if you check the length of the books they usually fall into groups of about 500-700 lines per incident. Book 2 is over 1000 and the numbering starts at around line 570. Also, right after all of that comes Book 3 when Priam asks Helen to point out the notable Greek commanders from their assembled army, making the previous section redundant. Going back to your Biblical comparison, this section reads a lot like the section of Genesis which names all of Adam's progeny, their progeny, and how long each lived. Both are totally unnecessary to the larger narrative and obviously added at a later date.

I think that is really a trait of religious texts, which are often recited to generals, kings etc and needed their praising. I see the militar parades, even Rio de Janeiro Carnaval and the listing gave me the feeling. I only suppose those passage make sense wth oral or musical approach. Something like, the momment Heavy Metal Bands of past wanted to look badasses.

One reason I consider Chaucer as a modern day Homer is because he mostly worked from previous sources. All of his stories are taken from earlier writers such as Boccaccio, Petrarch, Ovid, Dante, or The Bible and reworked in his own style and language. There were many earlier tales of Troy but none as masterful as what he turned them into.

When you say that Homer wrote a short song that grew and grew as others added to it, I don't entirely agree. I think most of the poem is as he wrote it with a few notable exceptions. For instance, in the embassy to Achilles the number of people changes at times in the text. This is a little like the section of Job where a later writer inserted another character when Job's friends remonstrate with him about his calamities. I don't think the relative size of the story has changed too much. But it is clear that the poem was originally 8 or so interlocking poems, each singable in a three hour period, say at a festival feast. And the poet probably continued his song day to day, or would single out favorite sections by request or as the occasion required.

I think i wasnt clear. It is not that homer wrote a small line that gets bigger. It is more likely that each chapter was created and performed apart and put together lately. The unity (the odissey was even split in more than one part) is not part of creation, like it was, for example, War and Peace each chapter. I think your example of Complete Works of Shakespeare is a good example too. Why not the complete works of Petrarch? Or Wordsworth? Or Schiller? Or Borges? Any small forms masters which strength is shown by their entire career and not by a single work. Much as Homer.

Now, some people claim that since The Odyssey came approximately 20 years after The Iliad they may be by different authors. But I find it to be more likely that the differences are all ascribable to age and experience. Chaucer's Troilus and Cressida is so different from The Canterbury Tales that unless you knew who Chaucer was you would have a hard time guessing they were by the same author. Furthermore, it probably took Homer about 20 years to write The Odyssey after his early work on The Iliad. The alternative is too ludicrous to even consider. Within the space of 20 years, in the same city or thereabouts, in a practically illiterate society, the two greatest poets of all time, both bearing the same name, wrote nearly identical works, using the same language, style, imagery, characters etc. I just don't buy that. To me, Homer wrote Homer and Shakespeare wrote Shakespeare.

While I think the argument can go both ways, that also a group of authors can pull out an entire work such Iliad with similar style, my point was more towards the unity of Iliad or Odissey, than Homer authorship.

lawpark

09-27-2011, 11:30 PM

You ask about the Mahabharata, and say that if all I'm judging works by is scale then clearly it should be the greatest. That is not so. There are many works as long or longer than the Mahabharata. The Epic of Manas, The Epic of King Gesar, Nanso Satomi Hakkenden, In Search of Lost Time, Romance of the Three Kingdoms, Devta, Les Rougon-Macquart, or La Comedie Humaine.

Romance of Three Kingdoms do not "feel" as long as Mahabharata for sure - the Chicago English version of Mahabharata is a 10 thick-volumes ... in Chinese Three Kingdoms is only 4 medium-sized volumes. I have always read that Mahabharata is the longest Epic / poetry ever-written. Was I reading crap?

The Iroha is a beautiful and interesting poem, but it cannot match the intensity, or the complexity, the depth of thought present in Firdawsi's Shahnameh. There are many hundreds of such Iroha experiences in Firdawsi's long poem. You simply cannot express in detail a really big idea with a very small poem.

I am guessing short poetry probably would be more intense. And why is literature judged by complexity, and not simplicity? If depth of thought / big idea becomes a key criteria for good literature, are we actually changing topic to philosophy? Is one greatest experience worth more than many mediocre ones?

I am actually not disagreeing with what you are saying, I can definitely see that (and was told to look for those when at school), I am just questioning whether those criteria are what I (we) should be accepting.

Furthermore, I don't think that a preference for longer works is a Western value. Sonnets, Villanelles, Limericks, Epigrams, Sestinas, short Lyrics, and Short Stories are all very popular in the west.

But none of them makes it into your top 10 ... even for Shakespeare you go for his complete plays and not his complete works. And I actually do think your list is quite a good worldwide literature list.

I don't see you championing any super short texts yourself Lawpark. At best, you champion collections of short works. I expected you to claim that Li Bai's poem "Tianmu Mountain Ascended in a Dream" was every bit the artistic achievement as Luo Guanzhong's Romance of the Three Kingdoms or that Basho's "Frog Haiku" was the equal of Murasaki Shikibu's Tale of Genji.

My selection of 10 works are quite simply based on rough numerical representation ... for some, like the Ancient Greek tradition, there is really not much choice (both Iliad and Odyssey roughly as long). For others, I just don't know anything more (e.g. for the early Spanish-language work, the only one I know of is Don Quixote). When I can (from "influence" standpoint), I pick shorter ones - Bhagavadgita over Mahabharata, Communist Manifesto over The Capital, etc.

Oh, anyday I would take Li Bai over Luo Guanzhong - no question at all about that one.

JBI

09-28-2011, 02:35 AM

Meh, all of poetry works as a long text. I mean, you cannot even come close to just reading one poem, or one book of poems - even Homer is contextualized to an extent. Try reading something like The Waste Land as an isolated work. The concept of one work is rather useless - each play has acts, should we choose amongst them? How do you designate 10? If we can include all of Shakespeare, could we include the whole Confucian Canon? Or the whole poetic tradition of a culture?

mortalterror

09-28-2011, 09:57 AM

Romance of Three Kingdoms do not "feel" as long as Mahabharata for sure - the Chicago English version of Mahabharata is a 10 thick-volumes ... in Chinese Three Kingdoms is only 4 medium-sized volumes. I have always read that Mahabharata is the longest Epic / poetry ever-written. Was I reading crap?
That's not crap, but it's not entirely correct. I have the four volume Three Kindoms set, and I've seen the only complete English set of The Mahabharata which is 4 much larger volumes. Mahabharata is massive, but it is not the most massive, or only massive book. Consider these behemoths:

Epic Poetry
Epic of King Gesar 120 volumes, more than one million verses
Epic of Manas 500,000 lines
Mahabharata 1.8 million words, 10 volumes, 180,000 lines,
Shahnameh 60,000 verses, 9 volumes
Orlando Furioso 38,736 lines
Faerie Queen 36,000 lines
Novels
Devta 11,206,310 words, 53 volumes
Artemene 2.1 million words
In Search of Lost Time 1,500,000 words
Clarissa 1 million words
Hakkenden 960,000 words
Romance of the Three Kingdoms 800,000 words
Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire about 700,000 words
Dream of the Red Chamber 625,000 words
Novel cycles
The Human Comedy 100 volumes
Rougon-Macquart cycle 20 volumes

I am guessing short poetry probably would be more intense. And why is literature judged by complexity, and not simplicity? If depth of thought / big idea becomes a key criteria for good literature, are we actually changing topic to philosophy? Is one greatest experience worth more than many mediocre ones?
But is short poetry more intense than longer poetry? Do they even tap into the same emotions?

I am actually not disagreeing with what you are saying, I can definitely see that (and was told to look for those when at school), I am just questioning whether those criteria are what I (we) should be accepting.
There is some merit to your remarks and I definitely see what you are saying. I think Callimachus put it quite well when he wrote:

The malignant gnomes who write reviews in Rhodes
are muttering about my poetry again -
tone-deaf ignoramuses out of touch with the Muse-
because I have not consummated a continuous epic
of thousands of lines on heroes and lords
but turn out minor texts as if I were a child
although my decades of years are substantial.
To which brood of cirrhotic adepts
I, Callimachus, thus:

A few distichs in the pan outweight Demeter’s Cornucopia
and Mimnermos is sweet for a few subtle lines,
not that fat Ladypoem Let “cranes fly south to Egypt”
when they lust for pygmy blood,
and “the Massagetai arch arrows long distance”
to lodge in a Mede,
but nightingales are honey-pale
and small poems are sweet.
So evaporate, Green-Eyed Monsters,
or learn to judge poems by the critic’s art
instead of by the parasang,
and don’t snoop around here for a poem that rumbles:
not I but Zeus owns the thunder.

When I first put a tablet on my knees, the Wolf-God
Apollo appeared and said:
Fatten your animal for sacrifice, poet,
but keep your muse slender.”
And “follow trails unrutted by wagons,
don’t drive your chariot down public highways,
but keep to the back roads though the going is narrow.
We are the poets for those who love
the cricket’s high chirping, not the noise of the jackass.”

So there are things which short poems are capable of which long poems are incapable of and vice versa.

But none of them makes it into your top 10 ... even for Shakespeare you go for his complete plays and not his complete works. And I actually do think your list is quite a good worldwide literature list.
I didn't mean to imply that I thought Shakespeare's complete works should be held in the balance. Maybe his top 8 plays, or 4 or 5, but only giving him one would put him at too much of a disadvantage against equally good artists having much longer books to work with. Likewise, I see no problem in a writer of short works measuring a collection of their poems or short stories against a novel by someone else. I think that Hemingway's Short Stories or Baudelaire's Flowers of Evil would make nice editions to any list of the world's greatest literature. I just think that some people would object that they don't display the same kind of unity that a War and Peace or an Odyssey possesses and can't be considered on a 1 to 1 basis anyway. I mean, how do you balance the scales to give each writer his fair chance? How many short stories are equal to one novel? How many poems is it fair to judge against one epic? The Three Hundred Tang Poems is by 77 authors. Is that fair? I'm not sure I know.

My selection of 10 works are quite simply based on rough numerical representation ... for some, like the Ancient Greek tradition, there is really not much choice (both Iliad and Odyssey roughly as long). For others, I just don't know anything more (e.g. for the early Spanish-language work, the only one I know of is Don Quixote). When I can (from "influence" standpoint), I pick shorter ones - Bhagavadgita over Mahabharata, Communist Manifesto over The Capital, etc.

I can dig that. Most people don't have the time to read all of the Mahabharata but they should at least read the Bhagavadgita. In a similar fashion, Madame Bovary is a much shorter work than Anna Karenina which may be just as good. I'm also a big fan of Heart of Darkness for one of the greatest novels ever too.

Oh, anyday I would take Li Bai over Luo Guanzhong - no question at all about that one.
I haven't finished my copy of Three Kingdoms yet. I like to chip away slowly at my monsters, so I can't fully judge it's worth as yet. But so far I like Li Bai better too.

lawpark

09-28-2011, 09:37 PM

Thanks for educating me on all the long works!! well, I know for sure I wouldn't be finishing the complete version of King of Gesar in my life ...

Arrowni

09-30-2011, 08:21 AM

JCamilo

09-30-2011, 09:00 AM

What is there to discuss about language? Everyone know well that Shakespeare and Milton wrote in english, Voltaire and Victor Hugo in French, Cervantes and Lope in spanish, etc.

lawpark

09-30-2011, 10:50 AM

I love the fact that most people addressed two obvious elements of the question (biasedness and the corpus itself), but so far they've failed to discuss throughly the most meaningful one: the language.

If we agree that a piece of literature is best read in its original language, then the most influential works of literature should by necessity be read by many people who can still understand the original (written) languages in which the works were written.

On the other hand, influence can't really just be current popularity, and I would argue that older works (as long as they remain in the Canon ... in this category I actually would exclude "excavated" works like the Epic of Gilgamesh) are generally more influential than later works, for the simple fact that the earlier works have the possibilities of influencing later works, but not vice versa.

We can assume on a statistical basis literary influential works are generally evenly spread-out in proportion to the number of people literate (across langauges), but that would rule out a specific factor of "prestige" out of the consideration - in reality, there might have been as much "good works" in Portuguese than in Italian, but somehow in prestige terms works in the later language clearly considered more influential than the former.

So the criteria here is:
- Works written early
- Yet continued to be read by sizable literate public in its original (written) language
- Language prestige

Statistically, pure math should suggest that Chinese works would need to be over-represented in a top 100 or top 1000 work list (when statistics start to matter), both because it started early enough and (some portion of) its written language is still taught to most high-schoolers in China. Lower prestige than English for sure, but nowadays probably not much lower than any other language.

Next might be Sanskrit - as early (oral versions earlier, written versions later) as Chinese, still learnt by those interested in learning the language in high-school under the 3-language formula. High prestige

Pali is of similar age to Sanskrit - and probably still learnt by monks in Sri Lanka, Myanmar and Thailand - just a guess would be less populous than Sanskrit learners, probably also less than Greek and Latin. Lower prestige than Sanskrit.

Greek is as early as Chinese / Sanskrit, but sizable literate public? Much smaller. High prestige

Latin is later (by some 500 years), and I guess literate public in Latin is about the same size as Greek, or slightly larger. High prestige

Tamil is next in line timing wise, but current literacy % of its ancient form probably not that high in my guess. Lower prestige than Sanskrit

Arabic is yet some 500 years later, but still taught widely in the Arabic world (I guess ~200-300M folks nowadays), plus Muslim who needs to learn Quran in Arabic. High prestige

Japanese is probably about the same age as Arabic in terms of the earliest texts, literacy is high nowadays out of a smaller population (120M?). Lower prestige than Chinese if we talk about works before 1900.

New Persian is another 4-500 years later, but current literate people probably less than Arabic. Prestigious, but not as much as Arabic.

Tibetan might be even slightly earlier than New Persian, but current population is probably an order of magnitude smaller than Persians. Low prestige.

Very roughly speaking, English, Spanish, Portguese, French, German are 2-4 centuries after New Persians (now I am discounting the likes of Bede's works, and start counting with the likes of Chaucer, somewhat arbitrarily). And within this set, English is most understood and has highest prestige now, followed by Spanish. French and German have prestige over Spanish I guess, but population wise on the order of Japanese only. Portuguese is more probably on the order of French and German combined, but prestige-wise could be lower than Spanish

Turkish is probably of the same literary vintage (in age), and prestige probably similar to Portuguese, with a ~100M or so current population. It is also very unclear to me with script change how much of the more ancient texts are actually still accessible to the literary public. Low prestige.

Hindi-Urdu is very late in formation (maybe 17th century for Urdu as literary language, and Hindi arguably only in the 19th), though some 16th century works by say Kabir are considered "understandable" enough to be counted in. Population-wise now estimates vary from above Portuguese to below Spanish. Probably Hindi still considered low prestige, Urdu might have fared better, possibly above Turkish.

Presumably the age of great Russian works are as late. Prestige probably slightly higher than Spanish? Used by maybe ~150-200M folks.

Bahasa (Malay-Indonesian) are probably late in formation, I am just not knowledgeable about its literary works to say more. I am not sure if there is a lot in fact. Possibly works that exists might be of Javanese-Bali languages.

Equally as late we might count in Bengali - prestige-wise probably similar / slightly lower than Hindi/Urdu; population ~250M. Age of great writers (Renaissance) is even slight later than the Russians.

Freudian Monkey

09-30-2011, 11:35 AM

All this talk about which language has the best prestige score made me feel sick.

JBI

09-30-2011, 12:10 PM

yeah, such a load of crap. Seriously, everyone knows that the most prestigious language is Old Church Slavonic, though Maltese comes as a close second.

lawpark

09-30-2011, 01:42 PM

If you feel sick, you should go see the doctor.

And yes, there are of course many more languages. But are there other ways to address the questions (besides calling the question itself crap) other than set up some criteria and then see how each language in question fits in?

mortalterror

09-30-2011, 02:23 PM

lawpark

09-30-2011, 04:49 PM

Lawpark, I'm a little confused by your criteria. On the one hand, you seem to be saying that only the languages still in regular use by large portions of the world's population should be considered canonical. Thus, languages like Chinese and Greek are still in, but Tamil, Sanskrit, and Latin are out. But then, even Chinese and Greek aren't the same as they were some twenty-five centuries ago, and probably aren't understood by everyone in their own modern ethnic group. At the same time, the Jews and Hebrew aren't anything like a large portion of the population, yet their influence is felt throughout the globe. On the other hand, there are a billion people in Africa, and I don't think most people would consider their literary heritage on a par with that of the Jews. I don't believe you can weigh a literature by the size of it's modern population any more than you can by the ancientness of the written language. Your premise is somewhat flawed.

I agree that overall the criteria are not that refined. How would you answer the question Arrowni posted - how should one consider language balance in a canon list? I am interested in what you think.

In response to your questions, to refine on my earlier criteria a bit, I think what I am saying is:

- Influence needs to be measured somehow, I think my proposed criteria would be a mix of a) total people "influenced" by the texts and b) duration of the influence. Conceptually, it could just be "total people ever influenced in history" - but given the population explosion in the past two centuries, a Dan Brown probably would blow many canonical authors away to create a list that even I can't accept. Thus I think it needs to be a mix.

- There are different levels of influence at the current time, from a language balance perspectives, there are at least 2-3 levels: A) original language still taught and understood directly by a mass of population, without translation; B) original language still taught and understood by a good portion of academics / specially-trained professions, and the language is considered "classical" and thus widely translated in subsequent language; C) language really no longer understood by other than a handful of folks, predominantly understood through a translation. In Chinese high-school, written form of ancient Chinese are taught as a matter of course, so it is A). I assume Greek secondary schools would teach ancient Greek, so partially it is A), but for the majority of others in the world, Greek, Sanskrit, and Latin belongs to category B), and all these can be taken as secondary school classes, though maybe at most a 10% of students take these electives.

- To address questions like African vs. Hebrew, the criteria I inserted is the beginning of the literary tradition - ultimately we are talking about texts, so it would work in this case. Now if you ask the question of Hebrew, it is an interesting question. My counter question is, do you think Old Persian is an important literary language in a canon? On one hand, there is almost not text available in that language. But it is presumably what Zoroastrianism (possibly earlier than Judaism as a monotheistic religion) which probably has the type of influence on some Hebrew Old Testament texts, similar (but potentially less direct) to Hebrew on Greek / Latin / Syriac / Ethiopian (Christianity) and Arabic (Islam). Old Persian also clearly influenced Middle Persian, where Avestan texts remained, and are still used as a liturgical language by maybe 2M Parsis in India. So my thought is Old Persian is probably less influential than Hebrew (based on current population, and strength of influence on later traditions), but given its potentially more "ancient" in the sense that Old Persian likely to have influenced Hebrew texts more than the other way round. So Old Persian is likely less influential than Hebrew, but not by much. In a canon list, I wouldn't feel compelled to include Old Persian, thus in the same vein, I am feeling the same for Hebrew. Other than Old Persian, you can ask the same questions on Aramaic / Syriac.

All this still comes back to the original question. What criteria can we use to weigh balance of languages in a canon list?

stlukesguild

09-30-2011, 05:15 PM

JBI

09-30-2011, 06:59 PM

Statistically, pure math should suggest that Chinese works would need to be over-represented in a top 100 or top 1000 work list (when statistics start to matter), both because it started early enough and (some portion of) its written language is still taught to most high-schoolers in China. Lower prestige than English for sure, but nowadays probably not much lower than any other language.

Unfortunately art is not egalitarian or even democratic. If we look to the visual arts where we are not confronted by the problems of translation we discover that there is no statistical correlation based upon population. We don't discover that for every 10 million individuals we get X-number of artistic geniuses. Countries such as Italy... in spite of their relative small scale in contrast to other nations... produced far more art of real genius than statistics suggest they should have. England, in spite of its wealth and power cannot rival France, Italy or even Holland in the visual arts. We discover the same thing in music. Even if we limit ourselves to the music of the West we find Germany/Austria absolutely dominates music to an extent far beyond what was achieved by France, Russia, England, and any number of other nations.

Still, countries like China have had a very strong literary culture and development throughout. The promotion of literacy and of writing through official program didn't hamper that - simply put, something like poetry has always been central to the culture, and the body of poetry, the sheer number of poems, are far heavier than Europe. That is excluding things like folk songs which also abound in the Chinese tradition, as they do in others.

Simply put, it is almost possible to weigh the Chinese tradition as a tradition against something as vast as the European tradition in terms of size, number of works, development, genre scope, richness, and any other number of criteria. That the texts as of now have not been translated is irrelevant, since, for the most part, 1/4 of the world population is privy to them in the original.

mortalterror

09-30-2011, 07:35 PM

Unfortunately art is not egalitarian or even democratic. If we look to the visual arts where we are not confronted by the problems of translation we discover that there is no statistical correlation based upon population. We don't discover that for every 10 million individuals we get X-number of artistic geniuses. Countries such as Italy... in spite of their relative small scale in contrast to other nations... produced far more art of real genius than statistics suggest they should have. England, in spite of its wealth and power cannot rival France, Italy or even Holland in the visual arts. We discover the same thing in music. Even if we limit ourselves to the music of the West we find Germany/Austria absolutely dominates music to an extent far beyond what was achieved by France, Russia, England, and any number of other nations.

I have to agree with StLukesGuild. Literature is not a numbers game. I'd rather the canon reflected aesthetics far more than populations. If we start valuing influence over merit then first rate writers in small isolated societies would be at a disadvantage to second rate writers of larger societies. English is spoken by almost 2 billion people today and Hungarian is only spoken by about 14 million people. Robert Browning and Janos Arany are contemporary European poets of roughly the same level. Should Robert Browning be more canonical or should they be equal? Should we stop reading Henrik Ibsen, the greatest playwright of the 19th century because he was Norwegian and only 5 million people can read him in his original language?

I think what Arrowni was getting at was how difficult it is to judge the worth of a work accurately when you don't speak the language it was written in and must rely upon translations to read it. But, of course, this is just the usual kind of kvetching you find on these boards. If you are reading bad translations which don't give a reasonable likeness to the original work, then your selection process and ability to gauge fidelity is in question anyway and you probably couldn't discriminate a good book from a bad book any more than you could a good translation from a bad one. Ta da! Problem solved.

That the texts as of now have not been translated is irrelevant, since, for the most part, 1/4 of the world population is privy to them in the original.

I'm of the opinion that the best Chinese literature has already been translated, in some cases several times, and is easily available through book shops, Amazon, or your local public library. I am literally sitting within footsteps of 20 different Chinese books, half a dozen of which I own. All of the major novels are here. The Book of Odes and the Three Hundred Tang Poems are represented. I have The Peony Pavilion, Pu Songling, Feng Menglong, Hanshan, Lu Xun, Lu Yu, essays by Han Yu. I have a handful of different anthologies full of different versions of Li Bai, Du Fu, Bai Juyi, Wang Wei, Qu Yuan, Tao Qian, Xu Ling, Yuan Zhen, Su Shi, Li Qingzhao, Li Houzhu, Yuan Mei, and Yuan Hongdao. I can get a hold of The Analects of Confucius, The Book of Mencius, or the Tao Te Ching at the drop of a hat. But do you know how many books my library has on Korean or Vietnamese literature? One each. The world is paying attention to China, JBI.

By the way Lawpark, Chinese was the written language of Vietnam, Korea, and Japan for a thousand years. Do the Chinese include those writings in their canon?

JBI

09-30-2011, 09:33 PM

Trust me, translation is not even. Japanese is well translated because of U.S. foreign policy for instance. I just finished reading an essay about how American interior decorating reflects the presence of the empire on the international scale, with the late 19th century beginning to show the American cosmopolitan presence in the world.

Japanese had the benefit of the Ford Foundation and the Japanese military funding excellent translations for years.

As for Chinese, much of it is still new ground. How many complete translations of Li Bai are there, or of Du Fu? the 300 tang poems is but a 300 poem sample, after all.

Or better yet, what of a wider range of texts, or translations without new-ageish philosophies behind them. Trust me not even 1/10 of the major canon has seen translation, much less good translation.

mortalterror

09-30-2011, 10:43 PM

How many complete translations of Li Bai are there, or of Du Fu?
That's a bad example. There are literally dozens if not hundreds of translations of those two poets. We may not have the absolute fringe, but we got those two covered.

Or better yet, what of a wider range of texts, or translations without new-ageish philosophies behind them. Trust me not even 1/10 of the major canon has seen translation, much less good translation.

I'm not sure I get your meaning. All of the new age type translations I see are coming out of the philosophy section of translation rather than the poetry or fiction sections.

Mr.lucifer

09-30-2011, 10:52 PM

I heard there weren't any good translations of chinese poetry.

JBI

09-30-2011, 11:34 PM

I heard there weren't any good translations of chinese poetry.

very very few.

As for another point Mortal, the author Jin Yong has solved hundreds of millions of novels, and had bootlegged copies of even more sold. His major novel, Eagle Shooting Heroes has yet to be translated into English.

If even something that popular hasn't been translated, what of more esoteric books like a complete Jade Terrace poems.

JCamilo

09-30-2011, 11:50 PM

Maybe they are translated, but the point is not well distributed. And I would say some of japanese gets more interest than not. Simply putting, as brazil usually shows a some contagion of USA culture, usually what is more central and has more market strength. Japanese modern prose and hai-ku poems are usual in libraries. Chinese is very rare (some female translations motivated by a recent centennial of chinese migration here). To find a collection of medieval "novellas" I had one old spanish edition. Dream of Red Chamber, I found only the imported penguin edition (and this because penguin signed a deal with a local publishing house).

Also, because Japanese anime, manga, etc are pretty much mainstream now, the number of japanese curses compared to chinese is considerable smaller, which probally make easier the japanese take over, compared to chinese.

mortalterror

10-01-2011, 07:59 AM

very very few.

As for another point Mortal, the author Jin Yong has solved hundreds of millions of novels, and had bootlegged copies of even more sold. His major novel, Eagle Shooting Heroes has yet to be translated into English.

If even something that popular hasn't been translated, what of more esoteric books like a complete Jade Terrace poems.

My local library has 58 of his novels in Chinese. If they remain untranslated, it is because he does not want them translated into English for some reason. However, when you and Lawpark were discussing him in the other Canon thread I did manage to find fan translations of many of his works such as this one. http://members.cox.net/foxs/loch.html

I remember this was the way most people had to read manga shortly before the U.S. began importing and publishing them en masse in every bookstore. Anyway, this definitely shows an interest and a strong potential market for Jin Yong's books. Even when they build a wall, the curious Americans come creeping over to find out what's on the other side.

JBI

10-01-2011, 09:43 AM

No, trust me, if this author wants anything, it is people reading his books - he is obsessed with the range of his texts.

The reason they have yet to come out in official translation is they keep getting canceled or delayed. His major work was commissioned but never solidified - it came out in French, which is where most of that fan translation is from.

stlukesguild

10-01-2011, 11:06 AM

It would seem to me that the dearth of translations faced by Chinese literature is no different than that faced by any other culture that lacked/lacks close ties with the major Western nations. It is more than possible that India and the Middle-East (Persia and the Islamic nations) have a literary tradition that may rival China. In spite of the European fascination with "Orientalism" that dates back into the Renaissance, to say nothing of the Arabic presence in Spain for centuries, much of their literature is just now being properly translated. I might also suggest that poets such as Rumi and Hafez have suffered far more from hippy new age translations than any other major writers I know of. India also remains a closed book to the West in spite of the years of English rule and the millions of Indians who speak English fluently.

lawpark

10-01-2011, 11:54 AM

JBI

10-01-2011, 02:50 PM

Fascinating discussions ... so we have established two things:

1) Granted, distribution of great literary works are probably not even, if we just look at how the relative concentration of great art / music have been generated within Europe. (Stlukes' point) ... but, in the European case, one can roughly say the "criteria" of what constitutes great works are more or less commonly accepted; what happens when the "criteria" themselves are vastly different?

2) Translations of works have been uneven; some gets probably virtually no attention (e.g. Hungarian?); some gets some attention (Chinese); some gets more attention because of some politico-historical reasons (Japanese).

Now, under these conditions, how would one establish a canon list that is somehow "balanced" in terms of language representation?

================================================== =======
Back to some specific questions / points:

1) It is not very clear how Chinese treat Korean / Japanese / Vietnamese works written in Chinese. Generally, they are not in; but say for me who is pretty serious about Buddhism, I do read some Japanese works written in the Chinese language collected in the Taisho collections.

2) I have to agree that compared with the Indians, probably the Chinese literary heritage is less impressive - in fact, my personal opinions nowadays is that the Indians have the most impressive literary tradition - better than Persians / Arabic, better than Western, better than Chinese or Japanese. But for now, it can purely remain an opinion because there is no way one person can become so expert in the world literary traditions to make a truly informed and balanced judgment.

Still, there is the problem of it being impossible to read the Qianlong collected works of literature in one lifetime. We must remind ourselves, something like the quite thick Wenxuan is a selection - my point was not to put one against the other, since that is pointless, just discuss the fact that there is far more world literature out there than 10 books, and it is impossible to even come close to judging.

Take India as an example - the whole reading of Indian culture has been a sort of newageism - but that is primarily Sanskrit understandings - there are many other language traditions there that nobody speaks of, and haven't been translated.

The same way that Middle Eastern work, or Persian work in general has been ignored - Europe is eurocentric, as China is sinocentric, etc. The whole idea of world literature is a political game, especially in translation. Confucius has become a cult leader for like the 4th major time in history (the others being the cult surrounding Mencius who is a fundamental evangelical, then the Han cult with the textual resurgence, then the Song cult with Neo-Confucianism, then finally our own new cult of Hu Jintaoism).

As for Vietnamese, I know nothing of it. As for Korean, many Koreans simply moved and wrote in China proper - there has been much written on the success and excellence of Korean scholars of the Keju examinations.

Simply put though, Korean history is obscure in that it develops much later than Chinese society. The first texts written by Koreans as Koreans come after the Mongols in the Choson period. Before then to even talk of a "Korean" literature is problematic. There was Japanese presence on the Island, there was Chinese presence, and, for the most part, the place wasn't united, even culturally.

A much better trace is through porcelain and architecture, which shows two-way interaction.

As of now though, there is a huge amount of cash being thrown for studies and translations of Korean, so look forward to seeing them, as I do, hopefully beyond that Haiwaii University Press anthology of Korean Poetry.

lawpark

10-01-2011, 07:33 PM

Still, there is the problem of it being impossible to read the Qianlong collected works of literature in one lifetime. We must remind ourselves, something like the quite thick Wenxuan is a selection - my point was not to put one against the other, since that is pointless, just discuss the fact that there is far more world literature out there than 10 books, and it is impossible to even come close to judging.

I have recently finished the 1997 book named "The Myth of Continents" ... now I have a new analogy for the "canon listing" effort - it is like "metageography" (in the sense that most people know of the world as consisting of continents like Europe, Asia, etc.): in reality, no one person would ever understand all the things that are happening across the world, and all the boundaries of various phenomena lie; however, for practical purpose, to be able to start learning about what is happening on earth, one needs to start with some sense of "metageography" - and if the "metageography" is not well thought-through, bias is in before one even started learning anything. I would argue any type of canon-list serve a similar function as a very low-resolution map under the some rough metageographical scheme.

Take India as an example - the whole reading of Indian culture has been a sort of newageism - but that is primarily Sanskrit understandings - there are many other language traditions there that nobody speaks of, and haven't been translated.

I have recently been starting to read translations from non-Sanskrit literature (other than stories inherited in Chinese Buddhism). One is a Tamil work translated by A.K. Ramanujan called "Nammalvar: Hymns of the Drowning". Another is called "Songs of the Indian Saints", which covers introduction and small selections from 6 north India proto-Hindi/Punjabi poets (Raidas, Kabir, [Guru] Nanak, Surdas, Mirabai, Tulsidas). The third one is Hala's Sattasai (original in Maharashtri Pakrit), which I am reading. All are quite good - the last is particularly easy to read while interesting. The next one I am likely to read is Hemacandra's (Sanskrit) poem called "The Lives of the Jain Elders". After that already ordered is a Ghalib book.

The same way that Middle Eastern work, or Persian work in general has been ignored - Europe is eurocentric, as China is sinocentric, etc. The whole idea of world literature is a political game, especially in translation. Confucius has become a cult leader for like the 4th major time in history (the others being the cult surrounding Mencius who is a fundamental evangelical, then the Han cult with the textual resurgence, then the Song cult with Neo-Confucianism, then finally our own new cult of Hu Jintaoism).

You probably are over-estimating this latest round ...

Simply put though, Korean history is obscure in that it develops much later than Chinese society. The first texts written by Koreans as Koreans come after the Mongols in the Choson period. Before then to even talk of a "Korean" literature is problematic. There was Japanese presence on the Island, there was Chinese presence, and, for the most part, the place wasn't united, even culturally.

This sounds like a description of say Italy ... first texts written in Italian not until after the Mongols conquest of much of the rest of the world (early 14th century by Dante) Then there are French, German, Austro-Hungarian intervention, and not even a united country until late 19th century. I guess no one (here) would say Italian literature is not well delineated?

JBI

10-01-2011, 08:43 PM

mortalterror

10-02-2011, 07:07 PM

Overestimating? Hardly, Confucius is being shoved everywhere around the world, he is being quoted, and dumped on everyone's heads. It is almost unnatural. There is a simple reason for it - it creates this idea of the peace, harmonious, scholarly, self-refined Chinese culture of 5000 years that has become a sort of soft-imperialism.

Or maybe he's just that good. I remember reading the Analects and thinking that he was a very strong early philosopher, not out of place in the company of Plato or Aristotle, and quite an improvement over Marcus Aurelius or Lucretius.

JBI

10-02-2011, 09:01 PM

Or maybe he's just that good. I remember reading the Analects and thinking that he was a very strong early philosopher, not out of place in the company of Plato or Aristotle, and quite an improvement over Marcus Aurelius or Lucretius.

It's hit and miss, especially with textual history - interpretation and rewriting has a long tradition within the Confucian Canon. Confucius himself wrote only one book, the one that people mostly do not read.

As for the Analects themselves, hardly reflective of anything to do with Confucius. The thing with early philosophers though, is that they always seem to ignore problems that we would find important, like the fact that Confucius' father is thought to have been 60 odd years older than his mother, or the fact that Confucius is (as we see him now) a rather elitist philosopher, as were Plato and Aristotle for sure, though not so much Moses/the Jewish tradition.

As for Confucius' philosophy, he gains much in translation.

lawpark

10-02-2011, 10:16 PM

For me personally, the "Contemporary Neo-Confucianists" such as Xiong Shili, Tang Junyi, Mu Zongsan (Mou Tsung-san), Xu Fuguan etc. takes priority over the current wave ... timing-wise they came earlier, and philosophically (like it or not) they are probably the most philosophically enduring group from 20th century China.

Of course, my personal hero, Mu Zongsan, like Jinyong, also lived in Hong Kong!

JBI

10-02-2011, 10:41 PM

lawpark

10-03-2011, 09:37 AM

Yes, Du Weiming is a student of Mu Zongsan ... these guys did start before the current harmonious cult you were mentioning.

JBI

10-03-2011, 09:29 PM

Yes, Du Weiming is a student of Mu Zongsan ... these guys did start before the current harmonious cult you were mentioning.

It's dangerous - it exists now in three forms then - Mou Zongsan's cult which is Taiwanese in development, Du Weiming and others, who are Western scholars and work on Western grounding, and the new Hu Jintao cult on the mainland which is borrowing from both places, but has its own less subtle political undertones.

Then of course there are 3 other traditions that see Confucius on different angles - The Mainland schoolroom text, which owes much I would wager to the Ming Dynasty Confucius, the Taiwanese mainstream confucius, which is a form of soft-fascism mixed with intense obsession with education, and then the third scholarly Confucianism of the rest of the world, which manifests itself differently, though seems to have a sort of "great books" or "great cultures" approach.

Arrowni

10-04-2011, 04:00 AM

What is there to discuss about language? Everyone know well that Shakespeare and Milton wrote in english, Voltaire and Victor Hugo in French, Cervantes and Lope in spanish, etc.

Well, it took me way too much time to answer, but I think that the question has been already illustrated by the posters that followed my interjection. Language has everything to do with canon. You never get to have a widely known work unless you happen to have enough translators behind it, and an equal distribution, which will never be egalitarian nor democratic -literati people have always been a marginal minority after all-. The problem of translation also suggests the trouble of the appreciation of a work outside its native language, there are many people who love the Illiad that have never been able to read the originals, which is to say, they don't love the actual Illiad, not Homer's anyways, but a translation of it -which can be excellent and a classic by its own right, but the problem still happens-.

Octavio Paz makes a rather long interjection about language itself when he discusses about rhythm in poetry in his book el Arco y la Lira, the division between languages happens because rhythm and tonic accentuation is widely different from one language to another, making their poetry effectively something else. French poetry will never be English poetry. And well, the implication is rather obvious: french prose isn't the same as french prose. I recall reading a translation of Proust's De côté de chez Swann, and frankly, it wasn't up to the same literary level than the original production. And you can replicate this argument for every language current or dead.

So well, imo you can see a few big arguments when it comes to discussing literature. I've never heard a language that isn't beautiful in its own way, but the aesthetics of a language could actually be argued. If languages weren't rich entities we wouldn't even have literature, so we should not dismiss them from our discussions as readily as we do sometimes. Languages aren't exclusively political and historical constructs for the literati, they are also the very essence of any literary work.

JCamilo

10-04-2011, 11:12 AM

mortalterror

10-04-2011, 06:58 PM

JBI

10-04-2011, 11:13 PM

I agree with JCamilo. There are many things which people like about literature which have nothing to with the sound of it. Even within a hypothetical canon there are going to be texts which sound better than others, but that doesn't necessarily mean that the text that sounds better is the superior text. There are too many variables to say that. We must take into account things like theme, structure, plot, character, unity, invention, and originality.

I feel that Arrowni's objections are more applicable to poor translations than to translations in general. I find that most great works translate well.

Language is actually strange in how it relates to Canon, and is quite dependent actually on the culture observing the canon.

The above examples, for instance, are important, but one must also note how tradition looks for standardization.

For instance, the Bible is canonical not in the original, but lets examine it. First of all, to the Jewish scholar, translation was ignored completely in favor of the physical written text. Jews have always maintained a double tradition of written and of oral, where the written is canonized to the exact word (despite debates over the individual meaning of words), whereas the oral tradition is subject to change.

The Vulgate tradition of Catholicism was traditionally also obsessed with language until scholars like Erasmus blew the thing apart.

Higher criticism of the Bible though ultimately repositioned the importance of language to the canonical understanding of text.

To the Chinese tradition, the language didn't change too much in terms of its written form. But the tradition was also obsessed with canonical texts - Confucius during the Han was engraved on stone to solidify an emergence of an authoritative version.

The canonical and the authoritative text are pronounced in the tradition. Homer was rewritten in Alexandria in an official version - Shakespeare has undergone similar work by numerous scholars sifting through different versions of Quarto and Folio.

To say that translation is not considered denies something of a traditional aspect to scholarship, which works closely with language.

Arrowni

10-05-2011, 03:35 AM

Non sense and people here is not even talking about language as a factor of canonization. The translation is a result of canonization, not a trait. Mortal just dismissed the importance of a specific language as canonical critery, JBI does not even bother with geographical relations to canon, so he won't be giving much importance to it.

I'd agree, but I would note that we are mostly discussing translation in between relatively known languages, because the scarcity of a language is proportional to its need to be translated before it's even read enough to conform any canon. Ignoring altogether geographical relations is not necessarily wrong, but it raises the question of whether historical relations -such as influence- should matter. Because time and space, for what we care, can be considered the same thing.

Bottomline: Canons are meant to be simplifications, so they can willingly ignore most of criterea you could consider to value a text. In all truth, we are just discussing if language should be considered, instead of confirming it's presence in canon.

Just because a verbal art has relations with idioms, it does not imply that it is such important factor for everything. In fact, it is so universal, that would not explain anything: translation and inner aspects of every idiom works for both classical works and completely forgotten works. Meaning, does not explain, means anything at all.

If you don't like ancient italian poetry and sound, you cannot really like the Commedia for what it is, form and function are the same thing. The same it's truth for any work to a different degree. Musicality and sound had been literary staple all the time up to the 20th century, so downright ignoring it seems arbitrary.

More easy is too point: The Bible is cannonical but not in their original language. Homer is cannonical and not because of his original language. The 1001 Nights became canonical in french. Today domain of english is but an historical accident (and caused more by Hollywood and American movie than literature). 150 years ago it was French. Once was italian. Let's see what will happen with the obvious economical decline of America, which is fundamental to make a language dominant, and what will happen with the challenge of China and Arabian.

While thinking and reflecting about your observation, I would consider that our conception of literary work is not that of a text, which is very interesting because it would justify why a bad text can be considered canonical. We don't attach importance to just one text, but a whole corpus of entities that had become attached to such text, such as translations, analyses, intertextual references, adaptations etc.

My conclusion would be that canonicity isn't about text themselves, even if the phenomena is meant to spawn from an original text. No canon text can be just one text, even if you could imply this is true for any artistic expression, it's even more glaring with classics. You can love a text without never ever reading it. That's hardcore.

The very idea you are talking about democratic in a aristocratic process (canonization) and that you are equalling the reading of original as the only form to love Homer is a form to miss the point. No text is only the words. No Canonical work is there because the word alone. And people do not read Homer for 3000 years and he still canonical.

This may sound as something evident to you, but the implications are still very interesting. You see, language is a shifting entity, and while we conceive the writen word as an ability to fix an internal language, readings will actually keep the written word shifting despite of it's fixed form. Classics that come from marginal or dead languages no longer mean the same thing, they have actually change and at some point, they will no longer exist (I know, I know, this has always been the case and it's quite evident, I'm just trying to explain that this is happening to a higher level than just historicity)

We never cared of the actual quality of a text, such things are only vanalities, as they run out of novelty, experimentations will follow and the legacy of texts will only grow thinner as we go. Canons would tolerate bad texts better than an adept reader would, which is quite charming in its own funny way.

JCamilo

10-05-2011, 10:02 AM

I'd agree, but I would note that we are mostly discussing translation in between relatively known languages, because the scarcity of a language is proportional to its need to be translated before it's even read enough to conform any canon. Ignoring altogether geographical relations is not necessarily wrong, but it raises the question of whether historical relations -such as influence- should matter. Because time and space, for what we care, can be considered the same thing.

Not really, Latim? I came from portuguese speaking world, JBI talks about chinese. The thing is: of course, literature does not happen in a vaccum where society does not matter. But really, once a text has spread its influence, no ammount of political power - and Language is a toy for politcs - can change it. No better example than Virgil. Dead language, dead political message and probally of the so called "fiction" the most lasting "center of the canon" ever.

Bottomline: Canons are meant to be simplifications, so they can willingly ignore most of criterea you could consider to value a text. In all truth, we are just discussing if language should be considered, instead of confirming it's presence in canon.

Canons are not meant to be anything. You are confusing listing of books for a given purpose with the Canon itself. It is just a result of continual influence of a given text. You cann't really be thinking the typical listing of english or french works in the canon lists really exemplify the canon languages? It is just historical chance and very dependable of narrowing critery for the list. If we are narrowing, probally only Shakespeare would be undenyable cannonical at the bible, cervantes, dante, homer, virgil, plato, aristotle, confucius, koran, etc list.

If you don't like ancient italian poetry and sound, you cannot really like the Commedia for what it is, form and function are the same thing.

Not really. I read and liked the comedy when i was 11, didnt knew even it was a poem and probally, more likely, that was in italian. Sound was irrelevant. Dante is much more than the immitation of sound in written words, frankly, his entire philosophy and metaphysics is what sustain the Commedia. His poetry is obviously excellent, and i do not even think you can put apart it from his narrative and philosophy, because affects how he managed to in a few lines bring something as Ulysses last travel. But no italian is needed for the love of te Commedia.

The same it's truth for any work to a different degree. Musicality and sound had been literary staple all the time up to the 20th century, so downright ignoring it seems arbitrary.

I am not ignoring it. I am pointing it is not relevant for the process of canonization. It is part of literature, some cannonical works have more importance due to it, some less. And this affects all works, not just classical works.

While thinking and reflecting about your observation, I would consider that our conception of literary work is not that of a text, which is very interesting because it would justify why a bad text can be considered canonical. We don't attach importance to just one text, but a whole corpus of entities that had become attached to such text, such as translations, analyses, intertextual references, adaptations etc.

I would point just one thing, I do not consider there is a bad cannonical text. I would point a good text is the one which style is reflex of its intention. I cann't get Montaigne and demmand him the poetry of Dante. This goes for scientific or philosophical work. Those more influential are usually well writen, because they often want to persuade the reader and they do. And that sometimes, as Mortal pointed, a work has other vallues than linguistic vallue.

But yes, just think: Why Shakespeare? His influence is imense on other arts too. Why Dante? He basically spread the circles of hell, purgatory, the punishment prision style for hell to all west.

My conclusion would be that canonicity isn't about text themselves, even if the phenomena is meant to spawn from an original text. No canon text can be just one text, even if you could imply this is true for any artistic expression, it's even more glaring with classics. You can love a text without never ever reading it. That's hardcore.

But those are the texts of the cannon. They are preserved even without continual reading. No hiatus managed to weaken Homer for example. A good example is Sappho. Her history is a bit related to linguistic, much of her fame and the lack or early preservation of her works is related to the stabilishment of homeric greek. By all accounts she was meant to be lost. Then, a few centuries and people are quoting her, using her forms, etc. Her actual body of work being discovered, but she was already one of the Muses.

This may sound as something evident to you, but the implications are still very interesting. You see, language is a shifting entity, and while we conceive the writen word as an ability to fix an internal language, readings will actually keep the written word shifting despite of it's fixed form. Classics that come from marginal or dead languages no longer mean the same thing, they have actually change and at some point, they will no longer exist (I know, I know, this has always been the case and it's quite evident, I'm just trying to explain that this is happening to a higher level than just historicity)[//quote]

No my friend, not classics from dead languages, but all works in any language. Lolita does not mean today at all the same thing as when it was released. Heck, even Conan, the barbarian does not mean the samething.

And yes, language is not fixed, but most of changes are a result of the oral daily use and the written norms conflict. Even one like Dante (Or Camoes, Cerantes, etc. Guys who are famous for somehow stabilishing the modern idioms) are not making up the idioms, but rather fixing a process already in motion.

[QUOTE]We never cared of the actual quality of a text, such things are only vanalities, as they run out of novelty, experimentations will follow and the legacy of texts will only grow thinner as we go. Canons would tolerate bad texts better than an adept reader would, which is quite charming in its own funny way.

The thing is that the cannon do not depend of democracy (or even, the individual), but it a process. I will say it, if in 200 years people still read JKRowling, then we must be at fault. We didt saw the quality of her work, we are not able, just many before us. But at this point, Joyce, Borges, Kafka... even those are bordeline cannonical. They haven't been forgot like Melville and returned, and even forgotten any kid would knew about moby dick. Kafka maybe is close of it, but a cannonical works must survive a few apokalypses.

JBI:

Language is actually strange in how it relates to Canon, and is quite dependent actually on the culture observing the canon.

The above examples, for instance, are important, but one must also note how tradition looks for standardization.

For instance, the Bible is canonical not in the original, but lets examine it. First of all, to the Jewish scholar, translation was ignored completely in favor of the physical written text. Jews have always maintained a double tradition of written and of oral, where the written is canonized to the exact word (despite debates over the individual meaning of words), whereas the oral tradition is subject to change.

The Vulgate tradition of Catholicism was traditionally also obsessed with language until scholars like Erasmus blew the thing apart.

Higher criticism of the Bible though ultimately repositioned the importance of language to the canonical understanding of text.

Well, but how much the translations were relevant to the canonical status of the Bible? When Constantine ordered the construction of the bible, the process was already on effect. Of course, without versions for the roman empire, latim, greek, versions and even the apocryphical works in other languages, it would not be the bible. But then, at that point the religious christian philosophy was selecting those texts not based on language, but rather on philosophical aspects. You didnt had texts abandoned due the language, but frankly put, the jewish texts were already selected (99% of it), the new testament were the most important from historical point of view like the letters or those who represented better the dogmas (and from what I read of apocryphical, those better written and more realistical).

Of course, translation has a toy, but when germans or english versions came, they changed the relation with the bible, it was already a cannonical text. It has effect on latter works? Yes. It is part of its story? Yes. Part of the democratization of reading? Yes. But the bible became cannonical being hidden from reading in a language that was dead shows the work was not "selected" because the linguistic power.

Of course, some works are strong related to languages and this grants them places on cannon world, but even a work like the Koran, which was meant never to be in anything but arabic and in the end, is responsable for spreading a language like no other work did, lives on in Iran or Pakistan in another language. Not much different from the bible, which we consider the King James version ,the St.Idunnowho in III century to be all The Bible. Language is of course important in literature, but in the end just a representation of political power and circusntance in those canonical lists.

mortalterror

10-05-2011, 01:27 PM

I don't really feel like having the translation debate again. We've done it so many times before in the poetry section of this site. So instead of going into particulars about accents and phonemes or musical covers I'll just boil this topic down to it's philosophical base. What we are really talking about is not linguistics or literature. This argument is between Perfection and Close Enough. I say close enough.

JCamilo

10-05-2011, 01:46 PM

I would say "Oops, it was wrong" is good too.

Arrowni

10-05-2011, 04:34 PM

Canons are not meant to be anything. You are confusing listing of books for a given purpose with the Canon itself. It is just a result of continual influence of a given text.

Is canon just really a result of influence? My question is more as: is canon just a finality or it produces something? As far as I've been following this discussion, canon itself acts as a language, it can be used as a political tool, it's rooted in history but it trascends mortality. Languages don't just die, neither do canons.

What do we really say while reproducing canon? What is it communicating? In any case, as you pointed out, if the process is more than just a list, it would be interesting to see some of its implications.

Not really. I read and liked the comedy when i was 11, didnt knew even it was a poem and probally, more likely, that was in italian. Sound was irrelevant. Dante is much more than the immitation of sound in written words, frankly, his entire philosophy and metaphysics is what sustain the Commedia. His poetry is obviously excellent, and i do not even think you can put apart it from his narrative and philosophy, because affects how he managed to in a few lines bring something as Ulysses last travel. But no italian is needed for the love of te Commedia.

I'm thorn between two possible outcomes of the same discovery. One tells me that canon makes it clear that there is no such thing as text identity. You love the Commedia as I do, but we don't get this admiration from experience the actual text, and we could probably feel the same without even reading a proper translation, just a few parts, quotes or paraphrasis may do the same work. Again, this is evident, but since author identity crashed and burnt in the 20th century, I think that dropping text identity too leaves you under the domain of the one other archetypical figure in the exchange (the reader).

Of course, as you imply in the next part of your comment, the reader isn't an individual being, it's more of an extended notion of social experiences that is reshaped as other cultural traits. The last bastion of shared objectivity is the personal impression of the reader -the fact that you liked the Commedia-, whose relationship with canon is, inexistant?

The other side of the argument would be that reducing the weight of language to favor some essentialist conceptualization of a work, is the road towards destroying literature. That's probably the end of the trip if we are really to believe that the Commedia isn't it's rhythm, and that form is just meant to mimick function and not the opposite. It's not worth it to destroy art for the sake of keeping textual identity -the Commedia is still the Commedia despite of the translation-, because if you cannot make something out of that identity is useless. Underrated form is a direct attack against poetry, and poems have been around much longer than written texts and are much better at surviving the test of time. The price, we all know it, is the dead of textual identity.

This is an underlying conflict -if you feel it's founded in false notions I would like to hear your argumentation-, that imo should be considered and learnt even if we don't pick a say per se.

JCamilo

10-05-2011, 05:10 PM

Is canon just really a result of influence? My question is more as: is canon just a finality or it produces something? As far as I've been following this discussion, canon itself acts as a language, it can be used as a political tool, it's rooted in history but it trascends mortality. Languages don't just die, neither do canons.

Yes, the canon is the result of influence. And the canon is neither a finality and what its produce (like our dicussion here) is not the canon itself.

The canon does not act as language, it is not a political tool, etc. Literature is not the canon, they are not synounimous and you are using literature as such.

What do we really say while reproducing canon? What is it communicating? In any case, as you pointed out, if the process is more than just a list, it would be interesting to see some of its implications.

Overall? Forgettable complains about the critery. Some irrelevant discussion.

I'm thorn between two possible outcomes of the same discovery. One tells me that canon makes it clear that there is no such thing as text identity.

The canon? The canon has nothing to do with how I read the Commedia. It is abotu the Commedia, its influence, that tells it. The Canon really told you nothing.

You love the Commedia as I do, but we don't get this admiration from experience the actual text, and we could probably feel the same without even reading a proper translation, just a few parts, quotes or paraphrasis may do the same work. Again, this is evident, but since author identity crashed and burnt in the 20th century, I think that dropping text identity too leaves you under the domain of the one other archetypical figure in the exchange (the reader).

Yes, you can feel the same for reading parts of several works. It happens a lot, simple because several works are splits in fragments more often than not. And if you pick a 1000 pages work, you wont like the 1000 alike. You will get the admiration from 20-30 pages, even if you read all the book.

Author identity didn't crash in XX century, it was more a theme. I mean, Voltaire destroyed any identidy by inventing himself, blamming his works on others, making up fake writers, and this was XVIII century.

We have no idea who Shakespeare was. This was XVI century.

Dante only could be Dante the character because he destroyed his identity, in much a similar way Walt Whitman would. Emily Dickinson was nobody too, and we have what? XIV and XIX century?

The modernists really talk much about the end of author, but it is not true for artists. Fernando Pessoas or Borges, are expceptions, but even them are repetions of previous patterns. The XX was trully the pinacle of authorship.

Of course, as you imply in the next part of your comment, the reader isn't an individual being, it's more of an extended notion of social experiences that is reshaped as other cultural traits. The last bastion of shared objectivity is the personal impression of the reader -the fact that you liked the Commedia-, whose relationship with canon is, inexistant?

What I imply is that the claim that you must know italian to enjoy Dante and the comedy is false. That is all.

The other side of the argument would be that reducing the weight of language to favor some essentialist conceptualization of a work, is the road towards destroying literature. That's probably the end of the trip if we are really to believe that the Commedia isn't it's rhythm, and that form is just meant to mimick function and not the opposite.

Commedia is rhytim of course. Like I said Dante is a major poet. And like I said, you cann't truly split from and spirit. But the major influence of the comedy is how the metaphysics of hell was shapped, the idea of hell as a prision, the hell-purgatory-heaven path... probally should add the idea of Italy and Beatrice as muse, which are reproduced over and over, everywhere, without the terza rima. If we are looking a major poetic form comming from italy, it is Petrarca and his sonnets, not Dante and his triple horned epic. (Epic wise, probally Ariosto gave more form than Dante too). It does not imply Dante form has no immitators, influence, etc. Implies we enjoy the influnce of Dante without italian and his metric.

It's not worth it to destroy art for the sake of keeping textual identity -the Commedia is still the Commedia despite of the translation-, because if you cannot make something out of that identity is useless. Underrated form is a direct attack against poetry, and poems have been around much longer than written texts and are much better at surviving the test of time. The price, we all know it, is the dead of textual identity.

That is quite a confusion. When I said the poem is an immitation of sound, it is simple because it is. The rhytim pattern, the musicallity, whatever in a poem is all artificial. It exists on text to cause us the illusion that sounds good. Of course, many do sound good, but at that momment, the necessary technique to sound good is not in the words alone anymore, but in the techinique of the performer. We just jumped into another art, an oral art. It is pretty much like the painting immitate reality with light or deepth that are not there. All art is like this, immitation of something natural, and poetry of music. Twice artificial maybe.

But of course, we have no poems that are much longer than written texts. They are all lost, because at the momment they are recorded in word, you had homer and done, written text. It is not lack of identity, it is a proper identity: writen literature and oral literature are two different things.

This is an underlying conflict -if you feel it's founded in false notions I would like to hear your argumentation-, that imo should be considered and learnt even if we don't pick a say per se.

Well ,the canon itself cann't be ever delimited. You just cannt make which works are part of it (impossible), albeit it exists. It has no traits as language, the individual works have. They are better than the canon.

Arrowni

10-06-2011, 06:41 AM

Yes, the canon is the result of influence. And the canon is neither a finality and what its produce (like our dicussion here) is not the canon itself.

The canon does not act as language, it is not a political tool, etc. Literature is not the canon, they are not synounimous and you are using literature as such.

I'm trying to make the concept of canon meaningful instead of meaningless. Pointing out what the canon is not, doesn't get you closer to understanding than noticing something that acts like canon, I don't claim that my analogies and comparisions are bearers of absolute truth, they are simply a way to approach and understand the underlying object.

Conventionally the short -but ineffective- way to clarify the position is to ask: what is canon if not anything mentioned?

Overall? Forgettable complains about the critery. Some irrelevant discussion.

Discuss is only irrelevant as long as you're fixed into not learning from a discussion, myself, I find the experience of sensorial discovery quite appealing.

Yes, you can feel the same for reading parts of several works. It happens a lot, simple because several works are splits in fragments more often than not. And if you pick a 1000 pages work, you wont like the 1000 alike. You will get the admiration from 20-30 pages, even if you read all the book.

Which is another proof that text identity is very flexible and fluid.

Author identity didn't crash in XX century, it was more a theme. I mean, Voltaire destroyed any identidy by inventing himself, blamming his works on others, making up fake writers, and this was XVIII century.

No point nitpicking this comment either.

What I imply is that the claim that you must know italian to enjoy Dante and the comedy is false. That is all.

This point is mooth since a bird can enjoy seeing the Commedia in the paper and yet not speak any language. But mostly, it's just nitpicking a definition of textual identity which leads to a not very interesting discussion as far as I can tell. (Opposing each other because we don't share rigurous definitions is breeding bad discussion overall)

Commedia is rhytim of course. Like I said Dante is a major poet. And like I said, you cann't truly split from and spirit. But the major influence of the comedy is how the metaphysics of hell was shapped, the idea of hell as a prision, the hell-purgatory-heaven path... probally should add the idea of Italy and Beatrice as muse, which are reproduced over and over, everywhere, without the terza rima. If we are looking a major poetic form comming from italy, it is Petrarca and his sonnets, not Dante and his triple horned epic. (Epic wise, probally Ariosto gave more form than Dante too). It does not imply Dante form has no immitators, influence, etc. Implies we enjoy the influnce of Dante without italian and his metric.

Delving into the reasons of why the Commedia is still read is good. My inquiry was more about the textual object itself, which cannot be stranded from it's form in any strict sense. Again, just considering textual identity as an axis.

If we can like the Commedia without reading italian, is because our concept of what the Commedia is, is quite wide. And this has nothing to do with canon. What is exactly the Commedia -or any other literary work-?

We just jumped into another art, an oral art.

Is it really another art or are we just reading texts disregarding a very real object that they containt? Admittedly, there are texts with no sounds, we don't know the right pronunciation of some ancient texts whose languages are long dead and cannot be retraced sound by sound, but nobody would deny those texts had an oral dimension. Yes, the textual object can be separated from sound -which would become a performance of the script, if we must-, but for that we would need to accept a minimum of textual identity. And we don't. If we can really accept that the Commedia isn't seen as per is text, nor it's sound, then the art is no longer literature, or literature isn't the art of words.

But of course, we have no poems that are much longer than written texts. They are all lost, because at the momment they are recorded in word, you had homer and done, written text. It is not lack of identity, it is a proper identity: writen literature and oral literature are two different things.

Do you think that it was written word that destroyed orality in most parts of the world? Oral literature is no longer the same since writting exists.