Past and present
Dec. 4th, 2006 01:45 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
beccaelizabethI'm having the most trouble concentrating lately.
But -
theories of the past.
Reading Ibsen it seems all about how the past intrudes on the present, all about ghosts. Like a big painting hanging center stage, dead dude that isn't really gone.
alternative -
"The past... is never entirely dead and can be seized for the purposes of the present."
Theory talk about historical materialism instead of historicism.
Because the past might be in the past, but we're in the present thinking about it, reading it, reinterpreting it, rewriting it, living influenced by it.
So it's like the past has power over the present, but the present has power over the past too, each shaping the other in a big dialogue/conflict thingy.
"The residue of history is not neutral and unchanging but must be fought over"
"even the dead will not be safe from the enemy if he wins" Benjamin (Thesis VI)
"By presenting us with the pas last, the play forces us to dwell on those things which a homogeneous, linear time would have us leave behind."
"Only a redeemed mankind receives the fullness of its past - which is to say, only a redemed mankind has its past become citable in all its moments" Benjamin (Thesis III)
"Quoting a text implies interrupting its context" - useful for assignment 2 writeup, that thought.
pulling bits from chapter 6 of Drama+Theory Buse, Peter
Yes, this makes me think of Doctor Who and Torchwood.
So far this morning instead of actually managing more than two pages of reading I've been sitting in my imaginary house in my head having tea with Sarah Jane and then going upstairs to chat to Ianto while Jack talks to her. This is in no sense productive. It's just what my brain does when it would rather be hiding under the duvet.
... oooh, headache. urgh.
But -
theories of the past.
Reading Ibsen it seems all about how the past intrudes on the present, all about ghosts. Like a big painting hanging center stage, dead dude that isn't really gone.
alternative -
"The past... is never entirely dead and can be seized for the purposes of the present."
Theory talk about historical materialism instead of historicism.
Because the past might be in the past, but we're in the present thinking about it, reading it, reinterpreting it, rewriting it, living influenced by it.
So it's like the past has power over the present, but the present has power over the past too, each shaping the other in a big dialogue/conflict thingy.
"The residue of history is not neutral and unchanging but must be fought over"
"even the dead will not be safe from the enemy if he wins" Benjamin (Thesis VI)
"By presenting us with the pas last, the play forces us to dwell on those things which a homogeneous, linear time would have us leave behind."
"Only a redeemed mankind receives the fullness of its past - which is to say, only a redemed mankind has its past become citable in all its moments" Benjamin (Thesis III)
"Quoting a text implies interrupting its context" - useful for assignment 2 writeup, that thought.
pulling bits from chapter 6 of Drama+Theory Buse, Peter
Yes, this makes me think of Doctor Who and Torchwood.
So far this morning instead of actually managing more than two pages of reading I've been sitting in my imaginary house in my head having tea with Sarah Jane and then going upstairs to chat to Ianto while Jack talks to her. This is in no sense productive. It's just what my brain does when it would rather be hiding under the duvet.
... oooh, headache. urgh.