’Pataphilology: An Irreader

Edited by Sean Gurd & Vincent W.J. van Gerven Oei

Preamble
Steve McCaffery
The Papyrus of Ani: Egyptian Book of the Dead: A Prototype of Ekphrastic Translation of Plate 1, Chapters 1–5 (Along with a Brief Note to Explain Its Rudiments) 11

Introduction
Sean Gurd
Elements of ’Pataphilology 21

One
Michael D. Gordin and Joshua T. Katz
The Walker and the Wake: Analysis of Non-Intrinsic Philological Isolates 61 [-92]

Two
James I. Porter
“On Epic Naïveté”: Adorno’s Allegory of Philology 93 [-115]

Three
Sean Braune
’Pataphilological Lacan 117

Four
Paul Allen Miller
Going Soft on Canidia: The Epodes, an Unappreciated Classic 139

Five
Erik Gunderson
The Paraphilologist as ’Pataphysician 167

Bibliography 217

Contributors 235

SOURCE: ’Pataphilology: An Irreader, edited by Sean Gurd & Vincent W.J. van Gerven Oei. Punctum Books, 2018. Freely downloadable book.

NOTES

Chapters 1 and 2 are of the greatest interest to me.

Michael D. Gordin and Joshua T. Katz, “The Walker and the Wake: Analysis of Non-Intrinsic Philological Isolates, ” pp. 61-92.

This essay begins with the question of boundaries—between languages, between science and pseudoscience, between structure and free play. Some novels to be discussed are Anthony Burgess’s A Clockwork Orange, Russell Hoban’s Riddley Walker, Paul Kingsnorth’s The Wake, James Joyce’s Finnegans Wake, Irvine Welsh’s Trainspotting. Note reference to Halliday’s concept of anti-language.

Invented languages in literature are compared to Esperanto, pp. 84-92. Diego Marani’s Europanto, in Las adventures des Inspector Cabillot (Sawtry: Dedalus, 2012) and other writings, is a satire on Esperanto. Graham Greene’s Entrenationo in The Confidential Agent is also mentioned. Europanto has an affinity with Wakespeak. Riddleyspeak is also mentioned.

A quote from Las adventures des Inspector Cabillot is contrasted with the opening sentences of the original Esperanto work Kredu min, sinjorino! by Cezaro Rossetti (p. 87):

Estis malvarmete ekstere, sed la ĉambro, kie ni sidis, estis agrable varma. Mia plej kara amiko, Ernesto, sidis kontraŭ mi, donante sin plene al sia komforta brakseĝo. Jam dum unu horo ni parolis Esperante kaj pasis de temo al temo. Estis vere instiga plezuro aŭskulti lin; li tiom bone sidis en la lingvo. Ordinare, kiam li parolas per sia gepatra lingvo: la angla, mankas al li la vervo kaj esprimo, — sume, la muziko, kiu montriĝas kiam li parolas Esperanton. Lia Esperanta prozo estas poezio.

Various nearly extinct languages and the successful revival of Hebrew are mentioned. And (p. 91):
At the fringes, how about the thousand-or-so denaskuloj (native speakers) of Esperanto or, even fringier, the devotees of the Klingon Language Institute in an era when every science-fiction franchise seems to require its own linguistic prop? The relationship to fiction is not accidental; indeed, it is pataphilologically necessary.

References to Klingon and Okrent are footnoted. The question of exolinguistics follows: Stanislaw Lem’s His Master’s Voice is mentioned.

James I. Porter, ‘“On Epic Naïveté”: Adorno’s Allegory of Philology’, pp. 93-115.

“On Epic Naïveté” (1943) is a short but dizzying fragment from Adorno’s “Excursus I: Odysseus, or Myth and Enlightenment” that never found its way into the final version of The Dialectic of Enlightenment.

For Adorno, The Odyssey is “a prescient allegory of the dialectic of enlightenment.” Epic discourse produces ‘noise’ which is non-conceptual. While the sensuality of this epic overwhelmed prior critics, Adorno deviates from the consensus: “Epic poetry is fascinated with the objectality of things and with the prospect of approaching and even taming them through a kind of mimeticism.” But this mythic dimension is approached by the enlightening deployment of language. Such is the play and contradiction of particulars and universals, the compromising of nonidentity via identity. So Homer comes out on the side of Enlightenment. Myth is produced via reason.

This is a Hegelian way of indicating that once the boundary between reason and myth was drawn, myth ceased to exist in a state of formlessness (“noise”): it instantly participated in the logic of reason (logos). Consequently, the very idea of a “naïve” epic seems something of a fallacy.

It is not clear that Porter agrees with Adorno’s ‘counter-philology’, as Adorno may not just be reading Homer, but is really reading Adorno reading Homer. Whether or not this is a legitimate scholarly practice (or, alternatively, a pataphilological one), one could wonder, beyond this analysis, whether this way of reading should be incorporated into a ‘dialectic of Enlightenment’ tout court.

Antilanguage & Esperanto

Graham Greene’s Entrenationo (1)

Graham Greene’s Entrenationo (2)

Graham Greene’s Entrenationo (3)

Definition of ’Pataphysics (& bibliography)
by Alfred Jarry

Surrealism: Selected Links

James Joyce: Special Topics: Bibliography, Links, Quotes

Philosophical and Universal Languages, 1600-1800, and Related Themes:
Selected Bibliography

Esperanto & Interlinguistics Study Guide /
Retgvidilo pri Esperanto & Interlingvistiko

Theodor W. Adorno & Critical Theory Study Guide