Date: Mon, 1 Dec 1997 17:39:44 -0500
Subject: MB: The Writer and Place


Hello everyone. I have been thinking this past week about the
relationships between the writer and place and place and subject matter
in literature. (If this is not directly related to MB I am sorry but I am
pretty certain it is.) To what extent is the writer involved in place? I
don't mean the settings in his writing. I mean the setting of his
writing, where he writes. Perhaps there is no clear rule about this (how
often are there rules with regards to literature? To what extent is
literature a breaking of all rules?) but I think that there are very
interesting cases where the writer and place are opposite. I think of
Joyce here. His facination with Ireland even though he was exiled from it
his whole life. And Faulkner, etc. I think it happens that sometimes
writers get "stuck" in a certain place. But does this "place" affect the
subject of their writing? In most cases I think it does. But is there the
same inverse relationship? Sometimes the writer seems utterly facinated
by what/where he is not. I guess my question is: Is this the case? And if
so, do we see it in Blanchot at all?