From: BUDGRANT-AT-aol.com
Date: Wed, 3 Jan 2001 03:27:46 EST
Subject: Re: What's wrong with mainstream sensibilities?



In a message dated 1/3/01 1:51:19 AM, kenneth.mackendrick-AT-utoronto.ca writes:

<< I've heard too many times that "If I didn't write, paint, 
create... I would go mad, or die." Aside from being rather cliche, almost 
embarrassingly so, isn't this a problem? >>

Yes, yes a gross cliche, and when someone says this I definitely take 
intonation into account along with the various motives possible for saying 
it, i.e. getting laid. BUT! Let's assume for a second that it is not said but 
rather implied, and that it is a sentiment that the subject takes to be 
certain, then the answer to the question as to whether or not this is a 
problem would have to be no. In fact it would seem that the someone who felt 
this was rather healthy in recognizing what helps as a palliative for 
despair. I'm with the radchick on this one. You mentioned Kant (and how many 
intro to philo students have had to suffer because of this man) and Will 
Smith as a pair of artist not reputed to be great sufferers. For those who 
did suffer how about Nietzsche, Proust, van Gogh, Plath, Althusser, Vigo, 
Dostoyevsky, Alice walker, Godard, Pollack, Krasner, Schwartzkogler, 
Beethoven, Benjamin, Ferrara, Pasolini, Goines, Nizan, Babel, Witkiewicz, 
Burroughs, Hamsun (Hamsun's Wife), Charlie Parker, Lispector, Frankl, De 
Quincey, Bruno Schulz, to name only the apex of the tip of a gigantic iceberg 
of artists who suffered and who have provided consolation for many. 
Cronenberg said in an interview:  When you're feeling despairing or suicidal, 
or feel like your dying, you don't want to see a movie like Mrs. Doubtfire. A 
film like Crash, Dead Ringers, or Naked Lunch will console you because 
they're dealing with this stuff. Mrs. Doubtfire will kill you.
I do agree that suffering should not be an imparative to create, and I know 
that there is a list of many artists that did not recount an unduly amount of 
suffering in their life, but in this age when we still catch a glimpse of 
despair we should cherish it, as it is an idication that the full 
transformation of the human being into a vacuous echo machine has not 
entirely occured. And then I suppose really what we need to do is figure out 
what the hell suffering means before we go too much further.
Top 3 of 2000:
Battle of Chile re-release at Walter Reade
Origins of the 21st Century
New Print of Phantom of Liberty
I honestly did not see one American release that was worth a fraction of the 
money it took to make it.
Paul


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