Date: Thu, 04 Apr 1996 15:55:14 -0600
Subject:  Ralph and BLAKE AND MARX 


I am finding Ralph's Blake/Marx stuff very stimulating, although I am
barely able to follow all of it, partly because of time problems
right now.

"And the end of enslavement to material conditions means the end of
the intellectuals as the embodiment of culture." 

This is very cool.  I want more, but it is going to take some
digestion on my part.  And I think I should read some Blake, among
other things.

Lisa

>>> Ralph Dumain <rdumain-AT-igc.apc.org>  3/31/96, 10:45am >>>
. . .  I have hinted at possible understandings to be gained from the
triangulation of Blake, Hegel (and Young Hegelians such as
Feuerbach), and Marx, particularly in understanding the relations
between individual thinkers and traditions, the capacities of people
to formulate an understanding of their world based on educational,
historical, social and personal circumstances, all to the goal of
understanding how and why people think about the problems they are
trying to solve.  

[snip]  Blake's apocalypse is a slave revolt: kings are overthrown,
prisons are opened, and the first one to sing the song of liberty is
the Black African. 
[snip]
The vast majority of humanity have never had the material or
psychological leisure to contemplate anything.  They live in a world
"where thought is crushed beneath the Iron Hand of power."
[snip]
This is true of both Blake and Marx.  And the end of enslavement to
material conditions means the end of the intellectuals as the
embodiment of culture.  This perspective was common to Blake, Marx,
and C.L.R. James.




     --- from list marxism2-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu ---