File spoon-archives/phillitcrit.archive/phillitcrit_1997/phillitcrit.9711, message 603


From: Patsloane-AT-aol.com
Date: Tue, 11 Nov 1997 05:32:49 -0500 (EST)
Subject: Re: PLC: Farbenlehre


In a message dated 97-11-11 01:38:00 EST, Greg writes:

> Pat, you may also want to take a look, at some point, depending on the 
> angle
>  you are approaching this from, at the way in which Joyce uses
(Anglo-Irish)
>  Berkeley's _New Theory of Vision_ as a crucial grounding for some of the
>  epistemic presuppositions of _Finnegans Wake_. 
Well, the archdruid sounds like a parody of Clerk-Maxwell's ideas about
color.

I did an anthology of writings on color, largely by artists. (Primary
Sources). Among the few non-artists I thought had said good things were
Bertrand Russell and Eliot.  Russell says color and light is the weakest part
of modern physics,  with which I totally agree.  

In The Visual Nature of Color (1991), I looked at color from different
perspectives. How color and light are explained in physics, in pschology, in
philosophy, in colorimetry, how color names are used, theories of color
vision, color symbolism, etc.  What I was trying to show was that in the end
none of it makes sense, and I personally think we should junk nearly all of
our ideas about color and just start over.  Too many contradictions and
inconsistencies.  This sounds extreme to say. But realize nobody is taught
much about color except artists.  As a result you find all kinds of
misconceptions in almost every area of the sciences and the humanities.
 Wittgenstein is supposed to be good on color. But he had all kinds of
mixups, not because he couldn't think, but he'd just never had any training
in how to think about color.

Now that Reg has opened this beautiful vista of net space, I'd like to revise
and update a few chapters of that book and maybe post them. If people on the
list are interested in color, I'll ask first what chapters might be of
interest.  

What I'm doing on Eliot is separate.  A different me.  Thanks for the great
stuff on color in Joyce, which I want to think about.  Look for things in
Joyce on W. E. Gladstone's theories about Homer's idiosyncratic use of color
names.   I have a hunch he'll include something.  

BTW, I like this list better because it's small, but with good people.  On
Phil-Lit, I stayed away from threads on color or art, because the level was
just atrocious. Dumb topics like "is modern art crazy."  I just can't deal
with things on that level. I couold be perfectly happy with 12 or 20 people,
if they were really interesting people to talk to.  Which you certainly are
Greg.  I'm always amazed at how much you know.  But I guess if you're doing
Joyce, that goes with the territory.

best,

pat


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