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Wow. Ancient Authenitcity Thoughts:
Mar. 31st, 2011 01:15 amAlmost four years ago I wrote this: http://wolven.livejournal.com/1188785.html and in it I said I'd expand on this, which I wrote on the 2nd of May, 2007:
'Ridiculous thought:
'The Art of Noise - [A Time for Fear (Who's Affraid?)]--- That The initial teaching/learning of magic was the structure of the universe explaining itself to the "first adept," whomever. Analysis of self, explained to another. Followed, then, by the analysis of "other," which is really just an attempt to understand self. The projection of consciousness upon the world, as Jung saw it, is an attempt for humanity, the "magician," to understand her/himself. This understanding creates changes in the magician, and those changes are reflected in how they see, and approach the world. The magician thus learns to manipulate the world inside her-/himself, and their changed perception of that world is projected outward.
'The Art of Noise - [Beat Box (Diversion One)]--- In the contact of that mind, will, perception, and understanding, with others, we can see the contagion of thought structures, at work, as they establish the world-view that they hold, in the minds of others, change their perceptions, their minds, their realities. If we allow that Jung's Universal Unconscious is true, then there is the basis for an even easier and more complete type of transmission, from one set of combination of perception (person), to another.'
And I find that it folds into a lot of things I've been considering, lately. So let's talk about this.
Now, some of you, my fine readers, don't believe in magic; not as a psychological exercise and not as a thing real in itself, and that's fine. But bear with me, because I want to talk to you about authenticity.
the pAper chAse - [what should we do with your body (the lightning)]--- Yamamoto Tsunetomo wrote Hagakure: The Book of the Samurai as a guide for how retainers (vassals, lawyers, loyal servants of any kind) should comport themselves in the service of their masters and in the service of themselves. It is a book that has much to say about the natural course of life and death, and about the willingness of a servant to die in the name of his or her master. It is a treatise on loyalty and determination and the way that one should behave, at all times, in all situations with a sense of rightness, ferocity, and unwavering resolve, like the blade of a good katana. It is also, ultimately, a fiction.
Yamamoto Tsunetomo lived in the 1700's, long after the ed of the reign of the samurai warlords about whom he writes the lauditory shining text of the Hagakure. (the pAper chAse - [this is a rape (the flood)]). In fact, Tsunetomo never saw fistfight, let alone a battlefield; he was a functionary, an accountant writing odes to a bygone era, a Japanese camelot, a mythologised time that never actually happened. And so the Hagakure is a fiction. (the pAper chAse - [the small of your back the nape of your neck (the blizzard)]). It is an embellishment on the actual history of the place and time, a misappropriation of the struggles of those who actually went before, and a misrepresentation of what they actually believed and desired.There's a technical term for this, but it's not coming to me, for whatever reason [EDIT: 04/07/11: Idealisation. Fetishisation]. The point is, he had this non-existent Golden Age of Japan in mind, when he wrote his book.
the pAper chAse - [this is only a test (the tornado)]--- But does that really matter? Over at Rune Soup, there's the article "What Happened To Chaos Magick?" which goes into great detail about what it means to engage in the appropriation of other contexts and contents, of fictional worlds and creatures for the sake of magical practice, and the long and the short of this is, "If It Does The Work, Does It Matter Where It Came From?" With the unspoken, rhetorical answer being "No. Of course not." But I said I didn't want to talk about magic[k], necessarily, right? I said I wanted to talk about authenticity. So let's talk about Bob Dylan.
the pAper chAse - [we have ways to make you talk (the human condition)]---I've been searching for a while for an article [Edit: 0233:It was this issue of Doktor Sleepless*] I read about the crafting of Bob Dylan's authenticity. Think about that, a second. Dylan is often lauded as one of the most "real," "guileless," "unvarnished" musicians of the 20th century, but the fac of the matter is his persona was very carefully constructed to fit to the zeitgeist, very cleanly polished to have exactly the right rough edges and gravelly bits; it's just true. You don't get much more inauthentic than the Real Bob Dylan, and the same goes for anyone who promises to give you the "real them."
But what does that matter? Really, when we get down to it, there is no "authentic self" beyond that which we create for ourselves, and when we talk about authenticity, maybe we should be talking about the honesty and integrity of the person[a] engaged in the endeavour. When we say to the world, "l know what I am doing, when I take pieces of other places, and I do it openly, and honestly. I don't hide my sources, I wear them proudly and integrate and use them freely. I'm working on an homage to them, and stealing from myself," that is the most authentic thing we can ask for.
There is no authenticity. There is no inauthentic thing. The work of Yamamoto Tsunetomo suffers only from the fact that he did not present to others the fact that he was cherry-picking his favourite parts of his father's tales of his grandfather's Japanese history. And that suffering? It's only a momentary distaste, a brief frisson before we stop and go, "Well, okay, but now that we know this what is the content of the thing and to what use can we put it?" By the same token, Bob Dylan's music is the product of very careful crafting and planning, yes, but we can listen to it and see if it actually can be used to shed light on a particular subset of Americana. (Cole Porter& Dinah Washington - [I Get a Kick Out of You]). As long as we approach the usage of his crafted persona with an eye to understanding the crafted nature of it, when it's brought to our attention, then yes, I think we can still stand in the perspective of "America As Viewed Through Bob Dylan," just as we can stand in the perspective of "Bushido As Viewed Through The Hagakure."
My self is a created self. I take in my influences and I reprocess them, and while this may eventually become automatic or reflexive (think about that word, for a second), that does not mean that I should ever, ever forget that I create the substance of my self. That, if I allow myself to be randomly assailed and pulled this way and that with no consideration of the content of my preferences and the constructions of my personality, I'm a puppet on someone else's strings, rather than my own. But when I do take the time to make clear the way of my process, when I dont' deny that I'm always in the process of making myself who I am, then I'm as "authentic" as anyone can be.
Tom Waits - [Anywhere I Lay My Head (Live Atlanta 2008)]--- "Authentic" is only honesty. "Inauthentic" is, among other things, pretending to authenticity, pretending as if there is an unvarnished, unmediated self to access. We are only ever comprised of and capable of being viewed through the mirrors of the things with which we interact, or else we look at an empty vessel, and not just that, but an utter and profound emptiness. (Gorillaz - [Clint Eastwood]). It's Zen recognition of the nature of the self/universe: The Gateless Gate; the circle which circumference is nowhere and which centre is everywhere. There is no form, no shape, until the contexts come along and interact with each other and the syntactic/semantic interplay of thing-in-itself-as-thing-in-relation.
The self is always mediated, is always derrived out of the layers and rules of Other Things. It's only the ownership of that mediation, the conscious appropriation and acknowledgement of that process according to whatever rules we decide which makes us "real." Authenticity, in any other form, is covering our eyes and claiming an "Essential Self."
Arcana - [The Passage]-- Which, okay, sure, but that's just potent emptiness and limitless void. It only "means" something when we start drawing lines.
Tom Waits - [Such A Scream (Live Atlanta 2008)]--- Thoughts, disagreements, arguments all welcome.
[*Yes I'm well aware of the irony of not being able to remember my source, here.]
'Ridiculous thought:
'The Art of Noise - [A Time for Fear (Who's Affraid?)]--- That The initial teaching/learning of magic was the structure of the universe explaining itself to the "first adept," whomever. Analysis of self, explained to another. Followed, then, by the analysis of "other," which is really just an attempt to understand self. The projection of consciousness upon the world, as Jung saw it, is an attempt for humanity, the "magician," to understand her/himself. This understanding creates changes in the magician, and those changes are reflected in how they see, and approach the world. The magician thus learns to manipulate the world inside her-/himself, and their changed perception of that world is projected outward.
'The Art of Noise - [Beat Box (Diversion One)]--- In the contact of that mind, will, perception, and understanding, with others, we can see the contagion of thought structures, at work, as they establish the world-view that they hold, in the minds of others, change their perceptions, their minds, their realities. If we allow that Jung's Universal Unconscious is true, then there is the basis for an even easier and more complete type of transmission, from one set of combination of perception (person), to another.'
And I find that it folds into a lot of things I've been considering, lately. So let's talk about this.
Now, some of you, my fine readers, don't believe in magic; not as a psychological exercise and not as a thing real in itself, and that's fine. But bear with me, because I want to talk to you about authenticity.
the pAper chAse - [what should we do with your body (the lightning)]--- Yamamoto Tsunetomo wrote Hagakure: The Book of the Samurai as a guide for how retainers (vassals, lawyers, loyal servants of any kind) should comport themselves in the service of their masters and in the service of themselves. It is a book that has much to say about the natural course of life and death, and about the willingness of a servant to die in the name of his or her master. It is a treatise on loyalty and determination and the way that one should behave, at all times, in all situations with a sense of rightness, ferocity, and unwavering resolve, like the blade of a good katana. It is also, ultimately, a fiction.
Yamamoto Tsunetomo lived in the 1700's, long after the ed of the reign of the samurai warlords about whom he writes the lauditory shining text of the Hagakure. (the pAper chAse - [this is a rape (the flood)]). In fact, Tsunetomo never saw fistfight, let alone a battlefield; he was a functionary, an accountant writing odes to a bygone era, a Japanese camelot, a mythologised time that never actually happened. And so the Hagakure is a fiction. (the pAper chAse - [the small of your back the nape of your neck (the blizzard)]). It is an embellishment on the actual history of the place and time, a misappropriation of the struggles of those who actually went before, and a misrepresentation of what they actually believed and desired.
the pAper chAse - [this is only a test (the tornado)]--- But does that really matter? Over at Rune Soup, there's the article "What Happened To Chaos Magick?" which goes into great detail about what it means to engage in the appropriation of other contexts and contents, of fictional worlds and creatures for the sake of magical practice, and the long and the short of this is, "If It Does The Work, Does It Matter Where It Came From?" With the unspoken, rhetorical answer being "No. Of course not." But I said I didn't want to talk about magic[k], necessarily, right? I said I wanted to talk about authenticity. So let's talk about Bob Dylan.
the pAper chAse - [we have ways to make you talk (the human condition)]---
But what does that matter? Really, when we get down to it, there is no "authentic self" beyond that which we create for ourselves, and when we talk about authenticity, maybe we should be talking about the honesty and integrity of the person[a] engaged in the endeavour. When we say to the world, "l know what I am doing, when I take pieces of other places, and I do it openly, and honestly. I don't hide my sources, I wear them proudly and integrate and use them freely. I'm working on an homage to them, and stealing from myself," that is the most authentic thing we can ask for.
There is no authenticity. There is no inauthentic thing. The work of Yamamoto Tsunetomo suffers only from the fact that he did not present to others the fact that he was cherry-picking his favourite parts of his father's tales of his grandfather's Japanese history. And that suffering? It's only a momentary distaste, a brief frisson before we stop and go, "Well, okay, but now that we know this what is the content of the thing and to what use can we put it?" By the same token, Bob Dylan's music is the product of very careful crafting and planning, yes, but we can listen to it and see if it actually can be used to shed light on a particular subset of Americana. (Cole Porter& Dinah Washington - [I Get a Kick Out of You]). As long as we approach the usage of his crafted persona with an eye to understanding the crafted nature of it, when it's brought to our attention, then yes, I think we can still stand in the perspective of "America As Viewed Through Bob Dylan," just as we can stand in the perspective of "Bushido As Viewed Through The Hagakure."
My self is a created self. I take in my influences and I reprocess them, and while this may eventually become automatic or reflexive (think about that word, for a second), that does not mean that I should ever, ever forget that I create the substance of my self. That, if I allow myself to be randomly assailed and pulled this way and that with no consideration of the content of my preferences and the constructions of my personality, I'm a puppet on someone else's strings, rather than my own. But when I do take the time to make clear the way of my process, when I dont' deny that I'm always in the process of making myself who I am, then I'm as "authentic" as anyone can be.
Tom Waits - [Anywhere I Lay My Head (Live Atlanta 2008)]--- "Authentic" is only honesty. "Inauthentic" is, among other things, pretending to authenticity, pretending as if there is an unvarnished, unmediated self to access. We are only ever comprised of and capable of being viewed through the mirrors of the things with which we interact, or else we look at an empty vessel, and not just that, but an utter and profound emptiness. (Gorillaz - [Clint Eastwood]). It's Zen recognition of the nature of the self/universe: The Gateless Gate; the circle which circumference is nowhere and which centre is everywhere. There is no form, no shape, until the contexts come along and interact with each other and the syntactic/semantic interplay of thing-in-itself-as-thing-in-relation.
The self is always mediated, is always derrived out of the layers and rules of Other Things. It's only the ownership of that mediation, the conscious appropriation and acknowledgement of that process according to whatever rules we decide which makes us "real." Authenticity, in any other form, is covering our eyes and claiming an "Essential Self."
Arcana - [The Passage]-- Which, okay, sure, but that's just potent emptiness and limitless void. It only "means" something when we start drawing lines.
Tom Waits - [Such A Scream (Live Atlanta 2008)]--- Thoughts, disagreements, arguments all welcome.
[*Yes I'm well aware of the irony of not being able to remember my source, here.]
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