[lit-ideas] Other Clashes, Other Rooms
- From: "Lawrence Helm" <lawrencehelm@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: "Lit-Ideas" <Lit-Ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Mon, 12 Nov 2007 12:24:19 -0800
I tried to post a note the other day but it never made it to Lit-ideas. I
debated forgetting it, but I ran across one of the many news items I’ve seen
lately over the border dispute between Argentina and Uruguay over a pulp mill
and I recalled that I questioned in the note below whether the
Argentine/British Falcon war might be considered a “Clash of Civilizations.”
Someone quoted someone whom I can’t recall to say that the Falcon War was like
two old bald men fighting over a comb. What can we make of the
Argentine/Uruguay dispute? http://www.mercopress.com/vernoticia.do?id=11860
<http://www.mercopress.com/vernoticia.do?id=11860&formato=HTML> &formato=HTML
Lawrence
From: Lawrence Helm [mailto:lawrencehelm@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx]
Sent: Saturday, November 10, 2007 9:22 AM
To: 'lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx'
Subject: RE: [lit-ideas] U and Non-U: A Survey
I thought of several things while reading your note, J.L.. At one point I
thought of Huysmans’ A Rebours, translated in English as Against the Grain.
Although the translation I read was called Against Nature. Here is the first
review of the first English Translation:
http://homepage.mac.com/brendanking1/huysmans.org/areboursrev/arebour4.htm I
could identify with Des Esseintes’ focusing upon a subject virtually no one
else was interested in; however, I was never focused on just one subject.
In regard to the classics, I think any person who considers himself educated
should be familiar with them – in the Alan/Harold Bloom sense. We in the West
have a common heritage and consequently a common set of concepts and allusions,
and if we want to be educated we should know what they are, or at least strive
to do so. Susan and I have some young friends who bought a set of the
Britannica Great Books and have resolved to read through them according to a
schedule they’ve devised. He is in the final throes of getting his PhD in
Geology but recognizes that being educated doesn’t consist of that.
I recall being stationed at 29 Palms. I was a corporal at the time and was in
the process of deciding not to stay in the Marine Corps. I began checking
books out of the base library. That’s when I first read Chaucer. I also
subscribed to something called “The Classics Club.” One of my regrets is
that I loaned my Shakespeare to a Sergeant who was subsequently arrested for
exposing himself in town. He never came back to our unit and I never got my
Shakespeare back. Of course I’m using the term “Classics” in the Harold
Bloom Western Canon sense and not the Medieval Oxford sense. I once read The
ABC of Reading, by Ezra Pound who was convinced that you couldn’t truly
appreciate a classic unless you read it in the original. Perhaps that’s one of
the reasons he devoted himself to Mussolini and went mad. I have been reading
through his Cantos with the help of “companions” and he apparently never
learned any of the languages he used as well as he thought he did. As for me,
I’ve contented myself with translations – even of Pound’s Cantos.
And yes, you wouldn’t fit any of the Argentine stereotypes – even if they
weren’t myths and over-rated. We here on Lit-Ideas have had our quibbles over
Left, Right, Liberal, and Conservative categories; which no one fits precisely
but we use them anyway. A few years ago I read Special Providence by Walter
Russell Mead. In it he identifies four categories related to Foreign Policy,
still viable, that Americans tend to fall into – or at least identify with to
some extent. 1) The Hamiltonian. This comprises an emphasis upon economics –
influencing foreign policy in such a way that it will benefit big business. 2)
Wilsonianism. This is the tendency to want to export Liberal Democracy. 3)
Jeffersonianism. This is the tendency toward legalism. And 4) Jacksonianism.
This comprises the American willingness to fight. If categories 1, 2 or 3
want a war for some pet project or idea they’ve got to talk the Jacknsonians
into it, because the Jacksonians will be the ones who have to fight it. Mead
describes each one of these categories in some detail. In the case of 1, 2 & 3
they are viewpoints to be entertained, but in the case of 4 he describes
individual types. Jaciksonians are rednecks, not too bright, and they love
country music. Call a war (he notes that in these modern times, Blacks often
fit the Jacksonian mold) and they are down at the recruiting offices signing
up. Actually, I did that at age 17 during the Korean war, but I hate country
music and I have an Esperanza-like contempt for people who aren’t too bright.
But in looking back, I’d sign up again; so maybe I’m more Jacksonian than any
of the other categories – although I’ve been accused of being Wilsonian a time
or two – this view which has morphed into what is now called Neoconservatism.
But I would never want to go to war just for that. Yes, if we’ve gone to war
and have to “nation build,” why not give Liberal Democracy a try, but let’s
stick to a Realpolitik live-and-let-live approach to Foreign Policy.
And then lastly I thought of Samuel P. Huntington’s Clash of Civilizations. He
distinguished between Western and Latin American Civilizations. Of course
we’re confronted with an atypical Argentinian, but will Argentina and Britain
fight again over the Falklands and if they did would that comprise a Huntington
clash? I see a future time in which South and North America have eliminated
their civilizational differences to the extent that any of those differences
would lead to a Huntington Clash.
Lawrence
From: lit-ideas-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx [mailto:lit-ideas-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] On
Behalf Of Jlsperanza@xxxxxxx
Sent: Saturday, November 10, 2007 5:00 AM
To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [lit-ideas] U and Non-U: A Survey
The Argentine Elite
L. K. Helm refers to:
http://www.tenfootsquare.com/top-ten-cultural-differences-about-argentina/
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