![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
rushthatspeaksDay before yesterday's review.
I was in fact looking for Wittgenstein's Remarks on Colour in the card catalog when I happened to see this listed. I had no notion it existed. Then after I jumped up and down grinning for a while, I think I kind of levitated to the relevant section of the stacks, and settled in for one of the most delightful hours I have ever had, consisting of Ludwig Wittgenstein telling me that Sir James George Frazer was a total idiot, for many original and awesome reasons. Oh little book where were you in my mythography classes. We always need more good reasons why Frazer was an idiot! It is an entire sub-field!
Anyway, for those of you who don't care about the history of the ongoing scholarly debates about the anthropology of myth (WHY DON'T YOU), this is also a really good book if you are, let us say, a fantasy writer and you would like to think more about the whys and wherefores of mythology and magic, because in completely debunking Frazer's explanations Wittgenstein also comes up with some good things I don't think anyone's said before.
So. The Golden Bough. It is best known nowadays I think as a collection of theoretically ancient rituals from ancient Greece, as with year-kings and so on, and the stories and rituals are indeed very compelling, although not so much based on archaeological evidence. Frazer, the author/compiler, says that mythology is a method of explaining the world by 'primitive societies' when they don't have thecurrently accepted real explanation. So the sun is carried across the sky by a chariot because chariots carry things and no one knows how else the sun could move, and people keep doing rituals to bring rain because they always work eventually, i.e. it always does rain again sometime. And the rituals of blood, human sacrifice etc., exist because the people who do them believe very hard that otherwise the year will not turn and the sun will not rise and therefore we can make some vague moral excuse for these poor ignorant savages I'M SORRY I DON'T LIKE FRAZER VERY MUCH OKAY. Especially since the logical corollary of his argument is that cultures 'grow out' of mythology and into science.
Wittgenstein says that the odd thing about Frazer is that he keeps representing people as doing these things out of stupidity, and it is just not that plausible that no one for thousands of years would notice that it rains sooner or later sometime. Frazer's error is in trying to explain ritual and mythology by saying that it depends on people's opinions about the world. But it does not depend on people's opinions, because if you change a person's beliefs about the reason the sun moves, it does not mean he automatically stops sacrificing to the sun god. The reasons for myth and ritual are found in the emotions we experience when we hear about/experience the myth and ritual, the very deep emotions. And something else:
For Wittgenstein, an expressed desire contains within itself the means of its satisfaction: if you are thirsty, your thirst contains the concept of water, which you know you need. And magic, ritual, these are expressed desires (as indeed most fantasy writers agree-- how many books in which the efficacy of magic is based on how badly you want something). But for Wittgenstein, and this is where I think his theory becomes original, magic is like any other expressed desire, in that it contains its own fulfillment. If you do the ritual, and the sun comes back, the cause and effect of things is immaterial. You are just as happy as if you made the sun come back, even though you know perfectly well on some level that you didn't, and on some other level that you did. The ritual was its own sufficiency. Hell, the sun doesn't even have to come back for you to know that at least you did the ritual right. This is the state of mind of someone who performs a curse, only to see their enemy become happier and luckier: well, I did everything I could.
Wittgenstein also points out that many separate ritual gestures may express exactly the same semantic content-- after Schubert's death his brother cut his remaining music into small pieces and distributed the pieces among his students, but we would equally take it as an act of pious memory, and of the same kind of pious memory, if the brother had burned the music, or locked it up in a cabinet where no one could ever see it again, or published it and insisted that copies be given free to everyone who wanted one. The point is that the gesture gravitates towards meaning, the rituals survive that contain the solution of expressed desire: the more effectively your myth tells this, your rite does this, the more likely it is to become widely adopted and survive.
Oh, this book is so good. I haven't even gone into what he thinks we ought to be doing with the anthropology of myth, partly because I am not sure I understand it, but the vague lineaments I can get are awesome. And I haven't gone into the way he thinks that ritual back-dates itself, that the sense that a given set of rituals must be incomparably ancient is part of the set of emotional responses that make that set of rituals compelling enough to survive.
And further demonstration of this book's sheer shininess: it was never published during Wittgenstein's lifetime; it was collected from a set of slips of paper tucked into his copy of The Golden Bough after he died and it holds together as an essay. Oh, Ludwig. It is no wonder people try to index, collate, and discuss his grocery lists.
The version I have is German/English facing pages, translated by A.C. Miles. I am considering buying a copy and sending it to one of my old college professors because there really was a gap shaped just like this in the syllabus of the best course I took on the history of mythography.
IN CONCLUSION: WITTGENSTEIN IS AWESOMESAUCE.
I was in fact looking for Wittgenstein's Remarks on Colour in the card catalog when I happened to see this listed. I had no notion it existed. Then after I jumped up and down grinning for a while, I think I kind of levitated to the relevant section of the stacks, and settled in for one of the most delightful hours I have ever had, consisting of Ludwig Wittgenstein telling me that Sir James George Frazer was a total idiot, for many original and awesome reasons. Oh little book where were you in my mythography classes. We always need more good reasons why Frazer was an idiot! It is an entire sub-field!
Anyway, for those of you who don't care about the history of the ongoing scholarly debates about the anthropology of myth (WHY DON'T YOU), this is also a really good book if you are, let us say, a fantasy writer and you would like to think more about the whys and wherefores of mythology and magic, because in completely debunking Frazer's explanations Wittgenstein also comes up with some good things I don't think anyone's said before.
So. The Golden Bough. It is best known nowadays I think as a collection of theoretically ancient rituals from ancient Greece, as with year-kings and so on, and the stories and rituals are indeed very compelling, although not so much based on archaeological evidence. Frazer, the author/compiler, says that mythology is a method of explaining the world by 'primitive societies' when they don't have the
Wittgenstein says that the odd thing about Frazer is that he keeps representing people as doing these things out of stupidity, and it is just not that plausible that no one for thousands of years would notice that it rains sooner or later sometime. Frazer's error is in trying to explain ritual and mythology by saying that it depends on people's opinions about the world. But it does not depend on people's opinions, because if you change a person's beliefs about the reason the sun moves, it does not mean he automatically stops sacrificing to the sun god. The reasons for myth and ritual are found in the emotions we experience when we hear about/experience the myth and ritual, the very deep emotions. And something else:
Burning in effigy. Kissing the picture of a loved one. This is obviously not based on a belief that it will have a definite effect on the object which the picture represents. It aims at some satisfaction and it achieves it. Or rather, it does not aim at anything; we act in this way and then feel satisfied.
For Wittgenstein, an expressed desire contains within itself the means of its satisfaction: if you are thirsty, your thirst contains the concept of water, which you know you need. And magic, ritual, these are expressed desires (as indeed most fantasy writers agree-- how many books in which the efficacy of magic is based on how badly you want something). But for Wittgenstein, and this is where I think his theory becomes original, magic is like any other expressed desire, in that it contains its own fulfillment. If you do the ritual, and the sun comes back, the cause and effect of things is immaterial. You are just as happy as if you made the sun come back, even though you know perfectly well on some level that you didn't, and on some other level that you did. The ritual was its own sufficiency. Hell, the sun doesn't even have to come back for you to know that at least you did the ritual right. This is the state of mind of someone who performs a curse, only to see their enemy become happier and luckier: well, I did everything I could.
Wittgenstein also points out that many separate ritual gestures may express exactly the same semantic content-- after Schubert's death his brother cut his remaining music into small pieces and distributed the pieces among his students, but we would equally take it as an act of pious memory, and of the same kind of pious memory, if the brother had burned the music, or locked it up in a cabinet where no one could ever see it again, or published it and insisted that copies be given free to everyone who wanted one. The point is that the gesture gravitates towards meaning, the rituals survive that contain the solution of expressed desire: the more effectively your myth tells this, your rite does this, the more likely it is to become widely adopted and survive.
Oh, this book is so good. I haven't even gone into what he thinks we ought to be doing with the anthropology of myth, partly because I am not sure I understand it, but the vague lineaments I can get are awesome. And I haven't gone into the way he thinks that ritual back-dates itself, that the sense that a given set of rituals must be incomparably ancient is part of the set of emotional responses that make that set of rituals compelling enough to survive.
And further demonstration of this book's sheer shininess: it was never published during Wittgenstein's lifetime; it was collected from a set of slips of paper tucked into his copy of The Golden Bough after he died and it holds together as an essay. Oh, Ludwig. It is no wonder people try to index, collate, and discuss his grocery lists.
The version I have is German/English facing pages, translated by A.C. Miles. I am considering buying a copy and sending it to one of my old college professors because there really was a gap shaped just like this in the syllabus of the best course I took on the history of mythography.
IN CONCLUSION: WITTGENSTEIN IS AWESOMESAUCE.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2011-03-23 10:14 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-03-23 11:11 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-03-23 11:18 am (UTC)YES!
*goes to read rest of review*
no subject
Date: 2011-03-23 11:13 pm (UTC)I loved that course so. It also contained the single best sentence any of my professors said in the entirety of college, about Sigmund Freud: "My God, we lost a great mediocre classicist in that man."
no subject
Date: 2011-03-24 01:42 am (UTC)*snrk*
no subject
Date: 2011-03-23 03:32 am (UTC)I have to get this.
But first, let me go kill that man in the orchard!
no subject
Date: 2011-03-23 11:14 pm (UTC)IT'S A TRAP
no subject
Date: 2011-03-23 03:33 am (UTC)Shiiiiiiny.
---L.
no subject
Date: 2011-03-23 11:19 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-03-23 03:34 am (UTC)Also: You have an icon of Twilight Sparkle reading! I squee forever and ever.
no subject
Date: 2011-03-23 11:14 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-03-23 03:41 am (UTC)I'd love to know if he defined the point at or the parameters within which a ritual or a symbol feels authentic enough to function as such.
The version I have is German/English facing pages, translated by A.C. Miles.
Yes, I want this book.
no subject
Date: 2011-03-23 07:51 pm (UTC)Me three!!
no subject
Date: 2011-03-23 11:15 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-03-23 11:48 pm (UTC)That sounds right; there are more questions than methodologies in Remarks on Colour.
no subject
Date: 2011-03-23 04:06 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-03-23 11:16 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-03-23 11:51 pm (UTC)Sadly for him, I think it was inevitable.
no subject
Date: 2011-03-23 04:14 am (UTC)And I haven't gone into the way he thinks that ritual back-dates itself, that the sense that a given set of rituals must be incomparably ancient is part of the set of emotional responses that make that set of rituals compelling enough to survive.
Gods yes. Twice is a ritual, twenty years is time out of mind.
Nine
no subject
Date: 2011-03-23 11:17 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-03-23 11:17 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-03-25 01:22 am (UTC)-Nameseeker
no subject
Date: 2011-03-23 04:29 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-03-23 11:18 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-03-23 11:45 pm (UTC)I(very lamely): "Oh, you've got it."
He (very offhand): "Oh yeah, had it in school."
The book has a well-read look to it. :)
no subject
Date: 2011-03-23 05:41 am (UTC)added to the queue. you find the coolest things. inspiring review.
no subject
Date: 2011-03-23 11:19 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-03-23 06:08 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-03-23 11:20 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-03-23 07:08 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-03-23 11:20 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-03-23 08:39 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-03-23 11:20 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-03-23 11:30 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-03-23 11:45 pm (UTC)As of last night, Amazon.com thought the bilingual edition was out of print, but that's what used book stores are for.
no subject
Date: 2011-03-23 10:52 am (UTC)WHY ISNT IT REQUIRED READING IN GRAD SCHOOL
no subject
Date: 2011-03-23 11:21 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-03-23 11:47 pm (UTC)You should. I think it may have fallen into the gap between Classics and philosophy, otherwise I like to think someone would have told me to check it out at the same time as Dumézil, Detienne, Claude Calame, etc.
no subject
Date: 2011-03-24 01:23 am (UTC)Because yes. There is a reason Frazier is required reading; there is also a reason this book exists.
no subject
Date: 2011-03-23 11:15 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-03-23 11:21 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-03-23 04:40 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-03-23 11:21 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-03-23 05:26 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-03-23 11:22 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-03-24 12:10 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-03-29 01:21 am (UTC)In fact, though, your writing is always wonderful, and when the heck did I start worrying about things being too difficult? I don't know. Your paragraphs about Frazier made me laugh, and the quote from Wittgenstein--especially Or rather, it does not aim at anything; we act in this way and then feel satisfied.--is wonderful.
I understand and deeply appreciate the example of what the brother does with Schubert's music. And yet the statement an expressed desire contains within itself the means of its satisfaction is almost beyond my reach. ... I am not sure I understand how this is always the case, or if it is always the case, it seems like a trick of linguistics (to express a desire is to say the thing that you want) .... and yet, regardless of that doubt, I totally accept the conclusion that somehow arises from the statement, about ritual being its own sufficiency.
Anyway.... very glad I came back.
no subject
Date: 2011-03-29 08:51 am (UTC)Much of Wittgenstein is centered around linguistic tricks, actually, he loved what he called 'language games' and was always focusing on what we can or can't say and the limits of language. But this one I don't think is a game-- more of a description of a natural human tendency. Some desires say what they want very clearly, you think 'I'm thirsty' and that has the concept in it of 'thirst-quenching liquid, thing to drink'. But some-- well, say you want the sun to come back. That looks like it's sufficiently expressed, yes? But what Wittgenstein is arguing is that you haven't actually said exactly what you want. Not only do you want the sun to come back, you want it to come back because it always has and because it's necessary and because the universe has order. Which is to say, it would be absolutely best if it came back because you had control over the order of the universe, because then you know it can't go wrong.
So when you've said, via language and expressive gesture, 'I want the sun to come back because I say so, because it always has, because the world won't be right unless it does and I want the world to be right'-- well, saying that with a language of gestures is magic, isn't it. Right there.
I do agree it may not always be the case-- for one thing I think there are circumstances in which one's desire may be not to have any control over some part of the universe, but the act of relinquishing control is a kind of control. But here we are getting into the kind of thing that means it takes forty-five minutes sometimes to read two sentences of Wittgenstein.
no subject
Date: 2011-03-29 10:30 am (UTC)--That's beautiful and true.
And yes, to what you said earlier about the wish for the sun and everything else that the wish contains being a kind of magic. And, when you add in what you said about relinquishing control, you can see how it has something to do with that area of feelings, experiences, and thought that people call religion, too.
I think I can deal with Wittgenstein better in dialogue, like this. Thank you!
no subject
Date: 2015-10-26 09:23 am (UTC)Excellent stuff. I will definitely have to find myself a copy of the book.