If one takes leave of the book with a cautious reserve about everything that has so far attained honor and even worship under the name of morality, this in no way contradicts the fact that the whole book contains no negative word, no attack, no spite—that it lies in the sun, round, happy, like some sea animal basking among rocks. (Nietzsche, Ecce Homo, III IV, §1)
Infinite Thought has demanded, according to the rules of her new Dogmeme, that I write a post containing no criticism of anything; conveniently, today I have been behaving very much like a Nietzschean sea animal, sitting out on my deck (which is like a balcony but, being American, bigger) on a perfect Berkeley day, reading Etienne Balibar and listening to bassline records. I discovered the other day that the internet is full of bassline, and I’ve been exploring parts of the genre I’d previously missed. I’m particularly liking the more house influenced stuff; and also this track that sounds like a northern soul Whigfield. And while looking for bassline on Youtube, I found out, to my relief, that northern hard house is still alive and well:
Also! Hard house remixes.
I’ve liked that Nietzsche quote for some time; indeed, I rather thought I’d taken his sea creature as a role model, so I was surprised when IT suggested that criticism was a “common rhetorical and stylistic trope” of this blog. What about all those entirely uncritical posts about Britney, Girls Aloud, and Tatu? But looking back on them, there is always a criticism of something lurking around somewhere. Although perhaps this isn’t so far from what Nietsche is talking about, as I like to think that my criticism is at least always cheerful.
So, furthering the meme:
The idea is to identify the common rhetorical and stylistic tropes of your favourite bloggers and ask them to write a post in which they get taken away, thus revealing the pure truth of their writing. Possibly. All posts must be at least 200 words.
- Infinite Thought: A post that contains no yearning for a world free of capitalism.
- K-punk: A post that contains either philosophy or popular culture, but not both.
- Adam: A post that is in no way “meta” (I realize there may be a Cretan problem here).
Adam Kotsko at 2:23 pm, September 3, 2008
An early confession: When I first saw that meme, I thought that no one would be able to come up with a way to tag me with it.
What I did today « The Weblog at 3:48 pm, September 3, 2008
[...] and The Girl occurred intermintantly throughout this period, and I also read and commented upon this post, which tagged me with Infinite Thought’s [...]
Brad at 4:07 pm, September 3, 2008
You say perfect Berkeley day, I say it was too hot for any self-respecting meter-matron to to write me out a ticket. And yet, so she did.
voyou at 6:32 pm, September 3, 2008
It’s an unusual meme, as it does require effort both in assigning it to someone, and in responding to it (I wanted to pass if on to Moll but, although she does have quite a distinctive style, I couldn’t think of how to sum it up in a specific rule.
And you’re right, Brad, it was too hot today. I wrote that bit of the post a couple of days ago, when the weather really was perfect, but I didn’t want to mention that, for fear that it would count as an implicit criticism of today’s weather.
Adam Kotsko at 6:40 pm, September 3, 2008
I can’t decide if my response post is non-meta or the peak of meta. OR BOTH.
jane at 10:18 am, September 4, 2008
I say perfect Berkeley day! But it’s the fourth now. Are you coming to Marxist Working Group tonight? Totally criticism-free!
Moll at 5:17 am, September 5, 2008
“What about all those entirely uncritical posts about Britney, Girls Aloud, and Tatu? But looking back on them, there is always a criticism of something lurking around somewhere.”
Hm, did you critique yourself here now? Personally I suspect the entire post of being a subtle criticism of the rejection of criticism. Everything comes undone when you start to go meta…
“I wanted to pass if on to Moll but, although she does have quite a distinctive style, I couldn’t think of how to sum it up in a specific rule.”
I never thought of myself as having a style. Incoherently and shambolic rambling? Spontaneous rantings caught in html? A mixture of personal angst and stolen field-notes smeared with a thin veneer of anthropological name-dropping(s)? Perhaps I would have had to write an entry that didn’t make use of any personal anecdotes and actually followed the rules of grammer.
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