virus: Fw: JENNY JONES & POSTMODERNISM (long)
Tim Rhodes (proftim@speakeasy.org)
Fri, 1 May 1998 11:10:21 -0700
>
>> Subject: JENNY JONES & POSTMODERNISM (fwd)
>>
>> > JENNY JONES: Boy, we have a show for you today!
>> >
>> > Recently, the University of Virginia philosopher Richard Rorty
>> > made the stunning declaration that nobody has "the foggiest
>> > idea" what postmodernism means. "It would be nice to get rid
>> > of it," he said. "It isn't exactly an idea; it's a word that
>> > pretends to stand for an idea."
>> >
>> > This shocking admission that there is no such thing as
>> > postmodernism has produced a firestorm of protest around the
>> > country. Thousands of authors, critics and graduate students
>> > who'd considered themselves postmodernists are outraged at the
>> > betrayal.
>> >
>> > Today we have with us a writer--a recovering postmodernist--who
>> > believes that his literary career and personal life have been
>> > irreparably damaged by the theory, and who feels defrauded by
>> > the academics who promulgated it. He wishes to remain
>> > anonymous, so we'll call him "Alex."
>> >
>> > Alex, as an adolescent, before you began experimenting with
>> > postmodernism, you considered yourself--what?
>> >
>> > Close shot of ALEX.
>> >
>> > An electronic blob obscures his face. Words appear at bottom of
>> > screen: "Says he was traumatized by postmodernism and blames
>> > academics."
>> >
>> > ALEX (his voice electronically altered): A high modernist.
>> > Y'know, Pound, Eliot, Georges Braque, Wallace Stevens, Arnold
>> > Schoenberg, Mies van der Rohe. I had all of Schoenberg's 78's.
>> >
>> > JENNY JONES: And then you started reading people like
>> > Jean-Francois Lyotard and Jean Baudrillard--how did that change
>> > your feelings about your modernist heroes?
>> >
>> > ALEX: I suddenly felt that they were, like, stifling and
>> > canonical.
>> >
>> > JENNY JONES: Stifling and canonical? That is so sad, such a
>> > waste. How old were you when you first read Fredric Jameson?
>> >
>> > ALEX: Nine, I think.
>> >
>> > The AUDIENCE gasps.
>> >
>> > JENNY JONES: We have some pictures of young Alex. ...
>> >
>> > We see snapshots of 14-year-old ALEX reading Gilles Deleuze and
>> > Felix Guattari's "Anti-Oedipus: Capitalism and Schizophrenia."
>> >
>> > The AUDIENCE oohs and ahs.
>> >
>> > ALEX: We used to go to a friend's house after school--y'know,
>> > his parents were never home--and we'd read, like, Paul Virilio
>> > and Julia Kristeva.
>> >
>> > JENNY JONES: So you're only 14, and you're already skeptical
>> > toward the "grand narratives" of modernity, you're questioning
>> > any belief system that claims universality or transcendence.
>> > Why?
>> >
>> > ALEX: I guess--to be cool.
>> >
>> > JENNY JONES: So, peer pressure?
>> >
>> > ALEX: I guess.
>> >
>> > JENNY JONES: And do you remember how you felt the very first
>> > time you entertained the notion that you and your universe are
>> > constituted by language--that reality is a cultural construct,
>> > a "text" whose meaning is determined by infinite associations
>> > with other "texts"?
>> >
>> > ALEX: Uh, it felt, like, good. I wanted to do it again.
>> >
>> > The AUDIENCE groans.
>> >
>> > JENNY JONES: You were arrested at about this time?
>> >
>> > ALEX: For spray-painting "The Hermeneutics of Indeterminacy" on
>> > an overpass.
>> >
>> > JENNY JONES: You're the child of a mixed marriage -- is that
>> > right?
>> >
>> > ALEX: My father was a de Stijl Wittgensteinian and my mom was a
>> > neo-pre-Raphaelite.
>> >
>> > JENNY JONES: Do you think that growing up in a mixed marriage
>> > made you more vulnerable to the siren song of postmodernism?
>> >
>> > ALEX: Absolutely. It's hard when you're a little kid not to be
>> > able to just come right out and say (sniffles), y'know, I'm an
>> > Imagist or I'm a phenomenologist or I'm a post-painterly
>> > abstractionist. It's really hard--especially around the
>> > holidays. (He cries.)
>> >
>> > JENNY JONES: I hear you. Was your wife a postmodernist?
>> >
>> > ALEX: Yes. She was raised avant-pop, which is a fundamentalist
>> > offshoot of postmodernism.
>> >
>> > JENNY JONES: How did she react to Rorty's admission that
>> > postmodernism was essentially a hoax?
>> >
>> > ALEX: She was devastated. I mean, she's got all the John Zorn
>> > albums and the entire Semiotext(e) series. She was crushed.
>> >
>> > We see ALEX'S WIFE in the audience, weeping softly, her hands
>> > covering her face.
>> >
>> > JENNY JONES: And you were raising your daughter as a
>> > postmodernist?
>> >
>> > ALEX: Of course. That's what makes this particularly tragic.
>> > I mean, how do you explain to a 5-year-old that self-consciously
>> > recycling cultural detritus is suddenly no longer a valid art
>> > form when, for her entire life, she's been taught that it is?
>> >
>> > JENNY JONES: Tell us how you think postmodernism affected your
>> > career as a novelist.
>> >
>> > ALEX: I disavowed writing that contained real ideas or any real
>> > passion. My work became disjunctive, facetious and nihilistic.
>> > It was all blank parody, irony enveloped in more irony.
>> > It merely recapitulated the pernicious banality of television
>> > and advertising. I found myself indiscriminately incorporating
>> > any and all kinds of pop kitsch and schlock. (He begins to weep
>> > again.)
>> >
>> > JENNY JONES: And this spilled over into your personal life?
>> >
>> > ALEX: It was impossible for me to experience life with any
>> > emotional intensity. I couldn't control the irony anymore. I
>> > perceived my own feelings as if they were in quotes.
>> >
>> > I italicized everything and everyone. It became impossible for
>> > me to appraise the quality of anything. To me everything was
>> > equivalent--the Brandenburg Concertos and the Lysol jingle had
>> > the same value.... (He breaks down, sobbing.)
>> >
>> > JENNY JONES: Now, you're involved in a lawsuit, aren't you?
>> >
>> > ALEX: Yes. I'm suing the Modern Language Association.
>> >
>> > JENNY JONES: How confident are you about winning?
>> >
>> > ALEX: We need to prove that, while they were actively
>> > propounding it, academics knew all along that postmodernism was
>> > a specious theory. If we can unearth some intradepartmental
>> > memos--y'know, a paper trail--any corroboration that they knew
>> > postmodernism was worthless cant at the same time they were
>> > teaching it, then I think we have an excellent shot at
>> > establishing liability.
>> >
>> > JENNY JONES wades into audience and proffers microphone to a
>> > woman.
>> >
>> > WOMAN (with lateral head-bobbing): It's ironic that Barry Scheck
>> > is representing the M.L.A. in this litigation because Scheck is
>> > the postmodern attorney par excellence. This is the guy who's
>> > made a career of volatilizing truth in the simulacrum of
>> > exculpation!
>> >
>> > VOICE FROM AUDIENCE: You go, girl!
>> >
>> > WOMAN: Scheck is the guy who came up with the quintessentially
>> > postmodern re-bleed defense for O. J., which claims that O. J.
>> > merely vigorously shook Ron and Nicole, thereby re-aggravating
>> > pre-existing knife wounds. I'd just like to say to any client
>> > of Barry--lose that zero and get a hero!
>> >
>> > The AUDIENCE cheers wildly.
>> >
>> > WOMAN: Uh, I forgot my question.
>> >
>> > Dissolve to message on screen:
>> >
>> > If you believe that mathematician Andrew Wiles' proof of
>> > Fermat's last theorem has caused you or a member of your family
>> > to dress too provocatively, call (800) 555-9455.
>> >
>> > Dissolve back to studio. In the audience, JENNY JONES extends
>> > the microphone to a man in his mid-30's with a scruffy beard
>> > and a bandana around his head.
>> >
>> > MAN WITH BANDANA: I'd like to say that this "Alex" is the single
>> > worst example of pointless irony in American literature, and
>> > this whole heartfelt renunciation of postmodernism is a
>> > ploy--it's just more irony.
>> >
>> > The AUDIENCE whistles and hoots.
>> >
>> > ALEX: You think this is a ploy?! (He tears futilely at the
>> > electronic blob.) This is my face!
>> >
>> > The AUDIENCE recoils in horror.
>> >
>> > ALEX: This is what can happen to people who naively embrace
>> > postmodernism, to people who believe that the individual--the
>> > autonomous, individualist subject--is dead. They become a
>> > palimpsest of media pastiche--a mask of metastatic irony...
>> >
>> > JENNY JONES (biting lip and shaking her head): That is so sad.
>> > Alex--final words?
>> >
>> > ALEX: I'd just like to say that self-consciousness and irony
>> > seem like fun at first, but they can destroy your life. I know.
>> > You gotta be earnest, be real. Real feelings are important.
>> > Objective reality does exist.
>> >
>> > AUDIENCE members whoop, stomp and pump fists in the air.
>> >
>> > JENNY JONES: I'd like to thank Alex for having the courage to
>> > come on today and share his experience with us.
>> >
>> > Join us for tomorrow's show, "The End of Manichean, Bipolar
>> > Geopolitics Turned My Boyfriend Into an Insatiable Sex Freak
>> > (and I Love It!).."
>