What else was I saying? Oh, that movies are specific things — unique, one-off entities — conversations are so much more open than that.
Telling M about finding the Gracie papers yesterday, I said if she had [word unclear], we wouldn’t have gotten the “little fool” Sam (I’m conscious of being a bit mean to him — then I recalled that he can’t read). And I don’t mean to be harsh on the boy. It’s just he’s more of a goof than Gracie was. I love the goof — Gracie was more devious.
See, and I’m off ideas and talking dog personalities — and that’s fine, fun. Conversations can veer from fun to serious and whatever. And blerg — this is the beauty of the journals — they can be anything, you know!
And that’s what I’m getting at. I’m not making some story that I’m claiming has some profound (mythic) power (of redemption, some idea of growth, or something). {And smart people like reading new ideas (like Eagleman’s book, like Borges) — for smart people, ideas are fun (to a point — as [my uncle G.] said once when he was with me, we have plenty of ideas )} And I’m not claiming my ideas have theoretical power/value (ideas vs. conversations), and I’m not making some pre-planned work of art (movie or novel or whatever — anything intended, planned).
It’s just, it’s — I sorta don’t even want to call it a public text — rather than call attention to it publicly, I’d almost rather somebody find it accidentally. Say, hide my tests in a bookstore or library shelf or at a doctor’s office — something to disrupt expectations, well, but not overtly — subtly. I mean, if I give a reading, I’m calling attention to my text. Actually, I’m defining it as a public text, I’m claiming it’s a complete work — and there are theories and expectations people have for complete works that they may not have for found documents — texts whose contexts are unclear. (And I don’t mean this in a cleverness way — I wouldn’t try to be super-sneaky like Banksy, that whole cheesily simple mystery of his real identity.)
But I’m saying that such a practice, such a way of presenting my writing — such a format would allow me to not put an ending boundary on it. No sense of “this is done.” It might be more like a conversation, and I’d have a sense of not knowing if and where and when and by whom it was ever found and read. And yet, the fact that I’ve already had this idea means it’s sorta done already for me (I mean, I could do it, but it’s not a final answer. There is no final answer in art!) — onto new ideas!
I mean, I don’t really have any particular thing to say to anybody — no arguments to try to convince others, no story to tell — will people take this in the way I’d like them to? (Maybe that’s the challenge of all art for others?)
[From journal of Weds., 1 June 2011, Journal 141, page 126-8 ]
MonkeyMoonMachine 