June 14, 2007

  • Gestalt, Part II

    Unscholarly Notes

    The time of the previous entry, 1:06:18, suggests both the date of Epiphany, 1:06, and Hexagram 18 of the I Ching: Ku, Work on what has been spoiled (Decay).

    Epiphany: A link in the Log24 entries for Epiphany 2007 leads to Damnation Morning, which in turn leads to Why Me?,
    a discussion of the mythology of Spiders vs. Snakes devised by Fritz
    Leiber.  Spiders represent the conscious mind, snakes the
    unconscious.

    On Hexagram 18: "The Chinese character ku represents a bowl in whose contents worms are breeding. This means decay." --Wilhelm's commentary

    This brings us back to the previous entry with its mention of the date
    of Rudolf Arnheim's death: Saturday, June 9.  In Log24 on that
    date there was a link, in honor of Aaron Sorkin's birthday, to a short
    story by Leonard Michaels.  That link was suggested, in
    part,  by a review in the Sunday New York Times Book Review (available online earlier, on Friday). Here is a quote from that review related to the Hexagram 18 worm bowl:

    "... what grabbed attention for his early collections was Michaels's
    gruesome, swaggering depiction of the sexual rampage that was the
    swinging '60s in New York-- 'the worm bucket,' as Michaels described an
    orgy."

    Related material for meditation on this, the anniversary (according to Encyclopaedia Britannica) of the birth of author Jerzy Kosinski-- his novel The Hermit of 69th Street.

    Kosinski was not unfamiliar with Michaels's worm bucket.  For related information, see Hermit (or at least a review).

    In Leiber's stories the symbol of the Snakes is similar to the famed Yin-Yang symbol, also known as the T'ai-chi tu.  For an analysis of this symbol by Arnheim, see the previous entry.  See also "Sunday in the Park with Death" (Log24, Oct. 26, 2003):

    "Ay que bonito es volar  
        A las dos de la mañana    ...."
    -- "La Bruja"