Old Email Archive

digest 1997-01-31 #001



11:29 PM 1/30/97 -0800
From: "Society for Literature & Science" 

Daily SLS Email Digest
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Date: 30 Jan 1997 01:33:13 -0800
From: Robert Maxwell Young 
Subject: Re: Reply: Re: idiot question--and fast! (Gregory)
Darwin changed the word from 'entangled' to 'tangled' in the 6th edition
of
_On the Origin of Species_. There is a useful variorum edition, edited
by
Morse Peckham, which chronicles every change in the text through the
editions. Darwin was a dedicated reviser of his text.
Peckham writes, 'Of the 3,878 sentences in the first edition, nearly
3,000
, about 75 per cent, were rewritten from one to five times each. Over
1,500
sentences were added, and of the original sentences plus these, nearly
325
were dropped. Of the original and added sentences there are nearly
7,500
variants of all kinds.  In terms of net added sentences, the sixth
edition
is nearly a third as long as the first' (Peckham, 1959, p. 9). Of the
total
revisions, 7 per cent appeared in the second edition, 14 per cent in
the
third, 21 per cent in the fourth, 29 per cent in the fifth and the
sixth
had even more. (pp. 20-24).
M. Peckham, Ed. (1959) _The Origin of Species by Charles Darwin: A
Variorum
Text_. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press.
Some years ago someone wrote a book entitled _The Tangled Bank_ and was
berated for bad scholarship. I always thought the critic was right, if
pedantic, but it now turns out that it depends on what edition one
reads.
I can find no reference to 'entangled; in the last paragraphs of
_The Descent of Man_, but I have only looked at the last three ones.
Bob Young
__________________________________________
Robert Maxwell Young:  robert@rmy1.demon.co.uk  26 Freegrove Rd., London
N7
9RQ, Eng. tel.+44 171 607 8306  fax.+44 171 609 4837 Professor of
Psychotherapy and Psychoanalytic Studies, Centre for Psychotherapeutic
Studies, University of  Sheffield. Home page and writings:
http://www.shef.ac.uk/~psysc/
Process Press publications:
http://www.shef.ac.uk/~psysc/process_press/index.html
'One must imagine Sisyphus happy.' - Camus
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Date: 30 Jan 1997 07:00:36 -0800
From: rauch@mindspring.com
Subject: (1) MLA: Literature & Science Division (1 of 3)
LITERATURE AND SCIENCE DIVISION SESSIONS: MLA 1997 (Toronto)
*Knowledge Texts: Institutionalizing and Diffusing Scientific
Knowledge*:
Papers or 2 Page abstracts dealing with encyclopedias, textbooks,
annuals and other forms of 'codified' knowledge to either
Alan Rauch or Eve Keller by March 15th.
____________________________________________________________
Alan Rauch                                              Eve Keller
Department of English                              Department of
English
North Carolina State University               Fordham University
Raleigh, NC 27695-8105                         Bronx, NY 10458
email: rauch@mindspring.com              ekeller@murray.fordham.edu
Tel.: (919) 743-3345
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Date: 30 Jan 1997 07:01:21 -0800
From: rauch@mindspring.com
Subject: (2) MLA: Literature & Science Division (2 of 3)
LITERATURE AND SCIENCE DIVISION SESSIONS: MLA 1997 (Toronto)
*Race and Science*: 
Science and the practices of racialization; race and the practices
of science.
Papers or 2 Page abstracts to Susan Squier by March 15th.
____________________________________________________________
Susan Squier
Brill Professor of English and Women's Studies
Department  of English
Penn State University
814-863-9582
email: SXS62@PSUVM.PSU.EDU
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Date: 30 Jan 1997 07:01:54 -0800
From: rauch@mindspring.com
Subject: (3) MLA: Literature & Science Division (3 of 3)
LITERATURE AND SCIENCE DIVISION SESSIONS: MLA 1997 (Toronto)
*The Cultural Work that Science Does: Science in the Other
Disciplines*:
Cultural critics have attempted to analyze
literary/social/political/cultural problems using
scientific theories, formulae, epistemologies.
Is it legitimate to apply scientific ideas to cultural matters?
How much does the critic need to know in order to deploy
such ideas? What are the political implications of using
science on culture? Papers or 2 page abstracts to
George Levine by March 15th.
____________________________________________________________
George Levine
Center for the Critical Analysis of Contemporary Culture
Rutgers University
8 Bishop Place
New Brunswick, NJ 08903
email: 76756.3360@compuserve.com
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Date: 30 Jan 1997 08:32:33 -0800
From: richard nash 
Subject: Re: Reply: Re: idiot question--and fast! (Gregory)
On Thu, 30 Jan 1997, Robert Maxwell Young wrote:
>         I can find no reference to 'entangled; in the last
paragraphs of
> _The Descent of Man_, but I have only looked at the last three
ones.
>
In my edition of _The Descent of Man_, "Reprinted from the Second
English 
Edition, Revised and Augmented,"  _The Descent_ concludes with a
"General 
Summary and Conclusion," followed by "A Supplemental Note on
Sexual
Selection in Relation to Monkeys."  The last two paragraphs of the
General Summary and Conclusion are set off by a line break.  What
follows, begins with these words:
"The main conclusion arrived at in this work, namely, that man is
descended from some lowly organized form, will, I regret to think, be
highly distasteful to many.  But there can hardly be a doubt that we
are
descended from barbarians.  The astonishment which I felt on first
seeing 
a party of Fuegians on a WILD AND BROKEN SHORE will never be forgotten
by 
me, for the reflection at once rushed into my mind--such were our
ancestors.  These men were absolutely naked and bedaubed with paint,
their long hair was TANGLED, etc."
My initial point in alluding to this was a modest offering as to why
Joe, 
working from memory, may have located the "tangled bank"
passage at the
end of _Descent_ rather than _Origin_.  I am not sure if there will
ever
be more that can be legitimately made of it.  Nonetheless, the word
"tangled" does in fact appear at the conclusion of _Descent_,
and we have 
the more sublime image of a "wild and broken shore"
substituting for its
pastoral corollary, the "tangled bank."  In a similar vein, we
might note 
that BOTH "tangled bank" passages in _Origin_ (Damashek
provides both
citations) invoke the metaphor of clothing, where at the end of
_Descent_ 
we are, as it were, confronted with "absolutely naked
[savages]."  The
"tangled bank" passages, I take it, are generally read as
endorsing a
notion of complex law rather than chance at work in nature--a position
that can be rendered amenable both to enlightenment arguments about
probability and contemporary arguments about chaos and complexity.  It
may be worth asking a Darwinist, if the tangled hair of the Fuegians
who
astonish Darwin on a wild and broken shore at the conclusion of
_Descent_ 
register a change in vision from the image of beautiful complexity with
which the _Origin_ concludes?  But I am not a Darwinist.
Richard
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Date: 30 Jan 1997 11:08:00 -0800
From: "Mike Merrill" 
Subject: tangled webs
Again, I want to thank everyone for their help in finding the
remembered but forgotten Darwin passage(s!).  Speaking of complexity,
little did I know what waves would grow from my ripple. (It's the old
cliche:  A butterfly in China flaps its wings, and halfway 'round the
globe, Michael Crichton earns another million dollars.)   To switch
metaphors:   I didn't mean to open old wounds.
If anyone cares, what set off this mad pursuit was a passage from a
book filled with various mad pursuits:  Wells's _The Island of Dr.
Moreau_.
"Chapter the Ninth," emphasis mine:
"I strode through the undergrowth that clothed the ridge behind
the
house . . . .
"The place was a pleasant one.  The rivulet was hidden by the
luxuriant vegetation of the BANKS, save at one point, where I caught
a triangular patch of its glittering water.  On the further side I
saw through a bluish haze a TANGLE of of trees and  creepers, and
above these again the luminous blue of the sky.  Here and there a
splash of white or crimson marked the blooming of some trailing
epiphyte.  I let my eyes wander over this scene for a while, and then
began to turn over in my mind again the strange peculiarities of
Montgomery's man.  But it was too hot to think elaborately, and
presently I fell into a tranquil state midway between dozing and
waking.
"From this I was aroused, after I know not how long, by a rustling
amidst the greenery on the other side of the stream.  For a moment I
could see nothing bu the waving summits of the ferns and reeds.  Then
suddenly upon the bank of the stream appeared something--at first I
could not distinguish what it was.  It bowed its head to the water
and began to drink.  Then I saw it was a man, going on all-fours like
a beast!"
Might this seem a conflation of both Darwin passages?
Prendick rejects a full  consideration of  either the complexity of
the tangled bank or the thin line between humans and other animals.
(Though
a decade in LA has taught me what I would not have before believed, that
there
is such a thing as "too hot to think".)  But as in the case of
Darwin's
persona,  the realizations are thrust upon him anyway.
Comments from adherents of any discipline are heartily welcome.
- --Mike Merrill
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Date: 30 Jan 1997 11:28:10 -0800
From: Marc Damashek 
Subject: Re: Electronic editions (...idiot question, etc.)
Clive:
Your question is probably of interest to more than one subscriber
(and many others probably already have their favorites). Please forgive
me
for replying to the list.
A good place to start (one of many) is
http://www.cs.cmu.edu/books.html at Carnegie-Mellon. Another
interesting
site at CMU can be found at http://english-www.hss.cmu.edu/ (the
English
Server, so-called). As usual, caveat emptor; a good deal of
hand-editing
has gone into many of these e-texts, and one is never quite sure of the
integrity of the end product.
Leave yourself plenty of time -- this can turn into quite a joyride.
Marc
>Dear Mark,
>
>            I saw your note about the Darwin tangled bank, and
wondered
>how easily I could get access to an electronic copy of the Origin
of
>Species and/or similar books.
>
>            Where should I start?
>
>                           Clive Sutton
>**********************
>Dr C.R. Sutton
>School of Education
>University of Leicester
>21, University Road,
>LEICESTER LE24FN., U.K.
>FAX (44) 116 252 3653  Email:  CRS@LEICESTER.AC.UK
>***********************
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Date: 30 Jan 1997 14:18:01 -0800
From: wu10@cornell.edu (Ted Underwood)
Subject: Re: tangled webs
This is turning into quite a detective story.  I was incompletely
convinced
that the _Descent_ passage echoed the _Origin_, but to my eye the
passage
from Wells does look like an echo of one or both of the Darwin
passages.
It's possible, I suppose, that they are all shaped by some larger
convention governing tangled vegetation.  One would like to run a search
on
"tangled near bank" in a hypothetical database more complete
than
Chadwyck-Healey's.
Too bad that this interesting sequence will be archived for posterity
under
the thread title of "Re: idiot question."
Ted Underwood                   wu10@cornell.edu
Department of English
Cornell University
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Date: 30 Jan 1997 14:41:11 -0800
From: "Mike Merrill" 
Subject: Re: tangled webs
OK, I admit it.  The reason I followed up by sending out the Wells
quotation was so that I would not go down in lit-sci lore as "The
Idiot" (no
offense to Prince Mishkin, but....)  Perhaps the damage is already
done.
- --Mike
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Date: 30 Jan 1997 15:30:26 -0800
From: noelg@deakin.edu.au (Noel Gough)
Subject: Re: (1) MLA: Literature & Science Division (1 of 3)
G'day Alan - hadn't realised you'd moved from Georgia... hope you are
enjoying NCSU. Quite by coincidence a young colleague from Canada is
there
right now for a job interview in Education... what's NCSU like as a
uni?
What are the dates for MLA in Toronto? We'll be back in Canada for a
month
or so this year (Annette and I are teaching summer school at UVic, BC,
and
daughter Kate is going back to spend summer with the friends she made
in
high school in Kingston, Ontario, in the fall of 1995).
On other matters: I'm holding a review copy of another Damien Broderick
book: _Reading by Starlight: Postmodern Science Fiction_ (London and
New
York: Routledge 1995). Would you be interested in me reviewing it for
_Configurations_? If you've got anything else along a similar lines that
I
could review along with it, I'd be interested in that, too...
Best, Noel (note that I've moved too - but just campuses - email hasn't
changed).
Noel Gough
Associate Professor
Deakin Centre for Education and Change
Deakin University
221 Burwood Highway
Burwood Victoria 3125
Australia
+61 (0)3 9244 3854 (office)
+61 (0)3 9244 6461 (messages)
+61 (0)3 9244 6752 (fax)
+61 (0)3 9836 8241 (home)
noelg@deakin.edu.au
http://www2.deakin.edu.au/e&c/dcec/members/Gough.html
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Date: 30 Jan 1997 18:46:27 -0800
From: Joseph Duemer 
Subject: Re: Reply: Re: idiot question--and fast! (Gregory)
richard nash wrote:
>
> On Thu, 30 Jan 1997, Robert Maxwell Young wrote:
>
> >         I can find no reference to 'entangled; in the last
paragraphs of
> > _The Descent of Man_, but I have only looked at the last three
ones.
> >
> In my edition of _The Descent of Man_, "Reprinted from the
Second English
> Edition, Revised and Augmented,"  _The Descent_ concludes with
a "General
> Summary and Conclusion," followed by "A Supplemental Note
on Sexual
> Selection in Relation to Monkeys."  The last two paragraphs of
the
> General Summary and Conclusion are set off by a line break.  What
> follows, begins with these words:
>
>   "The main conclusion arrived at in this work, namely, that
man is
> descended from some lowly organized form, will, I regret to think,
be
> highly distasteful to many.  But there can hardly be a doubt that
we are
> descended from barbarians.  The astonishment which I felt on first
seeing
> a party of Fuegians on a WILD AND BROKEN SHORE will never be
forgotten by
> me, for the reflection at once rushed into my mind--such were our
> ancestors.  These men were absolutely naked and bedaubed with
paint,
> their long hair was TANGLED, etc."
>
> My initial point in alluding to this was a modest offering as to
why Joe,
> working from memory, may have located the "tangled bank"
passage at the
> end of _Descent_ rather than _Origin_.  I am not sure if there will
ever
> be more that can be legitimately made of it.  Nonetheless, the
word
> "tangled" does in fact appear at the conclusion of
_Descent_, and we have
> the more sublime image of a "wild and broken shore"
substituting for its
> pastoral corollary, the "tangled bank."  In a similar
vein, we might note
> that BOTH "tangled bank" passages in _Origin_ (Damashek
provides both
> citations) invoke the metaphor of clothing, where at the end of
_Descent_
> we are, as it were, confronted with "absolutely naked
[savages]."  The
> "tangled bank" passages, I take it, are generally read as
endorsing a
> notion of complex law rather than chance at work in nature--a
position
> that can be rendered amenable both to enlightenment arguments
about
> probability and contemporary arguments about chaos and complexity. 
It
> may be worth asking a Darwinist, if the tangled hair of the
Fuegians who
> astonish Darwin on a wild and broken shore at the conclusion of
_Descent_
> register a change in vision from the image of beautiful complexity
with
> which the _Origin_ concludes?  But I am not a Darwinist.
>
> Richard
Nor am I a Darwinist, but having now checked the passages, and also
looked at Mike Merrill's quote from Wells, I have the sense that when
Darwin concluded the _Descent_ he expresses either a changed attitue
from the edenic view at the end of _Origin_, or that at the least he
reveals an ambiguity in his view of nature. In the _Descent_ Darwin
makes the arguement that humans are just another part of the natural
world, but at the end he seems appalled by the sight of what he takes
to
be a "natural" man. He says that modern and supposedly
civilized men are
doubtless descended from barbarians, but here he mistakes his own
biological theory for a social one; the mistake would later be
normalized under the label of social darwinism. Without having gone
back
into either text very deeply recently, I think we see evidence in his
two endings--always rhetorically charged moments in a text--of Darwin's
ambivalence.
Joe Duemer