A PREFACE TO WILLIAM CARLOS WILLIAMS: THE PREPOETICS OF KORA IN HELL: IMPROVISATIONS B.A., The Un i v e r s i t y of Manitoba, 1964 M.A., Simon Fraser U n i v e r s i t y , 1969 A THESIS SUBMITTED IN PARTIAL FULFILMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY i n THE FACULTY OF GRADUATE STUDIES (Department of English) We accept t h i s thesis as conforming by ROY AKIRA/MIKI to the required standard THE UNIVERSITY OF BRITISH COLUMBIA January 1980 (c) Roy Akira M i k i , 1980 In presenting this thesis in partial fulfilment of the requirements for an advanced degree at the University of British Columbia, I agree that the Library shall make i t freely available for reference and study. I further agree that permission for extensive copying of this thesis for scholarly purposes may be granted by the Head of my Department or by his representatives. It is understood that copying or publication of this thesis for financial gain shall not be allowed without my written permission. Department The University of British Columbia 2075 Wesbrook Place Vancouver, Canada V6T 1W5 D E - 6 B P 75-51 I E i i ABSTRACT F i r s t published i n 1920, Kora i n H e l l : Improvisations i s the f i r s t of a series of remarkable books which can best be described as experiments and affirmations of the w r i t i n g act, improvisational texts through which Williams sought to e s t a b l i s h a "poetics" of w r i t i n g . Williams c a l l e d Kora "an opening of the doors," and c e r t a i n l y the work that came of i t , immediately i n the 1920's, and throughout the r e s t of h i s w r i t i n g l i f e , would follow t h i s key book, t h i s "secret document." And he also thought of i t as a "wonder" because he had no book i n mind when he f i r s t sat down to write something d a i l y f o r a year, simply for the sake of w r i t i n g . Unpremeditated and unplanned as i t was, Kora f i n a l l y became a book and showed Williams that a wri t e r composes a£ he writes. This i s the key discovery which makes Kora a c e n t r a l document i n Williams' beginnings as a writer. At the same time, and j u s t as importantly, Kora also i n i t i a t e d Williams into what would be c a l l e d "modernist" w r i t i n g — that i s , w r i t i n g i n which the act of w r i t i n g i s affirmed as a mode of consciousness, actual to that extent. For t h i s reason, t h i s study not only examines the " h i s t o r y " of Kora's composition i n r e l a t i o n to the o r i g i n of Williams' poetics, but also argues that Kora i s a primary text i n the development of "modernist" w r i t i n g i n America, For Williams, i n f a c t , the two were inseparable. Williams -viewed the beginnings of modernist w r i t i n g i n terms of a s h i f t from language used as a transparent v e h i c l e of thought to a new sense of i i i language as i t s e l f a c t u a l . " I t i s the making of that step," he says i n h i s Autobiography, "to come over into the t a c t i l e q u a l i t i e s , the words themselves beyond the mere thought expressed that distinguishes the modern, or d i s t i n -guished the modern of that time from the period before the turn of the century." Williams aligns t h i s discovery with, e a r l y 20th century modernist a r t i s t s l i k e Stuart Davis, Marcel Duchamp and Juan Gr i s . Alongside t h i s change i n a t t i t u d e s toward language came an equally r a d i c a l awareness of the otherness of the world, i t s " o b j e c t i v i t y " i n r e l a t i o n to the " s u b j e c t i v i t y " of the mind's orders. This emphasis upon the p a r t i c u l a r i t y of things made possible a new understanding of man as a creature of nature, a l i v e thing i n a world of other l i v e things: "a speaking animal." This d i s s e r t a t i o n i s divided into three sections. Section One focuses on Williams' understanding, e s p e c i a l l y i n the 1920's, of modernist w r i t i n g and art by considering his "reading" of Dadaism and Surrealism as well as his c r i t i c a l appreciation of Gertrude S t e i n , James Joyce and Shakespeare. Section Two examines the texture of Kora, . - s p e c i f i c a l l y the opacity of the w r i t i n g i n i t , as the e f f e c t of a c r i s i s i n meaning. This c r i s i s i s t i e d d i r e c t l y to a c r i s i s i n language. The text of Kora i s thus discussed as a drama through which a doubletalking f o o l ' s voice emerges. The w r i t e r undergoing the act of w r i t i n g finds himself thrown into a c r i s i s of mind which subverts the closure of f i x e d points of view. A s i m i l a r e f f e c t i s evident i n the texture of Stuart Davis' drawing, the f r o n t i s p i e c e ; t o the f i r s t e d i t i o n of.Kora. Out of t h i s r e j e c t i o n of perspective Williams begins to perceive the nature of c r i s i s as a condition of experience. I t i s from t h i s basis that Section Three explores Kora as the o r i g i n of a new poetic for Williams. A f t e r dealing with the imaginative world of p r e h i s t o r i c art i n r e l a t i o n to the i v b i r t h of the imagination i n Kora, i t then argues that the improyisational method — an act comparable to the act of d r i v i n g a c a r — i s the one method which operates within the experience of c r i s i s , F i n a l l y , Section Three looks at c r i s i s as a l i f e - p r i n c i p l e and examines the new sense of a feminine " s e l f " i n Kora, one constituted through, the c r i s i s of w r i t i n g . For Williams the appearance of t h i s other s e l f i n the act of w r i t i n g i s a re-enactment i n the. imagination of the Kora myth. V TO SLAVIA & WAYLEN FOR PUTTING UP WITH ME & TO ELISSE FOR BEING BORN RIGHT AT THE END This immediacy, the thing, as I went on writing, living as I could, thinking a secret life I wanted to tell openly — if only I could — how it lives, secretly about us as much now as ever. It is the history, the anatomy of this, not subject to surgery, plumbing or cures, that I wanted to tell. I don't know why. Why tell that which no one wants to hear? But I saw that when I was successful in portraying something, by accident, of that secret world of perfection, that they did want to listen. Definitely. And my "medicine" was the thing which gained me entrance to these secret gardens of the self. It lay there, another world, in the self. I was permitted by my medical badge to follow the poor, defeated body into those gulfs and grottos. And the astonishing thing is that-at such times and in such places — foul as they may be with the stinking ischio-rectal abscesses of our comings and goings — just there, the thing, in all its greatest beauty, may for a moment be freed to fly for a moment guiltily about the room. In illness, in the permission I as a physician have had to be present at deaths and births, at the tormented battles between daughter and diabolic mother, shattered by a gone brain — just there — for a split second — from one side or the other, it has fluttered before me for a moment, a phrase which I quickly write down on anything at hand, any piece of paper I can grab. It is an identifiable thing, and its characteristic, its chief character is that it is sure, all of a piece and, as I have said, instant and perfect: it comes, it is there, and it vanishes. But I have seen it, clearly. I have seen it. I know it because there it is. I have been possessed by it just as I was in the fifth grade — when she leaned over the back of the seat before me and greeted me with some obscene remarks — which I cannot repeat even if made by a child forty years- ago, because no one would or could under-stand what I am saying that then, there, it had appeared. (.The Autobiography of William Carlos- Williams, 288-289) v i i ABBREVIATIONS A The Autobiography of William Carlos Williams AN A Novelette and Other Prose CEP The Collected E a r l i e r Poems of William Carlos Williams CLP The Collected Later Poems of William Carlos Williams EK The Embodiment of Knowledge GAN The Great American Novel IAG In the American Grain IW I Wanted to Write a Poem K Kora i n H e l l : Improvisations P Paterson PB Pictures from Brueghel and Other Poems PO Poems, 1909 SA Spring and A l l SE Selected Essays of William Carlos Williams SL Selected Letters of William Carlos Williams For convenience I have used the texts of Kora i n H e l l : Improvisations, Spring and A l l , "The Descent of Winter," The Great American Novel, and A Novelette and Other Prose c o l l e c t e d i n Imaginations, ed. Webster Schott, A l l page references f o r these t i t l e s r e f e r to Imaginations. For example, K, 39 refer s to a quotation from KOra i n H e l l on page 39 of Imaginations; SA, 92 a quotation from Spring and A l l on page 92 i n Imaginations, and so on. v i i i TABLE OF CONTENTS ABSTRACT PREFACE PROLOGUE: MY SELF WAS BEING SLAUGHTERED SECTION ONE: THE WORD MAN INTRODUCTION: RING,-RING;-'RING, 'RING • 33 CHAPTER TWO: RIEN, RIEN, RIEN 52 CHAPTER THREE: THE LANGUAGE . . . THE LANGUAGE 66 SECTION TWO: PERSPECTIVE AS CLOSURE CHAPTER FOUR:'fOi? WHAT IT'S WORTH 87 CHAPTER FIVE: TO LOOSEN THE ATTENTION 128 CHAPTER SIX: THE FRONTISPIECE? 148 SECTION THREE: A NEW STEP CHAPTER SEVEN: THE BIRTH OF THE IMAGINATION 169 CHAPTER EIGHT: WRITE GOING. LOOK TO STEER. 209 CHAPTER NINE: A.1NEW DIRECTION 244 CONCLUSION: AN OPENING OF THE DOORS 273 NOTES 287 BIBLIOGRAPHY 306 Pages i i i x 2 PREFACE There i s an anecdote t o l d me by his mother, who wished me to understand his character, as follows: The young William Carlos, aged l e t us say about seven, arose i n the morning, dressed and put on h i s shoes. Both shoes but-toned on the l e f t side. He regarded t h i s untoward pheno-menon f o r a few moments and then c a r e f u l l y removed the shoes, placed shoe a. that had been on h i s l e f t foot, on his r i g h t foot, and shoe b_, that had been on the r i g h t foot, on his l e f t foot; both sets of buttons again appeared on the l e f t side of the shoes. This stumped him. With the shoes so buttoned he went to school, but . . . and here i s the s i g n i f i c a n t part of the story, he spent the day i n c a r e f u l consideration of the matter. (Ezra Pound, from "Dr. Williams' P o s i t i o n , " 1928) Once I came .near .drowning, I dived from a row-boat during a storm to recover my oars which I had l o s t , having "caught a crab." I had l i g h t clothes on. I am not a very strong swimmer. I recovered one of the oars but the wind c a r r i e d my boat away f a s t e r than I could follow. The waves were high. I swam as hard as I could u n t i l out of breath. My clothes began to drag. I t r i e d to remove my shoes. I couldn't. I swallowed some water. I thought I was done f o r when there crossed my mind these sentences: So t h i s i s the end? What a waste of l i f e to die so stup i d l y . The thought was s i n g u l a r l y emotionless, simply a clear v i s i o n of the s i t u a t i o n . So much was th i s so that I was i n s t a n t l y sobered. My action taking at once the q u a l i t y of the thought, tucking the one oar under my l e f t arm I swam qu i e t l y along hoping someone would see the empty boat and come out for me, which a man did. My courage, i f you w i l l , turned upon the color of my thought. (William Carlos Williams, from "Three Professional Studies," 1919) X The l o y e l y anecdote Pound /uses to begin his essay "Dr. Williams' P o s i t i o n " (.1928),"'" i t s obvious .playfulness aside, indicates how immediately he understood Williams to be the kind of writer who could dwell on an inconsistency and turn i t around and around -until i t f i n a l l y engaged his whole undivided attention. An intimation of th i s same c a p a b i l i t y l i e s embedded i n a l i n e from Kora; i n H e l l : "Or throw two shoes on the f l o o r and see how t h e y ' l l l i e i f you think i t ' s a l l one way" (K, 80). Williams' mind operates i n contraries — many ways a l l at once — that are held i n t h e i r complexity. And i t can do so simply because i t thrives on what i s indeterminate, unknown, and i n the play of change. C r i s i s i s the very a i r i t breathes. The passage from "Three Professional Studies" was written around the same time as Kora, and although i t reads as a biographical s t a t e -ment, no other s i m i l a r statement written then could better reveal the texture 2 of his w r i t i n g i n t h i s unique book. He apparently saved himself i n the boating d i s a s t e r when he released h i s mind to the condition of the accident. By so adjusting i t to the confusion of t h i s c r i s i s , he discovered how to work his way through. His actions turned on the v a r i a b i l i t y of his thought. In essence t h i s drama presents the terms of what happens i n Kora. The book began out of a c r i s i s i n Williams' w r i t i n g l i f e ("my s e l f was being slaughtered" (A, 158), he says i n his Autobiography), but given his nature as a wri t e r , i t quickly translated i t s e l f i nto a c r i s i s i n language. In Kora Williams allowed himself to leap into his own "slaughter" to see i f the act of w r i t i n g i t s e l f could r e t r i e v e him. And the text f i n a l l y published i n 1920 i s the remarkable outcome of th i s venture, Throughout the massive amount that Williams would subsequently write, i t continues to read as a key, the one book that prefigures the Tinderlying pattern of assumptions i n x i Williams' w r i t i n g . Kora reveals Williams' own beginnings, or to use the term I have chosen f o r the s u b t i t l e : o f t h i s study, the "pre~poetics" of his w r i t i n g . In t h i s sense, what follows may be understood as a "preface" to Williams, Other than that, Williams himself offered me a clue as to how an extended study of such an unusual text might be structured. " I t i s r a r e l y understood," he says i n Spring and A l l , how such plays as Shakespeare's were written — or i n fa c t how any work of "value has been written, the p r a c t i c a l bearing of which i s that only as the work,was produced, i n that way alone can i t be understood. (SA, 128) ACKNOWLEDGMENTS I would l i k e e s p e c i a l l y to thank Peter Quartermain for supervising t h i s d i s s e r t a t i o n . His support and thoughtful advice throughout have helped me to see my way through. Warren Tallman and Robin Blaser have encouraged me at the r i g h t moments. And f i n a l l y , I would l i k e to thank the Dean of Arts, Simon Fraser U n i v e r s i t y , for providing me with the services of Miriam Walker, who typed the f i n a l draft of t h i s d i s s e r t a t i o n . ? 1 KORA IN HELL: IMPROVISATIONS By^ WILLIAM CARLOS WILLIAMS 2 PROLOGUE MY SELF WAS BEING SLAUGHTERED 3 In 1920 when the Kora i n H e l l was o r i g i n a l l y published by The Four Seas Co., of Boston, I was a young man, f u l l of yeast that was soon to flower as the famous outburst of l i t e r a t u r e and p a i n t i n g marking the e a r l y years of the present century. The notorious Armory Show had taken place i n 1913, seven years e a r l i e r , James Joyce's Ulysses was to appear i n 1922. (K, 29) Af t e r a long 37 year i n t e r v a l , Kora i n H e l l ; Improvisations was f i n a l l y republished i n 1957, the occasion of these opening l i n e s from a b r i e f "Prologue" that Williams wrote to replace the o r i g i n a l one. In 1920, Williams was 37 years old, perhaps not a "young man," but c e r t a i n l y " f u l l of yeast," who would soon flower i n h i s own "outburst of l i t e r a t u r e . " A v e r i t a b l e barrage of t i t l e s appeared i n the years immediately following Kora, as Williams wrote his way into the 20's: the magazine Contact (1920-1923) with Robert McAlmon; Sour Grapes (1921), a c o l l e c t i o n of poems; the experimental prose of The Great American Novel (1923); the c r i t i c a l prose and the poems of Spring and A l l (1923) ; the essays on American h i s t o r y that 4 comprise In the American Grain (1925), a portion of which was written during a t r i p to Europe i n 1924; the improvisational prose and the poems i n "The Descent of Winter" (1928).; A Voyage to Pagany (1928), a f i r s t novel that grew out of the European escapade; a t r a n s l a t i o n of P h i l l i p e Soupault's S u r r e a l i s t novel, Last Nights of P a r i s (1929); and f i n a l l y , A Novelette and Other Prose (1921-1931), more improvisations alongside a c o l l e c t i o n of essays, not published u n t i l 1932, but a book that c e r t a i n l y belongs to the 20's, and i n fact acts as a summation of Williams' involve-ment i n modernist w r i t i n g during the 20's. By the time Lawrence F e r l i n g h e t t i from City Lights Books approached Williams to re-issue Kora i n h i s Pocket Poets Series, the one book that had thrown Williams into a new decade of w r i t i n g had become one of h i s most hidden, though i t had, at the same time — by then — become one of the l o s t " c l a s s i c s " of modern American w r i t i n g . Long unavailable, but read by a growing number of poets and w r i t e r s , by the middle 50's Kora had entered another generation, another time. F e r l i n g h e t t i was acting on t h i s currency, and perhaps t h i s explains why Williams wrote another "Prologue" i n which he mentions that Kora has "remained more or l e s s of a secret document for my own wonder and amusement known to few others" (K, 30). Let another age, he implies, make of the text what i t can. Yet the phrase "secret document" resonates, despite the f a c t that Williams o f f e r s no further explanation or expansion of i t . And the same e f f e c t holds true f or another statement on Kora, which he made at about the same time, i n I_ Wanted to Write a. Poem (1958) : Kora i n . H e l l : Improvisations i s a unique book, not l i k e any other I have written. I t i s the one book I have enjoyed r e f e r r i n g to more than any of the others. I t reveals myself to me and perhaps that i s why I have 5 kept i t to myself. (IW, 26) 1 A "unique book, not l i k e any other I have written." A "secret document." An "amusement." The one book that "reveals myself to me," which i s why i t was kept "to myself" f o r so long. Kora did remain for Williams both an unusual and a s p e c i a l book, one that he often l i k e d to r e f e r to. In I_ Wanted to Write, a^ Poem, indeed, he goes so f a r as to provide a f a i r l y lengthy gloss on the unexpected way Kora came together as a text, written backwardly as i t was — The Improvisations . . . came f i r s t ; then the Inter-pretations which appear below the d i v i d i n g l i n e . Next I a r r i v e d at a t i t l e and found the Stuart Davis drawing. (IW, 29) As though he did not know u n t i l the very l a s t —- or l a s t but one — what i t was he was doing. His remarks seem to make Kora le s s obscure; i t i s s i g n i f i c a n t , however, that Williams does not t a l k about the severe personal breakdown — or about, a breakdown at a l l ! — that drove him to write i t i n the f i r s t place. The c r i s i s i s so priv a t e that i t s l i d e s only b r i e f l y into the 1957 "Prologue," but without further commentary — s c r i b b l i n g i n the dark, leaving behind on my desk, often past midnight, the sheets to be f i l e d away l a t e r . . . . (K, 29) The c r i s i s , Williams t e l l s us i n h i s Autobiography, was p r e c i p i t a t e d by the war, the war i n Europe, that was destroying everything he believed i n : "Damn i t , " he writes, the freshness, the newness of a springtime which I had sensed among the others, a reawakening of l e t t e r s , a l l that delight which i n making a world to match the supremacies of the past could mean was being bl o t t e d out by the war. (A, 158) " A l l that delight . . . could mean," destroyed. And the image of t h i s destruction gave r i s e to the figu r e of the maiden Kora (the Greek, Kore), 6 the v i r g i n deflowered or "raped" by Hades and abducted by him in t o the Underworld, into H e l l . "Kora was the springtime of the year; my year, my s e l f was being slaughtered" (A, 158). In such an impasse, the mind turns f o r r e l i e f , where? Against the l o s s , against the slaughter: "What was the use of denying i t ? For r e l i e f , to keep myself from planning and thinking at a l l , I began to write i n earnest" (A, 158). By 1917 (America entered the war i n •.April) Williams .could quite possibly have seen the war as a large-scale breakdown, a sign that an older world was c o l l a p s i n g inward upon i t s e l f . And the vengeance unleashed i n t h i s "slaughter" — which made a mockery of any b e l i e f i n reasoned orders — might i n turn have supported h i s growing sense, embryonic i n 1917, f u l l - f l e d g e d i n the 20's, that European culture was dying. His fr i e n d Ezra Pound wrote i n Hugh Selwyn Mauberley that so many "of the best" died f o r "an old b i t c h gone i n the teeth," f o r "a botched c i v i l i -2 zation," a c i v i l i z a t i o n bankrupt of s i g n i f i c a n c e and now brought to the nightmarish edge of d i s i n t e g r a t i o n . The war, for Williams, could thus very well have been an image of "Reason i n madness," to quote a l i n e from King Lear. 3 Having s a i d t h i s much, however, as readers of Kora, we s t i l l get the uneasy f e e l i n g that we are outside the text. The book, written during the war, was perhaps conditioned by i t s senseless violence, but nothing on the surface of i t would lead us to conclude that the war, and only the war, stands behind i t . Instead, we are drawn into the privacy of the w r i t i n g , the voice i n s i d e i t undergoing an i n t e r i o r i z e d c r i s i s , the very foundation of i t s mind being shaken apart — at war with i t s e l f . Hence the "secrecy" of Kora. In other words, the war i n Europe i s less the cause of Kora and 7 more the external equivalent of a l i k e disorder i n Williams' mind. And yes, i n t h i s sense, the w r i t i n g does manifest the c r i s i s of a breakdown, a former world of b e l i e f s destroyed by unpredictable forces that break i n t o the mind of the writer and s p l i t i t apart. And t h i s cleavage does account fo r the very texture of the w r i t i n g i n which the "slaughter" occurs. Hence the "documentary" nature of Kora. The "newness of a springtime" i n the "reawakening of l e t t e r s " that Williams says the war "blotted out" s t i l l l i n g e r s i n the opening paragraph of the 1957 "Prologue" to Kora. The Armory Show had happened seven years before. No mention of the war at a l l . The International E x h i b i t i o n of Modern Art at the 69th Regiment Armory i n New York opened on February 17, 1913 and brought to l i g h t what had been latent up to then. As Williams says i n "Recollections" (1952), t h i s infamous show "shocked New Yorkers into a r e a l i z a t i o n , a v i s u a l -i z a t i o n , that t h e i r world had been asleep while the art world had under-gone a r e v o l u t i o n . " Later i n the same year Williams would, have The Tempers (1913), a sl i m volume of poetry, published i n London through the d i r e c t e f f o r t of Pound. I t was Pound who also wrote, a year before, the f i r s t p u blic statement on Williams. "A Sel e c t i o n from The Tempers" appeared i n the October, 1912 issue of The Poetry Review (London), the " f i r s t magazine p u b l i c a t i o n of the poet" (IW, 11) and Pound's "Introductory Note," the " f i r s t published send-off of the then unpublished Williams" (IW, l l ) . 5 8 Williams would l a t e r consider The Tempers h i s f i r s t book of poems — i n h i s Autobiography, f o r instance, he c a l l s Kora h i s t h i r d book, a f t e r The Tempers and A l Que Quiere! (1917) (A, 158) — but there i s a "secret" l i f e : years before, he had p r i v a t e l y published Poems (1909) i n Rutherford. Perhaps Williams was almost immediately embarrassed by t h i s c o l l e c t i o n of early poems. He never allowed the book to be reprinted i n h i s l i f e t i m e , and hoped never. I t i s of course quite s u r p r i s i n g , at f i r s t , to discover that, the poet who wrote Paterson, or for that matter Kora, could have begun wr i t i n g by thinking up such l i n e s as: Hark! Hark! Mine ears are numb With dread! Methought a f a i n t h a l l o o i n g rang! Where a r t thou hid? Cry, cry again! I come! I come! I come! (PO, 9) Or: A l l o'ergrimed With dust and sweat art thou, which, j o i n t l y , mar Thine else smooth, well-watched bulk, t i l l many a scar Quick fancy sees there aptly pantomimed. (PO, 12) Much l a t e r , Williams was the f i r s t to admit that Poems was " f u l l of inversions of phrase, the rhymes inaccurate, the forms stereotype" (A, 107); "The poems are obviously young, obviously bad" (IW, 10). In Kora, Williams w i l l b l a s t those poets who use language to " r e c t i f y the rhythm" (K, 32) to make i t conform to r i g i d patterns, and who impose an a r t i f i c i a l p oetic method onto experience to " l i f t a l l out of the ruck" (K, 32) of the world: an exact measure of what he himself attempts to do i n the "'high f a l u t i n ' " (IW, 14) language of Poems. In "The Uses of Poetry" (PO, 11), for instance, the poet has a "fond a n t i c i p a t i o n of a day / O'er-f i l l e d with pure d i v e r s i o n presently." And why? "For I must read a lady poesy / The while we g l i d e by many a l e a f y bay." And on t h i s same day, he and h i s "lady" w i l l d r i f t away from a world of "woes" and be transported 9 "On poesy's transforming giant wing, / To worlds afar whose f r u i t s a l l anguish mend. Poems reveals Williams' i s o l a t e d state of mind at t h i s time, the poems heavily dominated by a disguised privacy, the poet i n them wanting his poems to l i f t him i n t o some transcendent completion that w i l l resolve the tensions of experience. Beneath the transparency of the language, however, we can detect a c e r t a i n s t r a i n , as i f Williams were himself aware that h i s poems are enclosed i n the privacy of his int e n t i o n s , his speech cons t r i c t e d by h i s own i n a b i l i t y to break through the closed forms of perception.in which h i s mind i s caged. In the same poem, "The Uses of Poetry," we glimpse b r i e f l y the q u a l i t y of a wholly d i f f e r e n t kind of mind: "at random play / The glossy black winged May-flies." This sharp image seems i t s e l f to appear at random, but i t i s almost l o s t i n a poem that i s being shaped by a predetermined end, "To worlds a f a r , " away from the aimless play of p a r t i c u l a r s . Or i n "The F o l l y of Preoccupation" (PO, 20), we are t o l d that "imperfection c l i n g s a l l forms about," and aside from the forced inversion of phrase ("about" must rhyme with "st o u t " ) , the poet who desires a "wisdom" to "out-face" t h i s condition i s , as the poem following, "The Bewilderment of Youth" (PO, 20) makes c l e a r , conscious of the aberrational nature of things, t h e i r m u l t i p l i c i t y and indeterminacy: . . . views forms which myriad seem, D i s t r a c t i n g here, there, each with changing gleam, Like f i r e f l i e s pointing midnight's c u r t a i n smooth. And a l l h i s purpose stands amazed, unknit By wonder, knowing naught of where nor why, Compassed about with f r e s h v a r i e t y Where'er his chancing eager looks may f l i t . "The Bewilderment of Youth," predictably so, moves to old age when a l l the " v a r i e t y " w i l l mingle " i n t o one," to t h i s end, but the a c t u a l i t y of a 10 "formless rout" nevertheless remains to exert an unacknowledged pressure that s t r a i n s t h i s closure. A l l the while Williams was assembling Poems for p u b l i c a t i o n , he was working as an i n t e r n , f i r s t i n French Ho s p i t a l , and then i n the Nursery and Child's Hospital on the west side of New York, " i n a notorious neighborhood c a l l e d San Juan H i l l , " or more simply " j u s t p l a i n H e l l ' s Kitchen" (A, 90). In the Nursery and Child's Hospital e s p e c i a l l y he was i n i t i a t e d into a sense of li f e - p r o c e s s e s quite removed from the kind of poetry he was w r i t i n g i n his off-hours, or even from "poetry" at a l l ! So he was lonely. Pound had gone o f f to London, and soon a f t e r , H i l d a D o o l i t t l e (H.D.) followed, h i s "lady" i n "The Uses of Poetry." They were his only poet-companions at the Univ e r s i t y of•Pennsylvania. Now he was l e f t to make h i s way i n the world of medicine. H e l l ' s Kitchen: "There were shoutings and near r i o t s and worse p r a c t i c a l l y every week-end" (A, 93). The violence of the area was mirrored i n the everyday l i f e of the children's ward of the h o s p i t a l . The administration was corrupt, Williams' "sleeping quarters . . . on more than one occasion f u l l of bedbugs" (A, 94), so many i l l e g i t i m a t e babies born there that a Miss Diamond suggested a banner with the sign '"BABIES FRESH EVERY HOUR, ANY COLOR DESIRED, 100% ILLEGITIMATE!*" (A, 94). be hung around the h o s p i t a l . And there were b a t t l e s among the women i n the ward, once, f i v e pregant women "s n a r l i n g and s p i t t i n g l i k e c a t s," two of them apparently "pregnant from the same man" (A, 94). Another time, Williams got the job of transporting a dead c h i l d i n a suitcase "by public con-veyance," and he wondered what would; happen i f the r i c k e t y container should f l y open and the body of the c h i l d f a l l out j u s t at the 11 wrong moment. I t e l l you I sweated over that job, plenty. (A, 96) S t i l l another time, Williams had to improvise a s o l u t i o n to the bedbug epidemic. The ward was fumigated with the fumes of bar-sulphur set on f i r e with alcohol. "When we opened the place up l a t e r i n the day," he r e c a l l s , "you never saw such heaps of insects on the f l o o r s and i n the corners of each bed!" (A, 98). Is t h i s image maybe the basis of those "forms which myriad seem" i n Poems? In any case, the s t o r i e s accumulate, one a f t e r another i n an endless stream. Williams' memory i n h i s Autobiography i s u n f a i l i n g here. As an i n t e r n i n H e l l ' s Kitchen, he was undergoing a major transformation, the poet i n him being thrown into another world that had u n t i l now escaped him. I t was at th i s time that Williams decided to become a p e d i a t r i c i a n . "I was fascinated by i t and knew at once that that was my f i e l d " (A, 95). The choice was fundamental and permanent. He entered, then and there, into the realm of c h i l d b i r t h , a woman's world h i s medicine gave access to: During my time there I delivered three hundred babies and faced every complication that could be thought of. I learned to know and to admire women, of a s o r t , i n that place. They l e d a tough l i f e and s t i l l kept a sort of gentleness and kindness about them that could, I think, beat anything a man might o f f e r under the same circumstances. (A, 94) 7 During t h i s time, Williams was going home to work on the poems gathered together i n Poems where the immediacy — and complication — of his l i f e as an i n t e r n i n New York was being transposed into poems that d i s f i g u r e d language, made i t conform to h i s own sense of distance from a contemporary a c t u a l i t y absent i n his poetic endeavors. He l a t e r confessed that the poems were dominated by "my idea of what a poem should be" (IW, 14). Should be: the r e l i a n c e upon predetermined intentions i s 12 the very narrowness that makes Poems the prototype of the kind of compo-s i t i o n a l method that Williams i n Kora would attack with, a vengeance, so d i r e c t l y would he associate i t , by then, with w r i t i n g that forces experience into conventionalized forms that, p e r s i s t by c l o s i n g out the present. A sign of the divorce from the actual i m p l i c i t i n Poems surfaces i n the opening l i n e s of "A Street Market, N.Y., 1908" (PO, 15): Eyes that can see, Oh, what a r a r i t y ! For many a year gone by I've looked and nothing seen But ever been Blind to a patent wide r e a l i t y . The v i z o r s are beginning to l i f t from Williams' eyes, and as they do, we can hear, however f r a g i l e l y , a poet who i s j u s t becoming aware of the i s o l a t i n g e f f e c t of h i s privacy and h i s separation from a present that he has yet to experience i n i t s p a r t i c u l a r i t y . Or as we read i n "The Loneliness of L i f e " (PO, 16-17): But now among low plains or banks which rear ;-Their flower hung screens o'erhead I wander — where? These f i e l d s I know not; know not whence I come; Nor aught of a l l which spreads so touching near. The very bird-songs I have heard them n'er And t h i s strange f o l k they know not e'en my name. Williams explains, i n retrospect, that the poems he was w r i t i n g around 1909 "had to be got out of my system some way" (A, 106), so what better way than to publish them himself. A l i t t l e further on i n the same section of h i s Autobiography he says that "Ezra was s i l e n t , i f indeed he ever saw the thing, which I hope he never d i d " (A, 107). But Williams had sent a copy to Pound i n London, and Pound had written an uneasy (yet t r u t h f u l ) reply. The tone of Pound's l e t t e r , dated May 21, 1909, suggests that he wanted to be honest without unduly hurting 13 Williams' f e e l i n g s . Poems shows that Williams has "poetic i n s t i n c t s , " but other than that, the book i s no d i f f e r e n t from "the innumerable poetic volumes poured out" r e g u l a r l y i n London. "Your book would not a t t r a c t g even passing attention here." No doubt Williams was disappointed, and yet no doubt he knew that Pound was r i g h t . Despite a l l the best intentions on h i s part, Poems was f i n a l l y not the kind of book he wanted to write; no matter, then, that he did take the task of poetry s e r i o u s l y , no slack-ness there. This may even be the same " i n t e n t " (A, 107) he l a t e r con-sidered the only value i n a book he would otherwise have preferred to forget. "I was t e r r i b l y earnest" (IW, 14). In any case, and fortunately so, Williams had no time to dwell on the l i m i t s of Poems. The p u b l i c a t i o n brought one phase of h i s l i f e to an end. In July, 1909, a f t e r only a few months, he l e f t New York "on a second-class vessel f o r Germany" (A, 108) where he planned to study p e d i a t r i c s . The following year, he would f i n a l l y get his chance to see Pound: that never-to-be-forgotten week i n London i n A p r i l , 1910 when he experienced Pound's l i t e r a r y m i l i e u f i r s t - h a n d and had a chance to hear. Yeats l e c t u r e — "a very fashionable a f f a i r , to be presided over by S i r Edmund Gosse, who, i t appears, hated the Irishman's guts" (A, 115). During Yeats' discussion of younger I r i s h poets who were, i n h i s mind, unjustly neglected i n England, Gosse i n protest rudely banged a b e l l and continued to do t h i s each time Yeats t r i e d to carry on his discussion. Af t e r the t h i r d time, Yeats was "forced to s i t down and the lec t u r e came to an end" (A, 115). What continued to dwell i n Williams' memory, however, was not simply the callousness of the event i t s e l f — l i v i n g evidence that English poetry was l i t e r a l l y c o n t r o l l e d by the heavy hand of 14 authority — but the fa c t that no one i n the audience, not even Pound, had the nerve to protest Gosse's actions. No one defended Yeats, not even Williams. And so Williams r e c a l l s h i s own i n a b i l i t y : What a chance i t had been f o r me — but. I wasn't up to i t . I must have shown by my face, however, how near I was to an.explosion, f o r a woman back of me, an extra-ordinary-looking woman, almost spoke — but didn't, and so I sank back once more into anonymity. (A, 116) London was not Williams.' place, and t h i s at l e a s t was c l e a r : " I t seemed completely foreign to anything I desired. I was glad to get away" (A, 117). It i s nevertheless a strange turnabout — t h o u g h not altogether so, Pound being at that time h i s only l i n k to a l i t e r a r y world — that Williams' f i r s t magazine p u b l i c a t i o n would appear two years l a t e r i n the same " f o r e i g n " place he was "glad to get away" from, and with a "Note" by Pound introducing him to a B r i t i s h audience as a younger American poet. Pound points to Williams' honesty ("He has not sold h i s soul to e d i t o r s " ) , his strength ("He has not complied with t h e i r niminy-piminy r e s t r i c t i o n s " ) , and h i s s t r a i g h t - t a l k i n g manner ('.'He apparently means what he says") , a l l of which indicates the emergence of a poet who "may write some very good poetry." Pound then goes on to affirm, the absence i n The Tempers of one qu a l i t y which had been written a l l over Poems: "the magazine touch" which feeds on conventional, expectations of what poetry should be. Pound also confesses h i s " f e e l i n g of companionship" with an American poet with whom he can " t a l k without a l e x i c o n . " This free-wheeling tone seems intended to taunt h i s so-called " c r i t i c a l English audience," but i n the b r i e f 15 l i n e s he quotes — . . . crowded Like peasants to a f a i r , Clear skinned, wild from s e c l u s i o n ^ — the accuracy of the image and the directness of the syntax reveal immediately a great change i n Williams' poetry. I t i s as i f Williams himself were one of the peasants "wild from s e c l u s i o n , " h i s own nature coming into i t s own through a language charged with desire. Pound's influence i s present i n The Tempers, the Provencal q u a l i t y of " F i r s t P r a i s e , " for instance: Lady of dusk-wood fastnesses, Thou art my Lady. I have known the c r i s p , s p l i n t e r i n g l e a f - t r e a d with thee on before, White, slender through green saplings; I have l a i n by thee on the brown fo r e s t f l o o r Beside thee, my Lady. (CEP, 17) But the temper of the whole volume displays a much d i f f e r e n t Williams. "There i s , " we are t o l d i n I Wanted, to Write a Poem, "a big jump from the f i r s t book to the poems i n The Tempers (IW, 15). What i s s t r i k i n g i s the new push toward a re-valuation of desire, the same desire that was confined i n Poems. In "Postlude" we f i n d the l i n e , "Blue at the prow of my d e s i r e " (CEP, 1 6 ) . ^ The image returns at the end of the "Prologue" to Kora, but modified, more e x p l i c i t , more d e c l a r a t i v e : "The poet should be forever at the ship's prow" (K, 28). For the rest of his l i f e , Williams considered The Tempers his f i r s t serious book. Slender as the volume was, i t did, i n d i r e c t contrast to Poems, allow f o r the b i r t h of a more authentic voice. The following l i n e s from "Postlude," as one example which comes quickly to mind, exemplify t h i s change: Your h a i r i s my Carthage And my arms the bow, And our words arrows 16 To shoot the stars Who from that misty sea Swarm to destroy us; (CEP, 16) The poet who surfaces i n The Tempers i s r e s t l e s s with narrow confining orders that deny the a c t u a l i t y of desire: We r e v e l i n the sea's green'. Come play: It i s forbidden'. (CEP, 20) The s i r e n voice i n these f i n a l l i n e s of the poem "Prom 'The B i r t h of Venus,' Song" c a l l s out seductively to those who w i l l follow the lead of i t s " f o r -bidden" movement; i t s p l a y f u l tone p u l l s the reader out to the sea of a laughter s t r a i n i n g to break free from i n h i b i t i o n s that confine desire. The counterpart to t h i s female voice speaks through a f o o l ' s voice, that i s ready to break out of i t s cage in."The Fool's Song": I t r i e d to put a b i r d i n a cage, 0 f o o l that I am! For the b i r d was Truth. Sing merrily, Truth: I t r i e d to put Truth i n a cage! (CEP, 19) This loosening of d e s i r e . i n turn makes possible a noticeable s h i f t away from the former r e l i a n c e on what poetry should say. In "Con B r i o " the speech i s sharp and cutting, n o • s l i d i n g o f f into strained inversions of phrase, no attempt to force words into an a r t i f i c i a l l y balanced syntax. The mind ins i d e the words cuts across the grain of the "perdamnable mi s e r l i n e s s " of petty orders that attempt to freeze the world into a neatness contrary to i t s natural rhythms: Bah, t h i s sort of s l i t h e r i s below contempt! In the same v e i n we should have apple trees exempt From bearing anything hut pink blossoms a l l the year, Fixed permanent l e s t t h e i r b e l l i e s wax unseemly, and the dear Innocent days of them be wasted quite. (CEP, 31) Pregnant apples, the i n s i s t e n c e of b i r t h , the fact of i t i n a world that 17 can never be "Fixed permanent":' Williams' experience as an i n t e r n comes home to roost. In The Tempers the p h y s i c a l i t y of desire, as well as the p h y s i c a l i t y of the world, asserts i t s e l f . The poet, caught i n the midst of estranging himself from those systems (poetic, moral, s o c i a l or other-wise) that deny desire, thus re-enters the world from i t s "back s i d e " (K, 80), to use a key phrase from Kora. "Hie Jacet," i n t h i s sense, stands as a measure of the jump from Poems to The Tempers: The coroner's merry l i t t l e c h i l d r e n Have such twinkling brown eyes. Their father i s not of gay men And t h e i r mother j o c u l a r i n no wise, Yet the coroner's merry l i t t l e c h i l d r e n Laugh so e a s i l y . They laugh because they prosper. F r u i t f o r them i s upon a l l branches. Lo! how they j i b e at l o s s , f o r Kind heaven f i l l s t h e i r l i t t l e paunches'. It ' s the coroner's merry, merry c h i l d r e n Who laugh so e a s i l y . (CEP, 30) What stands out i n t h i s l o v e l y short poem i s the almost p e r f e c t l y , but not quite, balanced opposition between the form and the subject of the poem. The two stanzas echo one another i n rhythm, language, and structure. There are rhymes but they are " i r r e g u l a r . . . yet u n i t i v e , carrying.from beginning to end" (IW, 15). When they are regular, the rhymes ( l i k e "eyes"/"wise" and "men"/"children") are p l a y f u l , they c a l l a t tention to themselves as rhymes. There i s no pretension behind them, no attempt to disguise t h e i r p a r t i c u l a r i t y . The near rhymes i n stanza two ("prosper"/ " f o r " and "branches"/"paunches") are also j u s t as p l a y f u l , near rhymes, nothing more, no d i s f i g u r a t i o n of the language to f i n d the correct rhyme. And the word "paunches" s t r i k e s home, the suddenness of i t s c o l l o q u i a l appearance i n an otherwise conventional l i n e of me t r i c a l poetry, almost as i f the poet were t r y i n g to d i s l o c a t e the reader's expectation with an 18 exact word that, as such., works to undermine the apparently regulated form of the poem. This tension between predetermined metrical patterns and precise wording i s the exact double of the s p l i t perception w i t h i n the•poem. Death can, from a perspective outside the conventionalized perceptions which disguise i t , be f r u i t f u l . Look, says the f o o l of a poet, j u s t look at the "paunches" of the coroner's "merry c h i l d r e n . " Once again, the doctor-Williams moves i n s i d e the poet-Williams, the one a s s e r t i n g i t s e l f within the other. The form of "Hie Jacet" i s thus deceptive. Inside the apparently neat and orderly e x t e r i o r there i s a l i v e mind at work, watching and waiting for i t s turn, attentive to contradictions, i n f a c t a c t u a l l y t h r i v i n g i n them. Williams says he was, at the time, "conscious of my mother's i n f l u e n c e " : Elena Hoheb, a stranger to America who, i n her detachment from the world of Rutherford, because of t h i s distance, could see i t s i n s u l a r forms as a " f a n t a s t i c world where she was moving as a more or l e s s pathetic f i g u r e " (IW, 16). The same detachment, and a s i m i l a r pathos i n Williams, made possible the poems i n The Tempers, the severance from the narrow perceptions of Poems allowing him to re-view h i s own world i n i t s otherness, as a foreigner l i k e h i s mother would, outside but curiously, for t h i s reason, inside i t s o b j e c t i v i t y . In the "Prologue" to Kora, Williams w i l l envision h i s estranged mother as the figure of the imagination. In The Tempers he was searching about f o r "a new order" because he "was p o s i t i v e l y r e p e l l e d by the old order which, to me, amounted to r e s t r i c t i o n " (IW, 18). The w r i t i n g l i f e was, so i t seemed, f i n a l l y assuming a shape of i t s own: "I was budding, had no r e a l confidence i n my power, but I wanted to make a poetry of my own and i t began to come" (IW, 16). 19 From 1913, and perhaps from the Armory Show on, Williams began to turn more and more to h i s own immediate world for the resources of h i s w r i t i n g . His c i r c l e of friendships i n New York quickly expanded to include the painters and writers who, l i k e himself, were hunting for new forms to accommodate t h e i r sense of the New, both i n painting and writing."'"'*" By then, h i s London experience s t i l l fresh i n mind, Poems and The Tempers behind him, Williams was hungry for companionship. Most of his enthusiasm found a focus i n the Grantwood group of painters and writers who clustered around Walter Arensberg and Alfred. Kreymborg. Kreymborg l i v e d i n Grantwood with h i s wife and edited Others magazine. Pound t o l d Kreymborg to get i n 12 touch with Williams. I t was to Grantwood that Williams, whenever he could get away from Rutherford, would drive to see Kreymborg and the others. In Troubadour, hi s autobiography of t h i s period, Kreymborg preserves a snap-shot of Williams p u l l i n g into Grantwood i n his car: One man, looking l i k e Don Quixote de l a Mancha d r i v i n g the rusty Rosinante, - came 'in. a. battered, two-^seated Ford. Though the actual place he started from was an ugly town, c a l l e d Rutherford, there was enough of the Spaniard i n h i s blood and the madman i n hi s eye and p r o f i l e to have warranted the comparison. Whenever he climbed down from the saddle, with an oath or a b l e s s i n g , he disclosed the bold or bashful features of Ezra Pound's old and Krimmie's new f r i e n d , Dr. William Carlos Williams.13 And against Kreymborg's impressions of Williams' energy, Williams' own memory of t h i s same period of his l i f e : There was at that time a great surge of i n t e r e s t i n the arts generally before the F i r s t World War. New York was seething with i t . Painting took the lead. (A, 134) 20 Grantwood was the focus of a l l these events. I was hugely excited by what was taking place there. For some unapparent reason, someone, years before, had b u i l t several wooden shacks there i n the woods, perhaps a summer colony, why, I cannot say — at l e a s t they were there and were rented for next to nothing. Several writers were involved, but the focus of my own enthus-iasm was the house occupied by A l f r e d and Gertrude Kreymborg to which, on every possible occasion, I went madly i n my f l i v v e r to help with the magazine which had saved my l i f e as a w r i t e r . (A, 135) For the f i r s t time, Williams found some semblance of the community of writers he had always yearned f o r , those who were a l l involved i n the excitement of a possible beginning i n t h e i r own l o c a l e , i n l o c a l America. "There had been a break somewhere," he writes, we were streaming through, each thinking h i s own thoughts, d r i v i n g h i s own designs toward his s e l f ' s objectives. Whether the Armory Show i n painting did i t or whether that also was no more than a facet — the poetic l i n e , the way the image was to l i e on the page was our immediate concern. For myself a l l that implied, i n the materials, respecting the place I knew best, was f i n d i n g a l o c a l a s s e r tion — to my e v e r l a s t i n g r e l i e f . I had never i n my l i f e before f e l t that way. I was tremendously s t i r r e d . (A, 138) And so during the period from 1913 to 1916, knee-deep i n a new world of writers and painters, excited that a new poetry was l y i n g there on the horizon waiting to be un-covered., Williams began to write poems i n earnest, tr y i n g to clear h i s speech of a l l a r t i f i c i a l i t i e s of d i c t i o n , experimenting with a poetic l i n e more natural to actual speech patterns, the images drawn from h i s immediate surroundings — a l l the f r u i t s of which he gathered together i n A l Que Quiere.' h i s t h i r d book of poems, published by The Four Seas Company of Boston i n 1917. "From t h i s time on," Williams says i n I_ Wanted to Write ji Poem, "you can see the struggle to get a form without deforming the language. In theme, the poems of A l Que Quiere! r e f l e c t things around me" (IW, 23). And yes, the language i s d i r e c t , the rhythm of speech without the a r t i f i c e of meter and rhyme, as say i n 21 "Pastoral" which begins: When I was younger i t was p l a i n to me I must make something of myself. (CEP, 121) Line breaks follow the syntax of the f l u i d movement of perception, as i n another poem c a l l e d " P a s t o r a l : " The l i t t l e sparrows hop ingenuously about the pavement quarreling with sharp voices over those things that i n t e r e s t them. (CEP, 124) And l i k e the sparrow himself, the poet i n A l Que Quiere.' comes down to what in t e r e s t s him, a more common earth, the one which grounds h i s l o c a l world, that of his "townspeople" whom he now addresses as a poet. The images are a l l close i n , near the skin of his immediate l i f e , the same mind i n "Hie Jacet" now coming out into the open a i r to see what there i s to see i n h i s own community: l o c a l f a c t s , d a i s i e s and chicory, poplar trees, neighborhood figures l i k e "the old man who goes about / gathering dog-lime" (CEP, 124), or the young housewife who comes out from "behind / the wooden walls of her husband's house" (CEP, 136), the "murderer's l i t t l e daughter" (CEP, 155), the cat "Kathleen" who reveals "a d i g n i t y / that i s d i g n i t y , the d i g n i t y / of mud" (CEP, 157), and so on. Many poems deal with the a r r i v a l of spring — "Spring closes me i n / with her arms and her hands" (CEP, 120) — a phase of existence i n which the dark earth discloses i t s e l f through the nameless p a r t i c u l a r s making up the .poet's l o c a l world. In A l Que Quiere! he senses the presence of forces pushing to break into the i n s u l a r i t y of his townspeople. They use r e l i g i o n to block out the very tensions he attempts to hold onto, i n "Winter Sunset," for instance; above the decorative clouds on:a h i l l .stands- "one opaque / stone, of a cloud," and 22 above the cloud, "a red streak, then / i c y blue sky" (CEP, 127). And the poet comments: It was a f e a r f u l thing to come into a man's heart at that time; that stone over the l i t t l e b l i n k i n g stars they'd set there. (CEP, 127) Running through A l Que Quiere! i s t h i s pressure of a largeness sur-rounding the p a r t i c u l a r s of the l o c a l . Here the movement of g u l l s spans an empty space so opaque that i t w i l l not admit of transparency. And a l l t h i s happens i n the midst of what i s close at hand: i n a walk before breakfast with the poet and h i s son i n "Promenade" (CEP, 132-134), i n the glimpse of a b i r d " i n the poplars" who becomes a "Metric Figure" (CEP, 123), or i n a turn up the back side of a street where the houses of the poor show the absence of the kind of order that shuts the world out — roof out of l i n e with sides the yards c l u t t e r e d with old chicken wire, ashes, f u r n i t u r e gone wrong (CEP, 121) And the poet concludes: No one w i l l believe t h i s of vast import to the nation (CEP, 121) If the poet of Poems was overly conscious of h i s own divorce from " a l l which spreads so touching near,!' i n A l Que Quiere! t h i s same poet attempts to close the gap by paying at t e n t i o n to those l o c a l p a r t i c u l a r s no one else seems to notice. These things go unnoticed because they are simply there, l i k e faces that go unrecognized up and down the streets of the town. In "Apology," w r i t i n g thus comes, of a necessity to reveal the hear world through i t s l o c a l i z a t i o n i n a s p e c i f i c place: The beauty of the t e r r i b l e faces of our nonentities s t i r s me to i t : (CEP ,131) 23 This "beauty" remains hidden p r e c i s e l y because i t i s so near, so immediate, being the very world we are i n because we are a l i v e , common i n our p a r t i -c u l a r i t y . Just t h i s , our "nonentities," which the poet i n A l Que Quiere! comes to from outside the s e l f - r e f e r e n t i a l forms of h i s "townspeople;" his estrangement, i n t h i s sense, i s a way back into a present resonant with a subversive desire: Love i s so precious my townspeople that i f I were you I would have i t under lock and key — l i k e the a i r or the A t l a n t i c or l i k e poetry! (CEP, 156) Or i n the l o v e l y poem "Love Song," the second to l a s t of the volume, we encounter the figure of the lover i n s i d e the density of an earth-world vibrant with forces and powers that are woven into the p h y s i c a l f a b r i c of things. This e a r t h - p u l l i s so strong that i t p u l l s the poet's heart into i t s l i q u i d play: I l i e here thinking of you: — the s t a i n of love i s upon the world! Yellow, yellow, yellow i t eats into the leaves, smears with saffron the horned branches that lean heavily against a smooth purple sky! (CEP, 174) The t i t l e A l Que Quiere! translated by Williams reads "To Him Who Wants I t " (A, 157), and i n t h i s t h i r d book of poems, he c l e a r l y wants to h i t out on h i s own and create a readership for h i s poems, not vice-versa. He no longer t r i e s to pander to conventional expectations of what a poem ought to be. Now, i n f a c t , the opposite p o s i t i o n a t t r a c t s him.. The "true music" (CEP, 126) of poetry works contrary to habituated forms of perception, the r e a l poet always the one who walks the back s t r e e t s , on the other side of. 24 the forms h i s townspeople l i y e i n . The bravado behind t h i s implied assertion i s perhaps a l i t t l e s t y l i z e d — who was Williams as a poet at th i s time? — but there was a future to ac t u a l i z e and now seemed the ri g h t moment to make a s t a r t . This i n s i s t e n c e becomes the announcement of "Sub Terra," the opening poem of the c o l l e c t i o n . Here Williams envisions a l l of his p o t e n t i a l companions underground, l i k e "seven year locusts / with cased wings," l y i n g dormant but waiting to be re-born i n a springtime when they s h a l l return to the surface of the earth — a premonition of the fi g u r e of Kora i n Kora i n H e l l : That harvest that s h a l l be your advent — thrusting up through the grass, up under the weeds answering me, that w i l l be s a t i s f y i n g ! The l i g h t s h a l l leap and snap that day as with a m i l l i o n lashes! (CEP, 117) Appropriately enough, A l Que Quiere! has t i e s with Kreymborg, a close companion during t h i s time. Talking about the t i t l e , Williams says that " A l f r e d Kreymborg noticed that the cacophony was a re-echoing of his name and f e l t complimented. We were very close friends then and I think h i s surmise was a proper one" (A, 157). And the volume concludes with the one poem — a rewriting of a long narrative poem Williams was working on around 1909 and which he abandoned then — that reads as a kind of mani-festo. The c e n t r a l event of "The Wanderer" i s the r i t u a l i s t i c baptism of the poet into the f i l t h y Passaic River through the agency of a magical old woman. She i n i t i a t e s him into the transformational nature of process, and by so doing, marries him to the body of the world. "The Wanderer" was pub-l i s h e d a few years e a r l i e r , i n 1914, i n The Egoist, but i t s i n c l u s i o n i n Al Que Quiere! points to Williams' b e l i e f i n the p o s s i b i l i t y of a future. 25 There i s s t i l l more to come. If there had to be one c l i m a c t i c moment i n Williams' l i f e when a l l the excitement of his new found friendships came to a head, i t would have to be the large party he and Floss — " s i x months pregnant" (A, 152) — threw at t h e i r home i n Rutherford i n the spring of 1916. Everyone i n the Others group came, poets and painters, and the party lasted a l l day Sunday and into Monday; as Williams says, "We fed 'em and wined 'em a l l day long" (A, 153). The Arensbergs were there, Marcel Duchamp, Kreymborg, Man Ray, Alanson Hartpence, Maxwell Bodenheim, and many more, the whole "gang" that made up Williams' l i t e r a r y m i l i e u i n and around New York. "We were i n and out a l l day over the lawn. I f anything was said I've forgotten i t . Yet i t was a good party" (A, 153). Later i n 1916, or early i n 1917, however, a l l the energy of new p o s s i b i l i t i e s i n the world of " l e t t e r s , " to use Williams' term, seemed to expire almost as suddenly as i t appeared. Williams blamed the war that America entered i n A p r i l , 1917 for b l o t t i n g the r e -16 awakening out, and i n a way, his assessment i s accurate. But by l a t e 1916, there i s already an i n d i c a t i o n that he was beginning to doubt the effectiveness of the so-called "Others movement." In a revealing a r t i c l e c a l l e d "America, Whitman, and the Art of Poetry," which Williams never re-published, we are given an i n s i g h t into his evaluation of contemporary w r i t i n g at t h i s time. In the process of glossing the strengths and weaknesses of .various recent magazines — Poetry, The Poetry Journal, Contemporary Verse, The S o i l , to name a"few -- he - • admits that Others has not proven to be, as i t had intended to be, the 26 strong front for new forms of wr i t i n g . "Ah, but Others," he writes, the magazine with which I am connected, i s of course excellent. Here we have an attempt to present a blank page to Tom, Dick and Harry with the i n v i t a t i o n to write a masterpiece upon i t . I f Others came out once or twice every three years and consisted of four pages i t would be the i d e a l magazine for poets. I t i s at l e a s t naked. 'But the r a i n i t raineth every day.'-^ The fo o l ' s voice again, quoting Shakespeare's King Lear to c r i t i c i z e the pretentiousness of a magazine that began with the highest intentions but which, l i k e a l l the r e s t , f i n a l l y s e t t l e d into a s t e r e o t y p i c a l form. Now any "Tom, Dick and Harry" can publish i n i t . Was Williams f e e l i n g that his own work was j u s t as pretentious? He does not say, but the message i s clear to him that the new poetic which so many of them had i n t u i t e d as early as 1913, or 1914, the year Others began, was simply not a r r i v i n g . And now the current magazines seemed to be r e t r e a t i n g into narrow c l i q u e s , l i t t l e niches, enclaves of, i n short, personalized s t y l e s : E i t h e r a magazine i s concerned with i t s own pet l i t t l e aversions, or i t i s too poor to e x i s t , or i t i s hope-l e s s l y without agbroad comprehension of what modern verse i s about. This l a s t statement leads Williams to suspect that h i s contemporaries r e a l l y have not moved beyond the opening provided by Whitman who, over 50 years before them, began the serious exploration of the "democratic groundwork of a l l forms, basic elements that can be comprehended and used with new force. "Have we broken down f a r enough?" Williams asks, or i s there s t i l l work to be done before new work that does, i n deed, mirror the age they a l l share can be possible? "America, Whitman, and the Art of Poetry" appeared i n The Poetry Journal i n November, 1917, only a month a f t e r the 20 f i r s t of the improvisations from Kora appeared i n The L i t t l e Review, and 27 Williams' misgivings concerning Others i s an i n d i c a t i o n that something had happened i n h i s mind to a l t e r his former faith , i n the magazine. He was to publish a group of sixteen poems i n the December, 1916 issue of Others, but a f t e r that, he stopped publishing with the same magazine that had "saved h i s l i f e as a w r i t e r . " He would not publish i n Others u n t i l J u ly, 1919, three years l a t e r , when he edited an issue and announced that i t had come to i t s end, that the magazine was, i n e f f e c t , defunct, h i s issue i t s f i n a l one. During t h i s period, Williams was to write what eventually turned into Kora i n H e l l . Perhaps the demise of Others was i n e v i t a b l e . The i n i t i a l excitement soon wore t h i n , and nothing of earth-shattering s i g n i f i c a n c e had come of i t s existence. In f a c t , the writers associated with the magazine could now continue publishing whatever they wished, no one would r e a l l y care. The large-scale r e s t r u c t u r i n g of w r i t i n g that before seemed possible was ju s t as f a r away as ever. Williams began to p u l l away, back to Rutherford. Because of his loss of b e l i e f i n Others? Or h i s fear that he too would continue to write the same kind of poems i n A l Que Quiere! f o r years on end, maybe i n time getting half-hearted recognition as a minor l y r i c poet of " l o c a l " i n t e r e s t i n the development of 20th century American poetry? In "The Ideal Quarrel," a short piece published i n the December, 1918 issue of The L i t t l e Review, two;years after, he stopped publishing with Others, Williams t a l k s about the necessity f o r anger, the force of i t a p o s i t i v e thrust forward that s p i t s "through a mush of lumpy s t u f f — mouldy words, l i e - c l o t s , " anger the very negation that gives way to a "new alignment." But the new s h i f t cannot simply be based upon a denial of the past. I t depends upon a f u l l - s c a l e destruction of the past which brings the past 28 into a present that demands to be recognized i n i t s terms. There i s , according to Williams, no other way to begin again. For to break and begin a new alignment i s r e c a p i t u l a t i o n but to recement an old and d i s s o l v i n g union i s without precedent, a t o t a l l y new thing. The old union i n t h i s case i s a part of the new and being d i r e c t l y a part needs no counterpart, the recemented union being ready at b i r t h to go forward. And anger, i n t h i s turnabout, becomes a strong negative force that returns the mind to i t s ground: It i s the roots of roots we desire! the flower of a flower! the man of a man! the white of a white — From the beginning again! "The hard backbite of anger recurring i n the ebb flow," Williams says at 21 the end of t h i s short piece, " i s sturdiness holding i t s own." He could very well be t a l k i n g back to Others. More anger and le s s complacency, more desire and le s s back-slapping, more serious w r i t i n g and le s s a clique of writers supporting t h e i r own biases. Had t h i s disturbance been a l l that Williams had to worry about, he may well have weathered the storm. Simultaneous to the breakdown i n his w r i t i n g l i f e , however, was an anger much closer to home. In 1917, Williams was drawn back into the same l o c a l world he had affirmed i n A l Que Quiere! but t h i s time i n ways, to say the l e a s t , that did not make for the short, c r i s p poems c h a r a c t e r i s t i c of t h i s volume. His p r i v a t e l i f e was also undergoing i t s own slaughter. The treatment during the war of Floss's father, Pa Herman, by the townspeople of Rutherford sets the tone of a number of setbacks. Williams r e c a l l s the s p e c i f i c incident i n his Auto- biography : The war was on and Pa Herman, being by b i r t h an East Prussian from near Breslau, was emotionally deeply involved. This marked a basic phase i n our l i v e s . I was a l l for the man whom I profoundly admired. •.' I t was a 29 tough spot. We were o f f i c i a l l y neutral before 1917, but i n d i v i d u a l l y most of us were pro-French i f not p r o - B r i t i s h . But Pa Herman was outspokenly pro-German. He was also president of the s o c i a l club of the town, which met f o r t n i g h t l y , a semi-dress a f f a i r , and when the club as a group wanted to write to the President advocating assistance to B r i t a i n , he voted no. (A, 154) When America declared, war.on.Germany l a t e r i n 1917, Pa. Herman was branded a " d i s l o y a l c i t i z e n " (A, 154), and although, as Williams says, he was l o y a l to Americaj the l o c a l c i t i z e n s - e v e n t u a l l y forced him out of Ruther-ford. Naturally Williams took Pa Herman's side and got caught up i n the b r o i l . He too was accused of being pro-German. "Later," he writes, the same mouths were c a l l i n g me a Communist, saying that F l o s s i e had gone abroad to divorce me because of my l a s c i v i o u s l i f e . I j u s t kept w r i t i n g my protests i n t o poems, essays, plays and reviews. (A, 155) Williams wrote a l e t t e r to The Rutherford Republican and Rutherford American 22 'newspaperdisclaiming a l l these charges. His own mother turned on him for supporting Pa Herman: "With fury i n her eyes she accused me of being pro-German" (A, 155). A l l the while t h i s frenzy was churning on the l o c a l f r o n t , Williams' father was "dying of cancer" (A, 159) , i n 1918 confined to the house. He died December 25th, 1918. But more, j u s t a f t e r the Hermans l e f t Rutherford, Floss's 14 year old brother, Pa Herman's only son, died i n a chance mishap — tripped over a strand of barbed wire hidden i n the grass at the top of a steep cut, f e l l , and was accidently shot and k i l l e d by h i s own gun which s l i d a f t e r him down the bank. (4., 156) On top of these d i s a s t e r s i n his family l i f e , Williams' work as a doctor i n t e n s i f i e d enormously when the infamous inf l u e n z a epidemic h i t — " i n the early months of 1918 what doctors remained here were driven o f f t h e i r feet by the work" (A, 159): We doctors were making up to s i x t y c a l l s a day. Several of us were knocked out, one of the younger of us died, others caught the thing, and we hadn't a thing that was e f f e c t i v e i n checking that potent poison that was sweeping the world. I l o s t two young women i n t h e i r e arly twenties, the f i n e s t p h y s i c a l specimens you could imagine. Those seemed to be h i t hardest. They'd be s i c k one day and gone 9the next, j u s t l i k e that, f i l l up and die. (A, 159-160) The world, f o r Williams, had suddenly turned, topsy-turvy, uncertain, indeterminate, a tangled web of i r r e s o l v a b l e complexities, a l l of i t coming to a point of c r i s i s i n the epidemic that k i l l e d 18-20 m i l l i o n people a l l over the world. The disease had-no known cause, hence no cure, but simply seemed to come from nowhere, from a darkness out there. And at the same time, i n the l o c a l world Williams had accepted i n A l Que Quiere! — "You see, i t i s not necessary for us to leap at each other" (CEP, 126) — he was undergoing a series of shocks that overturned his l i f e . His f a t h e r - i n -law ostracized, ostracized himself f o r s t i c k i n g by him, h i s father dying of an incurable disease, his brother-in-law k i l l e d i n a freak accident, and as we l l , the " l i t e r a r y " world that had consumed so much of h i s attention i t s e l f c o l l a p s i n g into narrow forms of self-defense. In his Autobiography, Williams mentions almost casually, "how much can happen i n a few years — from happiness to d i s a s t e r " (A, 155), but th i s i s , as f a r as we can gather, the shape of the c r i s i s that i n i t i a t e d him in t o the wr i t i n g of Kora i n H e l l . I t was Persephone gone into Hades, into h e l l . Kora was the springtime: o'-f the. year; my-yearmy. s e l f was being slaughtered. What was the use of denying i t ? For r e l i e f , to keep myself from planning and thinking at a l l , I began to write i n earnest. I decided that I would write something every day, without missing one day, for a year. I'd write nothing planned but take up a p e n c i l , put the paper before me, and write anything that came into my head. Be i t nine i n the evening or three i n the morning, returning from some de l i v e r y on Guinea H i l l , I'd write i t down. I did j u s t that, day a f t e r day, without missing one day f or a year. Not a word was to be changed. I didn't change any, but I did tear up some of the s t u f f . (A, 1 5 8 ) ^ I t i s , then, through w r i t i n g that Williams eventually got through the c r i s i s , but equally, i t i s through w r i t i n g that he managed to f i g u r e himself into a modernist world. SECTION ONE THE WORD MAN I make a word. L i s t e n ! LIMMMMMMMMMM^ — (GAN, 162) It i s the making of that step, to come over into the t a c t i l e q u a l i t i e s , the words themselves beyond the mere thought expressed . . . (A, 380) Words are the keys that unlock the mind. (SE, 282) Therefore he writes, attempting to s t r i k e s t r a i g h t to the core of his inner s e l f , by words. By words which have been used time without end by other men for the same purpose, words worn smooth, greasy with the thumb-ing and fi n g e r i n g of others. For him they must be fresh too, fresh as anything he knows — as fresh as morning l i g h t , repeated every day the year around. (EK, 105) The word i s the thing. (GAN, 171) Am I a word? Words, words, words — (GAN, 166) 34 INTRODUCTION RING,. RING, RING, RING "Am I a word? Words, words, words" (GAN, 166) — l i k e the i n s i s t e n t r i n g i n g of the phone or the doorbell. At the most unexpected of moments: pick up the receiver or open the door, and i n they rush, a whole multitude of them. The act of speaking through "the words themselves beyond the mere thought expressed" (A, 380) — w r i t i n g came to Williams i n t h i s kind of heightened way. Such speaking i s primary because i t i s both necessary and a c t i v e : In our family we stammer unless, h a l f mad, we come to speech at l a s t And I am not a young man. (PB, 77) So Williams writes i n the l a t e and moving poem, "To Daphne and V i r g i n i a " from The Desert Music and Other Poems (1954). And given the immediacy of t h i s drive to "come to speech at l a s t , " i t i s not s u r p r i s i n g that Shakespeare, a "Grandfather" (EK, 110), should become i n h i s mind the l i v i n g instance of a human condition — Shakespeare as the f i g u r e of the 35 writer who i s , above a l l , a type of man: "Man the speaking animal. Man, then at his highest p i t c h " (EK, 11). As a writ e r himself, then, Williams l i v e d a r e s t l e s s l i f e . He gave himself over completely to the i n t r i c a c i e s of w r i t i n g as an act, one i n which the writ e r constantly undergoes the complexity of h i s medium: Oh c l e a r l y ! Clearly? What more clear than that of a l l things nothing i s so unclear, between man and his w r i t i n g , as to which i s the man and which i s the thing and of them both which i s the more to be valued. (P, 140) I t i s often that hard, i f not impossible, to separate out the l i f e of the man from the l i f e of the writ e r without l o s i n g the connection that makes the separation a perhaps i r r e l e v a n t d i s t o r t i o n . The two, i n Williams' w r i t i n g , are entwined i n a knotted r e l a t i o n s h i p : Five minutes, ten minutes, can always be found. I had my typewriter i n my o f f i c e desk. A l l I needed to do was to p u l l up the l e a f to which i t was fastened and I was ready to go. I worked at top speed. ("Foreword," A, n.p.) To be, i n f a c t , "Man the speaking animal" i s to l i v e the intensest of l i v e s . Williams came to value speech i t s e l f f o r t h i s reason. And as a wri t e r , he never stopped being conscious of the power of words, how they not only demand, but also open the deepest l e v e l s of f e e l i n g . This a f f a i r , t h i s l o v e - a f f a i r with words began e a r l y f or him, and continued unwaveringly through a long and complicated, involvement with the r i c h density of "the language . . . the language!" (P, 21). In 1919, a statement i n "Notes from a Talk on Poetry" published i n Poetry, a s t i l l embryonic but unhesi-tant a s s e r t i o n of a possible assumption behind the discovery of a new kind of w r i t i n g , a kind which would permit the widest range to experience: I must write, I must s t r i v e to express myself. I must study my technique, as a Puritan did his B i b l e , because .36 I cannot get at my emotions i n any other way. There i s nothing save the emotions: I -must write, I must t a l k when I can. It i s my defiance; my love song: a l l of i t . This essay or series of "notes" i s tent a t i v e , overly self-conscious and even somewhat f r a n t i c , written as i t was during a period when Williams f e l t unusually i s o l a t e d and unjustly neglected as a poet. Yet the base tone of i t p e r s i s t s . In 1921, from a l e t t e r to Marianne Moore, i n response to her welcome comments on the recently published Kora i n H e l l (1920): Surely there i s no greater excitement than that of composition. I am dead when I cannot write and when I am at i t I burn with a fever t i l l one would think me mad. (SL, 5 3 ) 2 And f i n a l l y , one more of many s i m i l a r examples, t h i s time on the other side of a l i f e t i m e , i n a print-out accompanying the broadside p u b l i c a t i o n of "Sappho: A Translation by William Carlos Williams" i n 1957: "I think a l l 3 w r i t i n g i s a disease. You can't stop i t . " This sense of w r i t i n g as a f e v e r i s h necessity, a disease even, explains Williams' constant desire to maintain the excitement of composition f o r i t s own sake. Even when he f e l t c o n s t r i c t e d by his own present l i m i t a t i o n s , he would bring his doubts and reluctances into the e f f o r t of the text he was at the moment composing. The push was always forward: "Write going. Look to steer" (AN, 278). And often, as i n the "improvisations" that f i n a l l y became Kora i n H e l l , h i s desire to explore and "write" out, and i n t h i s way work through the blockages, became the important substance of the text. There i s also t h i s s p e c i f i c i t y i n these l i n e s from Paterson I I : "Blocked. / (Make a song out of that: concretely)" (P, 78). In Williams' terms, w r i t i n g i s a l i v e only when i t engages the s i t u a t i o n prompting i t . • The blocked w r i t e r should then meet head on whatever i s preventing him from authentic speech, i n the w r i t i n g i t s e l f . There i s a .37 possible "song" i n confronting the blockage ("concretely"), j u s t as there i s i n confronting any thing. And despite the obvious r i s k s inherent i n such an open-ended proposition, Williams continued to t r u s t the process, the movement within words, to help him f i n d a way out of both emotional and i n t e l l e c t u a l impasses. "The blankness of the w r i t i n g surface," he says i n "How to Write," may cause the mind to shy, i t may be impossible to release the f a c u l t i e s . Write, write anything: i t i s a l l i n a l l p r o b a b i l i t y worthless anyhow, i t i s never hard to destroy written characters. But i t i s absolutely e s s e n t i a l to the w r i t i n g of anything worth while that the mind be f l u i d and release i t s e l f to the t a s k . 4 Writing was, from the beginning, a hunt — The thing, the thing, of which I am i n chase (A, 288) — on the empty space of the page i n a s i l e n c e that the "unruly Master" (PB, 83), the heart, wants to f i l l with words. The desire i s for the animate, for whatever has l i f e and movement, and to carry that into the very words unfolding i n the heat of composition. In a revealing passage from the poem "Tapiola," Williams addresses the i n t e r i o r of the composer S i b e l i u s , p r o j e c t i n g himself through i t . There i s that curious resemblance between the f i g u r e of the composer wrapped i n the "power of music," submerged i n a composing of sounds coming together "edge against edge," and Williams himself, whose "improvisations" for,Kora i n H e l l could e a s i l y have arisen out of a s i m i l a r a ttention to words — t h e i r s i g h t s , sounds, and configurations: You stayed up h a l f the night i n your a t t i c room under the eaves, composing s e c r e t l y , s e t t i n g i t down, period a f t e r period, as the wind whistled. Lightning flashed! The roof creaked about your ears threatening to give way! But you had a composition to f i n i s h that could not wait. The storm entered your mind where a l l good things are secured, written down, for love's sake and to defy the d e v i l of emptiness. (PB, 67) 38 The desire i s to write down the storm of words r i n g i n g i n h i s mind —• i n Williams' work, desire i s t i e d to language.. Is language then wild because desire i s "unruly?" Or i s desire wild because language i s ' u n r u l y ? " It goes e i t h e r way, the i n s e p a r a b i l i t y of the two i s i t s e l f the a c t u a l i t y behind the questions. This i s why Williams took nothing for granted i n himself, and why he mistrusted so adamantly any theory of composition he thought betrayed the e s s e n t i a l l y mysterious, often confusing, but ever-present language of language. He was always swept up i n the heat of words as they appeared out of the deep recesses of the heart, declaring them-selves, sometimes, but more often than not simply breaking into the mind i n haphazardly crazy ways. And Williams was continually struck with wonder that they could so suddenly be there, and thus here i n the act of w r i t i n g : UimrmmmmTrammm — Turned i n t o the wrong s t r e e t at three A.M. l o s t i n the fog, l i s t e n i n g , searching — Waaaa! said the baby. I'm new. A boy! A what? Boy. Shit, said the father of two other sons. L i s t e n here. This i s no place to t a l k that way. What a word to use. I'm new, said the sudden word. (GAN, 162) The words themselves twisted and turned i n Williams' mind. F i r s t and foremost, he considered himself a "word man," l i k e Pound and Zukofsky, his companions who shared that most d i f f i c u l t and exacting art of w r i t i n g i n the words, "The best of a l l to my way of thinking" (SE, 282).^ And always, f i r s t and foremost, i n the w r i t i n g , the words were understood as primary — "for the words come f i r s t and the ideas are caught, perhaps among them . . . . I t does not go the other way." Out of t h i s recognition, Williams could often make what at f i r s t glance seem to be straightforward, even common-place ass e r t i o n s : Writing i s made of words, of nothing e l s e , (SE, 132) 39 Words are the keys that unlock the mind. (SE, 282) But not so s i m p l i s t i c a l l y , such statements hold weight only to the extent that a writer experiences words as hard-edged p a r t i c l e s with an "object-i v i t y " of t h e i r own. The basic assumption i s that language, the whole range of words i n t h e i r multiple i n t e r a c t i o n s with each other, exhibits a largeness within which the l i f e of the world comes into the reach of the human. Even what we c a l l the "meaning" of the words issues from the a c t u a l i t y of language. As Maurice Merleau-Pority.reminds us i n Signs, language "does not presuppose i t s table of. correspondence; i t unveils i t s secrets i t s e l f . " ^ Williams' a f f i r m a t i o n of the p a r t i c u l a r i t y of words rests upon a s i m i l a r sense of language. He implies as much i n a response to a question he must have encountered, both p u b l i c l y and p r i v a t e l y , many times before. This occasion i s an interview ("Is Poetry a Dead Duck"?) conducted by Mike Wallace i n 1957, which Williams c h a r a c t e r i s t i c a l l y g l i f t e d up into Paterson V: Q. But shouldn't a word mean something when you see i t ? A. In prose, an English word means what i t says. - In poetry, you're l i s t e n i n g to two things . . . you're l i s t e n i n g to the sense, the common sense of what i t says. But i t says more. That i s the d i f f i c u l t y . (P, 262) Is t h i s a p o l i t e dismissal? Possibly. Williams' answer does, almost teasingly, leave a great deal unsaid. But the i n s i s t e n c y of it.remains of a piece: the nature of language, and the fact of i t . These are s t a r t i n g points f o r understanding the basis of Williams' w r i t i n g . Here we can also see why he was so quick to acknowledge the kind of wr i t e r s , Joyce and Stein f o r instance, who deeply engaged, i n w r i t i n g , the appearance of language as an a c t u a l i t y . "I'm new, said the sudden word." 40 Perpetually amazed that, words thus contain the actual i n t h e i r o b j e c t i v i t y , Williams was led by them to hunt down a methodology — The thing, the thing, of which I am i n chase — to handle the r i n g i n g i n h i s ears, what he heard i n those moments "the language" flowed i n . This "chase" winds l i k e one continuous thread through a l l his work. And so when he sat down to write h i s Autobiography, he structures h i s l i f e — and the l i v e s of c e r t a i n of h i s contemporaries — i n a way wholly determined by the search f o r a poetic, one which would answer to the density of language. In th i s same book, he points emphat-i c a l l y , and not s u r p r i s i n g l y , to i t s o r i g i n a t i o n i n the emergence of language as a l i v e thing i n the early years of the century. Appropriately enough, : he does so i n "The College L i f e . " I t i s here that Williams talks about his stay at Reed College i n the l a t e 40's, where he read and conducted discussions on the nature of "modernist" w r i t i n g , the kind of w r i t i n g part and p a r c e l of h i s own l i f e — and of which he, as i t developed, was part and p a r c e l . " I t i s the making of that step," he writes, to come over into the t a c t i l e q u a l i t i e s , the words them-selves beyond the mere thought expressed that d i s t i n -guishes the modern, or distinguished the modern of that time from the period before the turn of the century. (A, 380) And then a b i t l a t e r i n the same chapter: The key, the master-key to the age was that jump from the f e e l i n g to the word i t s e l f : that which had been got down, the thing to be judged and valued accordingly. Everything else followed that. Without that step having been taken nothing was understandable. (A, 381) Williams a l i g n s that step over into "the words themselves" with the 9 discoveries of the painters i n those same early years. Just as Cezanne, 41 say, opened up the p o s s i b i l i t y f o r an experience of paint, f o r w r i t e r s the s h i f t opened tip the very p o s s i b i l i t y f o r an experience of language. Experience had to be r e - t i e d to words and the value of experience re-found, i n the configuration of words through which the actual i n a l l i t s indeterminacy, a l l i t s f l u i d i t y , appears. I t may sound simple, commonplace, to say "Writing i s made of words, nothing e l s e . " Words are ordinary, and common. They surround us. But- the phrase "nothing e l s e " makes that s i m p l i -c i t y hard for us to see: " j u s t words." Words are so much the a i r we breathe that we r a r e l y experience them o b j e c t i v e l y , as "themselves beyond the mere thought expressed." Without them, however, and j u s t then, we f i n d our-selves l o s t — for words, as we seem to have no choice but to say. And t h i s i s one reason why Williams so often mentions the work of Gertrude Stein when he t a l k s about the beginnings of "modern" w r i t i n g . "During the period of her work, i n f l u e n t i a l and f r u i t f u l as i t grew to be," he writes i n "An Approach to the Poem" (1948), "Miss Stein's emphasis on the word as an object was one of her most important contributions to contem-porary art.""*"^ Just as the o b j e c t i v i t y of a u r i n a l needed a Marcel Duchamp to bring i t f o r t h as "object," so the o b j e c t i v i t y of language demanded at that time the l i k e s of a Gertrude Stein to bring i t f o r t h as "object." Otherwise, language would simply have continued to be taken for granted, and the "mere thought" be thought of as p r i o r to the words themselves which make the "thought" possible i n the f i r s t place. This d i s t i n c t i o n had to be made, Williams suggests, or else "nothing was understandable." As Williams knew we l l , the s h i f t into words can cause intense r e s i s t -ances, since i t makes for an openness that runs contrary to the strong tendency of the mind to maintain i t s ha b i t u a l forms when opposed by change. The mind can be t r i c k y — t h i s Williams was to discover for himself i n Kora 42 i n H e l l — but most e s p e c i a l l y when i t i s l e f t s o l e l y to r e l y on nothing other than i t s own constructs. I t can abstract from m u l t i p l i c i t y any number of systems of thought. These i n turn can predetermine and reduce to t h e i r "orders" an otherwise endlessly dynamic world of things. The way i t c l i n g s to s t a t i c states. To consistency. To coherence. To unity. To a kind of order that overlays things with comparisons rather than accounts for "those inimitable p a r t i c l e s of d i s s i m i l a r i t y to a l l other things which are the p e c u l i a r perfections of the thing i n question" (K, 18). And i t s obstinate, sometimes obsessive determination to inhabit t h i s same order without questioning the l i m i t s of i t . Williams found t h i s habit of mind v i c i o u s because i t survives only through i t s power to negate. "I was early i n l i f e , " he writes i n "The Basis of F a i t h i n A r t , " s i c k to my very p i t with order that cuts o f f the crab's f e e l e r s to make i t f i t i n t o the box. You remember how Taine l e f t Keats out of h i s c r i t i c i s m of English l i t e r a t u r e because to include him would s p o i l the con-t i n u i t y of h i s argument? (SE, 188) The crab's f e e l e r s are as actual as Keats i s , as any thing i s , as f o r instance, language i s . But the assumption of t h i s type of power over things removes the mind from that which i t presumes to explain. The w r i t e r who places himself at the disposal of a s i m i l a r habit of mind s i t s behind closed doors and thereby loses what should be closest to his a t t e n t i o n : the "secret" of language, the words inseparably t i e d to an animacy always i n t r a n s i t . The enclosure within the confines of which he f i x e s himself i s nothing more than a symptom of a r e f u s a l to acknowledge a mode of conciousness — w r i t i n g as one such mode — active to the movement of words. The r e f u s a l i s r e a l l y the e f f e c t of denying what would.permit the destruction of such mental b a r r i e r s . I t i s only when language i s heard, i s allowed to "flow i n , " so Williams discovered, that the mind can be drawn 43 outside i t s own l i m i t s , into the j m i l t i p l i c i t y , the play as well as the i n t e r -play of words. The act of l i s t e n i n g , i n t h i s s p e c i f i c context, becomes an outwardness that releases the inwardness of words, but equally and simul-taneously, releases the write r to the drama of a contr a r i e t y within experience that i s p r e c i s e l y at odds with the mind's habitual precon-ceptions: of the dis-order behind and before order, as one instance. Or the i r r a t i o n a l , more accurately non-rational, behind and before the rational."'"''" Or the indeterminate behind and before the determinate. Or the dis-ease behind or before the ease. Or the change behind and before the form. Or the desire behind and before the mind. Or the language behind and before the man. Only one answer: write c a r e l e s s l y so that nothing that i s not green w i l l survive. There i s a drumming of submerged engines, a beat of p r o p e l l e r s . The ears are water. The feet l i s t e n . (P, 155) The continual tension of such.subtleties that never ceased to demand Williams' attention i s d i f f i c u l t , demanding indeed: i t c a l l s f o r concen-t r a t i o n , a concentration paradoxically enough focussed on keeping the mind and the senses wide open to the actual that words contain, rather than to the o v e r s i m p l i f i c a t i o n c a l l e d 'meaning' or 'sense.' Williams' work throughout abounds i n w r i t i n g of t h i s kind, so when he s t r i k e s out impatiently against those he takes to be the enemies, of language, as he does i n s i s t e n t l y during the 20's, i t i s not without some cause. At that time, few readers were prepared, or perhaps able, to see what he was doing i n h i s w r i t i n g . Frequently, i n f a c t , he was unable to f i n d publishers for his work. 44 This i s e s p e c i a l l y the case with. A Novelette and Other Prose (1932). In a l e t t e r to Pound dated March 13, 1930 --I've been up since 5.30 c e r t i f y i n g the death of a man's wife (he cried) and now f i n i s h i n g the c o r r e c t i o n of the Novelette (SL, 112) — Williams says that t h i s text " i s very close to my heart — and no one w i l l handle i t here" (SL, 112). Maybe Pound can help him get i t published somewhere e l s e . Floss and the ubiquitous Zuke ELouis ZukofskyJ are the only ones i n t h i s section of understanding who have f a l l e n f o r i t . And no two people could approach the thing from a more divergent angle. (SL, 112-113) No one w i l l handle i t here. There was no readership, other than a private one, a v a i l a b l e f or the sort of experimental w r i t i n g holding Williams' i n t e r e s t then. Why? The i n t e l l i g e n c e of possible readers, he argues i n part through the text, i s hampered by two of the most predominant forms of thought i n hisj. contemporary world: "science" and "philosophy," which together stand behind the narrow b e l i e f that the actual i s disclosed only by forms of r a t i o n a l discourse. Williams singles them out as s p e c i a l "categories" — to be treated as such — i n order the more accurately to delineate the l i m i t s of a l l such forms that overlay experience with pre-12 determination. They may be harmless i n themselves, but when they are applied wholesale to regions of a c t i v i t y beyond t h e i r boundaries, they permit the mind to s l i d e o f f into the comfort of a closure that prevents i t from dealing ("concretely") with p a r t i c u l a r i t i e s outside. . The assumption then grows that language i s transparent, nothing more than a v e h i c l e for "ideas" or "things," a mere sign, or a b i l l - b o a r d even, that points to something other than i t s e l f , u s eful perhaps, yet not to be taken as a c t u a l . Williams' anger, i n the face of what seemed to him an i n c r e d i b l y stupid transposition of terms could become scathing, almost b i t t e r at times: 45 when language i s subservient to the sale of old clothes and ideas and the formulas for the synthetic manufacture of rubber (AN, 280-281) Or e l s e , i f a more c r i t i c a l urgency came on, he could assume the function of "reader" and seek to c l a r i f y himself through other w r i t e r s ' work companion to his own. Through the w r i t i n g of Gertrude Stein, f or instance, where the experience of language i s dramatized i n a s t r u c t u r i n g of language, her work, for that very reason, confusingly mis-read. So, i n the 20's, when Williams was s t i l l reading her f r e s h l y , he writes an essay ("The Work of Gertrude Stein") that i s a part of the "other prose" i n A Novelette and Other Prose: I f the attention could envision the whole of w r i t i n g , l e t us say, at one time, moving over i t i n swift and accurate pursuit of the modern imperative at the instant when i t i s most to the fore, something of what a c t u a l l y takes place under an optimum of i n t e l l i g e n c e could be observed. I t i s an alertness not to l e t go of a p o s s i b i l i t y of movement i n our f e a r f u l bedazzlement with some concrete and f i x e d present. The goal i s to keep a beleaguered l i n e of understanding which has movement from breaking down and becoming a hole i n t o which we sink decoratively to r e s t . The goal has nothing to do with the s i l l y function which l o g i c , n a t u r a l or otherwise, enforces. Yet i t i s a goal. I t moves as the sense wearies, remains fresh, l i v i n g . One i s concerned with i t as with anything pursued and not with the rush of a i r or the guts of the horse one i s r i d i n g — save to a very minor degree. Writing, l i k e everything e l s e , i s much a question of refreshed i n t e r e s t . I t i s directed, not i d l y , but as most often happens (though not neces s a r i l y so) toward that point not to be predetermined where movement i s blocked (by the end of l o g i c perhaps). I t i s about these parts, i f I am not mistaken, that Gertrude Stein w i l l be found. (AN, 350-351) 1 3 We are struck i n t h i s passage by Williams' own desire to s t i c k c l o s e l y on the heels of another a t t e n t i o n that does not s a c r i f i c e language to predetermination. The "goal" he seeks i s nothing less than the complexity of a movement i n words such as Gertrude Stein e f f e c t s . Or at l e a s t , i n 46 the way Williams hears her work, the w r i t i n g processes she explores and enacts document an experience of language, the 'grammar' of that a c t u a l i t y , always ahead of the i n t e r p r e t i v e i n t e l l i g e n c e , but toward which the i n t e l l i g e n c e i s drawn out into the energy of a chase: the animacy of the present i n the a c t i v i t y of words. Here the i n t e l l i g e n c e i s a l i v e , Williams argues, and remains so p r e c i s e l y because i t refuses to l e t go of the i n d e f i n i t e . "The processes of a r t , to keep a l i v e , " we are t o l d i n the "Preface" to Selected Essays, must always challenge the unknown and go where the most uncertainty l i e s . So that beauty when i t i s found, as i t r a r e l y i s , s h a l l have a touch of the marvelous about i t , the unknown. (SE, x v i i ) As a state of indeterminacy i n which the attention i s t i e d to what cannot be predetermined, "uncertainty" maintains the pursuit i n words, the f l e x i b i l i t y of i t i n a context open to change. I t i s t h i s q u a l i t y of the i n t e l l i g e n c e that prevents i t from becoming, to use Williams' words, "a hole into which we sink decoratively to r e s t . " That i s to say, when the i n t e l l i g e n c e f a l l s o f f i n t o the s e l f - r e f e r e n t i a l i t y of preconception, language turns transparent and loses i t s a c t u a l i t y . " I t i s about these pa r t s " that Williams locates Gertrude Stein, but what he discovers also discloses what he wants i n his own w r i t i n g . I t i s movement then. Animacy — Satyrs dance! a l l the deformities take wing Centaurs leading to the rout of the vocables i n the writings of Gertrude Stein — but you cannot be an a r t i s t by mere ineptitude The dream i s i n pur s u i t ! (P, 258-259) 47 And w r i t i n g that i s actual keeps the mind a l i v e ("in pursuit") to the move-ment of consciousness i n language: A drumming i n my head and pain under my arm and i n my groins. Speak of the lack of general ideas — Jesu! i n the w r i t i n g . I t i s the w r i t i n g . This i s the theme of a l l I do. I t i s the w r i t i n g . Speak of a f l i g h t by plane to Europe, of the two hundred inch telescopic r e f l e c t o r that discovers the nebula on the obscure o u t s k i r t s of the milky way t r a v e l l i n g at the i n c r e d i b l e speed — away from the earth — of 2500 miles a second: i t i s the actual w r i t i n g that embodies i t , as the king i n a chair — or a f l e a on a cat. The general ideas — are over the w r i t i n g . No. They are the w r i t i n g . The w r i t i n g i s not carrying — t h e i r jackass. I t i s e s s e n t i a l to a l l exposition that the w r i t i n g be as discreet as the f l i g h t , the nebula, the telescope. I t i s and embodies them a l l . Actual. (AN, 291) A Novelette and Other Prose was f i n a l l y published i n 1932 — two years a f t e r Williams t o l d Pound that "no one w i l l handle i t here" — l a r g e l y through the support of a growing number of f r i e n d s . TO Publishers, made up of a group of o b j e c t i v i s t poets — Louis Zukofsky, Charles Reznikoff, and others — got together and decided to publish some books. A Novelette and Other Prose was one of the f i r s t to appear. (IW, 48) Williams had reason to be j u s t i f i e d i n h i s s a t i s f a c t i o n with t h i s piece he l a t e r looked back on as "a tremendous leap ahead of conventional prose" (IW, 49). He reveals himself i n i t as a "word man" drawn out into the f l u r r y of words, enacting, through the excitement of w r i t i n g , what turns into an intimate c r i t i c i s m of contemporary assumptions concerning language. There i s , running beneath the domestic n a r r a t i v e of the text, the unstated but repeated i n s i s t e n c y of a haunting question: How, by what 48 means, can the mind dis-lodge i t s e l f from f i x i t y and so be released to a kind of w r i t i n g i n which language i s v i s i b l e as a l i v e thing? Williams' answer i s only apparently i n d i r e c t . "A Novelette"(subtitled "January") was written under the pressure of a s p e c i f i c occasion, "the recent epidemic," 14 as we learn i n a l e t t e r to Zukofsky dated January 25, 1929. And yet, what i s f a r more important, t h i s incident i s l i f t e d into the occasion of a s p e c i f i c image. Nothing short of a large-scale epidemic can bring about th i s r e v e r s a l , t h i s upheaval necessary before the writ e r as "word man" can experience himself as a vortex for the animacy of words: Influenza: from 'influence' — "to flow i n " In the breakage i m p l i c i t i n t h i s attack, whatever i s preconceived, no matter how i n t r i c a t e the l o g i c a l connections and consistencies of r e l a t i o n -ships that constitute i t s order, gives way to what Williams i n section II c a l l s "The S i m p l i c i t y of Disorder": Ring, r i n g , r i n g , ringI There's no end to the r i n g i n g of the damned — The b e l l rings to announce the i l l n e s s of someone e l s e . I t rings today intimately i n the warm house. That's your bread and butter. Is the doctor in? (It used to ring.) What i s i t ? (Out of the bedroom window.) My c h i l d has swallowed a mouse. — T e l l him to swallow a cat then. Bam! This i s the second paragraph of the second chapter of some wr i t i n g on the influenza epidemic i n the region of New York Cit y , January 11, 1929. In the distance the b u i l d -ings f a i l . The blue-white s e a r c h l i g h t - f l a r e wheels over to the west every three minutes. Count. One. (AN, 275-276) The invasion — Ring, r i n g , r i n g , r i n g ! — of a system, any system, mental or p h y s i c a l , from the outside by par-t i c l e s a l i e n to i t , which subvert by penetrating the s h e l l , the skin of i t . Influenza i s one such i n f l u x of an -unknown and so mysterious quantity from somewhere el s e , flowing i n from a di s t a n t out — i n t h i s case, 49 The invasion i s sudden; the patients can generally t e l l the time when they developed the disease; e.g., acute pains i n the back and l o i n s came on quite suddenly while they were at work or walking i n the s t r e e t , or i n the case of a -medical student, while playing cards, render-ing him unable to continue the game. A workman wheeling a barrow had to put i t down and leave i t ; and an omnibus dr i v e r was unable to p u l l up his horses . . . . There are pains i n the limbs and general sense of aching a l l over; f r o n t a l headache of s p e c i a l s e v e r i t y ; pains i n the eyeballs, increased by the s l i g h t e s t movement of the eyes; shivering; general f e e l i n g of misery and weakness, and great depression of s p i r i t s , many pati e n t s , both men and women, giving way to weeping; nervous r e s t l e s s -ness; i n a b i l i t y to sleep, and occasionally delirium.15 In the i n f i l t r a t i o n of t h i s disturbance, the organism, possessed by a force beyond i t s c o n t r o l , finds i t s e l f reduced to the immediacy of i t s simplest element: i t s p h y s i c a l i t y . An e n t i r e community, threatened by an epidemic, such as the one k i l l -16 ing around 20 m i l l i o n people during 1918-1919, i s forced back to a recognition of what i s alone fundamental to i t s s u r v i v a l . Everyone i s open to attack, every one i s vulnerable. Through the primacy of need, i n other words, an epidemic l e v e l s o f f a l l values which are not, as Webster's Dictionary defines the actu a l , " e x i s t i n g at the present moment." Thus the epidemic had become a c r i t i c i s m — to begin with. In the seriousness of the moment— not even the-serious-ness but the si n g l e n e c e s s i t y — t h e extraneous dropped of i t s own weight. One worked r a p i d l y . Meanwhile values stood out i n a l l fineness. (AN, 273) And by extension, the epidemic of language allows for the rush of words, the m u l t i p l i c i t y of them i n a flowing i n from an outside at once larger than the mind and the condition of i t s i n t e r i o r i t y . Language i s both that f a r and near at hand. That's your bread and butter. Another voice enters, a l l u r i n g the mind away from the temptation to define 50 privacy s o l e l y by the l i m i t s of s o c i a l r e s p o n s i b i l i t y . The w r i t e r as doctor i n a s o c i a l c r i s i s : There's no end to the r i n g i n g of the damned — The b e l l rings to announce the i l l n e s s of someone e l s e . In the s o c i a l i t i s always someone else's i l l n e s s that needs attending. There was, understandably for Dr. Williams, the continual pressure of being on c a l l , i n t e n s i f i e d many times over during an epidemic, and he gave i n to 16 what seemed l i k e an endless drain of energy. In w r i t i n g , however, i f we take A Novelette as representative, Williams i s not intent upon a d e s c r i p t i o n of things ( i . e . "the recent epidemic"), although other writers may have done so for the sake of " r e a l i s m . " ^ His w r i t i n g attends to p a r t i c i p a t i o n s rather than descriptions of, engagements with language i n the near and f a r of i t s a c t u a l i t y . There i s the r i n g i n g need to be on c a l l to the c r i s i s of language: It rings today intimately i n the warm house. This d i s t i n c t i o n , the other voice intimates, has to be drawn, even c l a r i f i e d , to keep the mind clear of secondary concerns. Writing can be, i f the attention g l i d e s with the surface of words, an e l u s i v e and s l i p p e r y thing. This i s the second paragraph of the second chapter of some wr i t i n g on the influenza epidemic i n the region of New York Cit y , January 11, 1929. — i f only as a reminder that words come before descriptions using them as a f r o n t , j u s t as presentation comes before re-presentation. " I t does not go the other way." When t h i s p r i o r i t y i s l o s t , the w r i t e r fools himself i n t o the enclosure of a personal cause, from which perspective language i s subordinate to a manipulation of words to h i s own advantage alone. This can often be a t h i n l i n e , but i t i s one that Williams, to i s o l a t e the most common and so the most i n v i s i b l e trap f o r the writer, makes v i s i b l e for himself: 51 Is the doctor in? (It.used to ring.) What i s i t ? (Out of the bedroom window.) My c h i l d has swallowed a mouse. — T e l l him to swallow a cat then. Bam! There i s , as t h i s c r y p t i c a l l y f r a n t i c sequence suggests, that c r u c i a l instance of turning away ("Bam"!) from the motivation behind the kind of "cause" inherent i n diagnoses. This r e j e c t i o n , as a wri t e r , of the method of l o g i c a l analysis includes the r e j e c t i o n of w r i t i n g shaped by precon-ceived intentions, that i s , by^a personal "cause" imposed on the words. Neither of these "causes" allows f o r that inwardness, that moving with words i n a l i s t e n i n g out of which they emerge, l i k e so many figures appearing and disappearing. In the distance the buildings f a i l . The blue-white s e a r c h l i g h t - f l a r e wheels over to the west every three minutes. In the l i g h t of search, i n the movement of w r i t i n g , f i x i t i e s l i k e buildings l i k e "causes" f a i l : t h i s i s another beginning, one that proposes a l i s t e n i n g a ttentive to the rhythmic gaps between "the words themselves." Count. One. 52 CHAPTER TWO RIEN3 KEEN, KEEN Dada: or Dada-ism: or the push behind i t to dis-lodge the mind from i t s f i x i t i e s and to subvert the pretension of systematized forms of thought. I t r i e d to put a b i r d i n a cage. 0 f o o l that I am!1 The actual i s too quick and subtle to be contained and l a i d to re s t so e a s i l y . I t has i t s own resources. There i s always an i r r a t i o n a l i t y waiting to break out of the r a t i o n a l . Forms that cut o f f the crab's f e e l e r s to make i t f i t into a box are by that negation vulnerable to attack by those very forces they attempt to overpower. The actual moves according to i t s own n e c e s s i t i e s . And when I had the b i r d i n the cage. 0 f o o l that I am! Why, i t broke my pretty cage. Dada: Knowledge i s a thing you know and how can you know more than you do know. This i s Gertrude Stein quoted by Zukofsky i n an essay on Williams: "one of 53 2 Williams' i n t e r e s t s . " There i s t h i s monotonous c i r c u l a r i t y within the closure of systems of thought. They can be quite harmless i n themselves when understood as l i m i t e d constructs with i s o l a t e d duties to perform. They become pernicious once the "known" of them i s oppressively asserted as end, the end. Imprisoned by t h i s dogmatism, the l i v i n g , the actual has no way but to break out and f l y o f f , or the reverse, to break i n l i k e an epidemic to declare i t s e l f absent. Dada: e i t h e r way the absurdity and the i m p l i c i t cost of s e l f - r e f e r e n t i a l i t y i s s e l f - e v i d e n t . And when the b i r d was flown from the cage, 0 f o o l that I ami Why, I had nor b i r d nor cage. Sing merrily, Truth: I t r i e d to put Truth i n a cage! Heigh-ho! Truth i n a cage. In 1921, a year a f t e r The Four Seas Company brought out Kora i n H e l l 3 at Williams' expense, Marsden Hartley, painter and writer, a close f r i e n d of Williams at the time, published Adventures i n the A r t s , a series of essays on various American subjects and a r t i s t s i n which Hartley attempts to define the subject as well as the p o s s i b i l i t y of American, art forms. The concern i s one that Williams shared and supported. Har.tley i s mentioned 4 i n Spring and A l l (1923). Near the end of t h i s same book Hartley speaks of "The Importance of Being 'Dada'" i n a short essay, almost an appendix, and there he describes a Dadaist as "one who finds no one thing more important than any other one t h i n g , H e says furt h e r that Dadaism should not be mis-understood as another cause, as nothing more than another closed system of thought. I f i t were that, and only that, i t would be of no importance. Why substitute one tyranny for another? 54 Instead, Dadaism i s e s s e n t i a l l y a force that acts as a.sweeping gesture, or a turn of the hand s i g n a l l i n g a r e f u s a l to p a r t i c i p a t e any further i n the a r t i f i c i a l i t y — s o c i a l , p o l i t i c a l , c u l t u r a l , i n t e l l e c t u a l , and a r t i s t i c — of those forms of thought that depend for t h e i r power on t h e i r allegiance to "the Past." And here the past can he anything and everything up to the very moment i t s e l f . This negation'is not a f i n a l end, but when the mind finds i t s e l f i n such a dead-end, denial — "Men, r i e n , r i e n ! " (GAN, 174) — remains the one way to e x t r i c a t e i t s e l f without compromising i t s own i n t e g r i t y . With a thunderous No! to a l l imposed forms of s i g n i f i c a n c e — God over Man, Soul over Matter, Art over L i f e , Reason over Sense, Thought over Language, a l l such hierarchies which f i x the present i n s t a t i c forms — and an equally thunderous Yes! to the state of non-significance, the Dadaist with h i s da da da clears the way for what i s l e f t . And what i s l e f t i n t h i s destruction i s nothing other than the l i v i n g actual, the same actual that cannot be caged by thought, engaged, but never caged. One of the issues, " Art" ( c a p i t a l i z e d ) , the Dadaists single out for s p e c i a l attack. Not the art which i s an extension: of l i f e forces, as say i n the p r e h i s t o r i c cave paintings, but the c o n s t r i c t i n g concept of "Art" as a p r i v i l e g e d form, as then a category of thought separable from the a c t u a l , i n a s p e c i a l realm a l l to i t s e l f — and valued for that reason alone. Williams mentions the "handcuffs of ' a r t ' " i n Spring and A l l (SA, 97), and more than l i k e l y he has t h i s i n mind. In the f a l s e but stubbornly held assumption that "Art" stands above, or over l i f e , a r t i s t s and writers handcuff themselves with a f i x i t y that denies the authentic function of a r t : to free the mind from a l l imposed hierarc h i e s of "thought" and to re-open the immediacy of the present. As a gesture of negative force, Dadaism with i t s " r i e n " thus broke the s p e l l of "Art" ( c a p i t a l i z e d ) . 55 In t h i s l a r g e r sense, as seen by Williams at l e a s t , the Dadaists are symptomatic of a force within the mind that refuses, l i k e the b i r d i n Williams' early poem "The Fool's Song," to be caged by i t s own obsolete forms. I t i s the l i v i n g imagination they embody, an energy i n the mind comparable to " e l e c t r i c i t y " as Williams .says i n Spring and A l l (SA, 150) — which returns with a vengeance when constricted by an order that survives by denying the act u a l . The present constantly demands the destruction of the o l d , the known world, i n favor of the pressing desires-of the new, which by d e f i n i t i o n i s always the condition of an un-known world. "The imagination, freed from the handcuffs of 'art , ' takes the lead!" (SA, 97). A few pages before t h i s d e c l aration i n Spring and A l l Williams him-s e l f proposes nothing l e s s than a large-scale holocaust, a d a d a i s t i c destruction of a world that i s past (The past) simply because i t no longer accounts f o r the present. Against t h i s construct, the holocaust, l i k e an epidemic, or l i k e Dadaism, would break i n to destroy a past that prevents a present from breaking through. I t i s the renewal of the mind's force, we should emphasize, that c a r r i e s Williams: outside of any dead form the mind cl i n g s to f o r comfort l i v e s that "bizarre fowl" (SA, 92) — "Oh l i f e " (SA, 92) — ready to take wing i n order to re-assert i t s primacy, i t s immediacy. In t h i s transformation, the actual once again returns to the spring of i t s forwardness. Over against the "Art" (c a p i t a l i z e d ) that stands over l i f e , Williams wants that " a r t " which extends l i f e processes by taking i t s lead from the force of the imagination. "Yes, the imagination," he writes, drunk with p r o h i b i t i o n s , has destroyed and recreated everything afresh, i n the likeness of that which i t was. Now indeed men look about i n amazement at each other with a f u l l r e a l i z a t i o n of the meaning of 'art.' (SA, 93) 56 We w i l l return l a t e r to a more s p e c i f i c understanding of t h i s "meaning of 'art,™ but f o r the moment we-might remind ourselves that i n the destruction of obsolete forms of thought, i n the instant of that destruction, when the oppressive buildings of thought crumble, the world i s once again brought back to a state of newness — "everything afresh," or to re-state Hartley's statement, now no one thing i s any more or le s s than any other one thing. Since a l l things as things are p a r t i c u l a r s , a l l things, to that extent, are equal, no longer disposable through the overlay of secondary values assigned to them by v i r t u e of t h e i r " p o s i t i o n " i n a h i e r a r c h i c frame of reference, parts of a whole that i s greater and through which, because of which, they are merely a part, a sign say, that does nothing more than point somewhere e l s e , empty i n i t s e l f . Now each thing i s s u b s t a n t i a l , e x i s t s i n i t s own r i g h t : signs that before were transparent now become actual i n them-selves. Words, for instance: but, as w e l l , i n "A Novelette" e s p e c i a l l y , the mind comes into a new f e e l i n g f or things as themselves the context of the mind's acts ("No ideas but i n things"). This i s only another way of saying that the mind i s i t s e l f one of the a c t u a l i t i e s of the world, both of and i n a f i e l d of e x i s t i n g ( i . e . moving) things. Value i s no longer make-s h i f t , no longer dependent upon abstracted forms of reference (such as "Art," or "Science," or "Philosophy"). Instead, t h i s new sense of the p a r t i c u l a r functions as an extension of what Hartley i n the same essay c a l l s "the b r i l l i a n t e x c i t a t i o n of the moment," the same l i v i n g present Williams wants the hold of. In t h i s " s ingle necessity" which then a r i s e s to stay i n "the moment" (AN, 273), the epidemic, l i k e Dadaism, turns out to be a destructive force, but one that allows the mind to release i t s e l f , to move with the complex surfaces of things, as things: Where the drop of r a i n had been, there remained a d e l i c a t e 57 black s t a i n , the o u t l i n e of the drop marked c l e a r l y on the white paint, i n black, within which a shadow, a smoothest tone faded upward between the l i n e s and burst them, thinning out upon the woodwork down which the r a i n had come. In the tops of the screws the p o l i s h i n g powder could be seen white. And Williams' "thus?" Thus the epidemic had become a c r i t i c i s m — to begin with. In the seriousness of the moment — not even the seriousness but the single necessity — the extraneous dropped of i t s own weight. One worked ra p i d l y . Meanwhile values stood out i n a l l fineness. (AN, 273) And l a t e r on i n the same section, "A Paradox:" January. January. (AN, 275) A.Novelette i s s u b t i t l e d "January:" the epidemic and•Dadaism, neither of them as f i n a l ends, but as c r i t i c i s m s which w i l l not permit the mind to retreat from the " s i n g l e necessity" of the present moment. Both of them are gestures ("to begin with") that re-open the experience of the ac t u a l , make possible the mind's return to beginnings, to the condition of "January." "To begin with" — one way of viewing the dadaist elements i n The Great American Novel, Spring and A l l , and A Novelette and Other Prose, a l l of which were written during the 20's, without i n s i s t i n g that Williams was a Dadaist i n too s t r i c t a sense. The European Dadaism born i n the dark nightmare of the war grew out of conditions quite distant from American shores. As Maurice Nadeau says i n The History of Surrealism, t h i s p a r t i -cular form of Dadaism, the explosive dissent of T r i s t a n Tzara, for instance, made "enthusiastic converts i n a conquered Germany at grips with famine, 58 poverty," and revolutionary rio.ts."? In his work, as far as we can t e l l , Williams neither furthered the s p e c i f i c issues of European Dadaism, nor did he p u b l i c l y a l i g n himself with, that -movement. And yet, understandably enough, he could e a s i l y i d e n t i f y with- the l i n g u i s t i c ground of the Dadaist's attack on reason: the word "dada" i t s e l f , about which Georges Ribement-Dessaignes i n h i s History of Dada has the following to o f f e r : " I t means nothing, aims to mean nothing, and was adopted p r e c i s e l y because of i t s g absence of meaning." I f dada means "nothing," then the "absence of meaning" signals a r e l i e f from the s u f f o c a t i n g obsession with the meaning of words at the expense of t h e i r o b j e c t i v i t y . The word dada, i n t h i s way, re-opens the experience of language, and t h i s sense of playing with words Williams understood only too w e l l . He heard i t very much i n h i s own ear. In the few years p r i o r to 1917, the year America .joined the war, .; Williams did, however, come into contact i n New York with a c e r t a i n form of Dadaism, though Dadaism as such had not yet existed, through the presence and work of Marcel Duchamp. Williams admits i n h i s Autobiography the puzzlement of, and h i s uneasiness with, t h i s enigmatic French a r t i s t and 9 double-talker, the maker of "ready-mades" and The Nude Descending the Staircase, the one painting that thoroughly scandalized the New York art world at the 1913 Armory Show. As we s h a l l see, h i s references to Duchamp's work, scattered and few as they are, suggest that t h i s work, the experience of i t s e f f e c t on conventional notions of art form, did point to p o s s i b i l i t i e s i n w r i t i n g for Williams. The s o - c a l l e d influence of Dadaism, l i k e the influence of so many writers and movements i n Williams' l i f e , i s one more manifestation, i n h i s mind, of the struggle for the NEW, In t h i s a s s e r t i o n , Williams envisioned 59 a NEW world, that v i t a nuova he f e l t pushing for'embodiment i n his own experience of language. We might c a l l i t "modernism." The question of influence i n Williams' work, i n other words, i s more often than not questionable i n i t s e l f because i t remains so double-edged. On the one hand, we can almost go so:far as - to argue that anything and everything, p o s i t i v e - o r negative, i n some way "influenced" Williams. He was an intensely public writer, as anyone who has read him s e r i o u s l y knows. The whole of h i s Selected Essays, which begins with h i s "Prologue" to Kora i n H e l l , a l l the pieces he wrote on art and,artists c o l l e c t e d i n A Recognizable Image, not to mention h i s Selected Letters and h i s Autobiography, not even to mention a l l the essays and reviews that have not as yet been c o l l e c t e d , a t t e s t to t h i s side of h i s nature. "Granted my i n t e r e s t i n w r i t i n g , " he says simply i n h i s "Preface" to the Selected Essays, "to make the poets p a r t i c u l a r l y more accepted i n what they say, I wanted to r e i n t e r p r e t them and r e l a t e them to the world" (SE, x v i ) . The aim, of course, applies to writers and a r t i s t s as w e l l . On the other hand, when i t became a question of his own w r i t i n g , r i g h t from the beginning, i f we exclude Poems (1909), he could, and mostly did, stubbornly maintain his own p a r t i c u l a r sense of what he wanted from w r i t i n g . I t i s for t h i s very reason, the obvious foot-stomping aside, that his a s s e r tion i n the "Prologue," — " I ' l l write whatever I damn please, when-ever I damn please and as I damn please" (K, 13) — equally rings true to his nature. Could anyone but Williams have written Kora i n Hell? I t i s not exactly a question of influence. This i s another way of saying that i t i s possible to t a l k about the dadaist elements i n Williams' work without l a b e l l i n g him a D a d a i s t . ^ Williams was too r e s t l e s s a writer ever to be caught under the guise of a l a b e l . Brought into a piece of w r i t i n g wholesale, Dadaism ( c a p i t a l i z e d ) 60 could only lead to another closure, and Williams, of a l l w r i t e r s , c o n t i n u a l l y guarded against the predetermination of h i s w r i t i n g by any given f i x e d point of view, which Dadaism taken as an end.would be. But as a force, as an i n i t i a l negation that says No! to reason as end, i t could bring r e l i e f , even to Williams i n Rutherford, New Jersey. And e s p e c i a l l y to Williams, since the Dadaists brought into p u b l i c view a s i m i l a r c r i s i s of mind and language that he had undergone when he wrote Kora i n H e l l . Dadaism, then, by the time Hartley wrote "The Importance of Being 'Dada'" i n 1921, must have been l e s s "news" to Williams than a c l a r i f i c a t i o n that confirmed his own desire for new beginnings. He might have supported the basis of Breton's own farewell to Dada — It s h a l l not be said that Dadaism served any other purpose than to keep us i n that state of perfect a v a i l -a b i l i t y i n which we are and from which we s h a l l now set out with l u c i d i t y toward what claims us for i t s own.H Breton i s t a l k i n g about the o r i g i n s of Surrealism as an advancement, a re b u i l d i n g necessary a f t e r the destruction brought on by Dadaism. Whether 12 Breton i s r i g h t or not, his phrase — "that state of perfect a v a i l a b i l i t y " — s u i t s Williams very w e l l : Dadaism understood as a means through which the actual breaks through, because of which something else could now happen, the a v a i l a b i l i t y of new forms, for instance, or the a v a i l a b i l i t y of a new sense of experience interwoven with a new sense of language. The two times Williams mentions Dadaism i n I Wanted to Write a_ Poem are notable f o r t h e i r absence of d e t a i l . Talking about hi s 1924 t r i p to P a r i s , . for - instance, he comments, 61 I had met Soupault i n P a r i s , He was a very amusing person, r e a l l y amusing, a l l wound up i n Dadaism. I didn't understand what Dadaism was hut I l i k e d Soupault, (IW, 47) What Williams says here i s so sparse that i t sounds almost c r y p t i c , although i n that c h a r a c t e r i s t i c uneasiness he had with "movements" as ends, he does s h i f t a t t e n t i o n immediately from Soupault the Dadaist to Soupault the man. And yet i t i s so u n l i k e l y , given Williams' sharp 13 i n t e l l i g e n c e , that he "didn't understand" Dadaism. Against t h i s remark, another one i n r e l a t i o n to "A Novelette:" The pieces i n t h i s book show the influence of Dadaism. I didn't o r i g i n a t e Dadaism but I had i t i n my soul to write i t . Spring and A l l shows that. Paris had i n f l u -enced me; there i s a French f e e l i n g i n t h i s work. (IW, 48-49) Williams' statement that he didn't " o r i g i n a t e Dadaism" sounds curious because there are no i n d i c a t i o n s i n h i s work that he, or anyone e l s e , ever thought he did. But again, h i s attention quickly s h i f t s from the l a b e l to the man, t h i s time, to himself. "I had i t i n my soul to write i t , " he says, thus suggesting that Dadaism was less a movement with which he i d e n t i f i e d and more the instance of a way — an i n i t i a l breakage — that releases the mind to the play of language. In t h i s sense, i t i s possible that Williams viewed Dadaism (to use 14 Ribemont-Dessaigne's phrase) as "a movement of the mind" that prepared the ground for the S u r r e a l i s t exploration into the nature of language. He hints as much i n a l e t t e r to Norman Macleod written i n 1945 (July 25) where he t a l k s about a desire "to write something on the S u r r e a l i s t s , as French a r t i s t s " — and the weight, we notice, f a l l s heavily on the word French. He goes on to explain that he sees Surrealism as a science of misnomers (a purely l o c a l and temporal phase) evading correct nomenclature, e n t i r e l y a product of 62 contemporary France. The Immediate sequel of Dadaism and the F i r s t World War with the actual but diverted defeat of France, (SL, 240) Names t i e the world together i n language, so much so that most speakers of any given language are r a r e l y aware that language conditions experience. The word-men Williams admires — and the S u r r e a l i s t s are more instances — have experienced language as both here and there, a possession on the one hand, but some-thing that l i v e s i t s own l i f e as w e l l . Begin c a l l i n g things by t h e i r wrong names, as c h i l d r e n love to do, and suddenly confusion breaks i n . Nothing i s any longer s e t t l e d , the words become wiry and r e s t l e s s . Mis-naming something throws',language i n t o r e l i e f as something. "Thus, 'The Nude Descending a S t a i r c a s e , ' " Williams writes to Macleod, i s a c t u a l l y the F a l l of France — which could not be stated — formally i n any other way. The Surrealism that followed t h i s early, and i s o l a t e d example, a continued misnaming of external events, an appearance had to be invented to f i t the misapplication. I t s general character i s thus s e l f - e v i d e n t , both the subject and i t s treatment. (SL, 240) And so i n "A Novelette" Williams praises the S u r r e a l i s t s — "Take the s u r r e a l i s t s , take Soupault's Les. Dernieres Nuits de Paris"'*' 5 — for t h e i r e f f o r t i n bringing language back to " i t s January" by making "the words into sentences that w i l l have a f a n t a s t i c r e a l i t y which i s f a l s e " (AN, 280), that i s , by "misnaming." By so doing, they reveal that other falseness, when language i s subservient to the sale of old clothes and ideas and the formulas f o r the synthetic manufacture of rubber (AN, 280-281) The S u r r e a l i s t s are thus exemplary f o r the way i n which they undermine, the -constructive i n t e l l e c t (reason as end) in: favor of the a c t u a l i t y of language: the words as p a r t i c l e s by and i n which human desire seeks to explore, manifest and discover i t s e l f . We might add, by w r i t i n g i n the words. Those who make language subservient to "ideas" betray the very 63 thing ("No ideas but i n things") which i s most human i n man. Hence they subvert that which i s c l o s e s t to desire, "House for s a l e . " (AN, 281) Words become so much r e a l estate, and not the estate of the r e a l which they are. According to Williams, French Surrealism clears out t h i s f a l s e premise: Surrealism does not l i e . It i s the s i n g l e truth. I t i s an epidemic. I t i s . I t i s j u s t words. (AN, 281) And yet, and s i g n i f i c a n t l y enough, since p a r t i c u l a r i s m i s the e f f e c t of an epidemic that brings things back to t h e i r "January," Williams points to the s p e c i f i c a l l y French nature of Surrealism. He and other American writers can learn from i t , but to copy i t wholesale would be disastrous, because Surrealism i s i t s e l f a p a r t i c u l a r — a new thing: . . . i t i s French. It i s t h e i r invention: one. That language i s i n constant revolution, constantly being covered, merded, stolen, slimed. Theirs. It i s i n the kind that we should see i t . In that d i v e r s i t y of the mind which i s excellence, l i k e a tree — one single tree — French — i t i s surrealism. I t i s of that kind which i s the a c t u a l . (AN, 281) Language i s constantly changing to meet new conditions, or stated negatively, words are constantly "being covered" over with meanings that c l i n g to a past world. As a symbol of love, the "rose i s obsolete," Williams says i n Spring and A l l , but love can be re-discovered "at the edge of the / p e t a l " (SA, 107-108) of a rose, as words can as w e l l . " I t i s i n the kind," Williams argues, and r i g h t here he r e t r i e v e s a more primary, a more act i v e sense of the word "kind," one of the words "covered over," but uncovered momen-t a r i l y to get at the p a r t i c u l a r i t y of Surrealism. In Webster's Dictionary, we note one d e f i n i t i o n of "kind:" Rare or Archaic, a. o r i g i n , b. nature, c. manner; way. A very dense word indeed has been degraded and thus 64 emptied of i t s s u b s t a n t i a l i t y . And Williams implies that a world i n which "kind" had substance must have paid attention to the a c t u a l i t y of language, not covered over, can we say l o s t , i n such g e n e r a l i t i e s as (Webster's) sort; v a r i e t y ; c l a s s . I t i s i n kind, then, that such a p a r t i c u l a r form as Surrealism has come in t o "appearance" (to quote the term Williams uses i n his l e t t e r to Macleod): a return to o r i g i n s as a concern f o r what i s primary i n human nature made possible through the way of language. Through Williams' eyes, the emergence of Surrealism i s no d i f f e r e n t from that of the Indian i n America, indigenous but neglected, "a natural expression of the place, the Indian himself as 'r i g h t , ' the flower of h i s world" (TAG, 138). In Surrealism, France i s embodied i n a rooted thing, " l i k e a tree — one sing l e tree — French — i t i s surrealism" (AN, 281). And t h i s kind of thing, rooted, so Williams ( c i r c a 1929) believes, does not e x i s t i n America. I f , however, the S u r r e a l i s t s can break through the deadness of language forms i n France, then American writers must be able to do the same thing i n t h e i r world. Or as Williams had spoken of t h i s same necessity i n . 1923 i n The Great American Novel: "We must imitate the.motivation and shun the r e s u l t " (GAN, 175). I t i s from t h i s p o s i t i o n that he had then argued the need f or American writers to break away from European models.(the " f o r e i g n " i s not of the nature of "kind") i n order "to begin to f i n d a shape — to begin to begin again" (P, 167), to quote the way he puts i t in. Paterson, h i s own "reply;to Greek and L a t i n with the bare hands" (P, 10);.' He i s t a l k i n g about European music, but a l l forms of a r t share the consequences: Tear i t a l l apart. Start with one note. One word. Chant i t over and over f o r t y d i f f e r e n t ways. But i t would be stupid — It would, i f "-it were what I mean — i t would be 65 accurate. I t would a r t i c u l a t e with something. I t would s i g n i f y r e l i e f . Release I mean. I t would be the beginning. (GAN, 174-175) R e l i e f and release: the " r i e n , r i e n , r i e n " of Dadaism as an "apotheosis of r e l i e f " (GAN, 173) and the S u r r e a l i s t release into language, both of which restore to the mind the primacy of experience. What Williams wants i n the 20's i s a c r i t i c a l reading of modernist w r i t i n g — the kind of w r i t i n g actual to the conditions of i t s time. "Reading w i l l become an a r t " (AN, 364), so he hopes i n a "Statement" at the end of A Novelette. I t i s thus not s u r p r i s i n g that the writer-Williams might at times become the reader-Williams and that he might, i n t h i s capacity, turn to the l i k e s of a Shakespeare or a Joyce i n h i s e f f o r t to further modernist w r i t i n g i n America. No doubt, as a wri t e r , he i s simply looking f o r news from other writers which can be of use i n his own w r i t i n g , but as a reader — and Williams did take t h i s task s e r i o u s l y — he i s seeking c r i t i c a l terms to make a readership for such w r i t i n g a v a i l a b l e i n America. 66 CHAPTER THREE THE LANGUAGE . . . THE LANGUAGE Williams' deep attachment to Shakespeare began as f a r back as i n h i s childhood, when h i s father, so we learn i n h i s Autobiography, f i r s t i n t r o -duced him to the work of the Elizabethan, "whom I read a v i d l y , p r a c t i c a l l y from beginning to end" (A, 15). Further on i n t h i s same book, Shakespeare i s mentioned again, t h i s time i n terms of Williams' decision to become a writer. "Words offered themselves," he says, "and I jumped at them. To write, l i k e Shakespeare!" (A, 48). Quite an ambition, to be sure, but the excitement of the p o s s i b i l i t y - took root — and Shakespeare remained a constant companion i n Williams' mind."'' In The Embodiment of Knowledge, he even goes so f a r as to c a l l Shakespeare "My Grandfather" (EK, 110). A f e e l i n g of kinship as well. I t i s here that we are also offered, however incomplete, a more i n s i g h t f u l understanding of Shakespeare's s i g n i f i c a n c e , for Williams, as a write r who continues to be a source for modernist wri t e r s . But not simply because Shakespeare was a "great" dramatist, and as such, necessary reading, say i n the c u l t u r a l eyes of Williams' English father. 67 More than that, Shakespeare's plays prefigure the e f f o r t behind modernism to make language ac t u a l . Here Williams could locate a working model f o r the kind of American w r i t i n g he thought possible once the tyranny of d i s c u r s i v e forms of thought were overcome — the work of the Dadaists and the S u r r e a l -i s t s i n France — and w r i t i n g could once again become an extension of experience, not -merely a container i n t o which writers pour t h e i r precon-ceived ideas. In the plays themselves (as p l a y s ) , Williams could see the exemplifi-cation of that f i g u r e of the writer, the "word man" who l i v e s so much i n his words that the biographic impulse i s r e s i s t e d completely. Shakespeare l i t e r a l l y disappears into h i s words; they are not assumed to be transparent vehicles burdened with the "thoughts" of the w r i t e r , what he believes, his theory of l i f e , or whatever he thinks p r i o r to the act of w r i t i n g . Words are deeds through which Shakespeare composed an actual world. As Williams says, He i s not a dealer i n abstractions using a play as a subterfuge, words, w r i t i n g as a means. But the w r i t i n g i s a l l and only. (EK, 14) Shakespeare did not use words, as do the "idea-vendors" Williams attacks i n "A Novelette," to transmit abstract ideas. They were a switchboard for things and people's growth and movements, i n reverse. The actions pressed the keys and recorded them on the page. (EK, 15) Shakespeare was himself an instrument of action i n words, "he i s a l l play, a l l the play" (EK, .15) . Even more importantly perhaps, i n Shakespeare's plays, Williams also sees the emergence of new forces, new concerns, a new view of the world that undermines Shakespeare's hold on language, a change that could be 68 read as an h i s t o r i c s h i f t i n a t t i t u d e s toward language — over from language as a r e v e l a t i o n of human acts to the d i s c u r s i v e use of language as a t o o l , an instrument of control over things. This s h i f t marks the beginning of a "cleavage" (SA, 111), to use Williams' word i n Spring and A l l , between words and things that has continued into the early part, of the 20th century. To Williams, the e f f e c t of t h i s change i s most evident i n the "science" and "philosophy" he c r i t i c i z e s i n A Novelette and The Embodiment of Knowledge, but equally i n any form of thought ( " l i t e r a r y " or otherwise) that attempts to cage the actual by making i t conform to a preconceived frame of r e f e r -ence. Bacon enters the stage at the beginning of t h i s new methodology, one that works to sever the bond between words and things, i n f a c t constitutes i t s e l f through that severance. A new kind of " o b j e c t i v i t y " i s born. Language becomes secondary. Words are taken as signs for things, a f t e r things, for i t i s i n those same "things" that men can discover the s o - c a l l e d "laws" of nature which enable them to control forces that once appeared so mysterious and awesome. In t h i s separation, the substances of the world (men included) disappeared into abstract forms of thought: "science" into "materialism" and "philosophy" into "idealism," both of them taken as means to a new end: "knowledge" as a completed state of understanding. In i t s simplest form, so Williams argues, t h i s concept of "knowledge" was an i l l u s i o n r i g h t from the beginning. "Bacon and h i s confreres of the period," he writes, had a great work to do. Science had to be b u i l t up. The lure of a s o l u t i o n of l i f e c a r r i e d them forward giving them the b e l i e f that to know everything was the end of knowledge, the same f a l s i t y that debauches the mind of a college boy to t h i s day. I t had a perfect j u s t i c e as an incentive to work and has worked so wonderfully. (EK, 68) If the f i r s t quarter of the 20th century i s any i n d i c a t i o n , i t becomes 69 apparent to Williams that the habit of mind giving b i r t h to science has triumphed. But l i k e a l l other "truths" which eventually reveal t h e i r l i m i t s , the f i c t i o n of science i s now so worn, so v i o l e n t l y wrong that i t s viciousness has become surely the most d i s t o r t i n g , obsessive ghost of the world. I t i s the most v i o l e n t l i e i n existence to the extent that i t has been the most powerful force i n c i t i n g men to labor for hundreds of years. Now i t must be k i l l e d . It must be k i l l e d by showing i t f a l s e . This i s why Science — for that i s what "science" has come to mean, the f i c t i o n i t s e l f , and Philosophy — f o r i t i s the same there — must be branded as l i e . (EK, 68-69) A l i e , because somewhere i n t h i s triumph, Shakespeare's sense of man as a "speaking animal" got l o s t , and the s o l i d i t y of h i s use of words as w e l l . As a w r i t e r , Shakespeare r e s i s t e d the lure of abstractions and held to the density of l i v e experience: . . . never a philosopher i n any of Shakespeare's pieces — only men and women of action — bent by what you w i l l — something more s o l i d which was there before, some-thing he could not escape, opaque, u n s c i e n t i f i c , i n an awakening s c i e n t i f i c era, which Bacon was f i r s t i n awakening. Shakespeare had nothing but people to oppose to that, a s o l i d rock he could not break — j u s t arrange, rearrange. He could not get by them. There he stuck and spun. (EK, 111-112) Some of Williams' comments on Shakespeare found t h e i r way i n t o "The Descent of Winter" ( f i r s t published i n Pound's E x i l e , Autumn, 1928), but his reading of t h i s genius of the English language nevertheless remains i n a state of "notes and fragments," quick takes. What i s important for t h i s study, however, i s the manner i n which he reads Shakespeare i n t o the modernist movement i n w r i t i n g . Not that "the modern" should, or i s " t r y i n g or wishing or dreaming to bring back Shakespeare" (EK, 112) , not that kind of n o s t a l g i c lament for things past. "But h i s s o l i d i t y , " Williams says, "his opacity i s growing f a m i l i a r " (EK, 112). 70 In the section of The Embodiment of Knowledge immediately following the f i r s t discussion of Shakespeare as a writer — "Shakespeare's work i s a l l words" (EK, 11) — Williams affirms the experimental w r i t i n g of Stein and Joyce, two modernist w r i t e r s who have made the s h i f t back i n t o a sense of language as actual, the matter of w r i t i n g . By breaking through the " f a l s e r e l i a n c e on emotion and idea" (EK, 18) and returning to the o b j e c t i v i t y of words, they are attempting to overcome the same cleavage between words and things that enters Shakespeare's work. A f t e r s t a t i n g that "Language i s the key to the mind's escape from bondage to the past" (EK, 19), Williams outlines his own sense of the "province" (EK, 19) and "function" (EK, 20) of w r i t i n g i n his contemporary world. In w r i t i n g that engages language, "words and t h e i r configurations are r e a l and a l l ideas and facts with which they deal are secondary" (EK, 19-20). And because of t h i s , such w r i t i n g i s the complement of a l l other realms of the i n t e l l i g e n c e which use language as secondary to the r e a l i t y of t h e i r own materials — such as science, philosophy, h i s t o r y , r e l i g i o n , the l e g i s l a t i v e f i e l d . (EK, 20) Williams, i n other words, does not oppose w r i t i n g to other f i e l d s of i n t e l l i g e n c e , but separates i t out as that "realm of the i n t e l l i g e n c e " i n which language i s explored on i t s own terms. And since experience i s i n e x t r i c a b l y bound to the play of words, the modernist w r i t i n g Williams has i n mind functions to "re-enkindle language, to break i t away from i t s enforcements, i t s p r o s t i t u t i o n s under a l l other categories" (EK, 20). In very c r u c i a l ways, what we know of the past i s a language construct, a completed state of understanding frozen into the grammar and syntax of a world that no longer e x i s t s . By breaking up the language of that construct, 71 modernist writers thus free "the words themselves" to a present where they can be re-discovered i n t h e i r newness. So Williams concludes, "By taking language as r e a l and employing i t with a f u l l breadth and sweep, l e t t e r s frees i t from encroachments and makes i t operative again" (EK, 20). The key word i s "operative." I t i s imperative that now, i n the 20th century, writers be drawn into the hunt for a form of w r i t i n g that reveals the immediacy of t h e i r time, the one they l i v e . This l o y a l t y toward the present, however, can cause intense resistances i n those writers and readers who would prefer to r e l y on past forms because they are more predictable, l e s s threatening, more comforting. A great deal of what concerns Williams deeply s t r i k e s to the core of t h i s c e n t r a l drama, the modernist b a t t l e f or the New as against the dominance of the Old. Taken together, a l l the essays c o l l e c t e d i n Selected Essays are exemplary i n t h i s sense, and no doubt Williams had some such i n t e n t i o n i n mind i n the early 50's when he gathered them together for r e - p u b l i c a t i o n . Selected Essays begins with the "Prologue" to Kora i n H e l l , his f i r s t major defense of modernism, and ends with "On measure — Statement for Cid Corman," a re - a f f i r m a t i o n of the modernist poet's desire to discover "a new measure by which may be ordered our poems as well as our l i v e s " (SE, 340). "A Point for American C r i t i c i s m " appears mid-stream, f i r s t published i n t r a n s i t i o n i n 1929, around the same time as The Embodiment of Knowledge 2 was written and A Novelette and Other Prose compiled. By the end of the 20's, over ten years a f t e r w r i t i n g Kora i n H e l l , modernism was s t i l l , at l e a s t i n Williams' eyes, not accepted as an a c t u a l i t y . Rebecca West's 3 essay "The Strange Case of James Joyce," the focus of>his* attention i n "A Point-for-. American Criticism,." confIrmed-his-growing. sense that no 72 authentic American form of w r i t i n g had yet become p u b l i c . "No one w i l l handle i t here," he had written to Pound i n March, 1930, admitting his own f a i l u r e to f i n d a publisher f or A Novelette and Other Prose. He i s equally angered because West's c r i t i c i s m of Joyce was published i n America, further i n d i c a t i o n that Americans are s t i l l dependent upon foreign authority to t e l l them how to judge what i s , and what i s not, relevant i n contemporary l i t e r a t u r e . Williams thus writes "a point" f or American c r i t i c i s m and argues the need for readers i n America to become more conscious of the fa c t that modern w r i t i n g issues from the condition of t h e i r experience; and that Americans, for t h i s reason, have the opportun-i t y , i f they w i l l act on i t , to i n t e r p r e t the work of such a writer as Joyce from t h e i r own perspective. Possibly "A Point f or American C r i t i c i s m " does not deserve to be singled out for s p e c i a l attention — i t i s , a f t e r a l l , only a review of a review — except that i t dramatizes so c l e a r l y and so w e l l the nature of the constant struggle, i n Williams' work, out of which such a thing as "modernism" takes shape. Just as the Dadaists and S u r r e a l i s t s i n France — "We must imitate the motivation and shun the r e s u l t " — American writers must discover a form of w r i t i n g p a r t i c u l a r to t h e i r own needs. And c r i t i c i s m can act as a p o s i t i v e force i n t h i s endeavor. Modernist w r i t i n g demands the e f f o r t of modernist readers. So i t i s that i n the case of "Joyce vs West" an American form of c r i t i c i s m could have offered a more accurate evaluation of the larger context of Joyce's work. What then might t h i s form be f o r the "American" reader that Williams becomes on the occasion of t h i s b r i e f essay? We notice, f i r s t of a l l , that he does not choose to answer West i n the most obvious way, through a 7 3 point by point r e b u t t a l of her reading of Joyce. Instead, he constructs his argument negatively, moves behind the content of West's remarks back to the basic assumptions she holds as a " c r i t i c . " By so de-constructing the terms of her argument, he can l i f t her readerly misgivings — Joyce as a "strange case" — into the context of the h i s t o r i c condition of modernist w r i t i n g — again, the b a t t l e between the past ("West" defends what i s "old") and the present ("Joyce" manifests the b i r t h of the "new"). We are t o l d that Rebecca West, on the one hand, acknowledges Joyce's "genius," only then to expose h i s s o - c a l l e d defects, one of them his lack of " t a s t e . " What gets Williams i s the smugness behind the judgment, the apparent security of i t , which he translates as the other side of a f a i l u r e to deal with an object of attention — i . e . Joyce's w r i t i n g — that does not conform to pre-established l i t e r a r y standards. What i s outwardly a c r i t i c i s m i s thus r e a l l y a defense. Joyce.offends West's s e n s i b i l i t i e s , and she uses the whole weighted authority of her aesthetic perspective to demonstrate that Joyce's work, as " b e a u t i f u l " (SE, 81) as h i s prose may be, i s f i n a l l y unsuccessful because he f a i l s to l i f t h i s '"compulsions'" beyond "'the threshold that divides l i f e from a r t ' " (SE, 81). In Williams' deconstruction, such a statement betrays the fundamental bankruptcy of an aesthetic frame of reference that constitutes i t s e l f on the h i e r a r c h i c separation of " a r t " from l i f e . This i s the same "A r t " ( c a p i t a l i z e d ) that the Dadaists singled out for attack years before. Joyce, on the other hand, refuses to pander to t h i s separation, and h i s work i s s i g n i f i c a n t for that very f a c t . Words to him are not used as some kind of ladder to transport the reader out of the world to some transcendent "somewhere e l s e " (SE, 87). Like Shakespeare, he i s , f i r s t and foremost, a w r i t e r : " W i l l t h i s never be understood?" (SE, 86). 74 Williams would have enjoyed Marcel Duchamp's answer, i n an interview, to the question, "What i s taste f or you?" "A habit. The r e p e t i t i o n of 4 something already accepted." In t h i s sense, " t a s t e " i s a f i x e d response, an aesthetic measuring rod determined by an already given standard, a set of s o c i a l or c u l t u r a l norms against which, and only against which, a thing i s judged as " b e a u t i f u l " or not. This i s both i t s l i m i t and i t s danger. As a " r e p e t i t i o n of something already accepted," i t becomes one more example of a form that cuts o f f the crab's f e e l e r s to make those f e e l e r s f i t i nto a box. The r e s u l t i n g c o n s t r i c t i o n prevents the mind (Rebecca West's, according to Williams) from experiencing something altogether new. Of course, the issue of " t a s t e " i n i t s e l f i s not the sole point of Williams' attack. Rather, the dogmatic r e l i a n c e upon i t as a c r i t i c a l t o o l disguises what stands behind i t , " B r i t i s h c r i t i c a l orthodoxy (R.W. i t s spokesman)" (SE, 84), a frame of reference that asserts i t s power by refusing to accept what does not conform to i t s f i x e d standards. This i s the r e a l reason why i t cannot (or w i l l not) understand Joyce's so - c a l l e d defects — Joyce does offend i n taste. Joyce i s sentimental i n his handling of his material. He does deform h i s drawing and allow defective characterizations to creep i n (SE, 84) — as inconsequential i n the face of the much more pressing (and obvious, to Williams) fa c t that he i s breaking away from aesthetic forms that have become obsolete. " B r i t i s h c r i t i c a l orthodoxy" i s one such form. This, then, i s the immediate thing: "Joyce has broken through and drags h i s defects with him, a thing English c r i t i c i s m cannot t o l e r a t e " (SE, 85). Williams says that West cannot acknowledge t h i s complexity without s a c r i f i c i n g her pre-determined expectations: She cannot say that on the basis of Joyce's e f f o r t , the 75 defect i s a consequence of the genius which, to gain way, has superseded the r e s t r i c t i o n s of the orthodox f i e l d . She cannot say that i t i s the break that has released the genius — and that the defects are stigmata of the break. She cannot l i n k the two as an i n d i s s o l u b l e whole •— but she must put defect to the r i g h t , genius to the l e f t , B r i t i s h c r i t i c i s m i n the center, where i t i s wholly forced; a thorough imposition. (SE, 84) Meanwhile, Joyce — "the leap of a new force" (SE, 85) — s l i p s through her f i n g e r s : Forward i s the new. I t w i l l not be blamed. I t w i l l not force i t s e l f into what amounts to paralyzing r e s t r i c t i o n s . It cannot be correct. I t hasn't time. I t has that which i s beyond measurement, which renders -measurement a f a l s i -f i c a t i o n , since .the energy i s showing i t s e l f as recrudes-cent, the measurement being the aftermath of each new outburst. (SE, 85) "And t h i s , " so Williams asserts a l i t t l e further on, " i s the opportunity of America! to see large, l a r g e r than England can" (SE, 86). Severed from the need to r e l y on B r i t i s h t r a d i t i o n (which i s i t s e l f , would the " B r i t i s h c r i t i c a l orthodoxy" question i t s own past, a form of localism) American c r i t i c i s m can accept Joyce as a new force "beyond measurement." They both share the same c o n s t i t u t i n g break from orthodoxy and the state of newness that issues from t h i s break. There i s an American c r i t i c i s m that applies to American l i t e r a t u r e — a l l too unformed to speak of p o s i t i v e l y . This American thing i t i s that would better f i t the I r i s h of Joyce. (SE, 87) This "unformed" but "American thing" has not yet blossomed, but t h i s state of r e s t l e s s p o s s i b i l i t y i s i t s precise advantage. With no f i x e d standards to defend, i t does not have to deny what does not conform. I m p l i c i t i n Williams' argument i s thus a push toward a more authentic c r i t i c a l a ppraisal on the part of American readers of modernist w r i t i n g such as Joyce's. Its apparent absence of "order" i s the sign of a new kind of 76 readership. Williams i s perhaps h i n t i n g that behind the idea of l i t e r a r y '.'taste," which constitutes i t s e l f on the d i v i s i o n between a "high" and a "low" culture, there i s that more common, more democratic sense of " t a s t e " — o r i g i n a l l y , to test by touching; to test the flavour of by.putting a l i t t l e i n one's mouth; to receive the sensation of, as for the f i r s t time. In America, " t a s t e " can then become an act of f e e l i n g out something new, something other that i s other because as yet unknown. American readers can " t e s t " such w r i t i n g as Joyce's, not by judging i t according to ext e r n a l l y imposed standards of measurement, but by making contact with i t , "as for the f i r s t time." I t i s from t h i s perspective that Williams comes to conclude that the reader-West hides behind a c r i t i c a l framework conditioned by B r i t i s h norms. And by refusing to enter the dynamics of "the words themselves" i n Joyce's w r i t i n g , not s u r p r i s i n g l y , she transposes the w r i t i n g over into categories of thought which i t s very texture undermines. As Williams writes, She speaks of transcendental tosh, of Freud, of Beethoven's F i f t h Symphony, of anything that comes into her head, but she has not yet learned — though she professes to know the difference between art and l i f e — the sentimental and the non-sentimental — that w r i t i n g i s made of words. And that i n j u s t t h i s e s s e n t i a l Joyce i s making a tech-n i c a l advance which she i s a f r a i d to acknowledge — that i s a c t u a l l y c u t t i n g away a l l England from under her. (SE, 88) What West refuses to recognize i s the "t e c h n i c a l advance" part and p a r c e l of Joyce's w r i t i n g : Joyce maims words. Why? Because meanings have been dulled, then l o s t , then perverted by t h e i r connotations (which have grown over them) u n t i l t h e i r e f f e c t on the mind i s no longer what i t was when they were fresh, but grows rotten as poi — though we may get to l i k e poi., (SE, 89-90) That i s , i f we get used to i t s taste. And how else to get used to poi but 77 by eating i t ? This i s , of course, a f o o l ' s language, but i t i s the same kind of language Williams thinks Rebecca West judges without hearing. From a p o s i t i o n outside t h i s maiming of words, and predictably, to West's ears, Joyce f i n a l l y does become himself a f o o l , the Shakespearean f o o l returning i n I r i s h garb. But r i g h t here, once again, Williams moves i n s w i f t l y from the p o s i t i o n of the f o o l and turns her perception upside down: Truly her conception of the Shakespearean f o o l , to whom she l i k e n s Joyce's mental processes, i s c l o a c a l i f any-thing could be so, with h i s japes and antics which so d i s t r e s s her thought, i n that transcendental dream i n which the s p i r i t i s triumphant — somewhere e l s e . Where-as here i s the only place where we know the s p i r i t to e x i s t at a l l , befouled as i t i s by l i e s . Joyce she sees as a ' f o o l ' dragging down the great and the good to h i s own f o u l l e v e l , making the high s p i r i t 'prove' i t s earthy baseness by lowering i t s e l f to laugh at low truth. (SE, 87) In Williams' own r e - i n t e r p r e t a t i o n , . . . the true s i g n i f i c a n c e of the f o o l i s to consolidate l i f e , to i n s i s t on i t s lowness, to k n i t i t up, to correct a c e r t a i n fatuousness i n the round-table c i r c l e . L i f e i s not to run o f f into dream but to remain one, from low to high. If you care to go so f a r , the f o o l i s the premonition of the Russian Revolution, to modern revolutions i n thought. (SE, 88) And he c l a r i f i e s further: Lear's f o o l . . . i s far from what R.W. paints h i s genus to be, but i s f u l l of compassion. Joyce, where he stoops low, has i n him a l l the signs of a beginning. I t i s a new l i t e r a t u r e , a new world, that he i s undertaking. (SE, 88) For Williams, Joyce, l i k e Shakespeare before him, or l i k e the Dadaists and S u r r e a l i s t s i n France, i s the " f o o l " who turns a closed system of thought back on i t s e l f i n order to destroy i t , and so begins again, anew. It i s t h i s i nsistence that s t r i k e s the bass note of "A Point for American C r i t i c i s m , " but as well of so many of the essays Williams wrote during h i s 78 l i f e t i m e . Like the epidemic i n the rush of which whatever was secondary f e l l away, leaving only the a c t u a l , the moving present has no patience, or "hasn't time," to worry over some such item as " t a s t e . " Joyce l i v e s the condition of h i s time, as a w r i t e r , a "word man." In h i s work, Williams says, "The words are freed to be understood again i n an o r i g i n a l , a fresh, d e l i g h t f u l sense" (SE, 90). So i t a l l comes back home for Williams. "We must imitate the motivation and shun the r e s u l t . " And as f i n a l c l a r i f i c a t i o n of Williams' c r i t i c a l understanding of modernist w r i t i n g , we are reminded of a passage from l!The Basis of F a i t h i n A r t " written i n 1934. The essay i s structured as a conversation-discussion-argument, that i s to say, a dialogue, between an a r c h i t e c t (we cannot help but think of Williams' brother) and a poet (we cannot help but think of Williams), who t a l k themselves back to the necessity for a r t i s t s to recognize the primacy of need behind any given form, a r c h i t e c t u r a l or otherwise. There you are I Just what I s a i d . I mean you b u i l d a house for people, don't you? Then the needs of . . . I mean, the minute you l e t yourself be c a r r i e d away by purely " a r c h i t e c t u r a l " or " l i t e r a r y " reasoning with-out consulting the thing from which i t grew, you've cut the l i f e - g i v i n g artery and nothing ensues but r o t . What we seem to be getting to i s that a l l the arts have to come back to something. And that that thing i s human need. When our manner of action becomes i m b e c i l i c we breed dada, Gertrude • • Stein, surrealism., : These - things .seem unrelated to any sort of sense UNTIL we look f o r the NEED of human beings. Examining that we f i n d that these apparently i r r e l e v a n t movements of art represent mind saving, even at moments of genius, soul saving, continents of s e c u r i t y f o r the pestered and bedeviled s p i r i t of man, bedeviled by the deadly, l y i n g repetitiousness of d o c t r i n a i r e formula 79 worship which i s the standard work of the day. In my young days i t was "English." (SE, 178-179) In j u s t such an i n d i r e c t but persistent way, Williams moves from the actual as primary, to Dada, Gertrude Stein and Surrealism, and by negation ri g h t back to the one thing that grounds his own need — "the language . . . the language." I t i s t h i s language which undermines "English," a term taken here to be the front of minds dominated and so caged by the same "Doctrinaire formula worship" that Williams c a l l s "our r e a l enemy" (AN, 279) i n A Novelette. "English" i n h i s "young days" was thus another empty form cut o f f from that "which i t grew," the product of a methodology based on the denial of need, i n that way another predetermination that boxes i n an actual language to which desire i s t i e d . In i t s l a r g e r context, therefore, Williams' sneer i s a c r i t i c i s m of mind, more e s p e c i a l l y that power within i t to r e l y on forms of discourse that would make both experience and language transparent to preconceived systems of thought, the superimposed authority of the so - c a l l e d " r u l e s " of grammar on the same plane as any other narrow categorization that cuts o f f the crab's f e e l e r s , an actual speech that moves on i t s own terms, to make i t f i t into a box. And so i n Paterson I_ we meet those automatons who aimlessly walk the s t r e e t s , emptied of a l l passion because "need" has no path through t h e i r minds: Who because they neither know t h e i r sources nor the s i l l s of t h e i r disappointments walk outside t h e i r bodies aimlessly ^ for the most part, locked and forgot i n t h e i r desires — unroused. (P, 14) And what does Williams say a few pages further on? — the language i s divorced from t h e i r minds, the language . . . the language! (P, 21) 80 How then to "begin to begin again?" There i s s t i l l one necessary d i s t i n c t i o n to be made. "That's a l l very f i n e about l e mot j u s t e , " Williams says i n The Great American Novel, making sure that h i s sense of language i s not mis-understood as mere poetic technique, but f i r s t the word must be free. — But i s there not some other way? I t must come about gradually. Why go down into h e l l when -- Because words are not men, they have no adjustments that need to be made. They are words. They can not be anything but free or bound. Go about i t any way you choose. The word i s the thing. I f i t i s smeared with colors from r i g h t and l e f t what can i t amount to? I'd hate to have to l i v e up there, she s a i d with a frown. I t was the soul that spoke. In her words could be read the whole of democracy, the en t i r e l i f e of the planet. I t f e l l by chance on h i s ear but he was ready, he was a l e r t . (GAN, 171) No amount of e f f o r t to i s o l a t e " l e mot j u s t e " can guarantee that a writ e r w i l l experience the l i f e of language, although Williams, we should emphasize, does not undervalue the e f f o r t . I t i s , more exactly, a question of p r i o r -i t i e s : an exclusive concern (maybe obsession i s a better term) for exact wording divorced from the context of an experience i n language makes the w r i t i n g "mere;" more often than not i t indicates that the writ e r i s shaping words, making them conform to intentions brought to, rather than discovered i n the act of w r i t i n g . As we have seen i n the passage discussed from "A Novelette,"this use of words prevents the w r i t e r from hearing what s h i f t s and turns i n the words themselves. The "processes of a r t , " to be a l i v e , are much larger, are much more indeterminate, because language, to be free, must be allowed to flow i n . And i t i s t h i s flowing i n that a writ e r must somehow record as accurately as he can, what he hears i n those moments the words come r i n g i n g into h i s ears. Words cannot be expected to adjust themselves to preconceptions, except at the cost of l o s i n g t h e i r o b j e c t i v i t y . They are e i t h e r "free or bound" ( i t a l i c s added). A f t e r a l l , they are " j u s t 81 words." Or as Williams says, "The word i s the thing" demanding the attention of the w r i t e r . I f he remains f i x e d on the point of his own predetermined intentions alone, he stands, to that extent, above words. From t h i s removal, any word he chooses to express a p r i v a t e "meaning" w i l l amount to nothing more than a dominance that imprisons the very thing that can free him from his own self-imposed tyranny. The choice for Williams i s c l e a r : e i t h e r the writer comes down to the "democracy" of words, or he forever remains abstracted from those very elements that carry "the l i f e of the planet." Methodology i s the .cr u c i a l issue here at stake. The mind must learn how to adjust i t s e l f to the l i f e of language — and not vice-versa. Behind Williams' apparently c r y p t i c advice that writers should "write c a r e l e s s l y so that nothing that i s not green w i l l survive" (P, 155) thus l i e s an intimate sense of the mind's con t r a r i e t y . I t at once seeks to structure into form the m u l t i p l i c i t y of the world and forever desires release from i t s own f i x i t i e s . This i s the basis for the endless b a t t l e between the " o l d " and the "new," between the "past" and the "present" i n Williams' w r i t i n g . True to h i s own nature, however, he does not advocate a r e c o n c i l i a t i o n , since he was aware that the c o n t r a r i e t y i t s e l f i s p r e c i s e l y what makes the actual what i t i s . History too mirrors the mind's processes — and i n h i s t o r y , as w e l l , the present has no other choice but to assert i t s immediacy. L i f e presses forward, not backward. For " l i f e , " Williams says i n an early l e t t e r to Harriet Monroe (March 5, 1913), " i s above a l l things else at any moment subversive of l i f e as i t was the moment before — always new, i r r e g u l a r " (SL, 23-24). And much l a t e r , t h i s time i n a l e t t e r to John C. T h i r l w a l l (January 13, 1955), he applies t h i s sense of l i f e to the process of human h i s t o r y : 82 The tendency of the race i s to r e s i s t change v i o l e n t l y . At the same time the new presses to be recognized. Which i s the most conservative? That which, drives us to keep the old or that which seeks a place f o r us i n some slowly, or at times, as i n the present, some r a p i d l y evolving new? Certain i t i s that we have no voice i n the matter; we cannot refuse to go forward when the opportunity o f f e r s i t s e l f . Not to do so i s the end of us. (SL, 330) In order to go forward, the mind must f i r s t come face to face with that side of i t s e l f that works against change, against the flowing i n of the new, the present. And language c a r r i e s the front of t h i s necessity. Williams says so to T h i r l w a l l i n a l e t t e r (November 30, 1954) i n which he explains h i s own beginnings as a w r i t e r : The mind's a queer f i s h . I t wants to l i v e ; when the a i r i s denied i t , i t comes to the surface gasping f o r a i r , and when i t i s denied that, i t turns on i t s side on the sand and soon expires. I did not intend to die but thought very often during my youth that my time was short; I was often depressed, for I was ea r l y convinced that I had i n the compass of my head a great discovery that i f I could only get i t out would not only s e t t l e my own i n t e r n a l c o n f l i c t s but be of transcendent use to the men and women around me. That i t concerned something as evanescent as language I did not for a moment guess. (SL, 329) "That i t should concern something as evanescent as language:" again Williams reveals what i s fundamental for him as a wri t e r , the experience of language that c a l l s for the act of w r i t i n g i n words, an act that allows the mind to explore i t s contrary nature. I t i s t h i s tension Williams has i n mind i n a piece from The Embodiment of Knowledge e n t i t l e d (simply) "July 7," a kind of note that answers so c l e a r l y an unspoken question: Of what use i s wri t i n g as an act i n i t s e l f ? What he writes takes us d i r e c t l y into the heart of a drama — the mark, we might add, of the "texture" of Williams' w r i t i n g — that runs through a great deal, i f not a l l , of h i s work. For th i s reason, we quote at length: 83 A f r a i d l e s t he be caught i n a net of words, tripped up, bewildered and so defeated — thrown aside — a man hesitates to write down his innermost convictions. E s p e c i a l l y i s t h i s true a f t e r f o r t y when a l l h i s l i f e has formed, perhaps into a si n g l e strand which allows him to say to himself that l i f e i s to him a reasonable thing, of r e l a t e d parts coordinated and workable — n o matter what the end. I f t h i s be l o s t , t h i s c e r t a i n t y which must pass for hope, t h i s comforting inward sense of h i s own personal i n t e g r i t y l o s t i n a crashing together of words which w i l l not be resolved into l u c i d i t y — the l u c i d i t y he f e e l s i n h i s whole being somewhere — i t i s the end. He fears. It cannot be that t h i s c e r t a i n t y which alone c a r r i e s him forward i s f a l s e . Rarely does he think of that. Yet might i t not be that to be too e x p l i c i t — i n words — might b l a s t h i s comfort, t h i s s o l i d i t y of h i s mind? To write i t down might prove hi s f e e l i n g s just that, f e e l -ings alone, i n themselves nothing, a fo o l ' s paradise of self-deception i n which he manages to hide himself some-how i n order to l i v e at a l l . Better to leave i t so. Where ignorance i s b l i s s ' t i s f o l l y to be wise. But i t i s j u s t t h i s which drives a man on. For how can he be c e r t a i n that his conviciton, which i f i t be worth anything at a l l (must be able to bear examination) i s so., unless he test i t e x p l i c i t l y by statement? I t must be written down, b i t by b i t , as he may, i n fear for h i s lack of s k i l l at words, watching them, d i s t r u s t -ing them — yet counting on them to help him, to bring what he knows he must believe into a searchlight of scrutiny. And who knows, i t may be that he w i l l succeed. I f so h i s l i f e w i l l be strengthened, placed on a higher l e v e l of p u r i t y , made int o the thing he admires more than anything e l s e : the understanding of himself which he imagines many men possess i n the world. Therefore he writes, attempting to s t r i k e s t r a i g h t to the core of h i s inner s e l f , by words. By words which have been used time without end by other men for the same purpose, words worn smooth, greasy with the thunb-ing and f i n g e r i n g of others. For him they must be fresh too, fresh as anything he knows — as fresh as morning l i g h t , repeated every day the year around. (EK, 104-105) Although Williams does not, i n h i s l e t t e r to T h i r l w a l l , specify the exact period of h i s l i f e he c a l l s "my youth," the experience of language, so central to any understanding of the o r i g i n of h i s poetics, erupts i n Kora i n H e l l as a drama: a former state of mind, f i x e d i n what could be 84 described as a "c e r t a i n t y which, must pass f or hope," gives way to w r i t i n g that d i s l o c a t e s and disrupts a "personal i n t e g r i t y " that before seemed "reasonable." In th i s c r i s i s , t h i s "crashing together of words," Williams finds himself being drawn i n t o , out into a present that breaks through l i k e an epidemic. He r e c a l l s i n hi s Autobiography,the e f f e c t of t h i s h i s t o r i c moment: "my s e l f was being slaughtered." I t was a break up of the words. "Language," he wrote i n "The Modern Primer," considering the value of Gertrude Stein's w r i t i n g , Language being made up of words, the spaces between words and t h e i r configurations, Gertrude Stein's work means that these materials are r e a l and must be understood, i n l e t t e r s , to supercede i n themselves a l l ideas, f a c t s , movements which they may under other circumstances be asked to s i g n i f y . (EK, 17) 5 Kora i n H e l l begins on Williams' own i n i t i a l leap i n t o "the words themselves" where he discovers, by w r i t i n g , those spaces — or gaps — between words that make for "configurations fresh to our senses" (EK, 17). And the text does l i t e r a l l y enact t h i s s h i f t into the "objective" nature of language. In the opening l i n e of "Improvisation XVII.3," as one instance among many i n Kora, the spaces between the words on the page e f f e c t an experience of a " r e a l " language: Once again the moon i n a glassy t w i l i g h t . (K, 63) Without the spaces — "Once again the moon i n a glassy t w i l i g h t " — the l i n e , a sentence fragment, would most l i k e l y be read as a de s c r i p t i v e statement, nothing more. Although i t lacks-a predicate, the grammatical connections between the words are nonetheless conventional. The reader's mind i s drawn more or l e s s e f f o r t l e s s l y through the words to some external " r e a l i t y " that the l i n e apparently r e f e r s to. The t w i l i g h t i s "glassy" and the "moon" appears i n i t "once again," as i t has done many times before. 85 With the gaps between the phrases, however, the reader i s forced to bear witness to a.loosening of grammatical " r e l a t i o n s . " Disconnected from that predetermined system of ordering words, the words themselves come a l i v e as words — words tense with an apprehension, born as they are i n t o a present f i l l e d with desire. Now a voice comes into play, a speaking voice ("Once again"), one that constitutes i t s e l f i n an actual world ("the moon") which simply appears (".in a glassy t w i l i g h t " ) indeterminately within the gaps between the words. Now as w e l l the voice of the writ e r follows the lead of the words themselves, wherever they may go i n the time of the w r i t i n g that subsequently occurs. In t h i s one b r i e f example, we have i n miniature the kind of experience i n language that Kora announces i n the opening l i n e of i t s i n i t i a l improvisation. " I t i s the making of that step," we r e c a l l Williams saying i n h i s Autobiography, to come over into the t a c t i l e q u a l i t i e s , the words themselves beyond the mere thought expressed that d i s -tinguishes the modern, or distinguished the modern of that time from the period before the turn of the century. (A, 380) Perhaps, then, he did have Kora i n mind. 86 SECTION TWO PERSPECTIVE AS CLOSURE 87 What then would you say of the usual Inter p r e t a t i o n of the word " l i t e r a t u r e ? " — Permanence. A great army with i t s t a i l i n an t i q u i t y . Cliche of the soul: beauty. But can you have l i t e r a t u r e without beauty? I t a l l depends on what you mean by beauty. There i s beauty i n the bellow of the BLAST, etc. from a l l previous s i g n i f i c a n c e . — To me beauty i s p u r i t y . To me i t i s discovery, a race on the ground. And for t h i s you are w i l l i n g to smash — Yes, everything. — To go down into h e l l . — Well l e t ' s look. (GAN, 170-171) 88 CHAPTER FOUR FOR WHAT IT'S WORTH Fools have big wombs. (K, 31) The f i r s t l i n e of Kora i n H e l l : apparently straightforward and asser-t i v e , a statement of f a c t , no equivocation, no h e s i t a t i o n , no attempt even to be complex. In these four words we have the most fundamental form of the sentence, the simple sentence, and i f we are not completely mistaken, an instance of simple speech. There i s a swiftness of thought i n "Fools have big wombs" that seems to present the a r t i c u l a t i o n of a primary i l l u m i n a t i o n . But what does i t mean? Unfortunately, we have only t h i s one statement as beginning. No other statements i n the text lead up to i t , and there i s nothing within i t to t e l l us how the w r i t e r reached t h i s conclusion. There i s , i n other words, no past for us to draw on, no p r i o r matter or thought toward which, or because of which, t h i s statement can be read as the end of a thought process. I t i s simply there on the page, a bald statement. The reader i s thus forced back on h i s own resources. 89 Maybe the statement would be clearer had the writ e r l e f t out " b i g " and simply s a i d , "Fools have wombs," and yes, we can ei t h e r agree or disagree with t h i s statement. Why not, why cannot " f o o l s " have "wombs?" I t i s the word " b i g " that makes the statement so oblique. I f " f o o l s " have "big wombs," then that must mean that non-fools have "small" ones; at l e a s t the adjective appears to carry the weight of t h i s kind of s i g n i f i c a n t d i s t i n c -t i o n . But why go through a l l t h i s bother t r y i n g to account f o r the supposed meaning of t h i s statement? Perhaps the w r i t e r has simply not made his intended meaning c l e a r enough; "]_e mot j u s t e " i s missing. Perhaps he should have provided h i s reader with more l i n g u i s t i c clues, more signs. But then i t i s j u s t as possible that he i s himself being f o o l i s h and not to be taken s e r i o u s l y . Or i f not that, maybe he should re-think (that i s , re-vise) h i s proposition to make i t more accessible to i n t e r p r e t a t i o n . Had he done the l a t t e r , of course, he would not have wr i t t e n what he has written. We would not have the same text, the text he has given us. And i s i t not the text of Kora that should concern us, "the words themselves," we r e c a l l Williams saying, "beyond the mere thought expressed?" Behind a l l th i s i n t e r p r e t i v e v a c i l l a t i o n on our part, i n other words, we can never be quite c e r t a i n , given the disembodied e f f e c t of the statement, how we should read i t . In some such way, nevertheless, the reader i s brought toward an uneasy impasse. His understanding cannot break "the back" (K, 33) of the statement. In 1920, j u s t a f t e r Kora i n H e l l was published, one reader did react to the apparent meaninglessness of the opening l i n e . Williams' reply 90 (dated October 27) to Alva Turner's l e t t e r begins: Dear Turner: I am always glad to receive your l e t t e r s . Your c r i t i c i s m s of my book are j u s t and re f r e s h i n g . I l i k e e s p e c i a l l y your revised rendering of the f i r s t improvisation. I see your point about f o o l s having no wombs, i t i s well taken. Yet I am r i g h t . (SL, 46) It i s quite l i k e l y that Williams was not altogether surprised that readers would puzzle over the opening l i n e of Kora, but he would not rev i s e i t . His comment i s b r i e f , but h i s answer rings with a f i n a l i t y : "Yet I am r i g h t . " And he gives no further explanation. Instead, Williams talks about the discrepancies of experience and the sense of f e e l i n g "out of alignment with your environment" (SL, 46). And he sees t h i s environment as the narrow l i m i t s of the s o c i a l world which maintains a s t r i c t order h o s t i l e to any forces that may disrupt i t s smug s e c u r i t i e s . The writer who finds h i s own energies sapped by t h i s environ-ment suf f e r s a d i s l o c a t i o n which gives way, i n turn, to a f e e l i n g of the i n s i g n i f i c a n c e of any serious work. Williams i n d i r e c t l y hints that Turner ought to understand that what a writer says has nothing to do with what he ought to say, since t h i s ought i s nothing more than a cage whereby l i v e speech i s s t i f l e d . I t i s d i f f i c u l t to l i v e according to "sheer i n s t i n c t " i n a society that "would be destroyed by your mere presence d i d i t not make an example of you, keep you subdued. These are the f o o l s and t h e i r breed i s unnumbered" (SL, 46). "Fools have big wombs." There i s an anger i n these words. But i n the midst of i t , of what he c a l l s "my own heaviness" (SL, 46), Williams i s s t i l l "thinking of fathering a magazine. A p l a i n damned, r e s t l e s s f o o l " (SL, 47), he says of himself.^ And the l e t t e r ends with a reference to the kind of f o o l who, moving against the grain of "ought," i s suppressed by a world which c a l l s him " f o o l " and makes him think that perhaps he i s : 91 I have a f r i e n d who i s t r y i n g to get out of an insane asylum. His hearing i s on Friday. What chance has he? Yet you say fo o l s have no wombs. Mister Preacher, do not forget that you are a poet too. Look down. I am always, unhappily, knee deep i n blue mud. (SL, 47) Williams unleashes a great deal of anxiety i n t h i s l e t t e r , and h i s sense of a l i e n a t i o n comes through sharply, almost b i t t e r l y , stimulated by Turner's reading of the opening l i n e of Kora. Turner, he seems to be saying, should understand that poets often work within and against structures of thought that cannot accommodate t h e i r desires. No amount of preaching about the need to be more l o g i c a l with words w i l l change that f a c t . What i s insane i n a closed world can be very sane from a p o s i t i o n outside. There are, then, two types of f o o l s : one ins i d e a sanctioned frame of reference ("their breed i s unnumbered") and the other outside, i t s c r i t i c . The f o o l i n s i d e an enclosed frame cannot recognize the l i m i t s of that frame, thus h i s so- c a l l e d " f o o l i s h n e s s " i n denying the existence of any force that threatens h i s l i m i t s . This f o o l i s the one we f i n d i n any d i c t i o n a r y , "a person with l i t t l e or no judgment, common sense, wisdom," p l a i n l y the man who acts out of h i s own s t u p i d i t y . And he can, because of h i s narrow view of things, turn h i s s t u p i d i t y back on the world, e s p e c i a l l y on that other kind of f o o l , the one who does not f i t into r i g i d categories. John Coffee say, the " f r i e n d " Williams mentions in h i s l e t t e r , who was l a b e l l e d insane by a court system that could not tolerate a man who would s t e a l i n order to be arrested i n order thus to reveal the existence of poverty. He t r i e d to turn the system back on i t s e l f through t h i s gesture, but that same system subdued him by locking him up i n the one i n s t i t u t i o n i t has f o r such " f o o l s " : the insane asylum. The prototype of t h i s kind of f o o l can be found i n Shakespeare's King 92 Lear, and i t i s no wonder that t h i s play momentarily passes through Williams' mind as he writes to Turner: I have j u s t thrashed my youngest son for s p i t t i n g i n h i s nurse's lap. What i n God's name i s one to do? Better run out into the r a i n as Lear did. I wish I had the i n s p i r a -t i o n for i t . (SL, 46-47) The round of domestic t r i v i a l i t i e s — again the pressure of a closure, of an i s o l a t i o n , of a f u t i l i t y . And Williams hints that he can think of no way to escape t h i s impending sense of senselessness. I t i s here that the image of Lear comes to mind. We can hardly use Williams' words against him as an accurate measure of what he i s r e a l l y thinking about King Lear. The reference i s off-hand and s l i g h t , almost i n s i g n i f i c a n t . Perhaps i t i s no more than simply co i n c i d e n t a l that the image of Lear i n "the r a i n " should break into a l e t t e r about fools and Kora i n H e l l • But the image does come to mind, and i n i t s e l f , t h i s f a c t i s nonetheless suggestive. In the play, Lear does get trapped i n a domestic d i s o r d e r l i n e s s and becomes himself an old f o o l , one who i s i n s i d e , and thus prey, to a system of toppling values. And juxtaposed against him, there i s another f o o l , h i s Fool, the one who stands outside the system and whose wild speech, for t h i s reason, mirrors the breakdown of order. And Lear does form a close r e l a t i o n s h i p with h i s Fool i n the storm, h i s own " f o o l i s h n e s s " by then r e f l e c t e d i n the d i s o r d e r l y elements, the same elements that s p i l l out of the Fool's mouth, i n h i s words. In a way, then, the two of them do become the two types of fools who, between them, dramatize the collapse of an e n t i r e world of meaning i n the play. I t i s , of course, r i d i c u l o u s to jump immediately to the conclusion that a s o - c a l l e d "hidden" meaning i n the opening l i n e of Kora i n H e l l can be tracked down to King Lear, simply because the l i n e as statement c a l l s 9 3 attention to the density of Its, own language. Nevertheless, the d i s -i n t e g r a t i o n of p o l i t i c a l order i n the play i s related to the disappearance of language as a s u b s t a n t i a l i t y . And i n t h i s respect, the topsy-turvy world — "When p r i e s t s are more i n word than matter" ( I I I . i i . 8 1 ) , the Fool says of overturned values illuminates by correspondence the range of the reader's experience of Williams' text. In the famous opening scene of King Lear, Lear divides up the wholeness of h i s kingdom into three parts, one for each of h i s three daughters. I t i s t h i s act which breaks the unity of a former order and unleashes a pu b l i c language transparently the use of, at the disposal of the w i l l of, those whose speech i s nothing more than a front for purely personal ends, and silences those for whom language i s not merely a t o o l . Lear thus establishes the environment within which he i s made to play the kind of f o o l with " l i t t l e or no judgment," who i s w i l l i n g to s e l l out h i s kingdom — and f o r what? To hear only what he thinks he ought to hear, p r o s t r a t i n g himself to the most predatory use of words, "to f l a t t e r y " (I.i.150), as Kent says. With the question "Which of you s h a l l we say doth love us most?" (I.i.52) as the basis of h i s judgment, we already sense that he i s judging deafly, l i k e a sentimental f o o l who w i l l be duped by his own foo l i s h n e s s . His question asks for a speech, not speech. And th i s i s exactly what he gets i n Goneril's answer: " S i r , I love you more than words can wield the matter" (I.i.56) ( i t a l i c s added). And Regan's speech i s a copy cast from the self-same mould: S i r , I am made Of the self-same metal that my s i s t e r i s , And prize me at her worth. In my true heart I f i n d she names my very deed of love; Only she comes too short: (I.i.70-74) Mere words. In an environment where this kind of language i s the norm, Lear 94 hears only what he wants to hear, or thinks he ought, and so h i s one honest daughter Cordelia — i t i s the heart speaking — has no choice but to speak through the absence of speech, through the gap of s i l e n c e , what i s between words. Lear turns to Cordelia: . . . what can you say to draw A t h i r d more opulent than your s i s t e r s ? Speak. Cordelia: Nothing, my Lord. Lear: Nothing.' Cordelia: Nothing. Lear: Nothing w i l l come of nothing: speak again. (I.i.86-92) Lear, however, i s so much the f o o l that i n h i s hunger f o r f l a t t e r y he can only advise her to use words to get ahead i n the world: "How, how Cor d e l i a ! mend your speech a l i t t l e , / Lest i t may mar your fortunes" (I.i.96-97). And t h i s j u s t immediately a f t e r Cordelia had h i t the n a i l d i r e c t l y on the head, saying that she cannot use words i n the way her s i s t e r s have done: "Unhappy that I am, I cannot heave / My heart into my mouth" (I.i.93-94). The speeches of Goneril and Regan are less professions of love than con-fessions of t h e i r own w i l l to power. But Lear i s deaf; h i s ears cannot attune to the substance of Cordelia's s i l e n c e . Aside from Cordelia, only Kent hears and speaks, but he i s sent into e x i l e — for h i s words. I t i s from a p o s i t i o n outside t h i s world, one that i s f a l l i n g prey to a transparent language, that Lear's Fool comes to act as a word-mirror to Lear's eventual madness. In t h i s sense, he manifests the a c t u a l i t y of the dis-order at the edge of "Reason's" order, the same order that Lear broke when he divided up h i s kingdom, wrongly assuming that a whole i s equal to the sum of i t s parts. The Fool — i n words — r e f l e c t s the e f f e c t of Lear's error of judgment. He speaks a negative, or a "backward," language that emerges within the gaps between words, the s i l e n c e s , the speech that i s 95 not spoken i n the play but against which the action i s measured. On the other hand, Lear, the counterpart of h i s Fool, severs h i s blood t i e s with a l i v e speech and thus finds himself emptied of content, h i s authority become "nothing." The Fool, because he i s outside Lear's system, sees through t h i s reduction and c a l l s Lear an "0 without a f i g u r e " (I.iv.212): the mere s h e l l of authority with no f l e s h attached to i t . A Zero. But Lear cannot think i n negatives — "Nothing w i l l come of nothing" — and t h i s i n a b i l i t y to hear "nothing" locks him up within h i s own l i m i t s , defines him as that kind of f o o l who i s duped by the f i x i t y of h i s narrow perceptions. His Fool, on the contrary, stands outside the use of language c o n t r o l l e d s o l e l y by the i n t e n t i o n of the w i l l , and by being estranged i n t h i s way, i n h i s own speech c o n t i n u a l l y c a l l s language back on i t s e l f as the substance that has disappeared from the "order" of Lear's kingdom. After another of the Fool's dense statements — t h i s time how to make 10 and 10 equal more than a score — Kent l i s t e n s and says that the Fool i s saying "nothing" (I.iv.141). And the Fool answers, "Then ' t i s l i k e the breath of an un- / fee'd lawyer; you gave me nothing f o r ' t " (I.iv.142-143). This kind of c r y p t i c doubletalk i s a sign that the Fool values speech for i t s e l f alone — words for t h e i r own sake, not words used — as lawyers who are paid to use them — for the sake of other motives. The Fool l i v e s i n the words " p r i o r to the thought expressed," not unlike the Duchamp that Octavio Paz describes i n The Castle of P u r i t y , who i s fascinated by the power of language to mirror i t s e l f , "the most perfect instrument f o r producing meanings and at the same time f o r destroying them." The Fool then turns from Kent to Lear: "Can you make no use of nothing, nuncle?" (I.iv.144). Lear's answer i s predictable since i t echoes h i s response to Cordelia: "Why, no, boy; nothing can be made out of nothing" (I.iv.145). 96 Again, we hear the deafness of Lear, the voice of reason r e l y i n g on an aphorism, the use of words frozen into a dogmatism. There i s no place f or "nothing" i n reason's systems, which by nature constructs those orders that survive by denying what they cannot contain -— that i s , t h e i r negatives. But i t i s , by sharp contrast, i n the knotted speech of the Fool where meaning i s both produced and destroyed at the same time that we i n t u i t the pressure of a s u b s t a n t i a l world. This i s the content of the "storm" — to use the c e n t r a l image of the play, an image that operates i n Williams' work as well — that w i l l not be caged by the grammar and syntax of a l a n -guage that not only devalues the actual, but also f a l s i f i e s i t by disen-gaging the mind from the absence of meaning, what we might c a l l the "nothing" of i t s own l i m i t s . The kind of complex speech that s p i l l s out of the Fool's mouth, l i k e , for example, "Winter's not gone yet, i f the wildgeese f l y that way" ( I I . i i i . 46), sounds f a m i l i a r enough to readers of Kora: the same swiftness i n the words, the play of meanings (the pun on "way"), and the undermining of habitual perceptions that have been frozen into f i x e d grammatical forms. This much should become clearer when we examine the text of Kora at more length, but here we can single out t h i s one l i n e from King Lear for s p e c i a l emphasis; i t exemplifies s t r u c t u r a l l y the e f f e c t of reading the opening l i n e of Kora where a s i m i l a r c r i s i s " i n the words themselves" occurs: the very c r i s i s that, i n f a c t , establishes the texture of a l l the improvisations that follow. Taken i n themselves, the Fool's words, which read very much l i k e a 97 truism, stubbornly r e s i s t a discursive overlay, and instead constitute themselves as words that e x i s t before the imposition of a patterned order predetermined by grammatical conventions — very much l i k e , i n other words, the opening l i n e of Kora. And l i k e the opening l i n e , they create t h i s e f f e c t quite simply because t h e i r apparent r e f e r e n t i a l frame f a i l s to confirm the expectations i m p l i c i t i n t y p i c a l p r o p o s i t i o n a l statements, i n this case one held together by the conditional " i f , " the language-hinge upon which the two separate elements of the sentence swing. In i t s apparent form, the p r o p o s i t i o n a l sentence pos i t s a causal r e l a t i o n between seasonal change and the migration pattern of wildgeese. Not i n i t s e l f unusual, i n fa c t , the asso c i a t i o n i s so commonplace that we can, i f our att e n t i o n f l a g s , gloss the thought without becoming conscious of any d i s r u p t i o n of meaning. We bring to the sentence a r e f e r e n t i a l connection between the f l i g h t of the wildgeese out of a region at the end of summer or into a region at the beginning of spring, or at the end of winter. That i s to say, we apply a r e f e r e n t i a l frame — i n t h i s case, an already established association — because we automatically assume that the words are trans-parent to a meaning external to t h e i r o b j e c t i v i t y : they have a past. The a c t u a l opaque surface of the statement, however, displaces our expectations. And i t creates t h i s e f f e c t once we begin to notice the ambiguous r e l a t i o n s h i p between cause and e f f e c t i n the two parts of the proposition. I t i s not even clear what causes what. The statement, we soon discover, i s quite deceptive. I f , f o r instance, we rephrase i t to read, "Winter's gone i f the wildgeese f l y this way," then i t i s clear that a change i n the season i s responsible for a change i n the f l i g h t pattern of the geese; or, rather, that the change i n the geese's d i r e c t i o n of f l i g h t signals a seasonal change. Ei t h e r way, the conventional pattern of 98 association between the f l i g h t of geese into a region at the end of winter i s maintained. However, the Pool asks us to think that no change i n the season ("Winter's not gone yet") has effected a change i n the f l i g h t pattern of the geese ("if the wildgeese f l y that way"): the geese have changed t h e i r f l i g h t pattern for no reason. He therefore concludes from the change of t h e i r f l i g h t that nothing has changed. "Nothing" has changed. To put i t simply, the Fool's statement, as a statement, disrupts a conventional pattern of meaning and thought. What i n i t i a l l y sounds l i k e a conditional statement constructed on the premise that a l o g i c a l t i e binds two disparate things — the end of winter and the f l i g h t of wildgeese that way — now assumes the tension of an i l l o g i c a l i t y that runs counter to the discu r s i v e meaning we expected. How do we l o g i c a l l y think t h i s statement? We do not. Instead, we f i n d ourselves drawn into the p u l l created by t h i s disjuncture of meaning, A s s o c i a t i o n a l comparisons that make things subservient to a fixed perception are, i n t h i s way, revealed to be a r b i t r a r y . Comparisons deny the p a r t i c u l a r i t y of the things being compared. Similes are further examples of such a form of thought, as Williams says i n his "Prologue" to Kora: . . . the coining of similes i s a pastime of very low order, depending as i t does upon a nearly vegetable coincidence. Much more keen i s that power which discovers i n things those inimitable p a r t i c l e s of d i s s i m i l a r i t y to a l l other things which are the p e c u l i a r perfections of the thing i n question. But t h i s loose l i n k i n g of one thing with another has e f f e c t s of a destructuve power l i t t l e to be guessed at: a l l manner of things are thrown out of key so that i t approaches the impossible to a r r i v e at an understanding of anything. A l l i s confusion . . . . (K, 18) Here Williams seems to have i n mind a l i t e r a l sense of confusion as a "mix-ing together" that loosens the f i x i t y of habitual associations through which a 99 predetermined form i s imposed onto things: that i s , confusion subverts, i n a destructive manner, the dominance over things so evident i n the "coining of s i m i l e s , " or any s i m i l a r mode of perception that r e l i e s upon comparisons. The condition of confusion (the world of Kora i s born out of t h i s condition) i s thus a release, the mind thereby "thrown out of key," hence brought to the edge of i t s own l i m i t s where i t once again experiences a moving world of p a r t i c u l a r s . And we notice that i t i s the pressure of a fundamental confusion of t h i s sort that s p l i t s the Fool's conditional statement apart. The phrase "that way," for instance. I n i t i a l l y , we cannot help but read i t as a d e s c r i p t i o n of a d i r e c t i o n of f l i g h t . But where? A l l d i r e c t i o n s are possible, at l e a s t they are within the context of the i l l o g i c a l i t y the statement manifests. In an even more immediate way, the phrase, e s p e c i a l l y when dis-engaged from i t s apparent frame of reference, f l o a t s i n the a i r of the statement without being pinned down to a grammatical place. And since i t no longer need point to a geographical l o c a t i o n , we can read i t much more r a d i c a l l y — say, to i n d i c a t e , not the d i r e c t i o n of f l i g h t , but the nature of i t . The wildgeese now enter a r e a l i t y made within the play of words. I t may even be possible to envision them caught i n the act of f l y i n g e r r a t i c a l l y i n space with no where to go: because, as we are t o l d , "Winter's not gone yet." A world of fixed perceptions — the c l i c h e d r e l a t i o n between wildgeese and seasonal change — through the d i s l o c a t i n g drama of the s t a t e -ment, turns "topsy-turvy," and as i t does, we glimpse a disharmony under-l y i n g the s h e l l of an order emptied of substance. This i s the same order which, i n i t s emptiness, l i k e the Shade of "puritanism" that haunts In the American Grain, imprisons the actual to make i t l e s s threatening, l e s s what i t i s : the world of p a r t i c u l a r s that subsumes reason and "makes l o g i c 100 a b u t t e r f l y " (K, 81). And yet, we notice that reason s t i l l holds a grip (however te n t a t i v e l y ) on the actual i n the Fool's statement. The wildgeese cannot obey t h e i r i n s t i n c t s , so they f l y e r r a t i c a l l y i n space looking f o r somewhere to go — an exact mirror of the crumbling world of Lear, aptly described by Edgar, "Reason i n madness" (IV.vi.179). Almost i n e v i t a b l y , at some point, an echo of the Fool who spins a web of doubletalk must break e x p l i c i t l y into the text of Kora — Ah w e l l , c h a s t i t y i s a l i l y of the v a l l e y that only a f o o l would mock. There i s no whiter nor no sweeter flower — but once past, the rankest stink comes from the soothest pe t a l s . Heigh-ya! A c r i b from our mediaeval f r i e n d Shakespeare. (K, 59) The same r i d d l e r of a f o o l of a writer i n Kora teases thought to i t s break-ing point, i n words that twist and turn without coming to r e s t i n anything resembling a d i s c u r s i v e completion, i n fact mocking the pretension of any such end to thought: What i s i t i n the s t i l l e d face of an old menderman and winter not far o f f and a darky parts h i s wool, and wenches wear of a Sunday? I t ' s a sparrow with a crumb i n h i s beak dodging wheels and clouds crossing two ways. CK, 50) The s p i r i t of Dadaism —• two ways: the language moving i n two d i r e c t i o n s , "two ways," at the same time, c a l l i n g for meaning and destroying meaning, but i n between, a world (the world) i n movement that cannot be caught up i n reason's cage. This i s the same world with a l i v e sparrow i n i t , "crumb in h i s beak dodging wheels and clouds," a l i v e creature who must keep adjusting to h i s environment by constantly s h i f t i n g perspectives and positions, i n order simply to survive. The sparrow pays attention to the 101 f i e l d of p a r t i c u l a r s that constitute h i s world. Were he a w r i t e r , t h i s p a r t i c u l a r i t y may very well reside in. words.as w e l l , One of Williams 1 most intimate readers, Louis Zukofsky says that "at 4 best the w r i t i n g i n the Improvisations a t t a i n s a Shakespearean verbalism," and he quotes "Improvisation XI.2," the one improvisation i n Kora where the words are l i k e heavy blocks of matter, placed one beside.the other, the f o o l tongue absorbed by the sight and sound of them, "knee deep i n blue mud," while meaning flounders around looking f o r a place to come to r e s t — something of a s i m i l a r pattern we noted i n "Winter's not gone yet, i f the wildgeese f l y that way:" When beldams dig clams t h e i r f a t hams ( i t ' s always beldams) balanced near T e l l u s ' s hide, t h i s rhinoceros p e l t , these lumped stones — buffoonery of midges on a b u l l ' s thigh. -— invoke, — what you w i l l : b i r t h ' s g l u t , awe at God's c r a f t , youth's poverty, evolution of a c h i l d ' s caper, man's poor inconsequence. E c l i p s e of a l l things; sun's s e l f turned hen's rump. (K, 51) Within the s u b s t a n t i a l i t y of the language i n t h i s passage, and the verbal play, we can hear the energy of a writer who f e e l s the texture of words, the dense phy s i c a l words that "carry the l i f e of the planet." There i s the fig u r e projected of the earth as a surface that grows the m u l t i p l i c i t y of concrete things — beldams with, f a t hams who are digging clams, etc. — a l l of them crowding together on T e l l u s ' skin, l i k e "midges on a b u l l ' s thigh." We r e c a l l , i n t h i s context, Williams' comment on Gertrude Stein's hold on the m u l t i p l i c i t y of words: "They are l i k e a crowd at Coney Island, l e t us say, seen from an airplane." (AN,349) . Or "midges on a b u l l ' s thigh." What does i t a l l mean? Since the drama of earth, gives b i r t h to the very p o s s i b i l i t y of meaning, i j t can mean almost anything, "what you w i l l . " In a world where contradictions t h r i v e , where>''All Is confusioh, , r-even the "sun s e l f " can turn "hen's rump," the. face (as Octavio Paz i n Conjunctions and 102 Disj unctions s a y s ) 5 become, an ass, or the man become a. f o o l . At the l e v e l of earth,, down on the ground, a l l things are subject to the. p r i n c i p l e of transformation. Equalized, they are common: one to another to another. Against t h i s condition, the s t a t i c and h i e r a r c h i c forms of r a t i o n a l d i s -course are. an impertinence, an instance of control over process that i s a removal, a "divorce," which Williams much, l a t e r , i n Paterson, w i l l c a l l a "sign of knowledge i n our time" (P, 28). Like the b i r d i n "The Fool's Song" from The Tempers, the actual i s s l i p p e r y — i n t r a n s i t i o n , i n f l i g h t — like, the earth, which also constantly reverses stable orders: "laughs at the names / by which, they think to trap i t . Escapes."' (P, 33). And escapes, as w e l l , through the f o o l ' s tongue that mis-names, as Williams says the S u r r e a l i s t s do, i n order to s t i r up the mind to make i t , once again, a c t i v e to the opacity of words, the assumption being that language i s a surface that demands to be met as a surface, impenetrable to that extent. I t i s p r e c i s e l y at t h i s point that Pound's i n i t i a l response to the texture of Williams' w r i t i n g i n Kora holds weight. In a l e t t e r to Williams (dated November 10, 1917) — the f i r s t set of improvisations i n Kora were printed i n The L i t t l e Review (October, 1917) only a month before — he provides a quick take, parts of which Williams l a t e r incorporated into h i s "Prologue." "I was very glad to see your wholly incoherent unAmerican poems i n the L.R.," Pound writes, and then explains h i s sense of the q u a l i t y of Williams' language: (You thank your bloomin gawd you've got enough. Spanish blood to muddy up your mind, and prevent the current American i d e a t i o n from going through i t l i k e a b l i g h t e d collander.) The thing that saves your work i s opacity, and don't you forget i t . Opacity i s NOT an American q u a l i t y . F i z z , swish, gabble of verbiage,' these are echt Amerikariisch.7 For Pound, the "incoherent" q u a l i t y of Williams' w r i t i n g i s a p o s i t i v e 103 achievement. At l e a s t , as a writer, he has not f a l l e n prey to the "American" re l i a n c e on "i d e a t i o n , " which s i f t s i t s way through the density of language •— and by implication the density of the world — " l i k e a blig h t e d collander." Had Williams been more American, h i s language would be more transparent, much l e s s "opaque," much more the v e h i c l e of ideas. Apart from the truthfulness or not of Pound's argument that the opacity of Williams' language i s an "unAmerican" q u a l i t y (Williams w i l l r a i s e the issue i n h i s "Prologue"), the term — opacity — i s i n i t s e l f revealing. And s t r i k i n g i n i t s accuracy. Opacity, as we have t r i e d to show, i s exactly what the reader experiences when he f i r s t comes up against the opening l i n e of Kora. And i t i s , i n the end as we l l , t h i s opacity that he comes back to as he becomes conscious of the way i n which any " e x p l i c a t i o n " of "Pools have, b i g wombs" i s i n s u f f i c i e n t , given i t s a c t u a l i t y as a statement. He cannot get through, i t , except by ignoring the very words themselves i n the order they appear. "Fools have b i g wombs" thus r e s i s t s any attempt to i n t e r p r e t out of i t a r e f e r e n t i a l meaning outside, or as i t were, beneath, i t s surface. The surface of the statement, "the words themselves," declares i t s e l f as a surface -— an opaque surface, that breaks the si l e n c e of a blank space on the. page. Four words, taken separately, " j u s t words:" foo l s have. b i g wombs — b r o u g h t together i n the. context of a sequence, they formthe simplest p o s s i b i l i t y of a sentence, and with four words that do not, one plus one, and therefore as a whole, y i e l d a completed, hence transparent meaning. The 104 words precede, as Williams says. And so the " b i g " ( s t i l l ) s t i c k s out. Not bigger or biggest, e i t h e r of which, would have set up a r e l a t i o n between two or more things, possibly the f o o l and the r e s t of "us." But "big" i s f i n a l . I t does not permit comparisons, nor does i t allow for the assumption of a frame of reference external to the statement i t s e l f , i n a way, say, the 8 words " A p r i l i s the c r u e l l e s t month"' depend for t h e i r e f f e c t i v e content upon the a s s o c i a t i o n of A p r i l with the seasonal time of new growth, of beginnings, of change, of the resurgence of desire. The l a t t e r statement takes on meaning only when the reader brings t h i s perception to i t , and instead of c a l l i n g attention to i t s e l f , as the opening l i n e of Kora does, i t pos i t s an "understanding" or knowledge of human experience that ( i r o n i c a l l y ) contra-d i c t s the seasonal associations. Williams might have argued that the words i n the statement are being used, that i s , shaped by the s u b j e c t i v i t y of the write r whose point of view governs the thought he intends to express. On the other hand, "Fools have b i g wombs," as a statement, does not necessi-tate a r e l i a n c e on such intentions. On the contrary, i t undermines t h i s p r i o r i t y , and i n i t s e f f e c t , provokes an experience of language that brings thought to the edge of a c r i s i s . " A p r i l i s the c r u e l l e s t month," i n t h i s sense, ref e r s the reader back to some "thought" outside and p r i o r to the statement. "Fools have big wombs," though resonant with possible associar t i o n s , does not f i n a l l y give way to a r e f e r e n t i a l frame external to i t s a c t u a l i t y . I t i s for t h i s reason that the opening l i n e of Kora stands out as a w r i t i n g act, an event i n language. In h i s essay on Gertrude Stein, Williams says that Stein's theme i s w r i t i n g . But i n such a way as to be w r i t i n g envisioned as the f i r s t concern of the moment, dragging behind i t a dead weight of l o g i c a l burdens, among them a dead c r i t i c i s m which broken through might be a gap by which endless other enterprises of the under-105 standing should issue — f o r refreshment. (AN, .348) The w r i t i n g i n Kora dramatizes the o r i g i n a l consequences of t h i s c r u c i a l discovery, which erupts i n the text as a language c r i s i s : a confusion. "My s e l f was being slaughtered," we hear Williams saying. What then about the usefulness of our discussion of the f o o l and h i s r e l a t i o n to a dense language? The sense Williams has of the f o o l has pro-vided a context f o r the l i n e "Fools have b i g wombs." Without some such search — and the one offered here i s only one of many p o s s i b i l i t i e s — how else could.we have arri v e d back at the statement i n the way we have done? The statement i t s e l f c a l l e d f o r some such reading. Otherwise, i t would have remained dumb, maybe so outside a readership that i t could have been assigned to an i r r e t r i e v a b l e obscurity. I t would thus have turned i n v i s i b l e . The context we have provided, however, could not explain i t away. Somehow the statement springs back to i t s former state. I t i s t h i s very toughness that harbours a tension we now begin to understand as a tension, s i m i l a r to the one we noticed i n the Fool's statement from King Lear. Two contrary forces appear to be at work i n the statement p u l l i n g i t i n two d i r e c t i o n s : toward the desire for the ground of s i g n i f i c a n c e , but as well toward the desire f o r i n - s i g n i f i c a n c e , though perhaps we should say "unsignificance," to adopt the term Williams drops into h i s poem "Landscape with the F a l l of Icarus" (PB, 4), not simply meaninglessness, but the p o s i t i v e absence of obsolete meaning which does not eliminate, i n fact necessitates the c a l l f o r (new) meaning. And r i g h t here, caught between these two forces, these two ways, the statement holds within i t a 106 c r i s i s through, which langauge flows i n as an a c t u a l i t y t i e d to a world i n constant movement. And as i n any c r i s i s , there i s a breakage involved, over from some state more or less f i x e d to an unknown condition which i s undermining that f i x i t y . This c r i s i s , f o r Williams, may very well concern that s h i f t over from an "older" world wherein words are used as transparent v e h i c l e s to the "newer" world wherein words become themselves the o b j e c t i v i t y , the opacity the w r i t e r engages whenever he s i t s down to write. Not signs but un-signs. "Foolish words." There i s i n the opening l i n e of Kora some such severance, some breaking away, negative i n e f f e c t , but p o s i t i v e i n the sense that any breaking away from an "older" form i s a leap forward, a "plunge" (K, 51) into something new. And whatever i s new i s a beginning. "Yet I am r i g h t , " we r e c a l l Williams saying to Turner, who suggested that Williams re-write the opening l i n e to make i t more comprehensible, i n other words, more reasonable. But how does a writer say the experience of."Fools have b i g wombs" except by doing, by w r i t i n g i n the words.themselves — and more e s p e c i a l l y when the mind finds i t s e l f i n a blockage. Chance i s .there as wel l . With nothing but the blank page to begin with, "Fools have b i g wombs" i s one p o s s i b i l i t y among many. I t came to mind, f or Williams, a s t a r t without the intentions of thought. This i s what gives the statement the same kind of s o l i d i t y Williams recognizes i n Shakespeare's language, a writer f o r whom, as he says, "Words are deeds" (EK, 11), the very matter of h i s thought, "something he could not escape, opaque" (EK, 111). The actual beats at the edge of the Fool's statement i n King Lear, but 107 i n the opening seri e s of three improvisations i n Kora i t breaks v i o l e n t l y free. This d i s t i n c t i o n illuminates the. forward push of Williams' w r i t i n g . As a mirror, Shakespeare's Fool i s a kind of force within Lear's mind that wants to, but cannot, escape the confinements of reason. Lear i s the fi g u r e of "Reason i n madness," that i s to say, the fi g u r e of Reason trapped within i t s own l i m i t s . In Kora, on the other hand, the actual releases i t s e l f i n the laughter of a fo o l ' s voice that re-connects the body i n the mind to the s u b s t a n t i a l i t y of an actual world. "Fools have big wombs." Caught i n t h i s complexity, the writ e r inside the text of the w r i t i n g enters a drama that enacts a movement of mind that subverts•closed structures of thought wherein the actual i s denied. Gaps begin to appear, both i n the i n t e r s t i c e s between words and the space at the edge of words. The w r i t i n g i n Kora, so to speak, i n i t i a t e s through the act of negating, and i n t h i s sense i s a pre-text — or i n other terms s t i l l , a "dadaism" that re-opens the drama of the world through i t s r i e n , r i e n , r i e n . "Count. One." A b i r t h then, into w r i t i n g as a movement within words, but as w e l l — and for an under-standing of Kora t h i s s h i f t i s fundamental — into a b i r t h i n g world: This i s a s l i g h t s t i f f dance to a waking baby whose arms have been l y i n g curled back above, his head upon the p i l l o w , making a flower — the eyes closed. Dead to the world! Waking i s a l i t t l e hand brushing away dreams. Eyes open. Here's a new world. (K, 73) i i "Eyes open" — and a world rushes i n , a simple enough gesture, but as Williams came to know we l l , experience i s so evanescent that i t i s almost impossible to catch up i t s immediacy, so quickly does i t evaporate l i k e 108 mist into habituated frames of perception-and thought. The,gaps between things that appear i n the moment of perception are covered over, as words are also when they lose t h e i r o r i g i n a l freshness. And t h i s i s a l l the more evident i n the d i s c u r s i v e use of language wherein experience i s f i x e d i n predetermined forms. The drama of the opening improvisation undermines t h i s closure of meaning, and thus extends the tension between s i g n i f i c a n c e and unsignificance i n the statement "Fools have big wombs." Fools have big wombs. For the rest? — here i s penny-ro y a l i f one knows to use i t . But time i s only another l i a r , so go along the wall a l i t t l e f u r t h e r : i f black-be r r i e s prove b i t t e r t h e r e ' l l be mushrooms, f a i r y - r i n g mushrooms, i n the grass, sweetest of a l l fungi. (K, 31) The defiance of the voice situates i t s e l f within a tension. Out of i t , and because of i t , the w r i t e r inside the w r i t i n g begins to speak "'Out of 9 deep need.'" And subversively, e s p e c i a l l y i n r e l a t i o n to the demands of r a t i o n a l order. On t h i s account, along the surface of the w r i t i n g , there i s to be discovered the remains, the mere s h e l l of a d i s c u r s i v e form. The s h e l l reveals i t s e l f as a mode of abstraction, one instance of the way a predetermined systematization of experience imposes i t s e l f : f i r s t an assertion, then a question, then an answer to the question, then a q u a l i f i -cation, then, f i n a l l y , and almost i n e v i t a b l y , a proposition. This i s the very cage out of which the f o o l ' s voice f l i e s , and h i s gesture creates gaps that assert themselves as blanks, empty spaces appearing as "nothings" between the statements. A former coherence of thought (so we t e n t a t i v e l y s t a r t to reconstruct the drama) has given way to the unsignificance of statements that are equalized once released from the dominance, of the h i e r a r c h i c structure of argumentation. I t i s out of t h i s s o - c a l l e d "incoherence" (Pound's response) that we can hear i n the w r i t i n g i t s e l f the 109 b i r t h of a new kind of value, one discovered i n the r e f u s a l to l e t the mind become s e l f - r e f e r e n t i a l to i t s own constructs. To the f o o l outside, orders fabricated by the mind and o v e r l a i d onto things are distancings based upon a c o n t r o l l i n g order which i s an imprisonment rather than a r e v e l a t i o n of things. " A l l things brought under the hand of the possessor crumble to nothing-ness" (K, 20), so Williams warns us i n his "Prologue" to Kora, warns because t h i s assumption of power over things has i t s cost: at i t s worst, the mind's closed orders can become v i c i o u s obstacles to the release of desire, more than obstacles, the instrument of a repressive -mechanism which survives wholly through d e n i a l . We think of the "puritan" i n Williams' In the American Grain, the "puritan" habit of mind that sustains i t s e l f through i t s divorce from the body of the world. I t i s t h i s separation, i n turn, that stands behind i t s methodical obsession to conquer what i t cannot, or w i l l not, experience i n i t s e l f . The f o o l , on the other hand, estranges himself from that divorce,.and i n t h i s severance, projects himself outward, into the o b j e c t i v i t y of an otherness that now rushes i n to invade h i s awakened mind. And the eyes open once the b a r r i e r s are down. And the voice speaks — It seems r e a l l y the body i t s e l f speaking, a very old, very c e r t a i n , d i s t i n c t l y Rabelaisian and absolutely unflustered body, looking out through two eyes, a quick brain back of them, at some of the shows of the world. (AN, 359) This statement from Williams' review of The Human Body (by Logan Clendening), a piece included i n the "other prose" of A Novelette and Other Prose, a r t i c u l a t e s the emotional range of the body that s p i l l s out through the fool's voice: the defiance of a question ("For the r e s t ? " ) , f or instance, released through an answer that tempts us i n t o meaning only to destroy i t 110 at the same time. A d i f f i c u l t process to explain i n s t a t i c c r i t i c a l terms, and understandably so, but the multiple image of penny-royal that enters the improvisation i n the answer reveals, however ambiguously, something of the way t h i s complexity functions i n the w r i t i n g i t s e l f . At f i r s t , we may automatically assume that i t must have some connection with "the r e s t " — perhaps those non-fools who need the assistance of some secret remedy which would l i b e r a t e them to become the f o o l s with "big wombs" they s e c r e t l y desire to be, i f only they had not retreated into predetermined forms that deny the p a r t i c u l a r i t y of the world, i t s s u b s t a n t i a l i t y . And i t i s t h i s denial they turn back on the world through t h e i r oppression of the f o o l . Williams had explained to Turner the d i f f i c u l t y of l i v i n g by " i n s t i n c t " i n a community that "would be destroyed by your mere presence did i t not make an example of you, keep you subdued. These are the I r e a l J f o o l s and t h e i r breed i s unnumbered." So "here i s penny-royal," says the f o o l of a doctor. But who should use i t , f o o l s or non-fools? At t h i s point, furthermore, we can't even be c e r t a i n to whom the voice i s speaking — himself? other f o o l s non-fools? The speech s p l i n t e r s i n many di r e c t i o n s at the same time. And the image of penny-royal, instead of c l a r i f y i n g , only confuses the matter more. Being himself a doctor, Williams could quite e a s i l y have known the somewhat crazy h i s t o r y connected to t h i s herb. According to Maud Grieve i n A Modern Herbal penny-royal was sometimes known as "run-by-the-ground" because of the way i t ".'crepe th: much, upon the ground.'"''^ The herb has (had?) for the longest time been considered the cure for any number of diverse i l l n e s s e s . Grieve l i s t s many: a blood p u r i f i e r ; a cure for "spas-modic, nervous and h y s t e r i c a l a f f e c t i o n s " ; f or colds; taken with wine i t I l l heals bltes; : 'applied to the n o s t r i l s with vinegar" i t "revives those who f a i n t and swoon"; and i n other forms s t i l l , i t can be used against gout, f a c i a l marks, sple n e t i c conditions, u l c e r s , even leprosy and whooping cough; and more, i t can be used to promote menstruation, p e r s p i r a t i o n , as a stimulant, as a way of eliminating gases from the i n t e s t i n e s and the stomach.^ In other words, penny-royal ( l i k e a s p i r i n today i n our chemical world) has been understood as a kind of wonder herb. A c u r e - a l l . How s e r i o u s l y are we to take t h i s advice offered by a f o o l who sets himself up against "the tunspecif i e d 3 r e s t ? " The reference to penny-royal could be nothing more than a pun that teases us into a meaning i t simultaneously destroys, something only a f o o l would (or could) think. " I t was deemed," Grieve says further, by our ancestors valuable i n headaches and giddiness. We are t o l d : 'A garland of Penny-royale made and worn about the head i s of great force against the swimming i n the head and the pains and giddiness thereof.' A cure against the e f f e c t s of influenza? Possibly. Or i f we have i n mind not i n f l u e n z a i t s e l f , but the image of i t as an upheaval against which the mind encounters non-rational forces that cannot be c o n t r o l l e d through systematization, then penny-royal could also be used i n one of two quite contradictory ways, depending, of course, on whether we are f o o l s or not, and according to any d e f i n i t i o n we give to the term " f o o l : " e i t h e r to cure the confused condition (the "swimming i n the head") which f o o l s are subject to i n the collapse of reason, or i f we think negatively, to ease the c l o t -t i n g of the mind which prevents non-fools from being the f o o l s they would l i k e to be, could they but break the s p e l l of reason. The i n t e r p r e t i v e a c t i v i t y can go i n e i t h e r d i r e c t i o n . The w r i t i n g c a l l s f o r t h i s play of meaning. And besides, i f the gesture ("here i s penny-royal") i s read as 112 a defiance of s t e r e o t y p i c a l assumptions concerning disease, and i t s tone c e r t a i n l y suggests as much, then i t -may be considered a mockery of a s o c i a l world bound to the i l l u s i o n that a l l p h y s i c a l disorders can be "cured" through the l o g i c a l wizardry of medicine, whereas, i n f a c t , as any f o o l knows, disease i s a natural condition, of the body. Those fools need to be "cured" of that assumption, so the f o o l implies, at l e a s t from t h i s one perspective. Yet i n another very r e a l sense, we cannot be sure which of a l l the cures, i f any, the voice i n the text has i n mind. And who, i n any case, i s to use penny-royal? What, f i n a l l y , i s the disease? None of these questions have determinable answers, and i t would be c r i t i c a l l y absurd (and presumptious) to propose that they do. However — and possibly t h i s i s more to the point — a l l the supposed cures attached to penny-royal over the years are symptomatic of the under-l y i n g obsession men have with t h e i r bodies, another face of the t e r r o r before the fact of t h e i r own p h y s i c a l i t y . There i s also the further i m p l i c a t i o n that the disappearance of herbal knowledge, a r e s u l t of the separation of medicine from botany, i s yet another i n d i c a t i o n of the 20th century divorce of the mind from i t s ground i n earth processes. The so-c a l l e d argument would then follow that the technique of herbal use belongs to a former.time when.men;were more intimately aware of-the subtle i n t e r s connections between the plants of the earth and themselves as organisms wrought of s i m i l a r s t u f f . Who now "knows to use" penny-royal? We notice that the voice does not say "how," even though we almost expect to hear i t . The knowledge has apparently disappeared so completely from contemporary consciousness•that very few even know to use i t . The image of penny-royal thus creates a whole complex of associations 113 and contexts that are l e f t unresolved, l e f t to play on the mind of the reader, f i r s t shooting one way toward one possible set of meanings, then shooting i n what could be understood as an opposite d i r e c t i o n , i n t h i s r e v e r s a l d i s c l o s i n g a completely d i f f e r e n t set of possible meanings. And i n between, there remains the opacity of an image that refuses to come to r e s t , as i t might have, had i t become e i t h e r a s i m i l e , or symbol of some completed conceptualization or r e f e r e n t i a l frame outside the text. The image, i n short, i s a w a l l . "But time i s only another l i a r " — so the reader i s thrust forward again, across another gap i n the w r i t i n g . A wall i s one such gap, at le a s t the one we cannot go over or through. In language, "But" i s a w a l l : i n t h i s improvisation, a q u a l i f i c a t i o n , an end to what was supposed to be an answer to a question with no ascertainable context. -Another stoppage, and t h i s despite the fa c t that the form of the statement apparently moves the argument forward. Perhaps now the h i s t o r y of penny-royal has been negated as another dead end, the herb.nothing more than another f a l s i t y , a l i e . There i s no "ancient" wisdom retrievable, from a remote past to cure the i l l s of the present. The present i s exactly what we are i n , and here are no l o g i c a l t r a n s i t i o n s , no neat connections between the past and the present, no cures somewhere else i n secret medicines. There i s , i n experience, only and always process, a one a f t e r an other a f t e r an other, not unlike the way the statements i n the improvisation move, one a f t e r another with gaps between, of the same nature as experience. No way through, then, except by going s t r a i g h t ahead, i n time, along the surface of an otherness that w i l l not conform to r a t i o n a l orders. So "go along the w a l l , " l i k e a f o o l who i s a f o o l because he stands outside the mind's closures, 114 but inside an o b j e c t i v i t y that constitutes the opacity of an active world. In some such way, we f i n d ourselves pulled through, or more accurately, across the f l a t surface of the improvisation, dragging our understanding behind us l i k e baggage, nevertheless drawn by the w r i t i n g forward, and so down to the ground i n the f i n a l proposition that c a l l s into appearance those " f a i r y - r i n g mushrooms, i n the.grass, sweetest.of a l l f u n g i . " Gaps are thus not only walls. They are also edges, sharp d i v i d i n g l i n e s . Or "clouds," as the voice i n the-improvisation following t h i s one says, on the "world's edge," the image a figure of that instant of perception when the eyes open and "the great pink mallow" appears " s i n g l y i n the wet, topping reeds" (K, 3.1). Here the mind of the f o o l enters — despite, no, because of the disjunctures along the way — the same actual that was before apparently "subdued." This movement, a crossing over, i s swift, l i k e an arrow f i n d i n g i t s own end, the voice coming to land at a moment of beginning. The dawn breaks, the eyes open, and there are the mushrooms " i n the grass, sweetest of a l l f u n g i . " The w r i t i n g i t s e l f enacts the s h i f t of attention that gives r i s e to a b i r t h i n g world. Fungi, that i s to say, are manifestations, l i v i n g manifestations, of an actual i n which transformation i s primary. From the perspective of earth, nothing remains s t a t i c , no p a r t i c u l a r forms of l i f e exempt from the end-less push forward as new forms replace o l d . This i s e s s e n t i a l l y what Williams says to Harriet Monroe i n 1913: "Now l i f e is'above a l l things else at any moment subversive of l i f e as i t was the moment before — always new, i r r e g u l a r " (SL, 23-24). Or to quote Charles Olson's well-known and precise 13 formulation: "What does not change / i s the w i l l to change." Change, the fa c t of i t , and time, the condition of things. Fungi are the very image of 115 t h i s " w i l l to change" that constantly re-news i t s e l f through a destructive process. We a l l know how amazed we are to discover mushrooms i n the grass, they may be " f a i r y - r i n g mushrooms," a f t e r a r a i n f a l l i n the close dampness of an early autumn morning — the season, i n c i d e n t a l l y , that Kora opens out into — where the day before we saw nothing. Mushrooms appear that suddenly and mysteriously, l i k e flowers opening f o r the f i r s t time, s p l i t t i n g the earth and r i s i n g i n night's s i l e n c e s . And yet, from childhood, we also remember how many times we were warned against j u s t any mushrooms. Many of them, though b e a u t i f u l i n appearance, k i l l the organism that consumes them. This p a r a s i t i c form of fungi survives by breaking up, and thus destroying the c e l l s of the invaded body, i n e f f e c t , not unlike the action of influenza b a c t e r i a . In e i t h e r case, the human organism i s v i c t i m i z e d p r e c i s e l y because i t i s material. Fungi are unique i n terms of the way they contradict the more con-ventional categories we use to d i s t i n g u i s h plant from animal l i f e . No doubt the doctor-Williams would have been intrigued by t h i s , the w r i t e r -Williams possibly even more so. I t i s t h e i r p e c u l i a r i t y through which they become very p a r t i c u l a r . They are plants, for instance, but they do not grow l i k e plants. As Grieve informs us i n A Modern Herbal, Fungi are those plants which are colourless; they have no green chlorophyll within them, and i t i s t h i s green substance which enables the higher plants to b u i l d up, under the influence of sunlight, the starches and sugars which ultimately form our food. They have adjusted to t h i s condition by l i v i n g "as parasites on other l i v i n g plants or animals" or by l i v i n g on "decaying matter." And further, unlike other plants, they are s i m i l a r to animals " i n chemical composition." They 1.16 too "absorb oxygen and exhale carbonic a c i d . " And while some are "very agreeable to the smell," others, i n decaying smell "more l i k e putrescent 14 animal than vegetable matter." A l l of these contradictory q u a l i t i e s point to the p o s s i b i l i t y that fungi can be considered s o - c a l l e d "lower" plants, l i k e the f o o l i n the human kingdom, i n f a c t , the prototype of the f o o l i n the plant kingdom. Berries, l i k e blackberries, belong to the "higher" plants, those that grow upward toward the sun and that use the energy of the sun to transform t h e i r chlorophyll into food. In d i r e c t contrast, fungi "derive t h e i r energy by breaking up highly complex substances and, when these are broken up i n the l i v i n g plant, the l i v i n g plant suffers."'' 5 In t h i s sense, they almost seem un-natural, but what i s more natural than b a c t e r i a , moulds, mildews, toad-stools and mushrooms — and what, we might add, i s more natural than the f o o l , whose anger and doubletalk .subvert the pretension of "higher" thought by making men aware of t h e i r "lower" and more common nature, t h e i r p h y s i c a l i t y which subjects them to change? "Decay" i s a term we apply to the breakup of l i v i n g substances. We don't mind using the word r e f e r e n t i a l l y : we t a l k quite e a s i l y about the "decay" of a system of b e l i e f s , or the "decay" of words, as Williams does i n a piece published i n The L i t t l e Review i n December, 1918, a s p e c i a l "American Number." Anger s p i t t i n g through a mush, of lumpy s t u f f — mouldy words, l i e - c l o t s — transforms i t into that which l e t s a world beyond come through, before that, blocked out.16 Here anger becomes an epidemic force that cuts through "mouldy words," and by so breaking up a f a l l e n ("decay," l i t e r a l l y , as a " f a l l i n g away or down") language, allows a world to appear that before remained "blocked out." Is :ii7 the anger that Williams talks about and the way fungi survive at a l l similar? There i s some connection, we f e e l , but the voice i n the text does not provide a discourse on the "subject." There i s , nevertheless, an anger being released and a defiance as w e l l , and though neither are explained as such, the e f f e c t i s evident enough i n the w r i t i n g i t s e l f of the opening improvi-sation of Kora, which ends with a descent to the ground through a proposition that turns perception npsidedown: " i f blackberries prove b i t t e r , " the voice says, " t h e r e ' l l be mushrooms,:fairy-ring mushrooms, i n the grass, sweetest of a l l f u n g i . " Perhaps we are being i n d i r e c t l y reminded that "decay" as i t applies to l i v i n g organisms makes most of us uneasy, disturbs us, forced as we are into a recognition that a l l l i v i n g things, ourselves included, are subject to transformation. Mouldy bread. Mildew' on our shoes. The common cold. We l i v e i n the midst of fungi, our bodies prey to them. S t i l l , we have no d i f f i c u l t y eating them i n the form of mushrooms, the "sweetest of a l l f u n g i . " There i s a great deal of verbal and i n t e l l e c t u a l play i n the improvisation, but the play i s altogether serious. Change i s inherent i n any given form, and fungi are the very image of t h i s constancy. They survive through the decay of l i v i n g substances, breaking up complex forms (the human included) i n order to keep re-appearing i n form. This i s the same l i f e force that cuts loose i n - t h e : f o o l 1 s tongue, a, flood of words-that come flowing into the mind of the w r i t e r . And the act of w r i t i n g i n words i s a "wedge," to use the t i t l e of one of Williams' books of poems, that opens up gaps, l i k e the 17 saxifrage through rock, another key image i n Williams' work," or l i k e the " f a i r y - r i n g mushrooms" through, the earth., thus giving r i s e to the c r i s i s without which w r i t i n g could not become act u a l . Does w r i t i n g as a s h i f t into the play of language then give access to the s u b s t a n t i a l i t y of the world? 118 Or does the world, i t s otherness, force on the mind the equally r a d i c a l nature of language, i t s s u b s t a n t i a l i t y ? The questions spin on t h e i r own axes. Williams.discovers a back and f o r t h crossing over between language and the world as a context that necessitates the act of w r i t i n g . That, in, i t s e l f , i s the breakthrough. What else to do on t h i s bridge but write i n order thus to f i n d out what, i f anything, may come of i t . "For what i t ' s worth," the next improvisation begins, and the voice begins again, t h i s time landing on the transformed body of one Jacob Louslinger, a type of f o o l , a dead bum who has been invaded by the earth: For what i t ' s worth: Jacob Louslinger, white haired, s t i n k i n g , d i r t y bearded, cross eyed, stammer tongued, broken voiced, bent backed, b a l l kneed, cave b e l l i e d , mucous faced — deathling, — found l y i n g i n the weeds "up there by the cemetery." "Looks to me as i f he'd been bumming around the meadows for a couple'of weeks." Shoes twisted into i n c r e d i b l e l i l i e s : out at the toes, heels, tops, sides, soles. Meadow flower! ha, mallow! at l a s t I have you. (Rot dead marigolds — an acre at a time! Gold, are you?) Ha, clouds w i l l touch world's edge and the great pink mallow stand s i n g l y i n the wet, topping reeds and — a closet f u l l of clothes and good shoes and my-thirty-year's-master's-daughter's two cows for me to care for and a winter room with a f i r e i n i t — . I would rather feed pigs i n Moonachie and chew calamus root and break crab's claws at an open f i r e : age's l u s t loose! (K, 31) The language of the improvisation beats time to the composition of t h i s f i g u r e , p ossibly a deflected mirror of one of the f o o l s with "big wombs": "broken voiced, bent backed, b a l l kneed, cave b e l l i e d , mucous faced — " the opaque words i n the l i s t g i v i ng way to the l o v e l y moment of r e v e l a t i o n . A "deathling." The exact word for a man whose decaying body shows him to be, i n death, absolutely and u t t e r l y a creature of nature — s h a l l we say, an " e a r t h l i n g " as well? The body of Louslinger becomes the ground out of which flowers grow, earth substance. Juxtaposed against the p a r t i c u l a r i t y 119 of h i s corpse, a voice out of the s o c i a l realm that estranged him: '"Looks to me as i f he'd been bumming around- the -meadows f o r a couple of weeks.'" The empty response gestures a collapsed language - that numbs perception and shields the speaker by distancing him from the a c t u a l i t y of Louslinger's transformation. Subverting t h i s narrow, self-enclosed (and smug) voice of c l i c h e , the r e s t l e s s voice of the f o o l of a writer ("Shoes twisted into i n c r e d i b l e l i l i e s : out at the toes, heels, tops, sides, soles") enters the image of Louslinger's decay i n death. He thereby a l i g n s himself with Louslinger's fate, the instance of a man estranged from the "Neatness and f i n i s h " (K, 71) of s o c i a l forms of speech that gloss h i s death and simply sweep i t under the rug with a handful of empty words. The rug of clean minds, Minds l i k e beds always made up, (more stony than a shore) unwilling or unable. (P, 13) The i n a b i l i t y or the unwillingness to say "deathling" i s a denial of the the body's desire to escape the r i g i d i t y of perceptions predetermined by narrow s o c i a l norms. "Minds l i k e beds always made up" are, i n t h i s sense, caught i n the divorce from the physical that Williams attacks i n "science" and "philosophy." They have retreated from the s u b s t a n t i a l i t y of the world into c a t e g o r i c a l frames of reference, s o c i a l norms another face of those forms that cut o f f the crab's f e e l e r s to make i t f i t into a box. I f change i s the one constant i n a l i v e world, then man i s an organism i n nature, continuous with i t s processes, his body made of the same s t u f f as other l i v i n g things, a mushroom say, or one Jacob Louslinger. As Whitehead — one of the t r i b e of 20th century thinkers Williams held i n the highest respect, "0 Whitehead! / teach well"! (CLP, 161) he says i n "Choral: the 120 Pink Church," a hymn, i n part, to those whose work bridges the divorce between body and mind — so e f f e c t i v e l y reminds us i n Modes of Thought, the body of man i s part of the external world, continuous with i t . In f a c t , i t i s j u s t as much part of nature as anything else there — a r i v e r , or a mountain, or a cloud. Also, i f we are f u s s i l y exact, we cannot define where a body begins and where external nature ends. Consider one d e f i n i t e molecule. I t i s part of nature. I t has moved about for m i l l i o n s of years. Perhaps i t started from a d i s t a n t nebula. It enters the body; i t may be as a factor i n some edible vegetable; or i t passes into the lungs as part of the a i r . At what exact point as i t enters the mouth, or as i t i s absorbed through the skin, i s i t part of the body? At what exact moment, l a t e r on, does i t cease to be part of the body? Exact-ness i s out of the question. I t can only be obtained by some t r i v i a l convention. And Whitehead's further conclusion the doctor-writer Williams could only have assented to, and not without a c e r t a i n amount of l i b e r a t i n g laughter: Thus we a r r i v e at t h i s d e f i n i t i o n of our bodies: The Human Body i s that region of the world which i s the primary f i e l d of human e x p r e s s i o n . ^ & A wild and t e r r i f y i n g conclusion f o r the r a t i o n a l mind to entertain. What, for instance, would Williams' townspeople i n Rutherford ( i n 1917) have said about Whitehead's statement? I f not i n Rutherford, then i n Williams' contemporary America, the same America that refused to accept Marcel Duchamp's u r i n a l ( i n 1917) as a work of a r t , and despite the fa c t 19 that i t was named "Fountain" and signed by "R. Mutt?" The separation of the human body from the body of the world to Whitehead (and to Duchamp as well) i s only a " t r i v i a l convention," necessary perhaps, and understandable perhaps, but simply not true to man's creaturely nature. The consciousness of p h y s i c a l i t y i s written a l l over KOra i n H e l l , an intimate medical sense of the human as an organism i n nature. Three examples come to mind, a l l of them providing a context for the drama of divorce i n the second of the 121 three opening improvisations, Filth and vermin though they shock the over-nice are imperfections of the flesh closely related in the gust imagination of the poet to excessive cleanliness. After some years of varied experience with the bodies of the rich and the poor a man finds little to distinguish between them, bulks them as one and bases his working judgments on other matters. (K, 46) A man's carcass has no more distinction than the carcass of an ox. (K, 62) Pathology literally speaking is a flower garden. Syphilis covers the body with salmon-red petals. The study of medicine is an inverted sort of horticulture. Over and above all this floats the philosophy of disease which is a stem dance. One of its most delightful gestures is bringing flowers to the sick. (K3 77-78) "A flower garden" — j u s t what Jacob Louslinger's body has become i n death, a "deathling" re-integrated back into the common ground where s o c i a l d i s t i n c t i o n s carry no weight whatsoever. At t h i s l e v e l of reduction, a l l men are creatures of nature. So the f o o l ' s voice i n the improvisation s l i d e s past the voice of the s o c i a l as the w r i t i n g i t s e l f moves toward an af f i r m a t i o n of a world i n change. The image of herb-flowers surfaces: "Meadow flower! ha, mallow! at l a s t I have you. (Rot dead marigolds — an acre at a time! Gold, are you?)." Here i s a more authentic basis of value, the fool's gold to set against a repressive s o c i a l order that s i f t s the actual through i t s predetermined orders l i k e a collander. By shutting out the very thing that i s nearest to human desire, i t becomes the front of a "puritanism" that closes " a l l the world out" (TAG, 112) and retreats "into one safe mold" (IAG, 112), " b l i n d to every contingency" (TAG, 112) that would release the mind to the body of the world. The voice i n the improvisation r e j e c t s t h i s escape, p r e f e r r i n g instead the energy and passion of the ground revealed i n Louslinger's transformed body: "I would rather feed pigs i n Moonachie and chew calamus root and break crab's claws at an 122 open f i r e : age's l u s t loose.'" The t h i r d improvisation more s p e c i f i c a l l y and d i r e c t l y plays t h i s release i n t o desire against a p u r i t a n i c society: Talk as you w i l l , say: "No woman wants to bother with chi l d r e n i n t h i s country;" — speak of your Amsterdam and the whitest aprons and brightest doorknobs i n Christendom. And I ' l l answer you: Gleaming doorknobs and scrubbed e n t r i e s have heard the songs of the housemaids at sun-up and — housemaids are wishes. Whose? Ha.' the dark canals are w h i s t l i n g , w h i s t l i n g f or who w i l l cross to the other side. I f I remain with hands i n pocket leaning upon my lamppost — why — I bring curses to a hag's l i p s and her daughter on her arm knows better than I can t e l l you — best to blush and out with i t than back beaten a f t e r . In: Holland at daybreak, of -a fine spring morning, one-sees the housemaids beating rugs before the small houses of such a city as Amsterdam, sweeping, scrubbing the low entry steps and polishing doorbells and doorknobs. By night perhaps there will be an old woman with a girl on her arm, his ting and whistling across a deserted canal to some late loiterer trudging aimlessly on beneath the gas lamps. (R, 31-32) In the s o c i a l world surrounding the f o o l of a writ e r , s e x u a l i t y i s so covered over that the women i n . i t come to deny c h i l d b i r t h . But he at l e a s t knows that human nature cannot be caged so e a s i l y . E i t h e r i n Amsterdam or Rutherford, the same impulse to release desire ("age's l u s t loose!") presses through the obsessive concern of minds locked into "excessive cleanliness." Underneath the gleaming doorknobs and scrubbed doorways l i e the dormant but re s t l e s s "songs of the housemaids at sun-up — and housemaids are wishes." In t h i s synapse, the voice i n the wr i t i n g jumps a gap and i s drawn outside the norms of his community, toward the "dark canals" that c a l l him, w h i s t l i n g t h e i r s i r e n music, tempting him to stray, to become a vagrant i n thought, and so embrace what he r e a l l y desires, the "daughter" of the old lady. He 123 e i t h e r allows himself to undertake the i n i t i a t o r y night journey across the canal, or he curses himself to a l i f e with "a c l o s e t f u l l of clothes and good shoes and my-thirty-year's-master's-daughter's two cows f o r m e to care fo r and a winter room with a f i r e i n i t — . " The i t a l i c i z e d " i n t e r p r e t a t i o n " to t h i s t h i r d improvisation, written i n a very matter-of-fact tone, almost l i k e a t o u r i s t brochure, or a set of stage d i r e c t i o n s , i n t e n s i f i e s the experience of distance set up: the p o r t r a i t of a man who i s j u s t beginning to become a f o o l , j u s t beginning to awaken to those desires h i s community outlaws, j u s t beginning to s p l i t away from the s o c i a l forms that shape his l i m i t e d ego. And the distancing works both ways, one a l i e n a t i o n spawning another. The community (supposedly i n America, possibly Rutherford, or any small American town i n the early years of t h i s century) c l i n g s to the form of a past world, an Amsterdam say, that lodges i n t h e i r minds as a " p e r f e c t i o n " they superimpose onto another place. They thus deny a present that should be met on wholly other terms. I t i s t h i s removal, the trap of i t , that the voice i n the improvi-sation a c t i v e l y estranges himself from, possessed as he i s by an unknown, but more immediate world that comes to him across a.gap. This other world contains a darker realm of f e e l i n g that the daytime world of "Chris-tendom" cannot accomodate within i t s narrow perspectives. Better i n t h i s impasse to become "some late- loiterer, trudging aimlessly on beneath the gas lamps," to become a vagrant wanderer, l i k e Jacob Louslinger, a bum who went contrary to the habituated norms of h i s societ y and roamed the meadows of desire. This loosening of the mind the " i n t e r p r e t a t i o n " poses as a destructive force that both estranges and r e l i e v e s at the same time. A closed world breaks up and scatters into the open spaces of the night, i n .124 Holland,so i n America, where the dis-placed voice of the w r i t e r sets out, however stumblingly, to discover, as f a r as possible, the r e a l value of a present immediate to his desire. The s i t u a t i o n presented i n d i r e c t l y i n the t h i r d improvisation and i t s " i n t e r p r e t a t i o n " i s s i m i l a r to that of an immigrant i n a new world: he can e i t h e r overlay i t with some "Amsterdam" he c a r r i e s i n h i s memory, or take the r i s k , which i s quite possibly the news about Jacob Louslinger that no one i n town, except the writer — "best to blush and out with i t than back beaten a f t e r " — wishes to acknowledge. In the collapsed world of King Lear, the Fool and h i s doubletalk r e f l e c t the corruption of language into the transparency of f l a t t e r y . In Kora i n H e l l , the f o o l of a word-man of a w r i t e r also f o o l s i n a f o o l ' s tongue, but more importantly, through t h i s disturbance, undergoes the confusion of a mind turning a mirror on i t s e l f , f i r s t to reach the edge of i t s l i m i t s , only then to come into the influence of a more primary ground of i t s energies — and we can add, outside the "dead weight of l o g i c a l burdens." "The simple expedient of a mirror," we are t o l d i n Kora, has practical use for arranging the hair, for observation of the set of a coat, etc. But as an exercise for the mind the use of a mirror cannot be too highly recommended. Nothing of a mechanical nature could be more conducive to • that e l a s t i c i t y of the attention which frees the mind for the enjoyment of i t s special prerogatives. (K, 78) Writing that makes the attention e l a s t i c by c a l l i n g a t t e n t i o n to i t s e l f as a w r i t i n g also acts as a mirror that frees the mind to the "special prerogatives" of i t s own inherent nature. "Fools have big wombs" reveals i n i t s opacity a sudden rupture of d i s c u r s i v e meaning that i s an opening, a gap that i s a reduction to zero. A s p l i n t e r e d voice breaks onto the empty space of the .125 page and does nothing more than begin to speak out i t s n e c e s s i t i e s , the same ne c e s s i t i e s that have driven i t to speech i n the f i r s t place. I'd write nothing planned but take up a p e n c i l , put the paper before me, and write anything that came into my mind. (A, 158) Williams wrote the Improvisations, as he says, "For r e l i e f , to keep myself from planning and thinking at a l l " (A, 158). No plan and no "thought" but the w r i t i n g i t s e l f , and the scattered and opaque e f f e c t of the f i r s t series of improvisations make evident t h i s absence of a subjective order. The words come f i r s t , what flows i n t o the mind i s heard and written down. " I t f e l l by chance on h i s ear but he was ready, he was a l e r t " (GAN, 171) , we read i n The Great American Novel, another text of improvisations written not long a f t e r Kora i n H e l l was f i n a l l y published. "Talk as you w i l l , " says the voice i n "Improvisation 1.3" — but such " t a l k , " governed as i t i s by the intentions of the w i l l , i s subservient to an already determined frame, the words shaped by the speaker to j u s t i f y an end p r i o r to the words. No r i s k involved, no chance. This i s the very sort of mis-use of language the writer i n Kora wants to r i d himself of, and s p e c i f i c a l l y by keeping hi s mind i n s i d e the w r i t i n g that gets written by w r i t i n g , i n t h i s manner allowing the w r i t i n g to determine the movement of his mind. Kora i n H e l l thus maintains a hard surface and the language of i t does not pander to the burden of a r e f e r e n t i a l frame external to the text — rather, undermines that habit of mind. The insistence throughout, what-ever the p a r t i c u l a r nature of the subject-matter that finds i t s way i n t o the text, i s that w r i t i n g not become a v e h i c l e for something else but be i t s e l f the "matter" the writer engages. The s h i f t s and leaps, the gaps between words and statements, the absence of neat t r a n s i t i o n s between improvisations, the mockery o f d i s c u r s i v e thought, the v e r b a l puns, the ambiguity of image, 126 the reversals, the necessity for speech, the disjuncture of meaning made possible through chance ju x t a p o s i t i o n s : a l l of t h i s unruly but a n t i c i p a t o r y and open a c t i v i t y encourages the reader to understand Kora as the text of a drama. The normative assumption, that a w r i t e r simply expresses ( i . e . "presses out" of himself) what he preconceives, words the front for his s u b j e c t i v i t y , h i s s o - c a l l e d view of the world, or h i s b e l i e f s , or his wisdom, or h i s "ideas," whatever, i s challenged and thrown back on i t s e l f . In t h i s r e v e r s a l , w r i t i n g ceases to be a means of furthering a personal cause and becomes a method, the end of which i s contained i n i t s own processes. In other words, w r i t i n g i s the very medium that draws the mind outside the b a r r i e r s of d i s c u r s i v e modes of thought, those modes that distance i t from i t s more authentic place i n a l i v e world. As Williams says i n a l a t e r essay, i n t e r e s t i n g l y enough c a l l e d "Revelation" (1947), "The objective i n w r i t i n g i s , to r e v e a l " (SE, 268). What el s e , but the mind's processes. In t h i s same essay, he thus goes on to t a l k about a " l i g h t n i n g c a l c u l a t o r " i n the mind, which w r i t i n g releases — you know, the thing that made Shakespeare seem an i n t e l -l e c t u a l . I t worked. Watch i t work, that's a l l there i s to w r i t i n g ( i f i t works). Turn i t loose. Let i t turn i t s e l f into a codex on the page. That's w r i t i n g , r e v e l a t i o n . . . . (SE, 268) Against which, a statement from Kora: Bla! Bla! Bla! Heavy t a l k i s t a l k that waits upon a deed. Talk i s s e r v i l e that i s set to inform. (K, 17) The f o o l ' s voice — and t h i s was the advantage f o r Williams when he f i r s t sat down to write the Improvisations — becomes a necessity, i s constituted i n that moment the mind escapes i t s closed orders and enters the open space of w r i t i n g . Now a l l forms of thought and preception that are divorced from the actual lose t h e i r authority, driven as they are up 127 against the wall of an immediate present. Now form i s no longer even conceivable as a f i x e d e n t i t y , a separable whole. Now form i s attached to the movement of experience. Or to quote Robert Creeley's more precise 20 wording: "No forms l e s s / than a c t i v i t y . " Or more, i f we are on the other side of the canal, with the w r i t e r i n the opening s e r i e s of improvisations, only now beginning to journey, only now crossing over. Here the act of crossing over i s the issue of an i n i t i a t i o n into an experience of the world previously hidden beneath the layering abstractions of the mind. The w r i t e r i n s i d e the w r i t i n g finds himself estranged from a former closure, but f o o l that he i s , he also finds himself drawn in t o an openness made possible by w r i t i n g , outside where the mind can be re-attached to an actual world. The drama of the opening improvisations, to t h i s extent, reveals the f i r s t ascending shape, the f i r s t c o n f i g u r a t i o n a l appearance, i n Kora, of another world that i s j u s t coming into the present of the writer who i s j u s t crossing over into i t . The s h i f t that constitutes the f a b r i c of t h i s dynamic operates i n the w r i t i n g . The w r i t i n g , then, works — and i n reading Kora, we glimpse the awakening mind of the writer composing a w r i t i n g con-sonant with the texture of an actual world, the one p r e c i s e l y that he l i v e s . 128 CHAPTER FIVE TO LOOSEN THE ATTENTION " F l e x i b i l i t y of thought," Williams says i n The Embodiment of Knowledge, " i s so precious that sometimes i t seems the only v i r t u e of the mind — the > only v i r t u e the mind needs" (EK, 126). I f the whole of Kora i n H e l l has one underlying drive, i t i s t h i s i nsistence upon " f l e x i b i l i t y " as against the kind of thought that r e s i s t s experience by attempting to f i x into r i g i d categories i t s e s s e n t i a l l y open nature. This drive, we might add, i s so basic to an understanding of Williams that i t can be taken as one of the root assumptions of a l l his work as a writer. And as a reader as w e l l . Here, for instance, i s the ground theme of Pound's Cantos: "a closed mind which c l i n g s to i t s power — about which the i n t e l l i g e n c e beats seeking entrance" (SE, 106). Or take the following statement of Whitman's s i g n i f i c a n c e f or 20th century w r i t i n g , again a r e f l e c t i o n of Williams' desire for the same dynamic i n h i s own work: For God's sake! He broke through, the deadness of copied forms which keep shouting above everything that wants to get said today drowning out one man with the accumu-129 l a t e d weight of a thousand voices i n the p a s t — r e -e s t a b l i s h i n g the tyrannies of the past, the very tyrannies that we are seeking to diminish. The structure of the old i s a c t i v e , i t says no! to everything i n propaganda and poetry that wants to say yes. Whitman broke through, that. That was basic and good. (SE, 218) And then reverse the same process, and we have, i n Williams' reading of American h i s t o r y , a whole group of f i r s t immigrants (they are s t i l l a r r i v i n g from places l i k e Amsterdam i n the early years of the 20th century), who came to America, .a "new" place for them, and forced i t to conform to a c u l t u r a l form that had become " o l d " the moment they l e f t i t behind. Some-thing wholly o r i g i n a l was thus l o s t to them r i g h t from the s t a r t . They lacked the " f l e x i b i l i t y " of mind to recognize what they did not know — how could they? — but which they might have experienced. The new place demanded a "complete reconstruction of t h e i r most intimate c u l t u r a l make-up, to accord with the new conditions" (SE, 134), but the e a r l y s e t t l e r s , most of them, turned t h e i r backs on t h i s newness and retreated into the f i x e d perspective of a "past" they c a r r i e d i n t h e i r minds. The b a t t l e between the " o l d " and the "new" — r e a l l y a b a t t l e between an i n f l e x i b l e and a f l e x i b l e mind — finds i t s counterpart i n the i n t e r n a l -ized drama of Kora where Williams, as a w r i t e r , turns a mirror on himself. In the d i s l o c a t i o n that ensues, the voice that s t r i k e s out, i n the opening set of improvisations, f o r the open t e r r i t o r y of the night-time world of desire becomes un-settled, becomes i n fa c t a wanderer who strays from the "deadness of copied forms," his own former "closed mind" i n back of them. He thus sets out uncertainly to discover what "new conditions" l i e outside the imposed l i m i t s of any given completion of thought or perception. " I t i s to loosen the a t t e n t i o n , " we hear Williams saying over and over as we read Kora, "my a t t e n t i o n since I occupy part of the f i e l d , 130 that I write these improvisations" (K, 14). Inside a f i e l d , of course, the mind i s part of a complex of i n t e r a c t i n g forces, . So the term " a t t e n t i o n " here plays i n two d i r e c t i o n s at the same time: against the m i l i t a r y sense of attention as a motionless posturing or a frozen state of perception, and toward the kind of f l e x i b l e a ttention that enacts a l i v e consciousness of otherness. To i l l u s t r a t e , Williams turns to a s p e c i f i c instance, one that provides a context for h i s sharp antipathy toward p e r s p e c t i v a l forms of perception. "Here I clash with Wallace Stevens" (K, 14). Leaving aside the more obviously personal basis of Williams' response to Stevens' l e t t e r — Wallace Stevens is a fine gentleman whom Qannell likened to a Pennsylvania Dutchman who has suddenly become aware of his habits and taken to "society" in self-defense (K, 15) — what i s the nature of t h i s "clash?" "Given a f i x e d point of view, r e a l i s t i c , i m a g istic or what you w i l l " ( i t a l i c s added), Stevens says, everything adjusts i t s e l f to that point of view; and the process of adjustment i s a world i n f l u x , as i t should be f o r a poet. But to f i d g e t with points of view leads always to new beginnings and incessant new beginnings lead to s t e r i l i t y . (K, 15) Stevens advocates the necessity for poets to maintain the s t a b i l i t y of a given perspective on the world so that they not be stuck with "incessant new beginnings." And while Williams could have agreed with h i s assumption that "the process of adjustment" i s t i e d to "a world i n f l u x , " he takes issue with Stevens' conclusion that a poet survives only by r e l y i n g upon a " f i x e d point of view." Nothing could be further removed from Williams' own desire i n Kora to go, as he says the imagination does, "from one thing to another" (K, 14) and from his subsequent desire to remain i n a present that demands ,a continual re-adjustment of perspectives: the r e l a t i v i t y , not the 131 c e n t r a l i t y of the s e l f i m p l i c i t i n Stevens' admitted " d i s t a s t e f o r miscellany" (K, 15) and his desire f o r a 'poetic' point of view wit h which a poet can order the disparate nature of experience. What Stevens sees as a l i a b i l i t y to be overcome, Williams thus sees as a condition to be met. Granted, experience i s e s s e n t i a l l y an open-ended process — no disagreement there — but according to Williams, i t i s t h i s very fact that undercuts the v i a b i l i t y , at l e a s t f o r the writer, of any given perspective or "mode" (K, 14) the mind may use to make the world adjust to i t . The n a t u r a l i s t or the " s c i e n t i f i c " (K, 14) perspective, or the " r e a l -i s t i c , i magistic or what you w i l l " perspective are a l l f i n a l l y r i g i d categories of thought, s t a t i c frames of reference divorced from the l i v e drama of experience, merely examples of a " f i x e d point of view" around which "everything adjusts i t s e l f . " Such perspectives — to Williams, "the walking d e v i l of modern l i f e " (K, 14) — impose a form of predetermination onto things and thus subordinate them to an order into which they are made to disappear, as things. They may be, i n t h i s way, subdued by the mind, but rig h t here, so Williams discovered by w r i t i n g Kora, the mind n e c e s s a r i l y forgoes the f l e x i b i l i t y i t both needs and wants i f i t i s to survive as a l i v e force i n the world. The present can never be f i x e d into place. I t moves i n time, always forward, always i r r e g u l a r l y , always new. "Time presses" (AN, 278). And so Williams answers Stevens by c a l l i n g f o r the kind of w r i t i n g that works contrary to p e r s p e c t i v a l r e l i a n c e s . Such w r i t i n g , by provoking a c r i s i s — i n e f f e c t l i k e the epidemic i n A Novelette through which the writer was suddenly thrown into a world cleansed of his own s u b j e c t i v i t y — would overcome.the.tendency of the mind to adopt a "f i x e d point of view." In other words, "incessant new beginnings" do not neces-s a r i l y lead to " s t e r i l i t y , " but can become the way the mind can constantly 132 renew i t s own resources. A few pages further on i n the "Prologue," against Stevens' advice, Williams goes on to o f f e r h i s own p r e s c r i p t i o n : " I t i s , " he says, " i n the continual and v i o l e n t r e f r e s h i n g of the idea that love and good w r i t i n g have t h e i r s e c u r i t y " (K, 22). Change keeps the mind a l i v e , both i n love and "good w r i t i n g . " Many i n d i v i d u a l improvisations o b j e c t i f y Williams' statement, but one i n p a r t i c u l a r i s f a s c i n a t i n g both f o r i t s texture and subtlety. The domestic drama i n "Improvisation XVIII.1" (K, 64) reveals the cost of denying the " v i o l e n t r e f r e s h i n g " of love; and i t involves, curiously enough, a writer who uses the medium of w r i t i n g to voice h i s misgivings to his wife, And he begins: How d e f t l y we keep love from each other. I t i s no t r i c k at a l l : the movement of a cat that leaps a low b a r r i e r . Once again, as i n the opening improvisation, we hear a voice i n s i d e the words, but insi d e as w e l l the immediacy of the gap between his wife and himself, separated as they are by the mediacy of a " b a r r i e r " based upon a sentimental idealism. The "you," so the voice intimates, denies her present condition by f i t t i n g , to use some words from the i n t e r p r e t a t i o n to "Impro-v i s a t i o n V . l , " "the emotions of a certain state to a preceding state to which they are in no. way related" (K, 38-39). The i r r i t a t i o n i n the voice i s transformed into a smooth-talk through which he engages i n a play of words with the "you." "How d e f t l y " — s k i l l f u l l y , neatly, orderly, predictably, almost according to plan, to a reasoned order — they prevent themselves from re l e a s i n g themselves to what they desire. The mind i s swift, surmounts b a r r i e r s , not by meeting them head-on, but by constructing another b a r r i e r — that i s , by leaping over the present, or by f a l l i n g back on the mental construct of a "past," an abstrac t i o n that closes the world out. What i s 133 more natural than t h i s r e t r e a t into s u b j e c t i v i t y ? There i s no " t r i c k " to i t at a l l . The voice continues to taunt the "you" with t h i s kind of word-play as the drama of the improvisation continues. Words both conceal and r e v e a l : You have — i f the truth be known — loved only one man and that was before -my time. Past him you have never thought nor desired to think. The "you" has locked h e r s e l f i n t o a perspective around which a former lover has "adjusted" himself, and the "past" she c a r r i e s around i n her head i s a "thought" that conceals her r e a l desire to be i n a present. The voice admits his own f a i l i n g s as w e l l . Both of them, he says, have retreated from the immediacy of t h e i r needs, what they would more openly desire, could they simply destroy the b a r r i e r separating them from t h e i r own time, the one they are i n , now. Two no's on t h e i r part can lead to a yes that would negate the tyranny of the past — But — i t i s not that we have not f e l t a c e r t a i n rumbling, a c e r t a i n s t i r r i n g of the earth, but what has i t amounted to? Nothing so f a r , because they are caught i n a frozen state — at attention — the empty perspective of t h e i r " p e r f e c t i o n " a view of a completed past now superimposed onto a present that c a l l s f o r wholly new f e e l i n g s . In t h e i r s o c i a l r o l e as husband and wife, i n that narrowness, t h e i r two "apparently healthy" c h i l d r e n make them appear to "have proved f e r t i l e . " But they have never met i n the present as l o v e r s . "There i s only one way out," says the voice, at f i r s t thinking that he must f i n d some way (pos-s i b l y through hi s "basket of words") to supplant " i n your memory the b r i l l i a n c e of the old firmhold." But t h i s , he quickly admits, " i s impossible," And how can i t be otherwise, given the doubleness of h i s 134 address? The perspective i n t o which the f i r s t love has disappeared i s f i n a l l y tough and unyielding: "Ergo: I am a blackguard." Through the i r r e s o l u t e but tense i n t e r p l a y of the w r i t i n g i n the improvisation, the voice a r r i v e s outside the perspective of h i s wife — apparently where he began, but with one c r u c i a l d i f f e r e n c e : now the divorce between them has been brought into the immediacy of experience through the same words that, i n th i s instance at l e a s t , have not been able to break the perspectives they are caught i n . The voice thus becomes the enemy of what the "you" protects: "Ergo: I am a blackguard." By so " d e f t l y " keeping "love from each other," they both s u f f e r the abuse of t h e i r imaginations, the one force that could break the s p e l l of t h e i r s t a t i c r e l a t i o n s h i p and draw them into the moment of the actual that now only rumbles beneath the surface of t h e i r l i v e s . The act is disclosed by the imagination of it. But of first importance is to realize that the imagination leads and the deed comes behind. So we are t o l d by the di s t a n t but c l e a r voice i n the i n t e r p r e t a t i o n , and t h i s statement e s s e n t i a l i z e s , i n one swift thread of thought, the experience presented i n the improvisation: to d i s - c l o s e i s an act of negating a closure, which i s , i n that r e v e r s a l , an opening. As a l i v e force, the imagination acts by revealing i t s e l f through the destruction of those perspectives that attempt to prevent i t from acting. How then to get the imagination to lead? Having once taken the plunge the situation that preceded it-zbecomes obsolete which a moment before was alive with • malignant - rigidities. (K, 5.1) This i s the r i s k that neither the voice nor the "you" i n the improvisation i s . w i l l i n g to take, though the voice suggests that he would take i t were 135 a l l the b a r r i e r s down. A "plunge" i s a v i o l e n t thrust forward (or down-ward) into an indeterminate s i t u a t i o n , we say a stab i n the dark, that harbours something altogether new. I t i s , at the same time, a rupture with a s i t u a t i o n that turns into a "past" once the t i e s with i t are severed. In t h i s way a "plunge" i s a movement away from the "malignant . r i g i d i t i e s " of any given perspective, the "known" world of i t giving way to an experi-ence of r e v e r s a l . The break with any structured "past" — and the "perfect" memory of a former love i s one such s t r u c t u r e — i s a change that i s r e a l l y an "adjustment," a s h i f t into a present caged by a perspective that does not admit of change. The order of any given " f i x e d point of view" maintains i t s e l f through a removal from time and i t s exigencies, which i s exactly the nature of a " p e r f e c t i o n " that even a "basket of words" cannot feed, so stubbornly does i t r e s i s t the a c t u a l i t y of time. "Ergo: I am a blackguard." F u l l - s t o p . If the concern i s w r i t i n g instead of love, and i f further, the writer too must stay on the track of the immediate to keep h i s mind f l e x i b l e , then what i s he to do i n the absence of precedents? This i s , i n large measure, the f i e l d of exploration that the w r i t i n g i n the second set of improvisations i n Kora jumps into — the w r i t i n g process i t s e l f . , i t s possible despair as well as i t s p o s s i b i l i t i e s : 1 Why go further? One might conceivably r e c t i f y the rhythm, study a l l out and a r r i v e at the pe r f e c t i o n of a t i g e r l i l y or a china doorknob. One might l i f t a l l out of the ruck, be a worthy successor to — the man i n the moon. Instead of breaking the back of a w i l l i n g phrase why not t r y to follow the wheel through — approach death at a walk, take i n a l l the scenery, There's as much reason one way as the other and then — one never k n o w s — perhaps we'll bring back Eurydice — th i s time,' Between two contending forces there may at a l l times arrive that moment when the stress is equal on both sides so that with a great pushing a great stability results giving a picture of perfect rest. And so it may be that once upon the way the end drives back upon the beginning and a stoppage w i l l occur. At such a time the poet shrinks from the doom that is calling him forgetting the delicate rhythms of perfect beauty, p r e f e r r i n g in his mind the gross buffetings of good and e v i l fortune. 2 Ay diol I would say so much were i t not for the tunes changing, changing, darting so many ways. One step and the cart's l e f t you sprawling. Here's the way! and — you're hip bogged. And there's blame of the l i g h t too: when eyes are humming birds who'11 t i e them with a lead string? But i t ' s the tunes they want most, — send them skipping out at the tree tops. Whistle then! who'd stop the leaves swarming; curving down the east i n t h e i r braided jackets? Well enough — but there's small comfort i n naked branches when the heart's not set that way. •A man'.s desire is to-winhis way to some hilltop. But against him seem to - swarm a hundred jumping devils. These are his constant companions, these are the friendly images which he has invented out of his mind and which are inviting him to rest and to disport himself according to hidden reasons. The man being half a poet is cast down and longs to r i d himself of his torment and his tormentors 3 When you hang your clothes on the l i n e you do not expect to see the l i n e broken and them t r a i l i n g i n the mud. Nor would you expect to keep your hands clean by putting them i n a d i r t y pocket. However and of course i f you are a market man, f i s h , cheeses and the l i k e going under your fingers every minute i n the hour you would not leave o f f the business and expect to handle a 137 basket of f i n e laces without at l e a s t mopping yourself on a towel, s o i l e d as i t may be. Then how w i l l you expect a f i n e t r i c k l e of words to follow you through the intimacies of t h i s dance without — oh, come l e t us walk together into the a i r awhile f i r s t . One must be watch-man to much secret arrogance before his ways are tuned to these measures. You see there i s a dip of the ground between us. You think you can leap up from your gross caresses of these creatures and at a gesture f l i n g i t a l l o f f and step out i n s i l v e r to my fin g e r t i p s . Ah, i t i s not that I do not wait f o r you, always! But my sweet fellow — you have broken yourself without pur-pose, you are — Hark! i t i s the music! Whence does i t come? What! Out of the ground? Is i t t h i s that you have been preparing f o r me? Ha, goodbye, I have a rendezvous i n the t i p s of three b i r c h s i s t e r s . Encourages vos musiciens! Ask them to play f a s t e r . I w i l l return — l a t e r . Ah you are kind. — and I? must dance with the wind, make my own snow f l a k e s , whistle a contrapuntal melody to my own fugue! Huzza then, t h i s i s the dance of the blue moss bank! Huzza then, t h i s i s the mazurka of the hollow log! Huzza then, t h i s i s the dance of r a i n i n the cold trees. (K, 32-34) "That which is past is past forever and no power of the imagination can bring i t back again" (K, 36): i n w r i t i n g , t h i s past could be the sub-j e c t i v i t y of the writer, the imposition of a preconceived perspective onto words used to "express" i t , and the r e s u l t i n g aesthetic form that s t r i v e s for the symmetrical neatness of balance and coherence, but at the expense of the experience of language, the actual words themselves i n the ear of the wr i t e r , i f he i s l i s t e n i n g , which do not conform to the regular (or regulated) patterns of aesthetic completion. The b i r d of the actual i s sl i p p e r y — i n t r a n s i t i o n , i n f l i g h t — l i k e the earth which i s constantly reversing stable orders: "laughs at the names / by which they think to trap i t . Escapes!" (P, 33). The caged b i r d i s no longer a b i r d but the ghost of one; the actual b i r d has escaped, or for the possessor, crumbled to nothing. I f i t i s so wily, though, how then, i f at a l l , can a writer match up to i t s movement i n time? "Why go fu r t h e r ? " Maybe there i s no s o l u t i o n , 2 3 8 no method, no way through.. D e s c r i p t i o n i s of no use, since i t o f f e r s a mere "copy" of that world, nor can the writer escape into an aesthetic transcendence by shaping the words, f o r c i n g them to comply with a w i l l e d pattern. Both methods simply r e f l e c t the p r i o r i t y of an int e n t i o n on the part of the writer that precedes the act of wr i t i n g . Neither way thus works — i n both the actual i s l o s t to a predetermined and hypothetical "past." "Instead of breaking the back of a w i l l i n g phrase," on the other hand, "why not t r y to follow the wheel through — approach death at a walk, take i n a l l the scenery." Who knows, "perhaps we'll bring back Eurydice — t h i s time!" Orpheus, we r e c a l l , was given a chance by Hades to r e t r i e v e Eurydice from the world of the dead, but with one condition: that he not look back before they both reach the surface of the earth. Orpheus, of course, could not r e s i s t the temptation to look back upon the beauty of Eurydice, and besides, he was a f r a i d that she might disappear. He thus got caught i n a double-bind — and he made the f a t a l gesture, looked back and l o s t Eurydice again. The gesture of 'looking back' — i n t h i s context, at le a s t — i s a retre a t from the d i f f i c u l t y of the present, f i g u r a t i v e l y a r e l i a n c e on the past, any past, even the moment before. As the image of Beauty, Eurydice must be revealed i n the present where nothing i s c e r t a i n , where "There's as much reason one way as the other." And here we r e c a l l Williams' words from The Great American Novel: There i s beauty i n the bellow of the BLAST, etc. from a l l previous s i g n i f i c a n c e . — To me beauty i s p u r i t y . To me i t i s discovery, a race on the ground. (GAN, 171) Eurydice cannot be dragged up from the dead. She must be discovered i n the immediacy of experience, anew. 139 A personal i n t e n t i o n p r i o r to the act of writing i s another such past, as i s any f i x e d perspective that imposes a form onto language. The words, a f t e r a l l , are " j u s t words." They cannot be expected to adjust to the mind. Or i f they are forced into a patterned conformity, they thereby lose t h e i r s u b s t a n t i a l i t y and become ghosts of themselves — and the world they embody disappears with them. In t h i s impasse, why not then simply l i s t e n to them i n a l l t h e i r indeterminacy? What i s to be l o s t anyway, any-thing i s better than a transcendence that i s nothing more, than a dependence on another time, that time, not " t h i s time." In any case, what i s the whole obsession for the completion of a decorous order — the rhythm r e c t i f i e d , an apparent " p e r f e c t i o n " achieved, the w r i t i n g l i f t e d out of the ruck — but a s t i f l i n g s t a s i s , the possession of a world.gone.dead.. Any such balance (a "perfection") must perforce be a r t i f i c i a l , out of time.''' Any such "picture of perfect rest" must be a "stoppage," a separation from the actual which never ceases to move i n time. At t h i s end of thought, so the voice says, the poet, for the s u r v i v a l of his mind, forgets "the delicate rhythms of perfect beauty, p r e f e r r i n g in his mind the gross buffetings of good and e v i l fortune." The "buffetings" — and "the tunes changing, changing., darting so "many ways," nothing secure and at attention, the actual constantly f o r c i n g the mind to s h i f t perspectives. "Here's the way! and — you're hip bogged." The actual i s that kind of dense wall, simply there, but i f i t i s that, i t s surface i s p r e c i s e l y what the mind desires, the "scene s h i f t i n g " i n "Improvisation XX.1," which transforms the same wall into the drama of experience: "Climb now? The wall's clipped o f f too, only i t s roots are l e f t " (K, 69). The eyes by nature wander, here there and everywhere; they are "humming b i r d s " that cannot be t i e d down by a "lead s t r i n g , " moving as they JL40 do from thing to thing as desire moves i n i t s search to a c t u a l i z e i t s e l f i n the world. No aesthetic forms can "stop the leaves swarming; curving down the east i n t h e i r braided jackets." I f w r i t i n g i s to work, i t must become an extension of t h i s movement. For the w r i t e r i n the second improvisation of "Improvisation I I , " however, t h i s kind of w r i t i n g remains at the l e v e l of p o s s i b i l i t y . As yet he has not figured h i s way through to a method that would enable him to step onto a moving cart. I t i s one thing to acknowledge the storm of the actual, but much more d i f f i c u l t f o r the "heart" to become i t i n . words, or as the voice says, "there's small comfort i n naked branches when the heart's not set that way." The greatest enemy to the f u l l release of desire i n writing — and this i s the tune the eyes "want most" — i s the mind i t s e l f , "the demon" that "drives us" (P_, 272) and an uncertain power that "can t r i c k us" (PB, 75) into s e t t l i n g f or much l e s s than what we desire. The i n t e r p r e t a t i o n to the second improvisation o f f e r s an exact diagnosis of the mind's l i m i t , the manner e s p e c i a l l y i n which i t constructs those subjective "images," r e f e r e n t i a l fronts for "hidden reasons" outside the work i t s e l f , to that extent, wholly s o l i p s i s t i c and determined by the w i l l of the w r i t e r , "invented out of his mind" alone. These are the same "friendly images" that i n v i t e him "to rest" i n an a r t i f i c i a l l y manufactured aesthetic order. I t i s t h i s t e m p t a t i o n — we noted i t i n our discussion of A Novelette — that the writer i n Kora at a l l cost, i f he i s to "win his way to some h i l l -top," knows he must r e s i s t . And not s u r p r i s i n g l y , out of the pressure of t h i s necessity, the t h i r d 141 improvisation — and t h i s i s a basic s t r u c t u r a l pattern underlying a l l the improvisations i n Kora — attempts to provide some means of escaping that temptation through the act of w r i t i n g . The whole e f f o r t here i s a play on language i n which w r i t i n g continually c a l l s attention to i t s own processes. And the writ e r maintains t h i s play without foregoing i t s tension i n favour of an a u t h o r i a l stance wherein language i s used to further a given f i x e d perspective. In f a c t , the w r i t i n g s p e c i f i c a l l y undermines that stance. It i s i n t h i s context that the r i d d l i n g voice i n the improvisation begins to speak: When you hang your clothes on the l i n e you do not expect to see the l i n e broken and them t r a i l i n g i n the mud. Nor would you expect to keep your hands clean by putting them i n a d i r t y pocket. However and of course i f you are a market man, f i s h , cheeses and the l i k e going under your fingers every minute i n the hour you would not leave o f f the business and expect to handle a basket of f i n e laces without at l e a s t mopping yourself on a towel, s o i l e d as i t may be. Talk for tal k ' s sake? Or language for language's sake? In any case, c e r t a i n l y not the grammar of predictable expectations. The w r i t i n g here mocks the assumption that language can be used as a transparent v e h i c l e through which the mind constructs a discu r s i v e order, but not without l o s i n g a contrary assumption: that the play of language can disrupt the mind's f i x i t i e s by disturbing the language forms i n which that order i s fabricated. In the opening l i n e s of t h i s improvisation, as i n the opening set of improvisations to Kora, we have the s h e l l of a r h e t o r i c a l structure, simply the s h e l l alone. Inside, there i s a vo i c e . A b i r d i n a cage. And t h i s voice i n i t s . r i d d l i n g manner p l a y f u l l y mimics the a r t i f i c i a l i t y of language forms used for l o g i c a l ends. Of course, we do not expect to see our clothes " t r a i l i n g i n the-mud," Nor do we expect , , . etc. The f o o l ' s 142 voice mocks a discursiveness that i s i t s own l i m i t : "However and of course," a q u a l i f i c a t i o n immediately -undermined by an as s e r t i o n , these two forms of making statements clashing one against the other. In other words, the voice blasts the pretentiousness of any attempt to impose the s t a t i c form of l o g i c onto a world whose a c t u a l i t y r e s i s t s that kind of p u r i t y . Clothes do break a l i n e . Hands do get " d i r t y . " And " f i n e l a c e s " do get " s o i l e d " by use. As do words. They turn up unexpectedly, or up unexpected roads; they d i s c l o s e i r r e g u l a r i t i e s that no recourse to l o g i c can tame. Better then, i n t h i s impasse, to clear the mind of i t s "secret arrogance," as i f i t could r e a l l y f a b r i c a t e (out of a " t r i c k l e of words") an order invulnerable to change. Any order so constructed would be nothing more than a f i x e d per-spective, an i l l u s i o n constituted s o l e l y on i t s divorce from the actual. The d i f f i c u l t y , then, i s not to transcend p a r t i c u l a r s , but to move with them, which demands that a writer release himself to what i s outside h i s own c o n t r o l . The "dip of the ground," for instance. So i t i s that the voice addresses a "you," but even here the r e l a t i o n -ship between the speaking " I " and the addressed "you" i s confused, the one becoming the other as the w r i t i n g plays back on i t s e l f and begins to expose i t s own emptiness. The w r i t i n g , i n t h i s sense, turns back on the w r i t e r : Ah, i t i s not that I do not wait for you, always! But my sweet fellow — you have broken yourself without purpose, you are — The gap at the end of "you are — " i s l e f t as a gap. The w r i t i n g has come to an end, perhaps even a dead-end. That i s , t a l k f o r t a l k ' s sake can i n i t i a t e the drama of speech, yet there i s s t i l l a l i m i t to what words can be expected to do, even f o r the f o o l who loves to play with them. The in t e n t i o n to escape the use of words f o r l o g i c a l purposes i s well enough, .143 but to what end does t h i s i n t e n t i o n operate? The dialogue (pr -monologue of a writer who i s s p l i t i nto two by his own doubletalk) here i s broken by the i n t r u s i o n of music, the sound of something that comes from outside the word-play which momentarily exhausts i t s e l f . And as t h i s occurs, the voice finds i t s e l f being acted upon by the "you" that i t i n i t i a l l y addressed. The r e l a t i o n s h i p has reversed i t s e l f . The music that enters the w r i t i n g comes from a "you" that i s other than the " I . " In other words, the w r i t e r i s now being drawn out of himself by the w r i t i n g , and his attention s h i f t s accordingly. The improvisation thus moves by s h i f t s and leaps toward the p o s s i b i l i t y of a more authentic dance i n words, not word-play i n and for i t s e l f , which i s r e a l l y only another form of closure, but word-play that allows for the i n t r u s i o n of an actual world. " — and I?" says the w r i t e r — as i f to intimate that the " I " of the writer i s both a one and an other, and that i t i s t h i s tension that w r i t i n g must somehow maintain. In the f i n a l l i n e s of the improvisation, we notice that the doubleness of the " I " leaving and the " I " returning, and the doubleness of the "You" desired and the "You" l e f t behind, i s maintained. The w r i t i n g i t s e l f has brought the w r i t e r to t h i s c r i s i s , f o r i t i s here that the mind i s thrown back into a world that reveals a ground more primary to i t s desires. And thus the p o s s i b i l i t y of the dance begins: — and I? must dance with the wind, make my own snow fla k e s , whistle a contrapuntal melody to my own fugue! Huzza then, t h i s i s the dance of the blue moss bank! Huzza then, t h i s i s the mazurka of the hollow l o g ! Huzza then, t h i s i s the dance of r a i n i n the cold trees. In a way, t h i s one improvisation acts as a kind of prototype for a l l 144 the improvisations i n Kora, p a r t i c u l a r l y i n ..its e f f e c t . The .writing: consis-t e n t l y c a l l s a ttention to i t s own processes i n the time of the composition. The writer (and the reader!) within the w r i t i n g finds himself caught up i n the o b j e c t i v i t y of language, i t s a c t u a l i t y . And i n each case, he begins to discover that w r i t i n g , to be actual, must work toward a loosening of attention, a loosening experienced as a c r i s i s within which a substantial world breaks i n to declare i t s otherness. The event of t h i s c r i s i s — we have c a l l e d i t a confusion (a mixing together) — conditions the e f f e c t of the w r i t i n g that comes of i t . In h i s "Prologue" .to Kora, i t i s s i g n i f i c a n t that Williams comes to t a l k about the "broken" nature of h i s w r i t i n g i n order thus to r e t r i e v e i t s value as such. What he sets down c l a r i f i e s our experience of reading Kora so f a r . "By the brokenness of h i s composition," Williams says, the poet makes himself master of a c e r t a i n weapon which he could possess himself of i n no other way. The speed of the emotions i s sometimes such that thrashing about i n a thi n e x a l t a t i o n or despair many matters are touched but not held, more often broken by the contact. I I . No. 3. The i n s t a b i l i t y of these improvisations would seem such that they must i n e v i t a b l y crumble under the attention and become p a r t i c l e s of a wind that f a l t e r s . I t would appear to the unready that the f i b e r of the thing i s a t h i n j e l l y . I t would be these same foo l s who would deny tough cords to the wind because they cannot s p l i t a storm endwise and wrap i t upon spools. The v i r t u e of strength l i e s not i n the grossness of the f i b e r but i n the f i b e r i t s e l f . Thus a poem i s tough by no q u a l i t y i t borrows from a l o g i c a l r e c i t a l of events nor from the events themselves but s o l e l y from that attenuated power which draws perhaps many broken things into a dance giving them thus a f u l l being. (K, 16-17) Williams t a l k s about the speed of the emotions i n t h i s passage, and then himself attempts to enact the kind of thinking process which matches that speed. The w r i t i n g here states, to be sure, but i t does so by holding to a complexity of experience, the attention r i d i n g the syntax without 145 allowing the thought to resolve i t s e l f i n t o a s i m p l i s t i c completion. The mind within the w r i t i n g i s a l i v e to those d i s t i n c t i o n s without which com-p l e x i t y would be impossible. The language i n s i s t s upon remaining on the heel of i t s own resources. Not the closed syntax of l o g i c , but the move-ment Williams recognizes i n Gertrude Stein. The syntax unfolds as the mind thinks i t s way through. How else to describe a l i n e such as the open-ing i n which the spaces of t h i s pacing can be heard, however subtly: "By the brokenness of h i s composition the poet makes himself master of a c e r t a i n weapon which he could possess himself of" — perhaps somewhat awkward sounding, but a d i s t i n c t i o n i s held — " i n no other way." The unnamed " c e r t a i n weapon" i s l e f t unnamed, but the sentence makes clear that i t comes to the poet through the "brokenness of h i s composition" where incompletion i s an operation, not a dead-end, as i t very well might be had the "goal" been that df l o g i c a l thought. The writ e r of t h i s piece values d i s t i n c t i o n s — Marianne Moore points to t h i s q u a l i t y of Williams' mind i n 2 her review of Kora — at the same time that he knows how i n c r e d i b l y d i f f i -c u l t i t i s to catch the evanescence of experience. To the "unready," however, those who refuse, or cannot step into the condition of indeterminacy, the kind of w r i t i n g that composes i t s e l f as i t goes must i n e v i t a b l y escape them. They may assume that the absence of l o g i c a l i t y , or the presence of co n t r a d i c t i o n , i s a weakness absolving them from the further r e s p o n s i b i l i t y of the w r i t i n g , possibly concluding that i t i s nothing more than a " t h i n j e l l y . " They miss the point altogether, since such w r i t i n g does not depend f o r i t s l i v e l i h o o d upon the sort of r e f e r e n t i a l order they expect of i t , Williams says that the strength of "a poem" ( i . e . any piece of writing) i s not derived from i t s l o g i c a l i t y or by i t s d e s c r i p t i o n of some event, both of which are preconceived ends outside the 146 text, but i n the composing process i t s e l f where, he w i l l say much l a t e r , the "mind / l i v e s " (PB, 75) ( i t a l i c s added), Readers who r e j e c t the improvisations for t h e i r " i n s t a b i l i t y " are the "same f o o l s who would deny tough cords to the wind because they cannot s p l i t a storm endwise and wrap i t upon spools." Anything with texture — a piece of w r i t i n g , a storm, a painting, a tapestry, a flower, a drawing, what you w i l l — should be valued for i t s o b j e c t i v i t y , and not f o r the d i s c u r s i v e s i g n i f i c a n c e of i t s s o - c a l l e d "content": to Williams, a term that d i s t o r t s and so misplaces the more immediate function of w r i t i n g as an act. The "virtue of strength" i n w r i t i n g does not l i e i n the "grossness of the f i b e r " — what the w r i t i n g says — "but i n the f i b e r i t s e l f " — the w r i t i n g i t s e l f . Here the mind i s released to a movement "which draws perhaps many broken things into a dance giving them a f u l l being," the things i n t h e i r p a r t i c u l a r i t y thus revealed to be a l i v e , j u s t t h i s . Closed perceptions, on the other hand, freeze those same things into f i x e d perspectives. This i s the point of stoppage, so Williams says elsewhere i n his "Prologue," which the w r i t e r , " i n desperation" (K, 17) sometimes, must work against. Loosening the attention makes i t active once again. "Out! and the s t i n g of the t h i c k e t ! " (K, 60). Here the drawing by Stuart Davis, which Williams used as a f r o n t i s -piece for Kora, takes on a much larger s i g n i f i c a n c e than i s at f i r s t apparent. The c r i s i s of l i n e a r perspective i n the drawing mirrors exactly the c r i s i s of language i n Williams' w r i t i n g . The opacity of w r i t i n g comes from the opacity of language, i t s medium. The words escape a use which, r e f e r e n t i a l , would point to a perspective outside t h e i r own a c t u a l i t y as words. In the same way, Davis' drawing c a l l s a t tention to i t s own texture, and by so doing, disrupts the closure of l i n e a r perspective. The p r i n t , i n short, 147 enacts the texture of Kora, and thus confirms and enlarges the t h e o r e t i c a l basis of Williams' attack on a given " f i x e d point of view" i n his "Prologue." 148 CHAPTER SIX THE FRONTISPIECE? Perspective ("to see through") hinges on the determination of a number of parts (these parts were once things) which form a whole (an order) when organized around a f i x e d point of view. And "view" i s the key term. In art — the a r t of p i c t u r i n g objects or a scene i n such a way as to show them as they appear to the eye with reference to r e l a t i v e distance or depth (OED), or i n thought — the r e l a t i o n s h i p or proportion of the parts of a whole, regarded from a p a r t i c u l a r standpoint or point i n time. (OED) Perspective thus r e l i e s on a given view around which "the parts of a whole" adjust themselves into a h i e r a r c h i c s t a s i s . In t h i s arrangement, things lose t h e i r p a r t i c u l a r i t y and are made transparent to a subsuming order. What we are dealing with, then, i s a method or a way of apparently seeing through things. Stated even more simply, perspective as such i s nothing more than a " t r i c k " (K, 53) of the mind, f o r the f o o l of a w r i t e r i n Kora, a form which i s the very model of a mental construct based upon a denial of 149 process. Maurice Merleau-Ponty i n Signs o f f e r s as precise an account as any of the way p e r s p e c t i v a l form achieves t h i s a r t i f i c i a l , hence i l l u s o r y closure. Since experience i s an open-ended process i n which no assumed perspective i s n e c e s s a r i l y more important than another, the -view of the world given through " c l a s s i c a l perspective" i s merely "one of the ways that man has invented for p r o j e c t i n g the perceived world before him." Linear perspective i s a construct with definable l i m i t s — an optional i n t e r p r e t a t i o n of spontaneous v i s i o n , not because the perceived world contradicts the laws of c l a s s i c a l perspective and imposes others, but rather because i t does not i n s i s t upon any one and i s not of the order of laws.l 2 In what Merleau-Ponty c a l l s "free perception" (simply what happens i n experience), we are f i e l d e d by many things a c t i n g on us simultaneously. At one time we may focus on one thing, but we c a n — as we do — quite e a s i l y s h i f t our a t t e n t i o n to another thing, not over there, but here, or to the side, or behind us. And so on and so f o r t h . As we move i n t h i s f i e l d — and we cannot help but move because we are a l i v e — then a l l these d i r e c t i o n s change accordingly. Any number of objects can come into per-spective momentarily and then disappear as another and s t i l l another and s t i l l another draws our attention. In the f i e l d of experience a l l objects are p o t e n t i a l l y equal. Or p o t e n t i a l equally, since everything i s contingent. But i f we reverse the process and allow our minds to r e t r e a t from t h i s f i e l d and assume the f i x i t y of a perspective — here i s what Merleau-Ponty has to say about the nature of t h i s withdrawal: Then I " i n free perception " J I had the experience of a world of teeming, exclusive things which could be taken i n only by means of a temporal c y c l e i n which each gain was at the same time a l o s s . Now the inexhaustible being 150 c r y s t a l l i z e s into an ordered perspective within which backgrounds resign themselves to being only backgrounds (inaccessible and vague as i s proper), and objects i n the foreground abandon something of their aggressiveness, order the i r i n t e r i o r l i n e s according to the common law of the spectacle, and already prepare themselves to become backgrounds as soon as i t i s necessary, A perspective, i n short, within which nothing holds my glance and takes the shape of a present. The whole scene i s i n the mode of the completed or of eternity. Everything takes on an a i r of propriety and discretion. Things no • longer v e a l l upon me to answer, and I am no longer compromised by them. And i f I add the a r t i f i c e of a e r i a l perspective to t h i s one, the extent to which I who paint and they who look at my land-scape dominate the situ a t i o n i s readily f e l t . Perspec-tiv e i s much more than a secret technique for imitating a r e a l i t y given as such to a l l men. I t i s the invention of a world which i s dominated and possessed through and through i n an instantaneous synthesis which i s at best roughed out by our glance when i t vainly t r i e s to hold together a l l these things seeking i n d i v i d u a l l y to mono-polize i t . The faces of the c l a s s i c a l p o r t r a i t , always i n the service of a character, a passion, or a love — always si g n i f y i n g — or the babies and animals of the c l a s s i c a l painting, so desirous to enter the human world and so l i t t l e anxious to reject i t , manifest the same "adult" r e l a t i o n of man to the world, except when, giving in:to his fortunate daemon, the great painter adds a new dimension to th i s world too sure of i t s e l f by making contingency vibrate within i t . ^ Merleau-Ponty's statement provides a basis for Williams' attachment to those a r t i s t s , Cezanne and Braque for instance (A, 240), who showed the way through to the destruction of a "world too sure of i t s e l f , " a world "dominated and possessed through and through" by the conventional habit of judging the value of art according to the extent that i t f a i t h f u l l y "copied" a so-called ".reality" outside the frame of a painting. The Hartpence story which he "t o l d many times" (A, 240) signals the end of representational form and the beginning of a modernist movement i n art comparable to the modernist movement i n w r i t i n g . The story i s well-known, but i t deserves to be re-told i n this context. I t stuck i n Williams' mind as a turning point 151 for him, as he writes i n h i s Autobiography: Alanson Hartpence was employed at the Daniel Gallery, One day, the proprietor being out, Hartpence was i n charge. In walked one of t h e i r most important customers, a woman i n her f i f t i e s who was much int e r e s t e d i n some picture whose i d e n t i t y I may at one time have known. She l i k e d i t , and-seemed about to make the purchase, walked away from i t , approached i t and said, f i n a l l y , "But Hr. Hartpence, what i s a l l that down i n t h i s l e f t hand lower corner?" Hartpence came up close and c a r e f u l l y inspected the area mentioned. Then, a f t e r further consideration, "That, Madam," said he, " i s p a i n t . " (A, 240) Williams then goes on to t a l k about the s i g n i f i c a n c e of t h i s humourous event: This story marks the exact point i n the t r a n s i t i o n that took place, i n the world of that time, from the appreci-ation of a work of art as a copying of nature to the thought of i t as the i m i t a t i o n of nature, spoken of by A r i s t o t l e i n h i s Poetics, which has since governed our conceptions. It i s s t i l l the f a i l u r e to take this step that blocks us i n seeking to gain a f u l l conception of the modern i n a r t . In painting Cezanne i s the f i r s t consciously to have taken that step. From him i t went on, often by nothing more than the v i s a_ tergo, rushing through the gap where the dyke has been broken. But with such a man as Braque i t had basic s i g n i f i c a n c e . Braque i s said to have taken his pictures outdoors, on occasion, to see i f t h e i r invention ranked beside that of nature worthily enough f o r him to approve of i t . (A, 240-241) Of the writers who made t h i s "step" i n w r i t i n g , Gertrude Stein comes r e a d i l y to Williams' mind: "Gertrude Stein found the key with her conception of the objective use of words" (A, 241). In both a r t and w r i t i n g , the medium of the work i s experienced as an a c t u a l i t y : how we perceive alongside what we perceive. Marcel Duchamp's Nude Descending the Staircase, No. 2 (1912), exhibited at the Armory Show i n 1913, i s exemplary i n t h i s sense, Duchamp simply does what Merleau-Ponty c a l l s f o r ; he makes "contingency v i b r a t e within" his 152 painting. The s t a t i c "nude" of representational art suddenly begins to move. She walks down a s t a i r c a s e , and i n t h i s turnabout, the conventional order of three-dimensional perspective Is set upside-down, to be sure, a f o o l ' s gesture i n an art world that had, f o r Duchamp, gone dead. Further, the s o - c a l l e d "nude" that comes down into another world has shed a l l her "propriety" to become a s o l i d mass of blurred l i n e s , a wall of confusion. The once frozen object possessed through perspective now asserts i t s own a c t u a l i t y i n time. Like Williams' w r i t i n g i n Kora, Duchamp's painting illuminates i n i t s very structure a c r i s i s , an older world giving way to the i n s i s t e n t force of movement. This i s e s s e n t i a l l y what Duchamp i n retrospect says about the e f f e c t of h i s Nude. In an interview with P i e r r e Cabanne, he answers the question: "How did that painting o r i g i n a t e ? " In the nude i t s e l f . To do a nude d i f f e r e n t from the c l a s s i c r e c l i n i n g or standing nude, and to put i t i n motion. There was something funny there, but i t wasn't at a l l funny when I d i d i t . Movement appeared l i k e an argument to make me decide to do i t . In the "Nude Descending a St a i r c a s e , " I wanted to create a s t a t i c image of movement: movement i s an abstac-t i o n , a deduction a r t i c u l a t e d within the painting, without our knowing i f a r e a l person i s or i s n ' t descend-ing an equally r e a l s t a i r c a s e . Fundamentally, movement i s i n the eye of the spectator, who incorporates i t into the painting.4 Perspective allows the viewer to maintain the r o l e of observer, un-attached to the painting i t s e l f as painting-being-perceived. And more p e c u l i a r l y , i n a p o r t r a i t of the t r a d i t i o n a l r e c l i n i n g or standing nude, the viewer becomes a kind of 'peeping-tom' who looks over the a r t i s t ' s shoulder but without himself being seen. The spectator, i n t h i s r e l a t i o n to the painting, takes pleasure i n what he sees, but without taking any r i s k s . P e r s pectival art thus encourages the viewer to remove himself from time, to remain f i x e d i n 15.3 a moment out of time i n the "etexnity" of closure where everything i s s e l f -r e f e r e n t i a l , removed from, what i s contingent, In t h i s way, i t does what Merleau-Ponty says i t does: "invents a world" divorced from the immediacy of experience•in time. By simply having h i s "nude" assume movement, Duchamp throws a wrench into that world and so provokes a c r i s i s . His painting becomes opaque — the Cubist concern with surfaces — and as i t does, the once " s t i l l l i f e " of representational form i s s p l i t apart from the i n s i d e . The viewer, formerly an observer i s i n turn made suddenly aware of the i l l u s i o n of pe r s p e c t i v a l forms, but more importantly, he experiences i t s de-composition. Duchamp, however, as Arturo Schwartz says i n Marcel Duchamp, did not revert to the " F u t u r i s t ' s attempts to create the i l l u s i o n of movement."5 His mind worked d i f f e r e n t l y , and l i k e Williams i n Kora, he was much more intent upon f i g u r i n g h i s way out of the closure i n the very medium of h i s painting. In other words, he l e t h i s mind play against perspective from within, and so dissected i t s l i m i t , allowing movement to "appear l i k e an argument" to have i t s own way i n the painting. Thus h i s desire "to create," what he c a l l s , "a s t a t i c image of movement." This i s the c r i s i s out of which, or because of which, we might say, h i s "nude" has no other choice but to come down, to "descend" and assume the "movement of form i n time." And i t i s t h i s breakage of p e r s p e c t i v a l form that draws the viewer into the dynamic of the painting. P a r t i c i p a t i n g i n the creation of i t s movement, he i s no longer merely a spectator who sees without being seen. Or as Duchamp puts i t , "Fundamentally, movement i s i n the eye of the spectator, who incorporates i t into the p a i n t i n g . " The dadaist humour of the painting, e s p e c i a l l y i n the c r i s i s of the spectator a f f e c t e d , i s a " r i e n , " an attack on a l l forms 154 of preconception (impressionistic views of movement included) that remove the mind from i t s s i t u a t i o n i n a l i v e world. For Duchamp, i n any case, the " r i e n " b u i l t into h i s Nude signals the h i s t o r i c end of that numbing habit of mind. The Nude Descending a Staircase, No. 2^ had a tremendous l i b e r a t i n g e f f e c t on Williams when he f i r s t saw i t at the Armory Show. His memory of th i s major event comes through sharply i n "Recollections," p a r t i c u l a r l y the i n i t i a l e f f e c t of the Nude on h i s mind: In P a r i s , painters from Cezanne to Pisarro had been painting t h e i r revolutionary canvases f o r f i f t y or more years but i t was not u n t i l I clapped my eyes on Marcel Duchamp's Nude Descending a. Staircase .that I burst out laughing from the r e l i e f i t brought me! I f e l t as i f an enormous weight had been l i f t e d from my s p i r i t f o r which I was i n f i n i t e l y g r a t e f u l . ^ As we have already sa i d , by having h i s Nude become a "movement of form i n time," Duchamp reverses the i l l u s i o n of representational form and brings the viewer, now l e s s an observer and more a p a r t i c i p a n t i n the drama of "descent," face to face with the a c t u a l i t y of the medium i t s e l f , the two-dimensional and opaque space of the canvas where a three-dimensional form once invented "a world" from.a fixed point of view. The painting thus enacts a s i m i l a r c r i s i s of mind i n the world of art as Kora does i n the realm of wr i t i n g . The moment of clapping h i s eyes on i t brought home to Williams something unnamed but which he i n t u i t i v e l y knew could be of c r u c i a l s i g n i f i c a n c e to him as a wri t e r . In Duchamp's work, there was further evidence that "modernism" was now being created, the pioneering work of Cezanne, i n th i s sense, f i n a l l y coming home to roost. An "enormous weight had been l i f t e d from my s p i r i t , " The destruction of the i l l u s i o n of pe r s p e c t i v a l form was comparable to those modernist writers — l i k e Joyce, Stein, and Williams 155 himself i n Kora — who d i s p e l l e d the i l l u s i o n of aesthetic forms that make language transparent to an order separated from the immediacy of w r i t i n g as an act i n words. We r e c a l l the section i n h i s Autobiography where Williams affirms t h i s important t i e between the writers and the a r t i s t s i n the early part of the century. Again with the Hartpence story i n mind, he writes: It i s the making of that step, to come over into the t a c t i l e q u a l i t i e s , the words themselves beyond the mere thought expressed that distinguishes the modern, or distinguished the modern of that time from the period before the turn of the century. And i t i s the reason why painting and the poem became so c l o s e l y a l l i e d at that time. I t was the work of the painters following Cezanne and the Impressionists that, c r i t i c a l l y , opened up the age of Stein, Joyce and a good many others. I t i s i n the taking of that step over from f e e l i n g to the imaginative object, on the c l o t h , on the page, that defined the term, the modern term — a work of a r t , what i t meant to them. It i s a step that must take place i n s i d e the mind before the concept, l i k e an egg, can be l a i d . I t i s to play . . . not f a l l i n among the s t r i n g s . That's where i t begins. As Ed, my brother, once quoted some Frenchman as saying "L*architecture, c'est poser un c a i l l o u sur un autre." This i s a hard climb —• i t was for me — a hard thing to accomplish, but i t i s that which must be accomplished before sentimentality can be abolished and the thing i t s e l f emerge, l i b e r a t i n g the man. (A, 380-381) The word must not freeze. No doubt Williams was surprised, and no doubt delighted, to come upon, we assume a c c i d e n t a l l y , the drawing by Stuart Davis that he included as a f r o n t i s p i e c e i n the f i r s t e d i t i o n of Kora. The f r o n t i s p i e c e ? I had seen a drawing by Stuart Davis, a young a r t i s t I had never met, which I wanted reproduced i n my book because i t was as close as possible to my idea of the Improvisations. (IW, 29) And he wanted i t "reproduced" f o r very good reason, because the drawing, Note: The drawing by Stuart Davis on page 156 of this d i s s e r t a t i o n was o r i g i n a l l y printed i n William Carlos Williams' Kora in H e l l : Improvisations (Boston: The Four Seas Company, 1920). I t was used by Williams as a f r o n t i s p i e c e . 156 157 l i k e the w r i t i n g i n Kora, plays with the notion of perspective and enacts that play i n i t s structure, an accomplishment Williams would have whole-heartedly supported during the period he wrote Kora. Davis' p r i n t would have been unmistakable evidence that an a r t i s t , an American a r t i s t , one l i v i n g not f a r from Rutherford at that, i n Gloucester, had experienced the same s h i f t i n consciousness that he had undergone by w r i t i n g the Improvisations. The analogy was exact: " I t was, g r a p h i c a l l y , exactly what I was t r y i n g to do i n words, put the Improvisations down as a u n i t on the page" (IW, 29). We f i r s t glance at the drawing and notice two figures clothed i n black. They look l i k e p r i e s t s , p o s s i b l y out f o r a walk, perhaps conversing about some deep r e l i g i o u s matter. They could be themselves caught i n a frame of mind, outside the context through which they are at the moment passing, self-enclosed, l o s t i n meditation. Or the heavy weight they place on the drawing could be deceptive. The figure on the l e f t appears to be looking down at something on the ground i n front of him. He could be pointing to an edge, a "dip" i n the ground. A ditch? And yet a l l of t h i s f i g u r i n g on our part i s tentative. Our eyes l a n d ' i n i t i a l l y on the two figures because they appear to be c e n t r a l to the drawing, or more c o r r e c t l y , the foreground around which the various parts of the drawing cohere. And t h e i r blackness i n contrast to the r e s t of the drawing, as well as t h e i r " r e l a t i v e l y " large s i z e , separates them from t h e i r context. Behind them, i n what now appears to be a distance, we can see a motion-l e s s horse and wagon i n front of a carpenter's shop. And s t i l l further behind, a c l u s t e r of houses, the roofs of them covered with e l e c t r i c i t y poles, possibly the town out of which the two figures have j u s t walked. A 158 peaceful enough "scene" i n an ordinary day. Everything seems quite common-place. And t h i s sense of things i s r e i n f o r c e d when our eyes turn to the l e f t of the two figures where a woman with her back to us i s caught i n the act of hanging out her clothes i n her backyard, behind her a c l u s t e r of what appear to be sunflower plants, a whole profusion of them growing almost w i l d l y , i n fact covering quite a large space of the drawing. To her l e f t , a kind of ramshackle house, i t s chimney shooting up toward the left-hand corner of the drawing where we can j u s t make out — i n r e l a t i o n to the two figures, they appear to be quite distant — another group of houses sunken into a meadow-like space. And behind these houses, the landscape widens out to the h i l l s which suggest the "horizon" of the whole scene. But i t i s an horizon confined to a corner of the drawing, separated as i t i s from the right-hand corner where there are more b u i l d i n g s . They look l i k e f a c t o r i e s . By t h i s time, i n any case, we begin to envision what could very well be a "view," a number of things drawn together through t h e i r " r e l a t i v e " distances from one another i n the space of the drawing. As viewers, then, we must be standing on a h i l l , from which point we watch the two dark figures approaching. And our own distance from them gives us an advantage over them, mainly because we can share the a r t i s t ' s own panoramic view of the whole scene at once. We thus share h i s perspective. We might rest content i n this, assumption and now simply turn away from the drawing, having taken a viewer's pleasure i n i t , i f i t were not f o r the two figures themselves. On second glance, they seem unusually large and overbearing. And why are they so dark? They stand out from the scene too much. They.demand — or possibly, absorb i s more to the p o i n t — our attention. And as we sin g l e them out, we suddenly begin to pick up d e t a i l s 159 i n the drawing that escaped us when we f i r s t took i n the scene as a "whole." We look at the ground they are walking on and r e a l i z e that they are almost on the verge of stepping over a small but empty, non-representational space, an abstract space made by the a r t i s t with a few s t r a i g h t l i n e s . And what had appeared to be a fence a b i t ahead of them now looks f l a t on the page as i t almost veers o f f in t o the lower left-hand corner of the drawing. Now other d e t a i l s surrounding the two figures begin to intrude on our i n i t i a l perceptions.. The ground they are walking on i s , i n f a c t , drawn on the same plane as the horse and cart i n what formerly seemed to be a background. That background, we discover, i s r e a l l y nothing more than an i l l u s i o n , simply an a r t i s t ' s t r i c k . And what i s that t a l l b u i l d i n g i n the center of the upper h a l f of the drawing, which separates l i k e a b a r r i e r the l e f t and right-hand corners? I t s t r a i n s to become a foreground even though i t appears to be a part of the background. Is i t a cathedral? Or j u s t a t a l l b u i l d i n g s t r a i n i n g to reach outside the l i m i t s of the drawing? I t assumes a c e n t r a l i t y i n the upper h a l f of the drawing and c a l l s a ttention to i t s e l f , but for no apparent reason. It i s simply there — an empty bui l d i n g with a tower-like front f i v e s t o r i e s high. And i n i t s vacancy, i t somehow r e s i s t s a s i m p l i s t i c representational i n t e r p r e t a t i o n of i t . Rather, i t s looming s i z e seems to undermine the neatness of the rest of the scene. By t h i s time, we also notice that both c l u s t e r s of buildings i n the upper l e f t and right-hand corners of the drawing are not r e a l l y i n the "distance." They only appeared to be because they were on the upper h a l f of the paper on which the drawing was drawn. Otherwise, there are only those dark s c r i b b l e d l i n e s separating them from the lower h a l f of the drawing. 160 And f i n a l l y , a l i t t l e to the l e f t and below the large v e r t i c a l structure that has the semblance of a cathedral, two dogs, bloodhounds, are jumping over what must — i f the l o g i c of the "scene" i s to hold — be bushes. Except that these bushes, which would be i n front of the woman hanging clothes, are also f l a t on the page, only more so, as i f the a r t i s t i n t h i s section of the drawing allowed himself to indulge i n the act of drawing. These dogs may be jumping — as dogs do — over a series of bushes, but these bushes i n t h e i r v e r t i c a l i t y form a c e r t a i n pattern that resembles a wall made with l i n e s on paper. And these dogs, i n the absence of perspective i n t h i s space of the drawing, are thus allowed to move i n a play-f u l space. In d i r e c t contrast to the heavy earth-bound texture of the two dark f i g u r e s , the two dogs, t h e i r counterparts i n the drawing, are l i g h t i n both colour and weight. Moreover, t h e i r c i r c u l a r i t y plays against the l i n e a r i t y of the two p r i e s t l y f i g u r e s . One of the dogs turns upward and the other downward. They are, i n t h i s sense, figures of movement i n an other-wise " s t i l l l i f e " scene, within which, now, the two dark figures seem stopped on an edge at a point of s t a s i s . The dogs, on the other hand, move i n an open space, one that i s not determined by a given f i x e d point of view. Davis thus manages, through h i s drawing, to create a tension between the two-dimensionality of the page and the three-dimensionality of l i n e a r perspective, which we, as viewers, experience only by p a r t i c i p a t i n g i n the movement of the drawing. Step away from i t , and we are back on the h i l l as observers overlooking the scene. Step i n t o the drawing as a drawing, that i s to say, an act on the part of the a r t i s t , and we are drawn into the drama df that act. In the drawing, i n other words, Davis reveals himself to be the f o o l of an a r t i s t , l i k e the f o o l of the w r i t e r i i i Kora who enacts 161 the drama of w r i t i n g i n the words themselves. And the empty, c a t h e d r a l - l i k e form i n the drawing — i s t h i s , then, the doubletalk of an a r t i s t ? A world of meaning emptied of substance, an obsolete form no longer of use? A l l the windows are out, and outside there are the moving dogs, creatures who play because i t i s t h e i r nature to do so. Are the two dark figures also playing? Or are they as serious as they appear? Where are they going? Who are they? Assume the p o s i t i o n of the f o o l i s h dogs, and they suddenly become i n t r u s i v e . Somehow, now, they do not belong. And so we go on — one ambiguity revealing another and s t i l l another. Besides, of course, there i s the "dip" i n the road, not r e a l l y a "dip," more s p e c i f i c a l l y a gap i n the drawing, black l i n e s coming to two points. The drawing i s thus vibrant with unresolved tensions, very much the same a c t i v i t y as i n the w r i t i n g of Kora. The shock of recognition must have been almost instantaneous, for Williams a breath of f r e s h a i r . Davis l i v e d i n Gloucester, and the m a t e r i a l of his drawing was l o c a l to Williams' own, no distance there. The small town surrounded by h i l l s , the growing presence of i n d u s t r i a l smoke, clothes hanging out i n a fenced yard. In Kora, too, we f i n d that "long unbroken l i n e of the h i l l s there" (K, 44), the " d i r t and fumes" (K, 61) of industry, and "Improvisation II.3," as we have seen, opens with the image of "clothes on the l i n e " (K, 33). Even the two figures i n the drawing resemble the two voices i n the improvisation who take a walk i n the " a i r " of the place surrounding them, a "dip" i n the road before them. And the dogs juxtaposed against the two figures i n the space of the drawing, caught i n the moment of 162 leaping — the writ e r i n Kora also talks about dogs: "Or i f dogs rub too close and the poor are too much out l e t your f r i e n d answer them" (K, 53). Williams must have seen immediately that Davis' p r i n t emerges from the same context of h i s own present i n Kora. Here was an image of small-town America i n the early years of the century brought to that moment when a "new" age — c a l l i t "modernism" — i s j u s t about ready to burst i n upon i t . And the large c a t h e d r a l - l i k e b u i l d i n g , i s t h i s then the image of an " o l d " world whose forms have now become emptied of substance? In any case, the c r i s i s of l i n e a r perspective i n the drawing does mirror a s i m i l a r c r i s i s of meaning i n the w r i t i n g of Kora. And that Davis manages to a c t u a l i z e t h i s drama i n the act of drawing, j u s t as Williams had done i n w r i t i n g Kora, t h i s f a c t alone would have made Davis a companion to Williams' own desire to place, as he says Stein does, w r i t i n g on a plane where i t may deal unhampered with i t s own a f f a i r s , unburdened with s c i e n t i f i c and philosophic lumber. (AN, 349) During the e a r l y years of t h i s century i n the f i e l d of art t h i s "lumber" consisted of the habituated response to art as a "copy" of nature, a sign pointing somewhere e l s e . I n t e r e s t i n g l y enough, t a l k i n g about the beginnings of abstract art i n America, i n an essay "On Abstract A r t , " Davis r e c a l l s the impact of the Armory Show from the American a r t i s t ' s point of view: There was no American a r t i s t who saw t h i s show but was forced to revalue h i s a r t i s t i c concepts. The f i n a l charge was touched o f f i n the foundations of the Auto-cracy of the Academy i n a b l a s t which destroyed i t s strangle hold on c r i t i c a l art values forever. Hence-f o r t h the American a r t i s t r e a l i z e d h i s r i g h t to free expression and exercised that r i g h t . ^ Davis explains that though the term "abstract" would be defined quite d i f f e r e n t l y by d i f f e r e n t abstract a r t i s t s they would generally agree on one point. A l l of them i n i t i a l l y opposed the predominant s o c i a l d e f i n i t i o n of 163 a r t as a copy of nature 1s forms. "Art i s not and neyer was a mirror r e f l e c t i o n of nature," Instead of t r y i n g to "copy the uncopiable," which i s a useless dead-end, Davis says that he and other a r t i s t s l i k e himself are seeking "to e s t a b l i s h a material t a n g i b i l i t y i n our medium," the "two-dimensional plane surface" of the canvas i t s e l f . And what he adds bears a d i r e c t r e l a t i o n to an understanding of Williams' r e a c t i o n to the drawing he used i n Kora, how i t c l a r i f i e d so exactly, i n graphic terms, the texture of his own w r i t i n g : Since we forego a l l e f f o r t s to r e f l e c t o p t i c a l i l l u s i o n s and concentrate on the r e a l i t y of our canvas, we w i l l now study the material r e a l i t y of our medium, paint on canvas or whatever i t may be.9 According to Davis, then, a pai n t i n g (or a drawing) i s i t s e l f an a c t u a l i t y , an object with a two-dimensional plane surface, which means that the process of a r t i s an "act of def i n i n g two-dimensional space on that surface.""^ In the drawing that Williams chose to use as a f r o n t i s p i e c e for Kora, t h i s act becomes the very f a b r i c of our experience of i t , more so, the very thing which i s i n the process of being defined as such. The drawing i t s e l f , i t s a c t u a l i t y as a drawing, breaks the " o p t i c a l i l l u s i o n " of p e r s p e c t i v a l form by f o r c i n g on us the o b j e c t i v i t y of i t s two-dimensional surface. I t i s , i n other words, a "play" that enacts the "step over" that Williams sees at the root of modernism from " f e e l i n g to the imaginative object." The c r i s i s on the edge of Kora thus finds i t s counterpart i n the drawing i t s e l f . In Davis' p r i n t , as i n Duchamp's Nude, a perspective i n which, nothing "takes the shape of a present" releases i t s e l f to a movement that makes "contingency v i b r a t e within i t . " 1 6 4 Or as Charles Olson so aptly says i n "The K i n g f i s h e r s , " When the attentions change / the jungle leaps i n even the stones are s p l i t ^ they r i v e Any f i x i t y , apparent Ca stone say), becomes unfixed i n change, s p l i t as i t i s from the insi d e out, or from the outside i n . In e i t h e r d i r e c t i o n , the c r i s i s remains r e a l . Things move, and no e f f o r t of mind can make them stop. And t h i s i s what happened when our attentions, which at f i r s t seemed fix e d , i n the process of moving across the surface of Davis' drawing, began to "loosen," to use Williams' term. The elements of the drawing that before may have been understood as f i x e d i n perspective themselves began to move, as dogs do when they leap over bushes, or as the feet do when they walk, or as the foo l ' s voice does when i t i s released to i t s own nature — "Hey you, the dance! Squat. Leap. Hips to the l e f t . Chin — ha! — sideways! Stand up, stand up ma bonne! y o u ' l l break my backbone" (K, 56). And elsewhere i n Kora t h i s same f o o l says, "And i f you move the stones, see the ants scurry" (K, 36). In I_ Wanted to Write a Poem Williams c a l l s the Davis drawing "an impressionistic view of the simultaneous" (IW, 29), and perhaps he was think-ing of the "impression" of that s p e c i f i c moment when a three-dimensional perspective which before seemed securely "representational" now begins to f a l l apart. The objects i n that perspective suddenly come a l i v e as objects with (no longer) any necessary r e l a t i o n to each other. Everything becomes dynamic — a "play" or a "dance," through which we discover that perspective i s an imposed form that conceals the f a c t of change. And that i s why i t i s an i l l u s i o n , a l i e . Quite possibly, t h i s i s also why we f e e l the ground s h i f t beneath the feet of the two figures l o s t i n conversation, who appear i n t h i s 165 respect to have erected a " b a r r i e r " to divorce themselves from the very world that c l u s t e r s around them as they walk. The tension that appears between the s t a t i c nature of perspective and the f l u i d nature of non-per-spective loosens our hold on what we think we saw, enough to draw us out-ward into a sense of l i f e forces j u s t about ready to leap out of the confinement of an " o p t i c a l i l l u s i o n " — the dogs, e s p e c i a l l y , but as well the s u b s t a n t i a l form of the anonymous woman absorbed i n the act of hanging out clothes i n her yard, a very human moment i n the drawing. There i s , of course, a c e r t a i n amount of humour as w e l l : the two dark, self-enclosed figures walk through a f i e l d of forces they do not even sense the presence of — i s the image of a "jungle" too strong? Possibly, but Williams would have enjoyed i t , e s p e c i a l l y i f we take the "jungle" to be the density of a world i n which anything can happen at any time, experience i s that -unpredictable. This i s the same f o o l of a writ e r who c a l l s the world a "brutal jumble" (K, 36), and who t e l l s his townspeople that "Hell's loose ' every minute" (K, 39) under t h e i r f e e t , rumbling l i k e the earth i t s e l f , which they would "hear" (K, 39) i f only they could step outside the narrow perspec-t i v e of s o c i a l forms that remove them from t h e i r own desire. But they cannot cage i t by ignoring i t , j u s t as the objects i n the world that move because they are a l i v e cannot be caged so e a s i l y by an " o p t i c a l i l l u s i o n . " For that matter, neither can the p a r t i c u l a r i t y of Louslinger's decaying body be glossed over with empty verbal gestures. Time cannot be f i x e d i n space, p i c t o r i a l or otherwise. I f perspective gives the l i e to t h i s f a c t , then i t does so at the expense of what i s ac t u a l , the same actual that i s j u s t about ready to spring upon the two f i g u r e s , who w i l l , i n the next instant, f a l l into a gap i n t h e i r path, one made by the a r t i s t on the page with a few dark l i n e s , abstract and opaque. And once they do (and they w i l l ) , the actual 166 which i s presently outside t h e i r i s o l a t i o n , w i l l provoke a c r i s i s i n the throes of which they w i l l be •— and t h i s future p o s s i b i l i t y i s present i n the drawing as we experience i t — thrown into an other that i s the world i t s e l f : but new, for them. "Anyhow, Floss and I , " Williams says, "went to Gloucester and got permission from Stuart Davis to use h i s a r t " (IW, 29). No wonder he was excited by the drawing, so accurately does i t correspond to the w r i t i n g c r i s i s which characterizes the texture of Kora. Davis does i n his drawing what Williams does i n h i s w r i t i n g . They both a c t i v e l y push to subvert the way i n which the closed form of perspective imposes i t s e l f on the e s s e n t i a l l y open nature of experience. And the playfulness of Davis' mind would have struck Williams i n s t a n t l y , the mockery i n the drawing of any attempt to freeze the world which constantly breaks i n to declare the a c t u a l i t y of i t s movement. Like the w r i t i n g i n Kora, Davis' " a r t " begins on the recognition that any r e l i a n c e upon predetermined points of view survives only by denying the s u b s t a n t i a l i t y of the world. The a r t i s t i n the drawing, then, i s a double of the f o o l i n Kora. Had he been a w r i t e r — so the argument follows — he would have done p r e c i s e l y what the w r i t e r i n Kora does: make w r i t i n g active to the opacity of language. The drawing "was, g r a p h i c a l l y , " we r e c a l l Williams saying, "exactly what I was t r y i n g to do i n words" ( i t a l i c s added). For t h i s reason alone, Davis' drawing should not be considered merely as a decorative i l l u s t r a t i o n f o r some "secret" meaning i n Kora, nor merely 1 6 7 as a f r o n t i s p i e c e separable from the text i t s e l f . Williams chose to use i t because i t acts as a graphic commentary on the e f f e c t of h i s own w r i t i n g on readers. What i t does i s illuminate the w r i t i n g i n Kora through the exemplification of another medium. And by a l l i n d i c a t i o n s , by "reading" the drawing, Williams was f i n d i n g out how to understand h i s own function as a "word man." There was, a f t e r a l l , -value to his own "dark s c r i b b l i n g s , " and the drawing, coming as i t did a f t e r the i n i t i a l improvisations were written, was l i v e proof that he was not simply muttering to himself i n a closeted privacy. To t h i s extent, the drawing i s an i n t e g r a l part of the text Kora, one of the elements through which i t f i n a l l y turned into a text. "The one thing I possibly r e g r e t , " Williams writes i n h i s "Prologue" to the 1957 r e p u b l i c a t i o n of Kora, " i s the absence of Stuart Davis' a t t r a c t i v e f r o n t i s p i e c e " (K, 30). Williams n a t u r a l l y made sure that he sent a copy of Kora i n H e l l : Improvisations to Davis immediately a f t e r i t was published i n September, 1920. And what Davis wrote back to him c e r t a i n l y must have pleased him. It would have confirmed the accuracy of his sense of the drawing, both of them working to r e - e s t a b l i s h the o b j e c t i v i t y of a r t and w r i t i n g . Davis responded to Kora as a re-opening: I see i n i t a f l u i d i t y as opposed to stagnation of presentation . . . . I t opens a f i e l d of p o s s i b i l i t i e s . To me i t suggests a development toward word against word without any impediments of story, poetic beauty or any-thing at a l l except word clash and sequence. This may be a t o t a l misrepresentation of your motives. Best of a l l the work does not suggest any of the modern poets with whom I am f a m i l i a r . I l i k e the book and am glad to be associated with i t . - 1 " ' SECTION THREE A NEW STEP Awake ea r l y to the white blare of a sun flooding i n sidewise. S t r i p and bathe i n i t . Ha, but an ache tearing at your throat — and a vague cinema l i f t i n g i t s black moon blot a l l out. There's no walking barefoot i n the cr i s p leaves nowadays. There's no dancing save i n the head's dark. Go draped i n soot; c a l l on modern medicine to help you! Why then, a new step lady! I ' l l meet you — you know where — o' the dark side! Let the wheel c l i c k . In the mind there is a continual play of obscure images which coming between the eyes and their prey seem pictures on the screen at the movies. Somewhere there appears to be a mal-adjustment. The wish would be to see not floating visions of unknown purport but the imaginative qualities of the actual things being perceived accompany their gross vision in a slow dance, interpreting as they go. But inasmuch as this will not always be the case one must dance nevertheless as he can. (K, 66-67) 170 CHAPTER SEVEN THE BIRTH OF THE IMAGINATION One more step and the two dark figures i n Davis' drawing perhaps w i l l f a l l o f f the road into a dip i n the ground, thrown as they would then be into an empty space that demands of them a complete re-adjustment of t h e i r minds to accord with new conditions. This s h i f t would be the event of a d i s - l o c a t i o n , or a dis-placement, that draws the mind outside i t s t e r r i t o r i a l i z e d enclosures: i n terms of the texture of the drawing, a c r i s i s of perspective that i s an opening, a cleavage through which perception once again begins i n a world the mind, as yet, has not possessed, but which i t finds i t s e l f within. For Williams, these figures w i l l have come under the influence of the imagination, t h e i r minds brought to the edge of a threshold where the world suddenly configures and assumes the form of an appearance ( l i t e r a l l y , a "shining f o r t h " ) , out of a dark space, the world i n that instant imaged f o r t h . In the w r i t i n g drama of Kora, t h i s process i s both precise and evanescent, at once a severance from a known world and a leap into an -un-known world, -un-known because p r i o r to the mind's knowledge of i t . 171 It i s t h i s c o n tradiction that informs the image Williams presents of his mother at the beginning of h i s "Prologue" to Kora, " i n Rome on that rare journey forever to be remembered" (K, 6). Once, she got l o s t , and by so lo s i n g track of a perceptual frame f i x e d i n mind, estranged he r s e l f from her known world. In turn, she found h e r s e l f i n the midst of an unknown world i n which things again became objective, a c t u a l l y present as the face of an otherness that appears outside, i n the collapse of fi x e d perspectives. "The place," so Williams writes, had been chosen by my brother as one notably easy of access, being i n a quarter free from confusion of t r a f f i c , on a street close to the park, and furthermore the tram to the American Academy passed at the corner. (K, 6) Notice how the language — and the neatly structured syntax of Williams' w r i t i n g re-enforces t h i s play on words — maps out a possessed space, t e r r i t o r i a l i z e d beforehand for Williams' mother by his brother: "chosen," "easy of access," "free from confusion of t r a f f i c , " "close to the park," and f i n a l l y , the strongest l i n k with a known perspective, "the tram to the American Academy passed at the corner." Had Williams' mother simply conformed her mind to the map organized f o r her, she could quite e a s i l y have maintained her narrow perspective on t h i s foreign place, toured the pre-determined si g h t s , and returned home with her perceptions i n t a c t . But t h i s was not the case: "Yet never did my mother go out but she was i n fear of being l o s t " (K, 6). I t i s , of course, the nature of his mother's mind that i n t r i g u e s Williams. No matter how c a r e f u l l y her t r i p to Rome was mapped out beforehand, she of a l l people was incapable of remaining within t h i s narrow boundary. Elena Hoheb was that p e c u l i a r l y estranged woman — "indeterminate, 172 night-bound," as Williams speaks of her i n "From My Notes About My" Mother"''' — who grew up i n Mayaguez but ended up i n Rutherford, New Jersey, "an a l i e n i n a 2 remote land." In Kora, for a b r i e f instance, Williams re-imagines her childhood inside the heat of a culture much more d i r e c t l y i n touch with the p h y s i c a l i t y of desire, i n v i v i d contrast to the "puritan" America that divorces i t s e l f from the body of the world, from say the body of one Jacob Louslinger i n "Improvisation 1.2": Weave away, dead f i n g e r s , the darkies are dancing i n Mayaguez —- a l l but one with the sore heel and sugar cane w i l l soon be high enough to romp through. Haia! leading over the ditches, with your s k i r t s f l y i n g and the d e v i l i n the wind back of you — no one e l s e . (K, 62) No one e l s e , which i s to say, the Elena who eventually was confined to Rutherford was an " a l i e n " i n temperament.as well, one who followed the insistences of her own wild nature and wandered, l i k e Louslinger, i n the meadows of her desire, "over the ditches" and out i n t o open spaces, "the wind back of you," as Williams writes. And t h i s i s the underlying drive that comes through her speech i n Yes, Mrs. Williams, a book that f i n a l l y got written, her words transcribed by Williams i n conversation, no attempt on his part to i n t e r p r e t but simply an attempt to reveal her i n speech, the exact p a r t i c u l a r i t y of i t , moving out. Like mother, l i k e son. Williams does read himself into her i n the "Prologue," and the figure, romping through the sugar cane i n Mayaguez becomes the image of h i s own nature emerging i n the improvisations, his Kora i n H e l l the evidence of a s i m i l a r d i s p o s i t i o n , a s i m i l a r need to l e t go, to go out, t i e d to a fear of "being l o s t . " Desire must be served, and against the ought of c l a s s i f i c a t o r y r u l e s : By turning to the l e f t when she should have turned r i g h t , a c t u a l l y she did once manage to go so far astray that i t 173 was nearly an hour before she. extricated h e r s e l f from the strangeness of every new v i s t a and found a landmark, (K, 6) Should have? We are reminded of the self-enclosed, boxed world of the Puritans i n In the American Grain, whose "d o c t r i n a i r e r e l i g i o n , a form, that i s to say, f i x e d — but small" would not permit them to allow t h e i r senses to wander any more than they could allow a member of t h e i r company to wander from the pre-• einet of the church, even from Boston to Casco Bay, FOR WORLDLY PROFIT. This t h e i r formula condemned. (IAG, 111) Elena Hoheb possesses one such mind that cannot help but wander from fi x e d forms, and her whole sense of the world i s determined by t h i s i n a b i l i t y , which Williams, i n turn, sees as her p e c u l i a r strength. There are the "disreputable" men l i k e "William, former s a i l o r i n Admiral Dewey's f l e e t at Manila" and "Tom O'Rourck," outsiders who clung to her, " t h e i r Penelope" (K, 6). Elena l i v e s very much i n the present, one thing at a time, a p a r t i c u l a r i s t whose estranged mind i s c o n t i n u a l l y being invaded by the o b j e c t i v i t y of the world. For t h i s reason, She has always been incapable of learning from benefit or d i s a s t e r . I f a man cheat her she w i l l remember that man with a violence that I have seldom seen equaled, but so f a r as that could have an influence on her judgment of the next man or woman, she might be l i v i n g i n Eden. (K, 7) But t h i s i n a b i l i t y on her part not to resign h e r s e l f to the things before her at the expense of habitual modes of perception makes her a prey to those same things. Hence, her estrangement from the normative, her tendency to stray, to go l e f t when she should have gone r i g h t , i s the other side of the fa c t that she i s possessed by things, or the otherness of the world. "And indeed she i s , " so Williams continues, an impoverished, ravished Eden but one i n d e s t r u c t i b l e as the imagination i t s e l f . Whatever i s before her i s s u f f i c i e n t to i t s e l f and so to be valued. (K, 7) 174 She i s , i n a way, the f i g u r e of the maiden Kora who was drawn away by the beauty of the narcissus flower, Kora strayed so f a r from the protection of her mother Demeter that she became easy prey f o r Hades, a dark force who appears out of a-gap i n the - earth', "arid -by'.-, ravishing her 5 u c a l l s upon a destruction of her maidenhood, her p u r i t y . And yet, the wayward nature she embodies cannot be destroyed, i s as " i n d e s t r u c t i b l e as the imagination i t s e l f . " This i s the f i r s t point i n the "Prologue" that Williams mentions the : imagination, but without explaining t h i s term he quickly s h i f t s h i s att e n t i o n momentarily away from his mother and presents what, at f i r s t glance, appear to be two un-related images: the fig u r e of the poet V i l l o n and the b o l l weevil i n a song by Carl Sandburg. F i r s t V i l l o n . Williams quotes a l i n e from V i l l o n ' s "Ballade de l a Grosse Margot" ("Ballad f or Fat Margot"), a poem that concerns V i l l o n ' s l o v e - a f f a i r with a p r o s t i t u t e : Vente, gresle, gelle, g'ai mon pain ouitl (K_3 7) V i l l o n , so Williams suggests, prefers to make h i s "bread" — and the c o l l o q u i a l sense of "bread" for " l i v i n g " holds here — i n the stormy elements, close on the immediacy of an indeterminate, wholly su b s t a n t i a l world. In an "Introduction" to Bonner's t r a n s l a t i o n of The Complete Works of Francois V i l l o n , an essay that reveals a great deal about the l a r g e r context of the b r i e f , almost casual, reference to "Villon i n the "Prologue," Williams draws attention to the contemporary relevance of V i l l o n ' s work, the 20th century another period when the turn toward the c o n d i t i o n a l nature of 4 experience has once again become a necessity. Besides, l i k e Williams' mother, V i l l o n was also an outsider, a poet estranged from a society h i e r -,175 a r c h i c a l l y structured, burdened with, poverty, one of the f o o l s with a big womb i n 15th century France, but a poet whose poems, f o r t h i s reason, "keep an i n t e n s i t y of consciousness about them that i s not contrived.""' S i g n i f i c a n t l y enough, Williams constructs a p o r t r a i t of V i l l o n that enlarges the methodological issue at stake i n h i s mother's wanderings — he must have wandered the c i t y ' s shabbier dives whenever he f e l t the urge to go wherever the fancy took him.^ A prey to the world as w e l l , wrongly accused of murder, the strength of h i s " i n d e s t r u c t i b l e " imagination nevertheless comes sharply through i n the language of h i s poems. The f l a s h of an image of V i l l o n i n the Improvisations — "Villon oeased to write upon his Petit Testament [The Legacy] only when the ink was frozen" (K, 35) — i n a re-phrasing of V i l l o n ' s own words reveals him to be, l i k e Williams' mother, another figure of the imagination. The force that V i l l o n embodies, which estranged him from the closed orders of hi s society, drew him out into the " f i e l d of h i s environment" (K, 65) , to use some words from Kora. He thus adjusted himself to the world before him and became, i n t h i s manner, an instrument of h i s time. His time spoke through h i s l i v e speech, the words themselves that he set down: "Vente3 gresle3 gelle3 o'ai mon pain auitl" "Nothing to do," so Williams argues, reminding us of h i s own plunge i n Kora, but follow the lead of the times which surrounded him, inventing with the s e n s i t i v e ear with which he had been endowed and to which he clung — h i s comfort as an a r t i s t . Direct i s the word f o r every word that V i l l o n set down. There was no intermediate f i e l d to h i s address. He was d i r e c t l y concerned i n the a f f a i r s of h i s l i f e , took h i s r e s p o n s i b i l i t i e s deeply and, as he grew older, b i t t e r l y , but saw no reason to seek to avoid them or to confess them. He was a poet, needed no intermediary, secular or sacred.^ The imagination that breaks forth, i n V i l l o n ' s work, i n Williams' terms. .176 permits the mind a f l u i d i t y through, which, i t constantly keeps re-adjusting to changing conditions. And t h i s toughness, t h i s r e s i l i e n c e , i s very much of the same order as that of the b o l l weevil i n Sandburg's "Ballad of the B o l l Weevil." I t can be placed i n the sand, i n hot ashes, i n the r i v e r , and other u n l i k e l y places but the b o l l weevil's r e f r a i n i s always: " T h a t ' l l be ma HOME I T h a t ' l l be ma HOOME'." (K, 7) Like the influenza b a c t e r i a , or l i k e the " f a i r y - r i n g mushroom," the b o l l weevil i s yet one more image of a l i f e force that feeds on i t s e l f , t h a t i s , thrives on change by sustaining i t s e l f through the p r i n c i p l e of transfor-mation. In Spring and A l l , Williams w i l l come to speak of the "imagination as a force, an e l e c t r i c i t y or a medium, a place" (SA, 150). Williams' mother thus resembles V i l l o n i n that she too i s a l i v i n g instance of a wayward force i n the mind that enters the objective medium of the world — the place of the imagination — by wandering outside a l l fixed perspectives that would remove her from the condition of her percep-tions. By getting l o s t , she experiences an actual world that i s other than the mind's prefabricated orders. I t i s t h i s power, both a weakness and a strength, that distinguishes her perceptions from the conventional and the predictable. The p a r t i c u l a r to her i s p a r t i c u l a r , opaque, and not trans-parent to an imposed frame of reference. She gives h e r s e l f up to "whatever i s before her," which more often than not leads to s t a r t l i n g and o r i g i n a l perceptions. An anecdote: Looking out at our par l o r window one day I said to her: "We see a l l the shows from here, don't we, a l l the weddings and funerals?" (They had been preparing a funeral across the st r e e t , the undertaker was j u s t putting on his overcoat.) She r e p l i e d : "Funny profession that, . 177 burying the dead people, I should think they wouldn't have any delusions of l i f e l e f t . " W. — Oh yes, i t ' s merely a profession, M, —Hm, And how they study i t ! They say sometimes people look t e r r i b l e and they come and make them look f i n e . They push things into t h e i r mouths! ( R e a l i s t i c gesture) W. — Mama! M. -— Yes, when they haven't any teeth. (K, 7-8) It i s that f i n a l perception, the "dark turn at the end" (K, 8), that for Williams "raises her story out of the commonplace" (K, 8). She perceives what l i e s subdued, hidden i n conventional perceptions: "Yes, when they haven't any teeth." The absence of teeth, "the thing i t s e l f without forethought or afterthought but with, great i n t e n s i t y of perception" (K, 8). She thus becomes, i n the "Prologue," a prototype, a moving image of the way of the imagination. "She i s , " Williams says matter-of-factly, "a creature of great imagination. I might say t h i s i s her sole remaining q u a l i t y " (K, 8). We might add, her sole d e f i n i n g q u a l i t y , the very force that has made her a "despoiled, molted castaway" (K, 8); or stated i n another way, her estrangement from mapped out perceptions i s p r e c i s e l y the q u a l i t y of her mind that permits her to break " l i f e between her f i n g e r s " (K, 8). In short, she i s a creature of great contradictions. A f t e r Williams' anecdote of h i s mother, the "Prologue" suddenly turns d i r e c t i o n , i n t h i s sense, unexpectedly "turns to the l e f t , " and we are thrown into another world, t h i s time outside the i n t e r i o r i z e d one of h i s mother •— "lunch with Walter Arensberg at a small place on 63rd Street" (K, 8). The art world that appears i n the next s i x paragraphs, i n contrast to the moods of Williams' mother, i s almost decadent, so removed, as i t f i r s t appears, from the immediacies of 'Villon's poetry or the natural 178 tenacity of the b o l l weevil. But i t i s Williams' world, the immediate context of his w r i t i n g ; and here he begins to explore the', struggle to a f f i r m the imagination i n a contemporary s e t t i n g b u i l t upon i t s negation. The push, for the kind of consciousness so i n e v i t a b l y the substance of Elena's nature — "the thing i t s e l f without forethought or afterthought but with great i n t e n s i t y of perception" — i n t h i s public realm, has no choice but to move contrary, against the grain of " s t a l e " (SA, 134),forms of perception that deny the o b j e c t i v i t y of the world. Williams focuses on the art world p r i m a r i l y , and a l l the examples he draws attention to work toward the e f f o r t to break the " i l l u s i o n " of conventional categories of defining art by bringing into play the indeterminate medium of s h i f t i n g contexts, again the force of the imagination at work. "A stained-glass window that had f a l l e n out and lay more or l e s s together on the ground" (K, 8) becomes g a new thing. A photograph of Duchamp's Nude "with many new touches by Duchamp" (K, 9) i s not simply a reproduction but a new thing. Arensberg provides the account of "that old Boston hermit" (K, 9) who, despite — or i s i t because of? — the f a c t that he i s as removed from the modern art world as i t i s possible to be, i s not deceived by the i l l u s i o n of repre-sentational a r t . He presses "actual rings with glass jewels from the f i v e -and-ten-cent store" onto h i s "nudes" (K, 9). And what he makes i s a new thing. Extending the drive toward the New manifest i n these scattered examples, Williams then goes on to propose h i s own a r t i s t i c gesture. He would l i k e to see a c o l l e c t i o n of "unusual creations" by a r t i s t s "without master or method," one of which, could be a painting by a l i t t l e English-woman, A.E. Kerr, 1906, that i n i t s unearthly gaiety of flowers and sobriety of design possesses exactly that strange freshness a spring day 179 approaches without a t t a i n i n g , an expansion of A p r i l , a thing t h i s poor woman found too c o s t l y f or her possession, (K, 9) These "queer products" could be shown " i n some unpretentious e x h i b i t i o n chamber across the c i t y from the Metropolitan Museum of A r t " (K, 9). And they could be juxtaposed, also to good e f f e c t , against photographs of p r e h i s t o r i c rock-paintings and etchings on horn: galloping bisons and stags, the hind feet of which have been caught by the a r t i s t s i n such a p o s i t i o n that from that time u n t i l the invention of the camera obscura, a matter of s i x thousand years or more, no one on earth had again depicted that most d e l i c a t e and expressive posture of running. (K, 9) So i t i s that Williams leaps from one image to another, and lands back on the ground, l i f t i n g the l i d of time and placing the present world of a r t into i t s larger context, a d a d a i s t i c gesture that discloses the self-enclosed " c u l t u r a l " world that i n h i b i t s the imagination and that requires some one "negative" mind l i k e a Duchamp — or l i k e the f o o l of the w r i t e r i n Kora — to cut across i t s pretensions. Those a r t i s t s , A.E. Kerr among them, who have f a i l e d to master the a r t of i l l u s i o n , as outsiders to a predetermined and wholly learned technique of painting, i n d i r e c t l y reveal the a c t u a l i t y of p r e h i s t o r i c a r t , an other kind of art through which the anonymous a r t i s t s — creatures of "great imagination" — became instruments of a moving f i e l d of forces, in s i d e the a c t i v i t y of human experience, immediately present to the actual. And they did t h i s long before the advent of representational forms, at a time when there was no d i s t i n c t i o n between " a r t " and " l i f e , " or more accurately perhaps, when " a r t " as such was so much the extension of l i f e - p r o c e s s e s that the contemporary separation of " a r t " from " l i f e , " the nexus of Williams' c r i t i c i s m , was simply not p o s s i b l e . The neat symmetries of perspective, that conceived method of abstracting the perceiver from the perceived, had not yet occurred. The discovery of p r e h i s t o r i c a r t , a 180 da d a i s t l c event to be sure, f o r t h i s reason, threw into r e l i e f the i l l u s o r y nature of representational forms of a r t and thought. There i t was, another world manifest i n a r t i s t i c forms that enacted rather than "copied" a s o - c a l l e d external " r e a l i t y , " Williams i s struck by the fa c t of movement i n p r e h i s t o r i c a r t , the fac t of a s h i f t i n g world ("running") immediate to the minds of the unknown a r t i s t s , and i n non-vrepresentational forms that catch the appearance of l i v e forms, an i n d i c a t i o n that the a r t i s t s who made them l i v e d i n what they saw: the human creature, themselves, i n the midst of a world of creatures, not a p r i v i l e g e d species around which things gather, but inside a world larger than i t s e l f and f i l l e d with a whole multitude of animate things. In t h i s sense, p r e h i s t o r i c a r t presents an experienced rather than a conceived r e a l i t y . Or as Max Raphael says i n P r e h i s t o r i c Cave Paintings: P a l e o l i t h i c a r t i s centered around the animal; there i s no place i n i t for the middle a x i s , f or symmetry and balance i n s p i r e d by the structure of the human body. Rather, everything i s asymmetric and s h i f t e d . The objects are not represented as they appear when seen from a distance, as we are accustomed to seeing them i n paintings from the times of c l a s s i c a l a n t i q u i t y , but as near at hand — f o r the p a l e o l i t h i c hunter struggled with the animal at close quarters, body against body . . . .^ Hugh Kenner i n The Pound Era i s quite r i g h t i n suggesting that one day we may see as a "seminal force" i n the beginnings of modern a r t (though. modern thought may be more to the point here) the spreading news that painted animals of great s i z e and indisputable v i g o r of l i n e could be seen on the walls of caves which no one had entered f o r 25,000 years . . . . The f i r s t response was that they were surely fakes, and put there yesterday morning, but by 1895 phy s i c a l evidence had disposed of any such, notion, and a wholly new kind of v i s u a l experience confronted whoever cared. Williams' b r i e f gesture toward these drawings i n h i s "Prologue" indicates 181 that he was one of those who did care about the "wholly new kind of v i s u a l experience" a v a i l a b l e . The drawings would have confirmed h i s hunch, that modernist a r t — and modernist w r i t i n g as well — had become an h i s t o r i c a l necessity, not an aberration, but the issue of a re-valuation of experience. "The shock lay i n t h i s , " Kenner continues, that the horses and deer and aurochs brought the eye such immediacy of perception, though a disregard of up and down and through made them inconceivable i n today's canons: and yej^they seemed not to- r e l y on yesterday's canons e i t h e r . Behind Williams' strange, or apparently strange, proposal that the photographs of the drawings be hung i n the anteroom of an e x h i b i t i o n f o r those "unusual creations" by a r t i s t s "without master or method" stands an e f f o r t on h i s part to d i s l o c a t e convention "canons" that make them so "inconceivable." The divorce mirrored i n the "curious specimens," by sharp contrast — that i s , by d i s - s i m i l a r i t y — would bring to l i g h t the power of the drawings, t h e i r a u t h e n t i c i t y i n the context of so much a r t i f i c i a l i t y of form and method, what r e s u l t s from s t e r e o t y p i c a l notions of a r t . Here, then, i s an amazing turnabout i n a society dominated by the i l l u s i o n of progress and a naive f a i t h i n r a t i o n a l i t y , concrete evidence that supports a view that modernist attacks on p e r s p e c t i v a l forms are, at bottom, only one phase of a more large-scale revolution concerning the very nature of experience. What Williams i s a f t e r , i n other words, i s nothing l e s s than a destruction of predetermined modes of thought that deny the otherness of things. I t i s t h i s otherness that so c l e a r l y f i g u r e s , "without forethought or afterthought," i n the imaginative world of the cave-drawings, a world not yet under the domination of f i x e d perspectives. Or as S i g f r i e d Giedion comments i n his study of p r e h i s t o r i c a r t , The:Eternal Present: " V e r t i c a l and ho r i z o n t a l had not yet become the organizing p r i n c i p l e . A l l d i r e c t i o n s were of equal 182 12 importance." As, we might add, they are i n experience. Much l a t e r , though, no l e s s than 25,000 or so years l a t e r , there would be a r a d i c a l change as t h i s s h i f t i n g world gave way to an i n t e l l e c t u a l r e v o l u t i o n of such large dimensions that i t would a l t e r the very way i n which the Western mind would thenceforth conceive of i t s e l f . E r i c Havelock i n h i s thoroughly engrossing analysis of Plato's Republic i n Preface to Plato goes so f a r as to i n s i s t that Plato, and the triumph of Platonic thought, constituted i t s e l f on a r a d i c a l departure from an e a r l i e r mode of conscious-ness, which Havelock c a l l s the "Homeric" mind. Havelock understands Plato's "separation of knower-from known" (a chapter t i t l e of h i s study) as the basic cleavage of the mind from the world that made possible a wholly new doctrine of the autonomous personality, one which s e l f -consciously r a l l i e s i t s own powers i n order to .impose upon them an inner organization, the i n s p i r a t i o n for which i s self-generated and self-discovered. This s e l f i s then considered an " e n t i t y " — a psyche or soul — "which 13 e x i s t s beyond time and place and circumstance." But more importantly, concomitant with t h i s new s e l f , for Plato, a thinking s e l f , " i t now became possible to i d e n t i f y the 'subject' i n r e l a t i o n to that 'object' which the 14 'subject' knows." Knowledge as such became what i s known, i t s "objects" thereby absorbed and made transparent to a system of organization that has i t s own "inner l o g i c , " i n short, a closed system that imposes a s t a t i c a l l y structured, h i e r a r c h i c order onto things."''5 In i t s e s s e n t i a l form, therefore, Platonism stands as the triumph of the changeless subject as p r i o r to a world of moving objects, the triumph of knowledge as p r i o r to a world of s h i f t i n g appearances, the triumph of the "abstract" as p r i o r to "image," and the triumph of some such metaphysical e n t i t y c a l l e d " r e a l i t y " as p r i o r to "appearances." 183 Perhaps Plato's famous "Parable of the Cave," from the perspective offered by Havelock, does harbour a semblance of a former time i n Plato's c u l t u r a l memory that he r e - i n t e r p r e t s i n terms of h i s proposed systemati-zation of experience. His "Knowledge of the Forms" affirms an absolute s u b j e c t i v i t y , the thinking s e l f (a s t i l l center) e x i s t i n g undetermined by a constantly changing world. This same world subsequently gets-relegated to the realm of shadows, mere appearances that simply r e f l e c t the true " r e a l i t y " of abstractions, nothing i n themselves. In Plato's cave, a group of men s i t imprisoned i n a somnambulistic state endlessly s t a r i n g at shadows f l i t t i n g back and forth, on walls illuminated dimly by t o r c h l i g h t . One day, one of these men manages to escape through a hole where he sees the l i g h t of the sun entering. The story, of course, a l l e g o r i z e s the ascent of the Platonic mind from the world of appearances, up into the abstract realm of the Forms, the world of Knowledge. And Plato does construct his narrative i n such a way that there i s no mistake that the cave-men are trapped i n the images they stare at on the walls of the cave. By so d i s c r e d i t i n g a mode of consciousness caught up i n change, Plato devalues appearances, and p r e c i s e l y because these moving things "break up sets of abstract u n i t i e s and disperse them into p l u r a l i t i e s of images and 16 image s i t u a t i o n s . " Not s u r p r i s i n g l y , then, given h i s assumption that timeless abstractions constitute the essence of things, the imagination must be made subordinate to r a t i o n a l u n i t i e s and the " ' r o l l i n g ' and 'wandering'"^ v i s i o n of the poet be replaced by philosophic discourse. In The Republic the "philosopher" accordingly emerges as that i d e a l f i g u r e of the autonomous mind, the thinking s e l f as a being who understands the world through a 184 language of i s o l a t e d abstractions, conceptual and formal; a language which i n s i s t s on emptying events and actions of t h e i r immediacy, i n order to break them up and rearrange them i n categories, thus imposing the r u l e of p r i n c i p l e i n place of happy i n t u i t i o n , and i n general a r r e s t i n g the quick play of i n s t i n c t i v e r e a c t i o n , and sub s t i t u t i n g reasoned analysis i n i t s place as the basic mode of li v i n g , 1 8 The platonic habit of organizing experience i n t o abstract categories did win the day, Plato being, so Havelock argues, "one of those thinkers i n 19 whom the seminal forces of a whole epoch spring to l i f e . " And yet the e a r l i e r Homeric world that he subdued i n order to do so did not disappear completely. I t s t i l l l i v e s , f o r instance, i n the important term doxa or opinion. Plato uses t h i s term to relegate what he defines as the i l l u s o r y domain of appearances to a p o s i t i o n below the transcendent realm of Know-ledge. But when read back into h i s t o r i c a l time, as Havelock so c a r e f u l l y does, doxa s t i l l s i g n i f i e s the content of another mode of consciousness, p r i o r to Plato, i n which the s e l f i s constituted by the movement of things as they appear, and i n which his h i e r a r c h i c a l l y structured systematization of the world had not yet been, as i t were, invented: . . . i t i s t h i s word that, p r e c i s e l y because of i t s very ambiguities, was chosen not only by Plato but by some of his predecessors to c r y s t a l l i s e those properties of the poetised' experience from-which the i n t e l l e c t u a l s were try i n g to escape. Both the noun, and the verb doko, are t r u l y b a f f l i n g to modern l o g i c i n t h e i r coverage of both the subjective and objective r e l a t i o n s h i p . The verb de-notes both the 'seeming' that goes on i n myself, the 'subject,' namely my 'personal impressions,' and the 'seeming' that l i n k s me as an 'object' to other people looking at me — the 'impression' I make on them. The noun correspondingly i s both the 'impression' that may be i n my mind and the 'impression' held by others of me. It would appear therefore to be the i d e a l term to describe that fusion or confusion of the subject with the object that occurred i n the poetised performance l o f the Homeric poetJ and i n the state of mind created by t h i s performance. I t i s the 'seeming show of things,' whether t h i s panorama i s thought of as within me or outside of me.20 185 The perspective offered by Havelock's Preface to Plato thus allows us to understand the text of Kora as the enactment of a/movement against — though Williams of course does not use t h i s s p e c i f i c term — the " p l a t o n i c " habit of fre e z i n g the world into abstract categories that deny the objec-t i v i t y of things. The w r i t i n g i n i t s e l f , as we have seen, e f f e c t s a c r i s i s of the d i s c u r s i v e manipulation of language, i n which words become nothing more than a transparent v e h i c l e f o r "ideas" that empty "events and actions of t h e i r immediacy." I t i s i n the breakdown of t h i s control that the p a r t i c u l a r i t y of the world comes into play, the ceaseless movement of things that "makes l o g i c a b u t t e r f l y " (K, 81). Or as we r e c a l l the f o o l of the write r saying, "Ay ctiol I would say so much were i t not for the tunes changing, changing, darting so many ways" (K, 33). Williams' w r i t i n g , that i s , works s p e c i f i c a l l y contrary to a method of thought that constitutes i t s e l f on a h i e r a r c h i c d i v i s i o n of a " s e l f " over the world. This i s the same assumption — and here the methodological shadow of Plato s t i l l holds i t s grip — that stands behind the subjectivism so much the weather of h i s contemporaries that they have l o s t touch with a l a r g e r world outside the l i m i t s of human order. On the other side of t h i s same order, or more p r e c i s e l y i n Kora, on the horizonal edge of i t , " a l l i n a burst" (K, 71), re-appears another world close at hand: the dimension of doxa, a medium i n which the s e l f i s confused, l i t e r a l l y mixed up i n the l i f e of the object. Appearances now assume a nature of t h e i r own and become the context of dense surfaces within the play of which experience occurs, i n time. In "The Avenue of Poplars," the l o v e l y poem from Spring and A l l , the poet drives "without p e r s o n a l i t y " down a nameless str e e t i n a "wordless / world" (SA, 142), wrapped i n the immediate and s h i f t i n g play of the things 186 before him, the world simply there, and so here as w e l l , a presence that activates desire and frees i t from the enclosure of an "1" that defines i t s predetermined end against the things i t controls along the way: I do not seek a path I am s t i l l with Gipsy l i p s pressed to my own — I t i s the kiss of leaves without being poison ivy or n e t t l e , the k i s s of oak leaves — He who has kissed a leaf need look no further — I ascend through a canopy of leaves and at the same time I descend for I do nothing unusual — I ride i n my car I think about prehi s t o r i c caves i n the Pyrenees — the cave of Les Trois Freres (SA, 142-143) In Spring and A l l , t a l k i n g about the "great leap of the i n t e l l i g e n c e " into "the facts of the imagination" as a jump to "Cezanne or back to certain of the primitives" (SA, 134), Williams argues for the value of primitive a r t : 187 The p r i m i t i v e s are not back i n some remote age — they are not BEHIND experience, Work which bridges the gap between the r i g i d i t i e s of vulgar experience and the imagination i s ra r e . I t i s new, immediate •— I t i s so because i t i s actu a l , always r e a l . (SA, 1 3 4 ) 2 2 Thinking about the cave of Les Trois Freres, Williams p o s s i b l y had i n mind the image, one of very few, of the human figures there amongst the animals, disguised as animals. These enigmatic figures appear to be dancing, maybe enacting, f a r back i n the deep recesses of the womb-like cave, a r i t u a l i s t i c 23 i n i t i a t i o n into mysterious earth forces. The ground that everywhere pushes f o r release i n Kora i s of the same order. And Williams would con-tinue to associate t h i s elemental realm of experience with flowers opening, a mirror-image of the "running" movement that makes up the texture of the cave-drawings. "Or the l i l a c s , " he says i n "Asphodel, That Greeny Flower," of men who l e f t t h e i r marks, by t o r c h l i g h t , r i t u a l s of the hunt, on the walls of p r e h i s t o r i c caves i n the Pyrenees — what draftsmen they were — bison and deer. (PB, 174) P r e h i s t o r i c a r t must c e r t a i n l y have been a wondrous discovery f o r Williams i n the e a r l y years of th i s century. Here was unmistakable evidence of an imaginative world (buried underground) manifest long before the l a t e r triumph of the concept over the thing, the mind then s t i l l a l i v e to things, i t s a ttention s t i l l attached to the "quick play" of the world. And i n the caves, l i k e Les Troi s Freres, the a r t i s t s of the t r i b e — those creatures of "great imagination" — retreated into dark I n t e r i o r s and cast images on 188 the blank walls. I t was t h e i r own minds turned in s i d e out, In t o r c h l i g h t , these figures would have s h i m m e r e d — o r as Giedion says, having had access to these caves, " i n the caverns the f l i c k e r i n g torch makes the d i f f e r e n t shapes come and go." In a world that appears, things do come and go, and no e f f o r t of mind can stop them, as no e f f o r t of mind can, i n Kora, stop the leaves from swarming. The discovery of the cave-drawings suddenly made i t possible f o r writers l i k e Williams l i t e r a l l y to go back behind the platonic mode of thought. Behind i t s preconceived forms lay the beginnings of a more authen-t i c evaluation of experience. Coming at these forms from the "back side" (K, 80)., as the w r i t e r i n Kora does — and here Williams' dadaist nature surfaces — quite a contrary, and as i t were, negative "Parable of the Cave" thus becomes apparent. When that lone figure managed to escape from the cave and found himself i n the closed realm of Knowledge, i n that instant, he also removed himself from the un-known, those appearances that f a b r i c a t e the world of the imagination: which i s to say, i n that ascent, the human as a creature of nature disappeared and became that curious phenomenon, the autonomous " s e l f " who possesses the world through that completion called, "Knowledge." The term "mimesis," so Havelock reminds us throughout Preface to Plato, then l o s t i t s o r i g i n a l meaning. Before Plato, i t was t i e d to the drama of experience, but from Plato.on, i t came to s i g n i f y nothing more 25 than a "copy," a s t a t i c representation of something absent. Williams, i n essence, echoes t h i s d i s t i n c t i o n i n h i s Autobiography: It i s NOT to hold the mirror up to nature that the a r t i s t performs his work. It i s to make, out of the imagination, something not at a l l a copy of nature, but something quite d i f f e r e n t , a new thing, u n l i k e any thing else i n nature, a thing advanced and apart from i t . To imitate nature Involves the verb to do. To copy i s 189 Or: merely to r e f l e c t something already there, i n e r t l y , . , , But by i m i t a t i o n we enlarge nature I t s e l f , we become nature or we discover i n ourselves nature's a c t i v e part. (A, 241) — to place myself ( i n my nature) beside nature — to imitate nature (for to copy nature would be a shameful thing) I l a y myself down: (PB, 110) so we are t o l d i n "The Desert Music," a poem where Williams affirms poetic form as the process of an act that c a l l s a t t e n t i o n to i t s own movement as a j u s t i f i c a t i o n of i t s f o r m . ^ Thinking back a decade l a t e r , i n A Novelette, Williams comes to the understanding that the "excellence" of the w r i t i n g i n Kora " i s , i n major part, the s h i f t i n g of category. I t i s the d i s j o i n t i n g process" (AN, 285). -The s h i f t occurs i n a new sense of language (as we have seen), but equally, i n a new sense of experience. The act of l a y i n g the mind down, "to place myself ( i n / my nature) beside nature," i s the enactment of a transformation of consciousness, one that d i r e c t l y undermines a s u b j e c t i v i t y that closes the world out. In the text of Kora, i t i s t h i s very " d i s j o i n t i n g process" that e f f e c t s a "plunge" into a creaturely world of moving things wherein the " s e l f " as such i s no longer (Whitehead's d i s t i n c t i o n in. Science and the 27 Modern World) an " e n t i t y " but a "func t i o n " of nature. Williams here would c e r t a i n l y have nodded an assent to Whitehead's argument i n Modes of Thought that "a purely subjective experience of q u a l i t a t i v e d e t a i l s " reduces human 190 experience to a " s o l i p s i s t existence," In no way does i t account f o r "our-selves as a c t i v i t i e s among other a c t i v i t i e s . I t misses the point that we 28 know ourselves as creatures i n a world of creatures," Though much-more bl u n t l y , Williams says as much i n "A Beginning on the Short Story (Notes)": And who are you anyway? — with your small personal l i m i t a t i o n s of age, sex and other sundry features l i k e race and r e l i g i o n ? Unimportant. You, even you are at the moment — the a r t i s t , good or bad — but a new creature. (SE, 306) 2^ In Kora, the leap into the creaturely world of the human gives " b i r t h to the imagination," at once the death of the mind's f i x i t i e s (the "nightmare" of s u b j e c t i v i t y ) and the b i r t h ("a waking from a nightmare") of the mind in t o the re-newed " o b j e c t i v i t y " of the world, i t s p a r t i c u l a r i t y (K, 21). In th i s " d i s j o i n t i n g " turnabout, what was before known, the s e l f ' s possessions, gives way to the re-appearance of that which i s un-known. "The raw beauty of ignorance," so Williams writes of t h i s opening, that l i e s l i k e an opal mist over the west coast of the A t l a n t i c , beginning at the Grand Banks and extending into the recesses of our b r a i n s . — the c h i l d r e n , the married, the unmarried — c l i n g s e s p e c i a l l y about the eyes and the throats of our g i r l s and boys. (K, 21) By going contrary to the mind's subjective orders — that i s , by being 30 "ignorant" — the imagination re-opens the r i c h experience of the world, and so re-turns the mind to the same ground Williams i s so. struck by i n the cave-drawings. And how does Williams i n Spring and A l l account f o r the "excellence" of the w r i t i n g i n Kora? "The Improvisations," he says — coming at a time when I was t r y i n g to remain f i r m at great cost — I had recourse to the expedient of l e t t i n g l i f e go completely i n order to l i v e i n the world of my choice, I l e t the imagination have i t s own way to see i f i t could save i t s e l f . Something very d e f i n i t e came of i t . I found myself a l l e v i a t e d but most important I began there and then to revalue experience, to under-19_1 stand what I was at — The v i r t u e of the improvisations i s t h e i r placement i n a world of new values -— (SA, 116) Possibly Williams was thinking of the large methodological implications, for his own w r i t i n g , of t h i s act of l e t t i n g "the imagination have i t s own way" when he wrote his well-known (and j u s t i f i a b l y often quoted) l e t t e r to Marianne Moore i n 1934. The revaluation of experience t h i s makes possible helps to account for Moore's sense of his "inner s e c u r i t y " : The inner s e c u r i t y . . . i s an overwhelmingly important observation. I'm glad to have had you bring i t up. Not that anyone w i l l notice i t . I t i s something which occurred once when I was about twenty, a sudden resigna-t i o n to existence, a despair — i f you wish to c a l l i t that, but a despair which made everything a unit and at the same time a part of myself. I suppose i t might be c a l l e d a sort of nameless r e l i g i o u s experience. I resigned, I gave up. I decided there was nothing else i n l i f e f o r me but to work. I t i s the explanation for the calumny that i s heaped on my head by women and men a l i k e once they know me long enough. I won't follow causes. I can't. The reason i s that i t seems so much more important to me that I am. Where s h a l l one go? What s h a l l one do? Things have no names f o r me and places have no s i g n i f i c a n c e . As a reward f o r t h i s anonymity I f e e l as much a part of things as trees and stones. Heaven seems fra n k l y impossible. I am damned as I succeed. I have no p a r t i c u l a r hope save to r e p a i r , to rescue, to complete. (SL, 147)^1 Of course, there i s always the chance that Williams i s transforming into a single occasion a s h i f t i n consciousness that took place over a period of years. Or i f he did undergo some such "sudden r e s i g n a t i o n to existence" when he was about 20, i t would have occurred somewhere around 1902-1906, the period he attended the Medical School of the U n i v e r s i t y of Pennsylvania. Kora comes ten years or so l a t e r , but i n i t , the "nameless r e l i g i o u s experi-ence" that i n i t i a t e d Williams into the drama of the world enters the w r i t i n g as an act of giving the mind over to the play of things. The "resignation," i n other words, i s nothing more (or l e s s ) than a leap into experience, at :i9_2 once "a despair" because the mind i s suddenly made vulnerable to forces outside i t s c o n t r o l , but a despair that allows for a sense of opacity otherwise impossible. The same things that now become actual outside the grasp of the s e l f are experienced as "a p a r t " of the s e l f . By foregoing the enclosure of h i s own s u b j e c t i v i t y , Williams found himself face to face with a world that simply e x i s t s , Keats (a very early influence on Williams) c a l l s t h i s methodological s h i f t "negative c a p a b i l i t y " i n an equally w e l l -known l e t t e r that he wrote to h i s brother on December 21, 1817 — "when a man i s capable of being i n u n c e r t a i n t i e s , mysteries, doubts, without any 32 i r r i t a b l e reaching a f t e r f a c t and reason." We have c a l l e d t h i s state of uncertainty i n Kora a confusion, a "plunge" into process that y i e l d s a tense doubleness. Things are at once "nothing" and "everything," at once "nameless" and "new." And since existence simply happens, i s always going on, i t can have no t e l e o l o g i c a l end, as i t does, say, i n Plato's systemat-i z a t i o n of things. There i s no where to go. "Heaven seems frankly impossible," Williams says. And nothing to do, except, f o r the writer i n any case, write i n order thus to reveal ("to r e p a i r , to rescue, to complete") the immediacy of experience. In the early years of t h i s century, however — and the s t r u c t u r a l q u a l i t y of the w r i t i n g i n the "Prologue" to Kora makes t h i s a l l the more apparent — t h i s (new) sense of the mind's "negative c a p a b i l i t y " had f i r s t to enact a d i s - l o c a t i o n : the dominance of l i n e a r perspective i n a r t , and i n w r i t i n g , the f a l s e assumption that language i s only a v e h i c l e transporting the reader to a d i s c u r s i v e end behind or above the text. This i s why a r t i s t s l i k e Davis and Duchamp ( i n Kora) and Juan Gris ( i n Spring and A l l ) often play the surface of t h e i r work against the i l l u s i o n of l i n e a r perspective. They seek to destroy that conventionalized expectation by drawing attention 193 to the opacity of a r t - o b j e c t s . In Spring and A l l , f o r instance, Williams singles out a painting, The Open Window,, by the Gubist: J u a n - G r i s , — to Williams, another important modernist a r t i s t — and c l a r i f i e s the h i s t o r i c a l 33 condition of h i s compositional method: Things with which he i s f a m i l i a r , simple things *— at the same time to detach them from ordinary e"xperience to the imagination. Thus they are s t i l l " r e a l " they are the same things they would be i f photographed or painted by Monet, they are recognizable as the things touched by the hands during the day, but i n t h i s p ainting they are seen to be i n some pe c u l i a r way — detached (SA, 110) Williams then explains the a r t i s t i c basis f o r t h i s e f f e c t , t h i s "detached" sense of things: This was not necessary where the subject of art was not " r e a l i t y " but r e l a t e d to the "gods" — by force or otherwise. There was no need of the " i l l u s i o n " i n such a case since there was none possible where a picture or a work represented simply the imaginative r e a l i t y which existed i n the mind of the onlooker. No s p e c i a l e f f o r t was necessary to cleave where the cleavage already existed. (SA, 111) In Gris' work, things are brought into the actual space of the canvas, detached from t h e i r former contexts, and so made r e a l i n a context that reveals t h e i r o b j e c t i v i t y . Williams emphasizes the need for t h i s cleavage — t h i s detachment of things from imposed frames of reference — as a way of d i s l o c a t i n g the viewer, i n t h i s way drawing him out into the objective space of the painting. By c a l l i n g a t tention to i t s surface, Gris' art does not allow i t s e l f to be made transparent to a given " r e a l i t y " external to i t s a c t u a l i t y , being instead a compositional act that cleanses perception of i t s f i x i t i e s , i t s subjective c o n t r o l . In "former times," i n say p r e h i s t o r i c times, t h i s "cleavage already e x i s t e d , " so that there was no need to do what Gris , the modernist a r t i s t , must do i n order to r e t r i e v e the kind of l i v e consciousness evident i n the cave-drawings. Williams' mother Elena i s 19.4 the fi g u r e of the imagination p r e c i s e l y because, i n her own nature, she l i v e s t h i s cleayage as.well. She too i s incapable of not being possessed by p a r t i c u l a r i t y . Both of them, for Williams, l i v e the imagination of the world. Williams' s l i g h t but s u r p r i s i n g j u x t a p o s i t i o n of the camera obscura with the cave-drawings now begins to develop a very s p e c i f i c sense of perception. U n t i l the invention of t h i s forerunner of the camera, he says, thinking about the movement of animals i n the drawings, "no one on earth had again depicted that most d e l i c a t e and expressive posture of running." In i t s simplest form, the camera obscura i s a p r i m i t i v e camera, r e a l l y nothing more than a box with a hole i n i t to allow f o r the passage of l i g h t from the outside, the l i g h t then p r o j e c t i n g the reflected, images of things on the dark wall of the container. I t s name ( l i t e r a l l y , "dark chamber") comes from the combination of the L a t i n camera ("a vaulted chamber," "a cave") and obscura ("cover over"). The term suggests that the drawings, i n t h e i r p a r t i c u l a r i t y , reveal the actual instance of a time when men were themselves instruments, t h e i r eyes openings — holes — through which the l i g h t of the world projected the appearance of the world on the dark chambers of t h e i r minds. Like Williams' mother, they too were prey to a world outside t h e i r c o n t r o l , but which they engaged imaginatively, t h e i r desires surfacing i n the moving forms they painted. The cave-drawings, i n thi s l i t e r a l sense, are l i v e photographs of the drama of human experience, "simply the imaginative r e a l i t y which existed i n the mind of the onlooker." And what appears i n them i s the human as creature, "looking out through two eyes, a quick b r a i n back of them, at some of the shows of the world" (AN, 359). Hence Duchamp's "ready-mades," e s p e c i a l l y The Fountain that Williams 195 mentions, come to have a much, larger consequence than many may be w i l l i n g to admit, A u r i n a l ? In 1917, i n any case, a u r i n a l would not, i n any sense of p o s s i b i l i t y , become an object of a r t . In the accepted canons of the day (to re-phrase Kenner's statement on the cave-drawings) i t would be inconceivable. This, i n c i d e n t a l l y , was the dec i s i o n of the "hanging committee" (K, 9) of the "Palace E x h i b i t i o n of 1917" (K, 10), the members of which refused to accept i t "as a representative piece of American sculpture." This event "should not," Williams says without further explan-34 ation, "be allowed to s l i d e into o b l i v i o n " (K, 10). A u r i n a l serves the body's needs, but i n a p u r i t a n i c a l society that prefers to ignore the existence of the body (not so the a r t i s t s of the cave-drawings), Duchamp's object enacts the kind of cleavage evident i n G r i s ' art and which comes so n a t u r a l l y to Williams' mother. An object i n v i s i b l e because f u n c t i o n a l , by being detached from i t s context, hence mis-named, or re-named The Fountain, suddenly becomes actual again as a made-thing. Duchamp's act makes the u r i n a l a fac t of the imagination. No one i n America had been struck by the o b j e c t i v i t y of a u r i n a l before him. And of course, that he should have chosen such a "low" thing as a u r i n a l and re-named i t such a "high" thing as a fountain would have amused Williams: a dadaist attack on a r t i f i c i a l l y constructed hierarchies — the world of a r t that rejected Duchamp's piece i s one — t h a t disguise the commonality of the world. Duchamp's destruction of t h i s f a l s i t y transforms the u r i n a l i n t o a new thing, h i s estrangement (as an a r t i s t ) from i t s predetermined frame of reference — the assumption that a u r i n a l cannot be an object of art because i t i s mass-produced — the very detachment that makes possible h i s r e c o n s t i t u t i o n of i t s p a r t i c u l a r i t y . For Williams, Duchamp's "ready-mades" are furth e r instances of an imagina-ti o n that w i l l not be subdued by habits of perception that freeze a moving 196 world into f i x e d forms. These are.the habits that establish, " f a l s e values" (K, 14), against which: The true value i s that p e c u l i a r i t y which gives an object a character by i t s e l f . The a s s o c i a t i o n a l or sentimental value i s the f a l s e . I t s imposition i s due to lack of imagination, to an easy l a t e r a l s l i d i n g . The attention has been held too r i g i d on the one plane instead of following a more f l e x i b l e , jagged r e s o r t . I t i s to loosen the a t t e n t i o n , my attention since 1 occupy part of the f i e l d , that I write these improvisations. (K, 14) The w r i t i n g i n Kora di s l o c a t e s by working s p e c i f i c a l l y toward the destruction of the "easy l a t e r a l s l i d i n g " of the mind i n t o abstract forms that arrange p a r t i c u l a r s according to external patterns. In one instance, "Improvisation TV.3," the writer moves re d u c t i v e l y against a moral system that imposes a "sentimental value" onto death i n order to disguise i t s a c t u a l i t y as a condition of experience: The f r o n t i s p i e c e i s her p o r t r a i t and further on — the obituary sermon: she held the school upon her shoulders. Did she. Well — turn i n here then: — we found money i n the blood and some i n the room and on the s t a i r s . My God I never knew a man had so much blood i n h i s head! — and t h i r t e e n empty whisky b o t t l e s . I am sorry but those who come t h i s way meet strange company. This i s you see death's c a n t i c l e . A young woman who had excelled at intellectual pur-suits 3 a person of great power in her sphere, died on the same night that a man was murdered in the next street, a fellow of very gross behavior. The poet takes advantage of this to send them on their way side by side without •making the usual unhappy moral distinctions, (K, 37.-38)' The j u x t a p o s i t i o n here of two apparently un-related deaths — and i n a h i e r -a r c h i c a l l y structured s o c i a l world they would be kept s e p a r a t e — for the 197 voice i n the w r i t i n g who stands outside, estranged from the "usual unhappy moral distinctions" that close out the f a c t of death, reveals a common ground to both the murdered-man and the "young woman" who once "held the school upon her shoulders." There are, then, no -unchanging moral laws that transcend experience, no t e l e o l o g i c a l ends governing human events. The two deaths simply happened on the "same night," a chance event i n a world where death appears unpredictably. By r e f u s i n g to make the conventionalized d i s t i n c t i o n s , so the voice i n the i n t e r p r e t a t i o n comments, the "poet" can tre a t each death s i n g u l a r l y . The p a r t i c u l a r i t y of each death, i n other words, equalizes — restores to f a c t s and events t h e i r commonality. The use of comparisons i s thus a form of abstraction i n which things are sub-ordinated to a h i e r a r c h i c a l l y structured system of values, i n t h i s case, a moral d i s t i n c t i o n s o c i a l l y determined that would have removed the mind from an indeterminate world where things do occur by chance, or more p r e c i s e l y , i n chance. As we have already noted, Williams attacks " s i m i l e s " i n the "Prologue" because they are a mode of making comparisons that remove the mind from i t s primary engagement i n process. "Much more keen," he writes, i s that power which discovers i n things those inimitable p a r t i c l e s of d i s s i m i l a r i t y to a l l other things which are the p e c u l i a r perfections of the thing i n question. But t h i s loose l i n k i n g of one thing with another has e f f e c t s of a destructive power l i t t l e to be guessed at : a l l manner of things are thrown out of key so that i t approaches the impossible to a r r i v e at an understanding of anything. A l l i s confusion, yet i t comes from a hidden desire f o r the dance, a l u s t of the imagination, a w i l l to accord two instruments i n a duet. (K, 18-19) The presentation of the two deaths i n the proximity of time, not i n the frame of a s t a t i c order of laws, i s a "loose l i n k i n g " that destroys the habitual ways of f i x i n g events into the given perspective of a closed system of s i g n i f i c a n c e — say, a m o r a l system that would automatically assume that 198 the death of the "young woman" must be s i g n i f i c a n t l y d i f f e r e n t from the death of a murdered man. This l e v e l l i n g of assumed frames of reference on the part of the "poet" works contrary to the l o g i c of "understanding." I t throws the mind into the condition of a loss of p e r s p e c t i v a l meaning. But there i s , i n t h i s l o s s , a gain. " A l l i s confusion," the mind thereby l i b e r a t e d to enter the "desire f o r the dance, a l u s t of the imagination." The "jagged r e s o r t , " or the "loose l i n k i n g of one thing with another," i s therefore a way of d i s o r i e n t i n g the mind's orders, of estranging i t from i t s own s e l f - r e f e r e n t i a l forms. Confusion i s the p o s i t i v e e f f e c t of t h i s negative gesture, f o r i n the underlying confusion of experience, the imagination awakens to the quick play of i t s own powers. Elsewhere i n the "Prologue" we are given a kind of fo o l ' s diagnosis of the releasing force of t h i s destructive process: The stream of things having composed i t s e l f into wiry strands that move i n one f i x e d d i r e c t i o n , the poet i n desperation turns at r i g h t angles and cuts across current with s t a r t l i n g r e s u l t s to h i s hangdog mood. (K, 17) This statement i s l i f t e d from one of the in t e r p r e t a t i o n s to the improvisa-tions that Williams chose to place i n his "Prologue" with a group of others, possibly because together they help to c l a r i f y the complexity of the disorder operating i n Kora i n H e l l . Underneath the almost disembodied texture of the statement, however, resides the basic c r i s i s that Williams experienced by throwing himself into the w r i t i n g . A secure s e l f — c a l l i t an "ego" — consists of a closed perspective — c a l l i t a pe r s o n a l i t y say, or some such unity that i d e n t i f i e s i t s e l f through a separation from that which i t cannot know. Through the dominance of t h i s kind of s e l f , the "wiry strands" of the world are brought under c o n t r o l , hence divorced from consciousness. The 199 i s o l a t e s e l f , i n t h i s sense, invents i t s own world to escape the push of the a c t u a l , i t s o b j e c t i v i t y . But "the poet," we are t o l d , cuts across t h i s "current," and " i n desperation" because there i s no other choice i n t h i s impasse. To remain locked i n "one f i x e d d i r e c t i o n " (a f i x e d moral system i s one such di r e c t i o n ) i s to remain locked i n a "nightmare" that negates experience. Williams says he wrote Kora "to loosen the a t t e n t i o n , " i n t h i s way to un-settle closed forms of thought. To write i s the thing, f i n a l l y , f o r the sake of w r i t i n g , not i n any case to use w r i t i n g as a mode of conveying a package of predetermined judgments over to the helpless reader. i i I t i s from t h i s vantage point, mid-stream as i t were, that we can evaluate more accurately what Williams c a l l s the "broken s t y l e " (K, 6) of his "Prologue." And so c h a r a c t e r i s t i c a l l y throughout (our discussion has focused on the opening four pages) he refuses to argue from a discu r s i v e point of view what he, i n f a c t , says. What i s the s o - c a l l e d "subject" of the "Prologue"? There i s no such stable " e n t i t y " i n s i g h t . In other words, the "Prologue" i s i t s e l f a w r i t i n g act, for Williams, one of a piece with the Improvisations as a whole, a further extension of the p o s s i b i l i t i e s that began to dawn on him as "dark s c r i b b l i n g s " t r a n s l a t i n g themselves into the text Kora i n H e l l . I t s "broken s t y l e " i s at once a defiance of the unity of r a t i o n a l thought and an a f f i r m a t i o n of a compositional method consonant with the sense of the imagination that Williams talks but does not " t a l k about." The w r i t e r i n Kora, the improvisations behind him, now enacts the same method to probe and explore the ground of the w r i t i n g that l i e s behind him. It i s i n t h i s state of mind that Williams sat down to write the 200 "Prologue." He i s not seeking to prove i n l o g i c a l terms the nature of the imagination, for that procedure would go against the grain of his w r i t i n g i n the improvisations: "Talk i s s e r v i l e that i s set to inform" (K, 17) because such t a l k i n g about i s always a d e s c r i p t i v e removal from the thing at hand, what i s before the w r i t e r i n i t s p a r t i c u l a r i t y . The w r i t i n g i n the "Prologue" proves i t s e l f i n a c t i o n , that i s , un-covers i t s content through i t s own movement, and l i k e the improvisations themselves, figures i t s way toward an understanding of the imagination through a method of w r i t i n g that exemplifies i t s nature. In short, Williams composes, not i n abstractions but through images whose o b j e c t i v i t y determines the p o s s i b i l i t y of what comes to be thought. "No ideas but i n things." We are t o l d as much i n a statement from the "Prologue." "The imagination," Williams writes, goes from one thing to another. Given many things of nearly t o t a l l y divergent natures but possessing one-thousandth part of a q u a l i t y i n common, provided that be new, distinguished, these things belong i n an imag-i n a t i v e category and not i n a gross natural array. To me t h i s i s the g i s t of the whole matter. (K, 14) In the opening pages, we have watched Williams leaping from "one thing to another," one image to another, one s i t u a t i o n to another, without providing those d i s c u r s i v e t r a n s i t i o n s that would subordinate these "things" to a given frame of reference, some t h e o r e t i c a l point of view that determines the exact s i g n i f i c a n c e of the fac t s used to support i t . F i r s t , an image of Williams' mother i n Rome, then the disreputable people around her, a l i n e from V i l l o n , the unexpected appearance of Sandburg's b o l l weevil, verbatim snatches of conversation with Williams' mother, lunch with Arensberg, art pieces by Duchamp, Arensberg's story of the "old Boston Hermit," A.E. Kerr, p r e h i s t o r i c cave-drawings, the camera obscura — and so on, a one and a one and a one, the images drawn into the f i e l d of the w r i t i n g as p a r t i c u l a r s 201 that manifest, i n t h e i r p a r t i c u l a r i t y , the nature of the imagination. They are brought together, not i n a "gross natural array" (a sort of pot po u r r i of the poet's "sentimental or a s s o c i a t i o n a l " s e l f ? ) , but as objects that reveal themselves to each, other i n t h e i r uniqueness, t h e i r differences from one another, which i n turn constitutes t h e i r commonality. These images are presented as p a r t i c u l a r s not as transparent signs that "represent" a given view of the world p r i o r to t h e i r appearance i n the text. In Spring and A l l , Williams would c a l l t h i s kind of use (rather, mis-use) of image a "Crude symbolism" (SA, 100), the f a l s e value he attacks i n Kora. The movement of the w r i t i n g i n the "Prologue," i n other words, the leaps across the gaps between images, as well as the s h i f t s from one image to another without l o g i c a l t r a n s i t i o n s , enacts the indeterminacy of the process of composi-t i o n . The mind inside t h i s process does not possess, but resigns i t s e l f to the o b j e c t i v i t y of the material at hand; i t i s possessed by the play as w e l l as the i n t e r - p l a y of images. Like both Juan Gris and Marcel Duchamp, the writer i n the "Prologue" detaches each p a r t i c u l a r image from a former context (the l i n e from V i l l o n ' s "Ballade" i s one such image, as i s the Arensberg anec-dote, and so on), and draws them into the blank space of h i s w r i t i n g , one against the other, one alongside the other, the gaps between them l e f t as gaps. He thus l i t e r a l l y composes his way through to an understanding of the imagina-t i o n which i s e x p e r i e n t i a l rather than "reasonable" ( i . e . determined before-hand). Singly and together, the images themselves are complexes — Pound defined the "Image" as "that which presents an i n t e l l e c t u a l and emotional com-35 plex i n an instant of time" — and as such, they subvert a subjective posses-sion of things that depends upon a separation of the mind from things. In t h i s way, they simultaneously cut across imposed completions of "thought" and 202 r e - e s t a b l i s h the primary confusion of experience. In the r e s u l t i n g state of incompletion, the same images that c a l l a t tention to t h e i r p a r t i c u l a r i t y , as d i f f e r e n t as they are from one another, not only embody and reveal, but also perform the imagination as a force that by nature wanders, turns to the l e f t when i t should have turned r i g h t . And i t does so, because i t cannot help but go from "one thing to another," i n time, the same present time that Williams recognizes i n the cave-drawings, and the same present time that appears i n the contemporary world of h i s w r i t i n g . The w r i t i n g i n the "Prologue" thus creates a d i s - l o c a t i o n , i n e f f e c t , mirrors p r e c i s e l y the destruction of the i l l u s i o n of representative form i n a r t , i n Davis' p r i n t f o r instance. Since there i s no external frame of reference, no determinate "meaning" outside the a c t u a l i t y of the w r i t i n g to which the w r i t i n g r e f e r s , the reader discovers that he too, l i k e the w r i t e r , cannot transcend i t s opacity. The w r i t i n g turns into an objective event that draws his mind out into the process of i t s composition. His experience of the text becomes a c r u c i a l part of i t s a c t i v i t y . He too experiences the d i s i n t e g r a t i o n of h i s s u b j e c t i v i t y and the consequent confusion of a c r i s i s of consciousness, h i s mind turned inside-out, forced as i t i s to get l o s t i n the w r i t i n g as i t goes. One f a s c i n a t i n g statement i n "From My Notes About My Mother" i s to the point i n t h i s context. A f t e r r e c i t i n g an anecdote i n his mother's words, without explanatory or i n t e r p r e t i v e comments, Williams c h a r a c t e r i s t i c a l l y becomes conscious of h i s reader and attempts to f i l l him i n on what we might c a l l h i s "broken" method of presenting h i s m a t e r i a l : Perhaps my way of t e l l i n g t h i s i s n ' t exactly what you 'might prefer or expect, but i n t h i s family you are expected to understand what i s said and i n t e r p r e t , as 203 e s s e n t i a l to the t e l l i n g , the way i n which i t i s t o l d — for some reason which you w i l l know i s of the matter i t s e l f . That i s to p i c t u r e i t , "Figure to y o u r s e l f , " as my mother would often say . . . .36 The complex play — a t r i p l e - p l a y — on the term " f i g u r e " i s here revealing. In a very simple sense, Williams i s asking nothing more of h i s readers than that they place themselves within the language of h i s mother i n order to experience her words d i r e c t l y , or o b j e c t i v e l y , or perhaps (drawing on Keats' advice) more t e l l i n g l y , negatively, without that i r r i t a b l e reaching a f t e r completed thoughts. They should "imagine" the movement of her mind, which i s what he i s t r y i n g to do i n h i s account of h i s conversations with her. In another way, however, the term " f i g u r e " i s a c o l l o q u i a l word that has to do with the act of discovering a s o l u t i o n to a d i f f i c u l t y , i n other words, an i n t e l l e c t u a l process: f o r example, Williams -figured out how;to s t a r t his car. And yet, the term " f i g u r e " also points to the form of a thing, to the f i g u r e i t cuts i n space, i t s appearance, as say the appearance of the five-pointed star against the "black table" i n Williams' comments on the poetry of Marianne Moore. As a method, the act of f i g u r i n g proposes at l e a s t three d i r e c t i o n s at the same time: toward perception as an act, toward thinking as a process, and f i n a l l y , toward the appearances that constitute the texture of the world. The imagination manifests a l l three d i r e c t i o n s at once. In i t s domain, form i s a r e v e l a t i o n of content, so that how a thing i s said i s e s s e n t i a l to what i s being sa i d . Or stated i n another way, the act of f i g u r i n g i s an act of imagining what i s s a i d , and t h i s , i n i t s turn, i s an act of discovering what i s s a i d , the process i t s e l f the thing that affirms i t s own p a r t i c u l a r i t y . No imagining, no discovery. No discovery, no experience of process. In w r i t i n g , then, meaning as such issues from the i n t e r p l a y between 204 reader and w r i t e r , both, of them caught up i n the f i e l d of the text. Meaning, too, l i k e the mind, i s a function of th i s drama, not an e n t i t y that e x i s t s outside i t . In the "Prologue" — as i n a l l of the w r i t i n g i n Kora — the leaps across blank spaces, the transformational s h i f t s from one image to another, the r e f u s a l to define the imagination i n d i s c u r s i v e terms, or the reverse, the attempt to exemplify the imagination i n w r i t i n g that manifests i t s e f f e c t s , the attention thereby drawn to the things before the mind "without forethought or afterthought but with great i n t e n s i t y of perception" — a l l of t h i s a c t i v i t y i n the w r i t i n g i s t i e d to the loosening of the mind's f i x i t i e s that occurs when i t i s "slaughtered" by change and compelled to " s t r a y," as Williams' mother does. In the "Prologue," she i s also the figur e of the imagination. Like mother, l i k e son. For both, the imagination works, l i k e the b o l l weevil, that creature who bu i l d s i t s e l f i nto any condition i t finds i t s e l f i n , or l i k e the speech of the f o o l i n Kora that adjusts i t s e l f to the o b j e c t i v i t y of a world that never ceases to cleave the mind's orders. And i n c i d e n t a l l y , Williams' l i f e - l o n g attachment to "localism" begins i n t h i s same cleavage. "And to me e s p e c i a l l y , " he wrote to Marianne Moore i n a l e t t e r dated June 2, 1932, you give a sense of triumph i n that i t i s my own scene without mistaking the l o c a l for the parochial. Almost no one (or very few) has f e l t the f u l l and conclusive impact of that necessity i n the w r i t i n g . The meaning of the objective, the r e a l i z a t i o n of i t s r e l e a s i n g q u a l i t y , instead of i t s w a l l i n g e f f e c t when badly comprehended, has been nowhere so well forced to the l i g h t . I t i s the underlying r e a l i t y as well as the supreme d i f f i c u l t y of an a r t . (SL, 123) Speaking of the act of w r i t i n g i n "A Beginning on the Short Story 205. (Notes)," Williams could quite e a s i l y be a r t i c u l a t i n g the i n i t i a l c r i s i s that informs "the texture of Kora: At f i r s t a l l the images, one or many which f i l l the mind, are f i x e d . I have passed through i t and studied i t for years. We look at the c e i l i n g and review the f i x i t i e s of the day, the month, the year, the l i f e t i m e . Then i t begins; that happy time when the image becomes broken or begins to break up, becomes a l i t t l e f l u i d — or i s affected, f l o a t s brokenly i n the f l u i d . The r i g i d i t i e s y i e l d — l i k e i c e i n March, the magic month. (SE, 307) In t h i s same essay, Williams urges writers to "take to the imagination" (SE, 307), i n t h i s sense, to allow w r i t i n g i t s e l f to reduce the mind back into a process where nothing i s determinable, where everything i s asymmetric and s h i f t e d , l i k e the world of the cave-drawings — or i n Williams' terms, the mind thereby finds i t s e l f i n nature, in s i d e the actual that w r i t i n g becomes: Arrived at that condition, the imagination inflamed, the excitement of i t i s that you no longer copy but make a natural object. (Something comparable to nature: an other nature.) You yourself become the instrument of nature — the helpless instrument. (SE, 303) In Kora, Williams' sudden resignation to existence gives way to the b i r t h of the imagination, the condition, as he says i n h i s "Prologue," of the "mind's florescence" (K, 22). As he discovers, when the " r i g i d i t i e s y i e l d " and the f i x i t i e s of the mind "break up," there i s always an otherness ready to push through, an o b j e c t i v i t y that refuses to be caged by predeter-mined forms of s u b j e c t i v i t y , an actual world i n which desire surfaces: I t ' s a l l one. -Richard worked years to conquer the descending cadence, i d i o t i c sentimentalist. Ha, f o r happiness! This tore the dress i n ribbons from her maid's back and not spared the n a i l s e i t h e r ; wild anger s p i t from her pinched eyes! This i s the better part. Or a c h i l d under a table to be dragged out coughing and b i t i n g , eyes g l i t t e r i n g e v i l l y . I ' l l have i t my way! (K, 56-57) In the world of Kora, s e c u r i t y i s constantly being invaded by the epidemic 206 of the world, the mind constantly being drawn into a brokenness i n which i t flounders and gets confused, at war with I t s e l f , but for t h i s reason, engaged by things, inside the tension of d e s i r e : Nothing i s any pleasure but misery and brokenness, THIS i s the only up-cadence. T h i s ' i s where-the secret r o l l s over and opens i t s eyes. B i t t e r words spoken to a c h i l d r i p p l e i n morning•light! Boredom from a bedroom doorway t h r i l l s with a n t i c i p a t i o n ! The complaints of an old man dying piecemeal are s t a r l i n g chirrups. Coughs go singing on springtime paths across a f i e l d ; corruption picks strawberries and slow warping of the mind, blacking the deadly walls — counted and recounted — r o l l s i n the grass and shouts e c s t a t i c a l l y . A l l i s solved! (K, 57) And as the writ e r affirms the confusion of "brokenness," a l l former values are turned topsy-turvy; coughs become songs and the process of change ("corruption"), i n the language of the w r i t i n g , finds i t s e l f re-aligned with things ("picks strawberries"). When the mind warps and thus loses i t s s u b j e c t i v i t y , there i s no longer any further need for that i r r i t a b l e reaching a f t e r " f a c t and reason." Now everything becomes dense and multiple, actual. And, we are reminded that ecstasy i s a state of mind "out" of "place," i n t h i s instance, a state contrary to the s t a s i s of the mind's f i x i t i e s . " A l l i s solved!" Solved because there i s nothing to solve — no such end when the mind i s f l o r e s c e n t , active to what images i t s e l f f o r t h . I t i s out of t h i s immediate sense of the world that Williams openly attacks, throughout the text of Kora, but more p u b l i c l y i n h i s "Prologue," the sentimentalization of experience that occurs when language Is understood merely as a transparency, not the density i t i s . Language, to the awakening 207 w r i t e r i n Kora, c a r r i e s the o b j e c t i v i t y of the world i n i t s own wild move-ment. The play of words manifests the same processes embodied i n Jacob Louslinger's decaying body. The w r i t i n g that comes of t h i s play moves against the opaque wall of words, or p e r s i s t e n t l y attempts to, and through t h i s process, begins to reveal a way through to the imagination of an immediate world. The former nightmare of the i s o l a t e s e l f breaks — or i s "slaughtered" — and the feet once again assume the figure of the dance, the body f l e x i n g i t s e l f , the "cracked mind" (K, 65) tense with expectations, the writer thereby freed to enter a language play. This i s what makes Kora such a dense, complex work to read c r i t i c a l l y , and yet i t i s t h i s very q u a l i t y of the text that constitutes i t s nature. In i t the words themselves are constantly s h i f t i n g the attention away from one f i x i t y or another, fo r c i n g the reader to re-adjust to the condition of the w r i t i n g as i t goes, because the w r i t i n g i t s e l f , as the voice i n one of the i n t e r p r e t a t i o n s says, i s "interpreting as it goes. " The reader who accepts t h i s play finds himself i n the drama of the w r i t i n g and moves with the composing. He shares the time of the w r i t i n g , which i s p r e c i s e l y the demand — and the challenge — of improvisational formj a form that begins from scratch and which, for t h i s reason, forces the writer to allow the w r i t i n g to compose i t s e l f , the w r i t i n g thus an extension of a f i e l d of a c t i v i t y within which the mind thinks i t s way through, as Williams does i n h i s "Prologue," i n t e r p r e t i n g as he goes i n the time of the composition. An improvisation i s a state of mind open to process and transformation, to the quick play of time. Like father, l i k e son: My little son's improvisations exceed mine: a round stone- to him's a loaf of dread or "this hen could lay a dozen golden eggs." Birds fly about his bedstead; giants, lean over him with hungry jaws; bears roam the'. farm by 208 summer and are killed and quartered at a thought. There are interminable stories at eating time full of bizarre imagery, true grotesques, pigs that change to dogs in the telling, cows that sing, roosters that become -mountains and oceans that fill a soup plate. There are groans- and growls, dun clouds and sunshine :mixed 'in a huge phantas-magoria that never rests, never ceases to unfold into — the day's poor little happenings. (K, 74) There i s , perhaps needless to say, a great deal of humourous, good natured fun here, but the point i s that the writer's son i s s t i l l free to roam the f i e l d of h i s desires. He moves inside the intimacy of the present — "the day's poor little happenings." To him nothing i s stable, anything can be any other thing. Forms change i n the b l i n k of an eye, a "round stone" becomes a "loaf of bread," or vice-versa, no matter, there i s yet more to come, sometimes so quickly that "pigs" can even "turn to dogs in the telling" and "oceans" have no d i f f i c u l t y f i l l i n g "a soup plate." The writer's son thus becomes one more figu r e of the imagination that does go. "from one thing to another," and l i k e the seemingly i n d e s t r u c t i b l e b o l l weevil, thrives on change. But further, the thing that r e a l l y fascinates the writer about h i s son's f l e x i b l e mind i s the unabashed innocence of i t s openly aimless nature. He has simply not learned to predetermine his experience. The movement of his mind i s conditioned purely by the things before i t . He i s always getting l o s t i n h i s imagination. In f a c t , he does nothing but improvise: His tunes follow no scale, no rhythm — alone the mood in odd ramblings up and down, over and over with a rigor of invention'that-rises beyond-.the-power to follow except in some more obvious flight, (K, 74) And the pale negative, the i n h i b i t i n g opposite of t h i s "rigor of invention!" Never have I heard so crushing a critique as those des-olate inventions, involved half-hymns, after his first visit to a Christian Sunday school. (K, 74) Kora i n H e l l has a pointed s u b t i t l e : Improvisations. Or as Williams says, "Here i s dancing! The mind i n t a t t e r s " (K, 57). 209 CHAPTER EIGHT WRITE GOING. LOOK TO STEER. Buying a car, a rev o l u t i o n i n the d a i l y l i f e of a doctor i n small town America, who had to make the rounds, much fa s t e r and much more e f f i c i e n t than feet, or a horse, or a b i c y c l e : needless to say, an event i n Williams' l i f e , c r i t i c a l enough to si n g l e out i n an autobiography of a w r i t e r . Here was a completely new kind of machine — a self-moving thing — that demanded i n i t s own p a r t i c u l a r i t y a c a r e f u l a t t e n t i o n to d e t a i l s to make use of i t , a v e h i c l e that might, e s p e c i a l l y i f the operator of i t were a wri t e r with the kind of mind Williams possessed, change the very way he could think about the a r t of w r i t i n g . In " F i r s t Years of P r a c t i c e , " Williams r e c a l l s his f i r s t car: I walked to my c a l l s or rode a b i c y c l e . Then I hired a l i t t l e mare, A s t r i d , f o r a few months. I made seven hundred f i f t y d o l l a r s my f i r s t year. Then l a t e i n 1911, I got my f i r s t Ford! A beauty with brass rods i n front holding up the windshield, acetylene lamps, but no s t a r t e r ! Sometimes of a winter's day I'd go out, crank the car f o r twenty minutes, u n t i l I got i t going, then, i n a dripping sweat, leave the engine running, go i n , take a quick bath, change my clothes then s a l l y 210 f o r t h on my calls.. Once the thing kicked back and the handle of the crank h i t me above the l e f t eye. It'might have been worse. The t r i c k was to use the l e f t hand i n cranking, so that when the kickback came the handle would j e r k out of the fingers instead of s t r i k i n g the wrist and breaking i t . I had used the l e f t hand, got i t over the eye instead. (A, 127)^ "The t r i c k was" — and we notice immediately the kind of mind that works against any d i f f i c u l t y as a s p e c i f i c d i f f i c u l t y , that cuts i t s way through an impasse, not by consulting a manual, but by f i n d i n g a so l u t i o n , any sol u t i o n , with the material at hand. In other words, i t simply improvises: 1. to compose, or simultaneously compose and perform, sing, etc., on the spur of the moment and without any preparation; extemporize. 2. to make, provide, or do with the tools and materials at hand, usually to f i l l an unforeseen and immediate need: as, he improvised a bed of leaves. (Webster's New World D i c t i o n a r y ) 2 The d e f i n i t i o n s t r i k e s to the heart of what happens i n Kora. Williams had to learn how to compose and perform simultaneously — or think and write — and on the sharp, r i s k y spur of the moment in s i d e the w r i t i n g . The words came f i r s t as the material at hand, and w r i t i n g the act that f u l f i l l e d the need to f i n d a way, a compositional way, of moving through h i s own slaughter. Starting the car and learning how to write: a possible connection, a remote one perhaps, but nonetheless possible. In "Seventy Years Deep," an essay written very l a t e i n l i f e , Williams reminisces about h i s long l i f e as a doctor and writer i n Rutherford, New 3 Jersey, the town that remained h i s home s t r a i g h t through. And not sur-p r i s i n g l y , he remembers those countless times b i t s and pieces of phrases broke into h i s mind as he drove, most l i k e l y because he drove. He would f u r i o u s l y attempt to write down the words before they escaped him, "When the phrasing of a passage suddenly h i t s me," he writes, "knowing how quickly such things are l o s t , I f i n d myself at the side of the road f r a n t i c a l l y 211 searching i n my medical bag f o r a p r e s c r i p t i o n blank," And he explains further the urgency that l a y behind h i s need to write while d r i v i n g : I burned i n t e r n a l l y with something I had j n s t heard or that had occurred to my mind; i t i s evanescent, e i t h e r you put i t down at once — or i t i s gone. I would look out of my car f o r a place to park. People must have wondered at me — maybe a boy on a b i c y c l e would be pedaling by — but the urge was on me and I had to get i t off my chest.5 The v i v i d memory of these intense moments should alone remind us that Williams d i d spend a great deal of time, and e s p e c i a l l y as a doctor, on the road, d r i v i n g "unwitnessed to work," as Louis Zukofsky says, "no one but himself to drive the car through the suburbs."^ The short poem, "The Young Housewife" — "I pass s o l i t a r y i n my car" (CEP, 136) — was f i r s t published as ea r l y as 1916 i n Others ^ only a few years a f t e r Williams got his f i r s t Ford. In other words, r i g h t from the beginning, Williams could hardly have r e s i s t e d the fac t of the car as a technological object that brought into r e l i e f a (new) method of composition that he aligned so c l o s e l y with modernist w r i t i n g . The car was a natural image of the modernist concern with movement. Duchamp's Nude descends the stairway as a mass-in-movement, a self-moving thing, an auto-mobile. As any beginning d r i v e r quickly discovers, the car o f f e r s a sense of movement p a r t i c u l a r to i t s e l f . Get into i t , and the f i r s t thing that becomes apparent i s the separation of an out from an i n , perhaps no momentous event, but the subtle cleavage that occurs makes a v a i l a b l e a consciousness of things otherwise unavailable. The mind thus f i n d s i t s e l f i n s i d e an outside, and when the d r i v i n g begins, the driver enters the play of a doubleness: not only an insi d e experienced as an outside, but now as well an outside experienced as an i n s i d e . The dr i v e r i n 212 t r a n s i t moves through, a f i e l d of many surfaces, the eyes s h i f t i n g and turning with photographic r a p i d i t y , things appearing and disappearing. That i s , the writer finds himself i n process, i n a flow of events i n which no given perspective i s an end but simply a point i n an a c t i v i t y experienced i n i t s temporality. Driving the car, for instance, i n "A Novelette": And nothing — opens the doors, i n s e r t s the key, presses the s t a r t i n g pedal, adjusts the t h r o t t l e and the choker and backs out, downhill. Sees the barberry gouts. Seize the steering wheel and turn i t sharply to the l e f t , the l i l a c twigs — that have l o s t prestige through the loss of plumage — scrape the l e f t front fender sharply. (AN, 278) No f i x e d laws, but the law of change. The dying l i l a c s scrape the fender, and sharply, as a p a r t i c u l a r does when i t s t r i k e s the eyes. The act of d r i v i n g not only embodies a c o n t r a r i e t y that reveals the open structure of experience, but also places the mind of the d r i v e r i n a vulnerable s i t u a t i o n . Inside the s p a t i a l dimension of an environment on the move, things by nature are experienced as an invasion of mind, the eyes i n e v i t a b l y being struck, i n a way stung by p a r t i c u l a r s that appear i n view and as quickly disappear. The d r i v e r who i s capable of maintaining himself i n t h i s doubleness must pay attention to otherness, to "the thing i t s e l f without forethought" — those p a r t i c u l a r s that draw him out into a process wherein his mind i s reduced to i t s primary engagement i n a s h i f t i n g f i e l d of i n t e r - r e l a t i o n s . The e f f e c t i s s i m i l a r to the e f f e c t of the epidemic i n "A Novelette," the s t r e s s of which "pares o f f the i n a n i t y by force of speed and a sharpness, a closeness of observation, of attention comes through" (AN, 273). The poet/driver of "The Right of Way" i n Spring and A l l (SA, 119-20) moves with t h i s c o n t r a r i e t y and affirms the negative state of emptiness 213 that r e s u l t s from h i s resignation to experience. In passing with my mind on nothing i n the world — the mind becomes i t s e l f a "nothing," a vacant c a v i t y ( for Williams, a state of "ignorance") that p r o j e c t s , as a moving f i l m projects images on the screen, the appearance of things i n time that s t r i k e h i s eyes. Driving i s the event of t h i s invasion, t h i s "rape," as i t were, of the mind's closures. And i t occurs as the mind makes i t s way through a f i e l d of o p a c i t i e s that do not y i e l d to i t s l i m i t s : rather assert themselves s p e c i f i c a l l y against those l i m i t s . "I saw," so the poem proceeds, as the poet passes through a f i e l d of s h i f t i n g appearances, "an e l d e r l y man who / smiled . . . a woman i n blue / who was laughing and leaning forward . . . " Why bother where I went? fo r I went spinning on the four wheels of my car along the wet road u n t i l And of course everything, even the humourous laughter of the poet, hangs suspended i n the gap following the p r e p o s i t i o n a l hinge: " u n t i l " the mind i s invaded again by something other, t h i s time: I saw a g i r l with one leg over the r a i l of a balcony Things thus become those very walls that make a closeness of attention a fundamental condition i n the continual creation of a world — the actual world of the imagination — that constantly escapes the deadness of predetermined forms of thought. The same poet who wrote "The Right of Way" also declared i n old age: Only the imagination i s r e a l ! I have declared i t time without end. I f a man die i t i s because death has f i r s t 214 possessed h i s imagination. (PB, 179) Had the poet i n "The Right of Way" not allowed himself to pass with h i s mind "on nothing," he would have removed h i s nameless s e l f from the event of experience. His mind on "something" — or as i t were, something on his mind — he wouldn't have noticed anything. And the play on the " r i g h t of way" he enjoys "by // v i r t u e of the law" strongly hints that his method of seeing runs contrary to established forms of perception. And his speaking as we l l , f o r he adopts the frozen language of t r a f f i c signs that p o l i c e our movement through a t e r r i t o r i a l i z e d space and makes i t operative again i n h i s poem. Maybe, then, t h i s f o o l of a writer i s heading s t r a i g h t into a d i t c h or s t r a i g h t into a telephone pole — or he may, l i k e the two dark figures i n Davis' p r i n t , be on the edge of a dip i n the road, about to have an accident. In any case, Marcel Duchamp had an accident when he "decided h i s composition f o r that day would be the f i r s t thing that struck h i s eye i n the f i r s t hardware store he should enter" (K, 10). Williams' wording i s exact: "the f i r s t thing.that struck h i s eye," each word weighted, simulta-neously simple and complex, again the thing i t s e l f without forethought. In the opening pages of Spring and A l l , a text that d i r e c t l y extends the w r i t i n g i n Kora, the world suddenly becomes NEW because i t has ju s t immediately before come crashing down. Disasters and accidents, i n other words, destroy any given state of f i x i t y simply by bringing into r e l i e f the opacity of things, t h e i r s p e c i f i c and undeniable o b j e c t - i v i t y . And we might point out here that Williams' c a l l f o r the NEW i n his "Prologue" i s based upon the discovery i n Kora that the experience of the NEW i s the immediate e f f e c t of a s h i f t i n consciousness. "A new world / i s only a new mind" (PB, 76). 215 There i s thus t h i s c r u c i a l d i s t i n c t i o n between Duchamp's mind and the kind of mind that refuses to take i t s shape from what i s before i t : the one attempts to control things by r e t r e a t i n g into a s u b j e c t i v i t y that shuts the world out (e.g. the Puritans i n Williams' In the American Grain), and the other adjusts i t s e l f to the fac t of accidents, to the play of experience as an event i n the world. Duchamp, i n short, can think and act at the same time. He can make moves as he goes. We are t o l d i n Spring and A l l that "The pure products of America / go crazy" (SA, 131) because there i s no way, no method i n America to l i f t the world of its.immediate d e s i r e s ^ i n t o a. re v e l a t i o n of i t s e l f : No one to witness and adjust, no one to drive the car (SA, 133) The pun, then, i n no one, again the push f o r "the thing i t s e l f without f o r e -thought or afterthought but with great i n t e n s i t y of perception." The necessity to keep adjusting to a changing f i e l d of awareness while d r i v i n g a car mirrors exactly the necessity i n w r i t i n g as an act — If one should catch.me i n t h i s state.' — wings would go at a bargain. Ah but to bold the world i n the hand then — (K, 36) to hold onto the words at hand. "Write going. Look to steer," so Williams says i n "A Novelette" (AN, 278), a serie s of improvisations that uses the same method as i n Kora. Williams began w r i t i n g Kora with no book at a l l i n mind; he wrote, he says, "For r e l i e f , to keep myself from planning and thinking at a l l " (A, 158). 216 What e l s e , then, could he have done but.start from zero, from the blank page spread out before him, which, he f i l l e d with, "anything that came into my head" (A, 158)? The decision to begin " i n earnest" (A, 158), to write because of the pressure of a personal bankruptcy of b e l i e f , i n the circum-stances, would not have been unusual. What became an amazement and a wonder for Williams (and for the reader) i s the f a c t that the w r i t i n g would for t h i s very reason c a l l f o r t h what we e a r l i e r c a l l e d a c r i s i s of language, a c r i s i s i n language for the writ e r of Kora, f o r whom the words themselves became the actual material at hand. In the s l i p p e r y speech of the fo o l ' s voice, the f o o l whose ears are a l l eyes, w r i t i n g could now return to the elemental nature of words as they came, ringing i n t o the head of the wr i t e r , as they l i t e r a l l y do i n "Improvisation X X I I I . l " : Baaaa! Ba-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha! Bebe esa purga. I t i s the goats of Santo Domingo t a l k i n g . Bebe esa puvgal Bebeesapurga! And the answer i s : Yo no to quievo bebev'. Yonoloquierobeber! (K, 75) The p a r t i c l e s of sound here enter from an outside, from the distance of an otherness that embodies the nature of a foreignness. But as they configure (or cohere), goats begin to t a l k , and the l i s t e n i n g writer, wrapt by the l i q u i d q u a l i t y of these p a r t i c l e s of sound, i s tempted to lose himself i n a sea of laughter. Or the reverse, repeat a phrase over and over, and soon i t w i l l w i l l y - n i l l y d i s i n t e g r a t e into p a r t i c l e s of sound, even further, into the confusion of u n d i f f e r e n t i a t e d sound, a l l the s y l l a b l e s merging into one stream, p r e c i s e l y how they are f i r s t heard-as sound. And yet, as the improvisation implies there i s , at t h i s end, f i n a l l y no v i r t u e i n simply getting drunk on sound f o r the sake of getting l o s t i n the sea. For to be l o s t i n the sea i s an end, an end which leads to the death of speech. A s u i c i d e . "The sea i s not our home" "(P, 235^ as Paterson w i l l l a t e r t e l l 217 us. The p u l l i s strong and r e a l enough.; language has that appeal ( t h i s i s i t s p e c u l i a r power). But the writer has to r e s i s t that f i n a l i t y , must r e s i s t i t , and p u l l himself back, toward that point where sound ceases to be mere sound and becomes; morpheme. Sounds thus become words, and words a configuration of sounds. This i s that tense edge, a threshold,' that t i e s the imagination to the a c t u a l . The same resistance occurs i n "Improvisation XXV.2," but with one notable d i f f e r e n c e . Here sight rather than sound i s the focus of attention. In f l i g h t as w e l l as i n submersion ( i n Kora ascent and descent are constantly doubling back on one another) there i s the equal danger of a loss of that tension between appearance and disappearance which constitutes the f i e l d of experience. The w r i t e r of Kora desires to remain within the c o n t r a r i e t y , within what Williams i n "The Desert Music" comes to c a l l the protective " f i l m " (PB, 120) where the skin of any l i v e thing meets the opacity of the world. I t i s the tension i t s e l f that resonates the music of existence: The music guards i t , a mucus, a f i l m that surrounds i t , a benumbing ink that stains the sea of our minds — to hold us o f f — shed of a shape close as i t can get to no shape, a music! a protecting music . (PB, 120) The tension i s that " s t a i n " that makes a thing as a creature of nature both a form and a f i g u r e , both an I and a You, both an " e a r t h l i n g " and a "death-l i n g , " l i k e Jacob Louslinger. And i t i s t h i s tension that the w r i t e r i n Kora wants, f o r i t i s here also that desire as a force comes into i t s own. A man can shoot his s p i r i t up out of a wooden house, that i s , through the r o o f — the roof's s l a t e — but how far? I t i s of f i n a l importance to know that. To say the world turns under my feet and that I watch i t pas-sing with a smile Is neither the truth nor my desire. But I would wish to stand — you've seen the k i n g f i s h e r do i t — where the lar g e s t town might be taken i n my two 218 hands, as high, l e t us say as a man's head — some one man not too far above the clouds. What would I do then? Oh I'd hold my sleeve over the sun awhile to make church b e l l s r i n g . (K, 79) The i n t e r p r e t a t i o n juxtaposed against t h i s improvisation reveals (as so many of the i n t e r p r e t a t i o n s do) the methodological s h i f t of consciousness implied i n the desire _tp_ stand at that point i n the mind where the world may be "taken i n my two hands." The s h i f t , needless to say, i s not into s t a s i s , a fi x e d view of the world. I t i s not a journey, but an e f f e c t — the estranged writ e r of Kora re-enters the play of the world from the other side, from the "back s i d e " (K, 80) of perception, there where the world appears, not as a completed perception, but as the event of i t , a creative act: It is obvious that if in flying an airplane one reached such an altitude- that all sense of direction and every intelligible perception of the world were lost there would be nothing left to do but to come down to that point at which eyes regained their power. (K, 79) I t i s the edge of the indeterminate the writer i n Kora seeks. "It is nearly pure luck," so the voice i n the i n t e r p r e t a t i o n to "Impro-v i s a t i o n XXIII.1" ("Baaaal"), h i s tongue i n his cheek, says, "that gets the mind turned inside out in a work of art. There is nothing more difficult than to write a poem" (K, 75). This i s the same writer who has j u s t said i n the text of Kora: "A poem can be made of anything" (K, 70). Of course, i t a l l depends upon the writer's a b i l i t y to remain at "that point" where a l l the contraries that f a b r i c a t e the drama of experience (both i n language and i n the world) are a l i v e on the edge of the mind's l i m i t s ; t h i s point of consciousness w r i t i n g reveals and enacts. The writer who composes and performs at the same time drives through the world i n language. "It is something of a matter of sleight of hand" (K, 75). That i s , on the other side of the language 219 c r i s i s there i s to be faced the skin of the evanescent transformations of the words themselves, the experience of which bespeaks the alchemic nature of a world outside that escapes the container of any given form. Or as we are t o l d i n the f i n a l l i n e s of the same i n t e r p r e t a t i o n : The poets of the T'ang dynasty or of the golden age in Greece or even the Elizabethans: i t ' s a hind of alchemy of form, a deft bottling of a fermenting language. Take Dante and his Tuscan dialect — It 's a matter of position. The empty form drops from a cloud, like a gourd from a vine; into i t the poet packs his phallus-like argument. (K, 75) That c r u c i a l "matter of position" concerns method, the how — the "howl" i n Paterson II (P_, 28) — rather than j u s t the what. Williams i s e x p l i c i t about t h i s d i s t i n c t i o n i n h i s "Author's Introduction" to The Wedge (1944): I t i s n ' t what he Ethe w r i t e r ! says that counts as a work of a r t , i t ' s what he makes, with such i n t e n s i t y of perception that i t l i v e s with an i n t r i n s i c movement of i t s own to v e r i f y i t s a u t h e n t i c i t y . (SE, 257)8 In "The Desert Music," the content of t h i s d e c l a r a t i o n reverses i t s e l f to become the pe r s i s t e n t question that haunts the poet: "How s h a l l we get said what must be said"? (PB, 108). This question, as yet unspoken, rather j u s t being formulated on the horizon of Kora, i s nonetheless i m p l i c i t i n the very texture of i t s language. Sometimes, however, i n the text i t s e l f the i n t e n t i o n to enact the play of language f a l t e r s , the writ e r then aware that he has not managed to l i f t the experience of i t s s u b s t a n t i a l i t y into the event of a dance that " l i v e s with an i n t r i n s i c movement of i t s own to v e r i f y i t s a u t h e n t i c i t y , " In "Impro-v i s a t i o n XIII.3," for example, t h i s inauthentic kind of w r i t i n g becomes the brunt of a light-hearted laughter: The words of the thing twang and twitter to the gentle rocking of a high-laced boot and the s i l k above that. The t r i c k of the dance i s i n following now the words, 220 allegro, now the contrary beat of the glossy l e g : Reaching f ar over as i f —• But always she draws back and comes down upon the word f l a t f o o t e d . For a moment we — but the boot's c o s t l y and the play's not mine. The pace leads o f f anew. Again the words break i t and we both come down f l a t f o o t e d . Then — near the knee, jumps to the eyes, catching i n the hair's shadow. But t h e . l i p s take the rhythm again and again we come down f l a t f o o t e d . By t h i s time boredom takes a hand and the play's ended. (K, 55) To a considerable extent, we should note, the self-conscious insistence to play the " f l a t f o o t e d " game of words r e t r i e v e s the w r i t i n g here — the la r g e r compositional space of Kora can accomodate even t h i s exercise i n w r i t i n g — and thus the attempt to dance with the "she," though never i n fac t consummated, re-opens the necessity to f i n d a way i n which the "twang and tw i t t e r " of desire can surface i n the o b j e c t i v i t y of the words themselves. In other words, t h i s one play ends i n boredom, but the p o s s i b i l i t y of the play i t s e l f remains r e a l enough. "The pace leads o f f anew." And so i n another wholly d i f f e r e n t instance, when the tension between meaning and i t s absence i s maintained, the drive can be held i n hand with anything that comes to mind. And why not? "Why pretend to remember the weather two years back?" In t h i s i n i t i a l l i n e from "Improvisation XI.1," a short improvisation, the words themselves, appear as i f from nowhere i n p a r t i c u l a r , as does the passage that follows: Why not? L i s t e n close then repeat a f t e r others what they have j u s t said and win a reputation f or v i v a c i t y . Oh feed upon petals of edelweiss! one dew drop, i f i t be from the r i g h t flower, i s f i v e years' drink! (K, 51) Who, for instance, i s speaking? And why? To what purpose? The key word i n the opening sentence ("pretend") here f l o a t s i n an apparently charged space that i s emptied of r e f e r e n t i a l meaning: are we to read "pretend" as an assertion or as make-believe or as a l i e ? The next sentence does not resolve the ambiguity but maintains i t by creating a gap between i t s e l f and 221 the preceding sentence. "Why not"? challenges the f i r s t question. I t i s e i t h e r the same voice t a l k i n g to i t s e l f , or another voice that i s played against the f i r s t . Or both ways. As readers we cannot be sure which way to turn for a s o l u t i o n , but — and t h i s i s the point — we should not t r y to be sure. The w r i t i n g simply i n v i t e s us to p a r t i c i p a t e i n the dance made possible through the loosening of meaning. And when we do, when we enter the w r i t i n g that composes i t s e l f as i t goes, the structure of the language play becomes immediate to our involvement. The t h i r d sentence i s now heard playing back against the second — i t could be another voice entering; or i t could be the same voice coming from three d i r e c t i o n s ; or i t could be a dialogue, the t h i r d sentence t i e d to the f i r s t . A l l ways of reading t h i s improvisation are p o s s i b l e . In f a c t , t h i s v a r i a b i l i t y i s the precise q u a l i t y of w r i t i n g that strays i n many d i r e c t i o n s at once, the e f f e c t of t h i s passage very much the experience of experience. Williams' statement on the viewer's response to Davis' drawing comes to mind: "an i m p r e s s i o n i s t i c view of the simultaneous." Writing i s nothing more (or l e s s ) than the act of d r i v i n g a car through a textual space, the words themselves the objects that come and go. By the t h i r d statement of "Improvisation XI.1," i n any case, the pretension (whatever d i c t i o n a r y d e f i n i t i o n we attach to the word) of remembering the weather two years back now becomes symptomatic of an obsession f o r c l a r i t y that derives i t s power so l e l y upon a r e t r e a t from the actual ambiguity of the present. And t h i s e f f e c t i s the function of the gaps between statements made possible by the absence of a f i x e d i n t e n t i o n on the w r i t e r ' s part to say something preconceived. A c l e a r memory, on the other hand, could lead to a "reputation fo r v i v a c i t y , " but at the cost of l o s i n g that present alone which should — 222 so the w r i t i n g i t s e l f proposes -— concern the w r i t e r , the immediacy of the "petals of edelweiss" of the same order as the immediacy of words. No amount of r e l i a n c e upon past events can eliminate the present. And i t i s the present, the actual i n w r i t i n g , not w r i t i n g that i s a plagiarism of past wri t e r s , that makes the ret r e a t into a r e p e t i t i o n " a f t e r others" an i n a n i t y , a f a l s i t y , a "pretension." Even i f the w r i t i n g amounts to nothing more than a word, a phrase, a l i n e , or a few l i n e s , such as t h i s improvisation, for the writer who wants to s h i f t into the actual, i t s t i l l has the value of immediacy. In t e r e s t i n g l y enough, the i n t e r p r e t a t i o n to the improvisation shoots back across the language road t r a v e l l e d , l i k e a beam of dark l i g h t , and without explaining away the opacity of i t s language, which would have been a s e l f - d e f e a t i n g gesture, i t enlarges i t s methodological context: •Having once taken-the plunge- the situation that preceded it becomes obsolete which a moment before was alive with malignant rigidities. (K, 51) And i s n ' t t h i s what happens when we drive a car? Each moment along the way appears i n a present and disappears into a past "alive with malignant rigidities," only then to be replaced by a "plunge", into another present, the past i n that s h i f t of a t t e n t i o n suddenly "obsolete," and so on, the d r i v e i t s e l f the form that l i v e s with "an i n t r i n s i c movement of i t s own to v e r i f y i t s a u t h e n t i c i t y . " An improvisation, a dance. And "a dance," we are t o l d i n Kora, 'lis a thing in itself" (K, 47). D r i v i n g a car, w r i t i n g . As even a b r i e f reading of the above improvisation shows, improvisa-t i o n a l form i s both simple and complex at the same time, On the one hand, the wr i t e r does nothing s p e c i a l , he simply faces the blank page and begins to write what comes to mind i n the act of w r i t i n g ; on the other hand, the 223 way to the words themselves may be blocked by a l l the demons within the mind that conspire to prevent i t from d r i v i n g through the f i e l d of w r i t i n g . And yet, as the w r i t e r i n Kora discovers, t h i s kind of form i s the only one that matches the experience of the a c t u a l i n language. Indeed, improyisational form becomes a necessity i n the sharp spur of the present at the heart of Kora. As Williams says i n the "Prologue:" . . . the thing that stands e t e r n a l l y i n the way of r e a l l y good w r i t i n g i s always one: the v i r t u a l impos-s i b i l i t y of l i f t i n g to the imagination those things which l i e under the d i r e c t scrutiny of the senses, close to the nose. I t i s t h i s d i f f i c u l t y that sets a value upon a l l works of art and makes them a necessity. (K, 14) In Williams' terms — or i n the terms established by the text Kora — the imagination i s not some container into which writers pour a predetermined content, but i t s e l f a force that re-opens the world by destroying the f i x i t y of the mind's orders. Perhaps extending Williams' lead Robert Creeley i n an interview comes to t a l k about the act of w r i t i n g i n r e l a t i o n to d r i v i n g a car. "A man who can't drive at a l l , " he says, i s obviously embarrassed to go down a road that's opening before him. The most a r t i c u l a t e d r i v e r i s he who can follow that road with p r e c i s e l y the r i g h t response to each condition there before him. I would f e e l those might be i n some way equivalent contexts.10 Like d r i v i n g , w r i t i n g i s an indeterminate movement through a language f i e l d i n which words are constantly appearing and disappearing as the writer goes. The road i s opening before him. Or as Creeley explains i n another interview i n Contexts of Poetry, t h i s time discussing "open form" w r i t i n g (Olson's 224 "composition by f i e l d " ) , ". , . there can he no p r i o r determination of the form except that which i s recognized as the w r i t i n g occurs,""^ Creeley's account of the w r i t i n g process i s sharp and pointed, so c l e a r l y a r t i c u l a t e , and yet i t i s s i g n i f i c a n t that we can recognize i n Kora the beginning of th i s sense of w r i t i n g that would by mid-century, when Kora was f i n a l l y being read as an ea r l y modernist text by such writers as Creeley, come into i t s own. By then, even Williams was t a l k i n g about the poem as a " f i e l d of 12 acti o n " (SE, 280). In the early years of the century, however, these terms were not av a i l a b l e to Williams. There was the pressing sense that a new century demanded new forms of w r i t i n g , but how that demand was to be met s t i l l l a y dormant waiting to be discovered. For Williams, Kora begins the move i n that d i r e c t i o n and the instance of "the car" acted as one signpost along what must have seemed the crooked way. In "Improvisation IV.2" (K, 36-37), the single occasion i n which the car does enter the textual space of Kora, the awakening mind of the writer acts on the t i e between d r i v i n g and the improvisational nature of w r i t i n g . And s i g n i f i c a n t l y enough, the wr i t i n g i n t h i s improvisation, l i k e so much of the w r i t i n g i n Kora, works negatively, that i s , works through the recognition of the terms i n which wr i t i n g f a i l s as w r i t i n g , again an i n d i c a t i o n that the text of Kora was a s e l f - j u s t i f y i n g a c t i v i t y and an exploration. "How smoothly the car runs," so the improvisation begins, and so we are drawn inside the mind of the w r i t e r / d r i v e r , on the road i n l a t e summer or e a r l y f a l l , contemplating seasonal cycles as he drives past "these rows of c e l e r y . " Then the thought immediately occurs that "they b i t t e r the a i r , " and the writer, without h e s i t a t i n g , quite smoothly gives i n to the obvious temptation to read a generalized meaning in t o the scene. The a i r i s a 225 sign of an end to one season and the premonition of another — "winter's authentic f o r e t a s t e . " In the abstraction of t h i s gem of homely wisdom, however, the "rows of c e l e r y " disappear and are replaced by a frame of reference: the cycle of the seasons. The writer then predictably f a l l s into a desire to rest i n the age old wisdom based upon the lawful o r d e r l i -ness of nature outside the complexity of town l i f e . The landscape of the farms i n v i t e s him into an apparent timelessness — or a sense of change understood i n the image of the seasons as predetermined phases of one universal law: How smoothly the car runs. And these rows of celery, how they b i t t e r the a i r — winter's authentic foretaste. Here among these farms how the year has aged, yet here's l a s t year and the year before and a l l years. One might rest here time without end, watch out h i s s t r e t c h and see no other bending than spring to autumn, winter to summer and-earth turning into leaves and leaves into earth, and — As the w r i t i n g progresses, we notice that the syntax, as i f to imitate the writer's thoughts, bends and c o i l s inward upon i t s e l f , so that the language of the improvisation l u l l s the writer into a state of balance, the tension between the seasons eased, time i t s e l f disappearing i n t o the "caress" of images — how r e s t f u l these long beet rows — the caress of the low clouds — the r i v e r lapping at the reeds. The strained l y r i c i s m of the passage now subsumes the p a r t i c u l a r s , which i n turn become nothing more than emotional e f f e c t s , the scene so infused with the s u b j e c t i v i t y of the writer that he reads himself into h i s own projections. No wonder he loses track of d i r e c t i o n , even forgets where he i s going. At t h i s point, the undercurrent of humour running l i k e a thread through t h i s whole "miniature" drama becomes more e x p l i c i t , but i t i s too l a t e for the writer. This drive collapses inward upon i t s e l f . a s we f i n a l l y reach-some vague 226 destination only to f i n d out that the house i s empty. The w r i t i n g journey has been to no a v a i l . There i s no one at the other end to receive the message. The words have f a i l e d to cross over: It' s a l l dark here. Scratch a hurried note. S l i p i t over the s i l l . Well, some other time. The pun on "some other time" exposes the e a r l i e r "time without end" as an i l l u s i o n . That e a r l i e r phrase i s a fi x e d thought of a transcendence that i s an escape from the town into the narrowness of an anthropomorphic view of the "country." The images i n the improvisation are those "friendly images" which the wr i t e r "has invented out of his mind and which are inviting him to rest and to disport himself according to hidden reasons" (K, 33). A phrase l i k e "winter's authentic f o r e t a s t e " becomes a use of language governed by an i n t e n t i o n to impose meaning onto things, the words themselves made to parrot the writer's purely p r i v a t e order that i s disguised as a general law. The one spawns the other. This kind of w r i t i n g leads to a closed order that reveals the writer's i n a b i l i t y to drive through the opacity of words that do not conform to patterns of predetermination. So l e t ' s begin again, as the next paragraph i n the same improvisation does, and with exactly the same opening l i n e : "How smoothly the car runs." But t h i s "other" time, we f i n d ourselves inside a darker, much more dense landscape: This must be the road. Queer how a road j u t s i n . How the dark catches among those trees.' How the l i g h t c l i n g s to the canal'. Yes, there's one table taken, we'll not be alone. This place has p o s s i b i l i t i e s . The images of dark and l i g h t come from an outside, s t r i k e the eyes of the writer as they cast patterns, also j u t i n l i k e unforeseen roads, and as things themselves do i n a world that has p o s s i b i l i t i e s because i t e x i s t s i n 227 time. This d r i v e , instead of drawing the writer up into a peaceful state of transcendence, p u l l s him into an equivocal space that declares i t s u n p r e d i c t a b i l i t y and at the same time forces him to recognize h i s own p r i -vacy as a privacy. W i l l you bring hev here? Perhaps — and when we meet on the s t a i r , s h a l l we speak, say i t i s some acquaintance — or pass s i l e n t ? Thus h i s own voice s p l i n t e r s o f f from an unnamed, secret i n t r i g u e and quickly turns sideways into a language play. In t h i s sense, his privacy i s undermined by his i n a b i l i t y to maintain a consistent point of view: Well, a j e s t ' s a j e s t but how poor t h i s tea i s . Think of a l i f e i n t h i s place, here i n these h i l l s by these truck farms. Whose l i f e ? Why there, back of you. The sentences simply d r i f t into view, one surface a f t e r another, and so an incoherent speech emerges, one drawn into an ambiguous "place" that c a r r i e s i n i t s wake the push of de s i r e : I f a woman laughs a l i t t l e loudly one always thinks that way of her. This i s the same language of the Fool's voice i n King Lear — "Winter's not gone yet i f the wildgeese f l y that way" — the words twisting i n s i d e a doubletalk that w i l l not resolve i t s e l f into a d i s c u r s i v e completion. The words themselves tease us p l a y f u l l y without permitting us to make them r e f e r e n t i a l . Laughter takes the place of wisdom i n the second h a l f of the improvisation. The secret rendezvous never m a t e r i a l i z e s ; t h i s "place" i n which "poor tea" i s served i s not a place to l i v e i n , dependent as i t i s upon a n o s t a l g i a f o r an order emptied of a former v i t a l i t y . That meaning, i n t h i s time, has been-reduced-to-a-merely decorative-function. And yet the substance of desire i s as a l i v e as ever: "But how she bedizens the country-side." The dead-end of meaning i s the other side of a release into 228 the absence of meaning, a r i c h and f e r t i l e "vacancy that throws the mind back into the immediacy of i t s emptiness — the experience of the poet i n "The Right of Way" — or as Williams says elsewhere i n Spring and A l l , "the d r i f t of X i t s J nonentity" (SA, 134). Quite an old world glamour. I f i t were not for — but one cannot have everything. What poor tea i t was. How cold i t ' s grown. There i s no p o s s i b i l i t y f o r a l i f e outside the realm of p o s s i b i l i t y , and wr i t i n g that attempts to fa b r i c a t e "an old world glamour" — to use some words from "The Desert Music," "out of whole c l o t h " (PB, 116) — i s simply another cage to s t u f f the world into preconceived orders that survive by denying the condit i o n a l nature of desire. Writing that i s actual moves outward, and away from closures, as the heart does i n release. The r e -awakening of desire t h i s w r i t i n g journey makes possible points to the future of another present: Cheering, a l i g h t i s that way among the trees. That heavy laugh! How i t w i l l r a t t l e these branches i n s i x weeks' time. This improvisation r e s i s t s , perhaps even defies o u t r i g h t l y , our c r i t i c a l understanding, but the point of the w r i t i n g i s c e r t a i n l y c l e a r enough. The opaque language of i t pushes f or a condition of w r i t i n g that w i l l permit the wr i t e r to engage the complexity of language as a complexity. " I t i s chuckleheaded to desire a way through every d i f f i c u l t y " (K, 17), we r e c a l l Williams saying i n his "Prologue." Improvisational form allowed Williams to drive within the f i e l d of the c r i s i s that i n i t i a l l y led to Kora, and by so doing, became the method that helped him drive the car out of H e l l , out of the heart's dark confusions i n t o the l i g h t of wholly new p o s s i b i l i t i e s , the Kora within himself suddenly born into a new world. The descent, an 229 ascent: t h i s turnabout makes a l l the diff e r e n c e i n the textual space of Kora. Or as we read i n one i n t e r p r e t a t i o n : Often when the descent seems well marked there w i l l be a subtle ascent over-ruling it so that in the end when the degradation is fully anticipated the person w i l l be found to have emerged upon a hilltop. (K, 58) The act of "fully" a n t i c i p a t i n g the downward movement of the mind into the op a c i t i e s c o n s t i t u t i n g the actual makes for the closeness of attention that d r i v i n g through a w r i t i n g c r i s i s demanded. "Write going. Look to steer." This necessity to improvise i n the midst of a bankruptcy of meaning explains how the h i s t o r y of the text Kora assumed i t s own inherent au t h e n t i c i t y . As a record of Williams' c r i s i s , the book that f i n a l l y got published as Kora i n H e l l : Improvisations c a l l s a ttention to i t s e l f as an imaginative space ("a f i e l d of action") within which Williams struggled h i s way forward into a new method of composition. The text i n hand thus became the context through which he came to compose what i s written by writing,. Kora i t s e l f the very thing that embodies the form i t enacts. How e l s e , except backwardly, could Kora have come together? This i s exactly what happens when a writer adjusts his a t tention to what l i e s before him i n the context the w r i t i n g proposes as i t goes, the text of t h i s w r i t i n g an extension of the process. Talking about "The Poem Paterson" i n h i s Autobiography, Williams adamantly addresses what to him remains the s p e c i f i c nature of the w r i t i n g process — and i t s value as w e l l : The poet does not . . . permit himself to go beyond the thought to be discovered i n the context of that with which he i s dealing: no ideas but i n things. The poet thinks with h i s poem, i n that l i e s his thought, and that i n i t s e l f i s the profundity. The thought i s Paterson, to be discovered there. (A, 390-391) Williams i s of course a r t i c u l a t i n g a p r i n c i p l e of form he had come on over 230 t h i r t y years before, i n Kora. The thought i s Kora i n H e l l : Improvisations, to be discovered i n the text i t s e l f . This i s why the f i n a l design of Kora throws into r e l i e f (hence reveals) the fa c t of contextuality as the condi-t i o n of experience that necessitated the act of improvisation. In t h i s sense, even the s u b t i t l e to Kora i n H e l l came a f t e r the w r i t i n g , not before, the term Improvisations, l i k e Davis' drawing, a further i l l u m i n a t i o n of the "dark s c r i b b l i n g s " ; or to be even more precise, the s u b t i t l e i s one of the p a r t i c u l a r s that made up the f i n a l text. No ideas but i n things. Years before Kora Williams had written a l e t t e r to Harriet Monroe, the e d i t o r of Poetry magazine, o u t l i n i n g his i n t u i t ive sense of the basis for a new poetic, and what he f o r e t e l l s there l a t e r became the primary issue of Kora. F i r s t explaining that Poetry should be the kind of magazine that does not dogmatically enforce a view of what poetry ought to be, instead should be "a forum wherein competent poets might speak f r e e l y , uncensored by any standard of r u l e s " (SL, 23), he then goes on to argue the contem-porary need for t h i s openness (c. 1913): . . . most current verse i s dead from the point of view of a r t (I enclose some doggerel showing one of the reasons why). Now l i f e i s above a l l things else at any moment subversive of l i f e as i t was the moment before — always new, i r r e g u l a r . Verse to be a l i v e must have infused into i t something of the same order, some tinct u r e of disestablishment, something i n the nature of an impalpable r e v o l u t i o n , an ethereal r e v e r s a l , l e t me say, I am speaking of modern verse. Poetry I saw accepting verse of t h i s kind: that i s , verse with perhaps nothing else i n i t but l i f e — t h i s alone, regardless of possible imperfections, f o r no new thing comes through p e r f e c t , (SL, 23-24) Williams could quite e a s i l y be accounting f o r the value of Kora i n H e l l , i t s 231 astonishing l i f e . But t h i s text s t i l l l a y i n the future, We can note, though, that even i n 1913 Williams sensed the need f o r a s p e c i f i c kind of poetics. The one he wants would match up to l i f e as a subversive process, each present a destruction of the past, no l i v i n g form exempt from the fac t of change — and th i s includes poetic form. "Modern verse," so Williams say must have something of th i s same q u a l i t y , some "t i n c t u r e of disestablishment some "impalpable r e v o l u t i o n , " some "ethereal r e v e r s a l . " In th i s barrage of terms through which Williams s t r a i n s f o r a c l a r i t y he does not yet possess i n the l e t t e r — he acknowledges t h i s lack to Har r i e t Monroe, at l e a s t i n so many words — we can hear the struggle to define the very kind of w r i t i n g that characterizes the texture of Kora, e s p e c i a l l y the subversive e f f e c t of i t s "broken" w r i t i n g . Improvisational form imitates a l i f e process that always moves i n the present — "always new, i r r e g u l a r , " And l i k e l i f e , i t i s also a self-generating process determined by time, the actual time that binds the compositional space of the text. In the twenties, with Kora now behind him, Williams came to praise the Cubist a r t i s t Juan Gris for t h i s very a c t u a l i t y i n h i s a r t . Gris also confirmed the r e a l i t y of h i s medium, both the s p a t i a l opacity of the canvas and the temporal nature of the a r t i s t i c process i n which the a r t i s t creates an art-object that i s not r e f e r e n t i a l to some preconceived " r e a l i t y " outside i n a generalized distance, but i s immediate to the p a r t i c u l a r i t y of the a r t i s t ' s engagement with the materials at hand. This i s only to say that Gris recognized the contextual, nature of h i s art and worked from that compositional basis. Williams understood him only too w e l l ; h i s own wr i t i n g from Kora on began on the same plane of a c t i v i t y , the words them- selves the medium he entered by wr i t i n g ; But more, i n Spring and A l l 232 Williams singles out one p a i n t i n g i n p a r t i c u l a r , The Open Window, as an exemplification of the importance of design i n G r i s ' work: Things with which he i s f a m i l i a r , simple things — at the same time to detach them from ordinary experience to the imagination . . . . Here i s a shutter, a bunch of grapes, a sheet of music, a picture of sea and mountains ( p a r t i c u l a r l y fine) which the onlooker i s not for a moment permitted to witness as an " i l l u s i o n . " One thing laps over on the other, the cloud laps over on the shutter, the bunch of grapes i s part of the handle of the g u i t a r , the mountain and sea are obviously not "the mountain and the sea," but a picture of the mountain and the sea. A l l drawn with admirable s i m p l i c i t y and excellent design — a l l a unity — (SA, 110-111) Williams emphasizes the opacity of the images i n G r i s ' painting ("One thing laps over on the other"), and by Spring and A l l he could t a l k about the value of the Cubist's f a s c i n a t i o n with surfaces as an attempt to d i s c l o s e the medium of a r t as a l i v e spatio-temporal f i e l d of a c t i v i t y . The design of Gris' painting (non-representational as i t i s ) i s the very composition that reveals the o b j e c t i v i t y of those "simple things" detached from "ordinary experience to the imagination." The design, one opaque object juxtaposed against another opaque object, i s thus a function of the imaginative f i e l d of the art-object, and t h i s f a c t alone constitutes the "unity" of the painting. Like Williams, Gris had learned to paint by going. In "The P o s s i b i l i t i e s of P a i n t i n g , " an essay that Williams most l i k e l y read, he says: U n t i l the work i s completed, he I the a r t i s t J must remain ignorant of i t s appearance as a whole. To copy a precon-ceived appearance i s l i k e copying the appearance of a model. From t h i s i t i s c l e a r that the subject does not m a t e r i a l i z e i n the appearance of the p i c t u r e , but that the subject, i n m a t e r i a l i z i n g , gives the picture i t s appearance.13 The d i s t i n c t i o n Gris draws between methods of composition has i t s 233 d i r e c t a p p l i c a t i o n to the kind of w r i t i n g that characterizes the text of Kora. Writing as an act forces the w r i t e r to remain i n s i d e the w r i t i n g "as i t goes," and f o r t h i s reason, he w i l l be "ignorant" of any such p r i o r completion as a whole text, since the text as such comes into form only through the composing, i t s appearance conditioned by what happens i n the w r i t i n g . And not the reverse, which would be the case were the writer not to enter the w r i t i n g , instead c o n t r o l l i n g i t according to some "preconceived appearance" that takes precedence over the act of composition. To repeat, Williams had no book i n mind, no narrative or d i s c u r s i v e frame of reference i n mind to determine the structure of the i n d i v i d u a l improvisations. He had no preconceived "subject" i n mind, no t e l e o l o g i c a l end i n sight, nothing but the w r i t i n g i t s e l f . The w r i t i n g determined the p o s s i b i l i t y of the text. There was that r i s k involved. The time of Kora i s the time of the composing process. The f i n a l "book" that came' of t h i s process i s thus i t s e l f an appearance, the appearance of the text, i t s separate elements, l i k e the p a r t i c u l a r s that make up Gris' Cubist painting, opaque surfaces that lap over one another without coalescing into a r a t i o n a l unity. They remain surfaces that play against one another to create the f i e l d of the text. As e a r l y as 1914 Pound discussed the nature of "vo r t i c i s m " i n terms of the experienced "surfaces" of Henri Gaudier-Brzeska's sculptures. Mike Weaver t e l l s us that Williams, noted i n the second Blast a manifesto by Henri Gaudier-Brzeska i n which the sculptor spoke of d e r i v i n g his emotions s o l e l y from the arrangement of surfaces; i n s c u l p t u r a l terms this meant the planes and l i n e s by which the surfaces were d e f i n e d . ^ The design of Kora i s an arrangement of surfaces, the basic m a t e r i a l of Williams' text, i n w r i t i n g terms, the words themselves that are f i r s t experienced as opaque planes of force. Or as Williams says i n his "Vortex," 234 a statement never published, but perhaps a d i r e c t response to Gaudier-Brzeska: . . . i n using words instead of stone I accept "plane" to be the a f f i r m a t i o n of existence, the meeting of sub-stances, whether i t be stone meeting a i r or a sound of a c e r t a i n q u a l i t y against one of another or against silence.15 Davis noted the word-against-word q u a l i t y of Kora, and h i s response i s , to t h i s extent, completely accurate. Kora begins on the c r i s i s of language. The words themselves, i n t h e i r opacity, constitute one surface of Kora. The improvisations that a r i s e from t h e i r i n t e r p l a y , another surface. Two impro-v i s a t i o n s , one against the other, another surface. A set of three improvi-sations, a l l of them playing back and f o r t h , another surface. Or one set of improvisations, one against another, or others, s t i l l another surface. Then add some equally dense " i n t e r p r e t a t i o n s , " and another surface appears. And these " i n t e r p r e t a t i o n s , " one against another, or against a single improvisation, or a group of them, more surfaces. Such a process of gener-ating surfaces i s p o t e n t i a l l y endless, of course, because the v a r i a b i l i t i e s are endless. Kora i s "a f i e l d of p o s s i b i l i t i e s " — Davis' phrasing — and at every moment along the indeterminate way the w r i t i n g remains active to the interchange of the play of surfaces. Davis' drawing, then, i s another surface, as i s the "Prologue." And even the term, Improvisations, the s u b t i t l e to the text, i s yet another surface, likewise the t i t l e , Kora i n H e l l , and the cover with the s t y l i z e d drawing of the ovum impregnated by a single sperm, which "completed the design" (A, 158), as Williams says i n his Autobiography. To state i t simply, the text Kora, " i n m a t e r i a l i z i n g , " came into the form of an appearance. There i s consequently no attempt on Williams' part, as a w r i t e r , to merge a l l the elements according to a coherent pattern, no sin g l e determining "thematic" i n t e n t i o n external to the text around which, or through which, a l l the parts are ordered h i e r -235 a r c h i c a l l y . Rather, by allowing a l l the surfaces of the text to assert t h e i r p a r t i c u l a r i t y , Williams allows them to meet i n an interchange that i s an "affirmation of existence," Kora i t s e l f a l i v e thing, an actual composition. Or as we read i n the "Prologue": . . . one does not attempt by the ingenuity of the j o i n e r to blend the tones of the oboe with the v i o l i n . On the contrary the perfections of the two instruments are emphasized by the j o i n e r ; no means i s neglected to give to each the f u l l color of i t s perfections. I t i s only the music of the instruments which i s joined and that not by the woodworker but by the composer, by v i r t u e of the imagination. (K, 19) Kora may thus lack a l o g i c a l unity, a unity that would subordinate one p a r t i c u l a r to another, but i t has instead an imaginative unity, a unity that permits a p a r t i c u l a r to be revealed i n i t s p a r t i c u l a r i t y . What e l s e , then, i s the text at hand but a compositional space, a medium, or an actual place, a l l the separate elements of Kora lapping over one another within i t to create — i n t h e i r interchange — the contextual f i e l d of a c t i v i t y that constitutes w r i t i n g as an act. The w r i t e r composes his text backwardly, as he goes. Pound may have been accurate i n saying that Kora does not make sense, that the improvisations are incoherent, but t h i s i s p r e c i s e l y i t s strength as a text of w r i t i n g . I t r e s i s t s the overlay of any kind of superimposed order that removes the w r i t e r from the w r i t i n g process i t s e l f where the mind moves con t i n u a l l y i n a state of uncertainty. In f a c t , t h i s resistance l i e s at the heart of the f o o l ' s voice that everywhere mocks the l i m i t s of the mind's forms: A l l that seem s o l i d : melancholias, id&es fixes, eight years at the academy, Mr. Locke, t h i s year and the next and the next — one l i k e another — wheel — they are A p r i l zephyrs, were one a B o t t i c e l l i , between t h e i r chinks, pink anemones. (K, 81) 236 Perhaps the s o - c a l l e d " i n t e r p r e t a t i o n s " that Williams wrote to accompany the improvisations are those "pink anemones" that grew between the "chinks" i n the w r i t i n g . They too e x i s t i n t h e i r own r i g h t . They are hardly d i s c u r s i v e i n t e r p r e t a t i o n s that explain away the density of the w r i t i n g i n the improvisations. They are, more e s s e n t i a l l y , pieces of w r i t i n g that lap across — thus disturb — the language of the improvisations, i n t h i s way providing a context that throws the drama of the w r i t i n g i n t o a r e l i e f . They allowed Williams to come back against the "dark s c r i b b l i n g s , " but t h i s time from a p o s i t i o n outside the i n i t i a l w r i t i n g , himself a reader of the w r i t i n g , an other, who by v i r t u e of his distance can a r t i c u l a t e ( i n more words) what might otherwise have remained wholly i n a c c e s s i b l e , wholly trapped i n t h e i r c i r c u l a r language. More often than not, the i n t e r p r e t a t i o n s are remarkable for t h e i r dense c l a r i t y , at times acting as a w a l l , a kind of " f o r e i g n " perspective against which, or upon which various patterns of experience become v i s i b l e f o r the w r i t e r (and f o r the reader as well) as the w r i t i n g begins to assume the semblance of a shape. "I used to get very excited; the Interpretations had as much importance to me as the statements" (IW, 29-30), so Williams says. And r i g h t l y so. The i n t e r p r e -tations are further improvisations, but unlike the i n i t i a l improvisations that began i n a state of c r i s i s , they are purely the product of the w r i t i n g . Williams must have been excited because he was f i n d i n g out that w r i t i n g could feed on i t s own resources, that i t could, i f the w r i t e r were a t t e n t i v e enough, thereby generate i t s own contexts. I t could, i n short, be actual. Here a passing comment on that diversity of context in things and situations which 237 the great masters of antiquity looked to for the.inspira-tion and distinction of their compositions (K, 48) i n one of the i n t e r p r e t a t i o n s takes on considerable importance. On the one hand, the i n t e r p r e t a t i o n s must have been, for Williams, an exploration of the s i g n i f i c a n c e of the "dark s c r i b b l i n g s , " but j u s t as c r u c i a l l y , perhaps even more so, they must have quickly disclosed the contextual nature of w r i t i n g that i s an act. The i n t e r p r e t a t i o n s can thus be understood as the workings of a w r i t e r who i s struck by the f a c t that w r i t i n g i s a f i e l d of a c t i v i t y , and he, a d r i v e r who can engage complexities of experience on t h e i r own terms, as complexities, without re s o l v i n g them in t o s t a t i c completions. Many of the i n t e r p r e t a t i o n s thus sustain the tension between i r r e s o l v a b l e contraries by holding these contraries i n and f o r themselves — and i n a language that seems to f l o a t i n space, attached by context to i n d i v i d u a l improvisations, and yet c u r i o u s l y maintaining t h e i r own i n t e g r i t y as intense — and p a r t i c u l a r — moments of c l a r i f i c a t i o n . As the fog of confusion temporarily l i f t s , the mind of the w r i t e r i n Kora s l i d e s into a cleansed space, the dimension of a complexity binding i t s e l f to an i l l u m i -nation, not unlike the "acme point of white penetration" that Williams envisions i n the poems of Marianne Moore, i n which "apprehension perforates at places, through to understanding — as white i s at the i n t e r s e c t i o n of blue and green and yellow and red" (SE, 122). Moore's poems have value because she s t i c k s to the edge of the "thought" at hand, thinking as she goes. "There i s almost no overlaying at a l l , " Williams says. "The e f f e c t i s of every object s u f f i c i e n t l y uncovered to be e a s i l y recognizable" (SE, 129). Readers "who would read Miss Moore a r i g h t , " he adds, should not forget that i n her work "white c i r c u l a r d i s c s grouped c l o s e l y edge to edge upon a dark table make black six-pointed s t a r s " (SE, 129). Without the 238 context provided by the "dark t a b l e , " the stars would not be v i s i b l e , but with i t , or through i t s ctherness, there i s possible that moment of perception when the density of things y i e l d s a pattern, here those "black six-pointed" things appearing out of the "white c i r c u l a r discs grouped c l o s e l y edge to edge." I t i s t h i s moment of r e v e r s a l , that moment when the foreground and background s h i f t r e l a t i o n s h i p s , that r e t r i e v e s Moore's per-ception. And Williams' perception as well i n the i n t e r p r e t a t i o n s . In e f f e c t , they have value f o r the same reason; the wr i t e r i n s i d e them, i n statements that are acts of w r i t i n g , r e t r i e v e s those e s s e n t i a l points of i n t e r s e c t i o n where his understanding "perforates" the dense opacity of h i s confusions. In t h i s way, they not only b u i l d a context f o r the improvisations, but at the same time b u i l d a pretext f o r "c o n t e x t u a l i t y " as the bind that textures experience. In the play of d i v e r s i t y , f o r example: There are divergences of humor that cannot be recon-ciled. A young woman of much natural grace of manner and very apt at a certain color of lie is desirous of winning the good graces of one only slightly her elder but nothing comes of her exertions. Instead of yielding to a superficial advantage she finally gives up the task and continues in her own delicate bias of peculiar and beautiful design much to the secret delight of the on-looker who is thus regaled by the spectacle of two exquisite and divergent natures playing one against the other. (K, 79-80) Or i n the a c t u a l i t y of disease, the human body i n the context of a l i v e world: Pathology literally speaking is a flower garden. Syphilis covers the body with salmon-red petals. The study of medicine is an inverted sort of horticulture. Over and above all this floats the philosophy of disease which is a stern dance. One of its most delightful gestures is bringing flowers to the sick. (K, 77-78) Or a statement of a possible poetics, i n one of the cl e a r e s t statements 2 3 9 Williams would ever make on the contextual nature of h i s own w r i t i n g , a passage immediate following a reference to "our medieval f r i e n d Shakespeare": That which is heard from the lips of those to whom we are talking in our day 1s-affairs mingles with what we see in the streets and everywhere about us as it mingles also with our imaginations. By this chemistry is fabricated a language of the day which shifts and reveals its meaning as clouds shift and turn in the sky and sometimes send down rain or snow or hail. This is the language to which few ears are tuned so that it is said by poets that few men are ever in their full senses since they have no way to use their imaginations. Thus to say that a man has no imagination is to say nearly that he is blind or deaf. But of old poets would translate this hidden language into a kind of replica of the speech of the world with certain distinctions of rhyme and meter to show that it was not really that speech. Nowadays the elements of that language are set down as heard and the imagination of the listener and of the poet are left free to mingle in the dance. (K, 59) This l a s t statement, r e a l l y a manifesto, i s a breakthrough i n understanding for Williams i n Kora, and the fac t of i t alone demonstrates a major s h i f t on h i s part into a sharp consciousness of contextuality, a consciousness he discovered by w r i t i n g the improvisations, and that the inter p r e t a t i o n s both enact and announce. One e s p e c i a l l y exemplifies Williams' new found e f f o r t to write himself out into a "new d i r e c t i o n " (K, 65). He himself gave i t a singular importance. It i s the one i n t e r p r e t a t i o n that stands alone to take the place of an improvisation i n "Improvisation X X I I I . 3 , " which i s to say, he decided to l e t the w r i t i n g of i t assert i t s own terms. In many poor and sentimental households it is a custom to have cheap prints in glass frames upon the walls. These are of all sorts and many sizes and may be found in any room from the kitchen to the toilet. The drawing is always of the worst and the colors, not gaudy but almost always of faint indeterminate tints, are infirm. Jet a delicate accuracy exists between these prints, and the environment which breeds them. But as if to intensify this relationship words are added. There will be a "sentiment" as it is called, a rhyme, which the 240 picture illuminates. Many of these pertain to love. This is well enough when the bed is new and the young couple spend the long winter nights there in delightful seclusion. But childbirth follows in its time and a motto still hangs above the bed. It is only then that the full ironical meaning of these'prints leaves the paper and the frame and starting through the glass takes undisputed sway over the household. (K, 76) I t i s the movement of the piece that declares i t s own surface, the f l u i d dance of a syntax i n which the a t t e n t i o n of the w r i t e r i s active to the i n t e r p l a y between things and t h e i r context. The drive within t h i s i n t e r p l a y i s maintained on the sharp edge of a doubleness, the estrangement and the engagement of the w r i t e r held i n suspension (here i s a seed of Paterson), the w r i t i n g i t s e l f moving with the complexity of that tension. Williams says that the " b i r t h of the imagination i s l i k e waking from a nightmare," and perhaps he had t h i s kind of w r i t i n g i n mind as the medium of that awakening. The language of t h i s piece attaches i t s e l f to a present that i s actual only i n the dance of the mind, i n the words themselves that carry the c o n t r a r i e t y of experience. In t h i s dimension, w r i t i n g becomes an imaginative space where o b j e c t i v i t y assumes a value of i t s own. And we r e c a l l Williams' comment i n Spring and A l l that w r i t i n g Kora opened "a world of new values" (SA, 116) . Those "new values" have very much to do with the otherness of the world revealed i n the experience of w r i t i n g . The p a r t i c u l a r s i n t h i s passage are p a r t i c u l a r s , despite the fact that the apparent subject-matter, the "cheap prints" i n "many poor and sentimental households" which "may be found in any room from the kitchen to the toilet," seems to beg for some r e f e r e n t i a l frame. A frame i n which t h e i r p a r t i c u l a r i t y can become trans-parent to a d i s c u r s i v e i n t e n t i o n on the part of the w r i t e r p r i o r to t h e i r appearance i n the text of the w r i t i n g . The w r i t e r , at the same time, p l a y f u l l y seduces the reader into t h i s expectation, but without i n fact 241 allowing himself to f a l l i nto that kind of c o n t r o l . "Jet," he says, delaying a conclusion, thus extending the tension of the w r i t i n g , "a deli-cate accuracy exists between these prints and the environment which breeds them." The p r i n t s are objects situated i n the context so necessary f o r t h e i r existence. The environment "breeds" them. In t h i s manner — and the sexual undertones of the word "breeds" leads the w r i t i n g — the reader i s pulled into a verbal demonstration that generates i t s own insistences against the temptation to assign a d i s c u r s i v e meaning to the "infirm" nature of the p r i n t s . As i f to play h i s own language back on himself, the w r i t e r , h i s tongue i n cheek, then adds that sometimes, to "intensify this relationship" between the p r i n t s and t h e i r environment (he too i n t e n s i f i e s t h i s r e l a t i o n s h i p , not by glossing over i t , but by subverting i t ) , "words are added," a "rhyme" attached to provide a context for the "picture." And although the words, as dead things i n one sense, r e i n f o r c e the emptiness of an environment that breeds these "pure products" (SA, 131), they remain j u s t words, the rhyme one more p a r t i c u l a r to the w r i t e r . The subject-matter of these rhymes, he says, by now i r o n i c a l l y , often "pertain to love." The p r i n t s , and the words attached to them, as the w r i t i n g has hinted a l l along, nevertheless are actual. They e x i s t i n an "accurate" r e l a t i o n to the mind i n s i d e the house of t h e i r s e l f - r e f e r e n t i a l form, being so much the texture of that mind that t there i s no cleavage possible between the forms that c o n t r o l i t and the things themselves that manifest t h i s subtle c o n t r o l . These p r i n t s are objects — the things themselves that constitute the perspective of "sentimental households." S t i l l , as the writer says, t h i s frozen state of perception cannot sustain i t s e l f f o r long. Change i s i n e v i t a b l e . And when i t occurs, 242 as i t must, the f i x e d perspective w i l l collapse and the underlying context i n which these objects were once so orderly arranged w i l l assert i t s v a r i a b i l i t y , at which time the whole structure of r e l a t i o n s h i p s w i l l be thrown into the r e l i e f of a confusion. The b i r t h of t h i s s h i f t , i n the moment of breakage, w i l l reveal the contextual nature of the same things that were formerly i n v i s i b l e because hidden i n s i d e a closed form. We noted e a r l i e r how eagerly Williams jumped at the opportunity to use Davis' drawing as a f r o n t i s p i e c e for Kora. Here we can see p r e c i s e l y how the writer i n Kora does i n w r i t i n g what Davis does i n drawing. The collapse of a f i x e d perspective — i n w r i t i n g as well as i n experience — signals a b i r t h into a world of "new values." Not s u r p r i s i n g l y , f o r the f o o l with a big womb i n Kora, the collapse bares the l i t e r a l c r i s i s of c h i l d b i r t h , as the w r i t i n g winds down to an end that throws the household back into the context of a world larger than i t s own narrow enclosures. In b r i e f , when "the full ironical meaning of these prints" escapes from t h e i r former caged st a t e , the context that bred them suddenly "takes undisputed sway over the household. " This i n t e r p r e t a t i o n s t r i k e s a note of f i n a l i t y i n Kora, e s p e c i a l l y for the way i n which i t re-enacts what the w r i t i n g i n Kora i n s i s t s upon over and over. The event of c h i l d b i r t h that here holds "sway" over t h i s p a r t i c u l a r household provokes a c r i s i s , i t s former s e l f - r e f e r e n t i a l s tate s p l i t apart by the r i c h i n t r u s i o n of change. And the image of b i r t h , l i k e so many of the images i n Kora, works both ways. A c r i s i s i s a b i r t h because b i r t h i s a c r i s i s . By thus re l e a s i n g the mind of the writer i n t o the text of his desire, improvisational form authenticates a world that grounds that desire. And so we are t o l d , h a l f tauntingly, h a l f p l a y f u l l y , but altogether 243 seriously by the f o o l of a writer i n Kora, "Mg deeper mon ami, the rock maidens are running naked i n the dark c e l l a r s " QC, 54). Desire may be hidden, or i t may be denied, but i t can never be negated. I t always escapes — and i n the eyes of a writer who has a "sense" for the "strange blood that sings under some skin" (K, 49), i n the most common of ways: It is not the lusty bodies of the nearly naked girls in the shows about town, nor the blare of the popular tunes that make money for the manager. The girls can be procured rather more easily in other ways and the music is dirt cheap. It is that this meat is savored with a strangeness which never loses its fresh taste to generation after generation, either of dancers or those who watch. It is beauty escaping, spinning up over the heads, blown out at the overtaxed Dents by the electric fans. (K, 75-76) 244 CHAPTER NINE A NEW DIRECTION In that c r i s i s , around 1917, when meaning became bankrupt, that time which Williams l a t e r c a l l e d a "slaughter" of the s e l f (A, 158), Williams did not — though we might expect him to — f a l l into a numbing despair. On the contrary, he accepted that occasion as a condition to be met, and he began to write " i n earnest 1' (A, 158). The desire was to see how valuable the act of w r i t i n g could be i n t h i s impasse. "For what i t ' s worth" (K, 31), as the writer i n Kora says. And there i s an e f f e c t almost of r e l i e f i n the w r i t i n g that got written i n t h i s way. The fragmented (and fragmenting) voice that emerges i n the text of Kora does so i n the dense excitement of confusion. I t leaps l i k e a dog on the loose from one image to another, s p l i n t e r i n g i n many d i r e c t i o n s at the same time, becoming i t s e l f a chameleon-like force whose speech i s coloured by the i n t e n s i t y of i t s d i s l o c a t i o n s . Hence the writing that manifests t h i s energy begins to make i t s own kind of sense. And i t does so because we can hear, i n t h i s very voice, the language of a " s e l f " being torn apart by a larger world outside i t s c o n t r o l , the words of 245 t h i s c r i s i s "set clown as heard" (K, 59). "The b r u t a l Lord of A l l w i l l r i p us from each other" (K, 55) , so we are t o l d i n "Improvisation X I V . l . " And the " A l l " i s ALL since i t comes, as the a c t u a l i t y of the world does i n Kora, within the swiftness of a simultaneity which destroys a l l f i x e d perspectives. The " A l l " i s - a many, a one and-a one and a one, each one thing of a "many" no more or l e s s (Hartley's words on the l e v e l l i n g e f f e c t of Dadaism) than any other one thing. Any reduction to zero, what we might c a l l the democratization of the world, must by nature cut through the mind's closures. In the text of Kora, t h i s reduction s p l i t s the mind of the writer into two and so transforms him into a doubletalking f o o l whose mind i s " i n t a t t e r s " (K, 57). The w r i t i n g drama that comes of t h i s transformation, i n other words, constitutes i t s e l f through the tension of a cleavage: an older " s e l f " d i s i n t e g r a t e s , or crumbles to nothingness, i n the face of another " s e l f , " one that s h i f t s and turns outside the narrow view of any given closed system of order. The i n i t i a l "slaughter" thereby became — to Williams' continual amazement — an i n i t i a l " b l a st . . . from a l l previous s i g n i f i c a n c e " (GAN, 171). The " b l a s t " i t s e l f made possible a release into a new consciousness of the world. And t h i s i s the basis of why, at l e a s t for the writer i n Kora, the experience of self-estrangement could become the very substance of the w r i t i n g that subsequently began from scratch. So i t i s as well that we read i n "Improvisation X I I . l " how the writer, "imagining himself to be two persons . . . eases his mind by putting his burdens upon one while the other takes what pleasure there is before him" (K, 53). The act of estrangement allows him to turn a mirror on himself, hence simultaneously envision himself as both i n and out of his own l i m i t s , place the "burdens" of his l i f e "upon one3" while "the other takes what 246 0 pleasure there is before him." Becoming "two persons" the writer i s freed to enter the influence of the kind of consciousness within which p a r t i c u l a r s assume a sharp o b j e c t i v i t y , as things that are before because emptied of a l l imposed or prefabricated frames of reference. And one of those p a r t i c u l a r s , i n t h i s turnabout, may very well be a v i s i o n of a wholly d i f f e r e n t " s e l f " born i n the tension between these "two.persons," an other that appears as an e f f e c t of that s p l i t t i n g apart. Merleau-Ponty i n The Primacy of Perception posi t s the r e c i p r o c a l bind between perception and the movement of the body i n the world and explains the i m p l i c a t i o n of t h i s condition of experience: That which looks at a l l things can also look at i t s e l f and recognize, i n what i t sees, the "other s i d e " of i t s power of looking. It sees i t s e l f seeing; i t touches i t s e l f touching; i t i s v i s i b l e and s e n s i t i v e for i t s e l f . The s e l f that Merleau-Ponty has i n mind i s the s e l f "that i s caught up i n things, that has a front and a back."''' This s e l f i s , at the same time, both a one and an other, both in s i d e and outside i t s experience of the world, both " v i s i b l e and s e n s i t i v e for i t s e l f . " The writer i n Kora, who says that doors have a "back side" (K, 80) and that "there's more sense i n a sentence heard backward than forward most times" (K, 54), recognizes the doubleness of his own s e l f . "After t h i r t y years s t a r i n g at one true phrase," he says at the beginning of "Improvisation XVIII.2," he discovered that i t s opposite was true a l s o . For weeks he laughed i n the grip of a f i e r c e s e l f d e r i s i o n . Having l o s t the falsehood to which he'd f i x e d h i s hawser he r o l l e d drunkenly about the f i e l d of h i s environment before the new d i r e c t i o n began to dawn upon his cracked mind. (K, 65) It i s , then, through the "slaughter" of h i s f i x e d s e l f i n the language c r i s i s of Kora that the w r i t e r re-enters the waywardness of the world, both estranged and engaged as he i s . In terms of the ensuing drama, however, perhaps we would be more accurate i n saying that h i s estrangement frees him 247 to a "new d i r e c t i o n , " one i n which, h i s mind i s released to a s e l f "caught up" i n the knotted otherness of things. And when t h i s sense dawned on h i s "cracked mind," so we thus read, Thick c r y s t a l s began to shoot through the l i q u i d of h i s s p i r i t . Black, they were: branches that have l a i n i n a fog which now a wind i s blowing away. Things more. (K, 65) "Certain men keep the r e a l and are c a l l e d vagrants" (EK, 116), Williams writes i n The Embodiment of Knowledge. Called vagrants, that i s , by a s o c i -ety that judges them, as i t does the f o o l , or as i t does the l i k e s of one Jacob Louslinger — "'Looks to me as i f he'd been bumming around the meadows for a couple of weeks'" (K, 31) — according to what i t can accomodate within narrow perceptual frames. As the f o o l of the w r i t e r i n Kora c e r t a i n l y knows, "the r e a l " survives only by escaping those cages which deny the a c t u a l i t y of desire. Vagrants are those strangers — V i c t o r Turner i n The R i t u a l Process c a l l s them "'edgemen'" — who go contrary to predetermined systems of thought, and who thus stand outside these enclosures i n the midst 2 of an unruliness at the heart's core. This i n i t i a l breakthrough i n Kora (and i t i s a breakthrough occurring i n the w r i t i n g i t s e l f ) reveals that other s e l f constituted i n the i n t e r p l a y between t e r r o r and r e l i e f , between loss and gain, the terms of such opposing states of mind constantly doubling back into one another, as they do, f o r instance, i n "Improvisation XII.1" where the writer "notes" the emotional complexity of the confusion surrounding his 34th birthday: The browned trees are singing f o r my t h i r t y - f o u r t h birthday. Leaves are beginning to f a l l upon the long 248 grass. Their cold perfume raises the a n t i c i p a t i o n of sensational revolutions i n my unsettled l i f e , Violence has begotten peace, peace has f l u t t e r e d away i n a g i t a t i o n . A bewildered change has turned among the roots and the Prince's k i s s as f a r at sea as ever. (K, 52) The whole passage i s held together i n the play of unresolved c o n t r a r i e s : decay ( " f a l l " ) and b i r t h , f a l l i n g and r i s i n g , violence and peace, the near and the f a r . The language of the w r i t i n g enacts a f l u i d state of mind i n which opposites remain unsettled and i n a dynamic r e l a t i o n one to another — an exact mirror of the texture of experience — with no f i x e d frame of reference to locate them i n a d i s c u r s i v e space. "A bewildered change has turned among the roots." So much, of the tension i n the w r i t i n g of Kora i s the e f f e c t of t h i s change and the r e f u s a l of the w r i t e r undergoing i t to forego contraries and s e t t l e into a s t a s i s that would f i x a t e the mind i n one frozen perception, Opposites must remain unsettled. As the i n t e r p r e t i v e voice i n Kora comments, however obliquely, s u b s t i t u t i n g the image of a house to suggest the power of such closed forms over the mind: A house is sometimes wine. It is move than a skin. The young pair listen attentively to the roar of the weather. The blustering cold takes on the shape of a destructive presence. They loosen their imaginations. The house seems protecting them. They relax gradually as though in the keep of a benevolent protector. Thus the house becomes a wine which has drugged them out of their senses. (K, 72) And i f the concern i s a l i t e r a r y work the same analogy holds true: Neatness and f i n i s h ; the dust out of every corner! You swish from room to room and f i n d a l l p e r f e c t . The house may now be c a r e f u l l y wrapped i n brown paper and sent to a publisher. I t i s a work of a r t . (K, 71) Inside and out — "It is nearly pure luck that gets the mind turned inside out . . . " (K, 75): i n the world of Kora, the one i s constantly s l i d i n g 249 into the other, interchangeable, the way perception operates i n time, actions rather than points of r e s t , or a r r e s t . Or to use some l i n e s from Robert Creeley's Pieces that bespeak t h i s condition of experience so p r e c i s e l y : Inside and out impossible locations — reaching i n from out-side, out from i n -side — as middle: one hand.^ The two selves that come into play i n Kora f i n d themselves i n those "impos-s i b l e / l o c a t i o n s , " one inside a c o l l a p s i n g point of view, and the other outside, or rather, i n s i d e the outside that i t apprehends as the world, everything other than what i t knows, which i s to say, what i t possesses. For the estranged voice i n the text, possession i s a domination that divorces the possessor from what i s possessed, since t h i s tyrannization of "subject" over "object" prevents the thing possessed from being experienced i n i t s e l f . Creeley's "one / hand." Self-possession i s thus one more such form of removal, l e s s a sign of "age" and more a t r i c k , something the "subject" learns to do to protect i t s own t e r r i t o r i a l i z e d domain from the "blustering cold" outside that then "takes on the shape of a destructive presence. " Williams says as much i n "The Mind's Games," a l a t e r poem: The world too much with us? Rot! the world i s not hal f enough with, us — the rot of a potato with 250 a healthy skin, a rot that i s never revealed t i l l we are about to eat — and i t r e v o l t s us, (CLP, 109) The mind's games i n "Improvisation XEI. 2" — The t r i c k i s never to touch the world anywhere. Leave yourself at the door, walk i n , admire the p i c t u r e s , t a l k a few words with the master of the house, question his wife a l i t t l e , r e j o i n yourself at the door — and go o f f arm i n arm l i s t e n i n g to l a s t week's symphony played by angel hornsmen from the benches of a turned cloud. Or i f dogs rub too close and the poor are too much out l e t your f r i e n d answer them. (K, 53) The laughter of t h i s passage depends upon a r e v e r s a l of a f i x e d habit of response that f a l s i f i e s experience. The mind can t r i c k us out of a world we are i n s i d e because we are a l i v e and subject to change and transformation, subject, as i t were, to " r o t . " On the other hand, those who refuse to acknowledge t h e i r t i e s with a l i v e world are thrown back in t o the i s o l a t i o n of a fabricated perspective ("last week's symphony") and so deny themselves the present they, i n f a c t , desire. Juxtaposed against these divorced minds are those who are w i l l i n g to r i s k a movement outside, to the other side of the dark canal, or to use the key term that surfaces i n Kora, descend i n t o the i n e s c a p a b i l i t y of an actual ground to human d e s i r e : Something to grow used to; a stone too b i g f o r ox haul, too near for b l a s t i n g . Take the road round i t or — scrape away, scrape away: a mountain's buried i n the d i r t ! Marry a gopher to help you! Drive her i n ! Go yourself down along the l i t pastures. Down, down. The whole family take shovels, babies and a l l ! Down, down! Here's Tenochtitlan! here's a strange Darien where worms are princes. (K, 53) A few years a f t e r Kora, while w r i t i n g Tn the American Grain, Williams would extend t h i s sense of descent to a study of American h i s t o r y . Tenochtitlan would then become the exemplification of a culture whose forms, based upon the inseparable bond between the human as creature and the earth upon which he dwells and acts, were manifestations of the fa c t of change, a 251 culture i n d i r e c t a n t i t h e s i s to that of the American Puritans, As Williams says, It was the earthward thrust of t h e i r l o g i c ; blood and earth; the r e a l i z a t i o n of t h e i r primal and continuous i d e n t i t y with the ground i t s e l f , where everything i s f i x e d i n darkness. (IAG, 33-34) In the American Grain dis-covers the dark region of the phy s i c a l — the body and i t s desire — that i s figured f o r t h from a primary ground, the same source revealed i n Louslinger's decaying body, or i n the mushrooms that appear because of the a c t u a l i t y of decay. And i n that study of American pre-history, figures l i k e Daniel Boone and Edgar A l l a n Poe, among other "vagrants," become further faces of the f o o l who recognizes the "earthward thru s t " that comes to bear i n the language of Kora, r i s i n g on the horizonal edge of the known, or from "down under," a phrase through which Williams describes Whitman's o r i g i n as an American poet. "Beauty?" we are t o l d i n "The Mind's Games," Beauty should make us paupers, should b l i n d us, rob us — for i t does not feed the s u f f e r e r but makes his s u f f e r i n g a fly-blown putrescence and ourselves decay — (CLP, 109-110) In the d i s l o c a t i o n operative i n the language of Kora, the f o o l of a write r thus breaks free to experience "a new d i r e c t i o n " i n himself. " I t lay there, another world, i n the s e l f " (A, 288), we hear Williams saying, "a secret l i f e I wanted to t e l l openly" (A, 288). This other world that i s re-affirmed i n his Autobiography l i e s hidden beneath the mind's abstract layerings. I t i s the one his "medicine" gave access to, "these secret gardens of the s e l f " (A, 288): the dark realm of the body and i t s desires, 252 the human as a creature of nature, l i k e Jacob Louslinger, another element within the f a b r i c of l i f e f orces, one of the things "caught up" i n a world of things, a l l of them manifestations of change, of "decay," The instance of t h i s discovery hovers on the edge of the awakening drama of Kora: Imperceptibly your s e l f shakes free i n a l l i t s b r u t a l s i g n i f i c a n c e , f e e l s i t s subtle power renewed and abashed at i t s covered lustihood breaks to the windows and draws back before the sunshine i t sees there as before some imagined figure that would be there i f — a h i f — But f o r a moment your hand re s t s upon the palace window s i l l , only f or a moment. (K, 68) Ah i f . Again we are reminded that Kora i s a beginner's text, one that enacts the c r i s i s i n which the " s e l f " i n Williams "shakes free i n a l l i t s b r u t a l s i g n i f i c a n c e , " undergoes t h i s process i n s i d e the w r i t i n g , i s j u s t becoming conscious of desires that u n t i l now have remained underground, hidden. There i s "some imagined f i g u r e that would be there i f — " It i s within the empty gap of t h i s a n t i c i p a t i o n that we begin to apprehend the emotional range of the textual world of Kora, the nature of the i s o l a t i o n running through i t , the w r i t e r as a foreigner outside the norms of his society — "o' the wrong s i d e " (K, 40), as i t were. Louis Zukofsky's image of Williams, i n the 20's, i n t h i s respect, i s an exact measure of the mind that i s j u s t coming into i t s own i n Kora: It i s the l i v i n g creature becoming conscious of h i s own needs through the destruction of the various i s o l a t e d around him, and t i l l h i s day comes continuing unwitnessed to work, no one but himself to drive the car through the suburbs, t i l l they too become conscious of demands unsat-i s f i e d by the routine senseless r e p e t i t i o n of events.^ Of course, i n Kora the world i s not wholly given over to empty and r i g i d forms, so that the creaturely nature of the human does emerge, through the i n t e r s t i c e s — t h i s i s a frayed world, tattered — which i s to say, the apparent senselessness of what comes to be taken as nothing more than the 253 mundane i s only a product of a bankrupt system of thought, "The l i t t l e P o l i s h Father of Kingsland I c e r t a i n l y J does not understand" (K, 43) t h i s dichotomy. And how can he? "These are exquisite differences never to be resolved" (K, 43). His r e l i g i o u s r e s o l u t i o n to "the routine senseless r e p e t i t i o n of events" i s an empty form c a r r i e d out mechanically, by habit: He comes at midnight through mid-winter slush to baptize a dying newborn; he smiles suavely and shrugs his shoulders: a c l e a r middle A touched by a master — but he cannot understand. (K, 43) Along with t h i s " l i t t l e P o l i s h Father" — at l e a s t f o r the f o o l outside the frame of outmoded s o c i a l forms which maintain themselves by subduing the push of desire — are h i s equally mindless counterparts, those i n "Improvisation XIII.1" with " h a l f sophisticated faces," who have retreated into the cage of normative perceptions and have taken t h e i r positions there: There's no business to be done with them e i t h e r way. They're neither virtuous nor the other thing, between which e x i s t no perfections. Oh, the mothers w i l l explain that they are good g i r l s . (K, 54) These s o - c a l l e d "good g i r l s , " however, are the product of a moral system emptied of authority because so removed from the p h y s i c a l i t y of sexual needs. But who i n the community can hear things backwardly, "o 1 the wrong si d e , " besides the fool? The leaders, those i n c o n t r o l of p u b l i c power? Not one of them, according to the writ e r i n Kora, can hear the insistence of that other s e l f , as i t presses for release — i n the s t r e e t s , but more usually i n the privacy of personal h e l l s : It i s the water we drink. I t bubbles under every h i l l . How? Agh, you stop short of the root. Why, caught and the town goes mad. The haggard husband pirouettes i n t i g h t s . The wolf-lean wife i s r o l l i n g butter pats: i t ' s a clock s t r i k i n g the hour. Pshaw, they do things better i n Bangkok, — here too, i f there's heads together, But up and leap at her throat! Bed's at f a u l t ! (K, 39) 254 The ground of life-forces"bubbles" beneath the authorities of the community, but they refuse to acknowledge i t , be they "priests, school teachers, doctors, commercial agents of one sort, or another, " who the voice i n the interpretation to "Improvisation VII.2" c a l l s the "pestilential individuals," those who w i l l not permit themselves to recognize the "depth of a sea beneath them" (K, 43-44). "Yet even to these," the same voice i r o n i c a l l y concludes, sometimes there rises that which they think in their ignorance is a confused babble of aspiring voices not knowing what ancient harmonies these are to which they are so faultily listening. (K, 44) Again, as i s the case so often i n Kora, the anger of the writer i s trans-lated into a laughter, the same things that appear at f i r s t glance "sense-l e s s " revealing a "back side" that remains "secret" because denied. So much of course, depends upon di r e c t i o n : i f the ears are turned that way, the "confused babble of aspiring voices " are "ancient harmonies," the same persistent voices of creatures who speak because they must. As the f o o l of the writer does, p a r t i c u l a r l y i n that language c r i s i s through which his mind plays back against the uni-form grain of his community, and who, for this reason, enters the confusion of voices — his own voice s p l i n t e r i n g i n many directions — thus hears things from the other side, hears the constrained push of desire i n his contemporary world. "Oh c a l l me a lady and think you've caged me. Hell's loose every minute, you hear?" (K, 39). You hear? But i n Kora, so we are led to believe, very few minds do hear. Their ears are not turned that way. Another feminine voice i n "Improvisation X.2" says as much: "our husbands t i r e of us and we •— l e t us not say we go hungry for the i r caresses but for 255 caresses — of a kind" (K, 49), In her world, she continues, there i s "nothing to lead you astray" (K, 49), nothing to lure the mind away from i t s f i x i t i e s , no language r i s k s even that would a c t i v a t e the heart's unspoken desires, so to transform a dead place into a l i v e world: Risk a double entendre. But of a sudden the room's not the same! I t ' s a strange blood sings under some skin. Who w i l l have the sense f o r i t ? The men s n i f f suspi-ci o u s l y ; you at l e a s t my dear had your head about you. It was a tender nibble but i t r e a l l y did you c r e d i t . But think of what might be! I t ' s a l l i n the imagination. (K, 49-50) So another voice, the male voice of the writer, s l i d e s into the female voice. And the play, the dialogue, i s also a play of language i n which the writ e r becomes his own double, a female force within himself pushing to break out of confinement. " I t ' s a l l i n the imagination" of the world made possible through the mind's res i g n a t i o n to i t s i n s i s t e n c e s . Some three decades a f t e r Kora was written, the image of King Lear driven to madness, swept up into the fury of the storm, came back into Williams' mind, emblematic by then of the inescapable desire of the mind to transgress i t s own tyrannies. The "storm" that reduces Lear to zero mirrors the confusion of the heart's movement i n the world. Or as Williams says i n the opening l i n e from "Design f o r November": Let confusion be the design and a l l my thoughts go, swallowed by d e s i r e : recess from promises i n the November of your arms. (CLP, 87)5 Confusion releases the mind from a past that has become obsolete, an imposition obstructing the heart's desire f o r a present. "When the world 256 takes over for us," so the poem "Lear" (CLP, 237) begins. Without t h i s flowing i n of the a c t u a l , without t h i s confusion of thought, without t h i s influence — i n t h i s sense, the f o o l of the wr i t e r i n Kora i s "swallowed by des i r e " — we would be trapped time without end with i n the s u b j e c t i v i t y of " b r i t t l e consciences." And we would, i n t h i s way, remove ourselves from the world that i s near to us because we carry i t within ourselves as l i v e creatures. The destruction of th i s kind of mental i s o l a t i o n ("Was i t I?") d i s p e l l s the threat of forever being confined to a caged vacancy, "walking / at a l o s s " down corri d o r s emptied of desire. The "storm" i s actu a l , i s the actual which feeds the heart what i t wants — and as i t flows i n l i k e an epidemic the mind, turned inside-out, gives i t s e l f over to the r i c h drama of i t s otherness, drawn out as i t i s in t o the imaginative f i e l d of i t s own nature. As Williams writes, Today the storm, inescapable, has taken the scene and we return . our hearts to i t , however made, made wives by i t and though we secure ourselves for a dry skin from the drench of i t s passionate approaches we y i e l d and are made quiet by i t s fury P i t i f u l Lear, not even you could out-shout the storm — to make a f o o l cry! Wife to i t s power might you not better have yielded e a r l i e r ? as on ships facing the seas were c a r r i e d once the figures of women at repose to s i g n i f y the strength of the waves' lash. In the r e c i p r o c a l interchange between Lear and h i s Fool, Williams thus envisions a doubleness within the mind, one side c l i n g i n g to the enclosure of the prot e c t i v e house of predetermined forms, the other more "secret" side d e s i r i n g a release from that f i x i t y i n the "passionate approaches" of the storm. The rage of the storm grounds the heart's desires. And so Williams says that "we / y i e l d and are made quiet by i t s f u r y . " The dis q u i e t i n g 257 power of " f u r y " quiets the heart because i t thereby releases i t s e l f to i t s own feminine nature as "Wife to i t s power," This i s the same "heart" that Williams c a l l s an "unruly Master" (PB, 83) i n a s t i l l l atex poenij "To Eleanor and B i l l Monahan," whexe he openly confesses "to being / h a l f man and h a l f / woman" (PB, 84). And here Williams also writes, The female p r i n c i p l e of the world i s my appeal i n the extremity to which I have come. (PB, 86) The "extremity" i s the edge that the heart comes to when i t returns to "the storm inescapable." So Lear i s " P i t i f u l " because, f i n a l l y , the storm i s l a r g e r than reason's orders, king that he was, thrown as he i s back into a primary ground of the human creature, the Fool h i s only companion i n that moment his world comes crashing down. In t h i s c o l l a p s e , t h i s "slaughter," Lear i s drenched by forces outside h i s c o n t r o l but which mirror the common nature he had become deaf to, the "nothing" that s p l i t s his mind into a two, a one and an other, himself and his Fool, both sides within a p o l a r i t y i n constant t r a n s i t — i n constant change, themselves "decay." And the Fool c r i e s to witness t h i s reduction of authority. "Wife to i t s power," Williams says, "might you not / better have yielded e a r l i e r " ? C e r t a i n l y , but reason does not sustain i t s e l f by y i e l d i n g to what i t cannot control — or i f i t does, then i t finds i t s e l f transformed into the f o o l ' s voice, i n kind s i m i l a r to the one that composes i t s e l f through the imaginative drama of Kora. Moreover, i t i s t h i s voice i t s e l f that manifests an a c t u a l i t y which e x i s t s through i t s power to destroy and create simultaneously within a process experienced as a confusion, an inescapable mixture, As Williams says so aptly i n a short poem, s i g n i f i c a n t l y t i t l e d "Descent": From disorder (a chaos) 258 order grows — grows f r u i t f u l . The chaos feeds i t . Chaos feeds the tree. (CEP, 460) And "chaos" i s the "unfathomable ground / where we walk d a i l y " (CLP, 23), an o r i g i n and a source, the other world of the feminine that asserts i t s e l f from an underground, under because dark. And yet from here p a r t i c u l a r s appear and flower as l i v e things. "Chaos feeds the tre e . " The feminine force of the ground i s the same force — "The female p r i n c i p l e of the world" — that w r i t i n g i n the words themselves uncovers. This should not have come as a surprise to the wr i t e r i n Kora. In The Tempers, the same writer had written, i n a poem c a l l e d " T r a n s i t i o n a l , " It i s the woman i n us That makes us write — Let us acknowledge i t — (CEP, 34) In Kora, that same "woman i n us" becomes the other s e l f of the wri t e r . His creaturely s e l f surfaces i n the heart's confusions — and i n every which way i n f l i g h t from minds locked i n f i x e d perspectives that c o n s t r i c t the move-ment of i t s desires. This i s why, f i n a l l y , i n the text of Kora, the value of the feminine i s at stake. And we do bear witness to t h i s force, the various faces of i t configuring again and again i n a l l the female figures i n Kora who are, at one and the same time, a projection.of the writer's own re-awakening desire and the objects of h i s d e s i r e . The tension of th i s dynamic, t h i s dramatic p u l l i n two contrary d i r e c t i o n s , constitutes the experience of doubleness i n the w r i t i n g . The " H e l l " of Kora discloses the caged condition of the feminine i n a society that refuses to acknowledge the creaturely nature of the human, but j u s t as importantly, perhaps ultimately more so, t h i s same " H e l l " i s the condition of creatures who by nature are t i e d inescapably to earth processes beyond t h e i r c o n t r o l . I t i s , i n 259 other words, i n the "extremity" of t h i s contradictory s i t u a t i o n that a l l the feminine figures seem to appear i n Kora: they are so many faces of the "female p r i n c i p l e " — the same "Beautiful Thing" that comes and goes i n Paterson III — w h i c h resides i n the body of the world, and thus i n the other s e l f bound up with that world, but which i s c o n t i n u a l l y f i n d i n g i t s e l f at odds with narrow forms of perceptions that attempt to subdue i t . The feminine heart appears i n "Mamselle Day," for instance, whom the writer i n "Improvisation IV.1" asks to "come back again" (K, 36); i n the "young woman" (K, 34) at the explorer Amundsen's table i n "Improvisation III.2"; i n "VI.2" as "Persephone" who was "raped" (K, 41); i n "XIV.2" as V i l l o n ' s maitvesse — a f t e r he'd gone bald and was skin pocked and toothless: she that had him ducked i n the sewage drain. Then there's that m i l l e r ' s daughter of "buttocks broad and breastes high." (K, 56) And then there i s as we l l "Juana la Looa" (K, 57), the crazy Queen of Spain i n "XIV.3"; or "Bertha" (K, 58) i n "XV.3"; or "white haired Miss B a l l ! " (K, 43) i n "VII.2"; or the "lady" whom the wr i t e r i n "XVIII.3" plans to meet "o' the dark side" (K, 67); or the "She" of "XXIII.2" who runs beyond the wood follows the swiftest along the roads laughing among the b i r c h c l u s t e r s her face i n the yellow leaves the c u r l s before her eyes her mouth h a l f open. (K, 75) And t h i s "She" re-appears i n the figu r e of "a la Maja Desnuda! 0 Duquessa de Alba!" (K, 40) i n Goya's p o r t r a i t of the nude Countess of Alba. This l a s t instance of the feminine surfaces (in the writer's imagination) on the streets of Newark, a "lewd wonder" (K, 40) i n the context of a society b u i l t upon the repression of sexuality. But the f o o l i n Kora, as he says, i s not "fooled that e a s i l y " (K, 40), The writer i n Kora thus goes contrary to -modes of thought that codify 260 into r i g i d systems the feminine nature of the human, and he does so, not by escaping, but by stray i n g , wandering — i n other words, by allowing himself (as Williams' mother did i n Rome, on that rare journey never to be forgotten) to become a vagrant i n thought. In t h i s way, he becomes a stranger to his world, an outsider, who by v i r t u e of h i s negative v i s i o n of things — f o r Williams, the function of the imagination — descends to a more elemental ground of experience otherwise hidden. And l i k e Columbus i n "Improvisation X . l , " another vagrant, he returns to the f i e l d of desire, there where the mind i s once again "At sea! At sea!" (K, 48), once again released to the movement of l i v e things. The destruction of the one (subjective) s e l f reveals that other (objective) s e l f , the s e l f that l i v e s a world "in constant process. The arc of t h i s drama i s experienced as a t r a n s i t i o n or a "crossing over," one that re-opens a s u b s t a n t i a l world, i n Kora, a world i n heat: Open the windows — but a l l ' s boarded up here. Out with you, you sleepy doctors and lawyers you, — the sky's '• a f i r e and Calvary Church with i t s s n a i l ' s horns up, s n i f f i n g the dawn — o' the wrong side! Let the trumpets blare! Tutti i instruments! The world's bound homeward. (K, 40) On the wrong side, the side that i s both bound (going) and homeward bound ( t i e d ) : c a l l t h i s doubly-bound world, then, the side of Kora, i n H e l l , the mythological f i g u r e who i s h e r s e l f the "female p r i n c i p l e of the world" incarnate. On the one hand, she i s a mythological counterpart to the feminine s e l f of the writ e r whose "eyes open" i n the text that bears her name, and as such, she i s the one "She" who t i e s together a l l the various feminine figures there. But the image of "Kora i n H e l l , " the myth i t s e l f , d i s c l o s e s yet another, and more re v e a l i n g dimension to the w r i t i n g drama. Coming at the myth of Kora i n i t s p a r t i c u l a r i t y , from "what we can c a l l i t s 261 "back side," we begin to glimpse at the horizonal edge of Kora the way i n which the "slaughter" of the writer's s e l f has i t s roots i n the very nature of the world. Here Kora embodies the actual waywardness of a l i f e - p r o c e s s that i s i t s e l f constituted i n the play of contraries. Fox the writer i n Kora, the figure thus harbors within i t s wake the emergence of a cosmology to account for the experience of doubleness, not merely as an aberration from some f i x e d norm, but as the l i k e texture of a s u b s t a n t i a l world. In the world as well, "order" or form grows from a negative ground, from "disorder (a chaos)." And i n t h i s very process, "grows f r u i t f u l . " i i In the Homeric "Hymn to Demeter,"^ the main source f o r the myth of Kora, Kora strays, wanders and estranges h e r s e l f from the enclosed protection of her mother Demeter. And so she finds h e r s e l f i n a meadow where she i s drawn out of he r s e l f by the beauty of the narcissus flower, a flower that mirrors her own v i r g i n beauty, her maidenhood. . As -she becomes absorbed by the p a r t i c u l a r i t y of the flower, she loses h e r s e l f i n the play of her own desires. I t i s at t h i s precise moment, so the myth suggests, that she becomes vulnerable to forces outside her own con t r o l , although r e v e a l i n g l y , she had h e r s e l f summoned f o r t h those forces through her awakening desire. The womb-like ground opens, and Hades (or Pluto) comes out of a gap i n the earth, abducts and ravishes her. Kora f i n a l l y finds h e r s e l f down i n the darkness of the underworld. The abduction i n turn leads Demeter, her mother, on her wanderings i n search of her l o s t daughter. In her rage and sorrow, Demeter causes a great famine. Eventually, to avert the t o t a l destruction of the earth and a l l of i t s creatures, Zeus, the figure of order 262 i n the myth, agrees to allow Kora to leave the underworld where she i s held captive by h i s brother, his darker h a l f , the "Host of Many," as Hades i s c a l l e d . But before she ascends, Hades, as Kora explains to Demeter l a t e r , s e c r e t l y put a pomegranate seed, the f r u i t often associated with c h i l d b i r t h , i n her mouth. By t r i c k i n g her i n t h i s way, he managed to get her to return to the underworld for one-third of each year. The narrative of Kora's so - c a l l e d "rape," as even t h i s b r i e f e s t account suggests, i s double-edged. The sexual violence of Hades' abduction i s an inseparable part of Kora's awakening desire. The one c a l l s f o r the other. In terms of the text of Kora, the fi g u r e of the maiden Kora corresponds to the creaturely s e l f which i s bound to the world through Its desires. And l i k e Williams' mother, and l i k e a l l the feminine figures appearing i n the imagination of the wr i t e r , she too i s drawn outside h e r s e l f by the "unruly" heart. She too, by nature, strays from the mind's l i m i t s , wanders i n the meadow of her desires, and thus becomes a prey to the multiple appearance and disappearance of the world: i n the myth t h i s p l u r a l i t y i s embodied i n the figure of Hades, the "Host of Many"; i n Kora, the "Lord of A l l " (K, 55). And f i n a l l y , Kora's own slaughter, an act comparable to the "slaughter" of the writer's s e l f i n Kora, i s also the event of a destruction, the former enclosed " p u r i t y " of her i s o l a t e v i r g i n i t y broken apart or "cleaved" by forces l a r g e r than h e r s e l f , but which she desires. Desires, because j u s t here she can descend to the darkness of a more primary source, the ground of her heart's desires i n Hades' underworld realm. As a force, the force of nature i n man, desire i s always a desire f o r an other that i s other because un-known. And i t i s t h i s force that l i e s behind the heart's need to escape boundaries and to be possessed by a world outside that contains i t s 263 own i n t e r n a l nature. Williams would l a t e r c a l l t h i s act of giving i n a "resignation to existence" (SL, 147). In the "Prologue" to Kora, he points to h i s own return to source through the t i t l e , "The Return of the Sun." And the image suggests h i s own r e t u r n i n g as a sun/son, the b i r t h of an other s e l f that issues from an elemental darkness. The l i n e s of poetry that act as an epigraph, not only to the "Prologue," but also to the whole of Kora i n H e l l : Improvisations, catch the shadowy form of a feminine figure who i s both desire and what i s desired, "stained, with shadow colors, / Swimming through waves of sunlight" (K, 6): an exact image of the movement of con-t r a r i e s which everywhere i n Kora a c t u a l i z e the heart's need for a darkness y i e l d i n g l i g h t . "Her voice was like rose-fragrance waltzing in the wind" (K, 6). Perhaps Williams was thinking of a "Kora" within himself, his own creaturely heart r i s i n g from the " H e l l " of winter to re-enter an other, wholly new, b i r t h i n g world, when he said i n I Wanted to Write a Poem: I thought of myself as Springtime and I f e l t I was on my way to H e l l (but I didn't go very f a r ) . This was what the Improvisations were t r y i n g to say. (IW, 29) Having said t h i s much, however, i t i s s t i l l a misconception to then propose that the myth of Kora i s a primary source f o r the w r i t i n g i n Kora, i n d i s c u r s i v e terms, a p r i o r cause that explains i t s e f f e c t . Williams does say i n I_ Wanted to Write a. Poem that he i s indebted to Pound f o r the t i t l e . We had talked about Kora, the Greek p a r a l l e l of Persephone, the legend of Springtime captured and taken to Hades. (IW, 29) S t i l l , the comment leaves a great deal unsaid. Did Pound a c t u a l l y suggest the t i t l e Kora i n H e l l f o r the improvisations? Or i s Williams simply remembering a conversation about Kora long before he sat down to write the 264 improvisations, say when he v i s i t e d Pound i n London i n 1912, as Mike Weaver suggests?^ Perhaps t h i s conversation i s even acknowledged by Pound through the quote from Propertius he used to dedicate Ripostes (1912) to Williams: "Quos ego Persephonae maxima dona feram" ("Which I take, my not unworthy g i f t , to Persephone," as Pound translates the l i n e i n Homage to Sextus g Propertius). I f , however, Williams had no book i n mind when he threw himself into the "dark s c r i b b l i n g s , " i t i s not very l i k e l y that he had a t i t l e i n mind beforehand. Furthermore, Kora never appears by name i n the text i t s e l f , though one b r i e f (almost n e g l i g i b l e ) reference to Persephone does jump i n t o "Improvisation VI.2" (K, 41), and elsewhere Pluto, another name for Hades, i s mentioned i n connection with the "Chief of P o l i c e " i n "Improvisation XVI.2" (K, 61). And we have already drawn attention to the "old woman" with "her daughter on her arm" (K, 32) i n "Improvisation 1.3," a f a i n t hint of Demeter and Kora i n the image, but again no actual references to them. These oblique gestures that point i n the d i r e c t i o n of figures i n the myth of Kora, i n other words, appear so randomly — so accidently — i n the text that i t i s more l i k e l y that they simply came into Williams' mind as he wrote spontaneously with no predetermined "subject" i n mind and without a p r i o r i n t e n t i o n to use them as s p e c i f i c points of textual meaning i n the w r i t i n g . More true to the improvisational nature of the whole text, the f a c t that i t was written "going," the t i t l e Kora i n H e l l — perhaps suggested through conversations with Pound, perhaps discovered by Williams — came af t e r the i n i t i a l improvisations were written. We can suppose that Williams re-read what he had written, and i n his own reader's response, a f t e r t h i s f a c t , began to discover a mythological range of experience i n h i s own w r i t i n g . The choice of the t i t l e Kora i n H e l l thus became, l i k e the choice of 265 Davis' drawing as a f r o n t i s p i e c e , a further extension of a text that wrote i t s e l f . I t was another improvisational act, and the t i t l e one-more surface alongside a l l the other surfaces that constitute the text. And l i k e Davis' drawing, or the " i n t e r p r e t a t i o n s , " the t i t l e cuts back across the opacity of the w r i t i n g and provides — i n gestural form — the narrative of a myth that substantiates the s p l i t t i n g apart of the " s e l f " i n the w r i t i n g , but equally, i s i n turn substantiated by the w r i t i n g . In other words, the w r i t i n g i n Kora informs the myth of Kora as much as the myth informs the w r i t i n g . To t h i s extent, the t i t l e Kora i n H e l l i s as opaque as the w r i t i n g i t announces. Along i t s surface, nevertheless, the w r i t e r i n Kora begins to understand the mythological dimension of "the female p r i n c i p l e of the world." The r e c i p r o c a l i n t e r p l a y between the substance of the w r i t i n g i n Kora and the substance of the myth of "Kora i n H e l l " stands on the horizonal edge of the drama i n "Improvisation XVI.2." Here we are t o l d that the "gods" have f a l l e n , or are dragged down i n present-day America — "Giants i n the d i r t . The gods, the Greek gods, smothered i n f i l t h and ignorance" (K, 60). The gods (or goddesses) that at one time formed a mythology that projected human desire, i n the h i s t o r i c condition of a society i n which desire i s pushed underground, drained of t h e i r energy, mirror a time i n which the vacancy of mental forms — "Oh, the mothers w i l l explain that they are good g i r l s " — finds i t s complement i n the apparent senseless nature of the world: "Here Hebe with a s i c k jaw and a c r u e l husband, — her mother l e f t no place for a brain to grow" (K, 60). S t i l l , and t h i s i s the gain for the estranged write r i n Kora whose s e l f i s being "slaughtered," the "gods," though apparently " f a l l e n , " have not r e a l l y disappeared. The same p a r t i c u l a r s that are symptomatic of the barrenness of a culture divorced from the earth, reveal 266 negatively t h e i r mythological — or i n the language of Kora, t h e i r imaginative q u a l i t i e s . As the fig u r e s of desire, the gods now re-appear as "some imag-ined f i g u r e " r i s i n g out of a hidden c a v i t y , on rare nights f o r they w i l l come •— the rare nights! The ground l i f t s and out s a l l y the heroes of Sophocles, of Aeschylus. They go seeping down into our hearts, they r a i n upon us and i n the bog they sink again down through the white roots, down — ( K , 60) Down to the same ground that spawns mushrooms and that decomposes Louslinger's body. This same ground becomes a "She" i n the l a t e r In the American Grain, the mythological equivalent there of the grain-goddess Demeter. And i t i s th i s "She" who, c a l l i n g De Soto out of h i s Europeanized mind, simultaneously estranges him from hi s h i s t o r i c past and draws him into the i n t e r i o r of her dark wilderness recesses, the cave of her woods. De Soto dies and i s f i n a l l y received back into the "She," the womb of his/her own nature — Down, down, t h i s s o l i t a r y sperm, down into the l i q u i d , the formless, the i n s a t i a b l e b e l l y of sleep; down among the fishes : (IAG, 58) The darkness of the absence of form brings into play the a c t u a l i t y of the un-known. Or i n Kora: That which is known has value only by v i r t u e of the dark. This cannot be otherwise. A thing known passes out of the mind into the muscles, the w i l l is quit of it, save only when set into v i b r a t i o n by the forces of dark-ness opposed to it. (K, 74) As t h i s i n t e r p r e t a t i o n to "Improvisation JCXII.3" implies, the p r i n c i p l e of ne g a t i v i t y constitutes a fundamental aspect of the ground, that "un-known" region of experience through which the present appears, l i k e a mushroom out of the earth, breaking into a form that i s a moving image of process. Here too value becomes attached to the immediacy of desire, f o r desire comes into play once what i s "known" i s forced to be measured against i t s negation, i n Kora, against "ignorance." "This cannot be otherwise,"'so the 267 i n t e r p r e t a t i o n suggests, because t h i s p r i n c i p l e constitutes the nature of experience. Anything "known" has been absorbed and made mediate (no longer immediate) i n the instant that i t i s possessed i n t h i s way. Stripped of i t s p a r t i c u l a r i t y , a "thing known" leaves the mind as a l i v e thing and disappears into the habit of "muscles," unless of course i t i s made to re-appear i n i t s o r i g i n a l state of apprehension through the "forces of darkness" that set the mind back into motion again, once again i n a world of moving energies. The negative, i n other words, i n photography as i n l i f e , transforms the mind into a function of the world, a screen l e t us say, or a medium within which things are cast as appearances — i n Kora, the "vague cinema" awakening " i n the head's dark" (K^ 66) i s t i e d to the world of*the'Imagination.where the mind becomes an extension of change. Imagination! That's the worm i n the apple. What i f i t run to paralyses and b l i n d f i r e s , here's sense loose i n a world set on foundations. Blame buzzards for the eyes they have. (K, 77) And i t i s p r e c i s e l y "the eyes" of the f o o l of a w r i t e r i n Kora that allows him an imaginative v i s i o n of the creaturely nature of men i n his own immediate l o c a l e , the divorced world of his townspeople, where the "gods" go down to a saloon back of the r a i l - r o a d switch where they have that g i r l , you know, the one that should have been Venus by the l u s t that's i n her. They've got her down there among the r a i l r o a d men. A crusade couldn't rescue her. Up to j a i l — or c a l l i t down to Limbo — the Chief of P o l i c e our Pluto. I t ' s a l l the gods, there's nothing else worth w r i t i n g of. They are the same men they always were — but f a l l e n . Do they dance now, they that danced beside Helicon? They dance much;as they did.then, only, few have" an eye for i t , through the d i r t and fumes. (]<., 60-61) The "America" that surfaces i n t h i s l o v e l y piece of w r i t i n g i s " f a l l e n " only because no one as yet has discovered a means of overcoming the v i o l e n t 268 d e f l e c t i o n of desire i n the senseless b r u t a l i t y of rape. There i s , i n e f f e c t , no language to transform the force of desire into a performance of i t — a "dance" — which would both release and reveal i t at the same time. So we are t o l d i n "Improvisation "VII. 3" to " s t r a i n to catch the sense but have to admit i t ' s i n a language they've not taught you, a flaw some-where — " (K, 44). The flaw i s i n the means, not the (unavoidable) fa c t of desire. Or as the w r i t e r says, "few have an eye f o r i t . " I f the w r i t i n g being written here matters at a l l , however, then the w r i t e r i n Kora whose own eyes are drawn into the c o n d i t i o n a l nature of the things before him has already begun to compose an imaginative sense of that same " f a l l e n " place. "They dance as they did then . . . . I t ' s a l l the gods, there's nothing else worth w r i t i n g of." The Greek gods may have disappeared i n the modern landscape, but the ground of desire that once spawned them has not changed. They return i n "a saloon back of the r a i l - r o a d switch." The violence of the rape of "that g i r l " i s , needless to say perhaps, one of the severe costs of repression. Deny desire and i t w i l l surface i n grotesque forms. But from the "back s i d e , " from the side of the imagination, for those who do have an "eye" for i t , the same act i s the contemporary re-enactment of the myth of Kora ("that g i r l " ) , the Greek maiden who was abducted by Hades ("the Chief of P o l i c e our Pluto") and taken into the realm of the Underworld ("down to Limbo"), there to become his Queen ("the one that should have been Venus"). No matter how many t r i c k s the mind has up i t s sleeve to deny process, and the v i o l e n t tyrannization of the world i n the instance of "rape" i s one such response, nothing can i n fa c t escape. Process i s the inescapable l i m i t of being a l i v e i n the world. Even an attempt to escape i t by possessing things i n forms of t o t a l subjugation acknowledges i t s i n e v i t a b i l i t y . Here 269 the myth of Kora reveals the co n t r a r i e t y of a l i f e - p r o c e s s that a l l creatures are prey to as l i v e things, "Now l i f e " — we r e c a l l Williams t e l l i n g H a r r i e t Monroe i n 1913 — " i s above a l l things else at any -moment subversive of l i f e as i t was the moment before — always new, i r r e g u l a r " (SL, 23-24), In Essays on a Science of Mythology, C. Kerenyi argues that i n the Eleusinian Mysteries, the na r r a t i v e of Kora, her abduction and return, formed the mythological basis for a c u l t that affirmed the con t r a r i e t y of a l i f e - p r o c e s s e s s e n t i a l l y "feminine" i n i t s nature, t i e d as i t i s to a primary emphasis upon the earth as source. The more e x p l i c i t a g r i c u l t u r a l emphasis of the myth (Demeter as the grain-Goddess) i s thus not to be understood one-dimensionally as an end i n i t s e l f , but another mirror of a creative force that functions through a fundamentally negative process. Explaining the p a r a l l e l s between the sowing of grain and the disappearance of Kora, Kerenyi comments: ". . . the grain decays under the earth and thus, i n t h i s state of f r u i t f u l death, hints at the Kore dwelling i n the realm of 9 the dead." The cycle of the grain, that i s , reveals the fate of a l l l i v i n g things, the force of decay that a l l creatures of nature s u f f e r simply because they are extensions of earth processes. Kora's "rape," i n t h i s sense, i s a narration of the condition of a creative process that sustains, maintains, and nurtures i t s e l f i n a state of constant and continuous c r i s e s . L i f e feeds on i t s e l f . I t i s , l i k e the act of w r i t i n g , improvisational i n nature. In the myth, then, the figures of Demeter and Kora are two sides of one process, not mother and daughter, but mother-in-daughter and daughter-in-mother, or pos s i b l y more accurate to the feminine ground of the myth, woman-as-mother and woman-as-maiden, motherhood and maidenhood as the two i n t e r -changeable states without which birth, would not be po s s i b l e . "They are," so 270 Kerenyi says, "to be thought of as a double f i g u r e , one h a l f of which i s sary part of a complex of forces. He i s the Seducer, the god of Many, of death, of darkness, of an otherness that s p l i t s Kora's v i r g i n heart into two, her maidenhood tfrus g i v i n g way to her motherhood. In the Underworld she becomes "her bridegroom's K o r e , " ^ Hades' double, the Queen of h i s sphere of influence. In t h i s same cleavage, of course, Demeter-as-mother loses her maidenhood, her daughter, which explains the sorrowful pain of her wanderings. In short, c h i l d b i r t h necessitates the v i o l a t i o n of Kora's v i r g i n i t y . The mother, the maiden, and the dark lover are three complemen-tary figures i n the imaginary dimension of a creative force that constitutes i t s e l f on the i n t e r p l a y between slaughter and b i r t h , between destruction and creation, between decay and growth., between a one and a many, between form and formlessness, between disappearance and appearance: i n e f f e c t , very must the same subversive force that everywhere i n Kora struggles to shake i t s e l f free i n the w r i t i n g . I t i s t h i s future that the improvisations re-open and which the cover "design" of Kora both d i s c l o s e s and announces. the i d e a l complement of the other. ,10 And here too Hades becomes a neces-A text that began i n c r i s i s thus ends at a beginning. The drawing on the cover comes l a s t , a f i n a l surface to the text of Kora. As Williams says i n 271 h i s Autobiography, i t "completed the design" (A, 158). The p r i n c i p l e of c r i s i s , i m p l i c i t i n the t i t l e Kora i n H e l l , i s p a r t i c u l a r i z e d i n the s t y l i z e d image of impregnation, the one image which folds the play of the world back into the text as i t simultaneously folds the text back into the world. The imagination i s f i n a l l y that medium — c a l l i t a "place" — where the unspoken t r i a d of Kora, language, experience, and the world, intermingle i n a dance that i s a composition of the r e a l . Only the imagination i s r e a l ! I have declared i t time without end. (PB, 179) "I myself improvised the idea," Williams comments i n I Wanted to Write a_ Poem, seeing, symbolically, a design using sperms of various breeds, various races l e t ' s say, and directed the a r t i s t to vary the shadings of the drawing from white to gray to black. The c e l l accepts one sperm — that i s the begin-ning of l i f e . I was f e e l i n g f r e s h and I thought i t was a b e a u t i f u l thing and I wanted the world to see i t . (IW, 28-29) Whether Williams was f e e l i n g fresh or not, the cover design affirms the emergence of a root p r i n c i p l e , the f i n a l outcome of the "dark s c r i b b l i n g s " that began with nothing i n mind but the w r i t i n g i t s e l f . Williams was l i t e r a l l y d r i v i n g himself out of H e l l with a new sense of form. In w r i t i n g as i n the world, form i s e s s e n t i a l l y the event of a c r i s i s , i n i t s most fundamental sense, as any doctor would know, the instance of the i s o l a t e ovum being torn apart by a si n g l e sperm — many spermatozoa but only one "su c c e s s f u l . " Both proceed through a cleavage that makes a one, a two, hence a three, the number of birth.. The text of Kora, we n o t i c e , i s structured through a series of three's: three improvisations to each set, twenty-seven i n a l l , i n mathematical terms, three cubed. And the pun on "races"? The spermatozoa race to the ovum. Only one gets i n . B i r t h , then, 272 comes out of a hunt •— The thing, the thing, of which I am i n chase, "Without imagination," Williams says i n "Against the Weather," l i f e cannot go on, f o r we are l e f t s t a r i n g at the empty casings where tr u t h l i v e d yesterday while the creature i t s e l f has escaped behind xis. (SE, 213) The "beauty" of the "creature" i n Kora i s re-aligned with the act of w r i t i n g where the immediacy of the world becomes a "discovery, a race on the ground" (GAN, 171). A c r i s i s ( l i t e r a l l y , a " s p l i t t i n g apart"), i n short, i s the event of an emergency (from "emerge," the act of r i s i n g from a l i q u i d substance, say l i k e language, of so appearing); or i n the f l u i d language of Kora: " A l l beauty stands upon the edge of the deflowering" (K_, 59) . In the imagination, "beauty" i s not some abstract e n t i t y e x i s t i n g i n a transcendent form, perfect and remote from a c t u a l i t y , but i s i t s e l f an e f f e c t created "on the edge of the deflowering" ( i t a l i c s added), the text Kora one such e f f e c t . No "deflowering," no "beauty." No "slaughter," no "plunge" into confusion. No abduction of Kora, no Demeter. No opacity of language, no w r i t i n g that i s ac t u a l . The cleavage of the ovum on the cover design thus projects the p r i n c i p l e of "deflowering" through which whatever i s actual continues. Destruction and creation are simultaneous. "Chaos feeds the tree." Mushrooms grow, ch i l d r e n are born, plants sprout, books get written, and flowers cover the decaying body of Louslinger. What's an i c y room and the sun not up? This song i s to P h y l l i s . Reproduction l e t s death i n , says Joyce. Rot, say I. To P h y l l i s t h i s song i s ' (K, 74) 273 CONCLUSION AN OPENING OF THE DOORS The "Prologue" i s dated September 1, 1918 i n the 1920 e d i t i o n of Kora i n H e l l (K, 28). "As f a r as can be t o l d , " Williams says i n I Wanted to Write a_ Poem, " i t i s the f i r s t piece of continuous prose I remember w r i t i n g " (IW, 31). And he explains i t s impetus: I f e l t I had to give some indication, of myself to the people I knew; sound o f f , t e l l the world — e s p e c i a l l y my intimate friends — how I f e l t about them . . . . I paid attention very assiduously to what I was t o l d . I often reacted v i o l e n t l y , but I weighed what had been t o l d me thoroughly. I t was always my own mind I was making up. (IW, 30) This " f i r s t piece" i n i t i a l l y appeared i n p r i n t i n The L i t t l e Review, i n two sections, the f i r s t , which ends with Wallace Stevens' l e t t e r , followed by a bracketed "(to be continued)," i n A p r i l , 1919, the second a month later."'' In I_ Wanted to Write a. Poem, Williams also remembers t h i s d i v i s i o n of h i s essay: "When I was halfway through the Prologue, 'Prufrock' appeared," and he adds, "I had a v i o l e n t f e e l i n g that E l i o t had betrayed what I believed i n " (IW, 30). E l i o t "had rejected America and I refused to be rejected and so my reaction was v i o l e n t " (IW, 30). According to Williams, "The Love Song 274 of J. A l f r e d Prufrock" was evidence of E l i o t ' s r e t r e a t from a present that demanded "a new form of poetic composition, a form f o r the future" (IW, 30). Aside from the synaptic — and thoroughly c h a r a c t e r i s t i c — way Williams i d e n t i f i e s himself with the America he- ; f e l t E l i o t betrayed, the second"half of the "Prologue" does indi c a t e his v i o l e n t reaction to E l i o t ' s success i n London. His anger was f u e l l e d by an a r t i c l e by Edgar Jepson, a B r i t i s h c r i t i c who pointed to E l i o t as an authentic American poet. More importantly, that i t should have been his old f r i e n d Pound who would turn out to be the one to use h i s influence to get Jepson's a r t i c l e published i n the American context of The L i t t l e Review s t i r r e d Williams into an attack. A shortened version of Jepson's "The Western School," edited and with a note by Pound 2 appeared i n the September 1918 issue of The L i t t l e Review. "The Love Song of J . A l f r e d Prufrock" was f i r s t published i n H a r r i e t Monroe's Poetry i n June, 1915, and again i n Prufrock and Other Observations i n 1917, i n other words, before Williams wrote the "Prologue." Williams may thus have confused the date i n his memory, but there i s no confusion regarding h i s immediate response to Jepson i n the second h a l f of the "Prologue." Jepson i n p a r t i c u l a r holds up two poems by E l i o t , "Prufrock" and "La F i g l i a Che Piange," as outstanding exceptions to the altogether laughable q u a l i t y of c e r t a i n " p r i z e " American poems that appeared i n Poetry. E l i o t i s , as Jepson concludes, a r e a l poet, who possesses i n the highest degree the q u a l i t i e s the new school demands. Western-born of Eastern stock, Mr, T.S. E l i o t i s United States of the United States; and h i s poetry i s securely rooted i n i t s native s o i l ; i t has a new poetic d i c t i o n ; i t i s as autochthonous as Theocritus. Not to stop there, Jepson goes on to eulogize: 275 Could anything be. more United States, more of the soul of that modern land than "The Love Song of J, A l f r e d Prufrock"? I t i s the very w a i l i n g testament of that soul with i t s c r u e l c l a r i t y of sophisticated v i s i o n , i t s t h i n , sophisticated emotions, i t s sophisticated appreci-ation of a beauty, and i t s sophisticated yearning f o r a beauty i t cannot dare to make i t s own and so, at l a s t , l i v e . Never has the shrinking of the modern s p i r i t of l i f e been expressed with such exquisiteness, f u l l n e s s , and truth. Jepson ends by p r a i s i n g E l i o t ' s "La F i g l i a Che Piange," and i t i s h i s s p e c i f i c phrasing that draws Williams' attention i n h i s "Prologue": It i s i n s t i n c t with every poetic q u a l i t y the woolly masters lack Ithese so-called "masters" the p r i z e American poets, l i k e Sandburg and Masters, who published i n Poetry], with d e l i c a t e , b e a u t i f u l , intense emotion, with exquisite, b e a u t i f u l music. This i s the very f i n e flower of the f i n e s t s p i r i t of the "United States.3 On the whole, Williams agrees with Jepson's scathing condemnation of c e r t a i n American poems that appeared i n Poetry, but what gets him i s Jepson's gushy statement on E l i o t . To him E l i o t i s the very instance of a poet who turned h i s back on America and retreated-into the safety of a kind of poetry that panders to B r i t i s h c r i t i c a l tastes. In any case, Williams c l e a r l y does not take Jepson's c r i t i c a l assessment of American poetry very s e r i o u s l y , written as i t i s from a B r i t i s h perspective that i s u t t e r l y a l i e n to an actual America. On t h i s point, Jepson's a r t i c l e , of no r e a l use for American write r s , hardly even warrents a serious answer. " I t i s s i l l y , " Williams says i n h i s "Prologue," to go into a puckersnatch, because some brass-but-ton-minded nincompoop i n Kensington f l i e s o f f the handle and speaks openly about our United States p r i z e poems. (K, 23) And then he goes on to quote from Pound's note: "Anyone who has heard Mr. J . read Homer and discourse on Catullus would recognize his f i t n e s s as a judge and 276 respecter of poetry" — t h i s i s Ezra' — (K, 23) the amazement, then, to hear Pound supporting what to Williams' ear sounds l i k e nothing more than the cloak of a reactionary dogmatism, E l i o t i s the " f i n e s t flower" to Jepson, not because E l i o t ' s poetry i s new, but more accurately because i t conforms to f i x e d poetic conventions and standards that have no basis i n an actual America. Williams thus o f f e r s his own b l a s t : I t i s convenient to have f i x e d standards of comparison: A l l a n t i q u i t y ! And there i s always some eve r l a s t i n g Polonius of Kensington forever to rate highly his eternal E l i o t . I t i s because E l i o t i s a subtle conformist, I t t i c k l e s the palate of t h i s archbishop of procurers to a lecherous a n t i q u i t y to hold up Prufrock as a New World type. Prufrock, the n i b b l e r at s o p h i s t i c a t i o n , endemic i n every c a p i t a l , the not quite (because he refuses to turn his back), i s "the soul of that modern land," the United States! Blue undershirts, Upon a l i n e , I t i s not necessary to say to you Anything about i t — I cannot question E l i o t ' s observation. Prufrock i s a masterly p o r t r a i t of the man j u s t below the summit, but the type i s u n i v e r s a l ; the model i n his case might be Mr. J. No. The New World i s Montezuma or, since he was stoned to death i n a parley, Guatemozin who had the c i t y of Mexico level e d over him before he was taken. (K, 24) In his "Prologue" Williams argues for an authentic American perspective, one grounded i n a more primary sense of the earth, not a prefabricated " a n t i q u i t y " divorced from an opaque present; "Prufrock, the n i b b l e r at s o p h i s t i c a t i o n " t y p i f i e s the r e t r e a t into an outmoded h i s t o r i c i s m , "No," says Williams, "The New World i s Montezuma or , . . Guatemozin," not the i l l u s i o n of some Theocritan pastoralism of which the present i s a f a l l e n version. Nothing could be more removed from the America Williams hears 277 both i n h i s own work, p a r t i c u l a r l y the text of Kora that follows the "Pro-logue" -— h i s answer to Jepson — but as well i n the work of those writers and a r t i s t s , Duchamp, Demuth, Marianne Moore, Kreymborg, and Maxwell Bodenheim, who l i v e the America that E l i o t ' s work denies, Williams i s determined to remain i n the midst of American conditions and to write out of that s p e c i f i c context. Herein l i e s h i s defense of writers who stay i n America and accept the absence there of some such stable e n t i t y as a l i t e r a r y t r a d i t i o n , an i d e a l i z e d whole against which the i n d i v i d u a l talent i s measured and evaluated. For Williams, that kind of idealism i s p r e c i s e l y what the text of Kora undermines and refutes. The America that surfaces i n h i s w r i t i n g reasserts i t s a c t u a l i t y i n the p a r t i c u l a r i t y of i t s own conditions, and i t i s t h i s d i f f i c u l t y that the w r i t e r should release himself to, his present, which i s the only basis of anything " u n i v e r s a l . " So Williams, paraphrasing Kandinsky against Pound and E l i o t , asserts his own p r i o r i t i e s : Every a r t i s t has to express himself. Every a r t i s t has to express' his epoch, Every a r t i s t has to express the pure .and" eternal q u a l i t i e s of the a r t of a l l men. So we have the f i s h and the b a i t , but the l a s t r u l e holds three hooks at once — not for the f i s h , however. (K, 26)^ The impl i c a t i on i s , of course, that E l i o t ' s universalism attempts to jump the gun by leaping over the f i r s t two axioms. For Williams the l a s t one "holds three hooks at once" because a l l three axioms form a complex, l i t e r a t u r e becoming u n i v e r s a l only when i t roots i t s e l f i n the contextual f i e l d of i t s own time and space and when the wr i t e r i n h i s own p a r t i c u l a r i t y becomes an instrument of that context. This i s the " b a i t " that Williams o f f e r s through the text of Kora. 278 The f i g h t was on, and Williams was hardly ready to give up the b a t t l e to establish, a modernist form of w r i t i n g i n America, "By a mere twist of the imagination, i f Prufrock only knew i t , " he says, "the whole world can be inverted (why else are there wars?) and the mermaids be set warbling to whoever w i l l l i s t e n to them" (K, 25). This much, i n any case, Williams had figured out for himself by w r i t i n g Kora i n H e l l : Improvisations. Williams had stopped publishing i n Others at the end of 1916, The improvisations he published before Kora was published appeared i n The L i t t l e Review, the magazine he supported a f t e r he l o s t faith, i n Others. In 1919, however, the text of Kora now behind him, he returned to Others with a s p e c i a l issue which he himself edited, but with one clear announce-ment: i n "Gloria!" and "Belly Music," the two essays he wrote for the occasion, he points to the f a i l u r e of Others and i t s demise as a magazine. Moreover, he attacks with a great deal of energy the whole state of American w r i t i n g and c r i t i c i s m . Somehow or other, the r e v o l u t i o n that was supposed to occur i n America had f i z z l e d out. Modernist w r i t i n g s t i l l lay i n an unrealized condition of p o s s i b i l i t y . There was yet to be established a f u l l - s c a l e beginning: Others has come to an end. I object to bringing out another issue a f t e r t h i s one. Others i s not enough.. I t has grown i n e v i t a b l y to be a l i e , l i k e everything else that has been a truth at one time, I object to i t s puling 4 x 6 dimension. I object to i t s yellow cover, i t s s t a l e legend. Everything we have ever done or can do under these conditions i s being done now by any number of other MAGAZINES OP POETRY'. Others has been blasted out of existence. We must have a new conception from the bottom up or I w i l l not touch, i t . 279 And further along i n " G l o r i a ! " Williams summarizes his understanding of the sedentary q u a l i t y of most contemporary w r i t i n g : We older can compose, we seek the seclusion of a s t y l e , of a technique, we make r e p l i c a s of the world we l i v e i n and we l i v e i n them and not i n the world. And THAT i s Others. The garbage proved we were a l i v e once, i t cannot prove us dead now. But THAT i s Others now, that i s i t s l i e . 5 This i s the same wr i t e r who i n Kora discovered that w r i t i n g must not be a copy of some e x t e r n a l i t y , some hypothetical " r e a l i t y " outside the w r i t i n g , but must i n i t s e l f be a c t u a l , immediate to i t s own movement, inside a world that keeps breaking into the mind to declare i t s opacity. But now, Williams says, the writers that "were a l i v e once" have.retreated into "the- seclusion of a s t y l e , " which he himself might have done had he continued i n the " s t y l e " of A l Que Quiere and had not undergone the c r i s i s of Kora. Writing should reopen the world, not close i t out. Others has become another dead-end, another closure. Williams i n " G l o r i a ! " i s not bemoaning the present. The t i t l e alone suggests that he i s excited by a c a l l f o r another beginning, for something altogether new. The war was over, Kora was f i n a l l y composed, American w r i t i n g was s t i l l to be made. In the companion piece that concludes this issue of Others, " B e l l y Music" — the music of the f o o l with a big womb? — Williams launches a further attack on c r i t i c s and writers who have escaped into the "seclusion" of established modes of thought, who refuse to acknowledge the f a c t that r e a l l y new w r i t i n g , modernist w r i t i n g , must by necessity work contrary to such f i x i t i e s . Concerning American c r i t i c s , Williams writes, perhaps with the image of Jepson s t i l l present i n h i s mind: Never i s t h e i r c r i t i c i s m a new SIGHT of a SOURCE, a f l a s h into the future of a r t , wings under which a poet might spread hi s sparrow's wings and mount to the sky'. They 280 SEE nothing. I t i s never a confidence i n the purgation by thought. I t i s a puling testiness i n most cases or a benign ignorance i n others of the purpose of the work with which they are dealing, Imagine a man a c t u a l l y sensing the i n s p i r a t i o n that i s i n a poem. Never. His path must be sopped of r a i n water, the edges cut free of even the long grass, the way paved and SWEPT before an American c r i t i c w i l l walk into a new work. Where i s a man who has a head for smashing through underbrush?6 Williams i s impatient for a push through to another d i r e c t i o n . In t h i s sense, " B e l l y Music," the music of the body, follows the lead of Kora. Williams praises the magazine where fragments of that text appeared i n p r i n t for the f i r s t time. "I praise the L i t t l e Review. I praise Margaret Anderson."^ He also supports the work of Pound, which he aligns with his own e f f o r t s : I f i n d matter for serious attention i n Ezra Pound's discordant shrieking: to h e l l with singing the States and the p l a i n s and the S i e r r a Nevada f o r t h e i r horse's vigor. It i s the NEW! not one more youthful singer, one more lov e l y poem. The NEW, the e v e r l a s t i n g NEW, the ever-l a s t i n g defiance. Ezra has the smell of i t . 8 And Williams has the smell of i t i n Kora where defiance of outmoded forms of w r i t i n g — the Dadaist's r i e n , r i e n , r i e n — gives way to the p o s s i b i l i t y of "the NEW." Kora, then, i s a beginning for Williams, and i t i s a begin-ning for modernist w r i t i n g i n America as w e l l . "The v i r t u e of i t a l l , " we are t o l d at the end of the "Prologue," i s an opening of the doors, though some rooms of course w i l l be empty, a break with banality, the continual hardening which, habit enforces. (K, 28) In h i s own amazing fashion, by s t i c k i n g with, the material at hand, the words themselves, Williams had begun to write himself Into a new century. Kora i n H e l l : Improvisations may be considered the f i r s t modernist text wholly written and published i n America, 281 Aside from Williams' clo s e s t f r i e n d s , Marianne Moore and Ezra Pound, Kora f e l l l a r g e l y on deaf ears. A f t e r being published i n 1920 i n a l i m i t e d e d i t i o n , the text went underground and remained there, more or le s s i n t a c t , for 37 years, u n t i l the m i d - f i f t i e s , when Williams' reputation had grown to such an extent that F e r l i n g h e t t i would want to republish i t . Only Robert McAlmon, i n a short, almost inconsequential review of Kora, pointed to the larger importance of the book i n i t s s p e c i f i c h i s t o r i c context. "To me," he openly declared, "Kora i n H e l l i s immeasurably the most important book 9 of poetry that America has produced." McAlmon bases his assertion on a d i s t i n c t i o n between two kinds of w r i t e r s . On the one side are those s o - c a l l e d "professionals, whose concern i s s t y l e , technique, f i n i s h e d achievement" (Masters and Sandburg, f o r instance), who never r i s k w r i t i n g anything that undermines the conventional expectations of t h e i r readers. They never question the form of t h e i r w r i t i n g , and for t h i s reason, quite predictably f a l l i nto a f i x e d manner. "Unless from an impulse to say something keenly f e l t , " McAlmon says, "writing i s without j u s t i f i c a t i o n . " In d i r e c t contrast are those other writers who move against t h i s assumption and "attempt at l e a s t to explore and develop new experience" through a kind of w r i t i n g that contradicts the unspoken, but predetermining f a i t h i n " l o g i c , sequence, order — the i n t e l l i g i b l e , r a t i o n a l , deducible." It i s i n t h i s context that the book under review by McAlmon assumes a more s i g n i f i c a n t place i n contemporary w r i t i n g : In America William Carlos Williams, and he beginning only with h i s improvisations e n t i t l e d Kora i n H e l l , i s con-scious of the new form i n r e l a t i o n to the dubiety of the d a y . 1 0 Williams' w r i t i n g accurately mirrors the collapse of b e l i e f i n r a t i o n -282 a l i t y , which McAlmon sees as the fundamental texture of contemporary American l i f e . And i t does so because Williams has not retreated into an habitual s t y l e or technique. "There i s i n t h i s book," argues McAlmon, the spasmodic q u a l i t y of the a c t i v e , imaginative^ a l t e r -nately frightened and reckless, consciousness. One w i l l search i n v a i n f o r sequential o u t l i n e . . . . I t i s incoherent and u n i n t e l l i g i b l e to those people with lethargy of t h e i r sensing organs. They look for the order and neatness of precise, developed thought. I t i s not there. Readers who do not turn away from Williams' w r i t i n g f o r i t s lack of "sequen-t i a l order," on the other hand, w i l l discover that the absence of t h i s expectation i s p r e c i s e l y what makes Kora a p o r t r a i t of a l i v e consciousness that moves insi d e the weather of i t s times. McAlmon thus concludes that no book previously produced i n t h i s country has been so keenly, v i v i d l y aware of age conceptions, q u a l i t i e s , colors, noises, and philosophies as Kora i n H e l l . I t i s a break-away from poetry written by poets who set out to be poets. I t i s adventurous e x p l o r a t i o n . H Perhaps i t i s a l l too easy to dismiss McAlmon's praise of Kora by foregrounding i t s obvious biases. A f t e r a l l , at t h i s time, he was co-editing Contact magazine with Williams. And yet, more t r u t h f u l l y , he must have been angered by the lack of c r i t i c a l response to Kora; his dig at poets such as Masters and Sandburg suggests as much. The nature of h i s remarks, and t h e i r tone as w e l l , seem to be motivated by a sense that Williams' kind of w r i t i n g should be given the serious attention i t warrants; i n America, Kora s i g n a l i z e s the same s h i f t evident i n the prose of James Joyce who, as 12 McAlmon says, " f i r s t indicated the modern form." Some such, statement needed to be made, Poetry seemed the place to make i t . It i s i r o n i c that a number of years a f t e r Kora was published another reader who recognized Williams' importance i n the development of modern 283 American w r i t i n g should turn out to be a foreigner, the French c r i t i c Rene Taupin. In L'Influence du Symbolisme Frangais (published i n 1929, a time Williams was r e c e i v i n g very l i t t l e c r i t i c a l a t t e n t i o n ) , he says, "Peut-etre William Carlos Williams a - t - i l compose l a formule de l ' a r t americain." And Taupin, coming from the outside as he does, has no d i f f i c u l t y seeing Kora as the one text that points to Williams' beginnings as an American w r i t e r : Ce l i v r e Kora i n H e l l qui contient les Improvisations est probablement l e plus important dans 1'evolution de l a poesie de Williams, meme s i on pense q u ' i l n'est pas l e mieux r e u s s i . Pour composer ces Improvisations i l s'est pose toutes l e s questions a r t i s t i q u e a l'ordre du jour, et en l ' e c r i v a n t i l a p r i s plus intimement contact avec ses dons.13 Williams says that the v i r t u e of Kora " i s i n an opening of the doors," and he could not have been more preci s e . The act of composing Kora into a text opened many doors. And there they were, a great m u l t i p l i c i t y of rooms, so many i n fact that Williams would spend the r e s t of h i s l i f e d r i v i n g through the house of w r i t i n g . Immediately, and on through the 20's, the t i t l e s were so many places that Kora made possib l e , so many dimensions to the w r i t i n g act. The Great American Novel, Spring and A l l , In the American Grain, and so on, up to A Novelette and Other Prose, a l l of t h i s w r i t i n g , "The same method as i n the Improvisations . . . " (IW, 49), as Williams says of "A Novelette: January." By 1929, when Williams was f i n i s h i n g t h i s series of improvisations, he had so written himself into the improvisational method that he could (simply) w r i t e : What's your husband's job? Let's see, what s h a l l I say? he j u s t drives cars. (AN, 287) Williams might have added, because he must, because he i s driven to. This i s the same writer who had written back In 1919, "I am damned only when I cannot .„ ..14 write. 284 The w r i t i n g came f i r s t h a n d as the p u b l i c a t i o n h i s t o r y of Williams' early work i n d i c a t e s , f o r the most part against the odds. He paid to have Poems published p r i v a t e l y i n 1909, "around $50" (IW, 10). He "paid $50 to E l k i n Mathews, the English, publisher" (IW, .17) for The Tempers, And f o r A l Que Quiere, Kora, and Sour Grapes, the three books published by The Four Seas Company, "something i n the neighborhood of two hundred and f i f t y d o l l a r s " (A, 158-159) for each b o o k — "I never received a penny, so far as I remember, on s a l e s " (A, 159). The Great American Novel was published i n a l i m i t e d e d i t i o n by B i l l Bird's Three Mountain Press (Paris) through Pound, Spring and A l l , again i n a l i m i t e d e d i t i o n , through Robert McAlmon's Contact Press. Williams was f i n d i n g o u t l e t s f o r h i s work but only through personal connections. In the American Grain was the f i r s t exception, accepted for p u b l i c a t i o n by Albert and Charles Boni i n New York. " I t was my f i r s t book by a commercial publisher," Williams writes, and I was dancing on a i r — because to that point nothing I was w r i t i n g had any market: I had ei t h e r paid f or i t myself or had i t accepted, for the most part, without pay. (A, 236) And yet, i n terms of sal e s , In the American Grain " f e l l f l a t " (A, 236) and was soon remaindered. Williams r e c a l l s that he "used to go up and down Fourth Avenue pi c k i n g up copies for a d o l l a r to give to my f r i e n d s " (IW, 44). "The Descent of Winter" never did get published i n book form, but appeared i n one issue of Pound's E x i l e magazine. A Voyage to Pagany "was published by a man from Passaic, N.J., operating under the t i t l e of the Macauley Publishing Company . . . . I t didn't s e l l e i t h e r . Not-so happy.days" (A, 237). And then there was A Novelette and Other Prose, As Williams wrote Pound i n 1930, "the Novelette i s very close to my heart -— and no one w i l l handle i t here" (SL, 112). 285 "The p a r t i c u l a r thing," says the doctor-writer Williams, at the end of Kora, o f f e r i n g his own p r e s c r i p t i o n f o r the value of w r i t i n g i n a new century, whether i t be four pinches of four divers white powders c l e v e r l y compounded to cure surely, s a f e l y , pleasantly a p a i n f u l twitching of the eyelids or say a p e n c i l sharpened at one end, dwarfs the imagination, makes l o g i c a b u t t e r f l y , o f f e r s a f i n a l i t y that sends us spinning through space, a f i x i t y the mind could climb forever, a revolving mountain, a complexity with a surface of glass; the g i s t of poetry. D.C. al f i n . (K, 81) Writing would remain a mode of consciousness woven into the inescapable movement of the world. I t would be, i n t h i s sense, a condition of mind i n which the dense opacity of things constantly translates i t s e l f i nto the event of experience. And the " g i s t of poetry" would concern t h i s evanescent process. For Williams, then, the beginning i s an end, and the end is_ a beginning, and a thing is_ an appearance that "makes l o g i c a b u t t e r f l y . " In the future that Kora opened, the imagination of the world did become the one "season" constant only i n v a r i a b i l i t y — i n image, "a revolving mountain" or "a complexity with a surface of g l a s s . " The imagination l i v e s i n contradictions that do not resolve themselves into completions and main-tains i t s e l f i n the intimacy of what Williams i n Spring and A l l c a l l e d "that eternal moment i n which we alone l i v e " (SA, 89). The true seasons blossom or w i l t not in fixed order but so that many of them may pass in a few weeks or hours whereas sometimes a whole life passes and the season remains of a piece from one end to the other. (K, 82) And i f Kora i s a measure, the medium of the words themselves that carry "the l i f e of the planet" remained the one "season" i n Williams' l i f e , a l l of "a piece from one end to another." From f i r s t to l a s t , he was to be himself 286 a f i g u r e of the "word man, the best of a l l to my way of thinking," Williams died i n Rutherford on March 4, 1963, only a few years a f t e r w r i t i n g what s t i l l reads as a f i n a l statement at the end of a l i f e t i m e involvement i n words. In "Asphodel, That Greeny Flower" we f i n d l i n e s where h i s w r i t i n g l i f e f o l d s back into the i n i t i a l appearance of language that made everything else possible, back into Kora: But the words made s o l e l y of a i r or l e s s , that came to me out of the a i r and i n s i s t e d on being written down, I regret most — that there has come an end to them. For i n spite of i t a l l , a l l that I have brought, on^myself, grew that s i n g l e image that I adore equally with you and so i t brought us together. (PB, 169) 287 NOTES PREFACE Ezra Pound, "Dr. Williams' P o s i t i o n , " i n L i t e r a r y Essays of Ezra Pound, ed. T.S. E l i o t (New York: New D i r e c t i o n s , 1968), p. 389. 2 "Three Professional Studies," The L i t t l e Review, 5, Nos. 10-11 (Feb.-March 1919), 37. PROLOGUE: MY SELF WAS BEING SLAUGHTERED I Wanted to Write a Poem was published i n 1958, but the interviews with Edith Heal took place i n 1957. At the outset of t h i s study, I should acknowledge those c r i t i c a l i n t e r p r e t a t i o n s of Williams' work that were useful i n the i n i t i a l stages. Of the numerous book-length studies of Williams, the following gave me s i g n i f i c a n t i n s i g h t s into the o v e r a l l structure of h i s work: James Guimond, The Art of William Carlos Williams: A Discovery and Possession of America (Urbana: Un i v e r s i t y of I l l i n o i s Press, 1968); James B r e s l i n , William Carlos Williams: An American A r t i s t (New York: Oxford University Press, 1970); and Thomas R. Whitaker, William Carlos Williams (New York: Twayne, 1968). Of more s p e c i a l i z e d i n t e r e s t i s Rod Townley's The Early Poetry of William Carlos Williams (Ithaca: C o r n e l l University Press, 1975), a study that o f f e r s a very f i n e reading of Williams' e a r l y poetry up to and i n c l u d i n g Spring and A l l . Townley devotes a chapter to Kora. For the longest time, however, Kora had remained one of Williams' most neglected books. A l l too often, e a r l i e r Williams readers tended to shy away from i t s o b s c u r i t i e s . But from the early 70's to the present, a growing number of readers have begun to recognize how important t h i s "unique" book i s for an understanding of Williams' development as a w r i t e r . Although no extended study of Kora has yet been published, the following three a r t i c l e s were h e l p f u l i n my i n i t i a l reading of the text: Sherman Paul, "A Sketchbook of the A r t i s t i n His Thirty-Fourth Year: William Carlos Williams' Kora i n H e l l : Improvisations," and Joseph N, Riddel, "The Wanderer and the Dance: William Carlos Williams' Early Poetics," both of these a r t i c l e s published i n The Shaken R e a l i s t , eds. Melvin J . Friedman and John B. Vickery (Baton Rouge: Louisiana State U n i v e r s i t y Press, 1970), pp. 21-44 and pp. 45-71 r e s p e c t i v e l y ; and Joseph Evans Slate, "Kora i n Opacity: Williams' Improvisations," Journal of Modern L i t e r a t u r e , 1 (May 1971), 463-476. More recently, but a f t e r the main body of t h i s study was written, a number of scattered a r t i c l e s on Kora have appeared, among these 288 Ron Loewinsohn's '"Fools Have Big Wombs': Williams' Kora i n H e l l , " Essays i n L i t e r a t u r e , 1 (1977), 221-238, a very sympathetic reading of Kora's textual complexities, a reading that both shares and supports the c r i t i c a l approach to Kora furthered i n t h i s study. By a l l i n d i c a t i o n s , then, more and more readers are discovering how to read Kora. I f t h i s continues, the one book that Williams himself c a l l e d a "secret document" w i l l perhaps soon be recognized as an important text of e a r l y modernist w r i t i n g i n America. This study throughout proceeds on the assumption that i t i s t h i s kind of key work, pointing as i t does i n two d i r e c t i o n s simultaneously: toward the o r i g i n of Williams' poetics and t oward the o r i g i n of American modernist w r i t i n g . At the beginning of h i s w r i t i n g l i f e as well at the end, for Williams, they were the same thing. 2 Ezra Pound, Personae (New York: New D i r e c t i o n s , 1971), p. 191. 3 William Shakespeare, King Lear, i n Shakespeare, ed. Hardin Craig (Chicago: Scott, Foresman, 1958), IV.vi.179. 4 "Recollections," Art i n America, 51, No. 1 (Feb. 1963), 52. 5 "A Selection from.The Tempers," with an "Introductory Note" by Ezra Pound, The Poetry Review, 1, No. 10 (Oct. 1912), 481-484. Pound's "Intro-ductory Note" i s reprinted i n I_ Wanted to Write a_ Poem ( pp. 12-13) . I n c i d e n t a l l y , Williams' Poems (1909) was reviewed anonymously i n Rutherford under the t i t l e , "Poems Composed i n Odd Moments by one of Ruther-ford's Bright Young Men" (Emily M i t c h e l l Wallace, A Bibliography of William Carlos Williams (Middletown, Connecticut: Wesleyan Uni v e r s i t y Press, 1968), p. 8. For a more thorough discussion of t h i s period of Williams' w r i t i n g l i f e , which takes into account much unpublished material, see Rod Townley's The Early Poetry of William Carlos Williams, Chapter One, "Early Years, 1900-1909," pp. 22-54. ^ As Nicholas Dewey i n h i s a r t i c l e , "Dr. William Carlos Williams: The Writer as Physician" (The Academy of Medicine of New Jersey, B u l l e t i n , 16, No. 4 (Dec. 1970), 64-73) points out, p e d i a t r i c s was a new f i e l d when Williams decided to s p e c i a l i z e i n i t : "Before 1900 there had been l i t t l e p r ofessional i n t e r e s t i n the d i s t i n c t problems of c h i l d health: at that date infant m o rtality during the f i r s t year of l i f e was s t i l l as high as 15%. When Dr. Williams r e t i r e d from p r a c t i s e at mid-century that f i g u r e had been reduced to j u s t 3%" (66). Since there was no formal t r a i n i n g a v a i l a b l e i n America at the time, Williams had to go to the U n i v e r s i t y of L e i p z i g i n 1909-1910 to complete h i s q u a l i f i c a t i o n s . A l o v e l y piece from The Embodi- ment of Knowledge, simply c a l l e d "Children," shows Williams' deep attachment to the p a r t i c u l a r world of c h i l d r e n : "The amazingly i n t e r e s t i n g and continuously s a t i s f y i n g thing about c h i l d r e n i s that they_are not small adults but a race by themselves. I t took the Greeks a long time to recognize the correct proportions between a c h i l d ' s head and h i s t o t a l body length; at f i r s t they used the adult r a t i o i n making a c h i l d . P r i m i t i v e people p a r t l y recognize t h i s i n the e l f and gnome myths — j u s t kids. Really they are not small at a l l but f u l l s i z e . Only the most s u p e r f i c i a l conception compares them with adults: a whole world i n i t s e l f " (EK, 57). 289 g Ezra Pound, The Selected Letters of Ezra Pound, 1907-1941, ed. D.D. Paige (New York: New D i r e c t i o n s , 1971), pp. 7-8. 9 Ezra Pound, "Introductory Note" to "A Selection from The Tempers," The Poetry Review, 481-482. ^ Louis Zukofsky, one of Williams' most sympathetic readers, l a t e r singled t h i s l i n e out i n "William Carlos Williams" (Prepositions: The Collected C r i t i c a l Essays of Louis Zukofsky (New York: Horizon Press, 1967), pp. 39-47), an essay w r i t t e n i n the form of a l e t t e r to Williams. The "character" of t h i s e a r l y l i n e , he says, "owns a l l the phases of your l a t e r work, the catastrophic and gentle i n i t s characters, i n t h e i r signing hieroglyphics" (p. 40). ^ Bram D i j k s t r a i n The Hieroglyphics of a_ New Speech: Cubism, S t i e g l i t z and the Early Poetry of William Carlos Williams (Princeton: Princeton Un i v e r s i t y Press, 1969) provides an informative background, to t h i s period i n his discussion of the New York avant-garde (see e s p e c i a l l y , "Chapter I," pp. 3-46). 12 A l f r e d Kreymborg i n Troubadour: An American Biography (New York: Sagamore Press, 1957) quotes a l e t t e r from Pound i n which Pound says that Williams " ' i s my one remaining p a l i n America — get i n touch with old B u l l — he l i v e s i n a hole c a l l e d Rutherford, New Jersey'" (p. 157). 13 Kreymborg, p. 186. ^ Remembering "Sub Terra" i n I_ Wanted to Write a_ Poem, Williams comments on i t s s i g n i f i c a n c e for him at that early time: "I thought of myself as being under the earth, buried i n other words, but as any plant i s buried, r e t a i n i n g the power to come again. The poem i s Spring, the earth giving b i r t h to a new crop of poets, showing that I thought I would some day take my place among them, t e l l i n g them that I was coming pretty soon" (IW, 21). ^ "The Wanderer" has r i g h t l y been considered a s i g n i f i c a n t poem f o r an understanding of Williams' beginnings as a poet. For a convincing reading of i t s r e l a t i o n to the development of Williams' thought, see e s p e c i a l l y James Guimond, The Art of William Carlos Williams, pp. 14-25. ^ As D i j k s t r a says, when America entered the war, "A deadly seriousness began to take hold of the American p u b l i c ; a war mentality set i n . The seemingly carefree, i r r e v e r e n t a r t i s t s who had been tolerated by the public at large, and had even figured i n many a good-natured expose of modern art as examples of amiable frauds, began to f i n d the atmosphere more and more oppressive. The freedom of thought and a c t i o n they had enjoyed i n New York became an ' i l l u s i o n v i t e d i s s i p e e ' " (pp. 41-42). ^ "America, Whitman, and the Art of Poetry," The Poetry Journal, 8 No. 1 (Nov. 1917), 34. 18 "America, Whitman, and the Art of Poetry," 36, 19 "America, Whitman, and the Art of Poetry," 29. 290 20 "Improvisations," The L i t t l e Review, 4, No. 6 (Oct. 1917), 19. 2 1 "The Ideal Quarrel," The L i t t l e Review, 5, No. 8 (Dec. 1918), 39-40. 22 According to Emily Wallace i n A Bibliography of William Carlos Williams, Williams' l e t t e r was printed on May 12, 1917. She also notes that i t "refutes l o c a l accusations that he i s pro-German, but. extends sympathy to 'German-Americans among my friends who are quite as honest as I am'" (p. 170) 23 It i s possible that Williams has mistaken the date of the major influenza epidemic. In the spring of 1918,.there were a few cases, but the great spread of the disease that claimed the l i v e s of 18-20 m i l l i o n people occurred i n the f a l l of 1918 during those four f a t e f u l months from September to December. 24 Williams i n I Wanted to. Write a Poem o f f e r s e s s e n t i a l l y the same account of his day-by-day w r i t i n g : "For a year I used to come home and no matter how l a t e i t was before I went to bed I would write something. And I kept w r i t i n g , w r i t i n g , even i f i t were only a few words, and at the end of the year there were 365 e n t r i e s . Even i f I had nothing i n my mind at a l l I put something down, and as may be expected, some of the en t r i e s were pure nonsense and were rejected when the time for p u b l i c a t i o n came" (IW, 27). The text of Kora contains 85 improvisations, which means that i f Williams did i n fac t write 365 improvisations, as many as 279 were either rejected or torn up by him when he f i r s t began to compose the improvisations into the text of Kora. Perhaps, one day, some of these " s t r a y " pieces w i l l turn up. In any case, t h i s i n i t i a l stage i n the composition of Kora i s now " l o s t " to readers — a l l the more reason why th i s i n t r i g u i n g text continually c a l l s attention to i t s own a c t u a l i t y , or as we w i l l argue, i t s opacity. SECTION ONE: TEE WORD MAN CHAPTER ONE: RING, RING, RING, RING 1 "Notes from a Talk on Poetry," Poetry, 14, No. 4 (July 1919), 213. 2 Marianne Moore's "Review" of Kora i n H e l l appeared i n Contact, No. 4 [Summer 1921], pp. 5-8. 3 "Sappho, A Tr a n s l a t i o n by William Carlos Williams" (San Francisco: Grabhorn Press, 1957). 4 "How to Write," reprinted i n Linda Wagner, The Poems of William Carlos Williams: A C r i t i c a l Study (Middletown, Connecticut: Wesleyan U n i v e r s i t y Press, 1964), p. 145. As we have already mentioned, Pound wrote the f i r s t c r i t i c a l statement on Williams. And Louis Zukofsky, i n the l a t e 20's, during a time Williams' work went l a r g e l y unrecognized, singled out Williams ("of rare importance i n the l a s t decade") f or s p e c i a l a ttention i n h i s essay "American Poetry 291 1920-1930." Zukofsky points to the language of the work: "A c o l l e c t i o n of h i s works should contain only the f a c t s of h i s words, even those which j a r as they brighten i n the composition — for these, too, i l l u m i n a t e , as against the personally l y r i c padding, the i d l y d i s c u r s i v e depressing stages of w r i t i n g not the product swift out of the m a t e r i a l " (Prepositions, p. 140, p. 141). Williams wrote an essay ( i n 1931) on Pound's A Draft of XXX Cantos, and he too emphasized the language of Pound's poems: " A l l the thought and implications of thought are there i n the words ( i n the minute character and r e l a t i o n s h i p s of the words — destroyed, avoided by . . . ) — i t i s that I wish to say again and again" (SE, 107). The i n t e r e s t of a l l three poets c l e a r l y rests on the art of w r i t i n g i n words — and here we are reminded as w e l l of Marianne Moore, for whom, Williams writes i n "Marianne Moore," " . . . a word i s a word most when i t i s separated out by science, treated with a c i d to remove the smudges, washed, dried and placed r i g h t side up on a clean surface. Now one may say that t h i s i s a word. Now i t may be used, and how?" (AN, 318). "In Praise of Marriage," The Quarterly Review of L i t e r a t u r e , 2, No.2 (1945), 147. ^ Maurice Merleau-Ponty, Signs, trans. Richard C. McCleary (Northwestern University Press, 1964), p. 43. g "Mike Wallace Asks William Carlos Williams: Is Poetry a Dead Duck"? The New York Post, 18 Oct. 1957, p. 46. 9 On the r e l a t i o n s between Williams' work and modern a r t , the following, i n terms of t h i s study, have provided useful background material as w e l l as i n s i g h t s : Bram D i j k s t r a , The Hieroglyphics of a_ New Speech; Ruth Grogan, "The Influence of Painting on William Carlos Williams," i n William Carlos Williams: A C r i t i c a l Anthology, ed. Charles Tomlinson (Penguin Books, 1972), pp. 265-298; Mike Weaver, William Carlos Williams: The American Background (Cambridge: Cambridge Uni v e r s i t y Press, 1971); Dickran Tashjian, Skyscraper P r i m i t i v e s : Dada and the American Avant-Garde 1910-1925 (Middletown, Connecticut: Wesleyan Uni v e r s i t y Press, 1975). More recent l y , Tashjian has written a lengthy commentary on Williams' involvement i n modern American art i n William Carlos Williams and the American Scene 1920-1940 (New York: Whitney Museum of American Art, 1978). "An Approach to the Poem," English I n s t i t u t e Essays 1947 (New York: Columbia Un i v e r s i t y Press, 1948), p. 52. D i j k s t r a reminds us that Gertrude Stein's f i r s t magazine p u b l i c a t i o n i n 1912, one piece on Matisse and another on Picasso, appeared i n S t i e g l i t z ' Camera Work. Williams may very well have f i r s t encountered Stein's "emphasis on the word as an object" here. "Her work," D i j k s t r a comments, "was used from then on as an example of l i t e r a r y Cubism. During the time of the Armory Show her ' p o r t r a i t ' of Mabel Dodge gained a f a i r l y wide c i r c u l a t i o n and that, together with the s p e c i a l issue of Camera Work, gave her a l l the p u b l i c i t y she needed to be mentioned repeatedly alongside the painters of the Armory Show, mostly i n spoofs" (p. 14). c f . Williams' statement, i n the short but important essay "Revela-292 t i o n " (1947), concerning w r i t i n g as an act of consciousness that taps the "deeper veins" of the mind: "The non-rational, s h a l l we say"? (SE, 269). 12 The term "category" i s Williams' own. Science, he says i n "A Novelette," " i s a category of the understanding, j u s t as philosophy i s and i n the same way — i n f e r i o r to the not so well developed though equally well practiced category of a r t " (AN, 305). Against t h e i r s e l f - r e f e r e n t i a l i t y , Williams here points toward " a r t " (which includes writing) as a "category" that works i n the " f i e l d " of the " a c t u a l " (AN, 305). 13 In a section of h i s Autobiography c a l l e d "Gertrude S t e i n , " Williams describes h i s f i r s t meeting ("I had looked forward to t h i s with great excitement") with Stein i n Paris (A, 253). "Later by mere chance," he writes, "I discovered i n Sterne's Tristarn Shandy a passage i n which the q u a l i t i e s of c e r t a i n words as words, l i k e 'rough' and 'smooth,' were presented and discussed i n a manner s i m i l a r to that used by Miss Stein i n c e r t a i n of her writings. And when I wrote a short comment upon the subject, she was very pleased. She sent me several l e t t e r s a f t e r that f u l l of kindest regards and presented me with at l e a s t three books with her autograph and a f f e c t i o n a t e greetings i n s c r i b e d i n them" (A, 254). Then he goes on to quote at length from the essay, "The Work of Gertrude S t e i n . " Williams must have been pleased with t h i s "short comment": i t was published i n A Novelette and Other Prose (AN, 346-353); i n Pagany, 1, No. 1 (Winter 1930), 41-46; and of course i n Selected Essays (SE, 113-120). Emily Wallace mentions a copy of A Novelette and Other Prose i n the Yale American L i t e r a t u r e C o l l e c t i o n i n s c r i b e d by Williams to Stein: "Gertrude Stein / with appreciations / — and apologies / W.C. Williams / 4/12/32 — unfortunately f u l l / of typographical / e r r o r s " (p. 31). For other comments on Stein by Williams, see "A Modern Primer" in.The Embodiment of Knowledge (EK, 17-20) and "Al Pound S t e i n " (1935) i n Selected Essays (SE, 162-166). 14 Let t e r to Louis Zukofsky quoted by Wallace, p. 30. ^ From a d e s c r i p t i o n of the symptoms of influenza "given by Dr. Bruce Low from observations made i n St. Thomas's h o s p i t a l , London i n Jan. 1890," and quoted i n the a r t i c l e "Influenza," Encyclopedia B r i t a n n i c a , 1932 ed. 16 We have already pointed out Williams' response i n h i s Autobiography to t h i s influenza epidemic. For a readable attempt to recreate i t s week-by-week spread i n the F a l l of 1918, see Richard C o l l i e r ' s The Plague of the Spanish Lady: The Influenza Pandemic of 1918-1919 (New York: Atheneum, 1974). C o l l i e r c i t e s a kind of d a d a i s t i c j i n g l e "then current i n thousands of children's playgrounds across the United States" which would not have been l o s t on Williams' ears: I had a l i t t l e b i r d , Its name was Enza, I opened the window And i n - f l u - e n z a . (p. 75) The non-sensical nature of the j i n g l e r e f l e c t s the non-rational nature of an epidemic which flows i n from what seems l i k e nowhere, from no known cause, but which "affected over one b i l l i o n people — then h a l f of the world's population . . . (p. 3Q3). I n t e r e s t i n g l y enough, C o l l i e r l i s t s Williams' 293 Autobiography as one of h i s sources. ^ In The Embodiment of Knowledge, Williams distinguishes between "Realism" as a form of d e s c r i p t i o n that i s "not susceptible to w r i t i n g " and w r i t i n g that i s actual i n i t s e l f : "To transcribe the r e a l creates, by the same act, an u n r e a l i t y , something beside the r e a l which i s i t s tran-s c r i p t i o n , since the w r i t i n g i s one thing, what i t transcribes another, the w r i t i n g a f i c t i o n , n e c e s s a r i l y and always so. The only r e a l i n w r i t i n g i s w r i t i n g i t s e l f " (EK, 13). This i s , i n a n u t s h e l l , the. basis of Williams' well-known d i s t i n c t i o n between w r i t i n g that copies nature (realism as description) and w r i t i n g that imitates nature's processes. CHAPTER TWO: RIEN, RIEN, RIEN x These l i n e s from "The Fool's Song" (CEP, 19) i n The Tempers (1913), Williams' second book of poems, written as they were before such a thing as Dadaism existed by name, reveals the truthfulness of h i s statement regarding his sympathy toward Dadaism i n the 1920's: "I had i t i n my soul to write i t . " This i s only to say that Dadaism corresponded to something basic i n Williams' nature. 2 Louis Zukofsky, Prepositions, p. 44. 3 In his Autobiography, Williams says he paid The Four Seas Company "something i n the neighborhood of two hundred and f i f t y d o l l a r s " (A, 158-159). 4 See, for instance, SA, 101, 150. Three short pieces by Williams on Hartley are also c o l l e c t e d i n A Recognizable Image: William Carlos Williams on Art and A r t i s t s , ed. Bram D i j k s t r a (New York: New Directions, 1978), pp. 149-156. 5 Marsden Hartley, "The Importance of Being 'Dada,'" Adventures i n the, Arts (New York: Boni and L i v e r i g h t , 1921), p. 248. Hartley, Adventures i n the Arts, p. 249. Maurice Nadeau, The History of Surrealism, trans, Richard Howard (Penguin Books, 1973), p. 62. g Georges Ribemont-Dessaignes, "History of Dada" (1931), Dada Painters and Poets, ed. Robert Motherwell (New York: Wittenborn, Schultz, 1951), p, 101. 9 Williams recounts his f i r s t uncomfortable meeting with Duchamp i n his Autobiography (A, 137). ^ Dickran Tashjian i n Skyscraper Primitives,.arguing quite r i g h t l y that "Williams' r e l a t i o n s h i p to Dada has never been s u f f i c i e n t l y explored" (p. 251), discusses Williams, along with Hart Crane and e.e. cummings, i n the l i g h t of 294 American Dadaism. The chapter on Williams singles out Kora i n H e l l (pp. 92-101). Anyone interested i n the c u l t u r a l h i s t o r y of Dadaism i n America w i l l f i n d Tashjian's study of t h i s period informative. ^ Quoted by Nadeau i n The History of Surrealism, p. 72. 12 Nadeau says that the P a r i s i a n Dadaists, Aragon, Breton, Soupault and Eluard, i n i t i a t e d Surrealism i n 1922 as "a new current which no longer intends to confine i t s e l f to destructive a g i t a t i o n " (p. 73); however, we might keep i n mind Tashjian's point that the h i s t o r i c a l d i s t i n c t i o n between Dadaism and Surrealism i s b l u r r y because c r i t i c s and p a r t i c i p a n t s a l i k e tend "to go with the movement i n which [they have] the greatest i n t e l l e c t u a l or emotional investment" (Skyscraper P r i m i t i v e s , p. 223). 13 Tashjian i n Skyscraper P r i m i t i v e s p o s i t s the hypothesis that t h i s sparseness of comment on Williams' part i s d e l i b e r a t e : he wants to divorce himself from European Dadaism as much as possible i n order the more strongly to a f f i r m the p o s s i b i l i t y of American forms of art and w r i t i n g . 14 George Ribemont-Dessaigne, Dada Painters and Poets, p. 101. Breton also says that "Dada i s a state of mind" i n "Three Dada Manifestos" (Dada Painters and Poets, p. 203). ^ Williams translated Soupault's novel, The Last Nights of Paris (1929). CHAPTER THREE: TEE LANGUAGE . . . TEE LANGUAGE In an interview with Stanley Koehler ( A p r i l , 1962), Williams, then 78 years o l d , r e c a l l s that h i s father "used to read poetry to me. Shakespeare. He had a group who used to come to our house, a Shakespeare club. They did dramatic readings. So I was always interes t e d i n Shakespeare . . . " (Writers at Work: The Paris Review Interviews, Third Series, ed. George Plimpton (New York: The Viking Press, 1968), p. 12). 2 "A Point for American C r i t i c i s m " (SE, 80-90) was f i r s t p r inted i n Eugene Jola s ' t r a n s i t i o n , No. 15 (Feb. 1929), pp. 157-166. 3 Rebecca West, "The Strange Case of James Joyce," The Bookman (American), 68 (Sept.-Feb. 1928-1929), 9-23. West answered Williams' "A Point f o r American C r i t i c i s m " i n "A Le t t e r from Abroad" i n The Bookman, 70 (Feb. 1930), 664-668. 4 P i e r r e Cabanne, Dialogues with Marcel Duchamp, trans. Ron Padgett (New York: The Viking Press, 1971), p. 48. In "An Approach to the Poem," Williams talks about the poem as "a thing made up of words and punctuation, that i s , words and the spaces between them, as E.E. Cummings has sought to demonstrate" (English I n s t i t u t e Essays 1947, p. 52). 295 Unfortunately, the way t h i s l i n e i s typeset i n Imaginations blurs the more d e f i n i t e spaces between the three phrases i n the f i r s t e d i t i o n of Kora (1920). And there are other s i m i l a r instances. In these cases, my own spacing corresponds to that of the f i r s t e d i t i o n . SECTION TWO: PERSPECTIVE AS CLOSURE CHAPTER FOUR: FOR WHAT IT'S WORTH Williams i s thinking about Contact, the magazine he edited with Robert McAlmon from 1920-1923. As the t i t l e suggests, t h i s venture was an attempt on Williams' part to bridge the gap between the w r i t e r and his world. 2 For an account of Williams' connection with John Coffee (also s p e l l e d Coffey by Williams), see e s p e c i a l l y his essay, "A Man Versus the Law," The Freeman, New York, 1, No. 15 (June 23, 1920), pp.. 348-349. Williams' poem "An Early Martyr" was written for Coffee. "The Freeman," as Mrs. Williams says i n I Wanted to Write a Poem, "bought the poem, paid for i t , but l o s t t h e i r nerve and didn't publish i t " (IW, 56). The poem was not printed u n t i l i t became the t i t l e poem of An Early Martyr and Other Poems (1935), a book Williams dedicated to Coffee, "who had been," so Williams r e c a l l s i n his Autobiography, "arrested and sent to Matteawan Hospital for the c r i m i n a l l y insane .— without t r i a l — to prevent him from getting up i n court and saying his say as he had intended to do, that he was not insane, but that he was robbing to feed the poor since the c i t y was doing nothing for them. I v i s i t e d him there" (A, 299). 3 Octavio Paz, Marcel Duchamp or the Castle of P u r i t y , trans. Donald Gardiner (London: Cape Goliard Press, 1970), n.pag. 4 Louis Zukofsky, Prepositions, p. 141. Octavio Paz, Conjunctions and Disjunctions, trans. Helen R. Lane (New York: The V i k i n g Press, 1974), pp. 3-15. Williams published "Improvisation I , " the opening set of three improvisations for what would l a t e r become Kora, i n the October, 1917 issue of The L i t t l e Review under the t i t l e "Improvisations." At that-time, these improvisations did not include the " i n t e r p r e t a t i o n " ("In Holland at daybreak"). Some months l a t e r , i n the January, 1918 issue of The L i t t l e Review, another s i x sets of three "Improvisations" appeared, i n Kora numbers I I I , IV, V, VI, VII, and VIII. In June, 1919, more than a year l a t e r , Williams again published i n The L i t t l e Review another three sets of "Improvisations," i n Kora numbers IX, X, and XIV. 7 Ezra Pound, The Selected Letters of Ezra Pound, p. 124. In h i s b r i e f review of Others (1917) i n "A L i s t of Books" (The L i t t l e Review, 4, No. 11 (Mar. 1918), 54-58), Pound also pointed to Williams' "opacity, a 296 d i s t i n c t l y unamerican q u a l i t y , and not without i t s own value" (58). Although c r i t i c a l response to Kora when i t was f i r s t published was sparse, to say the l e a s t , one c r i t i c refused to see the value of Pound's assessment of Williams' w r i t i n g . In "William Carlos Williams, A United States Poet" (from Destinations), Gorham Munson, bringing up Pound's comment, writes: "Apparently Williams valued the counsel and 'It.-was.',bad, for whereas i n A l Que Quiere he had written with weight and c l a r i t y , i n Kora i n H e l l he set" out to c u l t i v a t e opacity and achieved impenetrability. The opaque i s simply the strong man's blur and excusable only i f i t i s the maximum luminosity a r e c a l c i t r a n t and profound subject w i l l y i e l d : profundity i s scarcely the term to associate with Williams' w r i t i n g " (William Carlos Williams: A C r i t i c a l Anthology, pp. 99-100). 8 From the opening l i n e of T.S. E l i o t ' s The Waste Land. 9 Robert Creeley i n his essay "The Creative," quoting Louis Zukofsky (Was That a Real Poem & Other Essays, ed. Donald A l l e n (Bolinas, C a l i f o r n i a : Four Seasons Foundation, 1979), p. 37. ^ Maud Grieve, A Modern Herbal, 2 Vols. (Darien, Connecticut: Hafner Publishing Company, 1970), p. 624. ^ A Modern Herbal, p. 626. 12 A Modern Herbal, p. 626. 13 The opening l i n e of Charles Olson's "The K i n g f i s h e r s , " Archaeologist of Morning (New York: Grossman, 1973), n.pag. 14 A Modern Herbal, p. 331. ^ A Modern Herbal, p. 331. 16 "The Ideal Quarrel," The L i t t l e Review, 39. 1 7 "Saxifrage i s my flower that s p l i t s / the rocks" (CLP, 7), from "A Sort of a Song," the opening poem of The Wedge (1944). 18 A l f r e d North Whitehead, Modes of Thought (New York: Capricorn Books, 1958), pp. 29-30. 19 c f . the discussion of Duchamp's "Fountain" below, pp. 194-196. 20 Robert Creeley, Pieces (New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1969), p. 3. CHAPTER FIVE: TO LOOSEN THE ATTENTION No wonder Keats was once Williams' f a v o r i t e poet. 297 2 Marianne Moore, "Kora i n H e l l by William Carlos Williams," Contact, No. 4 [Summer 1921], 5-8. Speaking of the opening l i n e of the passage we have singled out here f o r att e n t i o n , Moore writes, "We do not so much f e e l the force of t h i s statement as we f e e l that there i s i n l i f e . . ." (p. 5). CHAPTER SIX: THE FRONTISPIECE? 1 Signs, p. 49 Maurice Merleau-Ponty, Signs, pp. 48-49. 2 3 Signs, p. 50. ^ Pi e r r e Cabanne, Dialogues with Marcel Duchamp, p. 30. 5 Arturo Schwarz, Marcel Duchamp (New York: Harry N. Abrams, 1975), n.pag. Schwarz quotes the following statement by Duchamp: "My i n t e r e s t i n pain t i n g the Nude was cl o s e r to the Cubists' i n t e r e s t i n decomposing forms than to the F u t u r i s t s ' i n t e r e s t i n suggesting movement . . . " (n.pag.). Cabanne, p. 31. 7 " R e c o l l e c t i o n s , " Art i n America, 52. Q Stuart Davis, "On Abstract A r t , " i n Readings i n American Art Since 1900, ed. Barbara Rose (New York: Frederick A. Praeger, 1968), p. 123. 9 Davis, p. 124. ^ Davis, p. 124. 1 1 Charles Olson, "The Ki n g f i s h e r s , " Archaeologist of Morning, n.pag. 12 Quoted by Tashjian i n William Carlos Williams and the American Scene 1920-1940, p. 62. SECTION THREE: A NEW STEP CHAPTER SEVEN: THE BIRTH OF THE IMAGINATION 1 "From My Notes About My Mother," The L i t e r a r y Review, 1, No. 1 (Autumn 1957), 6. 2 Reed Whittemore, William Carlos Williams: Poet from Jersey (Boston: Houghton M i f f l i n , 1975), p. 16. Whittemore's biography of Williams i s a l i v e l y enough study to read, but his tendency to s i m p l i f y , at times to ignore completely, the i n t r i c a t e r e l a t i o n s h i p between Williams' l i f e and 298 h i s w r i t i n g often leads to the kind of easy psychologizing that i r r i t a t e s more than i t informs, 3 The section on his mother i n the "Prologue" to Kora may, i n f a c t , have set the pattern f or what eventually became"Yes,-Mrs.; Williams: A Personal Record of My Mother (New York: McDowell, Obolensky, 1959). Williams says that the book spans the years "from 1924 to her death" (p. 39), so he must have had such a w r i t i n g project i n mind long before i t was f i n a l l y published. Wallace l i s t s the parts of i t published e a r l i e r , f i r s t i n Twice a Year, Nos. 5-6 (Fall-Winter 1940-Spring-Summer 1941), 402-412, and then, "From My Notes About My Mother" i n The L i t e r a r y Review. -Surprisingly, however, a large part of the l a t t e r piece was published much e a r l i e r i n "A Memory of Tr o p i c a l F r u i t , " one of the essays i n A Novelette and Other Prose (AN, 324-326). 4 Anthony Bonner i n The Complete Works of Francois V i l l o n (New York: David McKay, 1960) o f f e r s the following t r a n s l a t i o n of the l i n e from V i l l o n ' s "Ballade de l a Grosse Margot": "Through wind, h a i l or f r o s t my l i v i n g ' s made" (p. 107). "Introduction," The Complete Works of Francois V i l l o n , p. i x . Williams also notes the ;tie between V i l l o n ' s estrangement and h i s poverty, his father dead when V i l l o n was a boy — "faced from the beginning with d i s a s t e r and thrown on the town, a p r i n c e l y P a r i s , which, with his imagina-t i o n raging among the rude splendors of those times, he was obliged to witness r i g h t at h i s back door — with an empty pocket" (p. i x ) . The f o o l of a writer i n Kora also t e l l s us that doors have a "back s i d e " (K, 80). "Introduction," p. x. ^ "Introduction," p. x i i i . 8 Williams i s r e f e r r i n g to Duchamp's Large Glass, The Bride Stripped Bare by Her Bachelors, Even. I t broke., but instead of discarding the piece and beginning over, Duchamp incorporated the "accident" into h i s compo-s i t i o n a l process. 9 Max Raphael, P r e h i s t o r i c Cave Paintings, trans. Norbert Guterman (New York: Pantheon Books, 1945), p. 1. ^ Hugh Kenner, The Pound Era (Berkeley: Un i v e r s i t y of C a l i f o r n i a Press, 1971), p. 29. ^ Kenner, p. 30. 12 S i g f r i e d Giedion, The Eter n a l Present: The Beginnings of Art (New York: Bollingen Foundation, 1962), p. 523. For an i l l u m i n a t i n g discussion of the non-representational nature of "acoustic" space i n the cave-drawings, see e s p e c i a l l y , "The Space Conception of Preh i s t o r y " (pp. 513-538). 13 E r i c A. Havelock, Preface to Plato (New York: Grosset & Dunlap, 1967), p. 204. And t h i s s h i f t , Havelock says, involved the movement from "the kind of mind which accepts and absorbs the passing show Eof the world] u n c r i t i c a l l y , and the i n t e l l i g e n c e which has been trained to grasp formulas 299 and categories which l i e behind the panorama of experience" (p. 205). 14 Havelock, Preface to Plato, p. 201. Havelock, p. 220. ^ Havelock, p. 225. ^ Havelock, p. 227. 18 Havelock, p. 283. 19 Havelock, p. 277. 20 Havelock, pp. 250-251. 21 The poems of Spring and A l l were o r i g i n a l l y u n t i t l e d . In r e f e r r i n g to them i n t h i s study, however, I have used the t i t l e s they are given i n The Collected E a r l i e r Poems. 22 Much l a t e r , Charles Olson was to say as much i n his "Letter to E l a i n e F e i n s t e i n " about the so - c a l l e d " p r i m i t i v e " : "I mean of course not at a l l p r i m i t i v e i n that stupid use of i t as opposed to c i v i l i z e d . One means i t now as 'primary,' as how one finds anything, pick i t up as one does new — fresh / f i r s t " (Human Universe and Other Essays, ed. Donald A l l e n (New York: Grove Press, 1967), p. 96. 23 Herbert Kuhn i n The Rock Pictures of Europe, trans. Alan Houghton Brodrick (London: Sidgwick & Jackson, 1966) speaks of these figures as magicians or shamans, and the caves such as those at Les Trois Freres as " c u l t - p l a c e s " (p. 7). The human figures i n Les T r o i s Freres are dancing. Speaking of one of them, "a naked man disguised i n a bison's mask," Kuhn comments: "The bent upper part of the body, the flexed knees, the outstretched arms, the l e g held high a l l remind us of some of the cult-dances performed to t h i s day by A f r i c a n , Amerindian and A s i a t i c t r i b e s " (p. 8). For in-depth discussions of the "feminine" nature of p r e h i s t o r i c a r t , see e s p e c i a l l y Gertrude Levy's The Gate of Horn (London: Faber and Faber, 1963) and Giedion's The Eternal Present. E r i c h Neumann i n The Great Mother: An Analysis of the Archetype, trans. Ralph Manheim (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1963) provides a Jungian i n t e r p r e t a t i o n of t h i s same material. 24 Giedion, The Eternal Present, p. 521. Some of these caves were, i n fact; such vast l a b y r i n t h i n e structures, i n t r i c a t e networks of caverns, as say i n Les Trois Freres, that there i s no doubt that they were ceremonial rather than dwelling places. Describing Les Tro i s Freres, for instance, Levy writes: "Les Tro i s Freres needs ha l f an hour's walk through a succession of co r r i d o r s to the chamber whose p r i n c i p l e f i g u r e i s wholly v i s i b l e only a f t e r the crawl through a p i p e - l i k e tunnel and negotiation of a rock-chimney, with a foot on ei t h e r side of the chasm" (p. 13). 25 Since Havelock's whole argument turns on t h i s d i s t i n c t i o n , the term "mimesis" recurs throughout h i s study. I t i s , however, singled out i n 300 Chapter Two, "Mimesis," pp. 20-35. 2 6 Writing to Louis Martz In a l e t t e r dated May 27, 1951 about "The Desert Music," Williams says that he plans to read on June 18th "a new 17-page poem at Harvard for the Phi Beta Kappa ceremonial at the Sanders Theatre." And he comments on the importance of the poem for him: "Whether r i g h t l y or wrongly, I f e e l that many of my culminating ideas as to form have entered into t h i s poem" (SL, 300). Williams ascribes t h i s sense of form as an i m i t a t i o n of nature's processes to A r i s t o t l e ' s Poetics, "misinterpreted," as he says i n his Autobiography, " f o r over two thousand years and more" (A,,241). 27 A l f r e d North Whitehead, Science and the Modern World (New York: The Free Press, 1967), p. 143. Weaver c i t e s Williams' note i n a copy of Science and the Modern World: "'Finished reading i t at sea, Sept. 26, 1927 — A milestone surely i n my career, should I have the force & imagination to go on with my work'" (p. 48). Discussing Whitehead's " o b j e c t i v i s t p h i l o s -ophy," Weaver quotes a key passage, i n which Whitehead distinguishes between "subjectivism" and "objectivism." Objectivism begins on the assumption "'that the actual elements perceived by our senses are i n themselves the elements of a common world; and that t h i s world i s a complex of things, including indeed our acts of cognition, but transcending them. According to t h i s point of view the things experienced are to be distinguished from our knowledge of them. So far as there i s dependence, the things pave the way for the cognition, rather than v i c e versa. But the point i s that, the actual things experienced enter a common world which transcends knowledge, though i t includes knowledge. The intermediate s u b j e c t i v i s t s would hold that the things experienced only i n d i r e c t l y enter i n t o the common world by reason of t h e i r dependence on the subject who i s cognising. The o b j e c t i v i s t holds that the things experienced and the cognisant subject enter into the common world on equal terms'" (p. 50). Or stated simply, as Williams does, "No ideas but i n things." 28 Whitehead, Modes of Thought, pp. 146-147. 29 Following on the opening provided by Williams, Charles Olson uses the term "objectism" to delineate t h i s sense of man as a l i v e creature i n a world of things, and l i k e Williams, he too attacks the " p l a t o n i c " notion of the s e l f as an e n t i t y . "Objectism," he says i n the now f a m i l i a r passage from "Projective Verse," " i s the getting r i d of the l y r i c a l interference of the i n d i v i d u a l as ego, of the 'subject' and h i s s o u l , that p e c u l i a r presumption by which western man has interposed himself between what he i s as a creature of nature (with c e r t a i n i n s t r u c t i o n s to carry out) and those other creatures of nature which we may, with no derogation, c a l l objects. For a man i s himself an object, whatever he may take to be h i s advantages, the more l i k e l y to recognize himself as such the greater h i s advantages, p a r t i c u l a r l y at that moment that he achieves an humilitas s u f f i c i e n t to make him of use" (Human Universe and Other Essays, pp. 59-60) . 30 cf. Williams' poem "Immortal," a kind of dadaist hymn to Ignorance whose powers, we are t o l d , "Transcend reason, love and sanity"! (CEP, 21). In t h i s l e t t e r , Williams i s responding to Marianne Moore's "Things Others Never Notice," a review of h i s recently published Collected Poems: 301 1921-1931 (New York: The O b j e c t i v i s t Press, 1934) that appeared i n Poetry. I t has since been reprinted i n William Carlos Williams: A C r i t i c a l Anthology. In her review, Moore mentions "an abandon born of inner s e c u r i t y " (p. 130) i n Williams' poems. She also draws attention to the objective nature of Williams' consciousness of things. "'The a b i l i t y to be drunk, 1" she writes, "'with a sudden r e a l i z a t i o n of value i n things others never notice' can metamorphose our detestable reasonableness and o f f s e t a whole planetary system of deadness" (p. 132). Williams was obviously pleased with her observations; i n h i s l e t t e r he says that she has "looked at what I have done through my own eyes. I assure you that t h i s i s so" (SL, 147). 32 John Keats, Selected Letters of John Keats, ed. Robert Pack (New York: New American Lib r a r y , 1974), p. 55. 33 Weaver says that Williams saw a "black-and-white reproduction" of th i s painting by Gris i n Broom, 2 [ s i c ; should be l ] , No. 3 (Jan. 1922), 41. Rob Fure i n "The Design of Experience: William Carlos Williams and Juan Gris"(William Carlos Williams Newsletter, 4, No. 2 ( F a l l 1978), 15) i d e n t i f i e s the painting as The Open Window (1921). For a further discussion of t h i s p a i n t i n g see below, pp. 231-235. 34 Duchamp did not forget t h i s event. In Dialogues with Marcel Duchamp, he r e c a l l s that no one on the e x h i b i t i o n committee — of which i r o n i c a l l y he was a member — knew he had submitted the "Fountain" because i t was signed "R. Mutt." Duchamp says he wanted "to avoid connection with the personal" (p. 55). The tone of h i s comments, however, suggests that he was hardly surprised when h i s piece never appeared i n the e x h i b i t . He even strongly hints that the r e j e c t i o n i t s e l f was what he wanted. Asked by Cabanne i f he would a c t u a l l y have been disappointed had the "Fountain" been accepted, he answers, "Almost. As i t was, I was enchanted" (p. 55). 35 Ezra Pound, "A Retrospect," L i t e r a r y Essays of Ezra Pound, p. 4. 36 "From My Notes About My Mother," 7. CHAPTER EIGHT: WRITE GOING. LOOK TO STEER. William E r i c Williams, Williams' son, provides a l o v e l y f i r s t - h a n d account of h i s father's attachment to cars i n "Cars," a b r i e f essay published i n the William Carlos Williams Newsletter, 3, No. 2 ( F a l l 1977), 1-5. Here he provides some anecdotes concerning what he c a l l s "the c l a s s i c man-auto duel" (1). 2 Weaver suggests that ' Hartley could j u s t as well have provided the s u b t i t l e to Kora i n H e l l : Improvisations through Kandinsky" (p. 42). Kandinsky i n Concerning the S p i r i t u a l i n Art mentions "improvisation" as a method. Parts of t h i s book appeared i n A l f r e d S t i e g l i t z ' Camera Work ( A p r i l 1912) d i r e c t l y through Hartley's influence, Hartley having met Kandinsky i n Germany i n 1912-13. 302 ~" "Seventy Years Jeep," Holiday, 16, No. 5 (Nov. 1954), 54-55, 78. I t i s i n t e r e s t i n g to note here that Williams must be one of the few 20th century writers whose address — 9 Ridge Road — became public information, a part of the legend of American " l o c a l i s m " which he did so much to f o s t e r . 4 "Seventy Years Deep," 78. "By the Road to the Contagious H o s p i t a l , " the opening poem of Spring and A l l (SA, 95-96) was o r i g i n a l l y written on p r e s c r i p t i o n blanks, probably i n the car. "Seventy Years Deep," 78. Williams also comments on the curious l i t e r a r y fate of these fragments: " I t amazes me when I r e a l i z e that these same p r e s c r i p t i o n blanks with my s c r i b b l e d notes are now reposing i n the l i b r a r y of the U n i v e r s i t y of Buffalo, and at Harvard and Yale" (78). 6 Louis Zukofsky, Prepositions, p. 143. ^ "The Young Housewife" was published i n a group of sixteen poems i n Others, 3, No. 4 (Dec. 1916), 15-31. 8 Williams considered h i s "Author's Introduction" to The Wedge a key statement of his b e l i e f that poetic form must be an extension of experience, "form" i n t h i s sense understood as a function of w r i t i n g and not a container separable from i t s s o - c a l l e d "content." Form i s a r e v e l a t i o n of content, which i s what Williams i s getting at e a r l i e r i n Spring and A l l when he says that "poetry has to do with the dynamization of emotion into a separate form" (SA, 133). 9 The issue of method, the "how" of w r i t i n g l i e s behind Williams' impatient — and b r i e f ! — response ("The I t a l i c s are God's) i n Contact (No. 4 [Summer 1921], p. 15) to John Gould F l e t c h e r . Fletcher had w r i t t e n a short, rather nasty note on Kora i n The Freeman, 3 May 18, 1921), 238. In i t he says that Kora " i s merely a symptom: a symptom of the disease that i s pervading :America as i t has pervaded Europe. This disease may be described b l u n t l y as a lack of c r i t i c a l standards on the part of both writer and pu b l i c . There i s no cure for i t except the r a i s i n g of the c r i t i c a l standard. Those who accept t h i s f a c t w i l l know at what l e v e l to place Dr. Williams" (238). Williams i n p a r t i c u l a r b l a s t s Fletcher's stated assumption that w r i t i n g "depends not on the kind but on the degree of statement," and he does so by quoting a passage from Fletcher's note with the above l i n e i t a l i c i z e d , for him a symptom of the narrowness of Fletcher's c r i t i c a l stance. And by typographically s e t t i n g Fletcher's name upside down, Williams suggests that Fletcher should do the same — that i s , see the world from that p o s i t i o n . Of course, Williams i n h i s own dadaist way i s simply i n d i c a t i n g how d i a m e t r i c a l l y opposed Kora's kind of w r i t i n g i s to Fletcher's expectations. ^ Robert Creeley, Contexts of Poetry: Interviews 1961-1971, ed. Donald A l l e n (Bolinas, C a l i f o r n i a : Four Seasons Foundation, 1973), p. 116. Williams' w r i t i n g has been a primary source for Creeley. His acknowledged debt to Williams has long been a matter of p u b l i c record. In the interview with Linda Wagner from which t h i s quoted passage i s taken, when asked what one writer has influenced his work, Creeley says, "I think Williams gave me the largest example" (p. 123). This admission i s s i m i l a r to another one i n "'I'm Given to Write Poems,'" where he says, "I think the most s i g n i f i c a n t 303 encounter for me as a young man t r y i n g to write was that found i n the work of William Carlos Williams. He engaged language at a l e v e l both f a m i l i a r and a c t i v e to my own senses, and made of h i s poems an intensely emotional perception, however evident h i s i n t e l l i g e n c e " (A Quick Graph: Collected Notes and Essays, ed. Donald A l l e n (San Francisco: Four Seasons Foundation, 1970), pp. 61-62. A number of essays that Creeley wrote s p e c i f i c a l l y on Williams are included i n A Quick Graph. Robert Creeley, Contexts of Poetry, p. 26. 12 The strong a r t i c u l a t i o n of the same compositional method i n Charles Olson's "Projective Verse" essay (Human Universe and Other Essays, pp. 51-61) must have instantaneously struck home for Williams. Olson's sense of "composition by f i e l d " so c l e a r l y extended his own sense of improvisational form. Williams acknowledged the essay by quoting i t at length i n his Autobiography (A, 329-332). 13 Juan Gri s , "On the P o s s i b i l i t i e s of P a i n t i n g , " i n Daniel-Henry Kahnweiler, Juan G r i s : His L i f e and Work, trans. Douglas Cooper (New York: Harry N. Abrams, 1968), p. 200. Weaver (p. 41) argues that Williams read t h i s essay when i t was published i n 1924 i n the t r a n s a t l a n t i c review. Weaver, p. 37. ^ Quoted by Weaver, p. 37. This piece has recently been published i n A Recognizable Image, pp. 57-59. CHAPTER NINE: A NEW DIRECTION Maurice Merleau-Ponty, "Eye and Mind," i n The Primacy of Perception, ed. James M. Edie (Northwestern U n i v e r s i t y Press, 1964), pp. 162-163. 2 V i c t o r Turner, The R i t u a l Process (Ithaca, New York: Cornell University Press, 1977), p. 128. Turner c a l l s t h i s t r a n s i t i o n a r i t e of passage that i n i t i a t e s the mind into a l i m i n a l space (from the L a t i n "threshold"). In t h i s sense, the f o o l who breaks out of the mind's closures i n Kora — Williams' mother and V i l l o n are further types — are l i m i n a l people, those "edgemen" who are such because, as Turner argues, they are "betwixt and between the positions assigned and arrayed by law, custom, convention, and ceremonial. As such, t h e i r ambiguous and indeterminate a t t r i b u t e s are expressed by a r i c h v a r i e t y of symbols i n the many s o c i e t i e s that r i t u a l i z e s o c i a l and c u l t u r a l t r a n s i t i o n s . Thus, l i m i n a l i t y i s frequently likened to death, to being i n the womb, to i n v i s i b i l i t y , to darkness, to b i s e x u a l i t y , to the wilderness, and to an e c l i p s e of the sun or moon" (p. 95). In t h i s same context, Richard A. Macksey's essay '"A Certainty of Music:' Williams' Changes" (William Carlos Williams: A C o l l e c t i o n of C r i t i c a l Essays, ed. J.Hl-llfs' M i l l e r (Englewood C l i f f s , New Jersey: P r e n t i c e - H a l l , 1966), pp. 132-147) s t i l l remains an important discussion of the r i t u a l i s t i c nature of Williams' work. Macksey argues that Williams' w r i t i n g bears s t r i k i n g s i m i l a r i t i e s to the early Greek sense of the world as a process "of 304 continuous deaths and b i r t h s between polar oppositions" (p. 137). He thus reads Williams' e a r l y work, e s p e c i a l l y "The Wanderer," Kora, Spring and A l l , and In the American Grain, as a s e r i e s of " r i t e s of passage" structured on a pattern of a descent followed by an ascent. "The structure of each t r a n s i t i o n , " he writes, "takes the form of an u n q u a l i f i e d plunge into that which the poet i s u l t i m a t e l y to apprehend and master, whether i t be the independent world of discr e t e objects, the anarchy of. unkenneled speech, or the daemonic s e l f that claps hands and sings behind drawn shades. In each case the r i t e takes the form of descent which means an abandonment and . resignation, but i n each case i t also discloses an access to a new kind of personal utterance and mastery. The plunge i s u l t i m a t e l y an ascent to an increasing command of the poet's materials" (p. 139). 3 Robert Creeley, Pieces, p. 4 4 Louis Zukofsky, Prepositions, p. 143. 5 I n t e r e s t i n g l y enough, Charles Olson i n "Grandpa, Goodbye" from Charles Olson &^ Ezra Pound: An Encounter at St. Elizabeths, ed. Catherine Seelye (New York: Grossman Publishers, 1975) comes to t a l k about the element of "confusion" i n Williams' work, an element that Olson associates with f i r e , as against Pound's l i g h t : "one achieves i t s c l a r i t i e s by way of c l a r i t a s , " he says of Pound, "the other goes about i t s business b l i n d , achieves i t s c l a r i t i e s by way of what you might c a l l confusio" (p. 101). As the figure of "confusion," Williams thus makes h i s way by "eating the substance of things" (p. 100). And t h i s method of experiencing the world, we might add, i s also the basis of the confusion at the heart of Kora. Olson sent Williams "Grandpa, Goodbye" and Williams wrote back saying that he took pleasure i n reading i t (p. 137). ^ "Hymn to Demeter," i n Hesiod, The Homeric Hymns and Homerica, trans. Hugh G. Evelyn-White (London: William Heinemann, 1970), pp. 288-325. 7 "The v i s i t to London," Weaver says, "produced the t i t l e for Kora i n Hell,which Williams-"acknowledged as Pound' s" (p. 6). Ezra Pound, Homage to Sextus Propertius (London: Faber & Faber, 1934), p. 21. 9 C.G. Jung and C. Kerenyi, Essays on a Science of Mythology: The Myth of the Divine C h i l d and the Mysteries of E l e u s i s , trans. R.F.C. H u l l (Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton U n i v e r s i t y Press, 1969), p. 119. "^ Kerenyi, p. 109. Kerenyi, p. 109. CONCLUSION: AN OPENING OF THE DOORS "Prologue: The Return of the Sun," The L i t t l e Review, 5, No. 11 (Apr. 1919), 1-10; "Prologue to a Book of Improvisations, Kora i n H e l l , Now 305 Being Published by The Four Seas Company," The L i t t l e Review, 6, No. 1 (May 1919), 74-80. 2 Edgar Jepson, "The Western School," The L i t t l e Review, 5, No. 5 (Sept. 1918), 4-9. In h i s short note, Pound defends Jepson's r i g h t to speak: "Only a barbarous or r e l i g i o u s nation," he says, " w i l l t r y to suppress the expression of views d i f f e r e n t from those of i t s r u l i n g or paying m a j o r i t i e s " (5). 3 Jepson, pp. 8-9. 4 Weaver (p. 38) points out that Williams would have read t h i s section of Kandinsky's On the S p i r i t u a l i n Art i n Blast, 1 (June 20, 1914), 119. 5 "Gloria'.," Others, 6 (July 1919), 3. 6 " B e l l y Music," Others, 6. (July 1919), 29. 7 " B e l l y Music," 27. 8 " B e l l y Music," 28. 58. 9 10 11 12 13 Robert McAlmon, "Concerning 'Kora i n H e l l , ' " Poetry, 18 (Apr. 1921), McAlmon, 54-57. McAlmon, 57, 59. McAlmon, 57. Rene Taupin, L'Influence du Symbolisme Francais sur l a Poesie Americaine (de 1910 a 1920) (Paris: L i b r a i r i e Ancienne Honore Champion, 1929), p. 278, p. 284. In h i s determination to prove that American poets were heavily influenced by the French Symbolist poets, Taupin emphasizes the connections between Rimbaud's Illuminations and Kora. For a convincing argument that t h i s comparison d i s t o r t s the "American" q u a l i t y of Williams' text, see e s p e c i a l l y Sherman Paul's "A Sketchbook of the A r t i s t i n His Thirty-Fourth Year: William Carlos Williams' Kora i n H e l l : Improvisations," The Shaken R e a l i s t , pp. 29-32. 14 "Three Professional Studies," 39. 306 BIBLIOGRAPHY BY WILLIAM CARLOS WILLIAMS: "A Man Versus the Law." The Freeman, 1, No."15 (June 23, 1920), 348-349. A Recognizable Image: William Carlos Williams on Art and A r t i s t s . Ed. Bram D i j k s t r a . New York: New D i r e c t i o n s , 1978. "A Selection from The Tempers. By William Carlos Williams, With Intro-ductory Note by Ezra Pound." The Poetry Review, 1, No. 10 (Oct. 1912), 481-484. A Voyage to Pagany. 1928; r p t . New York: New D i r e c t i o n s , 1970. "America, Whitman, and the Art of Poetry." The Poetry Journal, 8, No. 1 (Nov. 1917), 27-36. "An Approach to the Poem." In English I n s t i t u t e Essays, 1947. New York: Columbia Un i v e r s i t y Press, 1948, pp. 50-75. The Autobiography of William Carlos Williams. 1951; r p t . New York: New Directions, 1967. " B e l l y Music." Others, 6 (July 1919), 25-32. The Collected E a r l i e r Poems of William Carlos Williams. New York: New Dire c t i o n s , 1951. The Collected Later Poems of William Carlos Williams. 1950; rev. ed, Norfolk, Connecticut: New D i r e c t i o n s , 1963. The Embodiment of Knowledge. Ed. Ron Loewinsohn. New York: New D i r e c t i o n s , 1974. "From My Notes About My Mother." The L i t e r a r y Review, 1, No. 1 (Autumn 1957), 5-12. "Gloria'." Others, 6 (July 1919), 3-4. "How to Write." In The Poems of William Carlos Williams: A C r i t i c a l Study, by Linda-Wagner. Middletownj-Connecticut: Wesleyan University Press, 1964, pp. 145-147. 307 I Wanted to Write a Poem: The Autobiography of the Works of a Poet. Reported and ed. Edith. Heal, Boston: Beacon Press, 1958. "The Ideal Quarrel." The L i t t l e Review, 5, No. 8 (Dec. 1918), 39-40. Imaginations. Ed. Webster Schott, New York: New D i r e c t i o n s , 1970. "Improvisations." • T h e , L i t t l e Review, 4, No. .6 (Oct. 1917.) ,. 19. "Improvisations." The L i t t l e Review, 5, No. 9 I s i c; should be numbered 4, No. 9] (Jan. 1918), 3-9. "Improvisations." The L i t t l e Review, 6, No. 2 (June 1919), 52-59. "In Praise of Marriage." The Quarterly Review of L i t e r a t u r e , 2, No. 2 (1945), 145-149. In the American Grain. 1925; r p t . New York: New D i r e c t i o n s , 1956. "The I t a l i c s are God's." Contact, No. 4 ISummer 1921J, p. 15. Kora i n H e l l : Improvisations. Boston: The Four Seas Company, 1920. Kora i n H e l l : Improvisations. San Francisco: C i t y Lights Books, 1957. "Introduction." The Complete Works of Francois V i l l o n . Trans. Anthony Bonner. New York: David McKay, 1960, pp. ix-xv. Last Nights of Paris (Translation). New York: The Macauley Company, 1929. "Mike Wallace Asks William Carlos Williams: Is Poetry a Dead Duck?" The New York Post, Oct. 18, 1957, p. 46. "Notes from a Talk on Poetry." Poetry, 14, No. 4 (July 1919), 211-216. Paterson. New York: New D i r e c t i o n s , 1963. Pictures from Brueghel and Other Poems: Collected Poems 1950-1962. New York: New Directions, 1962. Poems. Rutherford, 1909. "Raquel Helene Rose." Twice a Year, Nos. 5-6 (Fall-Winter 1940 - Spring-Summer 1941), 402-412. "Recollections." Art i n America, 51, No. 1 (Feb. 1963), 52. Selected Essays of William Carlos Williams. New York: Random House, 1954. The Selected Letters of William Carlos Williams. Ed, John C, T h i r l w a l l . New York: McDowell, Obolensky, 1957. "Seventy Years Deep." Holiday, 16, No. 5 (Nov. 1954), 54-55, 78. 308 [Sixteen PoemsJ. Others, 3, No, 4 (Dec, 1916), 15-17. The Tempers. London: E l k i n Mathews, 1913. "Three Professional Studies." The L i t t l e Review, 5, Nos, 10-11 (Feb.-Mar. 1919), 36-44. "Prologue: The Return of the Sun." The L i t t l e Review, 5, No. 11 (Apr. 1919), 1-10. "Prologue To a Book of Improvisations, Kora i n H e l l , Now Being Published by The Four Seas Company." The L i t t l e Review, 6, No. 1 (May 1919), 74-80. "William Carlos Williams." Interviewed by Stanley Koehler. In Writers at Work: The Paris Review Interviews. Third Series. Ed. George Plimpton. New York: Viking, 1968, pp. 5-30. . Yes, Mrs. Williams: A Personal Record of My Mother. New York: McDowell, Obolensky, 1959. OTHER WORKS CITED: Bonner, Anthony, trans. The Complete Works of Francois V i l l o n . Introd. William Carlos Williams. New York: David McKay, 1960. B r e s l i n , James E. William Carlos Williams: An American A r t i s t . New York: Oxford University Press, 1970. Cabanne, P i e r r e . Dialogues with Marcel Duchamp. Trans. Ron Padgett. New York: Viking, 1971. C o l l i e r , Richard. The Plague of the Spanish Lady: The Influenza Pandemic of 1918-1919. New York: Atheneum, 1974. Creeley, Robert. A Quick Graph: Collected Notes & Essays. Ed. Donald A l l e n . San Francisco: Four Seasons Foundation, 1970. Contexts of Poetry: Interviews 1961-1971. Ed. Donald A l l e n . Bolinas, C a l i f o r n i a : Four Seasons Foundation, 1973. Pieces. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons>; 1969. . Was That a Real Poem & Other Essays. 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