Wednesday, October 29, 2008

The Furry Death

Dear Leonard Woolf, I personally do not find your subject of animals irritating in the least: no, indeed, I rather wish you'd had gone on. And on. And on. Or at least explained what exactly Bambi does when he acquires a nicotine addiction. i find myself horribly intrigued by Charles, "obviously a pukka English dog", as opposed to the pariah "yellow" dogs; I wonder what breed he was to have been so saliently genuine or superior, that he would, possessed by an "imperialist Anglo-Indian spirit" recognize a "native" cat. Caliber in this instance is proved by violence, the "rapidity" of murder that gleans "considerable prestige", which also gets translated into "canine society"- very reminiscent of colonial reaction and the modernist theme of anxiety about new uncertainties.
Growing actually made me think of a line: "For we are surrounded by mirrors, walled in by contradictory images of ourselves" when Woolf ponders on the rightness of sitting on a horse "arrogantly". This contradictory nature is also keenly observed in the anecdote he provided of his encounter of the graves of Adam and Eve. Charles is here the "dog of an infidel". The infidel here is also the savior, being trailed by "smiles and shaking of heads and lifting of hands".
Running an empire is, too, much like taming an elephant, using co-opted natives like "tame elephants" to assuage resistance, it's a "precarious position".

Who watched the newest episode of South Park (Pandemic) and tried grafting Stoler's ideas onto it? So if you obviously are a Peruvian pan flute band and yet... at the same time you're obviously not, you may very well be key in overthrowing Peru or saving the world from giant guinea pigs. Or it could just be why Craig says the kids at school dislike you. Heh heh heh.

1 comment:

akoh said...

Check/check plus
Your ideas are coming through more clearly now, Khai. Good job.