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T H E P O L I T I C A L
E C O N O M Y O F
I N T E R N A T I O N A L
O IL
A N D T H E
U N D E R D E V E L O P E D
C O U N T R I E S
by Michael Tanzer
The dynamics oi power
politics in the struggle for
contio] of the world's oi}
resources.
$12.50
25 B e ac on S t r e e t
v i M M H iailMil 1
your MIND
your HEART
your HAND
io th MENTALLY ILL
support your
lectuaiized reasons, in a timg when
there are no more observers in the
world and we are all Jews.
The three-page Theses on Feuerbach
is a better guide than the 500 pages
of Feuer's book. You will find that in
Marx & Engels: Basic Writings on
Politics & Philosophy,
edited by Lewis
Feuer (some years ago). The ideas
there are not infallible, but they
wise and humane (and, inciden
more understanding of capitalists
Feuer is of the young). We learn
that the world has real problems w
are historically rooted in part
ways we order our lives, and
treatable therefore, if we will
stop interpreting and start acting
Ke n n e th B u r ke :
T o w a r d t h e P e r f e c t l y P o i s o n o u
The Artist as Critic:
Critical Writings of Oscar Wilde
Edited with an introduction
by Richard Ellmann
(Random House; $10.00)
In his expert introduction to this book,
Richard Ellmann remarks on Wilde's
cult of the dang erous :
What muddies this point of view
in Wilde is his looking back to con-
ventional meanings of words like
sin, ignoble, and shameful. He is
not so ready as Nietzsche to trans-
valuate these, though he does re-
shuffle them. His private equation
is that sin is the perception of new
and dangerous possibilities in ac-
tion as self-consciousness is in
thought and criticism is in art. He
espouses individualism, and he en-
courages society to make individual-
ism more complete than it can be
now, and for this reason he spon-
sors socialism as a communal ego-
tism, like the society made up of
separate but equal works of art.
Wilde's preference for such old-time
words as sin has its counterp art in
what would otherwise be a surprising-
ly frequent use of perfect and per-
fection. The following passages indi-
cate the range:
fection is idleness: the aim of
fection is you th. . . . Life
literature, life and the perfect
pression of life. . . . To be pre
ture is to be perfect. . . . M
perfect by the critical spirit alo
. . . W e might make ourselves s
itual by detaching ourselves fr
action, and become perfect by
rejection of energy.
Wilde sums up in that most uneas
all literary species, an outraged
thor's Letter to the Editor, whe
tempting to defend
The Picture o
rian Cray.
It is poisonous if you
but you cannot deny that it is also
fect, and perfection is what we a
aim at. In a review of poems by
ley, he says that rhyme gives
delightful sense of limitation whic
all the arts is so pleasurable, an
indeed, one of the secrets of pe
tion. How ever, he can as readil
in the other direction. When n
that through poetry Mrs. Brow
realizes her fullest perfect ion, he
ther observes, 'She would rh
moon to table,' used to be said o
in jest; and certainly no more
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7/23/2019 Kenneth Burke_Toward the Perfectly Poisonous
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the possibility of a form which,
, he uses exactly the same for-
l Th e Soul of Man Under Social-
( soul is another of his now
the perfe ct writings of his Wa l-
he writes, A healthy work
personality, another word for
being individuality.
ting will no longer be an artificial
the natural expression of life's
uty, he is persistent in his dictum
the sphere of Art and the sphere
between saying that only a
a judge of pain ting and his
only an artist is a judge of
For in art there is no special-
All arts are in their essence the
whereat he adds a twist, But the
bly in saying, Th ere are not
but one art merely, he was
ttitude was involved in one's
of secret sin was at odds with
was merely in a different chan-
challenge, All art is imm oral.
instance, we read in Th e Decay of
that As a meth od, realism is
; art is not to be
In The Truth of M asks ,
s, we are told that Perfect accu-
f detail . . . is necessary for us.
;
"That dawn which
saw the first
coming of the
Europeans
to Africa is
for African
writers no
sim ple dawn but is charged w ith
layered mea n ing . Tha t m orn ing
w h i c h s aw t h e b e g i n n i n g s o f
European cultural imposit ion was
fraught with danger for the spiritual
protector of the African writer, for
his totem ."
-WILFRED CARTEY
are inc luded in th is un ique a
major work. The author, a po
himself, has created a vast k
cloth, into which are woven t
images and symbols of a
land,
cu l tur e, and a pe op le. He h
allowed us to hear history.
"Walking in thehi l ls
of Legon, I heard
the murmurs of the
wi n d .Sitting by the
Winn ebaS ea, I lis-
W h i s p e r s
f r o m a
C o n t i n e n t
W i l f r e d
C a r t e y
WHISPERS FRO M
A CONTINENT
thevoiceof
Africa today
speaking to
generations of
the future. It
is no t
literary
criticism in the
a c a d e m i c s e n s e T h c L i t e r a t u r e o f C o n t e m p o r a r y B l a c k A f r i c a
but a poetic and
passionate summ on-
ing forth of African
experience through
African l i terature.
The many novels, poems and
plays that Wi l f red Car tey of fers
and involves us in
dramatize the wrench
ing forces of c olo -
nial ism,
the exile
and flight of the
black African,
his search for ^
self, and the fi -
nal return through ' " , ' .
revolt to belief and
faith in his future. Leopold
S e n g h o r , A i m e C e s a i r e , L e o n
Damas, Chinua Achebe, are a few
among the fi fty leading contem-
porary Black African writers that
tened to the,
back-and-for
movements
the wate
Standing on t
Afric an so il at th
hour when t
heart strums t
guitar
dreams
voices
the
ch
dren Ara
and Adw o
Alice an d Eku
Abena a
Ama wi ,
Qua
and Ay eki, I receiv
the whispers from
cont inent. To Mother, an
to al l those who l isten to
c h
dren 's vo ices , g ive back the
whispers."_wiLFRED CARTEY (In h
new book WHISPERS FROM
C O N T IN E N T )
His book is a must. That is to s
we must read Dr. Cartey's boo
because Dr. Cartey has given
some valuable research, he h
taken time to give us authent
material and to allow us to mak
our o wn analyses and draw our ow
conclusions. Dr. Cartey does n
just shout lost culture, he retrieve
i t . "STOKELY CARMICHAEL
8.95, now at your bookstore
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xing
ver l
unprecede nted selection of
nowavailableto
5 REV DR MAR TIN
LUTHER KING,JR.
1929-1968 .
The Original Address
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Name.
supply US with
the
facts which
the ar-
tist
is to
convert into effects. Th oug h
he writes that neither in costumenor
in dialogue is beauty the dramatist's
primary aim at all. The true dramatist
aims firstatwhatischarac teristic, the
statement must
be
understood
as
modi-
fied, three pages later,
by a
reference
tc that
joy in
beauty
for
beauty's sake
without which the great masterpieces
of art can never be understood.
Mr. Ellmann's introduction sums
up
things admirably, as regards both
Wilde's aestheticism and its relationto
his sinful man -love. Even so, it is
worth noting that,in hisessay on the
gentlemanly poisoner Wainwright,
Wilde hits upon
a
stricter definition:
Sin should
be
solitary,
and
have
no
accomplices,
How
closely should
we
read that text? Would it mean that,
after his fa ll into homosexual en-
tanglements (presumably in iS86) he
could not wholly embody the idealof
individualism which he hoped for in
Utopian socialism? Insofar
as
sexual
analogues
for
socio-political situations
are concerned,
the
perfect
individu
nUstcould hav e erotic com merce on ly
withhimself.
As regards
the
book proper, there
are
two ideal places
to
begin.
The
first
is
A Chinese S age,
the
review
of a
translation
of
Confucius, which begins,
An eminent Oxford theologian once
remarked that his only objection to
modern progresswasthatit progressed
forward instead
of
backward.
Throughout,
the
stress
is in
keeping
with paradoxical thoughts
on the use-
lessness
of all
useful thing s. Wilde
suggests that the English publication,
two thousand years after Confucius'
death, is obviously premature. The
quality of Wilde's sympathy with this
book well indicates
the
quality
of his
own conceits, when they
now and
then
come nearest
to
perfection.
The other recommended starting point
is Poetry and Prison, a review of
poems that Wilfrid Scawen Blunt
wrote
in
connection with
his
imprison-
ment. Literature
is not
indebted
to
Mr. Balfour for his sophistical 'De-
fence of Philosophic Doubt,' which is
oneof the dullest booksweknow,but
it must be admitted that by sending
Mr, Blunt
to
gaol
he has
converted
a
clever rhymer into
an
earnest
and
deep-thinking poet,
In the
light
of
greatly. Blunt's
had the
dignity
political offense, whereas Wilde, th
poetically identifying himself
Christ, had to suffer the burde
mere scandal. As Mr. Ellmann
puts it, So long as he had b
scapegrace the door to comedy
still o^en; once having accepte
role
of
scapegoat
the
door
was
cl
After
his
release from prison ,
tried
to
write another play
in h
mer manner,
but the
kind
of
c
uity best suitedto hisgifts was br
There was nothing to do bu
which accordinglyhedid.
His reviewsare a charming com
tion of perception and patter.
are much better than his more
tentious pieces, which
are not s
defined
by the
requirements
o
business
at
hand,
and
which
more deeply affected
by the
com
tions
of the
Dorian Gray com
(a guilty senseoftoo greatahiat
tween secrecy andpublicity).
A quite differently slanted r
might have resulted from aselect
his witticisms. Also, along with
social shrewdness, engagingly
pressed, there
are
many serious
sages
of
great sympathy
and
b
for instance
his
pages
on
he
D
Cotrtedy. But of the
kind
of
p
we most spontaneously think
of
carian, here's the perfect one:
Whistler always spelt art, and w
lieve he still does, with a capita
Wildedid too.
But let's consider one more exh
review
of
only seven lines (whic
cidentally,
may
throw light
on
W
resistances
to
what
he
calls reali
'The Chronicle of Mites '
mock-heroic poem about theinh
tants
of a
decaying cheese,
speculate about the origin of
species,
and
hold learned discus
upon
the
meanings
of
Evolution
the Gospel according
to
Dar
This cheese epic
is a
rather un
oury production, and thestyle
times,somonstrousand sorea
that the author shouldbecalled
Gorgon-Zolaofliterature.
Hometown Source
The editors wish
to
call attent
to the fact that Jean Carperw
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