Fuck Rock'n'Roll

[gaucho]

@The King of Soup

The key figure here is Lionel Trilling (1905-1975) http://www.press.jhu.edu/books/hopkins_guide_to_literary_theory/lionel_trilling.html who took his degree a mere six years after T.S. Eliot’s “The Function of Criticism” and just as the new criticism movement http://bcs.bedfordstmartins.com/virtualit/poetry/critical_define/crit_newcrit.html was gaining traction in America. He would go on to write the definitive studies of Matthew Arnold and E.M. Forster as well as the brilliant essays collected in The Liberal Imagination (1950), in which he scolded, from a purely literary perspective, the American left for what he felt was an empty, bankrupt faith in their power to remake society for the better.

Of course the rarefied air of literary and cultural criticism might never have mixed with the more heady, marijuana-laced atmosphere of the sixties had Trilling not approached fellow critic and onetime Vanity Fair editor Edmund Wilson (1895-1972) http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/USAwilsonE.htm with an astonishing plan. Together, they would disguise themselves, and posing as brothers under the names Ron and Scott Asheton, form the Detroit proto-punk band The Stooges with lead singer Iggy Pop http://www.geocities.com/mnennoburke/stooges.html . They toured with the band until its demise in 1973, an end due partly to the folding of the Raw Power record label and partly to Wilson’s death the previous year. It had been Wilson’s job to poke their volatile frontman with a sharp stick for an hour before each performance: without that stimulus, rock star/cultural icon David Bowie http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Bowie would say later, Iggy “just wasn’t the same performer. His career might have been over right then. Fortunately, he discovered drugs just in time.”

Although Lionel Trilling died in 1975, the punk rock style he invented lived on, affecting the political landscape in a profound way. Politicians of all stripes had something to publicly condemn and privately envy. When The Clash http://punkandoi.free.fr/clash_biography.htm told the world in the early 80s to “Know Your Rights” many were inspired to look into it. The Soviet Union collapsed a mere seven years later.

Today, there is a new generation to cope with modern problems of political activism/literary criticism/power chord sustaining, and a new language with which that generation expresses it. Thus Marx could say “From each according to his ability, to each according to his need,” Meese could say “You couldn’t prove the White House staff sane beyond a reasonable doubt,” and Aguilera can say “Ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, oh yeah,” and the discerning eye can see not just the superficial chaos but the developing pattern underlying the always-moving, kaleidoscopic cultural Big Picture.

I’m only posting because this is genius and shouldn’t pass unremarked.

[dakota_19.32]

@The King of Soup

The key figure here is Lionel Trilling (1905-1975) http://www.press.jhu.edu/books/hopkins_guide_to_literary_theory/lionel_trilling.html who took his degree a mere six years after T.S. Eliot’s “The Function of Criticism” and just as the new criticism movement http://bcs.bedfordstmartins.com/virtualit/poetry/critical_define/crit_newcrit.html was gaining traction in America. He would go on to write the definitive studies of Matthew Arnold and E.M. Forster as well as the brilliant essays collected in The Liberal Imagination (1950), in which he scolded, from a purely literary perspective, the American left for what he felt was an empty, bankrupt faith in their power to remake society for the better.

Of course the rarefied air of literary and cultural criticism might never have mixed with the more heady, marijuana-laced atmosphere of the sixties had Trilling not approached fellow critic and onetime Vanity Fair editor Edmund Wilson (1895-1972) http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/USAwilsonE.htm with an astonishing plan. Together, they would disguise themselves, and posing as brothers under the names Ron and Scott Asheton, form the Detroit proto-punk band The Stooges with lead singer Iggy Pop http://www.geocities.com/mnennoburke/stooges.html . They toured with the band until its demise in 1973, an end due partly to the folding of the Raw Power record label and partly to Wilson’s death the previous year. It had been Wilson’s job to poke their volatile frontman with a sharp stick for an hour before each performance: without that stimulus, rock star/cultural icon David Bowie http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Bowie would say later, Iggy “just wasn’t the same performer. His career might have been over right then. Fortunately, he discovered drugs just in time.”

Although Lionel Trilling died in 1975, the punk rock style he invented lived on, affecting the political landscape in a profound way. Politicians of all stripes had something to publicly condemn and privately envy. When The Clash http://punkandoi.free.fr/clash_biography.htm told the world in the early 80s to “Know Your Rights” many were inspired to look into it. The Soviet Union collapsed a mere seven years later.

Today, there is a new generation to cope with modern problems of political activism/literary criticism/power chord sustaining, and a new language with which that generation expresses it. Thus Marx could say “From each according to his ability, to each according to his need,” Meese could say “You couldn’t prove the White House staff sane beyond a reasonable doubt,” and Aguilera can say “Ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, oh yeah,” and the discerning eye can see not just the superficial chaos but the developing pattern underlying the always-moving, kaleidoscopic cultural Big Picture.

Thank you King of Soup. I laughed and I laughed until my hangover didn’t hurt any more. Kind of you to take the time to reply.

[Ogre]

To paraphrase my original intention in an open way: How does the post war cultural revolution jive with pre war literary theory and present day political thought, and do you think any of our 2005 protagonists (apeing their latter day heroes) have anything historically significant to say.

I’m having a great time imagining what somebody like Leadbelly or Howling Wolf would have said to this question.