September 16, 2012

Nam Sibyllam Lorem Ipsum

To the long list of conference papers I'll never get around to writing, let us add the following: 

The Chair She Shat In: Eliot, The Waste Land, and Volkswagen

What I'm saying is that Eliot and Volkswagen have more in common than foundations in antisemitism. Consider the following: 

DA  
Datta: what have we given?  
My friend, blood shaking my heart  
The awful daring of a moment’s surrender  
Which an age of prudence can never retract  
By this, and this only, we have existed  
Which is not to be found in our obituaries  
Or in memories draped by the beneficent spider  
Or under seals broken by the lean solicitor  
In our empty rooms  
DA  
Dayadhvam: I have heard the key  
Turn in the door once and turn once only  
We think of the key, each in his prison  
Thinking of the key, each confirms a prison  
Only at nightfall, aetherial rumours  
Revive for a moment a broken Coriolanus  
DA  
Damyata: The boat responded  
Gaily, to the hand expert with sail and oar  
The sea was calm, your heart would have responded  
Gaily, when invited, beating obedient  
To controlling hands

And then: 



If ever I am called upon to read aloud from The Waste Land again, I'm totes reading those DAs as, like, "DUUUUH!!??"

And also, stinky chair, ha ha. Must be the broken Coriolanus.