Faun

La Seine à Suresnes d'Alfred Sisley 1877. Så här års, under de sista semesterdagarna, brukar jag då och då fundera över meningen med livet. Så i år blir det ännu ett blogginlägg, och det innebär ett om året ungefär i min nuvarande takt.   En AI har inte skrivit detta åt mig, det skulle helt förta nöjet i att skriva fritt en timme eller så. Så vad är meningen med livet? Uppenbarligen inte semester. Men inte jobb heller. En naiv fråga, skulle en filosof säkert tycka idag och det är ju sant. Men meningen med filosofi är ju att ställa naiva frågor. Fast ett naivt svar skulle vara en helt annan sak. Därför tänker jag inte bli naiv. Frågan är intressant, och aktuell. Men svaret? Helsvårt. Meningen med livet måste väl (?) delas upp på objektivitet och subjektivitet. Ett universellt svar som är subjektivt är såklart inte enbart naivt utan rent fel. Kanske ska man stanna upp där. Konstatera att varje svar på frågan fastnar i subjektivitet   och ge upp hela saken. Kanske. ...

  Claude Monet hela världen är en glasskål och himlen buktar sig över åkrarna  han bestämde sig en dag för att promenera  över stigarna av röd jord mellan sädesfälten de mörkgröna skogarna kom han på villovägar vid glasskålens kant  fälten lyssnande till vårtbitarna axen före skörd solen skärvor av månen den blå himlen  skymtande sin egen spegelbild i glaset det kortaste av ögonblick  skillnader och likheter såg den andras ögon vidgas i gräsets suddiga stjärnor  snabbare än ljudet och närmare jorden långsammare  snö mot den varma jorden - the whole world a glass bowl, the sky curves over the fields. One day he decided to walk along the paths of red earth between the grain fields and the dark green forests, where he lost his way at the glass bowl’s edge. the corn’s ears listen to the crickets, the stalks before harvest, the sun, fragments of the moon the sky for the briefest of moments he catches a glimpse of his reflection in the glass seeing the ...

  Monet, Grainstacks, White Frost Effect. 1889.   Jean-Paul Sartre asserted not only that reality is subjective  but that no objective reality exists at all . For him, objectivity was not just a mistake but a complete illusion. This radical subjectivity entails a total absence of objective meaning, leading us to a kind of existential angst . This is not a new idea. I guess Shakespeare at least brushed upon this thought by the end of the 16th century. Did it make him dizzy? Surely, it is more than just a common fear of death Hamlet expresses in his monologue? In any case, it is interesting how concepts can be linked, how a distinct concept like subjectivism can imply meaninglessness. What do this line of thought create? Hesitant, amazed at the implications of this thought line, time and again on stages throughout history To sleep, perchance to Dream; aye, there's the rub, For in that sleep of death, what dreams may come, When we have shuffled off this mortal coi...

Gustave Caillebotte Sketches  that explore different semi-fictionalized narratives delving into various modes of memory.  The narratives explore the nuanced boundary between memory and imagination, navigating through trauma before culminating in memory and personal identity. 1. Remembering and imagining The question of how to distinguish between remembering and imagining is importantly ambiguous. On the one hand, we sometimes remember but do so in a way that is in some sense inadequate; in such cases, we naturally say that we are “only imagining”.  The question can thus be taken to concern the distinction between cases in which the subject remembers successfully and cases in which he remembers  unsuccessfully .  Excerpt  from Memory /  Remembering and imagining ,  Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy .    "Damned nonsense," he muttered to himself and pulled out a band with small brown beads that he began to finger.    "Excu...

Vilhelm Hammershøi,  Solstråler "You should build a memory palace," she said one day as we sat discussing personal matters. It was eight in the evening in Sweden and late morning at her place. "What's that?" I asked. "Like a fixed building or place one returns to in memory... I'll send a book," she replied after a moment of thought. "Okay," I responded, feeling tired. It had been a long day. This was many years ago, and oddly enough, that advice and, to some extent, the book did change my life. It's an overused phrase, that something changes one's life, but the book that eventually arrived was like a key to, well, my memory palace. The book was titled The Art of Memory  by Frances Yates. Building my memory palace wasn't easy or quick, and maintaining it isn't simple either. Yet, it allowed me to construct a powerful reservoir within consciousness, functioning as an inner layer of reality. In short, it enabled me to store a...

Lesser Ury, Hochbahnhof Bülowstraße, 1922 Below is a brief prose fragment from a story I conceived this summer.  He woke up and sat up in bed. His pulse was racing, throbbing in his ears like drumbeats. For a moment, he just sat there, clutching the blanket and staring ahead. He did nothing but try to calm his breathing. The shadows behind the blinds from the tree branches outside. He didn't really know who he was. But eventually, he rose heavily and looked at the alarm clock. Half past two. He swore. He knew exactly who he was. As often happens when he woke up this way, he became wide awake. He put on his bathrobe and sat down at the computer. Sometimes, reading something on the Internet helped. But his heart continued to pound hard, and the computer's blue light gave him a headache. The Swedish-Danish wars in the 15th century and the bark beetles' spread in northern Uppland didn't help either, so he pulled up the blinds. It was still dark outside the window. The light...