Wednesday, January 18, 2006

The Violet Cow

William Blake + G.K.Chesterton = awesomeness

Once again I receive confirmation that in spite of the fact that my college career has only perpetuated the half-assed, unreliable, tottering instability of previous educational years, I am actually in the right place (I think). It is a running theme in my life that in hard times I just happen to be assigned a work of literature which answers my question of the hour. (The most obvious example being the vocatioal answer through The Four Quartets in Austria.) And now we have from Chesterton's biography on William Blake:

Impressionism is scepticism. It means believing one's immediate
impressions at the expense of one's more permanent and positive
generalisations. It puts what one notices above what one knows. It
means the montrous heresy that seeing is believing. A white cow at one
particular instant of the evening light may be gold on one side and violet on
the other. The whole point of Impressionism is to say that she really is a
gold and violet cow. The whole point of Impressionism is to say that there
is no white cow at all. What can we tell, it cries, beyond what we can
see? But the essence of Mysticism is to insist that there is a white cow
however veiled with shadows or painted with sunset gold. Blessed are they
who have seen the violet cow and who yet believe in the white one.

27 comments:

Brigid said...

touche

Mel said...

i still prefer "Blessed are the peacemakers; guns are not allowed in this sanctuary."

but hey, to each his own right? oh wait...

Black Mona said...

lol. check out me website now all you peopley peoples!
WOTD: 'luhoyau' meaning a nautical, hawaiian greeting?

Meghan said...

*sigh* I'm feeling rather disconnected here.

(I thought Chesterton was hilarious. I could be the only one...)

Brigid said...

yea, i actually didnt even read most of your post, but wanted to comment.. i didnt care on what. and dont worry... you are dealing with many slackers here... sorry!

miss you!
-Kalishy

Anonymous said...

Diversions of the Re-Echo club
By Carolyn Wells
in the style of Mr. John Milton:

Hence, vain, deluding cows.
The herd of folly, without colour bright,
How little you delight,
Or fill the Poet's mind, or songs arouse!
But, hail! thou goddess gay of feature!
Hail, divinest purple creature!
Oh, Cow, thy visage is too bright
To hit the sense of human sight.
And though I'd like, just once, to see thee,
I never, never, never'd be thee!

--Found and memorized by my brother Ben over Christmas break, from a book entitled Such Nonsense!
Many more where that came from.

Not quite so poignant as your Chestertonian exerpt, but I thought you'd enjoy a parody of both of these poets. :)
~Lauren P.

Mel said...

hey now, it's not my fault i'm not a lit major. actually, i'm all for Chesterton, but we theology students tend to suck all the fun out of literature via our preoccupation with not being destroyed by Darth Roy. : )

Black Mona said...

oh mel! you are way too much! HYSTERICAL!

Louise said...

Meg, my mom collects purple cows! Seriously!

Thomas Peters said...

As much as I loved this post, meghan...

And as slow a reader as I can be...

It's been 10 days.

And I've successfully read the post to the very end.

So I'm ready for a new post.

Can I have a new one now, please?

Black Mona said...

me too! count me in coach! i wanna new post too! *in an extremely whiny voice* pleeeeeaaaasssee?

J said...

Yah right Louise. My dad Makes purple cows

Mel said...

go to bed, justin.

meg- i know you're busy with the weirdness that always occurs at Ave, but even I've updated,and that just reflects poorly on you. : )

Thomas Peters said...

If my vision was based on movement this blog would be invisible.

Thomas Peters said...

If my expectations were higher I'd be dissapointed.

Thomas Peters said...

If my life were busier I'd spend less time telling you to update.

Thomas Peters said...

If I thought you cared I'd keep bugging you.

Thomas Peters said...

If I wasn't waiting for my ramen noodles to finish cooking I'd stop posting disparaging comments on your extremely-inactive blog.

Thomas Peters said...

If I didn't find "6" a better number than "5" I would have stopped then and not now.

Black Mona said...

NOW!!!!

Mel said...

*sigh*

I don't think she's listening, guys. Anybody know her password?

Thomas Peters said...

25 comments. that's a quarter of a century, meghan. shouldn't that make you think?!

Louise said...

I wet my bed.

Black Mona said...

wheezy, you too?
whaddya say we try for 30 comments? i think we could do it!

Anonymous said...

I guess I'm number 30!! I've been looking for an update too! I have TWO blogs and I keep up better than this! I saw the address on your parents computer, but I guess you were just checking comments, and chuckling to yourself. I hope you saw the dress, if not, email me and I'll send you the link. And I need to know when you're going to be home again to get all you girls together to try on dresses and vote on your favorite! So let me know: KBerry19@email.wintu.edu

Meghan said...

I would like to inform my surprisingly loyal readers that no, I have not died, suffered severe mutilation of the hands or lost the ability of cognitive thought. (Well, the last one, maybe a little.) I merely required a brief sojorn from the cyber world...then I I got addicted. In conclusion, I still love you all and I shall update very soon. Oh and to my sister, KoBear...haven't seen the dress, but I'll get right on that. We'll be in touch. ;) Oh and sorry we didn't get to see much of each other over the weekend!

Mel said...

yay! meggiebear still exists in the blogger world!

*holds breath in anticipation of update*