Monday, November 1, 2010

Garland, "Up the Coulee" and Bachelard

--Bachelard argues that "all really inhabited space bears the essence of the notion of home" (5) and that this sense of shelter fosters the imagination producing dreams and poetry. Reflecting upon your own memories and experiences, to what extent does this ring true? Or do you find it philosophical mumbo-jumbo?

--In Garland's story, there is a lot of attention to descriptions of the landscape and experiences of the landscape. Garland poses the aestheticized gaze of the artist/tourist against the familiar gaze of those living in upper Midwest. What are the explicit and implicit lessons of this comparison?

--Garland's story poses the success of one brother against the failure of another, raising classic issues within American life about 'self-made' men and 'success stories.' By the classic logic of American self-making and/or success, those who work harder and/or are smarter succeed, while failure reflects an individual's inadequacy. How does this story weigh in on the classic story of American success?

15 comments:

  1. On a micro level, I can't help but disagree with Bachelard in regards to shelter fostering poetry. I'm not sure if he was generalizing, or just sharing specific examples to himself, but I've never really been much for poetry under any social or mental circumstances.

    I will say, though, that–on a macro level–this musing makes sense to me. There is a space I can reach mentally, where reaching back for images and memories of my home helps me create in writing, even if it's definitely not conceptualized in poetry. The most direct example I can think of is my outside space essay. Sure, it wasn't inside my home, but it was set on its porch. The images and memories I was able to conjure for that were of great assistance in helping me "write my home" as Bachelard would say, more effectively than any other setting.

    I guess what I'm getting at is to say that, if poetry to Bachelard is really just a metaphor or symbol for raw creativity, I agree with him.

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  2. I thought it was interesting that Garland's "Up the Coulee" deals with the landscape where his other story hardly mentioned landscape at all. Garland uses the landscape to stress the foreign nature of Howard. It was interesting dynamic to watch Howard, a native of this area, treat it as a romantic space. It almost seemed like a forced space. Like he felt he was supposed to be having an emotional reaction. I think this lack of sincere emotion comes into view when he is consistently shook from his romantic viewpoint, such as when he sees the condition of his family and the when he receives a not so friendly welcome home.

    Also Garland demystifies the American "self-made man" philosophy. As seen in Horatio Alger or Benjamin Franklin, the reader only sees the story of the mans rise to fame and financial independence. What Garland exposes are the people who suffer in the shadows of the "self-made man." It seems that Howard is most haunted by this realization. It is the conclusion that both Howard and Grant arrive at the conclusion on the story. It is a conclusion that still leaves Grant in a pitiable situation but it is a conclusion that neither Howard nor Grant have the power to change.

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  3. In response to the second question, I think that Garland uses the landscape to help Howard start to remember and feel emotion towards the land but you do get a sense of outsider or tourist feel when he is describing it. When he first arrives at his brothers house, his "happy homecoming" is gone because he gets a first hand look at what life is actually like for them. Especially when eating at the dinner table, Howard looks at the fourteen year old boy and asks if thats what he looked like when he was younger, its seems that Howard has a distant sense of what "home" and his life used to be like and now it has transformed into a more tourist or outside view. I think a lot of people can relate to this feeling, when you are not home for a long time and you return usually things slowly are changing. Even now when I go back home, I'll be gone for 3 months and come back and there are things that I didn't even know could change. I think once we all leave home and come back, there will always be a sense outsider/tourist feel to our once known "home".

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  4. In response to the Bachelard question, it's very hard to generalize about the notions that influence the production of dreams or poetry or art or anything creative, because one cannot possibly know why anyone else was influenced to do what they did, and really, one cannot know why he or she was influenced to create what he or she did create. But I think in my experience, there is some truth to the idea that one must feel comfortable and have the ability to expand their mental presence within a space in order to create, and I think this is mainly possible because of Bachelard's idea that all really inhabited space bears the essence of the notion of home. For me, walking around campus, I will see a bench or a parking lot or an alley where I have a memory and then that place will be imbued with a sense of home, like the memories that have transpired there belong to me and the place, in some small way, belongs to me, also. Come to think of it, I have actually written songs and had ideas for papers in many of those spots, so there may be something to Bachelard's theory after all.

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  5. I agree with what Jared said about Bachelard focusing on poetry as his main experience within an intimate interior space. He writes, "through poems, perhaps more than through recollections, we touch the ultimate poetic depth of the space of the house." Not to belittle what the author is saying, but as Jared said, I've never tied any of my emotions or experiences with the houses I've lived in and visited with poetry. However, I can appreciate what I believe is the underlying idea Bachelard is getting at, which is that it is difficult to remember important places, such as houses or rooms, well enough to be "real historians." He writes that "the calendars of our lives can only be established in its imagery" and I thought this line really captures the essence of the piece. We discussed in class how memories cannot be fluid or even vivid, but that they are mere snapshots or feelings we randomly recall, whether it be during daydreaming or otherwise.

    I thought the excerpt on page 12 was the most valid, at least for me and my experiences. Bachelard explains that although he can go into depth of how his little room at the end of the garret possessed "the odor of raisins," along with other minute details, however, going into too much depth on such topics will only send the reader "back in his own room" into a "state of suspended reading." Although parts of the essay did seem like "mumbo-jumbo," I totally agree with the notion that explaining memories or feelings of a house only causes people to transcend into a memory state of their own. It kind of reminded me of something from a TV show or movie (I can't remember what it was), where a person asked a friend if they wanted to look through a photo album. The friend replied, "Am I in any of them?" as if they only wanted to see pictures they were in. I think there's something about memories that require the experience and the feeling of having actually been there in order for them to be important or meaningful.

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  6. Garland's story reverses the typical American "success story". The usual American self-made man has everything, money, friends, family, and the respect of everyone he comes in contact with. Howard in this story only has money and friends. He has forgotten his family along his path of success. Though he may have respect from his peers, he doesn't have the respect of his family, especially of his brother, nor did he work that hard to get where he is (as he describes it was merely "luck"). Grant on the other hand is not successful in the sense of money and wealthy friends, but he does have the love and respect of his family, and he works very hard for everything that he has. As a whole these brothers portray the perfect self-made man: Howard being wealthy and having the respect of other successful people; Grant being hard working and loved by his family. Both succeed and both fail in some aspects of the typical success story, and I believe that they both realize this at the end of the story when Grant declines Howard's gift of the old farm and they shake hands.

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  7. I'm not sure if this will still count for posting this week, the blog just completely slipped my mind this week with the paper and other class obligations. Anyways, I wanted to comment on the first question, at least try.

    Bachelard's statement that "all really inhabited space bears the essence of the notion of home"(5) I feel is somewhat similar to my own essay I will post shortly. I'm not exactly sure about the idea of imagination and producing poetry, I've never been big into understanding and interpreting poetry, although I do enjoy it.

    I do feel that our dreams obviously come from our imagination, however several forms of imagination, several ideas coming together. Reflecting on my own essay I will post and other personal experience, I must disagree with Bachelard. Perhaps I'm not thinking general enough, however when I think of an inhabited space, I think of a place that I have had memories in, I've had experiences, but it wasn't necessarily because of that space as much as because of the "things" surrounding it.

    I think about college houses that we move into for a year maybe two. In my opinion we truly inhabit these places however they don't give me a notion of home-like feelings. Sure I may catch myself thinking about the past, memories I have and perhaps that's the dreaming he's talking about. So maybe I agree? I'm not sure. When I initially think about it though, I'd have to disagree because I don't get that sense of home.

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  8. I tend to agree with Bachelard's idea that our memories and dreams of home are often poetic, in that they are not narrative memories that happen in order, or that we can recall exactly what happened and list them. Our memories of home are brief moments that have stuck with us that aren't concrete.

    Also, when speaking of memories of home, we often times remember the good memories and leave out the bad ones, and that makes our memories more like poetry instead of history.

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  9. "Up the Coulee" exposes the reality of self-made success or the "American dream." I think instances akin to the one in the story happen more frequently than the classic success stories. In the story, one brother is very successful, partly due to his skills and partly due to luck, and the other brother is deemed a failure due to circumstance. Both brothers seem to be equals in merit, intelligence, ability, etc. So, one is a successful self-made man not because of his merit, but because he was afforded opportunities and able to meet important people that his brother was not. The other one is a failure, but not because he is inadequate or not smart enough, but because of duty and responsibility that held him back. He found himself in a position that he was helpless to get out of for the rest of his life. I think this is often how people become successful or failures. This completely unveils the idealism of the traditional self-made man stories.

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  10. --Bachelard argues that "all really inhabited space bears the essence of the notion of home" (5) and that this sense of shelter fosters the imagination producing dreams and poetry. Reflecting upon your own memories and experiences, to what extent does this ring true? Or do you find it philosophical mumbo-jumbo?

    I believe that inhabited space can bear an essence of home even though it may not be your home or it could even be your first visit to the space. However I do think this has some limits. For example, when you go out of town to another state and stay with a friend for the first time, the space around you, the city is foreign to you as well as your surroundings in the inside space. When I went to France and stayed with a friend it was obvious that it was a home. The space had family photos, random knick knacks, and other homely decorations. This space was not home for me. Although more than welcome, I felt hesitant to move around the space without the accompaniment of someone who lived there. I felt intrusive in their space. I do believe that inhabited space can easily become or have notions of home because after we stay somewhere such as camp, a dorm, or even a hotel for some we begin to say "I'm going home" at the conclusion of an evening although that space is not one's home.

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  11. This story fits the self-made man story because of Howard. Howard leaves the farm and goes off and becomes rich. He later returns to the farm. This does not fit exactly though because he does not succeed because he is smart or talented, it is because he met the right people in the right place at the right time. He made his fortune by people being kind enough to help him out. He did not really have to work his way up the latter. And the other brother is not a failure because he stayed on the farm. He did not stay there because he was incompetent, or any less able to succeed than Howard,it is because Howard left and someone had to stay and take care of the mother and the farm. He did not stay on the farm because he was a failure, he chose to stay to help the family, since Howard essentially abandoned them. So I am not sure if this story fits the mold exactly, but I can see traces of it.

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  12. i don't tend to agree with bachelard. having been home in the last few days, the distinct feeling of truly being home is still fresh in my mind. the house i live in now is inhabited and, obviously, i spend more time here than i do back at my home. but when i walked into my house back in Gerald on tuesday there was an immediate sense of warmth. The first thing i said to my mom was, "my God it smells great in here." seems like an odd thing to say maybe, but my mom had just made some pies and the smell of wood smoke from our chimney was something i never knew i would miss. I get none of those feelings at my new house. its where i eat and sleep but it is not my home.

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  13. I agree with Bachelard that the notion of home does bring about poetry (or creativeness) or the imagination. However, I have a problem with his statement that "all really inhabited spaces bears the essence of the notion of home." My home, or places where I have spent a lot of time or have fond memories do make me feel comfortable and I am able to be inspired there. However, I can't help but argue that "all really inhabited spaces bear the essence of the notion of home." There are many places that are very much inhabited by myself and others that don't bring about a notion of home to me at all, such as the grocery store I visit practically every day or even campus itself. These are places that I visit nearly everyday and they don't necessarily bring about a notion of home. I suppose I just can't get the idea of spaces and places being different out of my head now and Bachelard, in my opinion, would have helped his argument by being more specific or qualifying the term "really inhabited space" more.

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  14. In my case, I think he is exactly right in assuming that "all really inhabited space bears the essence of the notion of home" (5). In writing about or thinking about a space that is central to my heart and my life, I tie it to a sense of homeyness. That being said, a lot of what I see and interpret as home, has shaped the way I imagine. When I say that, I'm simply saying that there are things I may or may not tend to think about or imagine to myself that I can classify as comfortable or "right", based off of the things at home that give me the feeling of what is comfortable or "right". I find a lot of times that what I tend to think about a lot usually ends up in a dream or two, so by saying that spaces can foster the imagination producing dreams, I would say that this is far from mumbo-jumbo, but more an accurate literary representation of how to interpret space

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  15. I disagree with Bachelard when he says that "all really inhabited space bears the essence of the notion of home". Just because somewhere is broken-in and inhabited does not mean at all that it is reminiscent of a home. There are plenty of spaces that I walk into where I feel that the residence is more of a "house" then a "home". The difference is the deep emotional connection that one has a with a home versus a house.

    I do think in a sense that a home fosters imagination, dreams and poetry. Like he said in his piece, we are not historians but instead poets. I agree. We tend to remember the past in the way we want to remember it. For example, some people remember their childhood as being all sunshine and rainbows and they completely block out any negative memories. Or maybe someone remembered a time in their life as being particularly horrible or gloomy when really they had many good times they just chose not to recall. In that way I think that we are definitely poets rather than historians.

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