[from J. Rothenberg and G. Quasha, America a Prophecy: A New Reading of American Poetry from Pre-Columbian Times to the Present, 1974]
LOGOGENESIS: Presented below are eight of ninety new words coined & defined by a “chronic schizophrenic.” Psychiatrist David V. Forrest who compiled them labelled the process of mind “poesis” & defined it by such characteristics as a tendency to concrete thinking, a use of self-created symbols “which have no consensual validation,” a logic of punning, metaphor, and “transient resemblances” to establish relations between things in the real world. Unlike related processes among “primitiives,” surrealists, etc., this poesis is said to be without a cultural context, dooming the patient (it would seem) to greater isolation & lack of communal outlet. The patient himself, “when asked at what age he began to coin words … replied: ‘Age 20, when I developed a sense of humor.’”
[ANONYMOUS]
Schizophrenic Definitions
Py’ro.im’pe.tra’tion: Firestarting. From pyro meaning fire, im meaning in, and petration, a form of rock, peter meaning rock. Fire and rocks. Grass burns in connection with rocks. Rocks can burn.
Pho’to.chro.nog’ra.phy: Study of time by light with a timepiece.
Hor’o.lo.ga’tion: Horology and separation; to keep apart in time. On April 28, 1964, I was alone with my clocks and jewelry – clocks, watches and diamond rings, sometimes pearls – watching TV, having a good time, talking with my parents, keeping away from bad company, with my clocks standing far apart, separating those that work and didn’t. All people are like clocks with a heart ticking inside.
Pho’to.sec’tion.al’i.ty: Sectioning by light, of oranges and other fruits into quarters, eights, and sixteens.
Cir’clin.gol’o.gy: Study of a rolling circle. A fruit can in the form of a cylinder rolling. Rollers of presses.
Ster’e.o.trans.la’tion: Solid change of language, solid changing of interpretation, word of overidolization. The most cherished word of English. Respected, cherished, lovable words, solid, hard. Solid understanding. Cherishing, begetting. One word begets another, with a similar meaning and opposite.
Os’te.o.pho’to.car’di.ol’o.gy: Bones, lights and hearts. Bones to begin with. Light in the form of scintillation, illuminating, lighting up. One of the most brilliant words, because of “photo.” Like superillumination.
Sem’i.cen’ti.os’te.o.pho’to.seis’mo.phys’i.o.ple’o.pol’y.com’pu.ta’tion: The longest word, having 50 letters. The act of boning up to count up to 50, a counting done by light, on earth, by nature (from natural resources), more than 25, many.
People who do not coin words have simply not grasped that
ReplyDeletethe entrained line
and its pre-identification
with what is supposedly called self or thought
is a great problem with the specie.
writing has always been drawing,
and words will always be pictures.
when someone disputes this, you'll know they are against the freedom of the individual, and in a larger sense against real experience as an organic process
instead of a drone of the fictional abstraction sometimes
called "society" which is nothing more than a set of protocols
seemingly bent on destroying the imagination, or making it understandable
when consciousness itself is something utterly singular, unrecreatable except by baking
in the stomach oven.
As Norman O. Brown so aptly spoke
in Love's Body
Is is the original mistake in every sentence.
I would take that further and say
that the entrainment of the copula
by socialized thought-forms
makes of IS
a life sentence.
The sad thing is that Schitzophrenics aren't able to
understand that society actually is insane, but that you have to be able to reproduce that insanity
in order to transcend it.
genius
as a generative nous (noose)
can be generous
but is generally rustic
give them enough rope
and they will hang you
words are pictures
that tend to "draw" meaning
to themselves..
draw reversed
is ward
word
ward
and the war of d
wart
d being the pavoninic ego flourish
of pecking order control games
the heavy thumb play
of entrainment or centention boxing
mind is the space of contention.