At 11:08 AM 28/11/2006 -0800, you wrote:
>Kerry J. Schooley wrote:
>
>"Transcend," in my Canuck Oxford, is to "be beyond
the
>range or grasp of (human experience, reason,
belief
>etc.)" ...To have low expectations for
transcendence
>is to deny it's practical existence. Which, unlike
any
>other literary form, noir does.
>
>*************
>Well if that's the definition of transend(ence),
then
>denying its practical existence isn't much of
a
>stretch.
Yeah, I'd have thought so too, but that's the definition and
there it is, a major impulse in western culture just the
same, as you indicate in your second paragraph.
> And there are several other literary
genres
>that approach noir's no-transcendence
endings.
Approach perhaps, but name the others that deny
transcendence, please.
>It is the quest for transcendence (or the
>lower-on-the-totem-pole survival) that is
significant.
>It is the struggle that lends life its nobility,
even
>doused with a serious dose of futility.
Yes, it's so hard to give up the notion of transcendence,
especially when it's been drummed into us from the get-go,
but that's no reason for a school of thought or genre not to
tackle the subject. Just the opposite, in fact. What if life
isn't noble? What if that's just some value people ascribe to
life in an attempt to make sense of it? What if nobility is
just some label we attach to our behaviour to lend value to
self-interest? What if it doesn't work and all we're left
with is survival?
Oh my, Kerry
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