As Consciousness Is Harnessed to Flesh Journals and Notebooks, 1964-1980
Reviews
Vor ein paar Wochen habe ich mich auf einen Susan Sontag Read-athon begeben, eine Autorin, Essayistin, Welt-Intellektuelle die ich schon sehr lange bewundere und über die ich nach einer kürzlich gesehenen Dokumentation gerne noch mehr erfahren wollte. Als mir Daniel Schreibers Biografie “Susan Sontag. Geist und Glamour” in die Hände fiel, beschloss ich dieses “Mehr erfahren” großflächig in Angriff zu nehmen. Neben der Biografie besorgte ich mir die Tagebücher “Reborn. Early Diaries 1947 – 1963″ und “As Consciousness is Harnessed to Flesh: Diaries 1964 – 1980″ sowie das Rolling Stone Interview “The Doors and Dostojewski” und begann, diese parallel zu lesen. Ein sehr intensives Eintauchen in das Leben und die Gedanken eines anderen Menschen. Die komplette Rezension findet ihr hier: http://bingereader.org/2014/12/06/the...
Highlights
Dec. 31, 1999. I would like to be there. It will be one of the great kitsch moments of world history.
Dorian Gay [sic]
Anyone who touches me gives me something in that instant: my body.
I, in my corner, with my monstrous needs. And all of them over there! I vow not to make a fool of myself.
Opposite of hide oneself is not show oneself (which is the same thing, inverted) but something beyond showing or hiding (shamelessness or shame).
Is beauty important? Maybe, sometimes, it's boring. Maybe what's more important is "the interesting"+ everything that's interesting eventually seems beautiful.
The unpleasantness of the feedback-other people's reac- tions to my work, admiring or adverse. I don't want to react to that. I'm critical enough (+ I know better what's wrong).
Im not “saying something." I'm allowing "something" to have a voice, an independent existence (an existence independent of me).
Have I done all the living I'm going to do? A spectator now, calming down. Going to bed with the New York Times. Yet I thank God for this relative peace resignation. Meanwhile the terror underneath grows, consolidates itself. How does anyone love?
One of the reasons I couldn't not have a job + just write (as Alfred did in NY) is that I can't stand to ask, to become in- debted to people as one does, when one begs, borrows, + steals to live. Need to be independent, i.e. not to trust. Not just middle-class timidity
I don't care about someone being intelligent; any situation between people, when they are really human with each other, produces "intelligence"
pg 59
Q: Do you succeed always? A: Yes, I succeed thirty percent of the time. Q: Then you don't succeed always. A: Yes I do. To succeed 30% of the time is always.
pg 38
The desire for reassurance. And, equally, to be reassured. (The itch to ask whether I'm still loved; and the itch to say, I love you, half-fearing that the other has forgotten, since the last time I said it.) "Quelle connerie'" [“What idiocy"]
pg 7
To say a feeling, an impression is to diminish it — expel it. But sometimes feelings are too strong: passions, obsessions. Like romantic love. Or grief. Then one needs to speak, or one would burst.
pg 7