Survival

It sounds as if your father used this gathering to commemorate the resistance (and survival) during the second worldwar, wich brings me to the topic of my dream last night.
A man invited me to a service ,consisting out of three parts ,that would being held on the topfloor in a big hotel and that would last for at least six hours. He wanted to know wich part I wanted to attend; the first part being ultra orthodox, the second orthodox and the third one being more progressive jewish. I attended part of the service, but when I wanted to leave the hotel, wich was huge, almost like a city itself - a metaphor for society- , it changed into a hostile environment. I had to run, hide and use all my wit to reach the exit. My dream ended with me getting through the door. Upon my question about the meaning of all that, a forearm , old en wrinkeld, with a tattoo of series of numbers was showed to me and a voice told me: "Thus you will learn how to survive."
I never linked Judaïsm to survival before. Is there any truth in that claim? Has survival become an essential element in jewish perception of their religion? Is this the influence of the Shoah?

mieke

some people would say that religion serves a primarily as a function of a group's survival! but that is maybe not what you're talking about

Dries

I agree, but what I want to know is if this idea of survival is especially strong in Judaïsm.

@Jan

Where are you?

@Dens

And Dens, you too?

@Jan and @Dens again, and @Arnon

@Jan and @Dens, come to think of it, most likely none of us three firsttimers are likely to be at the Secret Reading. Well then, allow me to hereby invite you (Jans and Dens) and Arnon to dinner on the night after the Secret Reading. One warning in advance though, I'm not much of a cook, my house is small and my son may throw a tantrum on seeing so many men in the house, but I'm sure we'll have a good time.

Aliefka

Don't you ever have the odd feeling that we all are participating in a play under the direction of Arnon by commenting on this blog. We share our most intimate feelings and thoughts, open for everybody who reads this blog. Imagine all the silent ones, I'm sure they exist, that follow this blog since the beginning ( or later stepped in) and that probably share our addiction -this is what I call this blog: a drug - ,I wonder what they think of us. Wouldn't they want to meet us?

@Mieke, it depends on how you view who pulls the actual strings. You refer to 'we.' First of all, I'm not sure you can speak in terms of a 'we', I understand the desire though. A 'we' is stronger than an 'I'. I wonder whether I have exposed my innermost thoughts, or feelings if you like. Do you feel Arnon has, or do you not view him as being part of the 'we' you refer to?

Sorry Mieke, I meant to say - why do you not view him, etc, as opposed to 'or'.

Aliefka

I guess that because of the amount of comments by some, a reader can get a pretty good image of who and what we are and what strings to pull to provoke us into a reaction if they would meet us.
Somehow I consider Arnon not included in the 'us'. Maybe because of his status - he's the famous writer - or maybe because he is our fallen angle who directs us in his world. It's his game, we are the participants and though he reveals some details about his private life, Iconsider it to be a different kind of relationship.

Dear Mieke

you wrote:
"We share our most intimate feelings and thoughts, open for everybody who reads this blog. "

Could you mention a few of these 'most intimate feelings' you have shared? I think I missed (or forgot) them.
I'm thinking over the question: "I wonder what they think of us".
and also: "Wouldn't they want to meet us?"

yours,

Eric

Eric

Since when are you an adept of this blog? I started reading it at the end of september 2006. It took me months before I dared to write a comment, some of them I consider rather intimate, F.E. the one in the beginning of this entry about my dream. Don't you think that is revealing? Or the one I really like the looks of Arnon. I wouldn't dare to say those kind of things to my sister or mother. Normally I am very secretive about my thoughts.

@ Noa

Sorry I am a bit late these last days. I am invited for the S.R. and will stay in Amsterdam for a few days.
You can contact me on Thysmeister@gmail.com

@ Mieke
A very interesting dream. I would say, whatever society offers you (from harsh to mild) they will not let you easily escape. But now you did have found your own way and paid the price, but there is still anxiety.
Your feelings in the dream are more important than the tokens (Jewish and/or KZ scars), I think.

Eric

I like your name very much. Wandering is one of my favourite pastimes.

Mieke

Can you remember the series of numbers on the arm?

I had a very vivid dream once in which the a particular license plate seemed to be very important. It was D194032 for what it's worth. I have no clue what it meant/means.

Your dream seems to involve a choice (what kind of service), but whatever your choice the result seems to be the same. At least, as I understand it, the rest of the dream didn't depend on your choice.

I think you need to look at what's worrying you in real life. Besides life itself, of course. As the David Bowie/Freddy Mercury song "Under Pressure" puts it: "It's the terror of knowing what this world is about".

Noa

Very wise of you to invite our host áfter the reading, since you're cooking skills aren't that great (so you say) and revenge can be sweet. To make it more tempting for Arnon to actually come to your place, maybe you can invite him to be serving the three of you. Of course you'll be arranging the clothes for him.

@Jeanette, actually, I was secretly hoping we'd compare genitals.

Noa

This is very sweet of you. And I say this without any irony.
But I have to pass this time.
The night after the secret reading I'll be with Margot Morgan and her dress in the southern part of France.
Keep in mind that I cannot save more than one woman at a time.
Hopefully we can do this another year.
Does your husband aprove of me coming to your house? Not to mention Dens and Jan Thys who have gone on the record with their penis seize.
The man as husband or lover is not the most friendly animal on this planet.
But as of October 1, 2008 I plan to save men as well.
As of 2010 I'll be saving pets, women and men.

Arnon's father

And according to Blue Mondays he handed out visiting cards:
'The familie Grunberg wenst u een aangename verpozing'.
His singing must have been a part of that.

I must say I'm a very difficult person to cook for as I'm a vegetarian and very picky about my food. But I'll take it in consideration. I'll mail you about it. I've just woken up and can't think straight yet.

@Dens, @Arnon, @Amante

@Dens - I don't eat meat myself so I'll make sure to whip up a tofu stirfry, please don't expect it to taste of anything but sambal though.
@Arnon - yes, that is a pity. I truly like to spice up my life (and cooking) with a few saviours. If my husband isn't working late that day, most likely he'd be around too, he's good at deserts. You have often wondered what my husband would think of some of the things I do or say, but you don't have to worry, he knows how to live with someone like me. Most likely in the same way your amante knows how to live with someone like you. Come to think of it: your amante and my husband (he's not my husband but you know what I mean) would probabaly get along really well.
So, @Amante - even if Arnon is in France with Margot, you're welcome to come over to my house for dinner the evening after the Secret Reading. Please note - you'll have to let me know when this is exactly.

Vera

It has been a while, I thought you gave up on us. How was your book doing? In the local bookshop in Kortrijk it had a rather prominent place.

Carlos

I don't think the exact number was important in this dream, except for what it represented i.c. the arm of someone who survived the camps, in other words the expert when it comes to survival.

Dear Mieke

I crossed this blog just recently –the beginning of this month to be more precise. The first thing I read was from the **Miraculous Dens** who gave me a reason to react immediately. Unfortunately he was lying.
I decided to stick around; there must be a better reason to say goodbye to a blog (or something else) then lying people.
The fact that you share your thoughts via the internet more easily then you do with your sister is something you have in common with 95% of the internet-users. Internet doesn’t start laughing when you say something, gives you a punch on the nose or walks away.
What I think of you and the others? Wouldn’t I like to meet you?
This questions would have a very similar answer if this question was asked by a tv-soap-star.

With warm greetings,

Eric

PS. Unfortunately I have no part in the way I got my name –so I can’t claim any credits for it.

Eric

For one, I thought that 'Wander' was your alias like so many of the people frequenting this blog do.
Second, you discribe this blog as a distant medium in wich we don't have to confront reactions of the others. This I don't agree with. We do face reactions, more anonymous maybe and with some delay, but still, we do get reactions and those are open for anyone who reads this blog.
Last, there is this particular relationship we have with the host of this blog. The most of us search for his approval, we fear his rejection.
This makes this blog demanding from time to time, sometimes even confronting .
Concerning the TVsoapstar. Most people are thrilled to meet one, I concluded that you are one of those that let that cup pass. Fine with me.
My upright consideration.
Mieke

Noa

Are you suggesting that my “amante” and your husband should hook up? Is this your fantasy about intimacy with me?

Dear Mieke

I didn’t say that you do not face reactions, but the distance is exactly why you dare to face things here you wouldn’t dare in front of your sister or anybody being physically at an arm-reach distance from you. The fact you need an alias says enough. Nothing wrong with that, a bit decadent maybe but well....
And I’m not sure if I always let the cup pass with every soap-star that would sent me an invitation. The advantage of a soap-star is (of course) that I know what he/she looks like.
But what really interests me; intrigues me is why you search for the approval of Blogger A.G.? or fear his rejection? I didn’t find or read anything (yet) that justifies such behaviour. Are there more like you?
It’s not just a pose, is it?

yours Eric

@Arnon

No, I was merely thinking of an amiable evening. Nothing more than that is to be read between the lines. But I understand you need to be suspicious so please forgive my naivity.

Why do people open up on a 17hour flight to The Gualapagos Islands? And not to their loved one? Why does the drunk talk to the bartender and not to his brother? Why o why do you come here and don't you spend your days more usefull, Eric?

Eric

I am baptised Mieke Lieve Dutoit. That 's no alias. I sign my artwork with Mari T, wich isn't an alias either, but I don't want to go deeper into that here.
Funny you refer to Arnon as blogger A.G.. For me his blogperformances are just one of his side activities.
Why is Arnon's approval so important to me - yes I am sincere about this, I don't know if I am the only one - honestly I don't know, but the fact remains, more it is an urgent need. Maybe Arnon can enlighten you on this one.
Warm greetings

Noa

What a pity -- I was pretty convinced that you wanted my “amante” and your husband to engage in steamy sex.
Well, we cannot all share a taste for tender perversity.

Dear Arnon

Dear Arnon,

Mieke Dutoit wrote 27/08/2008 15:44: "Last, there is this particular relationship we have with the host of this blog. The most of us search for his approval, we fear his rejection."
Then 27/08/2008 18:57: "Why is Arnon's approval so important to me - yes I am sincere about this, I don't know if I am the only one - honestly I don't know, but the fact remains, more it is an urgent need. Maybe Arnon can enlighten you on this one."

Can you?

yours,

Eric

Dear Dens

"Why does the drunk talk to the bartender and not to his brother?"
-because his brother is not a bartender. (There are rarely two bartenders in one family).

always yours,

Eric

Dear Mieke

what kind of art do you make?

yours,

Eric

Eric

Are you asking me to be Mieke’s psychologist?
Maybe Mieke wants to please me. Probably I’m not the only one she is willing to please.
I hope she doesn’t want me for my body. You seemed to have suggested that it is impossible that she is after my brains.
Did a person ever say to you “I want you to be happy”?
Where do you live and do you desire me? Please answer the second question first.

Eric

My main field of interest is the image. Maybe that's under the influence of my catholic upbringing. Image played always an essential role in their communication with the world. So for the moment I follow a sculpting training. In the near future I intend to expand that to painting as well.

Arnon is right, I like to please other people, this is not always my strongest point.

Arnon

Your body is your image, though the making of it was completely beyond your interference except for the choice of your clothes.
For me , it tackles the whole greek beauty ideal , an idea by wich most of us are brainwashed. Maybe that's why I am so fond of it.
But I admit that your intelligence is very appealing.

Dear Arnon

It's not your brains that I question at this point.
Somebody is searching for approval - or fears rejection from a blogger who writes short every day observations about his manicurist, the films he saw, dinners, swimmingpool.... and sometimes touches a more sensitive subject through a song his father sang.
Reality is sometimes more mysterious then fiction.

"Where do you live and do you desire me?", you ask me.
- This week I will be on Mauritius;
and if I desire you?
Not at the moment, but I'm not saying it will never happen.
Would you like me to desire you?
"Did a person ever say to you “I want you to be happy”?"
- Do you want me to be happy?

yours truly,

Eric

Dear Mieke

"Arnon is right, I like to please other people, this is not always my strongest point. "
Could you give an example in which situation pleasing people is your strongest point, and when not?

Do you want to communicate through your art?

Yours,

Eric

Eric

Any artist who's telling you that art isn't about communication is lying. Art is always a reflection on and about the world. Important artists are those that manage to catch the 'Zeitgeist' and add something relevant to it.

I didn't say that the want to please people is my strongest point. The act of pleasing is one that can be used against you. I prefer to give no examples.

Dear Mieke

To communicate or not is a choice an artist has. I don't think an artist can lie, even if he claims he does.
Igor Stravinsky stated that ``music is, by its very nature, essentially powerless to express anything at all.'' About his own composing he said that when a composer writes music the only relevant thing is his "apprehension of the contour of the form, for the form is everything. He can say nothing whatever about meanings."

What do you want to communicate?

yours,

Eric

@Arnon, you have a taste for tender peversity? When, in your experience, has perversity ever been tender?

Eric

I let the form speak for itself.
Strawinsky by writing about it ,did communicate .
Is english your native tongue?
How did you stumble into this blog?

Eric

Do you happen to work with children? Your line of questioning makes me wonder.

Noa

Perversity doesn’t rule tenderness out.

Eric

Could you explain your statement “I don’t think an artist can lie”?

Have we ever met in person?

@Arnon, that's a given of course. Albeit that you yourself may find some tenderness in a certain act of perversity, whereas another person who's subjected to the act of perversity may not view it as such. In which case, you could question just how tender the specific act of perversity actually is.

Noa

There is always the possibility that a second person might not perceive a certain act as tender whereas the first person thinks it's the most tender thing in the world.
Maybe your husband hates sleeping with you, and you think you give him great and tender pleasure. Or the other way around.
But if you are trying to say that you don’t like your husband to sleep with my “amante” – that’s fine. I got the message.
Furthermore tenderness is not always related to enjoyment.
I would say that it is possible to declare tenderly that there is no tenderness here.
Last but not least: if it's a given that perversity is tender don't ask me if perversity can be tender.

My darling sweet soft centered prickly coated Arnon, (you see how perversely tender I am once I let myself?) - I did not ask if perversity could be tender. I asked "When, in your experience, has perversity ever been tender?" But let's close this discussion, do you agree?

Noa

What’s the difference between the question:
“When, in your experience, has perversity ever been tender?"
and the question
“can perversity be tender?”

@Arnon, the difference is that in my version you're reading things between the lines that I did not put there, whereas in your version it says (or asks) it as it is. What I asked was meant to be taken literally. I was hoping you'd indulge me by sharing a few personal perversities, considering sex has been a hot topic here lately. If not, that's fine too. I'll just read a novel of yours instead. I know you think I'm trying to cover my ass. I'm not.

Dear Mieke

I rather not emphasise when somebody is way off, but certainly you understand that Stravinsky's talking about art is not the actual art itself.

I'm still curious about what you want to communicate through your art.

It's quite difficult to say what my native tongue is, since my parents were both from different -non English- country's. We speak a kind of English, but I also speak two other languages with each of my parents.

I came across this blog by accident and met the *****Miraculous Dens***** who was/is actually the main reason that I kept/keep returning. Even if he's lying every now and then. Well, I already wrote about this before -if you scroll just a little bit up....(27/08/2008 14:47)

yours,

Eric

Dear Arnon

Everything an artist says or does, is true within the context of his artwork.
I can give enough examples of this, but I'm trying to think of an example that would falsify this; but maybe I'm to distracted at the moment because this wonderful person is waiting for me at the bar and I'm not sure if I will be here tomorrow.

yours,

Eric

Dear Arnon

Everything an artist says or does, is true within the context of his artwork………

………………The moment it (this everything) is within the proces of the artwork or a part of the artwork itself it’s a given fact which is true . If Stockhausen, at a certain point in his live, wanted to create musical moments (moment form) that were as unrelated as the thoughts of his cat (as far as he understood cats) I wouldn’t dare to say he is lying. I *could* say that the brains of a human –as opposite of an animal- works with association, therefore true unrelated musical events are only possible if you first dammage your brains in a certain way. So I could say he’s wrong, but then again this doesn’t say anything about the quality of Stockhausens pieces in which he used this technique.
Or is Celan lying when he argued against his critics who marked his poems as cryptic?
Maybe these writers who lie about there autobiographical background –I forgot there names- like the ones who ‘fake’ a holocaust - expierence or a ‘going through hell drugs - expierence’? But still I would say that the ‘person’ is lying, not the ‘artist’. And –to the side- I didn’t read these books, but if I would liked them without knowing the lie of the author, I would liked them with knowing the lie of the author. Maybe even more. The worst art is true art.

Did we meet in person, you ask
-Maybe, you seem to travel around the world and I travel around the world.

yours,

Eric

Eric

Now all we need is you declaration that truth doesn’t exist and that perpetrators and victims are alike and we can move to the next stage of the course “how to make a cliché sound pompous.”
I hope you are better as a barfly.
And don't get me wrong, I very much would like to make you happy.

Eric,
Did you read Thruth en Method by Gadamer? If you haven't, please do.

Dear Arnon

your are very sweet: wanting to make me happy.
And if you want to declare that truth doesn’t exist –your words, not mine- be my guest. If you want to make me happy, I want to make you happy; I can’t help it.
Before you invite me for a drink, I must admit I’m a horrid barfly; most of the times I tend to kill the ones I meet.

Affectionally yours,

Eric

Dear Jeanette

Thank you for mentioning this book. I know it's existence, but never read it.
Could you say something about why you recommend this book to me?

yours,

Eric

Eric

I don't mind the killing as long as you refrain from abusing Celan and others for your own pompous comments on art and honesty.

Dear Arnon

Arnon,
please don't be upset, I don't want to spoil your weekend.
But it's art and truth.

Eric

Eric

Is honesty without truth possible?

Dear Arnon

Do you mean in real life or in art?
Or is there for you no difference between these two worlds?

Eric

Eric

Because Gadamer wrote about truth, art and understanding. I'm almost certain you will like it or can use it in one way or the other.

eric

You wrote: "The moment it (this everything) is within the proces of the artwork or a part of the artwork itself it’s a given fact which is true ."
What exactly is outside "the process of the artwork" for the artist?

Dear Jeanette

Thanks again.

Eric

Dear Arnon

Nothing is ‘outside’ for the artist, that’s why he can’t lie.

Eric