Arnon Grunberg

Good

Act

My friend P sent me this quote by Susan Sontag:

‘Jerking off the universe is perhaps what all philosophy, all abstract thought is about: an intense, and not very sociable pleasure, which has to be repeated again and again. It is a rather good description, anyway, of what Sartre’s own phenomenology of consciousness. And, certainly, it’s a perfect fair description of what Genet is about.’

I would say that this is also perfect description of the act of writing.

It’s the removal of all solipsistic tendencies in an act that is not a sociable pleasure, to say the least, that might even look like solipsism.

A sentimentalist would say: I’m making love with the universe.

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