Consider: Cage at the piano.
The audience in their seats.
Cage at the piano—sitting,
hands by his side for 4 minutes
and 33 seconds.
I want to know:
Why?
What's the purpose, use, good
in being at a piano recital and
the piano player doesn't play?
What's the good of sitting in
a classroom & the teacher
don't teach? Silence.
“Against Interpretation”
Title of a famous '60's essay
by Susan Sontag criticizing
our habit of interpreting—all
the time saying THIS is what
IT means & here's the Reason
Why.
Quit doing that she says.
Quit interpreting.
For awhile.
Shelley's advice to himself if
not to other writers: Make the
Familiar Strange and the Strange
Familiar.
Why do that?
Why Familiarize? Why Strangify? .
What's going on?
I want to know why?
Is this the kind of thing you'd do
in Witherspoon? The Hamil
Complex? Make familiar strange?
Virginia Wolf tells a story of a
snails pace its pilgrimage across
a leaf in Kew Gardens , London
pass in conversation. Over head,
a small plane, clouds and sky.
Does IT beg for interpretation?
And John Cage—sitting still at
the piano: do you need to
know why?
Just take IT in.
IT, I said. No questions asked.
No reasons why. No because
and affect. No scapegoating—
THIS is what's going on:
a man sits at the piano, a
snail crosses a leaf while
people pass talking about
love and life. A small
plane circles overhead.
No questions asked.
Why?
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