#paulemarshall

My major objection to the race for theory, as some readers have probably guessed by now, really hinges on the question, "for whom are we doing what we are doing when we do literary criticism?" It is, I think, the central question today especially for the few of us who have infiltrated the academy enough to be wooed by it. The answer to that question determines what orientation we take in our work, the language we use, the purposes for which it is intended. "I can only speak for myself. But what I write and how I write is done in order to save my own life. And I mean that literally. For me literature is a way of knowing that I am not hallucinating, that whatever I feel/know is. It is an affirmation that sensuality is intelligence, that sensual language is language that makes sense. My response, then, is directed to those who write what I read and to those who read what I read - put concretely - to Toni Morrison and to people who read Toni Morrison (among whom I would count few academics). That number is increasing, as is the readership of Walker and Marshall. But in no way is the literature Morrison, Marshall, or Walker create  ported by the academic world. Nor given the political context of our society, do I expect that to change soon. For there is no reason, given who controls these institutions, for them to be anything other than threatened by these writers

'Mothers? Hell, they seldom say die! Fathers perhaps. Like my poor father. He just acts like I don't exist. But not mothers. They form you in that dark place inside them and you're theirs. For giving life they exact life. The cord remains uncut, the blood joined, and all that that implies. They hold you by their weakness, their whining, their sickness, their long-suffering, their tears and their money...We're all caught within a circle of women, I'm afraid, and we move from one to the next in a kind of blind dance.' His words swirled like blown sand around them, stinging her, and she wondered briefly if he had included her in that ruinous circle. She said, 'I guess your mother considers it a crime to paint.'

"In the somnolent July afternoon the unbroken line of brownstone houses down the long Brooklyn street resembled an army massed at attention. They were all one uniform red-brown stone. All with high massive stone stoops and black iron-grille fences staving off the sun. All draped in ivy as though mourning. Their somber façades, indifferent to the summer's heat and passion, faced a park while their backs reared dark against the sky. They were only three or four stories tall--squat--yet they gave the impression of formidable height."