On Jan 2, 2013, at 2:47 PM, Louis Proyect <[email protected]> wrote: > Norman Mailer: "The White Negro": > > But the Negro, not being privileged to gratify his self- esteem with the > heady satisfactions of categorical condemnation, chose to move instead > in that other direction where all situations are equally valid, and in > the worst of perversion, promiscuity, pimpery, drug addiction, rape, > razor-slash, bottle-break, what-have-you, the Negro discovered and > elaborated a morality of the bottom, an ethical differentiation between > the good and the bad in every human activity from the go-getter pimp (as > opposed to the lazy one) to the relatively dependable pusher or > prostitute. Add to this, the cunning of their language, the abstract > ambiguous alternatives in which from the danger of their oppression they > learned to speak (“Well. now, man, like I’m looking for a cat to turn me > on ..“), add even more the profound sensitivity of the Negro jazzman who > was the cultural mentor of a people, and it is not too difficult to > believe that the language of Hip which evolved was an artful language, > tested and shaped by an intense experience and therefore different in > kind from white slang, as different as the special obscenity of the > soldier which in its emphasis upon “ass” as the soul and “shit” as > circumstance, was able to express the existential states of the enlisted > man. ' Wow, that guy sure was full of shit a lot of the time.
Doug _______________________________________________ pen-l mailing list [email protected] https://lists.csuchico.edu/mailman/listinfo/pen-l
