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November 17, 2004
Hard to read
Buckminster Fuller writes in an author's note for Synergetics that you need to go over and over almost the same ground in order finally to understand.
Friedrich Nietzsche explained in the preface to Genealogie der Moral that you'd better be a cow than a man to appreciate his work and in any case not a "modern person." Digesting his work requires "Wiederkäuen," rumination.
Ludwig Wittgenstein tells us right away in the preface to his Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus, "This book will perhaps only be understood by those who have themselves already thought the thoughts which are expressed in it--or similar thoughts. It is therefore not a text-book."
Jesus's observation that "everything comes in parables" seems to stem from the same vein of warnings to the reader, warnings that it's not going to be easy.
Yet I get the impression these four men slaved to make their words as straightforward as they could, that they did what Kurt Vonnegut says is so hard, which is the work of making things simple for the reader. It must've been hard indeed when they started out.
Posted by Mark at November 17, 2004 09:33 PM