The Barrcast

In this mini-episode we challenge Shelly Kagan's claim that we are lucky to be alive.

Full course: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLEA18FAF1AD9047B0. Episode #23 is the one we're reacting to.

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This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit barrcast.substack.com

In this mini-episode we read from Gertrude Stein's portrait on Picasso.

Full text: www.rodoni.ch/PICASSO/Stein-on-Picasso.pdf

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Enjoying the Barrcast? Subscribe on your favorite podcast app: www.stitcher.com/podcast/barrcast. And consider supporting us on Patreon! https://www.patreon.com/nsbarr

This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit barrcast.substack.com

In this episode we talk about nihilism, or at least my conception of it. We explore the claim that rather than getting past nihilism, we should embrace it, incorporate it, and employ it from time to time as a tool.

We discuss two great texts:

The Parable of the Madman: http://www.historyguide.org/europe/madman.html
The Snow Man: https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems-and-poets/poems/detail/45235

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Enjoying the Barrcast? Subscribe on your favorite podcast app: www.stitcher.com/podcast/barrcast. And consider supporting us on Patreon! https://www.patreon.com/nsbarr

This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit barrcast.substack.com

In episode 10 we're joined by our friend Bruno Valle(https://twitter.com/brunovalle) to discuss the narrative around the Olympics in Rio, where Bruno lives. Later (27:00), we talk more about Meaningness and Bruno makes the case for his Stage 5 status.

Further reading:
* meaningness.com/metablog/how-to-think
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plague_Inc

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Enjoying the Barrcast? Subscribe on your favorite podcast app: www.stitcher.com/podcast/barrcast. And consider supporting us on Patreon! https://www.patreon.com/nsbarr

This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit barrcast.substack.com

A podcast pivot! In this episode we discuss some of the themes coming out of work by David Chapman for the hypertext book Meaningness.

Posts that we mention:

https://meaningness.wordpress.com/2015/10/12/developing-ethical-social-and-cognitive-competence/
http://meaningness.com/metablog/stem-fluidity-bridge

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Enjoying the Barrcast? Subscribe on your favorite podcast app: www.stitcher.com/podcast/barrcast. And consider supporting us on Patreon! https://www.patreon.com/nsbarr

This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit barrcast.substack.com

In episode 8 we read and translate Horacio Quiroga's poem "Tu Agonía."

Original: http://www.poesi.as/hq01078.htm

Translation:

the afternoon was dying and
your voice was a silk piano
and your wet hand felt
limp in mine.

your fingers anointed me
with something like
forgiveness and you spoke
and the gates closed behind us.

the summer gasped
and the daisies sighed
and the afternoon died,
bleeding out and into
your temples
and on those purple
lakes I saw two swans
heralding your agony.

This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit barrcast.substack.com

In episode 7 we read Borges' essay "El Idioma Analítico de John Wilkins." Spanish and English versions here:

languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/myl/ldc/wilkins.html

languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll/?p=8930

This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit barrcast.substack.com

In this episode 6 we visit the work of California-based Language poet Rae Armantrout. We read her poem "Integer" in English and Spanish, and then provide a translation of our own.

About Rae Armantrout: www.poetryfoundation.org/bio/rae-armantrout

JotDown interview: www.jotdown.es/2012/03/rae-armantrout-me-inquieta-tener-una-experiencia-que-no-se-puede-articular/

John Cage Mushroom Haiku: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XNzVQ8wRCB0

INTEGRA

1

Un qué?
Un agarre?
No manos.
No colección
de estrellas. Algo oscuro
lo impregna.

2

Metáfora
es sacrificio ritual.

Mata el parecido.
No,
metáfora es homepatía.

Una célula sana
se exhibe inhibicion de contacto.

3

Estes créditos temporales
ya no estarán reflejados
en tu próximo período de facturación.

4

"Oscuro" significando
no reflejando,

no dispuesto
a sugerencia.

This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit barrcast.substack.com

In this episode we read Chapter 68 of Julio Cortázar's Hopscotch. It's an erotic prose poem reminiscent of Lewis Carroll's Jabberwocky. Here's the passage:

Apenas él le amalaba el noema, a ella se le agolpaba el clémiso y caían en hidromurias, en salvajes ambonios, en sustalos exasperantes. Cada vez que él procuraba relamar las incopelusas, se enredaba en un grimado quejumbroso y tenía que envulsionarse de cara al nóvalo, sintiendo cómo poco a poco las arnillas se espejunaban, se iban apeltronando, reduplimiendo, hasta quedar tendido como el trimalciato de ergomanina al que se le han dejado caer unas fílulas de cariaconcia. Y sin embargo era apenas el principio, porque en un momento dado ella se tordulaba los hurgalios, consintiendo en que él aproximara suavemente su orfelunios. Apenas se entreplumaban, algo como un ulucordio los encrestoriaba, los extrayuxtaba y paramovía, de pronto era el clinón, la esterfurosa convulcante de las mátricas, la jadehollante embocapluvia del orgumio, los esproemios del merpasmo en una sobrehumítica agopausa. ¡Evohé! ¡Evohé! Volposados en la cresta del murelio, se sentían balparamar, perlinos y márulos. Temblaba el troc, se vencían las marioplumas, y todo se resolviraba en un profundo pínice, en niolamas de argutendidas gasas, en carinias casi crueles que los ordopenaban hasta el límite de las gunfias.

You can find the English translation here:

https://books.google.com/books?id=8PcCBAAAQBAJ&pg=PT418&dq=novalisk&hl=en&sa=X&ei=-SkgVYOsJ4GSNvOfgcAI&ved=0CB0Q6AEwAA#v=onepage&q&f=false

This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit barrcast.substack.com

This is a bizarro episode! Today we read a poem in English, and discuss it in Spanish.

Here's Stevens' original poem:

http://www.poetryfoundation.org/poem/248826

And here's our translation into Spanish:

El poema que tomó el lugar de una montaña

Ahí estaba, palabra por palabra,
el poema que tomó el lugar de una montaña.

Él respiraba su oxígeno,
Aun mientras el libro se acostaba en el polvo de la mesa.

Le recordaba como había necesitado
un lugar para ir en su propia dirección,

Como había recompuesto los pinos,
Desplazado las piedras y hecho su camino por las nubes,

Para la vista que sería correcta,
Donde estaría completo en una completud sin explicación:

La piedra exacta en donde su inexactitud
descubriría, por fin, la vista a donde había avanzado,

Donde podría acostarse y, contemplando el mar abajo,
reconocer su hogar, único y solitario.

This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit barrcast.substack.com