Thoreau's A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers is one of the most beautiful, haunting works of American literature. It has been described as rambling and incoherent and, well, it is sometimes true. But it is also lyrical, philosophical, poetic, and dream-like. I'll be using this blog to think about Thoreau's Week in conjuction with my Hypertext and Literature class at Marylhurst University. It is my dream to create a hypertext edition of A Week.
I've been thinking lately about Lacan's connection of puns and word play with the unconscious and the way, it seems to me, in which Thoreau uses word play as a means to explore the undercurrents (so to speak) of his physical, intellectual and literary journey. There is the ever present image of the fish in this journey, those flitting, almost-seen shadows.
Thoreau writes: "It is worth the while to make a voyage up this stream, if you go no further than Sudbury, only to see how much country there is in the rear of us . . ." I am interested in exploring that wide country.
2 comments:
Thanks for the Ells blog - nice connectivity. I am at sea for now, but see you tomorrow. Jackie
I am still grappling with the thought of how to represent the Thoreau writing as a website. It is easy to grab literal images: fog on the river, a fisherman. I have ready images of both (one I took on Saturday on the Willamette) yet this in not what, or all he is saying or conveying and so the images feel false, yet the question remains how to convey/enhance as a website/hypertext these writings?
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