When I lived in Paris, people called it a "déclic", and I have never found a word to satisfy in English. Revelation? Of course fucking not. I'm not St. Paul collapsing into Carravaggio-ey light and starting to think nasty things about women. Realization? No, what has happened is more fundamental than the sudden memory of having an extra chocolate chip cookie shoved into the back of the lunchbox. A jumbly welter of rubbish has been charging about my head, kaleidoscope-like, for months, and sometime last night the kaleidoscope clicked into a shape that I can read like a text. Those clever French call that a déclic, and it is a phenomenom so central to how I live that I do think there should be a word for it in my first language.
Anyways, it wasn't about anything really fit to print about here - it was regarding the doctoral proposal - I just wanted to whine for awhile about how we don't have a word for déclic. If I'm wrong, and we do have such a word, please tell me. And yes, "moment of clarity" is too long. And too, somehow, fey. I want something foxy, quick, and clean - like déclic.
Something which aided in my déclic was the writing of Hannah Arendt, which has the effect of pulling my brain flat and steam-ironing it. On Violence is so nice - probably not so known now because it seems dated, an appearance whose fault would lie at the doors of the people who'd think it was dated. If anything I find the appendices more interesting than the body, whose subject revolves around the self-evident if ignored fact that power and violence are two extremely different things and that violence becomes an extremely attractive tool to people who feel their power is slipping away (On Violence came out in the very late 60s or very early 70s; it seemed to be inspired by perceptions of violence in the various student and civil rights movements as well as the response to them.) In the appendices she's free to wander for a few paragraphs about whatever, and oof - the indirect conclusions she comes to about consumer culture. . . my point is, I wish she was alive and in charge of the universe.
Have a good week, suckers. . .
9 commenti:
epiphany: a sudden, intuitive perception of or insight into the reality or essential meaning of something, usually initiated by some simple, homely, or commonplace occurrence or experience.
maybe?
i need me one of those declics. i can't find a freaking tag line that will drive the entire promo and decor for the party in early december. doh!
Yeah; I guess epiphany is the right meaning, but it sounds too fancy. Like it should be on television.
Just open your inner ears (not literally) - I'm sure it'll come to you!
I like declic and I don't see why we can't use it in English. Thanks for bringing to the table.
I like declic too - I'm sure it can survive in the English language like deja-vu has, for example!
You must feel so great to have things click for your proposal!
Oops, posted the same thing twice. Duh! It's Monday..
I love that about English - how gleefully we can plunder other languages! Mwahahaha!
That's the spirit!
Just out of curiosity, what do you think a 'homely' occurrence might be??
I don't know. 'Homely' is an adjective synonomous with 'plain' in the sense of ugly, which doesn't make sense in describing an occurence. But some people have lately been using it in the sense of 'homey', suggesting domesticity, which is wrong and silly but perhaps the case here. What's the context?
Oh, I was just reading the description that Lady provided above. It just jumped out at me as bizarre!
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