Roger Roger Roger

Which they pronounce as in the Dictionary of Phrase and Fable. I was disappointed. His second lecture introduced the term Il y a and frankly he made it sound intelligible. I could grasp the meaning. Anyone not fooled by his Flemish accent could have done the same.

In the beginning the world was formless and void or hubble and bubble, basically it was Il y a, pure existence, existence so pure it does not really exist. The self emerges from it. The self is held in terror by Il y a. Here he compares il y a to a Fascist State. Il y a tries to subjugate personal identity into the amorphous mass of marching same dressed goons. It is like insomnia hence the idea that it is the terror of the night. When you desire and will sleep yet you are powerless to do so ironically, because you desire unconsciousness. It is like psychosis. He compares it to the military calculus of acceptable casualties. Once you start thinking that way all life becomes meaningless. Apparently Levinas was too polite to express these thoughts to a NATO generals meeting, but why attend.

Perhaps NATO generals are morons or perhaps not how would Levinas find out. So first disappointment is he explains the terms so an idiot could understand them. But he has also taken away their power. He has in effect acted like Il y a on the terms absorbing them into something drab and powerless.

Or perhaps he knew what the NATO generals would say. I fight for those unwilling or unable to fight for themselves. When I look on the city lights behind me at night I whisper no one is going to hurt you tonight not on my watch. What Levinas called the Anthropology of the Hero as advanced by Heidegger and Hitler. A less complex debate perhaps but I am not sure if I should condemn Nazism and Heidegger out of hand. Heidegger brought out a paper defending National Socialism from those who misunderstood its nobility at the same time as Levinas brought out his philosphical dispute with Hitlerism, 1934. This might have been a more interesting debate however I had used up my question after the first session when Fr Jose met me and told me how to get a ticket for Kottayam. That was the other disappointment.

All I had said was, well the first session was a good introduction, stories about Levinas how he met, the talmudic school library where Levinas took him with a silent Librarian who knew all, and a taciturn Rebbe who spoke only to further discussion but did not yet know all. Excellent story went on to show basic rabbinical/qabalistic hermeneutic, not that interesting perhaps but the myth of a centre of learning with the buzz of ideas, students smoking and eating, (modern talmudic scholars then). And the personal history of Levinas and the pogroms under the Czar and the Shoah under Hitler. Interesting start Levinas has two birthdays one for Lithuania and the Julien Calendar and one for France and the Gregorian Calendar. Roger Burrgraeve can tell a tale I'll give him that.

All I had asked was and I prefaced it so as not to cause offence, great man wonderful stories etc, but just as I condemn Hitler and the Shoah because it was evil and at the same time have full faith in Germany and its right to exist, and given we all have blind spots, is it not a failing of Levinas that he could not condemn the State of Israel even after the Shatilah massacre and given today that a UN prosecutor has indicted Israel for war crimes and crimes against humanity for which an Israeli President could be arrested if he visited France isn't it yeah well it was a long question and got a longer response. He asked if his answer helped explain and I did the shoulder hand shake thing which meant not really but you did a good job matey peep.

So I was not allowed to ask any further questions and part of me thinks these peeps go on about how they need questions, he quoteth from Levinas we become possibilities for each other. In the end they want some arselick question that has no meaning or they get some lecturer from the philosophy department asking something incomprehensible that wasn't to do with the lecture. But then why do I bother.

There is a sense that the Il y a prefigures the Other. It views me as I view the Other and my response to Il y a just as the Other's response to me, the precognitive interruption of the Face, is Thou Shalt not Kill. Oh and he set the stage. We end up with these emergent selves doing deals out of self interest to form society. But this is just another calculus of war carried on by different means.

But if he makes the central teaching of Levinas intelligible, if he reduces it to examinable propositions then he will certainly be a good seminary teacher but what can he possibly know of Levinas. I want a poet and a dance and more stories of magickal qabalistic practices and the disordered pouring of coffee.

Oh and I got a return to Kottayam for less than a tenner. Ok I wanted a return train journey in an A/C cabin and I came away with a return one day later than I had wanted by non A/C bus but I figure I get from A to B so job done. Reminds me of a debriefing I had on a counselling skills programme, the actor client had said if he were going to choose a counsellor it would be me, well man from del monte and all that so the tutor went through my session pointing out good and bad, and I said bit like a wing commander going on about keeping the bombing pattern tight, gnat's arse hmmph, how did you think you did Coutinho, well sir 90% on target. yes but you also blew up a convent. Yeah but the others were on target. Thing is after we dropped the bombs, and get back home safe we just want to get laid get drunk and sell some double glazing, but obviously for us that means coco and an early night because tomorrow's a big day, and don't shoot the messenger but coco is stuck in traffic and the animal rights johhnies have released the companion so just an early night then. Oh no Coco is not a woman, he's a man's man, Belgian truck driver with his companion Muffin, what am I trying to say. Perhaps like Levinas I should remain polite and discuss these things with my blog.

Not really sure if I have any more to say about Il y a, the relationship between Il y a and the self is one of Love, and even the unhealthy calculus based on self interest is also Love. So all that needs is for Love to become who she is, to transcend. And although it can't have been his intention I have gained more respect for Hitler's anthropology of the Hero, it surely cannot be a better ideology to cut the hands and feet off our heroes because they show the rest of us up, after all that is what the Wagnerian myth suggests the nasty evil Jewish dwarfs did to the blonde haired blue eyed Goths and their Valkyrie friends. Can we not level up people. I have a bagsied a small meteorite several miles in diameter as the engagement ring for my beloved. So what if KRSN can hit a fish eye at 300 paces. One day we shall be God. That is how we honour the widow the orphan and the stranger not by disparaging muscle bound German swordsmen, if they want to wear loin cloths why not though it's now obvious why Fascists are really into uniforms and the odd seduction is that their molls have by far the best uniforms in terms of fetish or pure sex appeal, is that not perhaps the conatus essendi trying to break free from the Il y a, but you won't get Roger talking like that, he offered to continue discussions if anyone met him on campus but I don't think he meant me.