Finnegan’s Wake
I was reading “The Advanced TeXbook” by David Salomon (funny name: think Solomon, David’s grandson?). Anyhow, he spoke of where all the people who write books on TeX get their quotes from; he also mentioned James Joyce’s Finnegan’s Wake. Supposedly, that book has every word in the English language, and more. In searching for the text online, I stumbled across this quote, which is related in a strange way I don’t feel like exploring. Maybe I’ll add this to my quote db one day. It reminds me of Jorge Borges’ idea of textual cosmologies, and Protagoras’ statement that man is the measure of all things.
Talcott Parsons’ idea of glosses: A gloss is a total system of perception and language. For instance, this room is a gloss. We have lumped together a series of isolated perceptions–floor, ceiling, window, lights, rugs, etc.–to make a totality. But we had to be taught to put the world together in this way. A child reconnoiters the world with few preconceptions until he is taught to see things in a way that corresponds to the descriptions everybody agrees on. The world is an agreement. The system of glossing seems to be somewhat like walking. We have to learn to walk, but once we learn we are subject to the syntax of language and the mode of perception it contains.
Possibly relevant posts:
- Physical Semantics (7/2/2002)
- Life’s good again (2/27/2003)
- ESL and the mind (9/26/2002)