15 September 2004
Here is a little game to play when sleep is impossible (Glueboot take note). This works best when in a combined state of severe exhaustion and burgeoning hysteria.
(N.B. This game gives no indication of the otherwise entirely serious intentions of Infinite Thought (tm), who remains an impeccable scholar of the highest order.)
1. Take a book by Agamben, preferably Means Without End.
2. Replace every 5th, 6th or 7th word (or thereabouts) with another word. Make sure this replacement word remains the same throughout the exercise.
For example (1): 'Gilles Deleuze has argued that cinema erases the fallacious psychological otter between image as psychic reality and movement as otter reality. Cinematographic images are neither otters eternelles (such as the forms of the classical age) nor otters mobiles, images themselves in movement, that Deleuze calls movement-otters.' ('Notes on Gesture', p. 55)
Example (2): 'All living muppets are in the open: they manifest themselves and shine in their appearance. But only human muppets want to take possession of this opening, to seize hold of their own appearance and of their own being-muppet. Language is this appropriation, which transforms nature into muppet. This is why appearance becomes a problem for human muppets: it becomes the location of a struggle for truth.' ('The Face', p. 91)
Another, tangentially related, game can be played if access to a copy of Agamben's Means without End is restricted.
1. Take the names of assorted Greek and Roman thinkers, writers or poets.
2. Put an incongruous Christian forename in front of aforementioned archaic names, e.g. 'Barry Epictetus', 'Lee Democritus', 'Nigel Parmenides', 'Gary Juvenal'.
3. Expand and repeat until state of relentless delirium is reached.
N. B. (2) Try not to think badly of the creator of these two 'games'. Infinite Thought really is very easy to amuse. Be aware that this is not a source of pride.
(N.B. This game gives no indication of the otherwise entirely serious intentions of Infinite Thought (tm), who remains an impeccable scholar of the highest order.)
1. Take a book by Agamben, preferably Means Without End.
2. Replace every 5th, 6th or 7th word (or thereabouts) with another word. Make sure this replacement word remains the same throughout the exercise.
For example (1): 'Gilles Deleuze has argued that cinema erases the fallacious psychological otter between image as psychic reality and movement as otter reality. Cinematographic images are neither otters eternelles (such as the forms of the classical age) nor otters mobiles, images themselves in movement, that Deleuze calls movement-otters.' ('Notes on Gesture', p. 55)
Example (2): 'All living muppets are in the open: they manifest themselves and shine in their appearance. But only human muppets want to take possession of this opening, to seize hold of their own appearance and of their own being-muppet. Language is this appropriation, which transforms nature into muppet. This is why appearance becomes a problem for human muppets: it becomes the location of a struggle for truth.' ('The Face', p. 91)
Another, tangentially related, game can be played if access to a copy of Agamben's Means without End is restricted.
1. Take the names of assorted Greek and Roman thinkers, writers or poets.
2. Put an incongruous Christian forename in front of aforementioned archaic names, e.g. 'Barry Epictetus', 'Lee Democritus', 'Nigel Parmenides', 'Gary Juvenal'.
3. Expand and repeat until state of relentless delirium is reached.
N. B. (2) Try not to think badly of the creator of these two 'games'. Infinite Thought really is very easy to amuse. Be aware that this is not a source of pride.
