On Reading Crowds and Power

Highlight Actions Enable or disable annotations 1 Cloven Cloven Divided.About the title. The book Crowds and Power(Masse und Macht[1960], translated from German) was written by Elias Canetti; it is a study of how crowd behavior (ranging from religious congregations to mob violence) relates to obedience to state rule. Canetti (1905-1994) was a Bulgarian born novelist, playwright, and non-fiction writer who wrote in German and won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1981. The second section of this poem, in italics, is a long quotation/translation from this book , we are incorporate incorporate United in one body. Compare part of one petition from the Book of Common Prayer: “and that we are very members incorporate in the mystical body of thy Son” (from The Order for the Administration of The Lord’s Supper or Holy Communion). , our wounds simple but mysterious. We have some wherewithal to bide our time on earth. Endurance is fantastic Fantastic Imaginative or fanciful; remote from reality. ; ambulances battling at intersections, the city intolerably en fête en fête French for being festive, perhaps being dressed in festive attire . My reflexes are words themselves rather than standard flexures flexures Acts of bending, such as bowing or kneeling of civil power. In all of this Cassiopeia's Cassiopeia’s Cassiopeia is both a star constellation in the northern sky, and in Greek mythology an Ethiopian queen and the mother of Andromeda; a beautiful woman, but whose vanity and arrogance led to her downfall. John Milton refers to Cassiopeia in Il Penseroso: “Or that starr’d Ethiop queen that strove / To set her beauty’s praise above / The sea nymphs, and their powers offended” (lines 19-21). a blessing as is steady Orion Orion Orion is both the easily recognized star constellation and in Greek mythology a hunter. beloved of poets beloved of poets A list of poems naming Orion includes: Milton’s Paradise Lost , Tennyson’s Locksley Hall , Teasdale’s “ Winter Stars ” , Pickthall’s “ Stars ” , Eliot’s “ Sweeney among the Nightingales ” , and Frost’s “ The Star-splitter .” . Quotidian Quotidian Daily, everyday natures ours for the time being I do not know how we should be absolved Absolved To declare someone free from blame, guilt, or responsibility; also, in Christian theology, to remit or forgive someone for a sin. or what is fate. 2 Fame is not fastidious about the lips Fame is not fastidious about the lips In A Treatise of Civil Power(2007), Geoffrey Hill notes: “section 2 is a paragraph from Elias Canetti’s chapter on ‘Fame’, transposed, with slight changes of wording, into strophic form.” For more on this book by Canetti, see the note about the title above. which spread it. So long as there are mouthsto reiterate the one name it does notmatter whose they are.The fact that to the seeker after famethey are indistinguishable from each otherand are all counted as equal shows that thispassion has its origin in the experienceof crowd manipulation. Names collecttheir own crowds. They are greedy, live their ownseparate lives, hardly at all connectedwith the real natures of the men who bear them. 3 But hear this: that which is difficult preserves democracy; you pay respect to the intelligence of the citizen. Basics are not condescension. Some tyrants make great patrons. Let us observe this and pass on. Certain directives parody at your own risk. Tread lightly with personal dignity and public image. Safeguard the image of the common man the common man There is another version of this poem, printed in Geoffrey Hill’s book A Treatise of Civil Power(2007), with a fourth section added. .