kristeva-sublime

September 19, 2024

When the starry sky, a vista of open seas or a stained glass window shedding purple beams fascinate me, there is a cluster of meaning, of colors, of words, of caresses, there are light touches, scents, sighs, cadences that arise, shroud me, carry me away, and sweep me beyond the things that I see, hear, or think. The “sublime” object dissolves in the raptures of a bottomless memory. It is such a memory, which, from stopping point to stopping point, remembrance to remembrance, love to love, transfers that object to the refulgent point of the dazzlement in which I stray in order to be. As soon as I perceive it, as soon as I name it, the sublime triggers — it has always already triggered — a spree of perceptions and words that expands memory boundlessly. I then forget the point of departure and find myself removed to a secondary universe, set off from the one where “I” am — delight and loss. Not at all short of but always with and through perception and words, the sublime is a something added that expands us, overstrains us, and causes us to be both here, as dejects, and there, as others and sparkling. A divergence, an impossible bounding. Everything missed, joy — fascination.

Previous
Next

Thought:

“Yes, it seems to me that the fairies and the genies had it right when they said, “be careful what you wish for, cuz you’re gonna get it.” It’s worked out in my life. I’m not gonna tell you what I wished for, but I got it. It always comes back, there’s always a catch, and the catch kicks you in the teeth.”

Stanley Elkin

INSTAGRAM

BANDCAMP

YOUTUBE