The Ruins of the Night

I once had a real dislike for poetry. Too pompous, I thought. Jonathan Swift's scatological poems have played a significant role in bringing me into the poetic fold. This is one of my favourites:

A Beautiful Young Nymph Going to Bed

"Corinna, Pride of Drury-Lane,
For whom no Shepherd sighs in vain;
Never did Covent Garden boast
So bright a batter'd, strolling Toast;

No drunken Rake to pick her up,
No Cellar where on Tick to sup;
Returning at the Midnight Hour;
Four Stories climbing to her Bow'r;

Then, seated on a three-legg'd Chair,
Takes off her artificial Hair:
Now, picking out a Crystal Eye,
She wipes it clean, and lays it by.

Her Eye-Brows from a Mouse's Hide,
Stuck on with Art on either Side,
Pulls off with Care, and first displays 'em,
Then in a Play-Book smoothly lays 'em.

Now dextrously her Plumpers draws,
That serve to fill her hollow Jaws.
Untwists a Wire; and from her Gums
A Set of Teeth completely comes.

Pulls out the Rags contriv'd to prop
Her flabby Dugs and down they drop.
Proceeding on, the lovely Goddess
Unlaces next her Steel-Rib'd Bodice;

Which by the Operator's Skill,
Press down the Lumps, the Hollows fill,
Up hoes her Hand, and off she slips
The Bolsters that supply her Hips.

With gentlest Touch, she next explores
Her Shankers, Issues, running Sores,
Effects of many a sad Disaster;
And then to each applies a Plaster.

But must, before she goes to Bed,
Rub off the Daubs of White and Red;
And smooth the Furrows in her Front,
With greasy Paper stuck upon't.

...

CORINNA wakes. A dreadful Sight!
Behold the Ruins of the Night!

A wicked Rat her Plaster stole,
Half eat, and dragged it to his Hole.
The Crystal Eye, alas, was miss'd;
And Puss had on her Plumpers piss'd.

A Pigeon pick'd her Issue-Peas;
And Shock her Tresses fill'd with Fleas.
The Nymph, tho' in this mangled Plight,
Must ev'ry Morn her Limbs unite.

But how shall I describe her Arts
To recollect the scatter'd Parts?
Or show the Anguish, Toil, and Pain,
Of gath'ring up herself again?

The bashful Muse will never bear
In such a Scene to interfere.
Corinna in the Morning dizen'd,
Who sees, will spew; who smells, be poison'd."

The mixture of the comic and the tragic here really appeals to me. The poor lady is coming apart at the seams. She absolutely needs a trip to the doctor for those "Shankers, Issues, running Sores." It's all so overdone though, ending in that outrageous claim that anyone who looks at her can't help but vomit spontaneously. And all those animals eating her prosthetics during the night... it's like a Disney film gone horribly wrong.

And, oh look, its grotesque! At least, it is according to Arieh Sachs, who includes the poem in his collection The English Grotesque: An Anthology from Langland to Joyce.

Text from poemhunter.

Gross Science

I find it interesting that adults designing 'educational' science/human body related material for children very often use grotesqueness or the 'gross out' as a framing discourse. These clips exhibit this tendency quite well I think.

This is a Canadian kids TV show called "Grossology"... speaks for itself really.







And below, a special 'gross out and learn' event. I'm not sure where or when it was, but it sure looks fun. I also love the phrase "the impolite science of the human body."

Green Things

I've become more interested in Gargoyles since visiting the UK. They were everywhere, these strange faces protruding from walls, with mouths gaping and grimacing. None of them look particularly cheerful, although some were more mischievous. Which was nice. When the gargoyles look pained, you get the sense that the building is somehow distraught and trying desperately to speak of it. Bit disconcerting really.

I bought Mike Harding's A Little Book of Gargoyles and A Little Book of The Green Man to educate myself a little (heheh, dur). The "Green Man" refers to a face emerging from leaves, apparently. Where I'm from we have other names for men who stare at you from behind bushes, but there you go. On the very first page of Green Man Harding uses the word 'grotesque,' which makes me very well disposed towards him. But all this goes to show how very diffuse the term Grotesque actually is. Sometimes anything remotely ugly or bizarre qualifies: a funny face is often enough. It's not enough for me, personally. Gargoyles and Green Men are perhaps overlapping concepts/categories who share a 'grotesque' thematic: eg. humans morphing into buildings/plants. But does any amount of morphing satisfy the criteria for grotesqueness? How much is enough?

Tangent 1) why must it be a Green Man? A lot of faces in the diminutive book of masculine foliage resemble ladies to my highly biased eye.

Tangent 2) is the character of Poison Ivy a "Green Woman"? She sure has a lot of green going on, being part noxious weed and all. These are the deep questions that consume my days.



Pic from Entertainment Earth.

Chapter #4

I'm thinking of looking at comics for my forth chapter, primarily because I have discovered a recent (2007) Batman series devoted to our hero's battles with a freakish malignant named 'Grotesk.' Now, I haven't read any of the comics yet because I know myself too well. I have #1 and #4 - once I start reading I'm just going to get overexcited and skip the middle issues thus ruining the chronology and upsetting my waters.

Sometime in the next two weeks I will be receiving nearly every comic in which this 'Grotesk' character has starred. Bless the internet. These include such luminaries as Namore the Sub-Mariner (vol 1), The Avengers (vol 20) and The Mighty Thor (vol 481).

It has not escaped me that this chapter may well take my nerd quotient (over 9000!) beyond anything that has gone before.

Chimera and Hybrid Beasts

These are a few of the pics I took while in the UK for the International Gothic Association Conference. I'm fascinated by hybrid beasts. This is partly because of my thesis (hybrid bodies are historically described as 'grotesques'), partly because they come in so many different shapes and sizes: never boring = good for the easily bored (me). London, I found, is full of these creatures. They are literally smothered across every cornice, wall, picture frame and historical monument. Some of these pics are from the British Museum, other are from walking around London. Might put a few more up later.

Grotesque Games

I am on the tail end (hopefully) of my third chapter at the moment. Full draft due this Friday, to be specific. *hyperventilates into paper bag* For this chapter I looked at representations of the grotesque in two video games, BioShock (pic above) and Spore, and have come to some very interesting conclusions.

I am trying not to go off on tangents, however today I was struck by how much this quote by Donna Haraway evokes the grotesque:

"A cyborg exists when two kinds of boundaries are simultaneously problematic: 1) that between animals (or other organisms) and humans, and 2) that between self-controlled, self-governing machines (automatons) and organisms, especially humans (models of autonomy)." [Primate Visions]

Haraway is all about "transgressing boundaries, potent fusions, and dangerous possibilities": this is basically a text book definition of the grotesque. For real... go look you will find it in ANY book on the grotesque. Haraway never uses the term 'grotesque' to my knowledge. I'm unsure as to whether this is deliberate, or she never noticed the convergence between the grotesque and the cyborg. I feel they belong together. The "Cyborg" may very well be a/the key vision of the grotesque for the early 21st century.

Grotesquing the Stone

I am writing mostly to myself, but just in case anybody else pops by: welcome to Groteskology.

Whatever the grotesque means to you, to me it is the topic of my PhD thesis and thus intricately complicated and endlessly fascinating.

It is also fascinating to you, even though you may not know it. You discuss it almost every day, each time your pet eats some other creature's poo and you say "ew gross."

(Please note, this does not apply to mentions of 'gross income' - that is a different kind of gross, unless you find your income really disgusting: in which case I can do nothing for you.)

Every time you hold forth upon that "grotty guy with the BO" who sat behind you on the bus... you're talking about the grotesque. So this blog is about something we all love but rarely critique.

The ancient stone carving above right is called a grotesque. The beastly dude on the left is (blog namesake) Grotesk from Marvel comics circa 1968. Clearly there has been some water under the bridge.