Spoiled Distinctions by Freed-Thall Hannah;

Spoiled Distinctions by Freed-Thall Hannah;

Author:Freed-Thall, Hannah; [Hannah Freed-Thall]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Oxford University Press, Incorporated
Published: 2015-07-29T17:21:00+00:00


The glass of water contains the most crackling contradictions. What distinguishes this object is the way its worthlessness and its preciousness meet, each traversing, working through, making and unmaking the other. Like Proust, Ponge incites in his reader a mixture of enchantment and disbelief. He flaunts the magic trick: mere words can conjure a glass of water! And yet he spoils the trick, too, by letting a flood of verbs overwhelm the description, unsettling it with a litany of likenesses.

Fascinated by the proximity between the superlative worth of the glass of water and its insignificance, Ponge declares that this object is literally the vital minimum. The most humble of offerings, it is the very least that one can give (“la moindre des choses que l’on puisse offrir”).70 In this sense, the quenching effect of the glass of water is comparable only to other, similarly minor pleasures:

[O]pening the window, putting on a clean shirt, washing your hands, lighting a fire, lighting a lamp, receiving a letter or a handshake, or a simple salute, or a smile, stopping walking or stopping working, or stopping to think for a minute, your child getting a good grade, the sea making a pebble shine, or the sun a piece of straw.

[O]uvrir la fenêtre, passer une chemise propre, se laver les mains, allumer un feu, allumer une lampe, recevoir une lettre ou une poignée de mains, ou un simple salut, ou un sourire, s’arrêter de marcher, ou de travailler ou de réfléchir une minute, que votre enfant ait une bonne note, que la mer fasse luire un caillou, ou le soleil un brin de paille.71



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