Literature & Brain

Karl Horsky

Fiction as Apophantic Structure of Poetry over the Root in the Real World

Looking for Truth behind the poetic Veil of Fascination

- "The apophantic structure of fiction, so much of theory,  is it usefull for anything? Serve for literary education at schools, in introduction to theory of literature at university? German texts of philosophy and literature is possible to translate with scientific quality in english?" -

- " Below a page from the new book version in English as demonstration. " -

In the Middle Ages and the early imperial period, the breadth of consciousness was an important means of identification within the three-class society. Lacking identification with a photograph, behavior was evaluated alongside letters of recommendation. Hegel mentions proposals from his time, to include facial paintings in this documents of "laissez-passer". To demand registration, in a society, based on pride and honor, would have been impertinent and would have triggered a wave of duels. The dishonorable – «Leibeigene” in Germany and «души» in Russia – did not travel. The nobility loved privacy and liked to travel incognito, as is entertainingly shown in Joseph von EICHENDORFF's novel "Memoirs of e Good-for Nothing", 1866 ("Aus dem Leben eines Taugenichts") .

Hospitality towards traveling clergymen was contingent on knowledge of Latin, and respect for female travelers was tied to elegant, aloof behavior. The organization of brain activity cannot be completely altered overnight; one could represent a different class in the sense of Ingarden's presuppositional quasi-judgments, but the nature of the interaction between the hypothalamus, thalamus, cerebral cortex and the breadth of consciousness aleft little doubt as to the propositional identity. For it was not the preponderance of one of the centers, but rather their specific interplay, as humorously depicted in Henry FIELDING's novel "Tom Jones", that revealed the true origin of persons.

The reality of the external world as proposition, the reality of the internal world as presupposition, and the reality of the body as projection—these are the three realities, that make the apophantic level of the lyric poem and generally of the fiction to a source of knowledge. Fiction itself is a syndrome triggered in the recipient's brain by the reading of a fictional text

A reduced breadth of consciousness can not only serve as a tool for identifying individuals, but it can also provide clues to psychogenic developments, that lead to borderline psychosis.
A poet's great depth of consciousness can be accompanied by a narrowed breadth of consciousness.

As we observed by projective poems, both, contemplative and trance-like lyric poetry, possess a strong tendency, to shed the shackles of time, space, and causality. The lyric poet's worldview reveals abysses, that remain hidden in a purely rational understanding of the world. The lyric poet does not think within "reality," but rather beyond "reality"—he allows himself the liberty, to wander in images, capable of revealing the physiological secrets of existence.

Paul Celan created a unique language for this lyrical exploration of the world. The following texts are taken from the collection "Poppy and Memory." 

The whitest of the doves flew up: I may love you!

The quiet door sways in the quiet window.

The silent tree entered the silent room.

You are so close, as if you never were here.

From my hand you take the great flower:

it is not white, not red, not blue -

yet you take it.

Where it never was, there it will always remain.

We never were, so we never will go to lose it.

Der Tauben weißeste flog auf: ich darf dich lieben!

              Im leisen Fenster schwankt die leise Tür. 

              Der stille Baum trat in die stille Stube. 

              Du bist so nah, als weiltest du nicht hier.

              Aus meiner Hand nimmst du die große Blume:

        sie ist nicht weiß, nicht rot, nicht blau - 

doch nimmst du sie.

              Wo sie nie war, da wird sie immer bleiben.

              Wir waren nie, so bleiben wir bei ihr.

The poet gives the beloved a flower as a declaration of love. This flower appears to be imagined; it possesses no real characteristics (colors) and yet it is accepted, because its fictionality refers to a point of reference in the real world: "Where she has never been, there she will always remain." Because lived existence is transient, only that, which lies outside of it, can endure—so it's better to stick with an imagined declaration of love, an imagined flower, perhaps even an imagined love: "We were never, so we remain with it." The result of a romantic disappoitment experienced by the author of the poem? The sudden shift in mood to its opposite, typical of people, living on the edge of the real world, the uncertainty about what is truly lived and what is not, is evident in the poem statement: "I may love you!", and already the joy flips: "Where it [the flor, the love] never was ...", the perceived reality and the reality stored in the cortex become mixed and indistinguishable.

In terms of content, reality or quasi-reality merges into fiction; apophantically speaking, the proposition flows into the projection.