I. Out of the elements of "The Pink," I select a few related to the difference between cultural practices and natural processes. How is the cultural world portrayed in this story? What are its special features? How does the boy in the story make sense of it? What does his experience of that cultural world recommend to us?
II. Numerous elements of one order stand out simply as different
from related elements of the other; these elements
stand in a contrary
relation.
As the parents are divided:
natural processes vs cultural practices
mother's world
father's world
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Primary environment : garden
castle, game-preserve kitchen or banquet-hall
(outside)
(inside)
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Primary elements: water (bathing)
earth (ownership)
air (dreaming, wishing)
fire (cooking required)
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Parent's helper:
God
chef
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Helper's bird: "winged dove (from God,
feeds chicken (from chef,
instrument of desire" mother, uncooked)
cooked, feeds father)
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Parent's food fluids (water, air)
flesh; his own heart, coals
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Legacy, what is passed on wish-fulfilling thoughts, life
the kingdom
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Destiny, where parent ends up: heaven
earth
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Fatal error of parent too much sleep
too much vigilance? ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Child support love, affection, "Dear"
feudal duty/contracts
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Sources of power given by God
produced or stolen by men
verbal power prayers/wishes
commands, orders physical power
lying still
acting
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Sources of violence "wild beasts" to eat
king and chef: killers
son "raw"
of game and domestic fowl to be cooked
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The created or produced world:
created by whom? God (garden, boy, game)
King (dungeon, tower, castle)
boy (his girl friend, their mansion and garden)
chef or artist ("could have painted")
substitutes: fawn (for boy)
poodle (for chef)
Why? to save
to punish
III. The elements of cultural practice may also be seen in relation
to those elements of the natural process
with which they cannot logically co-exist. These elements stand in
a contradictory relation to each other.
Finding these elements in contradiction to each other is a delicate
task: depending on our
POINT OF VIEW towards the agents
in the story (e.g., the mother, father or boy), certain elements
will appear contradictory or merely
contrary. If they are in a contrary
relation, they will not appear to cancel or wipe each other out.
Process or Practice?
continuity or discontinuity
air/water (fluidity, flow)
or
earth (property, boundaries)
fire (start, put out)
God and angels
or
chef
reliable helpers
unreliable helper
mother always there
or
mother put to death
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what is visible or tangible
or
invisible or intangible?
mother's view: God and angels' help chef's treachery
father's view: chef's help
wife's defiance or treachery
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reversible?
or
irreversible?
barrenness/fertility
death, murder, imprisonment
game in/not in game preserve
punishment, reward,
boy's wishes: girl/pink/girl
property transfer
chef/dog/chef
IV. Between cultural practices and natural
processes: how, in the person of the boy, does the story
reconcile the cultural and the natural?