lexicography/pher as a literary/philosophical motif

[Evgeny Steiner]

Try also 'Alphabet as a Cultural Code' - http://www.polit.ru/lectures/2008/02/14/azbooka.html

-----Original Message-----
From: Toma Tasovac <ttasovac at PRINCETON.EDU>
To: SEELANGS at BAMA.UA.EDU
Date: Sat, 21 Jun 2008 10:34:31 +0200
Subject: Re: [SEELANGS] lexicography/pher as a literary/philosophical motif

Many thanks to Olga, Alexandra, Frank, Jan, Russel, Bob and William  
for excellent suggestions. I am getting giddy with possibilities that  
the works mentioned in this thread offer.

A lexicographer is, in many ways, like Benjamin's collector: somebody  
who takes objects (in this case -- words) out of their natural  
context and in doing so clears a space for a different kind of  
meaning. The dictionary is surely a model for the organization of  
knowledge that may be  driven by an innate fear of infinity, but it  
is also a text like any other, which means that it has its own  
remainders, i.e. moments which are left out by the analytic mapping  
of language. If a lexicographer is a madman -- figuratively and  
sometimes, quite literally -- there is, of course, method to this  
madness, and that's what makes his whole enterprise so fascinating.

Ellen Elias-Bursac also suggested to me yesterday off-list an  
interesting dissertation by Kristin Vitalich, "Lexicographic doxa:  
The writing of Slavic dictionaries in the nineteenth century" (UCLA,  
2005) -- available on ProQuest -- about Karadzic, Dal' and Linde.  
It's about how three important Slavic dictionaries in the 19th  
century suggested a common Romantic ideology and forged a common,  
Greater Slavic cultural identity, without necessarily elaborating or  
fully committing to either.

I have no doubt that I will die a fool (durakom pomriu), but for the  
time being I'll keep reading them dictionaries... :)

All best,
Toma

On 21.06.2008., at 07.01, Olga Meerson wrote:

> I forgot the most important, near contemporary book by Mikhail  
> Leonovich Gasparov-- Zapiski i vypiski (arranged alphabetically and  
> deliberately selectively). It is so much fun to read other people's  
> suggestiions! You live and learn, or as the Russian say, vek zhivi-- 
> vek uchis'--durakom pomresh'. But seriously, even the discussion  
> itself is very instructive.
> o.m.

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