WITT&STEIN
A Poetics
                        For Jackson Mac Low 
 
Joan Retallack
 

Witt: In logic nothing is accidental.
Stein: A sentence is a part of the way when they wish to be secure.
Witt: All propositions are of equal value.
Stein: A sentence is an interval during which if there is a difficulty they will do away with it.
Witt: If there is any value that does have value, it must lie outside the whole sphere of what happens and is the case. For all that happens and is the case is accidental.
Stein: A sentence is their politeness in asking for a cessation. And when it happens they look up.


 

To compose thoughts using logics and propositions and sentences is accidental like all that happens and is the case for it is the case that all that happens is accidental and all that is accidental is contingent but never arbitrary and it happens and is the case that values are composed in sentences and propositions that are accidental and are (therefore) (themselves) accidental and contingent and never arbitrary.

A sentence is a proposition during which if there is a difficulty there will be value since value is contingent on noticing and noticing occurs only when there is a difficulty. Much that happens and is the case and is accidental happens and is the case and is accidental in the intervals before during after between and among those propositions called sentences and those sentences called propositions.

Any accident that does have value must lie inside the sphere of what happens and is the case for all that happens and is the case is accidental and has accidental value. All that lies outside the sphere of what happens and is the case lies inside the sphere of the sentence that proposes what happens and does not happen what is and is not the case and is (therefore) (equally) accidental.

All propositions are of equal value is a proposition that may or may not be valued equally with the proposition that all propositions are not of equal value. Whether or not it or they are valued happens and is the case and is (therefore) accidental. These propositions are of value only because they are the case and are accidental and lie inside the whole sphere of what happens and is the case and is accidental.

To compose these thoughts using propositions is accidental like all things that happen and are the case. For the composition of anything that becomes the case happens and is accidental. This accident of what happens and is the case has equal value with what does not happen and is not the case. For all that happens and is the case is accidental. And all that does not happen and is not the case is accidental.

A sentence is an accident during which if there is any value there will be a difficulty. This proposition is a sentence that is an interval during which if there is a difficulty they may or may not do away with it.

An interval is a value in noticing what happens. That it is noticed is the case and is accidental and is its value. (Therefore) value is an accident of noticing and is the case and exists inside the sphere of all that happens and is the case with all that lies outside the sphere of what happens and is the case. An accident in which there is a proposition like all things that happen is always coincidental with an accident in which there is no proposition.

An accident that is called a they is a coincidence of noticing.

What may happen and therefore may be the case is an accident that has not yet happened and is not and may never be the case and is therefore a difficulty no one can do away with.

If all propositions are of equal value a sentence which is an interval during which there can be a difficulty must lie outside the whole sphere of what has happened and is the case and must do away with equal value.

If there is a difficulty in composing thoughts using sentences that are accidental like all things that happen and are the case they may or may not notice and may or may not do away with it.

If there is any value that does have value it must be noticed in the interval between what has happened and is the case and what has not happened and may never be the case. For all that has value and is the case is accidental and will (therefore) be accidental and when it happens they may look up.

 
 
Mac Lovian Summation

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Note: Epigraphic quotes from Wittgenstein are respectively from Tractatus 2.012, 6.4, 6.41. All Stein quotes are from How to Write (Sun & Moon, 1995, 141). All language in italics is from Jackson Mac Low’s Forties (ms.) #1
 
An earlier version of this piece appeared in Chicago Review, No. 49.2.