-----Mensaje original----- De: Gerd Groenewold Enviado el: viernes 20 de febrero de 1998 2:08 Para: ernst-juenger-l@maillist.ox.ac.uk Asunto: Re: The Anarch Greetings all, Thomas Friese wrote: > > The news sinks in slowly and deeply. It is altogether without sadness for the man - if anyone would have been ready, even eager to face the Great Hunt, it was Ernst Jünger. But the loss, the solitude, does stimulate a zeal to work, to proudly keep the faith, as Luke Skywalker might have heard it from his master. > I have found it difficult to express the sadness that overcame me when I heard that the great man had died. I am not so much sad for him, as he lead as long and as full a life as I think is humanly possible, but instead for us. The world indeed seems somehow emptier knowing that he is no longer with us. I don't think I have ever felt the loss of a man I have never met as acutely as I feel his. However, that being the case, I think it is our duty to go on and continue to attempt to understand his work, as I feel that as the next century goes by understanding what he had to say will be an invaluable guide to survival. > In 1995 I spent an afternoon in Wilflingen with Jünger - his signature graces the inside cover of my copy of Eumeswil. Now that the original anarch has left I would like to move ahead with a pet project on the Anarch in Eumeswil. A paper, or more, is in the works on this topic. It occurs to me that I, and the eventual readers, might profit from the abundant and diverse expertise available on this mailing list. I shall post a quotation from Eumeswil every few days for your: > > * interpretations, > * comments on the translation, > * feelings about the importance of the passage, > * illustrative examples from Junger's own life, > * citations and links to other authors, > * anything else that I might use to personally understand Ernst Junger's Anarch and to present a full picture of him (her!) to others. > I don't know that I have any real "expertise" but I will hazard a few comments. > I am using the English translation by Neugroschel (Eridanos, 1993, ISBN 0-941419-97-5) for the purposes of these postings. The phrases all deal with the Anarch directly. > > In my opinion the Anarch is Jünger's crowning creation, whether this is recognized yet or not. I hope by this effort to contribute to a broader recognition of this figure and his lessons on living in the world. > I think there is a problem with trying to claim the Anarch as a crowning creation. Indeed, discovery might be a better word than creation. Beyond that, I don't think the Anarch makes sense except in the context of the whole of Jünger's thinking. If we did not live in an age when all the ideals were dead, as he has said, why be an Anarch? There are a number of reasons, but it is not so clear. If the Titans were not in control, maybe it would not be desirable not to "drop out" as the anarch does. > Anyhow, let the experiment begin > > From Part 1 - The teachers > > (Regarding the psychological testing which the Condors's staff have to undergo to be hired:) > > "They found no mischief in me. I remained normal, however deeply they probed. And also straight as an arrow. To be sure, normality seldom coincides with straightness. Normalcy is the human constitution; straightness is logical reasoning. With its help, I could answer satisfactorily. In contrast, the human element is at once so general and so intricately encoded that they fail to perceive it, like the air that they breathe. Thus they were unable to penetrate my fundamental structure, which is anarchic. > That sounds complicated, but it is simple, for everyone is anarchic; this is precisely what is normal about us. Of course, the anarch is hemmed in from the first day by father and mother, by state and society. Those are prunings, tappings of the primordial strength, and nobody escapes them. One has to resign oneself. But the anarchic remains, at the very bottom, as a mystery, usually unknown even to its bearer. It can erupt from him as lava, can destroy him, liberate him. It is interesting that this anarchic nature is seen as an ambivalent, angerous force. It reminds me of states of ecstasy encountered in the context of ancient mystery cults, for example. I think that the key to keeping it from being destructive is discipline, and I think that this is a quality that Venator very well embodies, to a degree the Greeks, or the Prussians would probably find admirable. > Distinctions must be made here: love is anarchic, marriage is not. The warrior is anarchic, the soldier is not. Manslaughter is anarchic, murder is not. Christ is anarchic, Saint Paul is not. Since, of course, the anarchic is normal, it is also present in Saint Paul, and sometimes it erupts mightily from him. Those are not antitheses but degrees. The history of the world is moved by anarchy. In sum: the free human being is anarchic, the anarchist is not." > Page 41. > The dichotomy between the free human being and the anarchist is important. While the Anarchist seeks only external freedom, the anarch is free internally, whatever the outer circumstances may be. The anarchist fits into the system, by trying to weaken it, he instead strengthens it. Current examples would include Timothy McVeigh and the Unabomber, neither one of whom managed to do anything but give the US government an excuse to tighten certain laws. Indeed, I heard an interesting segment, I think it was on National Public Radio, about how The "Unabomber Manifesto" has become very popular in anarchist circles. They recognize one of their own I guess. Unfortunately they do not seem to see that he accomplished nothing. GERD [Roberto Calvo Macias] Gerd, I am completely agree with you. The most important thing to me is just the internal freedom, Thats the breakpoint: to know how it is. To look for the answers inside. Again its open the eternal game, Fate and Liberty, and again the J answer. Its not the point to win or not- externally, of course, the point is to win inside, the rest its pure fashion, goverments, a other vanishing things. A question: Is there a real good ethos?, a valid one?. I mean: what to do in a critical cuestion?. The ethic side of the anarch seems to me the most difficult part.
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