Williams, Cole

Raymond Williams:

The sentence that caught my sight in light of what Williams is talking about is philosophical beliefs when he refers to logical details on page 124: “Once upon a time an honest fellow had the idea that men were drowned in water only because they were possessed with the idea of gravity. If they were to knock this idea off their heads, say by stating it to be a superstition, a religious idea, they would be sublimely proof against any danger from water”. And to restate this quotation we can argue that mankind organizes thoughts and programs information into the brain at a particular time and place, but if time has stopped or an extraterrestrial object was sinking down to earth endangering species without any hope for survival then we would look at each other with eye’s wide open in contact and say what are we getting into? We are truly one and nothing can make us different because culturally we are all the same naked from head to toe. Of-course this is a difficult concept which prolongs debate and controversy, but to make ends meet we need to submit to consciousness highly philosophical that we are one society and the only thing that makes us different is our organization, our government. And certainly there are people who say, Are you crazy? You want me to bend metal with my bare hands and prove that everyone can do it? In fact, there are people who are strong mentally and physically and submit to the philosophy beyond human generalization or interception, in such case can bend a four inch nail with their bare hands, or a metal pipe into the shape of a horse shoe with the aid of their head and their hands beneath it. The concept here is to submit logically and absentmindedly that there is no pain but effort and to avoid thinking or possessed by the idea that there is no result in the pipe bending. I think William’s concept is beyond human imagination or just theory, and what I think this essay is about is higher consciousness and self perception as to what Gramsci was referring to but in a general sense without the idea of hegemony because Williams talks sufficiently about systematic knowledge and consciousness; “Social liberation would then come through a change in consciousness” (page 129).

Sarah Cole:

If this story was to be connected to a Marxist reading, then I get the idea that it had to do with two superpowers during the cold war, where you have the capitalist USA (Ron), and the communist USSR (Sarah) who at the end of the war crumbled to piece and died drastically because of its falling economy. The USSR had limited economical connections with the outside world, except for communist China who went into a compromisable commerce treaty with President Nixon. The USSR either failed or did not wish to follow China as it reached aims in business with the USA. We can see that Sarah wanted to be dependent with Ron, because he had the qualities her ex-husband did not. She had to look after her children without unsettled disputes with the court and child support from her ex-husband. It seemed like she wanted to be financially secured with Ron, but she failed because her fit was not up to date; Sarah was poor “Sorry I can’t get the people downstairs to take care of their garbage . . . sorry there’s no light I can’t get them to fix it” (page 8). So much has been said as the big fat Soviet Union and its socialist republics appeared to have perpetuated flawlessly during the mid to late twentieth century, and popularly assumed by the United States that the USSR could adapt to the environment on its own, but then ironically we figure in the early nineties that’s not the case; “It’s not as if she had died; it’s as if he has killed her” (page 15).