So does this mean that Alexander just made it up that Ginsbergs poem is a response to something C. S. Lewis has said?
It seems like Alexander makes a point that C. S. Lewis once said: ”what does it? Earth could be fair, and all men glad and wise. Instead, we have prisons, smokestacks, asylums. What sphinx of cement and aluminum breaks open their skulls and eats up their imagination?”
and that Ginsberg answered this question with the his Poem Howl in which he talks about Moloch. But this is not the case or how am I to interpret this?
It is for my bachelors degree project so what I am looking for is whether Ginsberg answered C. S. Lewis or whether Alexander just made up a quote out of thin air and put a meme as the reference.
Moloch is introduced as the answer to a question – C. S. Lewis’ question in Hierarchy Of Philosophers – what does it? Earth could be fair, and all men glad and wise. Instead we have prisons, smokestacks, asylums. What sphinx of cement and aluminum breaks open their skulls and eats up their imagination?
-- is that the reference to “C. S. Lewis’ question in Hierarchy Of Philosophers” is basically just a joke, and the rest of the passage is not really supposed to be a paraphrase of Lewis.
I agree it’s all a bit unclear, though. You might get a reply if you ask Scott directly: he’s ‘scottalexander’ here and on reddit (formerly Yvain on LW), or you could try the next Open Thread on https://www.astralcodexten.com/
So does this mean that Alexander just made it up that Ginsbergs poem is a response to something C. S. Lewis has said?
It seems like Alexander makes a point that C. S. Lewis once said: ”what does it? Earth could be fair, and all men glad and wise. Instead, we have prisons, smokestacks, asylums. What sphinx of cement and aluminum breaks open their skulls and eats up their imagination?”
and that Ginsberg answered this question with the his Poem Howl in which he talks about Moloch.
But this is not the case or how am I to interpret this?
It is for my bachelors degree project so what I am looking for is whether Ginsberg answered C. S. Lewis or whether Alexander just made up a quote out of thin air and put a meme as the reference.
My read of this passage --
-- is that the reference to “C. S. Lewis’ question in Hierarchy Of Philosophers” is basically just a joke, and the rest of the passage is not really supposed to be a paraphrase of Lewis.
I agree it’s all a bit unclear, though. You might get a reply if you ask Scott directly: he’s ‘scottalexander’ here and on reddit (formerly Yvain on LW), or you could try the next Open Thread on https://www.astralcodexten.com/
Thanks a lot. I think you are right.