In response to the question: "isn't the poem exactly the same in both
> cases? . . . does the text itself change when the medium of delivery changes?"
>
Don Larsson says:
>  There's no easy analogy between film and print literature, but the real
> difference might be more like reading a facsimile edition of the original
> text, with archaic spelling and punctuation, and then reading a revised
> edition that's been cleaned up for modern readers and printed in paperback
> format for easy accessibility.  One does lose something, however intangible,
> in the transition, but it certainly does widen access to the text.
 
i'm not absolutely convinced that the analogy between tha language of images
and the language of words is quite that hard . . . but for the moment it seem
more important to concentrate on that "something, however intangible" that
goets lost in the translation . . . one contributor to this conversation
suggested that it has to do with what w benjamin called the "aura" -- but
i've never been quite clear on what that aura really was except an
extraordinary example of excess value, that is to say, a function of the art
marketplace rather than of the universe of pure expression and communication
. . . of course rarity makes objects more desirable to those who can afford
them, and thus more "valuable" . . . but i'd rather read the paperback and
have no use for first editions
 
mike frank
 
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