University of Toronto Angels In-Between: The Poetics of Excess and the Crisis of Representation Ioana Cosma Centre for Comparative Literature University of Toronto A thesis submitted in conformity with the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. Centre for Comparative Literature University of Toronto © Copyright by Ioana Cosma (2009) ABSTRACT Ioana Cosma PhD, Comparative Literature, University of Toronto, 2009 Angels In-Between: The Poetics of Excess and the Crisis of Representation This dissertation examines the reconfiguration of the limits of representation in reference to the intermediary function of angels. The Modernist engagement with the figure of the angel entailed, primarily, a reconsideration of the problem of representation as well as an attempt to trace the contours of a poetics that plays itself outside the mimetic understanding of representation. My contention is that this transformation of literary referentiality was not simply a disengagement of art from reality but, rather, from the truth- falsity, reality-fiction, subject-object dichotomies. The angel, defined as the figure of passage par excellence, but also as the agency that induces the transformation of the visible in the invisible and vice versa, appears both as a model/archetype and as a guide towards the illumination of this intermediary aesthetic. Working with the joined perspectives from angelology, contemporary phenomenology, and poetics, this dissertation is an extended overview of the notion of intermediary spaces, as well as an attempt to probe the relevance of this concept for the field of literary studies. In the first case, this dissertation offers a theoretical background to the concept of intermediality, seen in its theological, phenomenological, aesthetic and ethical significances. In the second case, it presents the reader with a heuristic apparatus for approaching this problematic in the field of literary interpretation and provides examples of ways in which such an analysis can become relevant. The primary texts discussed here are all examples of attempts to redefine the notion of representation away from the truth-falsity or subject-object oppositions, as well as to create an aesthetic space with its own particularities, at the limit between visibility and invisibility, excessive presence and absence. Nicholas of ii Cusa’s “Preface” to The Vision of God proposes an ethics of reading defined by admiratio (the consubstantiation of immediacy and distance) under the aegis of the all-seeing icon of God. Louis Marin’s reading of the episode of the Resurrection reveals that history and narrative arise from the conjunction of the excessive absence of the empty tomb of Jesus and the excessive presence announcing the resurrection of Christ. Sohravardî’s “Recital of the Crimson Angel” is a presentation of the space-between of revelation, between cognitio matutina and cognitio vespertina. Walter Benjamin’s “Agesilaus Santander” restores the connections between the exoteric and the esoteric under the patient gaze of “Angelus Novus”. Paul Valéry’s Eupalinos, ou l’Architecte explores the aesthetic of “real appearance” in the space-between the image and the perceiving eye. Poe and Malamud’s short stories reveal the affinities between poetic language and angelophany. Elie Wiesel’s Les portes de la forêt expands the apophatic itinerary from the self to the radically other in a hermeneutical gesture which has the angel as its initial and final guide. Finally, Rafael Alberti’s Sobre los ángeles shows that the aphaeretic function of poetic language is very similar to the apophatic treatment of the world as representation; in this last sense too, the angels are indispensible guides. iii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS In writing this dissertation, I have enjoyed the invaluable counsel and guidance of my primary advisors, prof. Roland LeHuenen and prof. Paul Colilli, whose work and profound knowledge inspired me from the initial stages of conceiving this project. To their great patience and attention, I want to return here my gratitude and admiration. An equally heartfelt ‘thank you’ goes to my other readers, prof. Julie Leblanc and prof. Francesco Guardiani, for their valuable advice and expertise as well as their confidence in this project. I would like to thank all my professors for embarking with me on this itinerary. Ever since I started thinking about my topic, I have benefited from discussions and readings from a number of my professors, who have all marked their influence on the final form of this dissertation: prof. Linda Hutcheon, prof. Veronika Ambros, prof. David Thomson. Most of my understanding of Sufi mysticism comes from a course that was given two years ago at the University of Toronto by prof. Todd Lawson on the work of Henry Corbin. Prof. Lawson’s extraordinary understanding of the hermeneutics of revelation illuminated for me a space that I would have never been able to comprehend on my own. My colleagues and friends – Elisa Segnini, Andres Pérez-Simon, Corina Ionescu, Adriana Dragomir, Gina Beltran, Sarah Jane O’Brien, Ronald Ng, Vanessa Robinson, Maria Ioniţă, Martin Zeilinger – have all provided me with extremely useful advice, either through discussions or by patiently reading excerpts of this dissertation. Most importantly, they have made the whole dissertation-writing process a pleasant and luminous experience. iv I will never be able to thank enough my parents for their quite extraordinary support. Their guidance and love set me on a good path from the early years of my life. They are therefore the natural addressees and places of return of all my works. v TABLE OF CONTENTS Abstract ii Acknowledgements iv Dedication viii Introduction 1 Chapter 1. Angels and the Problem of Representation. Introduction 28 The Problem of Representation 33 The All-Seeing Icon 48 The Empty Tomb 59 The Crimson Angel 69 Conclusion 82 Chapter 2. Exceeding Presence. Angels and the Poetics of Appearing and Revelation. Introduction 86 Angelic Appearing and Revelation in Literature. 114 The Iconostasis of “Agesilaus Santander” 115 The Space-Between of Appearing: Paul Valéry’s Eupalinos, ou, l’Architect 136 The Fall in the Allegorical. Angels and Defamiliarization in Poe’s “Angel of the Odd” and Malamud’s “Angel Levine”. 154 Conclusion. 169 vi Chapter 3. Exceeding Absence. Angels and the Space-Between of Negativity. Introduction 173 Angels and Excessive Absence in Literature. 186 The Dark Wing of Gavriel. Apophasis and Alterity in Wiesel’s Les portes de la forêt. 195 “A Ladder without Heaven”. The Language of Ascesis in Alberti’s Sobre los ángeles. 218 Conclusion. 239 Conclusion 241 Notes 256 Glossary 271 Works consulted 274 vii DEDICATION This dissertation is dedicated to the memory of my cousin, Alina: a present which, even if it can never make up for her exceeding absence, constructs a space-between of re- encounter and adds the proximity of lived co-participation to the distance of the departure. viii Introduction If only we could discover such a singular human pace- pure, determined, self-contained, our own fruitful soil between the river and the stone! But our hearts outrun us. We cannot capture their essence by lingering before consoling statuary, nor by contemplation of those godlike forms containing all for which we yearn in monumental measure. (R.M.Rilke, “Second Duino Elegy”) In recent years, angels and their intermediary status have become objects of inquiry for many disciplines in the humanities (other than the study of religion): philosophy (Massimo Cacciari’s L’angelo necessario, Michel Serres’ La légende des anges), aesthetics and poetics (Alida Cresti’s Il colore dei angeli, Paul Colilli’s The Angel’s Corpse), cultural studies (Régis Debray’s Transmettre, McLuhan and Powers’ The Global Village, H. Bloom’s Omens of the Millenium). Alhough the connection between angels and intermediary spaces has long been familiar to angelology, until lately, this particular aspect has been somewhat neglected by the arts, mainly due to the assimilation of angels to the realm of the immaterial1. The latest discussions of a “third space” seem to retrieve a certain materiality of angels which can cast a new light on 1. The particular configuration of angels and the ensuing poetics in the works of twentieth century artists; 2. The problem of representation; 3. Aesthetic categories which have been so far largely treated in terms of binary oppositions (fiction versus reference, icon versus idol, history versus narrative, etc.); 4. the relations between poetic language and the 1 notion of revelation. Through my discussion of the figure of the angel in the works of modernist writers, I seek to identify and describe the functions of angels in literary language from these four main perspectives. My assumption is that some of the literary actualizations of angels are deeply related to an attempt to explore the limits and “blind spots” of poetic language. Therefore, my fundamental purpose will be to open the space of the confines of poetic language - that space where language both attempts to exceed itself and is still infinitely exceeded - in relation with the phenomenological and hermeneutic repertoire that the angel brings to the fore. Although the third space of representation has become a more prominent topic at the end of the twentieth century, this concept does have a history throughout this century both in art and in philosophy. Even if, in the twentieth century, the occurrences of the retrieval of a “third space” were but sporadic2, taken together, they articulate