Exploration Of Susan Sontag’s "Magic Power" In Artistical Creation

Recognizing Susan Sontag’s controversial so-called "formalistic aesthetics" was surface appearance in fact, previous studies discovered her intention of the stuntedness of content and unduely praise of form was to highlight the function of form itself:its construction as signifier can reveal the author’s spiritual world and it may implicit artistic critical forces in itself. Besides, it also discovered her later adjust and alteration on form was not only the outcome of her intervene in political-cultural activities but also the cause of her self-promotion in creation like a beginner. These discoveries were foreseen to be reveal secrets of Susan Sontag’s mind as passion and her magic power in artistic creation. Instead of following discovering the critical forces of form, this dissertation determines to explore reversely its formation-mechanism and causes of change and shift. In the process of overthrowing former problems and renewing starting points, it takes shape in distinct problem-awareness and self-conscious critical stand. Holding believe in "viewing the whole person" and "obtaining complete knowledge", it originally discovers that under the pressure of modernization and assimilation, like her admirable artists, Susan Sontag stands between morality and aesthetics and spiritually reconditely occupies a Gnostic stand. On one hand, she is attracted by this heretical spirit of Gnosticism with regards to her suffering of introspecting self; on the other, she gradually distrusts this sceptical religion affected by its principle of negative. This unusual way of faith not only promotes her pursuit of seriousness in entrusting her artistic creation spiritual light and offering her artistic criticism introspectionistic mirror; but also sets up problems of her creation of arts in fear of the loss of authority with her way of "camp". Rather than break her authority throughout writing, this examination aims to explore universal modern situations in the name of "gnosis":nihility as a worldly outsider, rootless wander both as realistic experiences and metaphysical symbols, and alienation between subjectivity and expression as private life. It also asks what introspections these self-contradictive inner tension may bring to our existent experiences under the pressure of modernization and what inspirations this case study may provide to our reconsiderations on the relationship between religion and art.In the first place, after introducing a question of the intention of artistic criticism and introspecting the methodologies of practical activities, this dissertation argues the nature of truth seek should be a process of asking questions as well as the presentation of truth should be a chain of problems. In favor of disenchantment of her magic power in artistic creation as such a complicated western author, a religious-cultural stand is not only a perspective to understand but also a platform to dialogue, on which hidebound interpretation is no longer a necessary while transcendental critique becomes a possibility. Equally emphasizing the importance of research perspective and perspective reconnaissance, this dissertation mainly chooses three points of sight to perspective explore Susan Sontag’s magic power in her artistic creation, of which the first point is her covert religious consciousness and religious feelings as a seed of Jew reflected in her fictional creation; the second point is her deep-seated generation-mechanism of her famed "mind as passion" and her appeal of true self under her public persona; the last point is her reasons of hiding under the sign of Saturn and both artistic and religious qualities of her dialogue with admirers in the writings of journals and works with autobiographical desires.As a further study of the former semiotic exploration, the second perspective into The Benefactor discovers that as the most important construction of artistic symbol in this novel, dreams signify the constructor’s emotional puzzles towards religious issues: home-sick exhaustion and situation of being at loss between America and Zion; assimilation into modernization as well as conversion to Christianity and the self-hatred doubt facing chooses of deiform salvation or intellectual salvation; conformation and contradiction of desires to overcome extreme dualism and emotions as intellectual elites as wells as temperaments as Jewish heretics. Based on close-reading of texts, the second chapter extensively searches religious literature such as the Holy Bible and The Talmud and applies approaches of allegory and topology to give a thorough exploration to both the cryptical overlay structure of Gnostic Valentinian’s holy tragedies in the artistic textual construction and the hidden "pneumaticepuation" of Gnostic myth systems in the artistic textual connotation. Chapter2points out that, instead of extroverted realistic writings, the intention of artistic construction is to explore the inner spiritual world, which has something to do with the author’s Jewish identity and religious feelings.As a further study of the former intertextuality criticism, the second perspective into Against Interpretation discovers that the Gnostic impulsion becomes the substantial radical drive of her "against interpretation" and behind this opposition she argues for a new ideology that the task of artistic criticism is to recreate its own spirituality. Chapter3also points out that, the aim of "against interpretation" is not to replace the intellectual analysis of meaning exploration with simple emotional sensations of artistic forms but to carry on a senior conscious exploration under the promotion of the Gnostic principle of negation:as the knowledge of meaning interpretation is the knowledge of its uninterpretablity, the knowledge of God is the knowledge of his agnosticism, which inevitably leads to neutral attitudes and lucid styles. With regards to the recognition of similarity in essence between "silence aesthetics" and "ecstacy" in Gnostic spirituality, Chapter3claims the nature of Susan Sontag’s "new sensibility" is resurge of ancient Gnostic sensibility in modern arts and such "camp" way of representation also embodies in her performance of "self in the name of "camp".Holding critical tension not only throughout criticism on Susan Sontag’s "against interpretation" and its development but also perspective into both her turn to "traditional" artistic criticism and her defect in "mind as passion" icon made by deity and wisdom, the third chapter perspectives into her portraits of admires and discovers alienation between her "self"in writing and her true self as well as her conscious set of comprehensive hinder in writing. Showing in the paradox that where she tries to avoid, there is the contrary; where she "honestly" admits, there is the more, this ambivalent contradiction in whether to hide or to reveal reflects not only Susan Sontag’s unique reflective way of thinking but also her special performing way of action. On one hand, instead of revealing in journal writing, her subjective attitudes towards and feelings of female identity, homosexual tendency, illness in reality and death as an event are expressed in her veiled autobiography; on the other, her admiring dialogue reveals her artistic secrets to a huge extent:her mentality like Antonin Artaud, her spirituality like Walter Benjamin’s, her writing belief similar to Roland Barthes’, her consciousness of death like Elias Canetti’s, the influence of the religious-cultural thoughts of those exile Russian artists in Fance and most important, their collective occupancies of Gnostic stand. Making a comprehensive survey on Susan Sontag’s worlds of both arts and life, especially in her journal writing and veiled autobiography writing, Chapter4applies desultory essay style in admiring her sharpness view and critical power as a literary essayist.Beyond a case study, this dissertation regards Susan Sontag’s artistic magic power as a calling composition in which Gnosticism transcends the artist’s stand and becomes a universal existent situation of private person under the pressure of modernization and arts become a reflective mirror of reconsidering our civilization and ourselves. In this sense, arts bear religious enlightenment and with this consciousness, we may reconsider and revalue the relationship of arts and religion.