Re: Ignace Meyerson cracks a joke, sort of

Thanks, Dan .

A quick reaction regarding that bit in your post :

> . . .  le coup de ciseau du sculpteur individuel, sa statue sociale ?

Reminds me, interestingly(?) enough -- if I may be so free, and switching
here from one to (an)other genre(s) of the *beaux-arts* -- of a very
recent  ( in _The new criterion_, December 2019 )  observation offered by
the Harvard 'intellectual historian' James Hankins, in his discussion of
the Louvre's currently running Leonardo exhibition, as follows :  "In the
end, Leonardo=E2=80=99s art was less about the objects he created than abou=
t
himself creating the objects." .   Something to think about at greater
length ?

For anyone  ( else )  interested, the  Hankins piece, "Being Leonardo", is
online at https://nam04.safelinks.protection.outlook.com/?url=3Dhttps%3A%2F=
%2Fnewcriterion.com%2Fissues%2F2019%2F12%2Fbeing-leonardo&data=3D02%7C0=
1%7CCLASSICS-L%40lsv.uky.edu%7C91f30c6136b84f52ec9308d77f30cc3c%7C2b30530b6=
9b64457b818481cb53d42ae%7C0%7C1%7C637117719879712353&sdata=3D%2Fzj3QqMX=
%2FgzDCKX3K4dtMQS7c4MoOboHrADVOUezoW8%3D&reserved=3D0 .


- Laval Hunsucker
   Breukelen a.d. Vecht, Nederland



On Thu, Dec 12, 2019 at 4:36 PM DANIEL P. Tompkins <[email protected]>
wrote:

Ignace Meyerson, important interwar (and later) psychologist, was along
> with Louis Gernet one of Pierre Vidal-Naquet's great influences - and the=
n,
> in his 50s, served under Vernant in the R=C3=A9sistance liberation of Tou=
louse,
> editing the unit's newspaper. When Vernant is discussed in the USA, he's
> most often linked with structuralist anthropologist Claude L=C3=A9vi-Stra=
uss: no
> complaints about that, since both are major figures.  But it's remarkable
> that Meyerson, a longer term and arguably equally important influence, ha=
s
> received far less attention.
>
> Vernant wrote a wonderful essay on Meyerson that appeared as introduction
> to a volume of Meyerson's writings and then re-appeared in Vernant, *Entr=
e
> myth et politique *(Paris, 1996).  Vernant calls Meyerson *un homme raide=
*,
> but also reports a quasi-joke that is packed with meaning:
>
> Au cours d=E2=80=99une conversation de sociologie et de grammaire avec Gr=
anet,
> Meyerson =C3=A9voquait un jour en disant sur un ton mi-s=C3=A9rieux, mi-p=
laisant :
> =C2=AB Au fond, pour vous, le verbe est individuel, le nom social. =C2=BB
> Faut-il dire que le faire est individuel, le fait social, le coup de cise=
au
> du sculpteur individuel, sa statue sociale ?
>
> En r=C3=A9alit=C3=A9, on ne peut s=C3=A9parer le faire du fait. [a few pa=
ges of
> explanation follow]
>
> Dan
>