Subject
Cognitive Dissonance (PF, the poem)
From
Date
Body
Should we read Shade's sudden insight
into the meaning of things while driving
home from visiting Mrs. Z, as an allusion
to the conversion of Paul of Tarsus
on the road to Damascus?
...
the theory of plexed artistry:
...
Life Everlasting—based on a misprint!
I mused as I drove homeward: take the hint,
And stop investigating my abyss?
But all at once it dawned on me that this
Was the real point, the contrapuntal theme;
Just this: not text, but texture; not the dream
But topsy-turvical coincidence,
Not flimsy nonsense, but a web of sense.
Yes! It sufficed that I in life could find
Some kind of link-and-bobolink, some kind
Of correlated pattern in the game,
Plexed artistry, and something of the same
Pleasure in it as they who played it found.
...
Shade's sudden and enthusiastic conversion to the theory of plexed
artistry
may reflect a familiarity [of VN] with the writings of the social
psychologist
Mr. Festinger and his theory of "cognitive dissonance" ,
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cognitive_dissonance>
and an interesting historic incident(1954) that launched the theory.
The following is from article on the topic by Cynthia Crossen
published last year in the Wall Street Journal:
His 1957 book [When Prophecy Fails] on the subject was widely
influential in many fields, and the theory is still studied and
applied in advertising and market research, politics, education and
health.
...
But where Mr. Festinger found the richest raw material for his theory
was in a cult that developed in Chicago in 1954. A woman Mr. Festinger
called Marion Keech claimed she was receiving messages from another
planet, Clarion. The messages predicted that on a given date, a
cataclysmic flood would engulf most of the continent. Those who joined
Mrs. Keech's sect would be picked up by flying saucers and evacuated
from the planet.
A brief newspaper story about the cult came to the attention of Mr.
Festinger. He was reminded of the followers of a New England farmer,
William Miller, who predicted that the Second Advent of Christ would
occur in 1843. Thousands of people who believed Miller's prophecy
prepared for the world to end. But 1843 passed without incident. Far
from admitting that the prediction was wrong, the Millerites attempted
to lessen their cognitive dissonance in two ways: They changed the
date of the Second Advent to the following year and stepped up their
campaign, trying to convince even more people that their belief was
right.
Mr. Festinger and two colleagues infiltrated Mrs. Keech's movement,
acting as participants for three months. They watched as about two
dozen well-educated, upper-middle-class people, "who led normal lives
and filled responsible roles in society," quit their jobs and threw
away their possessions. Before the dates of the expected flood, the
cult was mostly averse to publicity and had no interest in attracting
other believers.
On the day before the flood, the group was told that at midnight a man
would appear at Mrs. Keech's house and take them to a flying saucer.
But no knock came at her door, and the group struggled to find an
explanation for why there would be no flying saucer or flood. At 4:45
a.m., the group said, a message arrived from God saying He had stayed
the flood because of their strength.
What interested Mr. Festinger was not so much this face-saving
explanation as what the cult members did in the following weeks.
Rather than shunning public attention as they had before, they began
zealously proselytizing. "There were almost no lengths to which these
people would not go now to get publicity and to attract potential
believers," Mr. Festinger wrote. "If more converts could be found,
then the dissonance between their belief and the knowledge that the
prediction hadn't been correct could be reduced."
Link to Pittsburg Post-Gazette, a reprint of an earlier WSJ article:
<http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/06338/743472-115.stm>
(Amusingly, it might be noted that a belief in another Noah's Flood
is the underpinning device in Chaucer's The Miller Tale,
writ 600 years ago. So perhaps Chaucer's not all that remote!)
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into the meaning of things while driving
home from visiting Mrs. Z, as an allusion
to the conversion of Paul of Tarsus
on the road to Damascus?
...
the theory of plexed artistry:
...
Life Everlasting—based on a misprint!
I mused as I drove homeward: take the hint,
And stop investigating my abyss?
But all at once it dawned on me that this
Was the real point, the contrapuntal theme;
Just this: not text, but texture; not the dream
But topsy-turvical coincidence,
Not flimsy nonsense, but a web of sense.
Yes! It sufficed that I in life could find
Some kind of link-and-bobolink, some kind
Of correlated pattern in the game,
Plexed artistry, and something of the same
Pleasure in it as they who played it found.
...
Shade's sudden and enthusiastic conversion to the theory of plexed
artistry
may reflect a familiarity [of VN] with the writings of the social
psychologist
Mr. Festinger and his theory of "cognitive dissonance" ,
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cognitive_dissonance>
and an interesting historic incident(1954) that launched the theory.
The following is from article on the topic by Cynthia Crossen
published last year in the Wall Street Journal:
His 1957 book [When Prophecy Fails] on the subject was widely
influential in many fields, and the theory is still studied and
applied in advertising and market research, politics, education and
health.
...
But where Mr. Festinger found the richest raw material for his theory
was in a cult that developed in Chicago in 1954. A woman Mr. Festinger
called Marion Keech claimed she was receiving messages from another
planet, Clarion. The messages predicted that on a given date, a
cataclysmic flood would engulf most of the continent. Those who joined
Mrs. Keech's sect would be picked up by flying saucers and evacuated
from the planet.
A brief newspaper story about the cult came to the attention of Mr.
Festinger. He was reminded of the followers of a New England farmer,
William Miller, who predicted that the Second Advent of Christ would
occur in 1843. Thousands of people who believed Miller's prophecy
prepared for the world to end. But 1843 passed without incident. Far
from admitting that the prediction was wrong, the Millerites attempted
to lessen their cognitive dissonance in two ways: They changed the
date of the Second Advent to the following year and stepped up their
campaign, trying to convince even more people that their belief was
right.
Mr. Festinger and two colleagues infiltrated Mrs. Keech's movement,
acting as participants for three months. They watched as about two
dozen well-educated, upper-middle-class people, "who led normal lives
and filled responsible roles in society," quit their jobs and threw
away their possessions. Before the dates of the expected flood, the
cult was mostly averse to publicity and had no interest in attracting
other believers.
On the day before the flood, the group was told that at midnight a man
would appear at Mrs. Keech's house and take them to a flying saucer.
But no knock came at her door, and the group struggled to find an
explanation for why there would be no flying saucer or flood. At 4:45
a.m., the group said, a message arrived from God saying He had stayed
the flood because of their strength.
What interested Mr. Festinger was not so much this face-saving
explanation as what the cult members did in the following weeks.
Rather than shunning public attention as they had before, they began
zealously proselytizing. "There were almost no lengths to which these
people would not go now to get publicity and to attract potential
believers," Mr. Festinger wrote. "If more converts could be found,
then the dissonance between their belief and the knowledge that the
prediction hadn't been correct could be reduced."
Link to Pittsburg Post-Gazette, a reprint of an earlier WSJ article:
<http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/06338/743472-115.stm>
(Amusingly, it might be noted that a belief in another Noah's Flood
is the underpinning device in Chaucer's The Miller Tale,
writ 600 years ago. So perhaps Chaucer's not all that remote!)
Search archive with Google:
http://www.google.com/advanced_search?q=site:listserv.ucsb.edu&HL=en
Contact the Editors: mailto:nabokv-l@utk.edu,nabokv-l@holycross.edu
Visit Zembla: http://www.libraries.psu.edu/nabokov/zembla.htm
View Nabokv-L policies: http://web.utk.edu/~sblackwe/EDNote.htm
Visit "Nabokov Online Journal:" http://www.nabokovonline.com
Manage subscription options: http://listserv.ucsb.edu/