IN: Maurice Merleau-Ponty (French: [moRis meRlo poti]; 14 March 1908 - 3 May 1961) was a French phenomenological philosopher, strongly influenced by Edmund Husserl and Martin Heidegger. The constitution of meaning in human experience was his main interest and he wrote on perception, art, and politics. He was on the editorial board of Les Temps modernes, the leftist magazine established by Jean-Paul Sartre in 1945. At the core of Merleau-Ponty's philosophy is a sustained argument for the foundational role perception plays in understanding the world as well as engaging with the world.

Merleau-Ponty distinguishes between primary and secondary modes of expression. This distinction appears in Phenomenology of Perception (p. 207, 2nd note [Fr. ed.]) and is sometimes repeated in terms of spoken and speaking language (le langage parle et le langage parlant) (The Prose of the World, p. 10). Spoken language (le langage parle), or secondary expression, returns to our linguistic baggage, to the cultural heritage that we have acquired, as well as the brute mass of relationships between signs and significations. Speaking language (le langage parlant), or primary expression, such as it is, is language in the production of a sense, language at the advent of a thought, at the moment where it makes itself an advent of sense.  It is speaking language, that is to say, primary expression, that interests Merleau-Ponty and which keeps his attention through his treatment of the nature of production and the reception of expressions, a subject which also overlaps with an analysis of action, of intentionality, of perception, as well as the links between freedom and external conditions.  The notion of style occupies an important place in "Indirect Language and the Voices of Silence". In spite of certain similarities with Andre Malraux, Merleau-Ponty distinguishes himself from Malraux in respect to three conceptions of style, the last of which is employed in Malraux's The Voices of Silence. Merleau-Ponty remarks that in this work "style" is sometimes used by Malraux in a highly subjective sense, understood as a projection of the artist's individuality. Sometimes it is used, on the contrary, in a very metaphysical sense (in Merleau-Ponty's opinion, a mystical sense), in which style is connected with a conception of an "uber-artist" expressing "the Spirit of Painting". Finally, it sometimes is reduced to simply designating a categorization of an artistic school or movement. (However, this account of Malraux's notion of style--a key element in his thinking--is open to serious question.)  For Merleau-Ponty, it is these uses of the notion of style that lead Malraux to postulate a cleavage between the objectivity of Italian Renaissance painting and the subjectivity of painting in his own time, a conclusion that Merleau-Ponty disputes. According to Merleau-Ponty, it is important to consider the heart of this problematic, by recognizing that style is first of all a demand owed to the primacy of perception, which also implies taking into consideration the dimensions of historicity and intersubjectivity. (However, Merleau-Ponty's reading of Malraux has been questioned in a recent major study of Malraux's theory of art which argues that Merleau-Ponty seriously misunderstood Malraux.) For Merleau-Ponty, style is born of the interaction between two or more fields of being. Rather than being exclusive to individual human consciousness, consciousness is born of the pre-conscious style of the world, of Nature.

Are there any other interesting aspects about this article?

OUT: It is speaking language, that is to say, primary expression, that interests Merleau-Ponty


IN: "Cross Road Blues" (also known as "Crossroads") is a blues song written and recorded by American blues artist Robert Johnson in 1936. Johnson performed it as a solo piece with his vocal and acoustic slide guitar in the Delta blues-style. The song has become part of the Robert Johnson mythology as referring to the place where he supposedly sold his soul to the Devil in exchange for his musical talents, although the lyrics do not contain any specific references. Bluesman Elmore James revived the song with recordings in 1954 and 1960-1961.

Little is known about Johnson's life and musical career, although his recordings are well documented. In October 1936, Johnson auditioned for music store owner and sometime talent scout H. C. Speir in Jackson, Mississippi; Speir passed on Johnson's contact information to Ernie Oertle, who was a representative for ARC Records. After a second audition, Oertle arranged for Johnson to travel to San Antonio, Texas, for a recording session. Johnson recorded 22 songs for ARC over three days from November 23 to 27, 1936. During the first session, he recorded his most commercially appealing songs. They mostly represented his original pieces and reflected current, piano-influenced musical trends. The songs include "Terraplane Blues" (his first single and most popular record) along with "Sweet Home Chicago" and "I Believe I'll Dust My Broom", which became blues standards after others recorded them.  A second and third recording date took place in San Antonio after a two-day break. Johnson reached back into his long-standing repertoire for songs to record. The material reflects the styles of country blues performers Charley Patton and Son House, who influenced Johnson in his youth. The songs are among Johnson's most heartfelt and forceful, and music historian Ted Gioia sees a shift in the lyrical themes:  At the close of the San Antonio session, the darker, more apocalyptic side of Johnson's work emerges ... [he] evokes the themes of damnation and redemption, darkness and light ... glimpses into the musician's inner life, and all its attendant turmoils.  "Cross Road Blues" was recorded during Johnson's third session in San Antonio, on Friday November 27, 1936. The sessions continued at an improvised studio in Room 414 at the Gunter Hotel. ARC producers Art Satherley and Don Law supervised the recording and used a portable disc cutting machine. It is unknown what input, if any, they had into Johnson's selection of material to record or how to present it. Two similar takes of the song were recorded.

What dark sides did he have?

OUT:
... [he] evokes the themes of damnation and redemption, darkness and light ... glimpses into the musician's inner life, and all its attendant turmoils.