Conferential

In her essay on Walter Sickert, Virginia Woolf tells readers that writing and painting have much to tell each other. Many people of course are already aware of this fact, but the authority of a writer like Woolf brings the truth home in new ways. But my aim in mentioning this is to call attention to the shared edification one gets from a different kind of reading, which is the conversational exchanges of scientific conferences—scientific in the wide sense, a sense Nietzsche at least would have promoted. Lotman too, and this updates, regards the humanities and the exact sciences on equal footing. The master, Thomas Sebeok calls him in an article I unfortunately seem to have mis placed. In any event talking at conferences both formally and informally spurs freedom of speech. Tout simplement. They stay in touch and in many ways promote a more global social sense. Which takes us back to that writing/painting mot.........