Scope and Contents

The book consists of two parts entitled eunoia and oiseau. Bok notes that Eunoia is the shortest word in the English language to contain all five vowels and means 'beautiful thinking.' Eunoia is a univocal lipogram in which each chapter restricts itself to a single vowel and owes a debt to Georges Perec. As Bok notes, all chapters also abide by subsidary rules. Oiseau is a French word that means bird and is the shortest word in the French language with all five vowels. It is an anagrammatic text. This copy is the fourth printing of the book. -- Source of annotation: Marvin or Ruth Sackner.

Scope and Contents Back cover blurb:"Pataphysics, the pseudoscience imagined by Alfred Jarry, has so far, because of its academic frivolity and hermetic perversity, attracted very little scholarly or critical inquiry, and yet it has inspired a century of experimentation. Tracing the place of 'pataphysics in the tangled history of the relationship between science and poetry, Christian Bok demonstrates that 'pataphysics is fundamental to the nature of the postmodern. Bok considers the work of Jarry, 'pataphysician, both by itself and as it influenced work by later generations. Discussing 'pataphysics in general and Jarry's work in particular as a ludic counterpart of Nietzschean philosophy, Bok examines the relationship of rule and chance, of science and poetry, of the rational and the surrational. His work draws on a wide range of reading in poetry and theory to establish a firm historical ground for understanding the influence of 'pataphysics, making a variety of seemingly difficult or obscure...