Recitation

Memorizing that piece in Cage really changed my perspective of his work. Before, I thought he wanted to be sensible, but bland. Only thing, is that where he placed his pauses, were very insensible. It was shocking to me because I had previously felt, when I was reading, a sense of meaning in the silences. Instead, when memorizing, I felt no meaning. Actually, it felt as though the silences were there with the intention of destroying any possible meaning. Although, I got nervous and did not do the performance rehearsed, my intention was to be monotone. I wanted to make my voice seem uninteresting and my demeanor uninteresting as well. When performing it, it felt as though the underlying theme of nothingness should have been highlighted. By saying anything with too much enthusiasm, I would have been risking the bottom line: nothing. Those that hear this lecture are not supposed to be captivated, but rather should be anxious. We have this tendency to look for meaning in everything. We don't let things just be as they are said or written. . Cage just was wanted us to get nothing. He didn't want meaning to be extracted from his words.
Communication is a multifaceted action. It requires words, intonations, nonverbal cues, sometimes gestures and so forth in order for the meaning to be conveyed. Cage gives us words. Even when he is speaking on ideas with deeper meaning, or explaining a concept, it is not probable that the meaning was transferred. You can see this in the part where he was talking about life and structure. They work hand in hand to deliver meaning. One without the other is nothing. It's ironic, because his lecture is exactly that. Structure, without life. As an audience to a performance such as this one, nothing could be understood until reading it and realizing the true impact and genius of his work. In reading it, I didn't not fully grasp what Cage was trying to do. I feel that having to recite it put me in a place where I had to try to understand the author's state of mind even more so that reading and analyzing a passage did. In trying to connect the ideas with the silences, I was able to see the lack of connection.
The experience of reciting was very rewarding for me. I spent lots of time repeating and rewriting my excerpt. I spent time visualizing everything so that I could hopefully connect it to the words and to the silences. There came a point where memorizing exactly were the silences were no longer mattered to me, so long as they were incorporated. Cage’s application of structure from music composition juxtaposes the stream of conscience he seems to utilize in his work. This juxtaposition was made most known to me when approaching the work from another angle.
In the beginning of the semester, I remember the point was made that reading was not just about the words on the page. We were advised to read out loud, embrace confusion, analyze the way we felt confused, and not to be one-sided in our thinking and analyzing. I’m sure that many would agree that this assignment was the perfect way of showing that.