Percy-L: Literary, Religious, Scientific, and Philosophical Discussion of Walker Percy

[Robert Eckert <rgeckert AT yahoo.com>]

Dear List,

 

Peter Kramer, the author of _Listening to Prozac_, recently published _Against Depression_.

 

The last chapter of _LP_ is "The Message in the Capsule" and deal extensively with Percy. Kramer corresponded with Percy at some point.

 

However, to me he gets Percy quite wrong.

 

On p.265 of _AG_ Kramer writes:

 

"...Percy's position blurs distinctions we might want to make. It overstates the case only slightly to say that for Percy, there is no difference between treating epilepsy and treating

alienation. Both are best approached via faith and revelation, not technology."

 

It amazes me that Kramer could have read Percy's nonfiction, which he states he has (e-mail), and miss Percy's use of the Dyadic/Triadic distinction, especially:

 

"I can even visualize the hospital of the future in which the first signs the patient sees in the corridor do not read INTERNAL MEDICINE, SURGERY, OB-GYN, DERMATOLOGY, PSYCHIATRY UPSTAIRS, but rather two big signs just inside the front door, one pointing left, one right (I won't say which is which), but one reading DYADIC DISORDERS; the other, TRIADIC DISORDERS."

 

To Percy, the distinction is so profound that he feels the very architecture of the hospitals of the future could be based upon it!

 

It is a shame that Kramer has broadly disseminated such a profound and fundamental misreading of Percy's work.

 

Robert Eckert

Rochester, New York

 

---

Yahoo! Sports
 
Rekindle the Rivalries. Sign up for Fantasy Football