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Sartor Resartus
Sartor Resartus ("The Tailor Retailored") is ostensibly an introduction to a strange history of clothing by the German Professor of Things in General, Diogenes Teufelsdrockh; its deeper concerns are social injustice, the right way of living in the world, and the large questions of faith and understanding. This is the first edition to present the novel as it origi...more
Paperback, 273 pages
Published
August 1st 2008
by Oxford University Press, USA
(first published 1834)
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"Considering our present advanced state of culture, and how the Torch of Science has now been brandished and borne about, with more or less effect, for five thousand years and upwards... so that not the smallest cranny or doghole in Nature or Art can remain unilluminated, -- it might strike the reflective mind with some surprise that hitherto little or nothing of a fundamental character, whether in the way of Philosophy or History, has been written on the subject of Clothes."
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"Clothes make the man. Naked people have little or no influence on society." — Mark Twain
i have a sneaking suspicion that i shall forever be currently-reading this book.
Update - suspicion confirmed. After the 4th attempt I think I've given up hope - it starts off well with some amazing language but nothing happens - and this is from someone who loves moby dick in which nothing happens for most of the book and someone who read gravity's rainbow in barely anything happens and it doesn't happen in incomprehensible ways - but then again, the only reason I read that was becau...more
Update - suspicion confirmed. After the 4th attempt I think I've given up hope - it starts off well with some amazing language but nothing happens - and this is from someone who loves moby dick in which nothing happens for most of the book and someone who read gravity's rainbow in barely anything happens and it doesn't happen in incomprehensible ways - but then again, the only reason I read that was becau...more
Sartor Resartus is one of the without-which-nothings of How to Make Love to Adrian Colesberry. Carlyle's editor character, who makes running commentary on a fictional German author's "Philosophy of Clothes" reminds me very much of Kinbote in Pale Fire, making me wonder how much Nabakov derived from this. I can only imagine he'd read it but I've never seen it listed as one of his antecedents. It's certainly one of mine.
The way that he used a layering of narrators to make wry crit...more
The way that he used a layering of narrators to make wry crit...more
Thomas Carlyle’s one published fiction is this ragbag of satire, sarcasm and social commentary packaged as a spoof biography of the fictional German philosopher, Diogenes Teufelsdröckh. Sartor Resartus is clearly intended as social satire in the style of Jonathan Swift, using high-flown philosophical language to describe everyday items, in this case clothes. Happily, Carlyle keeps forgetting about the clothes, a clunky metaphor that produces such awful puns as “Clotha Virumque cano”.
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Or, redressing German Idealism. At the center of this strange “novel” is our ability to understand truth. Fiction cavorts as fact through the pen of an unnamed Editor and one Diogenes Teufelsdröckh, then becomes non-fiction as Carlyle’s own transcendental philosophy takes form. By balancing form and theme, it interprets Hegel by way of Blake’s “The Marriage of Heaven & Hell” to reveal truth as an imminent, rather than absolute, certainty that is reached by confronting known contradictions and...more
Alright, so he's an old bastard. I know. He was generally wrong-headed and entirely conceited. He's also hilarious and witty. I would that all those who disagree with me could do so in such a pleasing fashion.
I dipped in and out of most texts while at university, so putting them all on this shelf would be futile. I did try to read this one later on, however, after wearing the gown and getting bopped on the head by a stranger. This falls into the Scottish camp, a camp I am unsure about. As a Scot I have no interest in Scotland and consequently Walter Scott and the other Scots. I think the best Scots are Americans and Canadians. They truly care about this nation and take an active interest in our herit...more
Marcus
rated it
·
review of another edition
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review of another edition
Recommends it for:
sansculottes, reactionaries, tailors, women, dandies, bureaucrats
Shelves:
read-again,
canon
Sartor Resartus, which means "The Tailor Re-tailored" is ostensibly a book on "The Philosophy of Clothing" by a German author, Herr Diogenes Teufelsdrockh. We're told that this is the English translation from the original German. But, this is much more than a translation. The translator feels that in order to make the book more accessible to his English audience, he should include copious commentary and background. In the end, not only do we get the the translation of the ori...more
"The Tailor Retailored." This book is a gem. It is full of falsely attributed quotes, fabricated histories, inverted authorities, and patchworks of ideas all woven together to complete "Teufelsdrockh's "philosophy of clothes." This guy did it before Cathy Acker. Before Jorge Luis Borges. "Nay, farther art not thou too perhaps by this time made aware that all Symbols are properly Clothes; that all Forms whereby Spirit manifests itself to Sense, whether outwardly or...more
comic, mennippean 19th century novel that takes the form of an exegesis and biography of fictional philosopher Diogenes Teufelsdroeckh and his controversial discourse on clothes. DT's religious ramblings (The Everlasting Yea, etc.) remind me of the writing on Dr. Bronner's soap bottles, and the philosophizing on clothes-worship goes beyond dandyism and into total zaniness (legal rights for scarecrows, a gown that reigns on for years after its king has passed).
Well, I would never read this book unless I was forced to for class, which is the case here. Or unless I had an affinity for Victorian commodity culture. However much I do not like it, the book is a fascinating study of genre, biography, autobiography, consumption of the self, clothing, words, writing and editing, and many other tropes. My problem with it is that it presents too many dualities and does not follow a narrative form.
I think this is definitely a book that must be discus...more
I think this is definitely a book that must be discus...more
I observe that Carlyle had trouble finding a publisher. Having just completed the work, I am not surprised. Reading other reviews, I feel someone should shout out that this particular king is in the altogether.
Probably for a reader better acquainted with the style and works of the time, Sartor was a genius piece of work.
In my opinion, however, Carlyle, though knowledgeable, wasn't very organized, sure of what he wanted to say and just included every fact and the kitchen sink.
In my opinion, however, Carlyle, though knowledgeable, wasn't very organized, sure of what he wanted to say and just included every fact and the kitchen sink.
If you want the short version, read "Natural Supernaturalism," and the following chapter, "Circumspective," both from the third book. 19th century metafiction. Genius.
i thot this book would be a cool book about like, cool clothes, but it's like, about some metaphysical crap or something??? iono.
Looked into this the other day, and wow. Carlyle is easy to loathe. But I'd forgotten how good this is.
A brilliant allegory about the bible! One of my favorite books of all time.
Brilliant use of the subjunctive throughout.
Mahrya
rated it
·
review of another edition
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review of another edition
Recommends it for:
recommended to all
Shelves:
fictionschmiction
A fictional biographer wrastles with hoary Teufelsdrockh's philosophy of clothes--a crazy ideology that uses clothing to explain all sorts of things about society, relationships, religion and the world. This book meanders delightfully, covering details of the clothes philosophy, Teufelsdrockh's life and the biographer's writing process. The prose is some of the most beautiful and engaging stuff I've read in awhile.
Joanna
rated it
·
review of another edition
·
review of another edition
Recommends it for:
philosophers
Recommended to Joanna by:
Princetone Review
Shelves:
gre-prep,
philosophy
Truly weird stuff!! I would only recommend this if you're interested in untangling an ungodly mix of Scottish Calvinism and German philosophy - not really my bag at all. It is strewn with some fabulous quotes, which is probably its only redeeming feature.
Djuna Barnes certainly read this. Buried in the last chapter, I recently found a phrase she used for a chapter title in Nightwood. "Watchman, what of the Night".
I read Sartor Resartus repeatedly, with joy.
I read Sartor Resartus repeatedly, with joy.
Dense as anything. On the other hand, Carlyle in best humorous form. Narrated by an English editor trying to make sense of a German philosopher's "Philosophy of Clothes."
Not for the faint of heart.
Not for the faint of heart.
Yes, I really read it. No, I didn't skim. And I mention it here only because, for a Victorian dude, Carlyle is pretty postmodern. If you're into that kind of humor, then it's a pretty fun read.
And here I'd thought I'd come up with many of my spiritual and political philosophies on my own. Not so. Carlyle beat me by almost 200 years. Witty and ironic, and very clever.
Sort of overly-reflective insanity reminiscent of alan watts. An important book in its time, overshadowed by Fight club.
Sounded too strange not to read
Jules
marked it as wanted-victorians
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Thomas Carlyle was a Scottish satirical writer, essayist, historian and teacher during the Victorian era. He called economics "the dismal science", wrote articles for the Edinburgh Encyclopedia, and became a controversial social commentator.
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“Some comfort it would have been, could I, like a Faust, have fancied myself tempted and tormented of the Devil; for a Hell, as I imagine, without Life, though only Diabolic Life, were more frightful: but in our age of Downpulling and Disbelief, the very Devil has been pulled down, you cannot so much as believe in a Devil. To me the Universe was all void of Life, of Purpose, of Volition, even of Hostility: it was one huge, dead, immeasurable Steam-engine, rolling on, in its dead indifference, to grind me limb from limb.”
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“Silence is the element in which great things fashion themselves together; that at length they may emerge, full-formed and majestic, into the daylight of Life, which they are thenceforth to rule. Not William the Silent only, but all the considerable men I have known, and the most undiplomatic and unstrategic of these, forbore to babble of what they were creating and projecting. Nay, in thy own mean perplexities, do thou thyself but hold thy tongue for one day: on the morrow, how much clearer are thy purposes and duties; what wreck and rubbish have those mute workmen within thee swept away, when intrusive noises were shut out! Speech is too often not, as the Frenchman defined it, the art of concealing Thought; but of quite stifling and suspending Thought, so that there is none to conceal. Speech too is great, but not the greatest. As the Swiss Inscription says: Sprecfien ist silbern, Schweigen ist golden (Speech is silvern, Silence is golden); or as I might rather express it: Speech is of Time, Silence is of Eternity.”
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