From Poetics

• Divergence in Gestalt therapy? by Timothy C. McNamara, 3/8/97
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    • Data flow and self organization by Timothy C. McNamara, 3/21/97
      
      

Almost forty years ago, the poet Charles Olson observed that "form is never anything more than an extension of content". This was before the Internet, before any real clarification of chaos theory, and of course before several recent developments in Gestalt theory. Olson’s contribution to poetics touches the heart of both Gestalt theory and to its practice. What his poetics and poetry demanded were a spontaneous delivery of information; his promise was that from this organismic policy would come order. He anticipated the Net and chaos by at least a few decades, and I love his principle – but the actual product always turns out to be something else.

I encourage introspection on the matter. How do you respond to being overwhelmed with information, and how do you now respond to almost immediate re-responses? Do you become more "organized"? And in what way do you become more "organized"? I find that I can not avoid "organization" – no matter how chaotic that organization becomes. What is important to me is to take it all on, take it all in. I’ll attend to the appropriate figure at the appropriate time in the mythical cycle of experience.

• Form and Content by Brian O'Neill, 3/23/97
• Case Study by Philip Brownell, 3/24/97