Erotophronesis

Like Shakespeare, I like to invent words. However, unlike his, I don’t think mine will catch on. Like this one:

EROTOPHRONESIS

Go ahead. Try to say it. Rolls right off the tongue.

The word “philosophy” as you probably know, comes from the roots philia and sophia and is usually translated as “love of wisdom.”

But those clever Greeks had other words for love and wisdom.

Eros, as you also probably know, is the kind of love that lies in the body. Unlike philia, which is an abstract, transcendental form of affection, eros is sexually-charged desire with the potential to incite change, growth, or chaos.

Related to the word for light, sophia is the kind of wisdom that you gain through looking; it’s the result of outside observation paired with thoughtful consideration. Phronesis, however, was used by ancient Greeks to describe knowledge that develops through first-hand experience. While sophia helps you contemplate the nature of the world, phronesis must be used to determine a course of action that will generate change. Phronesis is something that comes with age and practice and that can’t be explained through words or pictures.

Erotophronesis. Erotic love of embodied knowledge.

The term isn’t very catchy. But the concept is a virus that I’d like to spread.

Dreams of Invisible Sycorax

In Shakespeare's The Tempest, the witch Sycorax dies several years before the play begins, enduring only as memory. Banished from Algiers and abandoned on the island to fend for herself and the child in her womb, Sycorax represents not just the Northern African subject, but would have also been seen (in Shakespeare’s time) as a stand-in for the variety of indigenous people that Elizabethan England was encountering more and more due to the expansion of their colonial project abroad.

Sycorax is described as inhumanly powerful, with control over the moon and tides. Her fecundity and connection to lunar cycles link her with archetypal female sources of power. But her version of femininity is far from the dainty European femininity embodied in the young Miranda. Described as a hag "bent into a hoop," her gender identity is illegible and monstrous. This illegibility is present in her race as well. A Northern African with “blue eyes,” she is an exile and a mixed subject who ascends to ruler of her own small realm.

The prefix “syco” is related to the Greek word for “fig,” which was slang for vagina. “Ax” relates to the term “axis” or “axial,” invoking a center around which something turns. Before the arrival of Prospero and his daughter, the island of Sycorax and her son did, in fact, revolve around the axis of female power. Prospero, an embodiment of masculine European rationality whose magical powers derive from his books and spells alone, was only able to "prosper" on the isle in the vacuum of her absence.

Yet at the end of the play, Prospero and the rest of the Italians depart, leaving only the monstrous Caliban, the now-freed Ariel, and Sycorax's invisible but enduring presence. Around what axis will the world of the island now turn?

It's true that Sycorax’s invisibility in this play can be read simply as the forceful eviction of the powerful, racially-marked female from the patriarchal narrative. Old story. However, perhaps there is some grace to be found in the negative space of this hoveringly absent character. Both race and gender only hold sway as identification markers in the realm of the visible. What power can they have over an invisible witch?

An aporia upon which the entirety of the play depends, the legacy of Sycorax is handed down from Shakespeare to us to consider and elegize. What can post-colonialist, feminist artists and thinkers do with her legacy? “As long as we are on the trajectory of the visible, we are more or less innocent or guilty,” says theorist Helene Cixous. Perhaps we can consider Sycorax as blessed, rather than cursed, with invisibility. In any case, her spells are still active, drawing us towards her now-vacant island with an inverse sorcery that resists the verdict of either guilt or innocence.

Oh Sister Ismene

I played Antigone once in my sixth grade production. I still remember the first line and the pleading look on my eleven-year-old face when I said it: "Oh sister Ismene! Unhappiness, calamity, disgrace, and dishonor have fallen upon us!"

Researching the play today, I tumbled into an internet rabbit-hole trying to pin down the meaning of Antigone's name. Like all etymological slip-and-slides, definitiveness is impossible, but the multivalent possibilities of those four little syllables are quite provocative.

We're all familiar with the prefix "Anti," which means against, opposed to, or the opposite of.

The second part of her name, however, poses more questions. Some sources claim it's related to the Greek word "gnomos" which means opinion or thought. An interpretation of this version or her name would be "one who goes against the opinions of others."

Another interpretation claims that the "gone" derives from the word "gonia" which means angle or bend (as in polygon). This gives us a vision of an Antigone who is unbending or unyielding.

Finally, there could be a relationship with the word "gonos," which means seed or semen, and is related to procreation as well as motherhood. This is the tricky interpretation. Was Antigone the first "man-hating feminist" of anti-feminist lore? Was she opposing motherhood and the "natural" flow of generations in the way she took on the masculine responsibility of defending her family's honor?

Oh Sister Ismene, for at least 2400 years, women who go against the opinions of others and hold to their beliefs in unbending ways have risked being seen as the enemy of mankind. All we want to do is bury our brother's body.