Stevens, Cavell, and Inexplicable Prose

While Wallace Stevens professed to dislike explanations, his letters often indulge in them. His lectures, by comparison, seek alternatives to explanation by appealing to shared intuition and by aspiring to the self-sufficient completeness of aphoristic form. Parallels with the work of Wittgenstein and Cavell suggest that Stevens's aphoristic evasions express a desire for a clear and communal language. The style of his lectures aligns with Cavell's vision of philosophical work as requiring responsiveness, a requirement not easily fulfilled. Ultimately, Stevens's lectures enact a tension between aspiration and frustration, exemplifying his lifelong struggle with the limits of clarity, sufficiency, and poetic theory.