Friday November 22, 2024

1:30-2:45 pm: Panel 5: Buddhism and geopoetics

Monika Kocot (University of Lodz): "The Way of Śūnyatā: Poetics of Emptiness in Gary Snyder and Kenneth White"

In his illuminating essay on Gary Snyder entitled "The Tribal Dharma" (published in English in 1975, and in French in 2015 and 2021), Kenneth White traces Snyder's poetic and spiritual inspirations, and attempts to show Snyder's journey from the Beat Generation an-arche, Native American mythology, and various schools of Buddhism, to his "Dharma revolution." "The way of Śūnyatā – White writes – is a way that leads ‘nowhere’ – like those Holzwege (paths through the wood) that Heidegger speaks of, ‘nowhere’ being ‘das Seiende in seinem Sein’, which we might translate, grotesquely enough, as ‘the what is in its being’ (which again would seem to be to us what the Chinese refer to as tzu-jan, ‘self-thus’)." He refers to Liou Kia-Hway who in his L'Esprit Synthétique de la Chine juxtaposes "the abstract totality of the West" and “the eastern awareness of ‘a concrete totality which suffers no separation.’” When writing about Snyder's "ontological hero" Han Shan (Cold Mountain), the 8^th century Ch’an hermit-poet, White returns to L'Esprit Synthétique de la Chine and offers the following quote: "Let us give ourselves up to an immediate perception of the reality around us. This flash of sun, this blade of grass [...] immediately reveal the presence of ontological being, an obscure, invisible presence in which everything is gathered-in and nothing excluded [...] a full and sovereign presence [...] a presence which makes for the joy of the sage deeply reintegrated with his ontological source."

Even though White writes about Snyder's poems ("the variety of paths they follow, and the range of territory they cover"), one cannot help thinking that he is coming back again and again to certain themes and tropes that (will) feature prominently in his own work: whiteness, emptiness, Śūnyatā, incandescence, thusness – to mention just a few. This paper will offer a comparative analysis of White's and Snyder's (geo)poetics. The emphasis will be placed on the poems which show how White's and Snyder's visions converge, and how they reflect their spiritual practice of emptiness inspired by Ch’an and Zen masters and poets of China and Japan.

Qinghe Song (UMR 9022-Héritages / UMR 8043–IFRAE): "Géopoétique et pensées-praxis du bouddhisme" 

Thoughts from Asian religions, such as Buddhism, Taoism and Tantrism, occupy a significant place in geopoetics. Between the “white world” and Asia, the open world and the śūnyatā, the Western and Eastern worlds, Buddha and his land offer a bridge and leaps for Kenneth White's intellectual nomadism. Thus, it's not surprising to see that, among his myriad of writings, quotations and criticism on Buddhism, Kenneth White presents an obvious sensitivity to the dharma and a perpetual research into the Buddhist tradition. As a great reader of Buddhist spiritualities, he dialogues with various masters, from Gautama to Nāgārjuna, via Suzuki Daisetsu. The Buddhist texts he deals with are rich and heterogeneous. At least three schools/branches of Buddhism crystallize White's thinking:

Mādhyamaka (middle way): Mādhyamaka (middle path) and Chittamatra (nothing but mind) are two main schools of Mahāyāna (great path) Buddhism. The notion of śūnyatā (emptiness, vacuity) characterizes the Mādhyamaka school, a notion that Kenneth White explores in depth. Nāgārjuna (c. 2^nd-3^rd century), the Indian master and founder of this school, is thus White's guide on the path to śūnyatā.

Zen/Chan is a Mahāyāna school sinicized in China during the Southern and Northern Dynasties (420-589), inherited and transmitted to Japan during the Kamakura Period (1185-1333). This school's understanding of Buddhism differs fundamentally from that of India, becoming a school of Chinese Buddhism. It exerts an ongoing influence on the philosophy, art and literature (haiku, for example) of the Chinese cultural sphere. In 1998, Zen was selected by the International Institute of Geopoetics for inclusion in the “Geopoetic Lexicon”, which lists the fifteen “most characteristic and significant [terms] of the author's thought”.

Vajrayāna: A Mahāyāna and Tantric branch that emerged under the Gupta Empire (3^rd-6^th century). Tibetan Buddhism ensures its Indian lineage, its Himalayan evolution and its vitality today. White has scrutinized terms relating to this branch, such as dakini, mandala, mahamudra, the last of which is also selected in the geopoetic dictionary. As a religion in migration, the three schools/branches of Buddhism that White refers to present more differences than similarities (all three being Mahāyānian). Temporally, they appeared a millennium apart; geo-culturally, they were formed on Indo-Sino/Japanese-Tibetan lands; and buddhistically, they present distinct, even opposed, thoughts and practices.

Problematic and objectives:

Firstly, the disparate state of Buddhist sources prompts us to ask the following question: how does Kenneth White treat and mobilize these Buddhist readings, with often present heterogeneous or even contradictory characteristics? By placing White's Buddhist ideas in the context of Buddhism, this paper aims at a better understanding of how White approaches and appropriates Buddhism. The aim is to clarify the relationship between geopoetics and Buddhism. Moreover, by examining the Buddhist research carried out by White, we hope to discover other Buddhist-spiritual and cultural sources, orientations and inspirations to explore and meditate upon.

Secondly, it is essential to understand that Buddhism is based on a trinity: “listening, meditating, practising (dharma)” (Chinese: wen, si, xiu). However, the aspect of Buddhist practise linked to śūnyatā, Zen and Mahamudra is not sufficiently explored by geopoeticians, even though these practices are rich and varied, and have a deep connection with the river (mani stone), the earth (kora), the wind (loungta) and, with nature. What's more, Buddhist thought and practise have inspired fertile artistic creations, from Eastern secular scholars to contemporary artists. The aim of this paper is therefore to examine Buddhist and artistic practises closely linked to White's reflections.