The dangerous prevalence of imagination

Abstract

The Dangerous Prevalence of Imagination constitutes an academic response to The Tapeworm Foundry by Darren Wershler (a poet who lists imaginary proposals for artworks that he might like to see created on his behalf). Wershler cites a complex network of references throughout both artistic history and populist culture, doing so in a form that emulates the segmented structure of a tapeworm. Each of his proposals can subsist on its own, with the potential to become a separate ‘parasite,’ and together they constitute a string of fecund motifs, all of which digress into an array of diverse allusions and oddball citations. The author begs each reader to be a plagiarist of his work – to steal each idea, without any need for the reader to seek permission or to give remittance. My essay, likewise, emulates the style of such a work by writing in a segmented structure, with each paragraph acting as a small essay of preset length on a given theme, with each topic arranged in a series; moreover, I have resorted to a form that connects these ideas together via linked ‘asides’, much like the array of citational references in the book itself. A number in square brackets can take the reader to an endnote that diverges into a digression from the main body of the essay, and the form of my essay plagiarises the aesthetic attitudes that animate such a catalogue of allusions. I might note, for example, that this prefatory paragraph almost serves as a kind of ‘tape head’ for the following, extensive ‘mixtape’ that unspools poetic ideas about an index for poetic ideas, all intended to be stolen. I do hope that, in keeping with the whimsical character of this topic, a charitable readership might find occasions for surprise while perusing this essay….