Saturday, November 11, 2006

A reply to Kate from McGill University: A.S Byatt, proprioception, poetry and the blind

Last night Kate from McGill University left me this comment:

"Hi, I'm a student at McGill University, and wondered if proprioception could possible be evoked through poetry. A.S. Byatt published a paper in the TLS a month ago or so about mirror neurons being fired when reading certain works of poetry (she cited Donne). But perhaps the reader could also have a proprioceptive experience through reading poetry, particularly the blind? This may have gotten away from the main argument of your blog entry, but I would love to hear your thoughts. Thanks."

Kate, I'm not really a neuropsycholgist but the question really does interest me - at least in the sense of mental representation in the abscence of vision and proprioception. Give me a few days, I actually want to read what Byatt wrote (do you have the article?) and I'll see if I can come up with something coherent.

For now I found these two blogs that might interest you: So Many Books & Musings from Lehigh Valley

btw - I did my undergraduate at Concordia University :)

Have a good weekend,

v.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Hi Victor,

Thanks for your reply. Sorry for the delay in response...I was unable to find this blog again! I do have the link to TLS article by A.S. Byatt, but unfortunately it can only be accessed via the TLS's subscriber archive. I will, however, send you a copy by email.

Regards,

Kate