“The House of Language: Laura (Riding) Jackson’s Rational Meaning
and the Truth of Experience”
10 AM–12 PM, Wednesday, November 18, 2009
Laura Riding Jackson House/Environmental Learning Center, Vero Beach, Fla.
Sponsored by Florida Atlantic University and the Laura (Riding) Jackson Foundation
Installation of text from Rational Meaning at the Laura (Riding) Jackson House, Orchid Island, Fla., November 2009. Copyright (c) Barrett Watten 2009.
On 18 November 2009, I lectured on Laura (Riding) Jackson’s culminating work, Rational Meaning, which she wrote with Schuyler B. Jackson until his decease and then finished herself. The lecture took place in (Riding) Jackson’s “cracker” house, which had been transported from Wabasso across the Intercoastal Waterway to Orchid Island and relocated on an open field proximate to an Environmental Learning Center. For the lecture, I sampled key passages from the text of Rational Meaning and displayed them on 8 1/2 x 11″ index stock throughout the house, presenting my lecture to a small group of (Riding) Jackson scholars and aficionados on the porch. After the lecture, the audience was invited to read the texts in situ. The photo above shows one passage, displayed against what remains in the house of LRJ’s library.
