How far then, does Walking a Line risk falling off the line, blurring
boundaries between opposites, in an attempt to escape from all that is
constricting; how may this be understood in terms of Romantic and
avant-garde explorations of the sublime, and what kind of politics
does this suggest?
Walking a Line, Paul Klee and DÈlire
Walking a Line remembers the avant-garde artist Paul Klee whose
painting and writing confronts the sublime or the ëdangerous edge of
thingsí, in a paradoxical effort to make visible the invisible or that
which evades representation. Attracted to the whimsical figure of Klee
who wrote and lectured on art theory, Paulin, in his poetry, cannot
remain in a refuge away from contemporary critical and aesthetic
theory. While exploring representation alongside the work of an
avant-garde artist, it is less possible for Paulinís poetry to establish a
firm foundation of belief with the effect that Walking a Line performs
an experimental act of representation rather than claiming a total or
stable knowledge of the world. The title of Walking a Line connects
with the notion of the artist or writer ëtaking a line out for a walkí.^18
The linguistic line, like the line of the artistís brush, may be taken out
for a walk which the audience follow doggedly ñ the lead is held by
the artist and viewers trail behind. For Klee, the ëline is the most
limited dimension of art being solely a matter of measurement.í^19
But while evocative of territorial, linguistic and ideological lines,
Walking a Line also offers us a playful version of art which is
fantastic, capricious or irrational. The poems hint at the experimental
nature of art rather than at a specifically political agenda to be
followed by the artist; looking to an art that is romantic rather than
enlightened, irrational rather than rational, and sensual rather than
sensible. In ëLa Ligne et la Lettreí (1971) which provides an analysis
18 Paulin, ëTwentieth Century Poetry Lectureí, The University of Kent.
19 Paul Klee, On Modern Art with an Introduction by Herbert Read (London:
Faber, n.d.), p.21.