ABSTRACT
Taking as its starting point the fluid and contingent nature of identity and the contingency that informs our interactions with others – what de Beauvoir called ‘the self as situation’ – this contribution applies the notion of attitudinal continua to explore the creative act as a phenomenon of performative and performed consciousness. The stance goes beyond ‘page vee stage’ dichotomies by positioning the era of the written and published word as a historical moment that may be reaching its end, and by examining creativity as an event internally performed as well as externally staged. This approach, as much mischievous and playful as critically rigorous and probing, helps structure the form as well as content of the chapter, wherein the poet’s-eye view constitutes an interrogation of meaning, assumption, canon and academy.
