home
***
CD-ROM
|
disk
|
FTP
|
other
***
search
/
Understanding McLuhan
/
Understanding McLuhan (1996)(Voyager)[Mac-PC].iso
/
pc
/
mcluhan.dxr
/
08286_Field_TCGG T51.txt
< prev
next >
Wrap
Text File
|
1996-04-10
|
895b
|
15 lines
And dizzy ’tis to cast one’s eyes so low!
The illusion of the third dimension is discussed at length in E. H.
Gombrich’s Art and Illusion. Far from being a normal mode of
human vision, three-dimensional perspective is a conventionally
acquired mode of seeing, as much acquired as is the means of
recognizing the letters of the alphabet, or of following
chronological narrative. That it was an acquired illusion
Shakespeare helps us to see by his comments on the other
senses in relation to sight. Gloucester is ripe for illusion because
he has suddenly lost his sight. His power of visualization is now
quite separate from his other senses. And it is the sense of
sight in deliberate isolation from the other senses that confers
on man the illusion of the third dimension, as Shakespeare
makes explicit here. There is also the need to fix the gaze: