Michelle Bailat-Jones

Writer, Translator, Reader

Archive for ‘January, 2008’

Kobo Abe – The Woman in the Dunes

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Sooner or later most humans come to grips with their relative insignificance. Maybe for people born in the second half of the twentieth century this is a given – we know we’re just one tiny speck on a bustling, diverse planet. We know we could slip easily through the cracks of our baggy social systems. We know how easy it would be to get lost in one of the world’s towering, complicated cities. And we know we’ve lost most of the threads that tied us once upon a time to previous generations. 

But for some, this realization comes as an appalling shock. For Niki Junpei, the hero of Kobo Abe’s splendid 1962 novel The Woman in the Dunes, the reality of his insignificance smacks him quite mercilessly into the bottom of a deep sand pit with no opportunity of crawling his way out. 

Niki is a teacher and amateur entomologist. One afternoon he strikes out for three days vacation near the ocean. He hopes to discover a new beetle or an otherwise unknown insect. He arrives at a strange village just barely holding its own against the massive shifting tide of the sand dunes. After missing the last bus, he asks the villagers for shelter for the night. They agree and he is lowered deep inside the dune into one of the homes whose only other occupant is a young woman, a widow. What he doesn’t know is that the village has no intention of ever letting him out again. 

Niki comes to understand not only that he is a hostage but also, and this part is much worse, that no one will ever come looking for him. He will vanish and his disappearance, for the most part, will leave the surface of the life he leaves behind undisturbed. His colleagues will joke and invent a sordid affair; his girlfriend will accept her abandonment as the natural result of their fading relationship. His attempts to fight, overcome, understand or transform this reality supply the novel with urgency and a distinct emotional momentum. 

Alongside Abe’s existential meditation, his prose is also a real delight (seamlessly translated, in my opinion, by E. Dale Saunders). Abe exploits the image of the sand and its weight, its beauty, and its near-magical quality: 

High in the night sky there was a continuous, discordant sound of wind blowing at a different velocity. And on the ground the wind was a knife continually shaving off thin layers of sand. He wiped away the perspiration, blew his nose with his fingers, and brushed the sand from his head. The ripples of sand at his feet suddenly looked like motionless crests of waves. 

The relationship between Niki and the woman is complicated. She needs him to survive in the hostile environment of the dunes. That is his only functional purpose. That he work alongside her clearing the sand each night. But in such close quarters the two can’t seem to stop themselves from embarking on an awkward affair. Their relationship seems to mirror another of Abe’s questions – why have things gotten so confusing, why have men and women become so aggressive with one another, why have people forgotten how to really connect? 

The Woman in the Dunes is an imaginative representation of our struggle to assert our own consequence, an honest depiction of the hidden despotic tendencies of the average human and a bleakly beautiful rendering of nature’s ultimate authority. 

To wrap up, I want to mention that Abe adapted the novel for film in 1964 (dir. Hiroshi Teshigahara) and it remains a stunning example of Japanese black and white cinematography. 

Also, let me just send a huge thanks to Dolce Bellezza for hosting the Japanese Literature Challenge. What a wonderful idea!

Meeting Helen of Troy – Book Three

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I find Helen of Troy one of the most compelling literary characters of all time. I don’t remember when I first became aware of her existence but it was well before I had actually experienced any real Greek mythology, definitely before I’d read The Iliad. It’s fascinating to me how literary characters become a part of our collective memory, how we can know of them before we actually meet them. She is supposed to be the most beautiful woman of all time, the face that launched a thousand ships. Why else would two countries fight for ten years? Why else would hundreds, maybe thousands, of innocent men die? Because a woman, who loved one man first, all of sudden loved another.  

Homer brings Helen to life for the reader for the first time in Book Three of The Iliad. She is not at all what I remembered, nor what I was expecting. She is so incredibly present. So angry and sad. So much more than just a pretty face. When we see her for the first time she is alone in her rooms, weaving a dark red robe out of the fury and tragedy of the battle that has been raging. 

Working into the weft the endless bloody struggles / stallion-breaking Trojans and Argives armed in bronze / had suffered all for her at the god of battle’s hands. 

I find this first image very powerful. Helen is literally working her fingers into the catastrophe of a war that’s been waging at her expense. It’s such a vivid illustration of her responsibility. But also of her futile attempt to transform it. Her needlework can be seen as her desire to render the warfare beautiful. Or to control it. Both of which we know are impossible.  

The messenger informs Helen that Menelaus (her old husband) and Paris (her current husband) have promised to duel, to settle the outcome of the war (and her fate) once and for all. She races to see what’s going on and finds King Priam (her father-in-law). He calls her to him lovingly and asks her to point out the fighters to him. This small scene highlights another of Helen’s unique qualities. She is one of few people involved in the conflict who know the strengths and weaknesses of both armies. She’s valuable, not just because of her beauty but because of her intimate knowledge of both The Trojans and the Achaeans. 

But Helen doesn’t answer his question right away. Which is good because this is the first time we hear her speak.  

I revere you so, dear father, dread you too / if only death had pleased me then, grim death / that day I followed your son to Troy, forsaking / my marriage bed, my kinsmen and my child, / my favourite, now full-grown / and the lovely comradeship of women my own age. 

Her regret and sorrow are palpable. She’s in mourning and has been in mourning for all she gave up to be with Paris. The conversation continues with King Priam noticing more men and Helen supplying some details about who is who. Until she breaks off onto another reverie of her own. 

I know them all by heart, and I could tell their names… / but two I cannot find, and they’re captains of the armies, / Castor breaker of horses and the hardy boxer Polydeuces / My blood brothers. Mother bore them both. 

She suggests that maybe they never came over to Troy or are refusing to take part in the battle to avoid hearing insults about her but Homer slyly informs the reader that they have both died and Helen doesn’t even know it. Rendering her just that bit more pathetic.  

Book Three returns to the battle scene and Paris and Menelaus do fight. Everyone, including Paris, knows that Menelaus, being a better fighter, will win. But Aphrodite intervenes, creating a series of silly accidents that insure Paris isn’t killed right away. She then envelopes him in a mist and spirits him back to his chambers. At the same time she beckons Helen to go to him.  

The exchange between goddess and woman is fascinating. Aphrodite tempts Helen to Paris’s bed and Helen refuses. She fights the idea of giving in again, after all the damage their lust has caused. And she sounds pretty convincing. Yet Aphrodite warns –  

Don’t provoke me – wretched, headstrong girl / Or in my immortal rage I may just toss you over / hate you as I adore you now – with a vengeance / I might make you the butt of hard, withering hate / from both sides at once, Trojans and Achaeans 

So there it is. Helen can no longer choose between one man or the other, but between all or nothing. This must be terrifying for her. A life even lonelier than the one she has now. She gives in. Goes to Paris. However, the first thing she does is rage at him. Calls him a coward for running away from the battle just to hide in his bed with her. Armed with his Aphrodite-bolstered seductive powers, he placates and woos her until she joins him. And they make love, hidden away in their sealed off chambers while the war outside ignites all over again.  

I love how The Iliad parallels these two powerful emotions – rage and love. Both are presented as a double-edged sword. All consuming passions, each has the power to transform, to protect, to shelter but also, to destroy.  

And I’m simply in awe of Homer and the complex character he’s created in Helen. In essence, she is powerless but at the same time the entire war rests on her head. Her reaction to that situation is complicated and sincere. In this first glimpse of her in Book Three, Helen’s loneliness is absolute. Despite the admiration of the men and women around her. Despite the still-powerful lust she feels for Paris. It’s an intriguing portrait of a mature woman. One who transgressed in her youth – choosing lust and adventure over stability, comfort and love – but who has now grown up and understood the irreversible folly of her decision.   

Yann Martel – Life of Pi

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Life of Pi is a piscatory novel of sorts. How fun is that word? Piscatory – a literary work portraying the lives of fishermen or anglers. And since the main character is named Piscine, which comes from the same root, my first sentence is nearly a pun.  

Today’s reverence for fish-related words comes from one of my favorite blogs – wordmall, which posted today on a bunch of English words coming from the Greek ichthus and the Latin piscis, both meaning fish. 

Some examples:

ichthyomancy: divination by means of the heads or entrails of fishes (I would like to know if this kind of divining only relates to oceanic issues, or if some fish guts could tell me things about political and social events as well)

ichthyolatry: fish-worship, the worship of a fish-god

piscicle: A small fish (but not a frozen one, as I would have preferred)

piscose: Of a taste: fishy (I would love, just once, to use this word in a wine-tasting context, just to see if anyone would call me on it) 

But back to Life of Pi. (If you haven’t read this novel, you might not want to read on. I don’t give up any huge spoilers, but I do discuss some things that might ruin a fresh reading of it.) 

Life of Pi is one of the most imaginative novels I have read in a long time. I knew before opening the book that the story centered on a boy trapped at sea in a small lifeboat with a 430-pound Bengal tiger. However, I also knew there was going to be some kind of trick or twist. Anyone who has ever mentioned the book around me would get a kind of funny look on their face and ask, “wait, you’ve read that right?” and I would say no and then they would get all hush hush. Which is why my criticism of the book might not be truly fair – I spent my time expiscating*, instead of simply focusing on the story. 

Still, I have some concerns. In general, I prefer books that reveal the essence of a character through their actions or through situations where I can hear them speak and watch them interact with other characters. This seems so much more immediate to me as a reader – that whole “uninterrupted dream” thing is really what I consider the most delightful reading experience. I grow quickly wary of a character that spends most of his time explaining himself to me or explaining the world to me and what he thinks. Although a truly compelling voice can get away with this for a while, I find a story grows stale, no matter how extraordinary the material, when the “telling” takes precedence over the acts and events. Which is what I felt happened in Life of Pi. 

Life of Pi is also interrupted by a series of italicized interludes, semi-scientific observations which read somewhat like a case study. The tone of these interludes runs quite perpendicular to the tone established by Piscine’s adolescent and angst-filled narrative style and so they struck me as, at worst, affected, and at best, unnecessary. It is a heavy-handed tactic, but only one of several Martel employs throughout the book. (For those of you who have read it, the ending interview with its flat out refusal to let the reader make up their own mind, was the crowning blow of this heavy-handedness). 

Still, the story gathers a huge amount of momentum near page 90 (in my copy) once Pi is aboard the lifeboat with the animals. The next 190 pages almost attain that vivid dream I was hoping for. Almost. Pi still continues to over explain and to tell me exactly what I am supposed to make of any possible symbolism hinted at by the active parts of the novel. The story of a teenager spending seven months at sea on a lifeboat with a Bengal tiger is absolutely absurd. But because of what this absurdity comes to mean, it isn’t really absurd at all. Because of the twist, this absurdity demands the reader be treated with respect. From the beginning. 

I will give an example. Chapter 56 consists entirely of three paragraphs philosophizing about fear. These three paragraphs are well written, they are intuitive, they are discerning and insightful. But to me, they are also a cop-out. Reading these three paragraphs doesn’t make me feel anything. They are only words on a page. They lack the ability to construct a fictional reality that could shove some real fear down my throat. This would be far more instructional, far more experiential and ultimately more rewarding.  

Pushing the limits of fantasy brought on by trauma is incredibly engaging, as well as touching. Human memory is a fragile thing and I love that Martel explores the idea of redemption through storytelling. But at the same time, he doesn’t really attempt to share the story with me, the reader. He doesn’t invite me to participate in Pi’s trauma, to experience my own hunger or thirst, to get my hands dirty, to get covered in fish slime or scales. I’m only allowed to watch all this from a distance safely mediated by Pi and his constant analysis of what’s going on.  

*expiscating – “fishing out”, discovering something through investigation    

starting The Iliad

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Rage – Goddess, sing the rage of Peleus’ son Achilles… 

This month I am reading The Iliad for the 10 yr reading plan. The last time I read The Iliad was about 13 years ago so it definitely feels like the first time all over again. What fun! I love that the story is mostly a surprise to me now but I keep having these flash visions of my tiny gray-haired Greco-Roman Civ teacher jumping around the room and raving about kleos and how it all comes down to kleos.  

Kleos is Greek for honor/glory and in the beginning of The Iliad it is the whole reason why Agamemnon and Achilles get in their fight in the first place. In Homer’s Greece, after a war, whatever the conquering army has managed to steal, loot, and plunder gets divided up between the victorious heroes and adds to each warrior’s kleos. Naturally, the women are some of the highest prizes. (Just an aside, I have often wondered if this is where we get our expression “trophy wife”.) 

When Book One opens, Agamemnon and the armies fighting with him have recently divided up some war spoils which include a priest’s daughter named Chryseis, who was given to Agamemnon. Well, Chyseis’s father is so upset at losing her that he comes to Agamemnon with ransom and begs for her release. Agamemnon refuses and the priest calls down the wrath of Apollo onto Agamemnon’s army. 

I can’t help loving the instant justice of this. Agamemnon had the chance to be merciful, he was even offered a ransom in exchange but he refuses and is immediately punished. How nice would it be to just point out someone’s wrongdoing and have some god swoop down and rain arrows on that person for their unnecessary nasty behavior? It would be so satisfying wouldn’t it?  

So after Apollo’s wrath has gone on for a bit too long, Achilles (who is fighting with Agamemnon but heads up his own troops, the Myrmidons) gets a little irritated. Agamemnon’s selfishness is causing a lot of death and destruction for all those around him and Achilles would just like him to step up and be a better man. Instead, Agamemnon says he will only return Chyseis if he can take the woman that Achilles was given. Achilles gets doubly pissed here because really, they are all there fighting this long and awful war just because of Agamemnon and his brother Menelaus (husband of Helen, who has been abducted by Paris).

Achilles loses Briseis (and she certainly doesn’t seem at all happy to be led away to Agamemnon’s tent) and as a result he vows to quit fighting. He calls upon his mother, the goddess Thetis, to convince Zeus to help the Trojans win the war so that Agamemnon and his armies will acknowledge how much they needed Achilles.  

This kleos thing is a pretty big deal after all. As I understand it, for a warrior, their kleos was a tangible, visible measure of their worth as a fighter and/or protector. By taking Briseis, Agamemnon is making it clear that he is worth more than Achilles. Which Achilles argues is simply not true at all. Achilles points out that Agamemnon takes the war spoils for doing basically nothing while Achilles is out getting wounded and beat-up.

whenever we sack some wealthy Trojan stronghold / my arms bear the brunt of the raw, savage fighting, / true, but when it comes to dividing up the plunder / the lion’s share is yours, and back I go to my ships, / clutching some scrap, some pittance that I love, / when I have fought to exhaustion 

Reading Book One last night made me laugh a little – here are all these big, warrior men arguing (I won’t say whining, but I could) about women and recognition. About who gets what and who is more important. And when something goes wrong, Achilles goes running to…his mother. In some sense they sound a bit like spoiled kids fighting over their toys on a playground-battleground. But at the same time, The Iliad is about rage. Real, dangerous, violent and destructive rage. It is about pride and about loss. Homer’s poem makes it clear from the first page that war and tragedy are inseparable, and that glory and honor are kind of beside the point. People, loved ones, will die. What could be worse than that?    

Yasunari Kawabata – Snow Country

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We had snow last week and the low mountains surrounding the village were a lovely white. Across the lake, the Alps are now boasting their beautiful winter plumage. The temperature has been hovering around zero for the past few weeks and it seemed like the perfect time to settle down with Yasunari Kawabata’s 1950s classic, Snow Country.  

Snow Country is set in a mountainous region of Japan, a place of long winters and deep snows, of cold and dark living. A place of tunnels and buried buildings. This setting works to underline the novel’s emotional preoccupation – the bewildering coldness of the human heart, the inevitable decay of beauty and purity. 

The novel takes place at an onsen (hot springs) resort and tells the story of an affair between a wealthy Tokyo man, Shimamura, and a geisha, Komako. Shimamura is incapable of love but drawn again and again to leave his family and visit Komako in the mountains. His rare visits and the life she must lead during his absences drain Komako of her innocence and ultimately her beauty.   

Kawabata’s feel for the lonely aesthetic of the snow country is just tremendous: 

The color of evening had already fallen on the mountain valley, early buried in shadows. Out of the dusk the distant mountains, still reflecting the light of the evening sun, seemed to have come much nearer. 

Presently, as the mountain chasms were far and near, high and low, the shadows in them began to deepen, and the sky was red over the snowy mountains, bathed now in but a wan light. 

Cedar groves stood out darkly by the river bank, at the ski ground, around the shrine. 

Like a warm light, Komako poured in on the empty wretchedness that had assailed Shimamura. 

I have written before about Tanizaki Junichiro’s essay, In Praise of Shadows. In it, Tanizaki lays out some of the principles of Japanese aesthetics – mainly, this idea of beauty in shadows. That art is rendered more beautiful through the darkness created at the borders of light.

Kawabata echoes this theory in Snow Country. The ultimate and inevitable failure of Shimamura and Komako’s affair is that unsettling but beautiful darkness hovering at the edge of what Kawabata chooses to illuminate: the warmth and steam from the hot springs, the crimson stain of hand-made Chijimi linen laid out on the snow and bleaching in the sun, the shimmery radiance of the Milky Way over the buried town.

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