The Eleven Thousand Rods by Guillaume Apollinaire was the first book I read in 2017. What a doozy of a book! Reading surrealist literature is like playing Russian Roulette. Some times your going to get fascinatingly weird books like Rene Daumal's A Night of Serious Drinking or Andre Breton's classic Nadja. Other times your going to get disgustingly weird books like this or Georges Bataille's Story of the Eye.
There is something admittedly admirable about Apollinaire's craftsmanship in this book. It is obviously well written. But, it isn't a fun read. It's not quite as gross as Bataille's Story of the Eye. But, I think that is only because it is so over the top and because Apollinaire obviously has a sense of humor. If there was any humor in the Story of the Eye I completely failed to see it. I wouldn't recommend this book to anyone I didn't wish to scar. (That is not some error of omission in that last word. I didn't accidentally leave off an 'e'.)
I won't quote much of this book here because I'm a bit embarrassed to admit to having read it. But, as a testament to the craftsmanship in Apollinaire's work and as a nod to his sense of humor (which is funny, but again embarrassing to admit I find it funny), I will note one thing. After engaging in a bit of murder and worse Mony (the main character) slips off the train. "The double murder not he Orient Express supplied the papers with news for six months. The murderers were not found and the crime was attributed to Jack the Ripper, whose back's broad enough" (Apollinaire, 53). I laughed an audible laugh at this line. There are a lot of little asides like this in this twisted novella. I'd write more about it; but, I must go shower...
Showing posts with label Bataille. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Bataille. Show all posts
Wednesday, January 4, 2017
Saturday, August 15, 2015
Pedro Paramo
I read Juan Rulfo's Pedro Paramo for the first time last night. I kept starting and stopping as I needed to go to bed. But, in the end I wound up staying up til 3 am to finish it. I have to read it again, and soon.
It is a crazy book. The surrealist aspects are grotesque, but not in the way that Bataille's The Story of the Eye is grotesque. Rulfo focuses on death in this book, not unseemly sexual encounters involving copious amounts of piss.
Juan Preciado is instructed by his dying mother to return to her hometown and take some sort of revenge on his father. The town of Comala is a ghost town in a more literal sense of the word. It is a quasi-purgatory where the disembodied souls of the townsfolk live in shame and fear of the dead Pedro Paramo. As I said earlier I have to read it again to grasp the fullness (or lack thereof) of the book. But, a couple things really struck me on this initial reading.
First, when Juan dies, or when he realizes he is dead - I am not sure if he was ever alive in the story or not, he is buried into a grave with Dorotea and the two begin to speak. That first encounter was fascinating. Dorotea takes over the narrative from this point, but her description of her death was truly incredible. She talks about her soul demanding that her body continue working, but the body is speaking to Juan inside their shared grave. The body tells him that she simply opened up her mouth and released the soul.
Second, when Juan encounters the burro driver you have no idea he's dead. Then he doesn't play much of a part for the whole book except to bring about what ever semblance of conclusion you can get. That was interesting too.
Third, and this might have been my favorite story arch within this multi-tiered story is that of Father Renteria. Father Renteria is a priest (whom we find out was killed by one of Pedro's many sons) that has been condemned to purgatory for putting up with Pedro and his horrible ways. Father Renteria even goes over into another town and finds another priest who refuses him absolution. It is a very intriguing story.
I'm finding that I enjoy some of the surrealist stories much better than others. I loved Queneau's Flight of Icarus and Rulfo's Pedro Paramo. I liked Nadja by Andre Breton. I hated The Story of the Eye. I don't think I can say that enough. I guess it's the same with all genres, but while Nadja and Icarus eventually wrapped up somewhat, Pedro and The Story of the Eye really offered no real ending per se. Yet of the four I would (at this moment) rank them my top and bottom of surrealist literature read so far. I guess the surrealist must have been on to something as style tends to outweigh substance in their genre.
It is a crazy book. The surrealist aspects are grotesque, but not in the way that Bataille's The Story of the Eye is grotesque. Rulfo focuses on death in this book, not unseemly sexual encounters involving copious amounts of piss.
Juan Preciado is instructed by his dying mother to return to her hometown and take some sort of revenge on his father. The town of Comala is a ghost town in a more literal sense of the word. It is a quasi-purgatory where the disembodied souls of the townsfolk live in shame and fear of the dead Pedro Paramo. As I said earlier I have to read it again to grasp the fullness (or lack thereof) of the book. But, a couple things really struck me on this initial reading.
First, when Juan dies, or when he realizes he is dead - I am not sure if he was ever alive in the story or not, he is buried into a grave with Dorotea and the two begin to speak. That first encounter was fascinating. Dorotea takes over the narrative from this point, but her description of her death was truly incredible. She talks about her soul demanding that her body continue working, but the body is speaking to Juan inside their shared grave. The body tells him that she simply opened up her mouth and released the soul.
Second, when Juan encounters the burro driver you have no idea he's dead. Then he doesn't play much of a part for the whole book except to bring about what ever semblance of conclusion you can get. That was interesting too.
Third, and this might have been my favorite story arch within this multi-tiered story is that of Father Renteria. Father Renteria is a priest (whom we find out was killed by one of Pedro's many sons) that has been condemned to purgatory for putting up with Pedro and his horrible ways. Father Renteria even goes over into another town and finds another priest who refuses him absolution. It is a very intriguing story.
I'm finding that I enjoy some of the surrealist stories much better than others. I loved Queneau's Flight of Icarus and Rulfo's Pedro Paramo. I liked Nadja by Andre Breton. I hated The Story of the Eye. I don't think I can say that enough. I guess it's the same with all genres, but while Nadja and Icarus eventually wrapped up somewhat, Pedro and The Story of the Eye really offered no real ending per se. Yet of the four I would (at this moment) rank them my top and bottom of surrealist literature read so far. I guess the surrealist must have been on to something as style tends to outweigh substance in their genre.
Wednesday, July 15, 2015
Notes on the Story of the Eye
The Story of the Eye by Georges Bataille is the most disgusting book I've ever read. I get that there is some value to his claims, but the language he uses is disturbing. But, since I have a newfound interest in Surrealism in Literature I suffered through it. And, while I wouldn't recommend the book to anyone that I know, I did find some interesting things in it.
"But I was unable to see as far up as the cunt (this name, which I always used with Simone, is, I think, by far the loveliest names for the vagina)" (Bataille, 4). This pretty much sets the tone for the book. It works to shock, which isn't that bad in and of itself. But, my problem with shock is when it is used for the sake of shock itself.
"And indeed, we blithely strolled out as though the woman had been reduced to a family portrait" (Bataille, 11). After witnessing her daughter's lewd sex acts the woman was frozen. I like the sentence and I think it's a good description of what would happen. It also has a vivid imagery.
"Little by little, I even thought I might kill myself, and, taking the revolver in hand, I managed to lose any sense of words like hope or despair" (Bataille, 18). I like that lack of emotional context, the moment where you simply exist without hope or despair. Brute fact.
"We pedalled rapidly, without laughing or speaking, peculiarly satisfied with our mutual presences, akin to one another in the common isolation of lewdness, weariness, and absurdity" (Bataille, 31). I think this sentence sums up about what I don't like about this book. It isn't just that its shocking, or even that it's shocking solely for the sake of being shocking. It is that Bataille is celebrating what ought to be condemned. His characters are reveling in the isolation that their lewdness brings about.
"And it struck me that death was the sole outcome of my erection, and if Simone and I were killed, the the universe of our unbearable personal vision was certain to be replaced by the pure stars, fully unrelated to any external gazes and realizing in a cold state, without human delays or detours, something that strikes me as the goal of my sexual licentiousness: a geometric incandescence (among other things, the coinciding point of life and death, being and nothingness), perfectly fulgurating" Bataille, 33). Here again, I find why this book disturbs me so much. Once again, Bataille is celebrating what shouldn't be celebrated. Death was going to be the outcome of his erection, but in that death he was finding nirvana. He found the point of nothingness and being colliding to be so desirable that he was willing to debase himself in any means necessary to get there.
What is also disturbing is some of his descriptions. It's a lengthy section so I'm just going to paraphrase. Bataille states that "I began writing with no precise goal, animated chiefly by a desire to forget, at least for the time being, the things I can be or do personally. Thus, at first, I thought that the character speaking in the first person had no relation to me" (Bataille, 89). Fine, sometimes I come up with sick things on paper, things that I never intended because I wrote something with no precise goal in mind. That's how I normally write a story. But, when you find a connection between an innocent event like your brother scaring you and a group of girls in childhood and the things written in the book there is a sickness underlying your thought process.
"I never linger over such memories, for they have long since lost any emotional significance for me. There was no way I could restore them to life except by transforming them and making them unrecognizable, at first glance, to my eyes, solely because during that deformation they acquired the lewdest of meanings" (Bataille, 96). I found much of this book absolutely repugnant. But, this paragraph I found to be profoundly sad. To reignite his memories he had to deform them and debase them. That is truly a sad thing to me.
"In 1920, I changed again, I stopped believing in anything but my future chances. My piety was merely an attempt at evasion: I wanted to escape my destiny at any price, I was abandoning my father. Today, I know I am 'blind', immeasurable, I am man 'abandoned' on the globe like my father at N. No one on earth or in heaven cared about my father's dying terror. Still, I believe he faced up to it, as always. What a 'horrible pride,' at moments, in Dad's blind smile!" (Bataille, 101). I found this profoundly sad again. First, I disagree wholly with the premise that religion is an attempt at evasion. That is simply philosophically unfounded in spite of years of trying to make this fact. Second, to hold on to pride in the face of such things for pride's sake solely is as revolting and wrongheaded as to be shocking for the sake of being shocking.
"But I was unable to see as far up as the cunt (this name, which I always used with Simone, is, I think, by far the loveliest names for the vagina)" (Bataille, 4). This pretty much sets the tone for the book. It works to shock, which isn't that bad in and of itself. But, my problem with shock is when it is used for the sake of shock itself.
"And indeed, we blithely strolled out as though the woman had been reduced to a family portrait" (Bataille, 11). After witnessing her daughter's lewd sex acts the woman was frozen. I like the sentence and I think it's a good description of what would happen. It also has a vivid imagery.
"Little by little, I even thought I might kill myself, and, taking the revolver in hand, I managed to lose any sense of words like hope or despair" (Bataille, 18). I like that lack of emotional context, the moment where you simply exist without hope or despair. Brute fact.
"We pedalled rapidly, without laughing or speaking, peculiarly satisfied with our mutual presences, akin to one another in the common isolation of lewdness, weariness, and absurdity" (Bataille, 31). I think this sentence sums up about what I don't like about this book. It isn't just that its shocking, or even that it's shocking solely for the sake of being shocking. It is that Bataille is celebrating what ought to be condemned. His characters are reveling in the isolation that their lewdness brings about.
"And it struck me that death was the sole outcome of my erection, and if Simone and I were killed, the the universe of our unbearable personal vision was certain to be replaced by the pure stars, fully unrelated to any external gazes and realizing in a cold state, without human delays or detours, something that strikes me as the goal of my sexual licentiousness: a geometric incandescence (among other things, the coinciding point of life and death, being and nothingness), perfectly fulgurating" Bataille, 33). Here again, I find why this book disturbs me so much. Once again, Bataille is celebrating what shouldn't be celebrated. Death was going to be the outcome of his erection, but in that death he was finding nirvana. He found the point of nothingness and being colliding to be so desirable that he was willing to debase himself in any means necessary to get there.
What is also disturbing is some of his descriptions. It's a lengthy section so I'm just going to paraphrase. Bataille states that "I began writing with no precise goal, animated chiefly by a desire to forget, at least for the time being, the things I can be or do personally. Thus, at first, I thought that the character speaking in the first person had no relation to me" (Bataille, 89). Fine, sometimes I come up with sick things on paper, things that I never intended because I wrote something with no precise goal in mind. That's how I normally write a story. But, when you find a connection between an innocent event like your brother scaring you and a group of girls in childhood and the things written in the book there is a sickness underlying your thought process.
"I never linger over such memories, for they have long since lost any emotional significance for me. There was no way I could restore them to life except by transforming them and making them unrecognizable, at first glance, to my eyes, solely because during that deformation they acquired the lewdest of meanings" (Bataille, 96). I found much of this book absolutely repugnant. But, this paragraph I found to be profoundly sad. To reignite his memories he had to deform them and debase them. That is truly a sad thing to me.
"In 1920, I changed again, I stopped believing in anything but my future chances. My piety was merely an attempt at evasion: I wanted to escape my destiny at any price, I was abandoning my father. Today, I know I am 'blind', immeasurable, I am man 'abandoned' on the globe like my father at N. No one on earth or in heaven cared about my father's dying terror. Still, I believe he faced up to it, as always. What a 'horrible pride,' at moments, in Dad's blind smile!" (Bataille, 101). I found this profoundly sad again. First, I disagree wholly with the premise that religion is an attempt at evasion. That is simply philosophically unfounded in spite of years of trying to make this fact. Second, to hold on to pride in the face of such things for pride's sake solely is as revolting and wrongheaded as to be shocking for the sake of being shocking.
I Finished The Trade
Today, July 15, 2015 I finished a short story. Well, I finished the first draft of the story. Now I'm going to give it to my wife to edit for grammatical mistakes.
The name of this story is called: The Trade, Or, How I was Banished From France. There are a couple of things about this that are interesting to me. First, it's the first short story that I've ever used myself and my wife as characters. Second, it is amazing how what I am reading at the time really impacts my writing. I'm nearly finished with Kurt Vonnegut's Timequake and halfway through this first draft I suddenly became conscious of the impact that Vonnegut was having on my writing. I hope that I haven't simply mimicked or copied him, but there is at least in my mind, an obvious tone. Thankfully, I had finished the Story of the Eye by Georges Bataille before I came up with that story. I don't think I'd like to do a memoir-style short story in that story involving my wife.
The name of this story is called: The Trade, Or, How I was Banished From France. There are a couple of things about this that are interesting to me. First, it's the first short story that I've ever used myself and my wife as characters. Second, it is amazing how what I am reading at the time really impacts my writing. I'm nearly finished with Kurt Vonnegut's Timequake and halfway through this first draft I suddenly became conscious of the impact that Vonnegut was having on my writing. I hope that I haven't simply mimicked or copied him, but there is at least in my mind, an obvious tone. Thankfully, I had finished the Story of the Eye by Georges Bataille before I came up with that story. I don't think I'd like to do a memoir-style short story in that story involving my wife.
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