I Don't Know as I Get What D. H. Lawrence is Driving at When He Writes of Bursten Bowels ...

Picasso: Gored Horse (1917) 

Graphite pencil on canvas with ochre primer 

(80.2 x 103.3 cm)

Museu Picasso de Barcelona

 

 

I. 

 

As readers of D. H. Lawrence are very well aware, he loves to write about the mysterious nether region of the human body known as the loins - i.e., that zone of libidinal intensity that lies somewhere between the ribs and the pelvis (or above the legs, but below the waist).

 

In fact, the only thing that excites his imagination more are the bowels ... 

 

 

II. 

 

Unfortunately, a bit like Frank O'Hara, I'm not quite sure I always understand what Lawrence is getting at when he uses this term [1]. On the one hand, it seems to be more than simply an anatomical reference to the gastrointestinal tract; indeed, for Lawrence, the bowels seem to be the seat of human compassion from which the deepest desires also spring. 

 

But, on the other hand, Lawrence likes to base his philosophical understanding of the body in biology where possible. So when he talks about the bowels, he is also referring us to the digestive system and those sausage-like organs known as the intestines or entrails. 

 

And, rather like Kenneth Williams, who described his daily bowel movements obsessively in his diaries, Lawrence seems to be plagued by a fear of things not working properly in this region, as we can see in the novel Kangaroo (1923), for example, when the marsupial-like fascist Ben Cooley is shot several times in his "'bloomin' Kangaroo guts'" [2], as one of his followers says.

 

Richard Somers - the book's Lawrentian avatar - visits Cooley in the hospital and can barely disguise his horror and disgust at the thought of ruptured bowels:

 

"Somers found Kangaroo in bed, very yellow, and thin [...] with haunted, frightened eyes. The room had many flowers, and was perfumed with eau de cologne, but through the perfume came an unpleasant, discernible stench. [...]

      Somers could not detach his mind from the slight, yet pervading sickening smell.

      "'My sewers leak,' said Kangaroo bitterly, as if divining the other's thought." [3]

 

Bruce Steele's explanatory note on this is spot-on:

 

"Jack's angry reaction to his leader's having been shot in the stomach and not killed outright probably reflects the First World War soldier's fear of abdominal wounds. In a pre-biotic age, peritonitis was a common and deadly complication of such wounds. While a ruptured bowel could be stitched, contamination of the abdominal cavity was frequently fatal; it would account for  the 'unpleasant, discernible stench' and Kangaroo's diagnosis 'My sewers leak'. If the sniper had deliberately aimed at his stomach rather than his head - which would probably have killed him instantly - it would have been in the knowledge that the victim would almost certainly die a slow and painful death." [4]

 

Of course, whilst being shot in the stomach can lead to a slow and painful death for a man, being disemboweled by the horns of an angry bull can be an equally horrific (and, arguably, even more obscene) way for an elderly horse to die.

 

And so to Mexico City ...   

 

 

III.

 

There are several disturbing scenes in Lawrence's novel The Plumed Serpent (1926), including the opening one set at the plaza de toros [5] - and I'm not referring to the fact that someone in the crowd thought it funny to throw an orange at the bald spot on Owen's sunburnt head.

 

Rather, I'm referring to the following incident involving a blindfolded horse ...

 

"The picador pulled his feeble horse round slowly, to face the bull, and slowly he leaned forward and shoved his lance-point into the bull's shoulder. The bull, as if the horse were a great wasp that had stung him deep, suddenly lowered his head in a jerk of surprise and lifted his horns straight up into the horse's abdomen. And without more ado, over went horse and rider, like a tottering monument upset.

      The rider scrambled from under the horse and went running away with his lance. The old horse, in complete dazed amusement, struggled to rise, as if overcome with dumb incomprehension. And the bull, with a red place on his shoulder welling a trickle of dark blood, stood looking round in equally hopeless amazement.

      But the wound was hurting. He saw the queer sight of the horse half reared from the ground, trying to get to its feet. And he smelled blood and bowels.

      So, rather vaguely, as if not quite knowing what he ought to do, the bull once more lowered his head and pushed his sharp, florishing horns in the horse's belly, working them up and down inside there with a vague sort of satisfaction." [6] 

      

As the novel's protagonist Kate Leslie rightly recognises, this shocking spectacle reveals nothing so much as human cowardice and indecency. She turns her face away in disgust. And when she looks again, "it was to see the horse feebly and dazedly walking out of the ring, with a great ball of its own entrails hanging out of its abdomen and swinging reddish against its own legs as it automatically moved". [7] 

 

But the sordid show isn't over: another horse is brought into the bullring so that it may be publicly disemboweled for the amusement of the crowd:

 

"Kate knew what was coming. Before she could look away, the bull had charged on the limping horse from behind [...] the horse was up-ended absurdly, one of the bull's horns between his hind legs and deep in his inside. Down went the horse, collapsing in front, but his rear was still heaved up, with the bull's horn working vigorously up and down inside him, while he lay on his neck all twisted. And a huge heap of bowels coming out. And a nauseous stench." [8] 

 

 

IV. 

 

I've never been (and wouldn't go) to a bullfight, and so would find it difficult (and disturbing) to visually imagine this scene were it not for the fact that Picasso - a lifelong bullfighting enthusiast - produced the image at the top of this post, after attending a bullfight in Barcelona during his stay in the city in 1917.

 

As the anonymous author of a piece describing this work on the Picasso Museum's website rightly notes:    

 

"In contrast to what he had mostly done on previous occasions, here the artist leaves aside the colourful and festive representation of the spectacle of bullfighting to focus his attention [...] on the solitary agony of the disemboweled horse, which collapses until it falls on its knees in a fetal position or prayer posture that has been compared to that of a fossilised crustacean or bird. Picasso manages to transcribe the animal's stabbing pain by means of its outstretched neck and raised head, looking upwards with a fixed gaze, as if asking for mercy to put an end to its cruel agony, once and for all." [9]

 

The author concludes: 

 

"The drama and cruelty of the scene reaches its zenith with the horn that sprouts from the ground and stands threateningly, waiting for the horse to finish collapsing to then finish it off." [10] 

 

I suppose, to end on a slightly more positive note, it might be mentioned that bullfighting was banned in Catalonia several years ago and the the last bullfight in the region took place in September 2011. [11]

 

However, there are still eight countries in the world where this ancient festival of gore still takes place - Spain, France, Portugal, Mexico, Columbia, Venezuela, Peru, and Ecuador - and every year around 180,000 bulls (and 200 horses) are slaughtered in the ring.

 

 

V. 

 

In sum, I might not get what D. H. Lawrence is driving at when he writes of bursten bowels, but I do know: 

 

(i) I wouldn't want to be shot in the stomach ...

 

(ii) I don't like cruelty to animals ...

 

 

Notes

 

[1] See Frank O'Hara, 'I don't know as I get what D. H. Lawrence is driving at', Selected Poems, ed. Mark Ford, (Alfred A. Knopf, 2009), p. 167. The poem can be read online at allpoetry.com: click here. 

 

[2] D. H. Lawrence, Kangaroo, ed. Bruce Steele, (Cambridge Unversity Press, 1994), p. 317.

 

[3] Ibid., pp. 322-323.    

[4] Bruce Steele's explanatory note to 317:12 of D. H. Lawrence's Kangaroo ... p. 406.

[5] In Lawrence's day, the main bullring in Mexico City was the Toreo de la Condesa. This ancient bullring was replaced in 1946 by the monumental Plaza de toros México, an arena that seats over 41,000 people.

[6] D. H. Lawrence, The Plumed Serpent, ed. L. D. Clark, pp. 15-16.

[7] Ibid., p. 16. 

[8] Ibid. 

[9-10] See the text that accompanies Picasso's Gored Horse (1917) on the Museu Picasso de Barcelona website: click here. 

[11] The ban was officially annulled for being unconstitutional by Spain's highest court in October 2016. However, despite the overturning of the ban, no further bullfight has taken place in Catalonia. 

 

 

On Constipation and Calomel in D. H. Lawrence's Aaron's Rod (1922)

  

 

When Aaron Sisson gets the flu and is forced to sweat it out in bed for days on end, one of the unfortunate consequences is the cessation of regular bowel movements. 

 

A local quack is summoned and gives him a dose of the mineral calomel, a popular medicine made from mercury chloride often used as a purgitive to relieve constipation and to treat numerous other illnesses that negatively impact the gastrointestinal tract [1]. 

 

Usually, as in this case, the calomel was administered orally in the form of  a little blue pill, the mercury chloride being mixed with either licorice or sugar to help sweeten the experience of, essentially, being poisoned. 

 

Unfortunately, the doctor gives Aaron a rather strong dose and this causes the patient to have a rough time: "His burning, parched, poisoned inside was twisted and torn." [2]

This isn't Lawrence indulging in hyperbole for literary effect; many poor sods given calomel experienced terrible side effects, including cramping, vomiting, and bloody diarrhea (mistakenly read as signs the treatment was working). 

 

Indeed, when given in extremely high doses, calomel led to mercury poisoning, which could result in permanent deformities and even death. For example, some patients ended up with gangrene of the mouth, thanks to the mercury in the medicine causing the tissue of the cheeks and gums to rot and teeth to fall out.

 

Thankfully, with the development of safer and superior cathartics in the mid-twentieth century, it was determined that, due to its toxicity, calomel was causing more harm than good and it was removed from medical supply shelves. 

 

It is now only used in certain insecticides and fungicides ...

 

            

Notes

 

[1] Calomel first entered modern medicine in the West in the early 17th-century. By the 19th century, it was viewed as a miracle drug and used against a wide range of diseases, including syphilis, bronchitis, cholera, gout, tuberculosis, influenza, and cancer. During the 18th and early 19th centuries pharmacists used it in moderation; but by the late 1840s, it was being prescribed in heroic doses up to four times a day.

 

[2] D. H. Lawrence, Aaron's Rod, ed. Mara Kalnins, (Cambridge University Press, 1988). p. 94.

 

 

Sometimes, Better a Dead Mountain Lion Than a Live Dog

Artist Heide Hatry & 

Luna the Mountain Lion (2023) [1]

 

 

I.

 

According to the author of Ecclesiastes, a living dog is better than a dead lion [9:4]. 

 

However, as the New York based German artist Heide Hatry knows, that's not always true; sometimes it is the deceased who have something vital to teach us, which is why her long fascination with corpses has often resulted in work of great insight.

 

Her latest muse (and family member) happens to be a stuffed puma [2], which interests because D. H. Lawrence also once drew inspiration from the long slim body and round face of a dead mountain lion, killed by two foolishly smiling hunters, in Lobo Canyon, New Mexico, on a cold winter's morning.    

 

He concludes his beautiful and misanthropic poem on the subject:

 

And I think in this empty world there was room for me and a mountain lion. 

And I think in the world beyond, how easily we might spare a million or two of humans 

And never miss them. 

Yet what a gap in the world, the missing white-frost face of that slim yellow mountain lion! [3]

 

Which is, of course, all-too-true ... 

 

 

II. 

 

According to the Nature Conservancy, there are only around 50,000 mountain lions left in the world; 30,000 in the United States and 20,000 in the rest of the Americas. Contrast this with the fact that the human population is believed to have reached 8 billion in November 2022. 

 

That's 1 mountain lion for every 160,000 people ...

 

And yet, 3000 of these magificent cats are still killed by the latter in the United States each year. Again, compare that with the fact that in the last 100 years there have been fewer than 130 officially documented cougar attacks on people, of which only 27 were fatal (which is less than the number of bee sting fatalities in the same period). 

 

It's very depressing: for whilst I still insist that even a dead puma is at least as fascinating as any of the 470 million mutts kept as pets around the world, it would be nice if there were a significantly higher number of live mountain lions - yes, even at the expense of one or two million human beings [4].

 

     

Notes

 

[1] This photo, taken from Hatry's newsletter, is also used as a profile picture to advertise her MFA Art Practice Lecture Series at the School of Visual Arts (NYC), where she is currently the artist in residence. Click here for further details. 

[2] Mountain lions are known for good reason as the cat of many names - in fact, they are listed in dictionaries under more names than any other animal in the world. Depending on the region and native language, common names for the American lion include cougar, panther, puma, and catamount. 

 

[3] D. H. Lawrence, 'Mountain Lion', in Poems, Vol. I, ed. Christopher Pollnitz, (Cambridge University Press, 2013), pp. 351-352. The poem can easily be found in numerous places online; click here, for example. 

 

[4] Readers who agree, might like to support the work of the Mountain Lion Foundation (a non-profit organisation protecting mountain lions and their habitat): click here.       

More Philosophy on the Catwalk (With Reference to the Case of Andrea Sachs and her Cerulean Blue Sweater)

 

Anne Hathaway as Andrea Sachs and Meryl Streep as Miranda Priestly

The Devil Wears Prada (dir. David Frankel, 2006)

 

 

When writing about fashion, it's important to do so with reference to politics and philosophy; to show, for example, how the sartorial expression of identity is never purely an individual matter. 

 

For as Miranda Priestly so memorably instructs a smirking Andrea, no one pulls on a lumpy blue sweater as a matter of personal preference [1]. 

 

That's not to argue that the way we look is determined and regulated in the minutest detail by the fashion industry, or that human beings lack a certain degree of free will.

 

But it is to indicate how those who say they don't care about the dictates of fashion are never truly exempt from the latter and that, to paraphrase Schopenhauer, whilst we are free to wear whatever we want, we are not free to choose what we want [2].

 

Notes

 

[1] I'm referring to the scene in The Devil Wears Prada in which Miranda Priestly (editor of a hugely influential fashion magazine) instructs her fledgling assistant Andrea Sachs (a college graduate who aspires to be a serious journalist) on how her unstylish dress sense doesn't reveal that she is above (or outside of) the world of fashion. 

      In fact, quite the opposite; it exposes her as an unwitting fashion victim, naive about the importance of design. Objecting to Andy's use of the word stuff to describe (and dismiss) fashionable clothes, Miranda launches into a devastating monologue:

 

"Oh, okay. I see, you think this has nothing to do with you. You go to your closet and you select, I don't know, that lumpy blue sweater, for instance, because you're trying to tell the world that you take yourself too seriously to care about what you put on your back. But what you don't know is that that sweater is not just blue. It's not turquiose, it's not lapis. It's actually cerulean. You're also blithely unaware of the fact that, in 2002, Oscar de La Renta did a collection of cerulean gowns, and then I think it was Yves St. Laurent [...] who showed cerulean military jackets [...] 

      And then cerulean quickly showed up in the collections of eight different designers. Then it filtered down through the department stores, and then trickled on down into some tragic Casual Corner where you, no doubt, fished it out of some clearance bin. However, that blue represents millions of dollars and countless jobs, and it's sort of comical how you think that you've made a choice that exempts you from the fashion industry, when in fact, you’re wearing a sweater that was selected for you by the people in this room, from a pile of 'stuff'."   

 

      - From the original screenplay by Aline Brosh McKenna. To watch how the scene plays out on screen, click here. 

 

[2] See chapter 5 of Schopenhauer's 1839 essay Über die Freiheit des menschlichen Willens, trans. into English as 'On the Freedom of the Will', by Christopher Janaway, in The Two Fundamental Problems of Ethics (Cambridge University Press, 2009), where he argues that whilst man always does what he wills, he does so necessarily. 

Vestis virum facit

King Charles waves to the crowds and the cameras from the balcony 

of Buckingham Palace following his coronation (6 May 2023) 

knowing full-well that beneath the clothes he remains allzumenschliche

 

"Look at the waxwork head - the face, with the expression of a melon - the projecting ears ..."

 

 

I. 

 

The recent Coronation of King Charles III was a spectacular demonstration of how clothes remain a crucial means of signifying wealth, power, and social distinction. 

 

For all his desire to modernise the royal family, there was never any possibility that Charles would adopt a more casual (less regal) look (even if he did swap breeches for a pair of trousers).  

 

And so: 

 

(i) His Majesty rocked up at Westminster Abbey wearing a robe of red velvet and an ermine cape ...

 

(ii) Following his annointing, Charles put on a tunic similar to a priest's vestment in order to symbolise the divine nature of monarchy ...

 

(iii) When the jewel-encrusted St. Edward's Crown was placed upon his weary head, he wore a gold-sleeved robe, embroidered with flowers, beneath the Imperial Mantle ...

 

(iv) Finally, at the close of the ceremony, the King changed into a newly-made purple satin Coronation Tunic, trimmed with gold artillery lace, and George VI's grand purple silk velvet Robe of Estate.      

 

The point is: there was nothing subtle about this ostentatious display and if clothes maketh the man, they also maketh the monarch - something noted by Mark Twain in his short story 'The Czar's Soliloquy' [1] ...

 

 

II.

 

After taking his morning bath, it was the Russian emperor's habit to look at himself in a large mirror and reflect upon his own physical limitations: "Naked, what am I? A libel on the image of God!" 

 

He realises that what invokes awe and reverence in his people are his magnificent robes: "Without my clothes I should be as destitute of authority as any other naked person." 

 

In other words, without his fine robes, his magnificent crown, his titles, etc., he is - like King Charles - an old man without substance; "a cipher, a vacancy, a nobody, a nothing". 

 

It is the trappings of kingship that conceal his essential emptiness and which "move a nation to fall on its knees".

 

 

Notes

 

[1] Mark Twain, 'The Czar's Soliloquy', North American Review, Issue 580 (March 1905), pp. 321-26: click here to read on JSTOR. Lines quoted from the story are on pp. 321-322.

      Note that although the saying clothes make the man is often associated with Mark Twain, it didn't originate with him. In fact, it was already popular during the Middle Ages and can be found, for example, in the work of the great Dutch philosopher and theologian, Erasmus, who recorded it in his collection of Greek and Latin proverbs as vestis virum facit [Adagia: 3.1. 60]. 

 

Get Knotted: In Praise of the Hanky as Headwear and Why I Hate the Gumbys

Steve Jones wearing an Anarchy in the UK knotted hanky 

and establishing himself as the coolest Sex Pistol

 

The fashioning of a handkerchief into protective headwear on a hot sunny day by tying knots together at the corners is, sadly, a practice that has mostly died out amongst Englishmen. 

 

In fact, the last champion of this do-it-yourself look that I can think of was Sex Pistol Steve Jones, who, by coupling it with a mohair string jumper, gave it a brilliantly avant-garde punk edge, whilst remaining true to the working class tradition from which it came.

 

Partly, this look has declined due to the triumph of the ubiquitous baseball cap and other more trendy forms of headgear. But it's also due to the continuous and contemptuous mocking of British working class culture by the media, including Oxbridge educated comedians such as the Pythons. 

 

One recalls, for example, the brick-carrying Gumbys, who would wear knotted white handkerchiefs on their heads and have shirts rolled up to the elbows and trousers rolled up to the knees. They would usually behave in a violent and oafish manner and speak as if mentally retarded.

 

Even at a very young age, it was clear to me that John Cleese and his privileged friends were sneering at men of my father's generation and background. However, rather than make me ashamed of the latter, it made me despise the former and their condescending classism; the fact that they thought it funny to punch down.

 

And so, I would sincerely encourage readers next time they venture out in the sun to knot a hanky and wear it on their head with pride, à la Steve Jones - oh, and when I say a hanky, I mean a hanky (i.e., a thin cotton square) and not some poncy attempt to reimagine and refine the hanky-as-hat for which you have to pay through the nose like a tweed pig.

 

  

Ghost Rider

Ghost Rider (SA/2023)

 

I know there are those who will wax lyrical about the violent beauty of such, but, actually, there's always something profoundly depressing about encountering the blackened remains of an abandoned and burnt out vehicle. 

 

For criminal vandalism, involving the deliberate destruction of property, is more often than not merely a sign of social deprivation and crass stupidity. To romanticise such as neo-primitivism, an act of political insurgency, or a counter-cultural rejection of prevailing values, is often insulting to those of us who have to live with the consequences and pay to have the mess cleaned up.    

 

Having said that, there is something strangely haunting about a burnt out bike - perhaps because it suggests the supernatural figure of a ghost rider; i.e., one who rides a flaming motorcycle and whose flesh has been consumed by hellfire. 

 

But of course, I very much doubt that Johnny Blaze is now a resident of Harold Hill ... 

 

 

 

Hooray for Male Hosiery

Men's tights by Gerbe 

(the famous French hosiery manufacturer, est. 1895)

 

I. 

 

There are not many advantages to being diagnosed with superficial vein reflux (and associated varicosties) in your leg and then having endovenous surgery to address this. 

 

Indeed, the disadvantages and risks are clear; lumps, bumps, bruises, scarring, pain and discomfort, not to mention possible sensory nerve damage (causing numbness) and the danger of deep vein thrombosis.

 

However, once the layers and layers of mummy-like bandaging and protective gauze are removed 48-hours after the operation, one is afforded the opportunity to parade around in full-length elasticated black stockings and that at least affords a frisson of pleasure. 

 

One can even pretend to be Paul Morel, who famously found it thrilling to pull on a pair of Clara's stockings when alone in her bedroom [1]; or Steve Jones, at the end of The Great Rock 'n' Roll Swindle, holding up Malcolm's ten lessons inscribed on tablets of stone, like a punk Moses, whilst wearing black rubber stockings [2].

 

 

 

II.

 

Of course, whilst men wearing stockings is today mostly seen as either comic or kinky, historically this practice was the norm for long periods; from the Middle Ages until the mid-late 16th century men wore hose and proudly displayed their legs (whilst covering their groin with a cod piece).

 

After this date, the fashion was for separate breeches and stockings, but men still loved to show a shapely calf and members of the nobility would wear stockings made of expensive silk or the finest wool (rather than the coarser fabrics worn by the lower classes).

 

Now, sadly, male legs are either hidden under trousers, or bare and exposed in shorts and it is only ballet dancers, super-heroes, and drag queens who get to regularly and openly wear tights [3].

 

 

 

Notes

 

[1] See Chapter XII of D. H. Lawrence's, Sons and Lovers, ed. Helen Baron and Carl Baron, (Cambridge University Press, 1992), p. 381. 

 

[2] Actually, I have misremembered this scene; Jones wears a black rubber (or PVC) cape with bright red PVC thigh boots; not stockings. See The Great Rock 'n' Roll Swindle, (dir. Julien Temple, 1980).

[3] Thankfully, at least women are increasingly wearing hoisery once more, as the fashion for bare legs wanes and coloured tights are bang on trend for 2023. And there are some who fly the flag for male legwear; see for example the blog Hoisery for Men: click here.     

 

Ticked Off (Reflections on an Idyllic Essex Crime Scene)

An Idylillic Essex Crime Scene 

(SA/2023)

 

 

I. 

 

Yesterday, whilst taking a walk in what remains of and passes for the great outdoors, I came across what appeared to be an idyllic crime scene, all sealed off with blue-and-white police tape instructing people not to cross.

 

There was no indication of what had happened and no one to ask why my route was barred in this manner. So, returning home, I decided to investigate ... 

 

According to a local news site, it seems that a number of parks and green spaces in Essex have been designated as danger zones and thus closed to the public. 

 

But what is it, you might ask, that so threatens the health and safety of walkers: are there wolves in the woods; are there big cats lurking in the long grass? 

 

No: apparently, we are being protected from ticks! 

 

What next: will we be sent alerts on our phones everytime someone spots a wasp in the area? 

 

 

II. 

 

In the view of Havering Council, residents are at severe risk of being infected with Lyme disease, cases of which are rising across the UK, but particularly in the South East counties of England, including Essex. 

 

Now, without wanting to downplay or dismiss the seriousness of this vector-borne disease - caused by the Borrelia bacterium and spread by the hard-bodied, black-legged deer tick - I do think locking down the countryside and virtually declaring a state of emergency, is something of an overreaction (one which, sadly, we became all-too-familiar with during the Covid pandemic).  

 

As there was only around 1,500 laboratory confirmed cases of Lyme disease in the UK last year, one suspects that the local council has ulterior motives; namely, they wish to exterminate (or at least radically reduce in number) the deer population - a move which would be popular with many Havering residents, including this anonymous blogger who wrote:

 

Herds of deer are picturesque to look at, but, without natural predators, they breed rapidly and not only cause road accidents, damage gardens and property, but present an actual health hazard due to the ticks living on them. As delightful as we might find them, deer are wild animals and have no place in an urban environment, interacting with humans and spreading potentially deadly diseases.

 

Personally, I'm happy to keep the deer - and the foxes and the badgers - and, yes, even the ticks; it's fearful councillors and cold-hearted cunts like the blogger above whom I would like to get rid of.    

 

 

The Black-Legged Tick 

(SA/2023)

 

 

In Memory of Anne Dufourmantelle: Risk Taker Extraordinaire and Defender of Secrets

Anne Dufourmantelle (1964-2017)

 

"To become an occult philosopher is to choose the shadows; 

to cross over to a secret world ..."

 

 

I. 

 

For those readers who may be unfamiliar with the name, Anne Dufourmantelle was a French philosopher and psychoanalyst, perhaps best known for her work on the vital importance of living dangerously. 

 

When, in 2017, she drowned attempting to save two young children caught in rough seas, the obituary writers couldn't help (sometimes spitefully) recalling the fact that she had published a book entitled Éloge du risque [1] just a few years prior to this tragic event. 

 

As her English translator - Steven Miller - notes, the implication was that Dufourmantelle was somehow the author of her own fate [2]; that her death served to confirm the ancient idea that to philosophise is to learn how to die and thus only practiced - like occultism - by disturbed individuals. 

 

Even if true, this tends to downplay the fact that Dufourmantelle was a courageous woman who wrote a number of books - including one on hospitality in collaboration with Jacques Derrida [3] - who wished to think risk not as an act of madness or deviant behaviour, but in vital (and ethical) terms.

 

To quote Miller: "the horizon that orients her approach to risk is not death and sacrifice [...] but rather what she calls not dying" [ne pas mourir]" [4] - i.e., having the courage to live whilst at the same time loving fate. 

 

It's a shame, therefore, that unthinking journalistic accounts of her death reproduce "the very paradigm of risk that she explicitly seeks to displace" [5]. But then of course, news editors are never going to let philosophical subtlety get in the way of a good story.   

 

 

II.

 

Dufourmantelle, however, wasn't just a woman who dared her readers to take risks - particularly the risk of opening themselves up to otherness and to intimacy - she was also a defender of secrets and it's this aspect of her work which currently most interests, engaged as I am in writing my own defence of Isis veiled [6].

Originally published in 2015, Défense du secret was translated into English by Lindsay Turner and published by Fordham University Press in 2021. 

 

As with her earlier book - In Praise of Risk - there are bits I like (the philosophical musings) and bits I don't like (the psychoanalytic observations). But that's just me - other readers will love the latter and hate the former.

 

Like Dufourmantelle, I also believe that in an age obsessed with exposing everything to x-ray vision - Byung-Chul Han famously speaks of the transparency society - secrecy might have an important role to play as part of a counter-narrative which also includes terms such as silence, solitude, and stillness. 

 

It's not that the secret is necessarily some kind of hidden truth - it might simply be a forgotten memory, an unspoken thought, or even a lie. But it is something that has a relation to truth and it is something we should revalue, I think, as a term of opposition to the see-all, tell-all, know-all ideology of today.     

 

But the problem, for a writer, is how does one speak of secrecy without giving the game away? The answer, as Dufourmantelle demonstrates, is to speak quietly and enigmatically; to murmur in a voice that is lighter than breath, or to whisper with the lights down low, as it were. 

 

Indeed, we might even dim the lights completely - for isn't darkness the custodian of being and isn't it the case that, ultimately, it is not we who keep secrets safe, but secrets that safeguard us and our right to become other (to be more than we seem) ...?           

Again, like Dufourmantelle, I would place the secret beyond good and evil - that is to say, align it with individual ethics rather than a universal morality. It's up to every one of us to nurture their own secret identity (or alter ego) - just like Superman and the Scarlet Pimpernel; to cultivate the darkness, as it were, so that we in turn might grow and blossom (like flowers).        

 

I don't think that Dufourmantelle's work - or my own forthcoming defence of Isis veiled - amounts to a religious call, as some suggest. Rather, it simply offers an occult perspective on contemporary culture and brings a little mystery into the social order. 

 

And, who knows, it just may lead to a new mode of relating to one another (less transparent, less open, but richer and more intense), which, in turn, might allow us to leave behind the society of transparency and build - for want perhaps of another phrase - a secret society which has what the German sociologist Georg Simmel called purposeful concealment as its structuring element.    

 

 

Notes

 

[1] Anne Dufourmantelle, Éloge du risque, (Editions Rayot & Rivages, 2011), translated into English by Steven Miller as In Praise of Risk, (Fordham University Press, 2019). 

[2] See Steven Miller's Introduction - 'The Risk to Reading' - to Dufourmantelle's In Praise of Risk. This can be read online (thanks to Amazon) by clicking here.

[3] Of Hospitality, Jacques Derrida and Anne Dufourmantelle, trans. Rachel Bowlby, (Stanford University Press, 2000). 

[4] Steven Miller, 'Translator's Introduction: The Risk to Reading' ... See link above in note 2.  

 

[5] Ibid.

[6] A paper entitled 'In Defence of Isis Veiled and in Praise of Silence, Secrecy, and Shadows' will be given at Treadwell's bookshop - 33, Store Street, London, WC1 - on Thurs 7 September. Further details will be made available on the Torpedo the Ark events page in due course. Essentially, this post might be seen as an (unofficial) preface to the paper, or a kind of preview.   

On the Uncertain Duty of a Writer

 

 

Someone told me the other day that, as a writer, I have a duty to always say what I think. 

Aside from the fact that I don't feel under any such obligation, I'm not sure it's possible to speak one's mind and then simply turn spoken words into text; certainly it's a far more difficult task than non-writers imagine. 

 

For as Kafka pointed out, whilst thought, speech, and writing all emerge from (and proceed into) the same darkness, we write differently to how we speak; speak differently to how we think; think differently to how we feel - and, indeed, think differently to how we think we think and how we think we ought to think.     

 

To put this in a Nietzschean nutshell: We knowers are unknown to ourselves - and that's why it's only naive or stupid people who are sure of themselves and their opinions; who pride themselves on their sincerity and believe they can instruct others on their duty. 

 

Writers, like quantum particles, are bound by the principle of uncertainty. 

 

 

A Warning from Cinematic History: The Tragic Case of James Xavier - The Man with the X-Ray Eyes

"He stripped souls as bare as bodies!"

 Ray Milland as Dr James Xavier in

The Man with the X-Ray Eyes (1963)

 

I. 

 

People who subscribe to the myth of Genesis [1] believe that darkness is simply a lack of illumination, or the absence of visible light. 

 

In other words, they think of it as a purely negative quality in binary opposition to divine radiance; that truth, goodness, and wisdom all shine brightly, whilst darkness is the home of secrets, lies, and a shameful form of ignorance that leads to sin. 

 

Such metaphysical dualism is, of course, just a convenient way of ordering the world for simple-minded folk who fear complexity (and, indeed, fear the darkness and those things that go bump in the night).

 

Artists and philosophers, on the other hand, understand that not only is darkness vital - that human life needs a little shadow to add depth and mystery - but light and darkness are coeval. That is to say, they are intimately connected and bring each other forth; not absolutely distinct and separate. 

 

Thus, when I say that I love the darkness, I am not implying I hate the light. 

 

Indeed, my concern, as a philosopher, is not to critique those who wish to see the world clearly by the light of reason, but take issue with those who subscribe to an ideal of total transparency, driven as they are by an insane desire to see through everything in a profoundly dangerous (and nihilistic) manner as if they had x-ray vision like the man who best exemplifies our Transparenzgesellschaft [2], James Xavier. 

II.

 

The Man with the X-Ray Eyes (1963) is an American science fiction film directed by Roger Corman, from a script by Ray Russell and Robert Dillon, and starring Ray Milland as Dr James Xavier, a scientist who develops eye drops that allow him to see beyond the visible spectrum into the ultraviolet and x-ray wavelengths. 

 

What starts out as fun - seeing through a pretty girl's clothing - soon ends in tragedy. For eventually Xavier can see the world only in forms of light and texture that his brain is unable to fully comprehend and - having lost the darkness - he loses his mind and his life. 

 

The film was a huge hit at the time, but it is only now that it's warning about the dangers of total transparency and of no longer being able to close one's eyes and dream in revitalising darkness, takes on cultural pertinence.

 

As Xavier's self-induced condition worsens, he begins to wear thick protective goggles, that uncannily anticipate the headsets that we are encouraged to put on in order to explore a digital metaverse in which reality is dissolved in an acid of virtual light.     

 

One fears that eventually the only thing that will save us from madness will be to gouge out our own eyes, as Xavier does his.  

 

   

 

If thine eyes offend thee ...

 

 

Notes

 

[1] I'm referring here to the famous opening lines of Genesis 1, which detail how light was created by God and separated off from the primal darkness that was upon the face of the deep when the Earth was without form and void.

 

[2] This concept is explored by Byung-Chul Han in his book The Transparency Society, trans. Erik Butler, (Stanford University Press, 2015). I have discussed this book in a three-part post on Torpedo the Ark: click here for part 1; here for part 2; here for part 3. 

The Astounding Story of Olga Mesmer: The Girl with the X-Ray Eyes

 

I recently mentioned Superman and his x-ray vision in a post on the pervy comic potential of such a gift: click here. 

 

But whilst he is certainly the most famous possessor of this ability, he is not the first fictional character to be able to see through solid objects (such as brick walls) and opaque materials (like the fabric of Lois Lane's dress) [1].   

 

Pre-dating the Man of Steel's first comic book appearance by several months [2], was the pulp fiction pin-up Olga Mesmer - aka, The Girl with the X-Ray Eyes - who appeared in Spicy Mystery magazine from August 1937 to October 1938. 

 

Like Superman, Olga was blessed with incredible strength and x-ray vision, though her powers stemmed from scientific experimentation (involving radiation) carried out by her human father (Dr Hugo Mesmer) on her alien mother (Margot), and had nothing to do with living beneath a yellow sun.

 

These powers lay dormant throughout her childhood, but burst into light once she reached adolescence and first became sexually aroused. She would later use her powers to battle evil-doers, in the course of which she would invariably rip (or manage to lose) her clothes (unlike Clark Kent, she didn't have a homemade costume to wear).  

 

Sadly, Olga Mesmer is now largely a forgotten female figure in the pop cultural imagination. 

 

And amongst those who do remember her, there are some who would deny her status as a genuine superhero; apparently, she doesn't display all the necessary tropes to qualify (and heaven forbid that Siegel and Shuster's Man of Steel should be denied the title of World's First Superhero).    

 

 

 

Notes

 

[1] Although commonly referred to as x-ray vision, this ability might more accurately be described as see-through vision, as it has very little to do with actual x-rays. Still, it seems a little pedantic to press the issue. The point is that when Superman turns his extraordinary vision on an object it is effectively rendered transparent, allowing him thus to either see inside or see beyond. I'm not sure how this power is explained, but assume it is attributable to the Photonucleic Effect.   

 

[2] Superman, created by writer Jerry Siegel and artist Joe Shuster, made his debut in Action Comics #1, cover-dated June 1938, but published in April of that year.

 

On the Voyeuristic Comic Potential of X-Ray Vision (With Reference to the Case of Superman and Lois Lane)

 

The voyeuristic comic potential of x-ray vision has long been recognised. 

 

Older readers may recall ads for novelty glasses, such as the one above, which guaranteed that one would not only be able to see bones through flesh, but, more interestingly, what lies beneath the dress of the girl next door (to your amusement and, presumably, her embarrassment). 

 

Who needs to try and sneak-a-peek upskirt or down blouse, when one can actually see through clothing thanks to a pair of X-Ray Spex ...?

 

But, alas, such glasses don't really allow one to possess x-ray vision. In reality, they merely create an ingenious (though not very convincing) optical illusion, that is quite literally a trick of the light and its diffraction [1]. 

 

And so, unless you happen to be Clark Kent, I regret to say you're probably never going to be able to see through solid objects and normally opaque materials. 

 

Speaking of Superman, it's interesting to note with reference to what we have been discussing, that whilst he mostly uses his power for good, even he can't resist perving on Lois Lane and checking out the colour of her underwear on at least one occasion (although to be fair to the Man of Steel, this was at her invitation) [2].      

 

 

Lois Lane invites Superman to demonstrate his x-ray vision 

by asking: What colour underwear am I wearing?

 

 

Notes

 

[1] The principle behind the illusion - as well as its use in a pair of spectacles - was first patented (in the United States) in 1906 by George W. Macdonald. But the man behind x-ray glasses as most people know them, was the American mail-order genius and inventor Harold von Braunhut. He was also the man who sold the world Sea-Monkeys and invisible goldfish. 

 

[2] I'm referring here to a scene in Superman (1978), dir. Richard Donner, and starring Christopher Reeve as Clark Kent / Superman and Margot Kidder as Lois Lane: click here. 

      For the record, Miss Lane was wearing pink underwear, which, depending on one's sartorial taste, would either compliment or clash with our hero's favoured red pants (famously worn over his bright blue tights). 

Reflections on Stephen Alexander's 'When the Moon Hits Your Eye' - A Guest Post by Sally Guaragna

Stephen Alexander: When the Moon Hits Your Eye (2017) 

 Caspar David Friedrich: Der Wanderer über dem Nebelmeer (1818)

 

For me, whilst Stephen Alexander's amusing photograph entitled When the Moon Hits Your Eye has a surreal aspect provided by its incorporation of a big pizza pie [1], it is clearly rooted in German Romanticism, nodding as it does to the mid-period work of Caspar David Friedrich [2] which typically features a contemplative figure seen from behind and silhouetted against an allegorical landscape.

This compositional device - known as a Rückenfigur - is often used to convey man's insignificance before the vast expanse of nature; that is to say, his sense of isolation and existential anxiety when confronted with the sublime (i.e., inhuman beauty on an overwhelming scale). 

 

As one commentator rightly notes, in using this anonymous and indistinct figure seen from behind, artists are able to create "a metaphorical bridge for the viewer" [3] by which they are able to insert themselves into the image. The Rückenfigur functions thus as an avatar, as well as symbolising the heroic archetype of Man Alone. 

 

Alexander makes clear, however, that the figure in his image should primarily be conceived as a wanderer - a key term in his philosophical lexicon, as it is for many artists, poets and thinkers who work in a post-Romantic tradition. One recalls the words of Nietzsche, for example, with which I would like to close this short post: 

 

"He who has attained freedom of spirit to any extent cannot regard himself otherwise than as a wanderer on the face of the earth - and not even as a traveller towards a final destination, for such does not exist." [4]          

 

 

Notes

 

[1] I have since discovered that Alexander's picture does not, in fact, make use of a pizza; the 'moon' is actually a pancake. It remains a witty and surreal use of food in order to create a work of art. 

 

[2] Caspar David Friedrich (1774-1840) was a 19th-century German landscape painter, generally considered the most important artist of his generation. His work seeks to convey a subjective, emotional response to the natural world coupled to a Gothic sensibility. 

      It has been suggested by the American art critic Thomas Bonneville, that Alexander's image actually owes more to the work of the English painter (and visionary) Samuel Palmer (1805-1881), who certainly loved a moonlit landscape. However, whilst this might be the case, I can find no evidence to support this claim.

 

[3] Laura Thipphawong, 'The Mysterious Appeal of the Rückenfigur' (2021) on artshelp.com: click here. 

 

[4] Nietzsche, Human, All Too Human, I. 638. It's important to note, however, that Nietzsche's wanderer is not some kind of hypercultural tourist. Indeed, paradoxical as it sounds, his form of existence is what Heidegger terms dwelling.  

 

Artificial Intelligence Doesn't Get Goosebumps

Illustration: Victor de Schwanberg 

Science Photo Library / Getty Images

 

 

Just about everyone - from Elon Musk and Geoffrey Hinton to Tim Pendry [1] - is warning these days about the coming AI revolution. 

 

And whilst I certainly don't wish to underestimate the dangers presented by artificial intelligence, I continue to be encouraged by the fact that because machines cannot feel, they cannot really think; that mind is ultimately a product of suffering.

 

Or, as Byung-Chul Han puts it: "The negativity of pain is constitutive of thought. Pain is what distinguishes thinking from calculating, from artificial intelligence." [2]

 

Generative AI may be capable of independent learning and producing the most astonishing results. But it will never give birth to thoughts in the manner that a mother gives birth to a child, invested with "blood, heart, fire, pleasure, passion, agony, conscience, fate, and catastrophe" [3].  

 

 

Notes

 

[1] Whilst I take seriously what these three wise men have to say about technology and the future of humanity, I certainly don't wish to hear from King Charles III on the subject: see the post written on 7 September 2018, when he was still the Prince of Wales: I said it then and I'll say it again now: better artificial intelligence than royal stupidity.      

 

[2] Byung-Chul Han, The Palliative Society, trans. Daniel Steuer, (Polity Press, 2021), p. 39. 

      See also Han's Non-things: Upheaval in the Lifeworld, trans. Daniel Steuer, (Polity Press, 2022), in which he argues: "Artificial intelligence is incapable of thinking, for the very reason that it cannot get goosebumps." Readers who are interested may click here for my post on this book. And this short piece by Mariella Moon on robots designed to sweat and get goosebumps, might also amuse.    

[3] Nietzsche, The Gay Science, trans. Walter Kaufmann, (Vintage Books, 1974), Preface for the Second Edition, §3, p. 36. 

Reflections on a Snail at the Birdbath

Snail at the Birdbath 

 (SA/2023)

 

 

I sent the above photo of a garden snail crawing along the lip of the birdbath to M. and she said: 'I didn't know they needed to drink.'

Which is not as foolish as it first sounds; for although garden snails absorb a significant amount of fluid from their food - and some directly through their skin - they do, in fact, need to drink regularly in order to maintain their water balance and not dry out. 

 

This is not surprising when one discovers that snails are actually composed of almost 90% water (which is 20% more water than human beings, but 5% less than jellyfish). 

 

But still, it's not often you see snails actually taking a drink ...

 

However, that's not to say the snail pictured was quenching its thirst; I prefer to think he was, like Narcissus, admiring his reflection in the water (even at the risk of falling in and drowning). 

 

But then, it might be asked: Can snails see? And, even if they can see, would they pass the mirror test; i.e., are they able to recognise their own reflection?

 

In answer to the first question - yes, snails can see. 

 

However, they can't see very well; they can't differentiate colours and although their eyes do possess a lens, they lack the ability to focus images. Pretty much, they can sense light and dark and work out where a source of light is coming from. But that's about it. 

 

Still, snails do have an excellent sense of smell and can feel vibrations, changes in temperature or humidity, etc. Thus, they do okay - and have been doing okay for millions of years.

As for the second question, well, to be honest, it's doubtful that a snail would pass an MSR test. As far as scientists are aware, only a very small number of creatures can do so; apes, dolphins, elephants, magpies - i.e., the usual suspects. 

But who knows what goes on in the (literally) brainless mind of a snail ...?