A birthday card

I didn’t forget my second unofficial red-letter day this year – but I forgot the “birthday card”. So, it will be makeshift, but I am officially “away” from my blog anyway – on holiday deep down in the past …

The day before yesterday I saw “Wuthering Heights” with Ralph Fiennes who I am looking into right now. The film (from 1992!) is rather boring, at least the first half of it, though there are good bits. And it is impossible anyway that I will ever see a satisfying film adaptation of this novel because I hate it … But then, at some point, I got completely swallowed up by watching Ralph Fiennes play Heathcliff. It is strange: in his case I never expect it, and it ALWAYS happens! Nonetheless, this was still different because Heathcliff is one of these characters I always thought could never “come out” of a book. I think every single person who ever read the book has this crushing experience about Heathcliff: that he is just totally horrible but that we FEEL for him. And in films this usually doesn’t work, not even if they are a great adaptation of the story - as this one isn’t. But at some point I just couldn’t look away anymore, seeing Heathcliff “coming out” of the book. It was just totally horrible and REALLY good at the same time. And – as it usually happens – only by seeing this I understood that it is an important text nonetheless. There is a reason why the books we hate are often the most important.

Every time I see this happen: one of these iconic characters unexpectedly coming out of a book I feel like witnessing something really, really important. This is just the newest example (- which is, in fact, probably the oldest …) And it doesn’t happen THAT often. The realization that THIS actor is the only one who will ever play this “impossible” character as he/she has to be played. As of now there are five of these events I remember: Of course Colin Firth playing Mr. Darcy, then Ralph Fiennes playing Heathcliff, Ciaran Hinds playing Mr. Rochester, rather recently Rosamund Pike playing Gudrun Brangwen, and Richard Armitage playing John Thornton.

I must admit: I hate birthdays. My own in particular, of course, but also in general. Birthdays, anniversaries … I hate them because they keep reminding me of the annihilation of good things. But what I have just seen reminded me that it is not so. Something “structurally” great like this is never just “gone” – though what happened afterwards might make it appear relative. It is even supposed to appear relative because of it. But, apart from the fact that readers will always have the chance to discover it anew, it is at the bottom of everything else that happened. Other great things happened because of it, and they will go on happening!

With this in mind: Many happy returns – and a great time playing theatre again!  

Flashlights from Munich under the heat wave

Actually, my blog is on summer holidays, but there are a few things for the record. First, after I had finally given up on Filmfest last year, this year they reanimated the dying patient and showed at least a few interesting films – none of which I have seen. And they gave one of their CineMerit awards to Ralph Fiennes who, consequently, had to come to Munich to receive it. I didn’t see him either because I had been booked for looking after the children a long time before I discovered this, but I didn’t really mind as I hate this kind of thing anyway. I remember how I liked to go out in the heat wave and dive into dark, air-conditioned cinemas to see strange films, but I always felt uncomfortable (for them!) when some director or actor turned up and had to answer stupid questions before an audience of ten or twenty … It probably wouldn’t have been like this, and I could have seen Ralph Fiennes “for real” (I saw him in the theatre in January, which doesn’t count as “real”), but never mind … Anyway, it appears to be the year of Ralph Fiennes in my calendar, and of course I was absurdly pleased that he got the award. But the really important thing about it was that I discovered “Coriolanus”, his first film as a director, which they showed and which I couldn’t see in the cinema either but instantly bought on DVD. That was the better choice anyway because it is damn difficult to understand without having read the play. I watched the (dreadful) old BBC version as well, as a “shortcut” to be able to judge about the relation between film and original text. And I must say – even though this is probably my second least favourite play by Shakespeare – that I was thrilled. Maybe this is even the second best Shakespeare film – with original Shakespeare text in it! – ever made, after the old Baz Luhrmann “Romeo and Juliet”, but for a completely different reason. I always come to hate what they do with Shakespeare’s text in films, the way they take all poetry and life out of it by cutting into verses like they did in the “Hollow Crown” or the Michael Fassbender “Macbeth”. In this case it might even be that the original Shakespeare text is in fact as hideous and pompous as it appeared in the old version, and that they IMPROVED it by cutting into it. However, there was much more of the SPIRIT of “Shakespeare” in that film than in the conventional tv version, even though (or because?) it is basically a war movie. And at one point I noticed that this is because of the ingenious and successful way of dealing with the language – which is, in my experience, still the pivotal point when it comes to adaptations of Shakespeare. As I still had no time to read the play this is little more than an unfounded impression, but I think I will have to look into it. Even though - where “Antony and Cleopatra” is still entertaining and scandalous, and “Titus Andronicus” absurdly funny - THIS definitely shows the darkest side of the Roman empire, and - on the “timeless” side - our world as well. So “CineMERIT” definitely covers it, from my point of view, even though, to my knowledge, Ralph Fiennes has never again directed a film remotely as good as this one.

This was the extent of what happened in Munich, as far as I am concerned, but recently I heard a science program on Bayern 2 (radio) that gave me fascinating input which I need to file here. It has to do with the relation between orgasm and reading, about which I have written and which has always been a fixed part of my experience but which I couldn’t really EXPLAIN. There was this bit about treating erectile dysfunction with a mental indication by some kind of “focusing training” which was explained by learning to INVESTIGATE situations instead of just labelling them. This made me think … not just a bit. In fact, I keep thinking … Of course I wouldn’t go as far as to recommend reading AS THERAPY. I am sure it doesn’t work like this, but the analysis that lead the scientist to think that this might work is based on the fundamental structure that links a lot of situations where “we” learn to enjoy ourselves properly – based on how we learn to have a good relationship with ourselves. Still too complicated, but at least I know now what I was writing about … and WHY this is in fact a fundamental structure that I want to “promote”. As I find, there is more and more of just labelling and “ticking off” experiences as success or failure – supported by the omnipresent “like button” – instead of looking at how a certain situation relates to us and how it MAKES US FEEL. This is what we are doing when we are living in the moment – of which achieving an orgasm is the most evident expression -  and it is what we are doing when we are REALLY READING. (Although there is not just the pleasure but the PAIN as well – which would be less easy to promote. Looking back on the very beginning of “House of Cards” I have no doubts anymore that somebody aspired to writing world literature … and probably succeeded. As I wrote, there is very little to ENJOY about “Coriolanus” – not even the language! - but I am getting involved nonetheless. And the main reason why I “chose” Ralph Fiennes over other great actors is still that he is so exceptionally good with the pain!)

Of course there is also some need for living in the future, which I usually don’t enjoy that much (at my age …) But next year is probably still okay, and the last good thing – and the greatest! – is still just a rumour (or probably a twitter). Quite reliable though, as it came from Claudia.  I haven’t even checked on it because I don’t dare to believe it. I might be able to see Richard Armitage IN THE THEATRE in London next year in “Uncle Vanya”.  As soon as I heard it I checked how difficult it would be for me to get a passport because of this brexit shit. Good thing that I did! To apply for a passport in Munich it is necessary to make an appointment, and the first open slot was in … October!!! (I don’t suppose I could apply for a passport anywhere else than where I live …) So there is a long journey ahead of me still, to get there, but at least Claudia is confident that we will make it!

Mind the gap (- and remember the porter)!

It is kind of funny that I keep writing introductions for the theoretical part of my “treatise” and always get distracted from dealing with the rest of it. Now, this new one came to me when I suddenly couldn’t stand the boredom anymore and reviewed what I have written about “Antony & Cleopatra” – and I must say: it is quite a VOLUME! This time, I became fascinated how COMPLETELY I documented my reading, and, basically, in the order it actually happened.

There wasn’t much about foreplay this time though I know there was one. There almost always is one, with Shakespeare - mostly the not very inviting kind consisting of failed readings, prejudices, reluctance, and incomprehension, as in this case. I just DISLIKED these characters, especially Antony … But there definitely must have been something in it that made me WANT to read the play. (External inducements - like Ralph Fiennes playing Antony - augment the chances for really reading by a lot but cannot make it HAPPEN.) In this case it was probably the one sentence which I loved and which, I knew, held the potential to connect me to the play: “Think you there is or may be such a man …” But I had seen three productions already (on DVD) and it never happened. I think I had not unreasonable hopes that Sophie Okonedo might be the one to make it happen - and she actually did! (See my first post on January 16^th about seeing the play in London.)

So, I got “connected” in the Olivier Theatre, but really reading apparently didn’t begin until I saw the recorded production in the “Cinema” in February – although I am certain the sentence WAS important. (As is foreplay. Even though I like playing with them I never use metaphors lightly! 😊) It was rather similar as it had been with “The Crucible”, just not as disruptive. There I had my personal “juvenile” short-version of the play without even knowing this, obviously sitting very close to quite important personal stuff, and kind of condensed into this one sentence I was waiting for … and which didn’t come! And, I think, this personal link got me started on the “grown-up” version I got to see in 2015. Kind of like: O shit – I am a grown-up now! Which was, I believe now, what made for the not so enjoyable aftermath. I might actually have done a bit of growing-up that escaped me (at almost fifty!) SEEING the play! Harsh … but this is the kind of thing that can happen – and happens ONLY! - in the theatre.

My “Apologies!” post after having seen A&C in the “Cinema” already contains a good deal of analysis – getting deeper into the text. But then I GOT STOPPED again, and there is indeed something fundamental that usually happens to reading at some point – even repeatedly, in this case!  I guess the main (and only) reason why I envy directors and actors – or am sorry that I am not writing fiction anymore – is that you cannot be stopped until you are done. Until you “have” your PERSONAL best version of a text. (Apart from what I am constantly aware of hearing these people tell us how much “fun” they have at their jobs - how hard it is to make a career, or, when you “have” one, to get anything WORTH playing - seeing “Tea with the Dames” recently alerted me to another suppressed aspect of being an actor: the amount of FEAR you have to deal with, and which I know - just from my tiny bits of experience of performing music - I would never be able to stand. I always knew why I value my stupid desk job!)

On the other hand, it is rather difficult to consider reading a SERIOUS occupation that can be put BEFORE other things on the list of necessary or worthwhile occupations that, miraculously, appears to become longer by the day. Therefore I always get stopped BEFORE I AM DONE at some point, usually because there are other things. There are always other things(, like – worst of all: great TV series produced at such a rate). There always are so many new things to get into the way of REALLY reading anything, and therefore there is nothing like SHARED READING to make me stay with a text. It happened before, but never on this scale!

I know that I would never have stayed with the text – not least because there was little time and really bad distracting things going on in real life just then – if I hadn’t had this opportunity of sharing my thoughts with my friend and getting input that made me question and revise my own “readings”. Not least PERSONAL input that put me in a position to investigate for the first time why people will always read fictional texts differently, even especially on a “primitive” level where we “bond” and identify with characters, or reject them. Of course I KNEW this continually observing the DIFFERENCE actors make to characters. Even “back then”, before I wrote about it, I observed this distinctly about such characters as Mister Rochester, Mister Darcy, or John Thornton that have to trigger a very PRECISE emotional response and call for “specialists” (like Ciáran Hinds, Colin Firth, and Richard Armitage turned out to be). (As, by the way, does Marc Antony whom James Purefoy nailed in “Rome”!) But observing the same dynamics in another person’s reading made me aware of how crucial this is for the direction our reading takes – and which “parts” of a text we want or don’t want to read because of this kind of attraction or repulsion. And this time it wasn’t about the men, for once, but about Cleopatra. She became the reason “women’s stuff” (and “Gedöns”) became so important and took me to places I have always been reluctant to go …

Which brings me to another fundamentally important issue of reading that I have always been aware of: the way OTHER TEXTS are “kicking in” when I am reading. In this case, “kicking in” particularly applies to the way “The Favourite” began to interact with A&C, and how it activated the “feminine” content that is usually not very dominant in my reading. The connection was RANDOM because “The Favourite” just came to the cinema and got hyped. So I went to see it, whereas I watched “Rome” because of A&C and, as I expected, got a lot out of it regarding the play. But there isn’t really a definition for such a connection being random or “necessary”. There, I believe, deconstructivism is just so right. I had a feeling that “Rome” got a lot more out of Shakespeare than meets the eye – through people just knowing Shakespeare’s version BEFORE they knew anything else - but this could never be proved. And there couldn’t be a necessary connection in the opposite direction anyway. On the other hand, there always is some kind of “real” connection between texts referring to the same historical facts, and to explore this is always interesting. But, as usual, this was not my chief interest. I personally think that there IS a parallel: that Shakespeare was as intrigued by the Roman way of thinking and feeling, and dealing with things, as the makers of “Rome” were. In both cases this issue is at the centre of what happens between Marc Antony and Octavius Caesar. And THIS is something that can be “proved” by describing it.

Nonetheless, the reason for me to keep the notion of “random” where it comes to text relationships is that I am always so intrigued by texts that have absolutely nothing to do with each other interacting just because they got read around the same time. In this case it was “Berlin Station”

which I was watching at some point and which yielded specialized input on sexual relationships from a MALE point of view. Which was actually rather important. Even though I THINK that I am aware that men ARE different I know that I am seldom capable of actually taking their point of view. (Male virtual reality – what would that be like??? I am afraid I’d be rather surprised …)  So, basically, I agree with the deconstructivist view of “random” vs “necessary”: there IS no such thing! Unless, of course, “thinking makes it so”. So, basically: MY choice!

Even though I wanted to avoid raising definition issues at this point, “random” and “necessary” are important for what I am getting at. There are no more or less important connections or texts, there is JUST TEXT. EVERYTHING is text. And THERE, of course, deconstructivism has it wrong – from my basically naturalistic point of view. What philosophers, scientists, and critics always have to leave out because it is, from their point of view, random is: US. It is understandable, and quite often leads to viable theories on how people “work”, but, where reading is concerned, it just DOESN’T work. Consequently every attempt to USE deconstructivist theory FOR READING results in the kind of irrelevant nonsense I so hated when I was at uni. WE = THE READERS are the ones who make choices – or, as it often turns out, GET CHOSEN!

Last but not least – there was an amount of PERSONAL STUFF from the beginning. In this case very little of my own. By the way - though it shouldn’t surprise me as to how thin my personal life has become – it is intriguing how little of the personal stuff I use when I am reading is actually my own but other people’s. My personal contribution in this case was more or less limited to my “amimetobion experience” – about how special it is to be in love at that age. IF it is finally the right person. And this is, of course, the matter that made me WANT to read it and not let go – but also may have (mis)informed my reading in a way it got biased.

Thinking about it, I find that this experience might be less contingent on me than on “Shakespeare”, which is such a “big” world that my – or any person’s – personal stuff will always be totally insufficient to fill it. This might even be one of the main attractions for me – as, probably, for actors! – to find this amount of personal matters and predicaments laid out SO PRECISELY that it WILL draw us into other people’s issues eventually. In this case, I had the added experience how it actually helps to expand my consciousness of human relationships IN REAL LIFE and deal better with them. Within limits, of course. I probably hate “the bitch” no less than I did before reading A&C, but I got compelled to perceive her as a complex human being with an UNDERSTANDABLE predicament. MAKING SENSE appears to be an important category for me to apply to people. I don’t have to LIKE them – which is something that happens appallingly seldom! – but they have to make sense to be considered less of a threat and more likely to be “dealt with” … What I also noticed – and which hadn’t really happened before – is that personal stuff MIGHT HAVE STOPPED my reading. I just got lucky, and “real life” shriveled in time for me to read on.

As to the issue I had with deconstructivism – I recently found the explanation for it. And an explanation why ANY approach to reading EXCLUSIVELY BASED ON TEXT must fail. Apparently by chance – walking in my favourite spot in Munich along the Isar towards the “Museum” cinema, thinking about what I would want to have on a t-shirt, if I’d get another one printed ... As I just had one made with “Never engage with Pting!” (and a picture of the pting, of course, otherwise nobody would know what my t-shirt was talking about 😉 ) something like “Mind the gap!” wasn’t an option. But I felt a bit sorry that it wouldn’t do because, all of a sudden, the sentence struck me as this kind of message with a “straight” second meaning (or ONE precise second meaning), something like: “Remember the porter!” from “Macbeth”. Just that, in this case, the second meaning just got created. It struck me that nobody EVER minds the gaps, unless they are in the London Underground. Well, of course, they don’t – and I don’t! – because the gaps “between texts” are not dangerous, and there is nothing to see (or play with). Besides, they can take care of themselves. But their BEING THERE explains an awful lot.

It does because everything I ever tried to describe in this blog HAPPENS IN THESE GAPS between texts, or between text and reader (respectively: the “personal stuff” that, by being drawn to other texts, exploited by them, itself becomes text). Nothing ever happens with text OUTSIDE these gaps – with the text itself being, in fact, this black box. Or the reader, come to that … (Though I am constantly writing theories about it I will never KNOW what happened with me when I saw “The Crucible”. The only thing my strange symptoms could tell me for sure is THAT something out of the ordinary had happened.) But, of course, nothing would ever happen, no gap would ever open without a fictional text STRONG ENOUGH to draw other text in this way: that this gap of infinite questions and possibilities of making sense will suddenly appear. This is what fictional text DOES.

I remember the one time when I SAW this happen before my eyes. That was over fifteen years ago when I started to tell the story of the Ring to my five-year-old nephew. I had just seen the first film in the cinema and was enthusiastic. And I must have done it right (as Peter Jackson did!) because I could see almost instantly how the story “grabbed” him - like no other story ever had. And in this case I am sure it grabbed him for the EXACT same reason it grabbed me when I was in the cinema, hearing Cate Blanchett speak these first lines … (I only read the book after having seen the first film!) I am sure it was this ONE time I have been on exactly the same page with somebody else about a fictional text. And it became a ritual that I had to go on telling the story whenever we met. There was literally NOTHING more important than that.

Remembering HOW EXACTLY the story grabbed him, I know that it was because of the tale that everybody is telling themselves probably from the very beginning of conscious thinking. Where I am concerned, I “had” it at the age of one and a half because there is a recording of me, telling a story about the devil living in a hole in the ground with his family. (For me, of course, crucial evidence that I have always been telling stories to myself!) It is the tale about the nature of evil – what we fear, why it is there, why it is so dangerous … And we were both likewise fascinated by Tolkien’s imaginative and compelling version of it.

It just struck me that Tolkien might have pulled this off as nobody else did before him BECAUSE he was such a “text person”. Because he had this superior knowledge about what text does, how it works – conjuring up things that are not there, making them interact with each other. How much the Ring metaphor actually might be this parable about writing and “the gap”: “One ring to BRING them all …” But this might already be way too deconstructivist …? 😕