Rep

Skidmore College
Representation & The War For Reality
Author(s): WILLIAM H. GASS
Source: Salmagundi, No. 55 (Winter 1982), pp. 61-102
Published by: Skidmore College
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/40547478
Accessed: 25-10-2015 06:01 UTC

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& TheWarForReality
Representation
BY WILLIAM

H. GASS

I
MATTER Suppose, witha relaxed mind,we examine any ordinary
object:thisor thatlamp or chair,piece of sweet cake, meltof custard;
or imagine we consider some sensation: odor of onion, glisten of
shellac, low mutterof thunder; or that we follow the ruminating
length of the digestive tract, travel the highwayfrom Nimes to
Nantes, studythe calamitouscourse of a seduction; in short,thatwe
take a lightlygeneralaccount of thingsand our varied experiencesof
them - survey,as theysay, the whole - will it not seem entirely
naturalthatour speech as we proceedshouldseem to be aboutall that;
should seem to serve all that;should be shaped, even iffromnothing
moresubstantialthana systemof fixedsounds, intoa hollowin which
we tryto hold our worldlike waterin leakinghands? since, indeed,
our worldis this or thatwet towelor wantonglance; it is the stupid
stonewe stumbleover, thedark starwe wonderat, the brutebulk of
Being; it is the Lambeth Walk, a sentimentalfeeling, shred of
cabbage, piece of bruisedfruit;it is lifelit bya neon lining;forwhat
are thewordssweetcake worthcomparedtothelayeredtorteour teeth
are gentlysublimating?and theglistenof shellac - whatwood would
want the wordas its protection?and whyshould we, like Whitman,
be enchantedby an aimless list? a hollowlitanyof names?
clothesline
dashboard
bloodstain
twitch
If consciousnessitselfseems strangelyvaporousand evanescentas near to nothingas we care to come, like the crumblingedge of a
steep cliff- it is neverthelessclearlyreferential;it is as insistently
intentional,as much made, like the zero, byits blank as byits circle,

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62

WILLIAM H. GASS

thewaya land's end is equallyan onset ... a rise,a float. . . of earth;
and we can, comfortedbythisrealization,returnforanotherhelping
ofthatdessert,and smileat our friendswhosemindsare momentarily
in theirmouthswhereours is, secure in our communalassumptions:
thatwe share withthem a moistcube of cake and a number of not
dissimilarcrumbs;thatcalorieswillnotcapriciouslyclingto one of us
ratherthanto another;that,in one sense, we lickour fingerswiththe
same tongues.
A name is notso securelyattachedas all that.The color of a leaf/a
termfor the tree: thereis an ontologyof difference.Colors do not
come in Yugoslavian. Fall willnotfindtheforestbarrenof characters
inscribedtherein Japanese.A name can be anyminormeowa cat can
manage, any donkey bray or honk in a hankie. Kamikaze, we cry,
runningforcover; Gerónimo,we shout, fallingthroughthe floorof
theplane.Justas well: Philadelphia*.
Whynot: mashieniblick?How we
and
whistle!
and
clack
squeak
Starlingsare no more vociferous.
and
the defendant's wife bursts into
the
Turnpike, judge decides,
tears: ruthlesssentence,callous word.
So even ifwe are notsure howthethunder'srumbleregistersin us;
even if, betweenthe fruitand its flavor,a gulfa tall god could not
cross has opened, it is, in truth,a gulf,a gap - thisCartesiancut a wound in Reality which is precisely defined by its sides and
separation,its type of spilled blood; but neitherthe name nor its
of its prepositions,thesweet taste ofthe
arrangements,the propriety
cake, for instance, has the faintest resemblance, or any other
reasonablerelation,to thelightcoat of chocolateon mytongue1;and,
again, even if the expression,lightcoat of chocolate,fell away out of
the world altogether,the sweet taste would linger, just as the
glisteninglipsofmydinnercompanion,smilingand full,existoutside
thesentencewhichdescribesthem(unless, ofcourse,I'm composing
a fiction;then, if the words go, all is gone - away in the erasure
withoutleavingan ash - unless thereremainsa small rollof rubber
on thepaperwheretheywere like a slightsmearof sugaron thechin).
How can we weighor reacharoundtheworldwiththesemerelyverbal
measures; and may not everybeautifullysubstantialthingrecoil at
the scentless breath of the Word as fromthe kiss of Nothingness
itself?
1. I have discussed the formaland sematic emptinessof such expressions as "the
X of the Y," in "The Ontologyof the Sentence, or How to Make a World of
Words," The World Withinthe Word (Alfred Knopf, New York, 1978), pp.
308-338.

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& The War For Reality
Representation

63

Sartre's early novel, Nausea, concerns itself,in part, with this
problem. The narrator'srevulsion, felt as outside himself - as a
feelingforthe feelingin things,as a feelingthathas been passed to
himfromthings,like the transferof dampnessfromglass to hand is a consequence of what was at firsta dim apprehensionof real
existence,and finallybecomes a revelationof whatit is foranything,
simplyand completely,to be' hence, of course, the perception(we
cannotcall it "an understanding")of whathis own existencecan be
reduced to. To look on Being bare, we must stripit of signs. Our
knowledgeof it, clothedin conceptslike figuresat a masquerade, is
onlyof thisor thatsmellyblack witchor fairyprincess,harlequinand
clown.Naked - naturally,we knowthembetter.As we enterreality,
we are entered,and we understandit,then,in a waybeyondknowing
- absolutely- as Bergsonclaimed:
If there exists any means of possessing a realityabsolutely
instead of knowingit relatively,of placing oneself withinit
insteadoflookingat itfromoutsidepointsofview,ofhavingthe
intuitioninstead of makingthe analysis:in short,of seizing it
withoutanyexpression,translation,or symbolicrepresentations
- metaphysicsis that means. Metaphysics,then,is thescience
whichclaimsto dispensewithsymbols.2
When all the signs are removed, all significantrelationshipsshall
cease, since the mysticalexperience (like the estheticone) is one
unmediatedbyconcepts;but withoutsuch relationand meaning,this
is onlythat.It is, in thecase of the
pure presence,thistotalthereness,
novel, Nausea, the knottedblack mass of a chestnut'sroot risingout
of theearthbeneaththenarrator'sparkbenchlike a serpentfromthe
sea; a root Roquentinbecomes - not in its role as a root, forit has
lost thatidentity- but by sharingthe sense of its sheer existence.
the sublimesort
Paradoxically,then,his experienceis of rootlessness:
of whichRilke wrotein the FirstElegy,when the dead are suddenly
able to perceiveeverythingfluttering
loosely in space like a sleeve.3
to Metaphysics(Liberal Arts Press, New York,
2. Henri Bergson, An Introduction
1949), p. 24. Sexual imageryseems to cling to these ideas like perfume.
3. Rilke writes of an experience very similar to Roquentin s in his little essay,
"Erlebnis": "Walking up and down with a book, as was his custom, he had
happenedto reclineintothe more or less shoulder-highforkof a shrub-liketree,

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64

WILLIAM H. GASS

Dizzied by the spin of thingsout of all relation,the narratorRoquentin - throughthe cancellationof any sense of himselflike a
cashed check, by a total loss of footing, by an almost tropical
of life,as thoughhe were suddenlycaughtin a cloud of
proliferation
while
midges
takinga calm autumnwalk; thenarrator- Roquentin
- bytheslidingaway of everything,
like snowfroma warmingroof,
towardwho knowswhatit will be ... soon again won't be - never
quite wasn't - isn't ... becomingneithermorenorless so, but simply
is'Ungieating,sleeping,shitting,
fortuitously
findinga goldcoin in the
and cold as stone or
in
still
or
unhappiness honey, lying
garbage
as
a
bench
or,just likely,an upturneddead
rapturously
fucking,being
Roquentin donkey's bloated belly; the narrator to
self
and
self
to selves like
of thingto thing
noticingtheindifference
streetlessrows of the one same shutteredhouse di Chirico'd in the
silver glaze of a turning mirror; the narrator- Roquentin impressedby the completepointlessnessof lettinggo, of persisting,
gettingon, in Bouville to begin with - mudville - in the primeval
slimewhichBeckettwilllaterrenderso well in How It Is' thenarrator
- Roquentin - convincedof theabsolute adventitiousnessof every
event, the speciousness of everyvalue, the absurdityof the genital
spasm, spermlike a billionmidges,love an acid rain; thenarratorRoquentin - withsuch turnstaken,feelsa nausea whichsickensthe
sidewalk,theshoes, theclothes,thesoul, thecells, tilltheeyes vomit
theirperceptions,and the mind lies down in swillto thankan empty
heaven, author of all - like Roquentin - a dotard, knockabout,
anothernil among nillions:narrator.
Many Greek philosophersapparentlyfelt that existence was a
propertywhichthey,as human beings,had, but whichthe gods, for
example, as clan and familyfictions,did not.Hamlet has irresolution,
but notis ^ ness.Later,it became fashionableto describeexistenceas
a relationbetweenthings,and not a thingor propertyitself;it was a
condition,much like drunkennessor having the croup. If Hamlet
dies, he does not cease to breathe,because his breathingin the first
place was only say-so. His death means merelythatHamlet has no
more lines. As a character,thereare certainexistentialrelationshe
lacks, among thema kind of materialcausality.Hamlet cannotgive
(ftnt.3 continued)
and in thispositionimmediatelyfelthimselfso agreeablysupportedand so amply
reposed, thathe remained as he was. . . It was as thoughalmost imperceptible
vibrationswere passed intohim fromthe interiorof the tree. . . "Quoted in The
Duino Elegies,trans,by J. B. Leishman & Stephen Spender (Norton,New York,
1939), p. 124. The characterof the experience,for Rilke, is plainlybenevolent,
but this is not entirelythe case for Roquentin.

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& The War For Reality
Representation

65

Ophelia thefluor thepox, althoughtheactorwho playshimmaygive
his cold to theactresswho playsher.In Nausea, however,thenarrator
experiencesexistenceas an ultimatesubstance,much as Heraclitus
considered fire,or Anaximines air. It is the primal stuff,the true
<j>uai a , and thissimple,daring,yetprimitivesolutionhas much to
be said forit - as attitude,at least as poetry.
If we dissolved appearance, and thus plurality,by force, Thaïes
seems to have suggested:ifwe squeezed the orange, meltedthe ice,
condensed the steam, we would find theywere made of water, as
is - our bodies are mainlyrivers,swamps,and slush; and
everything
must
thisdiscoverysuggeststhatthepowerof producingparticularity
lie in actionsof wateritself,as it driftsoffas air, or congealsas a solid
of some sort; just as, in later thought,the élan vitalwas seen to
explode in the directionof everypossibility.Existence is infinitely,
randomly, pointlessly changeable; yet, although it does change
constantly,we insiston seeing the same face in our mirroror across
thebreakfasttable,our eyes sew up all theholes in our clothes;habits
like a healthyheartbeatare never heard; we live in the comfortable
communitiesof cliché.
Still,ifwe see Sartre'ssolutionas pre-Socratic,we mustalso see to
whatdegreeexistence(in Nausea) is identifiedwiththeobjectiveside
of theCartesianslice: withprimematterand fiatfact.The otherside
mightbe representedbyValéry's M. Teste, who putson showsin the
theaterof the head. Consciousness must naturallyfeel this external
realitytobe itsenemy,forthemovementofconsciousnessreflectsthe
movement of matter only by dissolving its substantiality,and
whichhad distinguishedit. Yet what
deprivingit of theverythereness
marksoffthisbench,theman whositsupon it,therootbeneath,from
the slots whichhelp to drainthe seat, therise of thebench above the
earth,the arm's-reach-awaythe root is, if it's not thefactthatspace
is never in theway(in the novel's repeatedand italicizedphrase). As
Descartes had definedit, theonlydifferencebetweenmatterand the
void was matter'srelativeuninvadibility.So you exist if you can be
said to be in theway.However, the root, the bench - lodged in the
experience of Roquentin, Anny, or the Self-taughtMan - will
become will-o'-the-wisps:multiplicitiescorruptedby self-concern,
convention;and never,like a roller-skateor kid's trike
insensitivity,
or slow truck,in theway.
We are balanced, as on Beckett's bicycle, between one fall and
another:betweenthemadness of thosedisembodiedcreaturesof his,

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66

WILLIAM H. GASS

keptalive onlythroughan obsessional flowofwords;and theinsanity
of thede-sensitized,thoseloweredbelow thelevel of thelivingas the
narratoris in Nausea. Both approachsilenceas a limit:in one, it is the
silence of the shatteredand scatteredstone; in the other, it is the
silence of the exhausted, embitteredsoul. Beckett's characterslose
almost all ability to act; they merely, if barely, speak. Sartre's
protagonistfinds himselfin a realityso indeterminatehe believes
himselfterrifyingly
free,althoughhow his will can directhis actions
withoutthe assurancesof some determinatecausalityis inexplicable.
The voices, in Beckett,whichwe overhear,sufferfroma language
which lacks nearlyall denotation,whereas Roquentin's mystically
uncovered world is nothingbut; because essence, if we dare to
introduce that unwanted notion, belongs to language, where
definitiondwells, and to things.Words mingle in more ways than
thrownrice; theyinterconnect
theinterconnections
theybasicallyare;
and witha numberof themrightlyplaced, I can make themoonjump
over the cow and the fiddle play the cat. Things, however,do not
modifyone another;theydo not intersect(not in a realm without
relations);theycan onlydisplace somethingfromtheirway,and ifthe
sledge shattersthe stone,it is, as Hume averred,only anotherhabit
which may be altered itself as readily,for it is not the blow but
happen-stancewhichsends those fragmentson theirseparate ways.
Surreal metamorphosisis the rule, and in a passage which cannot
help but remindus of Rilke's TheNotebooksofMalte LauridsBrigge
(as Nausea's entire text does: in theme, attitudes,imagery,ideas,
even upshot) Roquentin wonders "what if something were to
happen?"4 Whatifchancewereking,and a red ragweretochangeinto
a side of rottenmeat, a pimplesplitlike an openingeye in a painting
by Magritte;or what if one's clothingcame alive, or one's tongue
turnedintoa centipede? New names will have to be inventedfora
spider's jaw, or, as Borges has imagined,fortransparenttigersand
towersof blood.
It is preciselyin such passages, as effectiveas theyare, thatSartre's
literaryand philosophicalproblems,in a novel like Nausea, are most
evidentand unavoidable. As we watch the red rag blow across the
street, what are we watching? And as it approaches us, meat
now, spurtingblood, where is the change takingplace? It is taking
place the only place it could take place - on the patient
page, in among the steadfastwords, the metaphorsof mind and
4. Jean-Paul Sartre, Nausea (New Directions, New York, 1959), pp. 212-213.

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& The War For Reality
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No one wantsto seem dense about poetry,but we must
imagination.6
not believe poetryat the expense of the world. There is not the
slightestchance thata red rag, howeverwindblown,will reach us as
bleedingmeat. The cards I am dealt may be Q K 10 A 2 one time,3
J 988 another- who knows? - but the Jackof Hearts willnever be
otherthanpasteboard,theQueen cannotgive me a lewd kiss, threes
become treesbylosinga letter,nottheirnature.Roquentincan be as
full of erroras bile, deep in his metaphysicalmiseries, but Sartre
cannotchancebeingso mistakenaboutchance,unless he thinksitalso
has no nature; because there is no likelihood that whitenesswill
become musical, as Aristotlenoticed,foreven randomnesswanders
along logical lines, so that what's white may impulsivelybecome
green,perhaps- thatis possible - or what'smusicalmayfallfirmly
silent - that's possible - or the red rag may flutterunaccountably
thitherratherthaninexplicablyhither- that's possible - Mr. and
Mrs. Wholesome America may beget loathsome freaks - that's
possible - whatis possible is possible - tryingto filla straightand
receivingthe Jokerby the dealer's mistake - thatis possible.6
Roquentin can have his imaginarynightmare.Let us not stand in
thewayof literature.But we must rememberthatit is just that.It is
fiction.A fictionat furiousodds withitsown form,itsown style,and
even its own denouement.When Sartrewas young, he tells us, he
believed thatwordswere the quintessenceof things,and so theyare
- for the writerof quintessences. "The writtenword . . . worried
me," he reports.
At times, weary of mild massacres for children,I would let
myself daydream; I would discover, in a state of anguish,
ghastlypossibilities,a monstrousuniverse that was only the
undersideof my omnipotence;I would say to myself:anything
5. Compare Sartre's passage withany numberfromLautréamont,forinstance:"O,
that inane philosopherwho burst into peals of laughterwhen he saw a donkey
eating a fig! I am inventingnothing:ancient books have related in the greatest
detail this voluntaryand shamefulspoilation of human nobility.. . Very well
then, I witnessed somethingeven funnier:I saw a fig eating a donkey! Such
miracles are easily performedon the page." Les Chants de Maldodor, New
Directions, New York, 1966, pp. 168-169.
6. This is the point of Aristotle'stheoryof privation.It is interestingto compare
Roquentin's "possibilities" withMalte's. The latterwonderswhetherhe has seen
or said anythingimportant;whetherhe has ever lived elsewhere than on the
surfaceof life; thatthe whole historyof the worldhas been misunderstood,and
so on. In short,he worriesabout real possibilities.

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68

WILLIAM H. GASS

can happen! and that meant: I can imagine anything.
Tremulously,alwayson thepointoftearingup thepage, I would
relate supernaturalatrocities.If my motherhappened to read
over my shoulder, she would uttera cry of gloryand alarm:
"What an imagination!"7
The accidental glimpse, we can be sure, was not accidental; and
thereis a certainglory,as well, in causingalarm.Sartrewas practicing
his role as Roquentin.8He goes on to say thathe did not inventhis
horrors,but foundthemin his memory,and thenhe gives an account
of several"supernatural" eventsof thesortwhichexhilaratechildren
and sustain the superstitious.Pure chance is embraced by the New
Faith because it can do whatan absent god cannot:performmiracles
and confound science. Why not turn water into wine? Why not
imaginea dead man restoredto sight,onlyhis eyes alive in his rotting
head?
But let us back over the issue a bit. It will not cryout or protest.
We begin witha desire to describe,to render,to captureeven a bit
of the world.We wish to stand in thewayof time.We wish to gain a
littleinformationabout things.We wish to understandthe make-up
and theconnectionof events.But firstwe must make thingsstill.We
must liftthingsfromtheirworldof thingsand finda place forthem
in therealm of thought.We mustrepresent.I take myexample from
an extraordinary
and beautifulbook by Danilo Kiáf.
Late in the morningon summerdays, my motherwould come
into the room softly,carryingthat trayof hers. The traywas
beginningto lose its thin nickelized glaze. Along the edges
whereitslevel surfacebentupwardslightlytoforma raised rim,
traces of its formersplendorwere stillpresentin flakypatches
of nickel that looked like tin foil pressed out under the
fingernails.The narrow,flatrim ended in an oval troughthat
bent downward and was banged in and misshapen. Tiny
decorative protuberances - a whole chain of little metallic
7. Jean-Paul Sartre, The Words(Braziller, New York, 1964), pp. 148-149.
8. Throughout The Wordshe describes his childhood rehearsals,without,I think,
being completelyaware of themas preparations.At one point,he says, "I decided
to lose the power of speech and to live in music" (p. 125), a criticalexchange
in Nausea.

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& The War For Reality
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grapes - had been impressedon the upper edge of the rim.
Anyoneholdingthetray(usually mymother)was bound to feel
at least three or four of these semicylindricalprotuberances,
like Braille letters,under the flesh of the thumb. Rightthere,
around those grapes, ringlikelayers of grease had collected,
barelyvisible, like shadows cast by littlecupolas. These small
rings, the color of dirt under fingernails,were remnants of
coffeegrounds,cod-liveroil, honey,sherbert.Thin crescentson
thesmooth,shinysurfaceof the trayshowedwhereglasses had
just been removed.9
This trayis not handed to us on a tray,all its elements in order,
coexistent, communal, clean of commentary.Rather the tray is
brokenapartand strungout, theglaze precedingitssurface,theflaky
patcheson theraisedrimas in frontof itsfriezeof metalgrapesas the
soup is in advance of the fish. Our reading runs in loops of
understandingas we gathera phrase togetherand then carryit on
throughthe sentencelike a package under our arm. The complexity,
character,the length,the chronologyof everyquality'soccurence,is
carefullyregulatedby the writer.It is true thatin "real life," as we
continueso foolishlyto call it, our experienceof the traywould have
We turnthe trayover in our hands, for
many serial characteristics.
instance:firstfront,thenback. We look here,thenthere.We trythis,
thenthat.Taste thesherbet;run our fingeralong the tray'srim; look
throughthecurtains,throughthewindow'shaze at thelawn escaping
towardthetrees.How ideal languageis forthat.Meet Gertrude.Meet
Ophelia.Put on theleftshoe, droptheright.But thetrayis notentirely
present,even in thisrecitalof bitsand pieces. I remembertherewas
a maker's mark on the back of the real one, crudelyindented,as if
stepped on. The boy for whom honey and cod-liver oil are being
broughtcares only for its bearingsurface,where a teaspoon might
restalong withthejars. We have all the traywe need, forit is a tray
we hold in our heads, and not in our hands. We thinknot only tothe
the details of its development.The odd
nickelizedtray,but through
standsin forthenickelizationitself.We
sound of theword,nickelized,
watcha thoughtin theprocessofcomposingitself.No "real life" tray
does that.It does so, furthermore,
largelyin termsof visual details.
The trayis touchedbut once. It is nota thingwe're thinking,withits
9. Danilo Kií, Garden,Ashes (Harcourt Brace, New York, 1975), p. 3.

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molecules and secret laws, but a perception,a perception
remembered,10
Of course (and thepassage was chosen in partforthisreason), this
tray is only a version of the Slavic one; only this one has been
nickelized;only//ordersits constructioncarriedout in English; only
itwill be "perceived" by most Americans.
It is just a tray,a mere tray,we can hear our Sartreannarratorsay,
a trifleof no worthbut forthesad or simplelittlememoriesitharbors.
True. But the paragraphhas superceded the tray,devoured it, if it
ever was (indeed, ifiteverdared tobe) ; we need itno longernowthat
we have this unfoldingthingof words in frontof us; this path the
mind will followin search of a feeling;this thought-outobject upon
whichwillalwayslie theremnantsofcoffeegrounds,thecod-liveroil,
the honey,the sherbet,in preciselythatmarchingorder; and there
willbe, in addition,theauthor'sattentiontoit - close, precise,loving
- a shinewhichcan restupon even lead withoutchangingits lack of
gleam.
We reach the surreal world which Nausea envisions in two, not
quite coherentstages. In thefirst,we feel theroot forwhatit is apart
fromour categoriesand classifications(createdbya bourgeoisscience
and society in any case, and hence corrupt beyond mere
metaphysics); in thesecond, we pass beyondthattotheexperienceof
undifferentiated
existenceitself:i.e., fromwhatit is fortherootto be
(as root, presumably),to whatit is foranythingto be (as any thing).
However, when we deprive the worldof words,do we deprive it of
anythingat all, unless we have onlytakenawaywhatrationalistshave
said was therelikespooks in a hauntedhouse? Havingdenied a logical
structureto reality,are we compelled to conclude thatit is actuallya
heap of non-rationalrubble? Our reasoningseems to be thatif we
remove universaisfrom thought,
we shall immediatelysee singular
things.
So each timethemothercame in withthetray- she, the tray,the
carry, contents, motive, sticky spoon, soft light and summer
ambiance - would be unique, and reallyunlike every other time,
10. The recursivecharacterof reading is almost impossible to represent.The first
sentence of our speciman "reads" somethinglike this: late in the morning,late
in the morningon summer days, my mother,late in the morningon summer
days, would come intothe room softly,late in the morningon summerdays, my
motherwould be carryingthattrayof hers,late in the morningon summerdays,
when my motherwould come into the room, softly,with that tray.

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thing,space and movement.In a sense, if Nausea had its way, the
habitualpast tense, in which this paragraphis written,as well as all
its general terms,its logical connectives,would vanish into vicious
- vicious because it is a particularity
withoutclasses,
particularity
withoutrepetition,withoutuniversais.Borges' madman, Funes, is in
touch with reality,but Kis has simply falsifiedit, implyingthe
existence of a humble singularitywhich he describes in arrogant
generalities.
Actually(and I have been presentthere,on myscientificmission,
in case, a beeper at mybelt, an obedient
clock in hand, thermometer
camera staringlike an owl's eye pasted on a box, pad of wet black
paper on my shivering knee), yes, actually Roquentin is right:
differencesare epidemic. The firsttime his mothercame, she was
wearinghighheels and a paper hat, swayinga littlefromlast night's
champagne;thesecond timeshe was downcastand held thetrayas low
as herwaist,as low as herspirits;thethirdtimeall thebottlesand the
spoon had slid to one side as if theywere on a capsizing ship; the
fourthtime the honey had crystallized,the sun came throughthe
curtainedwindowslike a knife;thefifthtime... ah, thefifthtimeshe
fairlyflew, clothingin charmingdisarray,a light flush rose from
between . . . but enough - this inspectionisn't needed, isn't nice.
Nevertheless,she did come each time, and she was carryinga tray
each time, and, in fact, everythingalleged in the paragraphwas
exactlythere,unaltered,thanksto thevirtuousgeneralityof language
- virtuousbecause it leaves the particularity
I have just generally
describedquite undisturbed,quite untouched.
We can, moreover,determinejust wherethemonstrousmutations
ofchancemayoccur - withinthemetaphors- as thenickelbecomes
tinfoil,themetalgrapesripen,and littlecupolas crowdtheroomwith
theirinsistentshadows.We can say ofNausea whatMontaignesaid of
naturalscience: In words are its questions asked, in words are they
answered.
One finalfactor twoabout thisparagraphand thetrayit presumes
to create. Our object - unlike the chestnut tree whose root has
trippedus up - our trayis acutelyaware of itself.It does not,in our
account, pretendto any granderexistence than the Forms have wee modest thoughtthatit is. It is not out therebeneath a bird shat
bench being stepped on, being mysticallymerged with a foreign
corporation.Nothing is being represented.A thought,instead, is
- a memory.Nor is the language out of whichit is
being constructed

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builtany differentfromthe thoughtitself.There is, at thispoint,no
fatal separation. Although nothingbut universais are employed;
although every word is in common parlance - even cupola and
protuberancemust be used many timesdaily - and althoughthere
is nothingunusual or outrageous about its syntaxor its rhetorical
a quite singular paragraph- this
patterns;it is, notwithstanding,
and
wholesof Nausea. As a passage of
as
are
the
Kis
parts
English
felt thought,this bit is perfectlyadequate, even beautiful. As a
descriptionof things,it is misleadingand false - only,however,ifit
is believedto be a mimeticrepresentation;
only,thatis, if its natureis
misunderstood.
It is a matterofimmensedifficulty
(and I am thankfulI do notneed
it does seem that words, by
but
to explore it extensively here),
themselves,can't tellus whatand howthingsare; thatonlythethings
in question can do that; it does seem that syntax is surprisingly
indeterminate,thatobjectsand actionssettleon theirown effectsand
relations.Things give rise to thoughts,thoughtsdo not give rise to
things,except secondarily,as plans foraction.
I said our paragraphwas aware of itself.Words must be aware of
one anotherwhentheyare put intoplay,otherwiseeach one would lie
as satisfiedsimplyto be thereas the
down on the page indifferently,
thingsof pure existence are. The word absurdityis coming to life
undermypen, Roquentinwrites,and, indeed, thatis howit happens,
for words have only a second-raterealitywhile the book's covers
remain closed over theirheads. Out therethe word is only ink and
paper or a tremorin the atmosphere,unaware of its existence,
unaware of its freedom,just as the root is, asleep in its being like a
bed. Only in hereis the word alive, in reflection,forlanguage is the
vehicle of the upper self.
Roquentin's journey into the root reveals to him the freedom
conferredon thingsby chance. And it is sickening,in the deepest
sense, to lose theworld,theself,thesoul, thesightand feel of flesh,
one's circumstance.But to remainin therootlike a ghostin thegrave
is to refuse the freedom one has found there. Now we see that
existence is simplyindeterminate,not free; that freedomrequires
consciousness, requires choice, requires (and here the paradox
becomes extreme)just thatlanguage,thatbaggage of bad ideas, that
reallybum beliefthatthe word, woman,say, wrapsher round like a
heated houses
robe, and babies and boudoirsher in the comfortably
of the bourgeoisie;requires,thatis, a returnto a worldwherewords

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are littlemore than social criminalsin the pay of the saludes, the
police of chief.
Sartregrewup amongrationalists(as one in France must) theway
Nietzsche grewup among women, and his dislike of theirdesigns is
deep, as is the strengthof their hold on him. If you believe, as
rationalistsdo, thatthe structureof language reveals the structureof
thought,and that the structureof thoughtis in harmonywith the
structureof theworld(as it must be, iftheworldis to be an objectof
thinking);then, of course, to remove thatlanguage, as Roquentin
does, would uncorseteverything;but itdoes so onlyiftherationalists
is as essentialtothingsas language
are right,and if,in addition,thought
is essentialto thethought
of things.The sort of freedomSartre's hero
findsis terriblyiffy:he may have removedmy belt and leftme still
in handcuffs.Suppose I sweep out language like a dirtyroom (as I
earlier suggested),and all the furnitureof the universe remains in
place?
Furthermore we found (we claimed), that the kind of
whichis discoveredis one onlypossibleto particularize
indeterminacy
in language,in theexistentialproductivity
metaphors,wherewe may
imagine any outrageous image to have a literalreferent.Anything
that can be thought has Being, Parmenides said. Unicorns are
possible, and the left-handedhead.
Thereis onlyone reasonforbelievingin thiskindofunconditioned,
-crossingtychism- since experienceconfounds
universal,category
it everywhere and thatis because languagecan be so arrangedand
manipulated.Watchme liftlatticeout of a sentenceabout flowersand
putitdownso thesun lies like a latticeacrossBarbara'shuskybreasts.
There, the ... But we cannot linger to admire her nipples,justly
famous:how theyseem like the buds of flowers,and so forth.These
gloriesare movingon, anyway,intoa liveliercontext.In short,the
freedomSartrefindsforRoquentin is only made of words, like the
wordsof the rationalistshe despises. But it is truethata writer- an
artist- must be a rationalistwithinthework- just becauseit is not
the world.And Roquentin is allowed to perceive that.The formsof
fictionand the aims of art supportIdealism, whateverthe sentences
of any novel assert.Such worldsare worldsof thought,wherea kind
of Platonismreigns,and the veryfactthatit describes so well what
occursthereis good reason to believe thatfictional,too, is its account
of things. Nausea is a young man's book, even if it seems to be
Sartre's most enduring, purely literary,achievement.It was also

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74

writtenbeforethe war and the fall of France. In it, Sartretakes the
esthete's way out, but he will not do so again.
of thewordare banalities;but behind those,
Behind thephysicality
in the music of theirmotion,thereis somethingwhich escapes the
blunt inertness of existence, and the blaque of the bourgeois.
Althoughthe narratorknows how we deceive ourselves by turning
our futileand foolishlives intostories;how we shape a trivialevent
intoan amusinganecdote,an incidentintoan adventure;howwe hunt
forperfectmoments,like the perfectfuck,whichcan occur only in
daydreams;althoughhe knowshow we trimlifelike an artificialtree
to celebratea merchandiser'sversionof an ancientcanard, and then
dress up and mask our faces for another,and get drunk for yet
another,and fora fourth,and fora fifth... he neverthelessthinks
thatifthe rightwordswere put in the rightorderforonce, he mightbe
permittedto claim forhis workand himselfsome of therealityof the
littlefournote phrase he has heard on the saxophone - as unlikely
an instrumentof spiritualelevation as one mightimagine. Some of
thesedays, the tune is. Do not smile. Such songs sound better in
thissong - a suffering
France and in French.It is a bit of suffering,
rhythm,although it is not yet a signature,like Vinteuil's "little
phrase."
It does notexist. It is even an annoyance;ifI were to get up and
rip this recordfromthe table whichholds it, if I were to break
it in two, I wouldn't reach it. It is beyond - always beyond
something,a voice, a violin note. Throughlayersand layersof
existence, it veils itself,thin and firm,and when you want to
seize it, you find only existants, you butt against existants
devoid of sense. It is behind them:I don't even hear it, I hear
sounds, vibrationsin the air which unveil it. It does not exist
because it has nothingsuperfluous:it is all the rest which in
relationto it is superfluous.It is.n
Not to exist,but tobe; tobe is nowtheaim. So Mallarmémighthave
said. However, Sartrewill emergefromthisdismal Valéry.His later
novels willnotwonderwhethertheirlanguage,theirform,willbetray
him. Still seeking freedom,the imagerywill be of roads. They will
embrace "realism," the estheticof the middle-class,like a mistress
11. Nausea, op. c/7,p. 233.

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one has mistakenlymarried- no longerwithenthusiasticlust, but
out of a guiltysense of duty.The notebook'sexploratory,open form
willbe abandoned,and thelanguagewilltryto be as directand useful
as a roofingnail. There will be suits, coats, ties. Many people.
Importantthemes.There will be a lot of dialogue. Trains. Different
cities. Much dust. And long lengthsof slow discussion. Though the
real rain of the word is still falling - back in that earlier, more
impassionedbook - back in Bouville.

2
MIND From the firstthe novel has been a fact infestedform,
almostas if it had been made fromtheiradhesion - this small bit
clingingto thatlike bees in a swarm- and ifthefactsweren'theaths
and hedges, streetnames and silken gowns, cows in a wet meadow
followinga storm, they were transportsand follies, love affairs
lingeredover morelovinglythantheloversever did theirown ardent
flesh. Unhurried,calm, as if the world would await its rape like a
whore, the novel has looted one Nature to compose another - in
nowas whenit
Richardson,Proust,Gide, Musil, Mann. As faithfully
trivial,
initiallyappeared,thenovel has been dedicatedto thetrifling,
minor,and minute,to the firstand second footstep,the half-smile,
the sneeze, the skin-tighttrouser,powderedbosom, littleoddityof
speech or dress. It has been and remainsa realm wherethe passing
of a thoughtis celebrated like a change of crowns; where a whim
receives the solicitudedue a desperate resolve.
Yet it is notsimplyparticulars- passions,people, daringdeeds whichthenovelseeks so greedily;but all thepropertiesofthese,their
clumsiestqualities - accidentsof everykind like a wet bed - the
blush of an embarrassmentnow growncold; no, it's not merelythe
treeand its scalingbarkwhichwritingwishesto immortalize,but the
clatterofcottonwoodsin a wind,thesilvermaple's glisteningleaflike
a happywhistle.It even wants to render in words the cake's moist
taste, the crazed surface of the serving plate, a look which
candle-lighthas blownacrossthedinnertable: itslongingdividedinto
onset, tyranny,despoilment,overthrow,release, as a doctormight
understandthe course of a disease, or a lease mightbe drawnby a
diligentattorney.
The telescope broughtwondersintotheworldwhichweren'teven
dreams - neitherof India northe dread edge of the ocean - before

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WILLIAM H. GASS

the voyaginglens laid claim to them; and the imaginationof the
microscopedid the same; yetwhatdoes fictiondo forCervantes, in
enlarginglifeand bringingit as close as the nose, thatthese gadgets
didn't do for Galileo and his friends? - in a prison, one way or
another,of matteror mind,each of them.We mustneverforgethow
importantprisonhas been to the art of fiction,forit is always from
withinwalls, literallike Malory's and Dostoevsky's arrest,or, like
Lowry's, dreamed; whetherof cork and self-imposedlike Proust's,
like Lawrence's, of flesh, or because, as in the case of Borges and
Joyce,thewriteris goingblind; whethertheworldoutsideis defined,
like Balzac's, fromthe middle of a shade-drawn,coffee-stimulated
nightas still and solid as a cloud; whetherin sexual retirementor
alcoholichaze, Celine's embitteredhate; itis alwaysfromthepointof
view of theconfined,theshut-in,thattheworkis performed;and the
scenes ofpubliclifewe see whenwe look throughthepen appearonly
at theink end wherethereseems to be a light,because thecell of the
self stares back at us fromthe other.
I introduce these examples and their images (scope, sky, the
rhythmin a barredSpanishwindow); I writeGalileo's weightyname,
because I believe it's in his day (in Descartes', Kepler's, Harvey's
hour) where we must begin our attemptto understand fiction's
special relationto things;a relationwhichSartre'snarratorin Nausea
drew his doubts from,as if the world of objects were a blackboard
which,when wiped, would registeran undifferentiated
darkness,a
like
an
lack
of
distinction
democratic
overly
threatening
club, a
of
both
absence
and
resemblance.
everywhere
uniqueness
dizzying
In England Francis Bacon was collectingfacts like coins - any
kind, fromany place - you never knewwhen an uglypennymight
be foundstampedwitha raremintmarkor distantdate. Meticulous
observation, the natural historyof anything,an open notebook,
carefulrecordswere therule; and itwas expectedthatthen,out ofthe
mass, would emerge a sudden saliency;the sea would proclaimits
contents,as in a noisymob of men it is feltthatthoseof qualitywill
quietly stand out. The scientist, with exactly the impulses of a
novelist,should dissolve disfiguringaccumulations;clear away the
moss, grime,verdigris,and pigeon-shitfromtheshouldersof things;
so that,withall hermasksand make-upremoved,modestNaturecan
disclose her virtuoussecrets. Innocentof bias, preconception,even
hypothesis,a clear eye will perceivean equally honestand undefiled

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reality.The spiritof such an empiricismis a splendidone, itsenergies
naive.
admirable,but it has always been disconcertingly
Not so acrossthechannel,on themind's side. There,Descartes was
deploring the disorders of his favorite subject - mathematics.
Mathematiciansnot only treatedgeometry,arithmetic,and algebra,
as fieldswithoutcommonborders,problemswere dealt withone by
- as if they were stones
one and separately - pragmatically
encounteredin a garden,simplyto be removedeach timeas seemed
best. There was no generalmethod;littleunityor correlationbetween
this "fact" and that; small sense that a solution might exemplify
some broaderprinciple;althoughmatterswere shiftingsignificantly
towardthe betterend: for instance,letterswere now being used to
stand for indeterminatequantities,and mathematicalnotationhad
been importantly
improvedby the introductionof signs like > , < ,
x, and - : : -, forideas like "greater or lesser than," operationslike
times,and forrelationslike proportionality.
Still, while the lines of battlewere being drawnbetweenfactand
form,matterand mind, sense and reason (a war for realitywhich
would be fought in the novel as furiously as anywhere), the
possibilitiesofpeace werebeingsoughtfor,and possiblyfound,in the
workof Descartes and Galileo; althoughin philosophy,perverseas it
is, arbitrationproduces anger, and peace-makingmeans war.
On theone handthereweretheobserver'sfactslikeso manyspilled
masses and an increasingdemocracyof data,
beans, the multiplying
while on the other there was the clearly more rigorous realm of
geometry,withitsrelativelycrispideas, its carefulproofs,its orderly
offigure.The problemwas, in effect,to
procedures- thearistocracy
unite the two: to introduce mathematicsinto the confusions of
observation,and theloud richtumultof theworldintothethoughtful
reticenceof angle, plane, and cube.12Apart,one was blind,the other
remarked.
empty,as Kant later unsymmetrically
If we simplify,fora moment,whatwas, in fact,a rathercomplex
history,partof Galileo's accomplishmentcan be understoodas the
of motionin termsof geometry.13
successfulrepresentation
First,the
timeduringwhichany movementtookplace was seen as a horizontal
12. I have discussed this problem before, in "Groping for Trouts," op. cit., pp.
262-279.
13. Strictlyspeaking, this is kinematics.Mechanics would include a studyof forces
and causes, or whatis called dynamics,as well. Nor should we reallyimaginethat
Galileo managed all this by himself.It may have culminatedin Galileo, but it
did not begin or end in him. With Newton, mathematicaldescriptionbecame
explanation.

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WILLIAM H. GASS

line. This line was divided into equal units in such a way that the
lengthof the line was like a runningsum of ones. Then velocitywas
conceived as another,vertical,coordinate.The formulaforthe area
of a rectangle,and the formulaby which we compute the distance
traveledalong a line bysomethingmovingat a uniformspeed are, of
course,thankstothesedesigns,seen tobe thesame. Ofcourse.We are
so accustomedto thismiracleit seems, now, neverto have been one.
It is necessaryto notice,at thispoint,a numberof things:first,that
our problemwas simplifiedbyconsideringonlyuniform,straight-line
change, already an abstraction;second, thatwe made a number of
forinstance,thattimeand velocitywere lines
rules of representation,
seen as sums themovingobjectwas a point,and its patha straight
line[
•■*]; thatnot only were our observationsstrippedof local
interestand excitement(the body in question is actuallya carriage
containingthe PrincessCassamassima en route to a rendevouswith
herSicilianlover,thedespicableCount Luciano) , so theobjectand its
motionbecamejust and onlythat;but theprocessof additionalso had
to leave its abstractcenterforthe suburbs, to become concreteand
containitselfin the line's littlevisualization [ ^^'
]. Galileo, in
short, had gone a long way toward establishingmechanics as the
geometryof matterin motion.
Continuing to foreshorten,we can next consider Descartes'
whichwas to elevate geometryintoalgebrabyfindinga
contribution,
to
way representany pointupon a line as a pair of numbers [as a, b
or x, y], a procedure already implicit in our earlier schema.14
Mathematics,havingdescended fora time like Hermes into Hades,
has now returnedto itsproperplace in theLight,draggingthescience
of mechanics with it by the so-called scruff.One abstract system
(algebra) has enveloped another (geometry), to findwith a certain
surprise,as perhapsthe whale did when it swallowedJonah,another
science in its stomach.The day of Descartes' discovery[November
10, 1619] may have been the day on which we determined,
fundamentally,one way in which science worked: by a series of
correlationsin which the particular,changing,concrete world of
clarified,complicated,
thingsis advanced intoa realm of increasingly
and independentlyproductivecalculations.In thisrarifiedarena (the
14. TanneryconsideredDescartes to have geometrizedalgebra,ratherthanthe other
way round, but in factit is the "higher" systemwhichalwaysworksits will upon
the "lower" one. Nevertheless,to mark the mutualityof the movementbetween
them is important,as my later suggestionsabout metaphorwill, I hope, show.
See S.V. Keeling, Descartes,2nd ed. (Oxford, London, 1968), p. 11 ff.

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worldas well as it can be figuredout), the externaland accidental
relationsbetweenthings,if thatis whattheyare, are systematically
replaced by internal,analytic,necessary,and universal ones (or by
statisticalconnections - whateverthe scheme requires); and all
actionsof organizationand unification,whichKant attributedto the
Categories of the Understanding,take place, at it were, outsidethe
thinking
self,in the explicitconstructionof the scientificmodel. We
mustremember,too,thatsimilarcorrelationswere beingmade in the
arts,and thatgeometryhad been introducedintopainting(again in
termsof our organizationof thingsin space) withwhat were to be
results.
revolutionary
The objectswhichthe new science requiresare onlysurrogatesfor
things:theyare dots, points, lines, extensions, coupled numbers,
algebraic equations; theyare "things" as a systemof thoughtwill
reviseand devise them,and, in thatsense, theyare idealized poles of
our scientificintentions.16Any satisfactorytheory has its own
momentum,and will carryits objects on as it must, transforming
them,conferringupon them a realitywithintheirown realm which
firstrivals,thenreplaces,theoriginal- nowa paltryobjectof merely
ordinaryperception- by a kind of coup de vrai.Thoughtgoes best
when its object is also a thought.Equal in thewillpowerof its wishes
to any of our most urgentdesires, thoughtthinksbeings intobeing.
Of the scientist,Bachelardshrewdlywrote:He must forcenatureto
go as faras the mind goes.16
The firstsort of mistakewe mightmake would be to attributeto
nature propertieswhich properlybelong only to the medium of its
description;hence the error of imputingnecessary connection to
causality on the grounds that the hypotheticalsyllogismseems a
theantecedentis like producing
perfectmodelforit,so thataffirming
a cause; or the erroneousnotion,Descartes himselfwas led to, that
thereis a place of pure extension somewhere- a kind of machine
without ordinary gross materiality:perfect, ineluctible, precise,
silent,a mechanicalimage of the mathematicalmind. Nor should we
confusea rule of representationwitha law of nature,as we would if
we thoughtlight traveled in straightlines simplybecause we had
15. For an interestingapplicationof the notionof ideal objects, wherea constructed
thingmightbe the concreteand intermediateexpression of a strugglebetween
several intentionalpoles (the practical,the structural,the generic, the formal,
MIT Press,
etc.), see Christian Norberg-Schultz, Intentionsin Architecture,
Cambridge, Mass., 1965.
16. Gaston Bachelard, The Philosophyof No (Orion Press, New York, 1968), p. 30.

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WILLIAM H. GASS

decided to draw it thatway in our newlylit up Euclid, since such a
resolutionallowsus tocalculatesuccessfullytheheightof towersfrom
theirshadows,to predictpathsof reflectionand recreateobjectsfrom
theirimages,to make thehead of a horseout of darkair or a swan sail
slowlyacross a wall like a whitelake.17
We need to notice,too, thatsome of our conceptualapparatusfalls
away out of sight,like the middle term in an argument,never to
appear in the conclusionof the proof,althoughfacilitating
it,just as
the x- and >>-axesdo, as we pass fromthe planetwe have made into
a point,and thenmove throughthe plain geometryof its path to the
complex algebra of its orbit.18
If thingshave no significanceexcept as thoughts,how is it thatour
thoughtshave significance?Our thoughtsare often thoughtsof
things,of course, but when we thinkabout a thing,we do so by
thinkingabout our thoughts.I may dream of Jeanie,but it is always
theJeanieof mydream I dream of, and so it is withthinking,which
can onlyhave anotherthoughtas itscentralconcern.One mightobject
thatI can perfectly
well thinkabout mytoothache,or mydate, or the
road ahead, since these can be immediateperceptions,not merely
memoriesor expectations;but I would like, verygingerly,to suggest
thatwhatI thinkabout are my implicitdescriptions,whichis another
way of sayingthatour knowledgeis only of universais.In any case,
these considerationsreturnus to philosophy,whose medium has
alwaysbeen logic,notcalculationalequivalence, and whose products
have been conceptualfictions,forthe most part,not elegant nets of
number; theyhave been thoughts,thatis, withmuch meaning,but
only to the mind.
Most of the characterscreated by philosophersduringtheirlong
novelizinghistoryhave come fromtheirmeditationson thenatureof
words: the Forms, forone, and the One, foranother- Universais
and Particulars,of course - all Essence; or fromtheirmeddlingwith
the structureof the sentence, which has yielded Substance and
Accident,the Mutt and Jeffof our paper cosmos; or fromtheirlove
affairwith logic, which has illegitimatelyengendered Necessary
17. Stephen Toulmin, The Philosophyof Science (Hutchinson's UniversityLibrary,
London, 1953).
18. There is a possibilitythatentiretheoriesmay be lost in thisway,foronce a theory
has establisheda firmcorrelationbetweentwophenomena,a direct"cause-like"
connection can replace it. The problem is formulated nicely as "The
Theoretician'sDilemma" by Carl Hempel, MinnesotaStudiesin thePhilosophyof
Science, Vol. II, edited by Feigl, Scriven, and Maxwell, Minnesota U. Press,
Minneapolis, 1958, p. 37 ff.

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Existence,Cause, God, Certainty,and theubiquitousA Priori.They
have derived ratherless frommathematics.Althoughphilosophers
have frequentlyand piously invoked it, rarelyhas geometrybeen
gainfully employed. Still, we can trace the monads to their
like a hobo at
mathematicalorigins,and we can tryto shoo infinity,
our picnic,back to the doubtfulclass it came from.Nor is it hard to
see how the distinctionbetween Primaryand Secondary Qualities
helped to free physics from the common sense of Aristotle.
Determinism,withits villainousarch-enemy,Free Will (or is it the
other way round?) sprang like Cain and Abel from the union of
premises in the syllogism,that is, via the idea of necessityand its
collusion with cause; just as part of the notion of Perfection(for
instance,in "The cause must be as perfector more perfectthan its
effect") was derived from the concept of logical extension or the
denotativerangeof terms("You cannotsay morein yourconclusion
thanyou have said in your premises").
We have been allowed to look on with considerable esthetic
pleasure while Socrates conceived the soul, so that his favorite
subject,ethics,would have a self to concernitselfwith;and is it not
a movingstoryofhowtheseeded soul makes itsperilouswaythrough
many bodies, and the vulgar marriedlives theylead together,to a
finalvisionof theForms and a reunionwithitsstar?Indeed, we need
thatsoul, forotherwisetherewould be nothingto soil or save. Think,
then,of the creaturesof conveniencetheologyhas called intobeing,
and the tales it has toldof them,as it has explainedto us in dazzling
sky-borneallegorythe vast tragedyof all existence. Yet for sheer
drama, what can rival the ravenous Will which Schopenhauer has
invented like a Golem for the globe? Or what could exceed, for
intrigueand excitement,the paradoxes of Zeno - the resultof just
the kind of confusionI've been discussing (in Zeno's case, thatof
mathematicswithmotion) - argumentswhichdenythe evidence of
our senses, and freeze us in the middle of our most nervous leap,
even if we're frogs.And surelyno one now seriouslyconsidersthe
élan vitalapartfromBergson's novels about it.
There are all kinds of charactersand charactersof all kinds.
Madame Bovaryis a memberof the pettyBourgeois,and the actions
of theBourgeoisexemplifyexactlythemood of theZeitgeist,whichis
an episode in that stirringstory:the Search for the Absolute. One
differencebetween the fictionsof the novelist and those of the
philosopheris that it is not only perfectlypermissible, but it is

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expected - it is hoped - that others will take up these patterns,
plots,and characters,and continuetheiradventures,enlargeon their
bafflingelucidations.It is not entirelya wholesome game. Sartre's
novel, Nausea, has taughtus thatyou cannotescape or deny Essence
in orderto affirmthe brutalbaby-like 'Va'* of particularexistence,
withoutplayingpattycakewiththeconceptsof yourcaptors. Now it
is perhaps time to say straightout what I've been intimating:that
thereare twofundamentalmethodsfordescribingthe world.These,
with no originalitywhatever,may be called the Abstract and the
Concrete,or, as I prefer,theThick and theThin (therewill be other
names); and foreach of these, again, thereare two basic strategies.
If we divide theThin like a hairto reach the thinnestThin of all, we
obtain the scientific(such is its reputation),whichwritesthe world
down in number like a dry-goodsclerk; which picturesmotion in
terms of stationaryfigures:the triangleof acceleration,the steady
area of a square; which must manage to representthingsas if they
were integralsor sums, forces pacing in theirparallelograms,light
like a line from which one hangs wash; and then there is the
philosophical,also all bones (such is its reputation),which employs
the language of logic, and through definitions,distinctions,and
deductions,endeavors to thinkitswaythroughtheworldlike a small
mole aftergrubs. Both may be called abstractbecause the systems
they use in constructingtheir models are perfectlypure and
unempirical,or so we imagine them. Each leaves thingsout of its
theoryof things.And even ifits own conclusionis, as Hegel reached
it, thatnothingis trivial,accidental,or of littleworth,thateverything
counts, the account itself is at an elevation and a distance our
astronautsmightcry"Wow!" from,when theylook upon a wholeso
faraway it has forbiddenitselfparts.
The pair whichoccupy the Concretelike dead feet in such shoes,
are, naturallyenough, more like arts thansciences, more concerned
withthe skillsof writingthancalculating,withamassing factsrather
than discoveringlaws, preoccupiedwithtime more essentiallythan
space, satisfiedwithpatterninstead of principle.The firstis history,
astridechronologylike a huntsman,but interestedmorein theterrain
it rides over thanthe quarryitself,if thereis one. And finally,there
is fiction,of all unlikelythings: the large, lazy, slop-about novel,
whose representationsof the world no more resembleit than the
models of science and philosophydo, and whose weapons are the
cast-offequipment of the sophist - the estheticgrammarof the

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language,of course, and thenthe schemes,tropes,figuresand fancy
forms,of rhetoricand oratory,table talk and gossip.
If thechiefaims ofscienceappearto be description,prediction,and
control; then the principlegoals of philosophyare understanding,
explanation,and moral direction;while historyis afteran adequate
description,too, but alwaysat the level of immediatehuman life,of
whose sorrowfulvicissitudesand gloriousachievementsit hopes to
retaina record,and whereitspredictionsalso live, ifitis able to make
any; on theotherhand,theobjectoftheartoffictionis estheticorder,
reconciliation,celebration,pleasure, forfictioncreatesworldsforus
to live in thatare designed to satisfyour deepest feelings,not our
intelligence.O, not thatintelligenceshould be insulted;reason must
be reckonedwithas well, but onlyas it gives a sense of structureand
stabilityand completenessto the huge moods, like clouds of stellar
dust, the novelistis coalescing in the greatspace of the page.
Aristotlesaw the relationbetween genus and species in typically
Thin terms.Concepts were arenas: the pin went in its cushion, the
cushion in its box, the box in a bag, the bag in a closet, the closet in
the house, the house on its street,its block, neighborhood,section,
city,and so on, in the customaryway the Thins thinkof thinkingin spacial metaphors,mainlyof occupancyand containment.Thus
Being, the most general class, surrounding everythinglike the
horizon,is itselfalmost withoutmeaning,since it has had to share
itselfequally with everything.Plato's Forms were supposed to be
thick.The Form of theGood containedall theForms,but notas a pen
containssheep, but as a soup circulatesitsflavors,or stage lightsmix
theirhues. Every Form is a compactionof terms.AlthoughForms,
theyare like thingsfilledwiththings.It is thisthicknessthehistorian
and novelistseek: redolence,richness,intensity,focus.The essences
theyare afterare cores of concentration.
We knowthatthereare people who preferProustto Peano, Gibbon
toGodei; thereare JackSpratswhowilleat no fat,and despise history
as a waste of alreadywasted time.But the war forrealityis not to be
won or lost in the quarrels between historiansand scientists or
and philosophers,because each disciplinehas its thickand
fictionists
its thinside, its solid terms,and theirinvisiblerelations.There must
be data; theremust be observations;theremust be facts,incidents,
events,theThick side says, whiletheThin remindsus thattherealso
must be order,structure,form;otherwise,and withoutmath, there
is no science; withoutlogical analysisand argument,no philosophy;

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without arrangementand connection, no history; and without
rhetoric,without pattern, without coherence, there is only the
ordinarynovel.
The war forrealityis thereforea strugglebetweendata and design,
and ifthedata win thereis a tendencyto see nothingin theworldbut
brute dumb fact and indifferent
chance; and then, ironically,there
to
introduce
thelaws of probabilityinto
thinnish
the
appears
impulse
thisrubbishheap, and to publish,shortly,a carefulcatalogueof trash.
If design wins the data are deformed,the systemruns ahead of the
load it was carrying,and thereis a multiplicationof artificialentities
and metaphysicalmyths.Thins reallywonder whetherfacts aren't
entirelythecreationsofabstractschemes,like thegolfcourses,lakes,
and tree-linedstreetsof desertdevelopers;and Thicks tend to think
thatconceptscarve continuitiesintodiscretechunks,thatlaws are lies
of some systemof society,some secretlegislatureillegallyelected.
But whatmeetswhatin thethickworldofthenovelist?Whereis the
war,whenwe perceiveno systemof design to beginwith- no logic,
no method,no geometry?In fiction,thewarofwhichI speak is fought
withintheword,and is foughtwithinthewordwhereverthewordis.
Faust, who is in one sense the Word at its most temptedand beset,
admitsto Wagnerthat
Two souls, like hearts,beat in my breast
each strugglingto outbeat its brother.
The one is fleshembracingflesh,
feeding,copulatingwithoutrest,
while the forcefulyearningof the other,
is to replace thisdust withthe breathof ancientstars.19
A wordbeginsas a small sound fastenedto a thing- a thoughtlikea balloon tiedto theworriedfingerofa child;itis a nearlynothing
noise,almostimmediatelygone; and thenitis utteredin thecompany
of others,among maturitiesof meaning,in a crowdof uniformsand
gowns,possiblyit appears firstof all betweena pairof beauties, both
of whom have lovelyhillious chestsand lissome limbs, whereasour
fledglingterm has only two thin veins to bleed from,two dark flat
eyes and half a boneless shoulder: alas! what can this wretched
Cinderella do to modify such miracles of completeness and
complexityas chestand lovelyare? I set down several othersearlier:
lattice,clothesline,
dashboard,bloodstain,twitch.It perhaps survives
19. Goethe'sFaust,Pt. One, Sec. Two. My translation.

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unnoticedlike the playerof the trianglein the symphony.But words
are formedas oftenand as ceaselesslyas sunshine- evolve through
millions of expressions - so as time passes, hillious,for instance,
takes on the characterof its contexts; its station is defined; its
substitutesand similarsare recognized (it is similarto biliousin one
sense, like and unlike hilly,while lumpyis way offthe mark); in any
case, its contributionis anticipated (it is a bit clownish, perhaps,
eternallynouveau)',eventuallythe additionsto the sum of meanings
ithas become are no longerlargeand crudeas greatstrawbales forked
froma loft,but lightand slim and subtle as thesinglestraw.Yet this
being whichbegan witha frailumbilicalto its referent- a mother
who willnotremainto sustainit but comes intoview on occasion the
waya busy parentsees its children- thisbeing thatbegan so slimly
soon has growna core, a center,and althoughit is onlya crossingof
contexts,a corner,a relationbetweenrelations,it is a cityof sorts,
and has its own life in it, its own character,it has a nature - a
hilliousnesslike San Francisco's; so that now our word, a vacant
universalwhenits meaningswere notyetits own, but assigneditlike
busyworkfortheotherwiseunemployed,is a complete,complex,and
quite singular creature, conscious of its rights,its past, its rich
roundaboutsof referenceand suggestion,definition,its varietyand
ambiguityof use, its layered ironies and opposing inclinations,its
elegance, status, social tone, its fullyformedthough frazzled and
untidyself; and it is in thisrefulgentconditionthatthewordpresents
itselfto the artist:as a silted-upsymbolfor his ardent declaiming,
signs inside the sign of itselfthe way feelings mingle with other
feelingswhen lips meet - when the historyof earlier encounters,
kisses, eye-closing contacts, modify one another amid all that
moisturewhichhas notyetturnedintospit- and consequentlyis now
a signwhichis preparedto establishthemostprofoundrelationswith
othersof its sortto shape - what? - a simple sentencelike a single
berryplucked from its bush to melt into a cautious music in the
mouth.
Nominalistsendeavor to reduce everyclass to its referents;they
would ratherall groupswere like audiences at concerts,broughtthere
by common interests,instead of constitutingsome transcendent
entity:the Audience whichhas no ears; while Realists not onlywant
to stressSense ratherthanReference,the referencestheypreferare
to classes, not to things;and to classes - betteryet - thatcontain
names, as myown name mightbe includedin theclass, Teacher; but

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WILLIAM H. GASS

- betteryet - onlyto thattitleI possess as a Professor,and not to
the Billy of my boyhood, or the Willi who has sloppilysigned my
checks,or the Gassy who demonstratesthe accuracyof his name on
occasion afteroccasion. Howeverwe choose to thinkabout it,thefact
remainsthata wordis closer to its sense thanto itsreference,even if
we can writeor say thewordwithoutknowingwhatit means, as ifits
meaning were as absent as its object usually is, and therefore
producingit withoutthinkinganything,the way I mightpick a word
at randomfromthedictionary- phot,forinstance- and simplysay
it:phot. . . phot,phot,phot. . . beforeI learnitis a unitof illumination.
Furthermore,the richestwords are rarelythose that signifythe
thingswe encounterevery day: dog, car, dollar,dinner,teeth,but
ratherthose whose referentsaren't perhaps real at all: god, soul,
goodness,nature,love; which suggests that words get theirpowers
fromotherwords - somethingmostThins have knownrightalong.
Certainlyit's not simplyour devoted cultivationof roses whichhas
made the word so redolent.A wealthyword like reddid not inherit
fromthecolor.Onlywhen thecolorleftthestreetand moved intothe
mind did it begin to make a call-girl'sprofit.Words may issue from
things,and ultimatelyland again on things,but thearc of theirflight
is neitherhere northere,noris it the same birdwhichleftthe branch
when it returns.
What collectsall these meaningslike a dustycloud of lintbut the
actual word-noiseitself,ITS LIFE IN LARGE TYPE, itspresencein
thehand?,whatacquiresthishistoryofuse? whatappearswhenhillious
is spoken, printed,or writtendown, if not our friendlyand helpful
notation,a kind of Fifth Column in the war for reality?Caught
betweenThicks and Thins, each of whomdemand thatany systemof
notationserve theirinterestsfirst,it countersbybetrayingboth,and
finding,in theartist,a championso note-drunkand loyalto loops and
labials, he may be knocked out by one of his own gloves. Notation
includes, not only the requirementsfor formingletters,or for the
spelling and sounding of words, but the ways we express our
grammaticalrules. These prescriptionsdirect our reading-andour
fromleftto rightalong the line, and fromtop to bottom
writing-eye
withinthe page (although,like the Japanese,otherssometimesissue
differentorders).
When we speak of things and their qualities, we are speaking
presumablyabout our data, thedensitiesof theword;whenwe speak
of substances and their accidents, we are inside a philosophical

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thatmaterial;and whenwe talkof
systemwhichis busy interpreting
we
are
and
predicates,
dealingwitha syntaxwhichmayeven
subjects
have points of identitywith logical form; but when we place our
adjectivesin frontof our nouns to indicatesome sortof modification,
or when we inserta verb between two of themto signifyan agent's
action on an object, we are followingthe directionsof our notational
system.
We cannot be confidentthat our schemes of inscriptionwon't
deceive us, and replace the realitywe were after with their own.
Though it may seem silly indeed to wonder how longcame to be a
shortword when, already,shortis, or whyMississippiisn't the name
of a snake, as ifthisA were a triangle,and an * a star; thefactis that
fora long time - and still,in the popularmind - that A reallywas
one, and not its visualization.For most people, the true triangleis
neitherthe park between three intersectingroads, nor a series of
equations, but the Euclidean drawing.We also ought to recall the
mischiefmade bythesubtractionsign,whichso absolutelyresembled
thesymbolfornegativenumberthata numberand an operationwere
confused; or the case of the law of commutationin which (a b) was
said to equal (b a), a notunreasonableclaim, and one whichcertainly
seemed to be true of multiplication until Hamilton created
quaternions( or did he discoverthem?).20Now one may suspectthat
commutationis an inscriptionalrule of ratherwide but notuniversal
application.
Sometimesour notationis inadequate in otherways. If it does not
unambiguouslyreporton everyelementof structure,we may begin
to believe thatthereare hidden grammars,like bones buried in the
basementof the language,whichwe knoware therefromthe way in
which we speak and write,but which we will not acknowledgeor
directlyrecognize.In short,notationmayfailto pointout elementsin
the data, or obscure partsof its organizingstructure;it may be itself
too flamboyantand distracting;it may contributeto the confusionof
one thingwithanother;it may sneak its own elves intoEuclid or into
the external composition of things. Although, without rules of
therecan be no correlationbetweenmatterand mind,
representation,
systemof data; nevertheless,withoutnotation,these two can not be
20. A quaternionis a fourcomponentnumberof the forma + bi + cj + dk in which
i, j, & k possess the same propertyas v^l- For an account of the significanceof
these numbers,as well as the confusionssurroundingthe minus sign, see Morris
Kline's Mathematics:theLoss of Certainty,
Oxford, New York, 1980, p. 90 ff.

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broughttogetherin the same place. It, not the pineal, is the true
Cartesiangland.A pointmustbecome a dotbeforea bodycan be said
to be at one. Musical marks (notes, clefs, and staff)revolutionized
music, just as those new squiggles did logic. They aid the memory;
they facilitatecommunication; they let us think,they also lend
conviction.Afterall, who would believe in zero untilit was formed
as an 0, and infinity'sfallen °° suggests the endless curvilinear
entrapmentit representsin some theories.
"
"La théoriec'est bon, mais ca n'empêchepas d'exister, Charcot is
supposed to have said, but what do thingswithouttheorybecome?
Nausea containssome suggestions;stillit is difficultto knowhow to
assess these mystical"states of nature." The mind makes mistakes
with such joy. Its errorscannot be erased withoutrubbinga hole
throughthe paper.When Hume removednecessaryconnectionfrom
causality merely by observing its rather absolute absence, he
neverthelesspresumedthatwiththatglue gone,all would fallapartin
pieces of pure sensation,simplybecause therewere no otherkindsof
ties, and he was leftwithmeaninglessjuxtapositionlike the postage
stamps in those Mission Mixtures. He was still so much under the
spell of the spell he had dispelled,it neveroccurredto him thatthere
mightbe physicalembraces weaker than logical ones, yet stronger
thanthose betweendistantstrangers,the way thosejumbled stamps
remainstuckto theirpaper. He was in theconditionof the man who,
living in a haunted house, feels he has driven his ghosts away by
oftheirexistence.In anycase, Hume leftthe
provingtheimpossibility
continuities of experience in ruins, replacing the stream of
consciousnesswitha steadyspillof discretesensationslikejellybeans
pouringfrom a jar, and these fell straightinto the mouths of the
mathematicians,the only people prepared to believe him, his
impressionswere so suitablycolorful,fragrant,and ideal.
The novel, whichI earliersaid was a factinfestedform,was able,
also fromthe first,to forecastthe futureof those facts,because so
many novels were epistolarythen, which meant we were already
one-mind-removedfrom events when we read them; it meant we
were clearlyconscious of reading words,ratherthan seeing directly
throughthosewordstotheirreferents,as ifwe wereeyeingthatguilty
group of shoes in the hotel hallwaywhich Max Beerbohmdrew for
HenryJamesto peer at, his huge head at the heightof the keyhole.
Later on, mostnovels would pretendnot to have been writtenat all,
but to be lifeitself,thereas soon as you faced the text,ifyou could

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summon the spunk for it; but in the pages of Pamela, Richardson
and howthose
allows us to recognizehowwhollyitswordsare written,
wordsreveal theirwriteras well as the world; even, forinstance,in
thatmoistmomentwhenPamela, deceived, permitsthelustfulMr. B
intoher bed, believinghim a maid-servantbecause of his disguise.
Whatwordsshall I find,my dear mother(formyfathershould
not see this shocking part), to describe the rest, and my
confusion,whenthe guiltywretchtookmyleftarm, and laid it
under his neck,and the vile procuressheld myright;and then
he clasped me round the waist!21
Whatwordsshall I find,Pamela wonders,but she does notsay her
fathershould not read them,ratherthathe should not see them; and
thiswas the transitionthatshortlytookplace in much of fiction,just
as I am sure itdid forRichardson'sreadersas well: to read was to see,
and tosee was towatchMr. B puthis handin Pamela's bosom. Dream
to thattune, ladies! Who wants to read words when one can watch
such hillious hanky-panky?However, as the novelist's art became
artful,the novel's previous attentionto detail, its love of ethical,
and sociologicalanalysis,itssimperingsentimentalities
psychological,
and lubriciousteasing,itsdrearydaring-doand wild-eyedrunningup
and down on roads, was replaced,withoutalteringanythingbut the
aim of our attention,by words- neverbymerewords,forwordsare
never mere - in the same radical yet simple way in which Pierre
Menard rewritesQuixote,so thatthis brilliantpassage
A woman reachedherbare arm out of thewindowto theparrot
and gave him a rotten-ripebanana. The parrot,with a little
croak of thanks, took it in one claw and ate, fixinga hard
dangerous eye on the monkey,who chatteredwithgreed and
fear. The cat, who despised them both and feared neither
because he was free to fightor run as he chose, was roused by
thesmellof theraw,taintedmeathangingin chunksin thesmall
butcher'sstand below him. Presentlyhe slid over the sill and
droppedin silenceupon theoffalat thebutcher'sfeet.A mangy
dog leaped snarlingat the cat, and there was a fine, yelping,
hissing race between them to the nearest tree in the square,
21. Pamela, or VirtueRewarded,Vol. 1. Tuesday night during the fortiethday of
Pamela's imprisonmentin the house of Mr. B.

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wherethe cat clawed his way out of dangerand the dog, in his
blindnessof fury,stumbledacross theabused feetof theIndian
on the bench. The Indian seemed hardlyto move, yet with
perfectswiftnessand economyswunghis leg fromtheknee and
planteda kickwiththe hardedge of his sandal in thedog's lean
ribs.The dog, howlingall the way,rushedback to thebutcher's
stand.22
can be seen as cinema, withits vivid portrayalof animals in action;
or as sensualityand decay, not simplybecause of the characterof its
objects,but throughitsregulatedpace and heavymusic; or as system,
withits referenceto the stick/stick-beat-dog
nurseryrhymesof our
its
order
and
its
childhood, pecking
allegory,
foreshadowingof the
structureof Ship of Fools itself;or finally,as I should hope, as the
tense and totalinterplay,in any fictionalmodel,of all theelementsof
ontologicalconstruction:things,meanings,feelings.Such a turnof
attentionrequires that we focus on the functionalcomponentsof
wordsand whatis done withthemwhen words,themselves,are the
very medium of our imagination:when we exploit every aspect of
inscription,enlist every scrap of significance,enroll each object or
event or property,always in theircompetitiveunity,locked in their
relationshiplike felons, the way members of a familywere before
divorce was legal, and consequentlyconcernedonly with survival,
domination,and theirsuccess in supplantingall rival realitieswith
theirown.

3
It is Act IV, Scene XII of Antonyand Cleopatra.
METAPHOR
Enobarbus is dead. The fleetsof Caesar and of Antonyare engaged,
but Antony's Egyptianallies have again turnedtail, as theydid at
Actium. Antonyhas gone where a pine tree tops a hill to watch his
galleyscome torestlike logs in thewater,and his warwithCaesar sink
out of sightlike one of his ships. His men deserthis cause. Enemies
a momentbefore,the sailors now cast theircaps up and carouse like
friendslong lost. Alone, Antony's embitteredsoul is speaking to
itself:
22. KatherineAnne Porter,Ship ofFools (Atlantic,Little-Brown,Boston, 1962), pp.
5-6.

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O sun, thyuprise shall I see no more:
Fortuneand Antonyparthere, even here
Do we shake hands. All comes to this? The hearts
That spaniePd me at heels, to whom I gave
Their wishes,do discandy,melt theirsweets
On blossomingCaesar; and this pine is bark'd
That overtopp'dthemall.
A gloss on thisgloriousoutburstis easy enough,althoughwe leave
the poetrybehind like a departingplane. The sycophantswho once
fawnedon Antonyhave takentheirflattery
to Caesar now,and yap at
Antonyinstead- a treethat'sbeen blazed forcuttingdown.A vulgar
joke, a double pun, combinewitha neologismin a complexintermesh
of images to conveyAntony'sangerand contempt.The action of the
languageis feltimmediately,thoughmiraculously,thewaytheflavor
of a complex sauce can be complete in a single taste. However, the
construction,the operationof the imagery- thatis anothermatter.
The firstthingto observe is thatwe encounterthesemetaphorsone
at a time,althoughtheycome at us quickly,like poles we pass on a
speeding train; but there is that momentwhen we are alone with
hearts,our overtsubject. The heartsthat.. . Individualslike Cleopatra
and those who comprise her court, as well as Antony's allies in
general,are the objects of the image. The heartthroughwhich they
are examined, and which serves, then,as a thicksystemof related
richtheworditselfcan be said todesignate
meanings,is so historically
a symbol. Certainly,it is not the actual muscle which is being so
honored. It could hardlyserve as the seat of feeling. It is not red,
heart-shaped,and velvety as any valentine. It hasn't a history
reachingto the ancientGreeks in whichit is the pot where passions
boil.The verynatureofthisinitialnoun has been changed;ithas been
redefined;itis no longerthesame worditwas outsidethepassage, for
ithas lost its essentialmeaning;peripheralideas nowoccupyitscenter.
When Rilke remarkedthat:
No word in the poem (I mean here every "and" or "the") is
identical with the same-soundingword in common use and
conversation; the purer conformitywith the law, the great
relationship,the constellationit occupies in verse or artistic
prose, changes it to the core of its nature, rendersit useless,
unserviceable for mere everyday use, untouchable and

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WILLIAM H. GASS

permanent: a transformationas it takes place, incredibly,
splendidly,sometimesin Goethe . . . oftenin George.23
to this phenomenon.An ontologicaltransformation
he was referring
has occurred,one whichis fundamentalto thenatureof everyart,not
literaturealone, and one whichhas many importantramifications.24
Following a principleof synecdoche,the rule of representation
let theorganstandfor
whichis in forcehere is arrivedat transitively:
the entirebody; and let the body,in turn,representthe innerlifeor
soul; then the heartcan be the soul of the body - specifically,the
passionate part. From the very opening of the play, the characters
have been seen as emotional centers - that is, as hearts - for
instance,in this firstspeech, by Philo, about Antony:
... his captain's heart,
hath
burst
Which in the scufflesof greatfights
The buckles on his breast,renegesall temper,
And is become the bellows and the fan
To cool a gypsy'slust.
All the actions of these creaturesof feeling- to whichtheyhave
been explosivelyreduced - are perceivedas acts of spaniels - in
particular,theacts of followingand obeying.In an instant,thatwhole
deep range of meanings representedby heartsis reinterpretedby
spaniel*d' it is transformedand reordered,especially in terms of
value. The acts of the courtiersare immediatelyunderstoodto be
unworthyof honestmen and women.
There are no doubtgood thingsto be said about spaniels, but they
won't be relevantin thiscontext,whichchooses fromwhatweknow,
what it wants. Our experiences of such dogs, includingour visual
memoriesof them - the way, precisely,theybound afterone, their
wet affectionand overeagernessto bestowlove - play an important
partin our appreciationof theimage; but whatis happeningwhenthe
spaniel serves as our Euclid forthese movementsis a whollyverbal
process; one which is unlike ordinarymodificationor extensional
selection, where, among dogs, an adjective picks out the largest
23. Rainer Maria Rilke in a letterto Countess MargotSizzo-Noris-Crouy,March 17,
1922.
in an essay, "Carrots,
24. I have discussed the idea of ontologicaltransformation
Noses, Snow, Rose, Roses," The WorldWithinthe Word,op. cit., pp. 280-307.

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long-haired one, or when a verb like bites establishes a
correspondinglypainful relation between a dog and its victim;
because one entireset of actions (bowing,scraping,protestingone's
love) is interpenetrated
by anotherset (jumping, panting,wagging,
It
that
one
set simplyreplacesanother,because we don't
isn't
licking).
like
our
courtiers
yesterday'snews, and thinkexclusivelyof
forget
a
number of internal,implicitlyrealized
considerable
rather
dogs;
are
as
the
metaphors produced,
spaniel's sortof fawningis broughtto
bear, act afteract, detail against detail, upon the behavior of some
Unlike mathematicalor philosophicalmodels,
kowtowinglickspittles.
which cause theirobjects to divest themselvesof all theirordinary
propertiesin orderto become purepointsor transcendentalpurposes,
"hearts" become "spaniels" here, withoutdiminishment.
Although
it is importantwhichtermis
these intricatemeaningsinterpenetrate,
the active one, because, on anotheroccasion, I mightwantto say: O
those spaniels I raisedfrompups, and who played courtto me with
fluttering
cuffs. . .
We also understandjust how Antonythrewhis benisons to his
followers,like bones beneath the table, and how he called them to
him,scratchedtheirears and held theirpaws.The candyimagebegins
as a separate,thoughsubordinate,one; thatis, it never formsitself
outsideofthedominantspanielmetaphoras theheartsynecdochedid.
The complimentsof the courtiersare regardedas Indian-givengifts
whose dubious sweetnessis beingofferednowto Caesar; but Caesar,
himself, has meantime become a tree, like Antony, whom the
spanielscome tolifta leg for;so thatthedis-in discandyfunctionsboth
withtheconsequence
like the dis-in disappearand the dis-in disgorge,
thattwo processes are distinguished,and then united again, as the
appearance of flatteryon the one hand, and its realityon the other.
The wishes which Antonygranted(his sweets) reappearas piss and
and theservilitiesof thecourtiers(their
vomit [therealityofflattery],
sweets) are pouredupon Caesar nowin theformofmeltingwordsand
syrupaciousdeeds [the appearance of flattery).Then the dazzling
double pun on barkedallows Shakespeare to tie the almost flapping
edges of his image down.
f
Onlybymakingthemindblinkrapidlyfromheartsto spanield and
back again, could one sustain the notionthata realm of factwhere
dog-behavingorgans were a rule, and the lungs brayedand bowels
baa'd as a matterofcourse,was beingrepresentedin thispassage. We
are in anotherworldhere,all right,one in whichheartsand spaniels,

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trees and men, are fused - fused the only way they can be conceptually,by a process of interpenetrating
meanings; and each
relation which is established with that interpénétrationis itself
metaphorical(the courtiersask forfavorsthe way dogs beg), hence
anotherpenetrationof one meaningbyanother,and so on (Philo put
up an imploringpaw). The totalresultis an understandingfounded
on feeling, not on fact. The fact is that followersare frequently
self-servingand treacherous;thefeelingis thattheyare pissy-nervous
littleyaps.
Like scientificmodels, everymetaphorhas a range or scope. The
spaniel image controlseach word in thisspeech of Antony's,but the
moment Antony begins to think specificallyof Cleopatra, its
boundariesare overstepped,its influenceceases, otheremblems are
invoked, other comparisonsrule. O thisfalse soul of Egypt,Antony
cries,
this grave charm,
Whose eye beck'd forthmy wars and calFd themhome,
Whose bosom was my crownet,my chiefend,
Like a rightgypsyhathat fastand loose
Beguiled me to the veryheartof loss.
Cleopatra has been called a gypsyby othersbeside Antony,and we
must understandher under this headingforthe entirecourse of the
action.Philo's openinglinesdescribeheras a gypsywhose lustis first
aroused (fanned) and then cooled (again, fanned) by Antony's
bellows-breathingheart. At the end of the passage which is our
presentconcern,thatword heart,withwhichit began, pops up once
morein thepoet's playon thephrase loss ofheart.Antony'sfollowers
have donejust that- lost heart- and Antonyhas done just thatlost his heartto Cleopatra - so thatnow he is leftalone in the very
heartof loss itself.It is a brilliantbut characteristic
turnaroundin the
writing.
A metaphor,as we've just seen, may rule openlyor serve quietly
for the durationof its life, invisiblysometimes,even behind those
who are behind the throne,as heart,here, begins withconsiderable
of the spaniel
prominence,
gives itselfover to the transformations
image, and then reappears, its meaning ironicallyaltered, in the
conclusion.We should expect this, because thatis the nature of its

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behaviorduringthe entirework- a workthe wordheartis truly
Queen of.
We mustnotonlyhavea sense of theforeground
or background
hence
its
of
an
comparative
placement
presenceor absence
image,
but
we
must
also
be
able
to
its
measurethedegree
throughout range;
of commitment
of everymetaphorto the model it's made. The
are not
commitment
ofthespanielimageis complete.The courtiers
thisheel-tagging
breedon thebasisofonlyone likeness,butmany;
and notmerelymany,butwithrespectto all theactionswhichthe
followers
eatlike
metaphor's
partofspeechrendersrelevant:
Antony's
dogs,sleeplikedogs,pee likedogs,nodoubtdo itdoggiefashion,and
so on; buttheydon'tnecessarily
havelongloosesilkenliver-colored
tail,or wet,full,liquideyes,
curlyhairand floppyears,a feathered
becauseour modelhas been made to serveas a verbwhichmust
calls
acton itsobject,notas an adjectivewhichcosmetically
perforce
was
foritsqualities.So whenhisfalsefriends
spaniel'dhim,Antony
treed.
A metaphor,
hasa focus,in thiscase indicatedbythe
furthermore,
at thispointinthe
phrase,at heels,whichstartsoffourinterpretation
maze of its meanings,ratherthanat some other.A focusmaybe
doubled,or fuzzy.
narrow,sharp,or soft,wide-angled,
Finally,thereis no metaphorwhichdoes not reach figuration
in thefaceofsomefactualcommonplace,
without
flying
The lady'slongarmlaylikea lengthof snakearoundmyneck,
without
somegrammatical
rule,
violating
She lady'dherwayaroundtheroom,
somesocialnormor prevailing
or outraging
standard,
Nevertipyourtie toa lady.
inthesyntactic,
and
is uppity
andsometimes
themetaphor
semantic,
dimensions
simultaneously,
pragmatic
witha lotmore
ThatdemurelittleladyinvestedLuke's lingerie
thanLuke did,whosedimplesrosewithholeslikedoughnuts,
thetotaleffect.
muchmarring
We mustnotbe misledbywordsor phrasessuchas lookslike,as,
way, though,and as if into supposingthatsome simple prosy
is beingmade,because,moreoftenthannot,thesimile
comparison
intentandeffect:
arebeingusedwithmetaphorical
wordsthemselves

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96

WILLIAM H. GASS

Her hands feltlike ice, and soon theyhad meltedin mine.
Change the critical preposition slightly, and another meaning
emerges:
Her hands feltlike ice, and shortlytheyhad meltedintomine.
Ordinarycomparisons simply lack commitment.One might have
begun by meaningthatthe lady's hands were quite cold, but having
said somethingelse, somethingstronger,a new beliefis born - one
whichcan carryus this way or that:
Her hands feltlike ice cubes slidingdown my back.
If I said thatthedawn was likeduskduringtheeclipse,we mighttake
my remarkto contain a relativelyfactualcomparison,somethingit
charactercan be quickly
certainlycould be doing; but its forthright
subvertedby givingit, forinstance,a more Homeric focus:
The dawn was like dusk duringthe eclipse,
its fabled rosyfingersthe pale bones of
a buried corpse.
Finally,notall the metaphorsin a literaryworkare immediatelyor
obviously verbal. The pine tree which Antonygoes to stand by is
alreadya metaphorforhim. Not onlyis the pine tree indicatedin the
text, one can presumablysee its painted cardboardoutline on the
stage. In this case, the cutout designates the tree, which, in turn,
standsfor theword,which then can be a metaphorfor Antony.The
road in Waiting
for Godotis of course an image. It is the image of a
road. But whatworddoes theroad standfor?If we abide bythelesson
we ratherperverselywrenchedfromNausea, thingshave no meaning
unless theystandfor- become - signs; foronce thatpathupon the
stage is read as a road, and theroad we've reachedis renderedas the
company:withtramp,withbicycle,
word,theroad can keep a different
with ditch,and not simply with a tramp, a bicycle, or a ditch. A
literaldescriptionof
particulartext can contain a straightforwardly
two objects or events which neverthelesspossess a metaphorical
relation to one another, as the parallel scenes of cattle sale and

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seduction do in Madame Bovary.However, the figurativerelation
betweenthemdoes notexistin some "reality," but is indicatedbythe
placementof thetwoscenes in the text.In short,althoughnotall the
metaphorsin a literarywork are immediatelyor obviously verbal,
theyultimatelyare, howeversubtle theiraction and connection.
Yet you nevercan tell. Out of a cloud thatmerelylooks dragonish
may come a bolt of lightninglike a sudden exhalationof fire.
The tensionwe mightfeel betweenthe twotermsof a metaphorin
anyparticularexample is exactlythatrivalrybetweendata and design
I've been speakingof, and, in nota fewinstances,it is difficultto be
of meaning
certainwhichwordis in command,the interpénétrations
seem so mutual.
We say thatBeckett'semptyroad is an image, but of whatwe are
notso sure. We pointtotheleaflesstreein Godot,or toWinnie,buried
toherneckin stageclay,or to theobjectsshe hauls out of hershopping
bag, and argue that they,too, are symbols; but withoutthe same
confidence and security we have with Shakespeare's spaniels,
because theobject of the image has been suppressed.Sometimesthe
suppression is momentary,as it is with hearts,sometimes it is
permanent,as in the case of Endgame's ashcans; more rarely,the
systemitselfmayshoulderitswayintotheworlditwishes
interpretive
to render,becoming,as we mightsay, "one of the boys"; as though
thefifthapple we countedwere tobe eaten byitsnumeral,whichthen
pretendedto be red, tart,crisp,and - in theapple's place - enclose
a core. Normally,we mighthave said of GregorSamsa thathe was a
littleno-accountman wholived in thecracksoflifelikea bug between
boards; but Kafka causes the image to become the character,which
Shakespeare mighthave done had he allowed Cleopatra and Antony
to disappearleavingonlytheirlargetumultuousheartsto carryon the
action on the stage. In Gregor Samsa's situation,the interpretive
systemsucceeds in abolishingits object,in takingits place. But a bug
of whatkind,we mightask. Why,a bug in a bed - a bedbug - the
sperm thatSamsa's name suggests in German, and the immediate
meaning of bedbug to the imagination. Hence, in Kafka's
termbecome the agent
notonlydoes the interpretive
Metamorphosis,
of the action, it thenreceives its own appropriatefiguration.
Certainphilosophicalsystemscan claim to discoverconditionsand
laws in our life because they have become so enamored of their
interpretivesystems,where alone such conditions and laws exist,
theydo notrealize thattheyare dreamingin theirdressinggownsand

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98

WILLIAM H. GASS

an unconsumingfireis lit; yetit is preciselythisancientbeliefthatin
thebeginningwas theword (formanya mathematician,probablythe
word, One, or the symbols,1+) which allows them to describe the
generalprinciplesof creationwithsuch accuracy;and, althoughthe
likelytruthis thatthereal worldfellout of bed beingbornand broke,
so that whateveronce might have worked no longer does, and
whateverwas whole once is now in pieces; all the same, like Plato in
his Timaeusor Leibniz in his Monadology,theystill approach the
cosmos as if it were a fabricatedobject, designed down to the last
detaillike a novelbyNabokov, and thereforeobedientto everylogical
and estheticnecessity,and to nothingelse. Had God had the wit of
HenryJamesor AlfredNorthWhitehead,He would have done better
byus; as, I am sure, were thereone, He would have had, and would
have done.
A monad is a spiritaware of a world.The worldwhichany monad
more or less clearlyapprehendsis one forwhicheveryelementand
event has a sufficientreason - a ground in God - so that each
alterationis an act of definition- of innermostexfoliation- and
would be seen to occurwithabsolute necessitywere we able to grasp
thatimmensewholeofwhichitoffers,amongindefinitely
many,only
one pointof view. Nevertheless,it promisesitselfa perspectivefrom
whicha completenesscan, in principle,be inferredwiththesame sort
of condensed immediacywithwhichwe have sometimesexperienced
a short,hard,sudden noise as a slam, and in thatslam hearda violent
closing,and fromthecharacterand directionof thenoise understood
whatkindof doorit was, and thensensed theangerin thearm which
swungit shut, feltthe feelingin anotherwhichcreatedthissignalof
rejectionand departure,the finalfateof an affaircompressedintoa
single sound of severance and settlement;so that one hears it,
weakens, trembles,knows:we shall have to sell our Miró.
I cannot have in my consciousness the actual consciousness of
another,so thereis no directway forme to knowifwe are seeing or
feelingthesame things- you causingthedoorslam,I hearingit,both
and fearingdivorce,bothlostand out of love in thatinstant,
inferring
cuttingan aquatintin two witha lawyer'sshears - because we are
wholly windowless with regard to one another, to use Leibniz's
wonderfulword; so we must depend upon the harmony(not of our
loves but of our lives) pre-establishedbetweenus by God.
Whetherany of thisis reallytrueof human beings like ourselves,
immuredin our morbidand measlyperspectives,it is a ratherfirmer

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factaboutfiction.Made ofconceptsand theirconnections,of vestigial
twitchesin the larynx,gray paradigmsof sound, the novel moves
throughthe mind like a procession of speech; and as it does so it
largelyreplaces,like music, our own interiorlife - thoselittlevistas
of bedsheet, table, and freeway, our immodest mumblings of
and praise,our low heatsand frostsof absent feeling
self-justification
- withitsgranderavenues of interest,itslucentobjectsand eloquent
emotions;fora novel is a mind like a monad aware of a world; and
as we, while reading,live it, we live withina metaphoricalmodel of
our own, even thoughthe twomay seem as distantas mylifeis from
Sancho PanzaV, as different
as thecareeningcarriageof the Princess
Cassamassima is from the mere point on a penciled path it
momentarilymay have become for a criminal calculating its
interception;and it is the aim of the pages which add up to
Remembrance
of ThingsPast or A Man Without
Qualitiesto construct
a thickconceptualsystemwhose meaningswillsimilarlyinterceptand
penetrateand alter ours - as I fancyI see the dastardlyCount
Luciano this minuteliftinga lacy chemise; for we are the courtiers
now who nuzzle our masters, or who break the buckles on our
breastplatesas our heartsenlargein theheatof battle;and itis natural
thatwe should resisthavingthe details of our lives placed by others
whichdo notennoble or enlargeor excite us, or favora BrandName
Realism over Handke's dislocationsor Calvino's shimmeringcities.
The narrator'smother,in A SorrowBeyondDreams, prefersbooks
whichshe can profitably
compare withher own life.
"I'm not like that," she sometimessaid, as thoughthe author
had writtenabout her.To her,everybook was an accountof her
own life,and in readingshe came to life; forthe firsttime,she
and with
came out of hershell; she learnedto talkabout herself,
each book she had more ideas on the subject."25
We needn'tnarrowour readingeye tosuch a slit,or look so literally
upon the text; nevertheless,it is our world, as we most broadly
perceive it, which the novel intersects, interpenetrates,and
transforms.Like any metaphor,the novel, too, will have a scope,
several undulating layers of meaning, a focus, its kind of
commitment;and even those realistic novels which claim to be
25. Peter Handke, A SorrowBeyondDreams,in ThreefyPeterHandke (Avon Books,
New York, 1977), p. 276.

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WILLIAM H. GASS

comparisonswhose accuracycan be verifiedby carefulaccountants,
will oftenreveal themselvesto be more metaphorically
like us than
promised,and turn us into theirterrorsand theirtears, as thaticy
hand, I mentioneda momentago, was firstmoist,and thenmoisture
- to disappear intoa towel.
If thewar withinthewordis a fierceone, thereader's reluctanceto
submitto the novel's transforming
poweris like thatof a threatened
want
their
of theworldreinforced;they
readers
view
people. Ordinary
want to be reassuredthatwickednessis reallywickedness,thatall is
notwell in thewaytheysee theillness;theywanteveryrepresentation
to resemblethem;theywantto wear a textlike gardeningpants; they
wantromance,escape, or sameness. Even mostcriticsimaginethatit
is Terra Nostra, or whatever, they are interpreting,when it is
them.To let go of one's
Hopscotch,or whatever,whichis interpreting
another
order
alter
own vision of lifeand let
it; to become a different
will
look througheveryappamonad fora moment,oftenone which
rentparadise and see only hells; one whichwill forceus out of our
world'sdisinterestedcontemplation;
worldlyinterestsintoa different
which will not pander or curtsyor gentlyor easily mean, but one
whichwill mean too much, too precisely,too entirely,withthe total
commitmentof the turtle'ssnap; above all, one which is perilously
perfectin bothitspleasuresand its pains, necessaryto itselfas reality
inhumanway,cruelrarelyis; formfuland orderlyin a disheartening,
ly conceptual; one which dares to make beautifulall the causes we
curse, and all thebrutaluglinessof lifeas well, whenCinderella'd by
therightlanguage; to adoptanothermind and findyourown is paltry
and unworthy:how can this be thrilling?somethingto be sought
after?what is the pointpast pure humiliation?
Since thenovel is made of so-called factsin a so-called system,the
reader's readiest ally is always the data, for the data can be
domesticated; the data can be V ; the data belong to daily life
somewhere or other; the data suggest that the novelist has a
wholesomeacquaintancewiththings- is sound, observant,sober since data don't dance; and the reader rushesnervouslythroughthe
wordin search of some object in theworldhe has a date withtheway
Alice's whiterabbitdithereddown his hole; but the organizationof
thisdata - itsshapingand subordination,themakingof itsmeanings
- is essentiallyresisted;because it is here thatthemetaphoris most
likelyto rearrangethe reader's life; not by speakingof farmyardsor
jungles when the readerwalks a citysidewalk,or carriesheavywater

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to the elephants,has money,beard, good looks, the pox; but when
sentencessimilarto GertrudeStein's
It looked like a gardenbut he had hurthimselfby accident.
him like a flyingsaucer; wherespaces are created like kites
affright
toflytime;wherea soul maybe pitchedlikea nomad's tent,a calculus
of charactersconstructed,a voice given tongue; theneverythinghas
been rephilosophized,and even ordinaryobjects seem strangeand
lack resemblance when we recognize them recombined within a
systemthe way we followthe passage of insultand injurythrough
parrot,cat, dog, Indian and monkey, in KatherineAnne Porter's
paragraph- a peckingorderpreludeto our voyageon a ship of fools.
Or do we reallyimaginewe are readingabout otherpeople?
Or readingabout parrots?
Or readingabout?
Novels whichallowme toturnthetables,whichpermitme tobe the
metaphor,themodel,tofindthefocus,tofill-inand furnish,are lousy
novels. Theirformshave to be as loose as the wiresof a weak fence.
Bad criticstreatgood books as iftheywere lousynovels. Even though
and haven't cost them,theysprawl
theircopies were complimentary
on top as if theyhad paid.
Considerall thosewhohave endeavoredtomake overMarx, mimic
and compare
Nietzsche,playthepositivist,or prattlephenomenology,
them to those criticswho have thoughttheyhad jaws hinged like
snakes, and could swallow masterpieceslike small pigs. So in their
pridetheybecome hilliousfora moment;but Balzac and Bovaryand
Mann and Proust,theyreturnalive withoutthebenefitof thewhale's
belch or woodsman's ax. Slowly the swallowed systematicallysupplantsthe swallower.Mann ist was er isst,afterall, even if it is the
letterS.
Of the enemies of art (and what is a war withoutenemies?),
perhapsthe worstare thosewho will notread, sense, see, hear, sing,
the word. For them it is not even a note. They look down upon a
passage of Beckett,forexample, as thoughit were a false trailin the
snow; theywill not step into such tracks. Yet if the inscriptionis
skimped, whatis read?
A novel is a mind aware of a world, but if the novel is not
performed;ifitis notmoved as itoughtto be throughthespace of the
spirit,the notationnotes not; because our metaphors,our theories,

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our histories,do not merelyfall upon theirpage like picturessent in
black pricksover a wire; theymust be enacted, entered into; they
mustbe rolledlike drums;theymustbe marchedin columns,formed
in hollowsquares; theymust be hummed,or possiblypanted.
'
'
past moments old dreams back again or freshlike thosethat
' and memories' I
'
' or
say themas
pass
things thingsalways
I hear them ' murmurthem in the mud
'
in me ' thatwere without' whenthepantingstops scrapsof an
'
'
ancientvoice in me not mine
'
'
'
'
'
my life last state last version ill-heard ill-recaptured
'
'
ill-murmuredin the mud briefmovementsof the lowerface
losses everywhere26
Yes. Right.Losses everywhere.But you expectsome losses. In a war.
26. Samuel Beckett, How It Is (Grove Press, New York, 1964), p. 7. The
apostrophiesare pant marks.

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