Anais and Ulysses, slightly changed
paigerella
I slightly changed this... :)
Nin, Ulysses, and the Plastic Arts
Question:
What does this quote mean in relation to Molly, and why did Nin use it?
Original Quote:
"Fowlie
says of Ulysses: 'In the last episode of Joyce's Ulysses the long
soliloquy of Molly Bloom the character has ceased being real in any
usual sense. She is lying down in bed and the words which pass through
her in her half dream, half conscious state convert her into the
mythical figure of woman, into the figure of the earth itself."
-from Anais Nin, in The Novel of the Future
Response:
Dear HCEFW,
First, I want to thank you for your letter. It was like a beautiful
stone in my dull, dull day. Today, at work, I photocopied documents for
almost an hour and did several other mindless, trivial (to me) things.
Then I read your letter, with your question about Molly Bloom, Fowlie,
and Nin, and you gave me a glint of crimson (thought) and something to
look forward to: answering your question.
However, I do not
know if I can answer it accurately at all. It is a quote that Nin used
to... to illustrate the depth that a writer must delve to cross from
the conscious to the subconscious (or vice versa). It is also a symbol
of the subconscious in the works of the conscious. For some reason, I
am thinking of Nietzsche and Bacchus, and the plastic arts.
Nin says that Fowlie discusses Freud, who said that "man is primarily a
sleeper," (15). While Molly is sleeping, she loses herself and the
prose moves from Molly the physical to the world of her dreams- symbols
and symbolism. This dissipation of Molly and the symbols of her dreams
transform her from the physical to the mythical. Molly represents
fertility in Ulysses and here Fowlie is saying that, through her
dreams, we reach her subconscious where the very essence of Molly
resides. In Ulysses, she is Mother Nature, or, the Earth itself.
Because of your question, I have re-read the first part of Nin's book, The Novel of the Future,
where she discusses how to write and how literary artists must write.
She begins with dreams which ultimately, she claims, aside from being
thought without rules, are symbols from the subconscious.
Symbols are important because they express different layers of meaning
at once. They have presence. She says, "The unconscious cannot express
itself directly because it is a composite of past, present, future, a
timeless alchemy of many dimensions. A direct statement, as for an act,
would deprive it of its effectiveness. It is an image which bypasses
the censor of the mind, affects our emotions and our sense. An act has
to be interpreted on two levels-- one as action, the other as meaning,"
(11).
In The Novel of the Future,
Nin says that there are several levels/ layers of consciousness, and
artists / poets are the ones who do and must build bridges across them
to have full access to all realms. This, in itself, is like Ulysses.
While reading about Bloom, the narrative takes us (the readers) into
his head, outside of his head and onto the street, into his memories,
and then outside of his head again, yet within his memories or
imagination (as if he is imagining himself in a room, and we are in the
room watching his imaginary self- therefore we're "out" of his mind,
yet within by reason of standing in the room of his imagination). We
have all of these various levels happening almost simultaneously. And,
as you know, there are the different layers of meaning in theme: Bloom
and his day/ Ulysses and his epic voyage, different colors and parts of
the body, layers of sound, etc. Joyce's work reminds me of this other
quote by Nin: "Dream, waking dream, reverie, fantasy, all interlock and
interrelate simultaneously but on different levels" (9).
Nin
says that separating the conscious from the subconscious creates
neurosis and that dreaming is indispensable to humanity because it
provides an escape and perspective from history as it is lived in. This
perspective reinforces personality/ individuality, and personal choice.
It also provides the ability to choose actions within a situation and
to keep from being swept up in history itself (here she briefly
mentions the Nazis).
But why is this important? Well, for
personal reasons- people must be in touch with their subconscious to
keep neurosis at bay. They must also have a realm from which they can
strengthen their spirits and gain perspective on their positions within
history. And, by accessing our innermost symbols and translating them
into the plastic arts, we add to history. This is why she admonishes
drugs-- drugs reveal images and the subconscious, but they do not
create activity.
We need to create, then, and to translate
the symbols of our subconscious into the arts. "The young," she says,
"would have no need of drugs if they had been educated in the life of
the senses and emotions through art. Art has through the ages given
people their heightened sense of life and given them the key to its
meaning," (16). (As an aside, check out this quote-- I took the word
"drug" out and replaced it with "television": "We downgraded and
denigrated the artist who would have expanded their imagination and
consciousness without side effects. Consequently, the young, trained in
passivity and acceptance, have become, through television, voyeurs to
the world of images--not creators." )
For some reason, I'm
thinking of the poem that you put in your blog, "The Morning of Eternal
Separation," by Kenji Miyazawa. He did what Nin was talking about. He
created symbols in his poem, about the snow and the death of his
sister, and the transformation of the snow into the food of Tushita
Heaven. It became more than it was. It was translated into dreaming and
layers and symbols and the universal language of understanding/
consciousness. All Nin does or did is try to explain what it is that
poets do, and what those who would be poets must do in order to
succeed. Things that we already know intuitively-- she just provides
the language. Symbols have more power than words, and they are stronger
because our subconscious recognizes them on several layers. Thus Molly
is an important, powerful figure in Ulysses because she isn't just
Bloom's wife; she is the Mother of all creation, the Earth, the
mythical woman figure, and fertility.
Good night,
Paigerella
