Profane Exegesis: My Day In The Night Of Sylvia Plath

Profane Exegesis: My Day In The Life of Sylvia Plath: 2 …It crosses my mind also, that Sylvia Plath may well have been a whole lot happier if she could have followed her own inclinations more, rather than feeling she was over-obligated to various other projects and demands on her time, which is, admittedly, what our lives are made up of, if only on the face of it, but she wasn’t to know that it seems – though I could be wrong. I spend far too much time not getting it together as an 'artist', during which I’m spending the time on writing. I’ve never really 'got it together' as an artist; proficient and even prolific as I can be over periods of time. Part of the problem for me, not least an obsession with ideas, was in applying this speculative or analytical predilection to relationships. Patterns were beginning to be discerned as were my deeper motivations beyond the usual male drive for sex, ever alert to the possibility of bedding any attractive woman if it was there or seemed to be there. Of course, I got the types where it was there, just not with me as often as not, as my more altruistic qualities came to the fore and I was relegated to a sort of belated Parsifal-like pedestal – then under one, as much in an unspoken, covert way, while they carried on their relationship/s with their significant and less significant others while I was supposed to wither and shrivel in frustration, literally and metaphorically; emotionally, and physically. Eventually you have to come to the realisation that love is in you and not something some else can give or withhold, as with sex. And anyway, there are other things to think about. Easier said than done, sometimes. My keenness – as much 'blasé', would be anathema to relatively experienced and intelligent, but sensitive women, who liked me more than I realised or acknowledged to myself as I would be drawn into the seductive trap, which – 'worldly-wise' – as with most things that reflects the worlds thought-system, would be offered only to be taken away. A more descriptive way of describing subconsciously or overtly 'man hating cock teasing bitches'... cagey coquettes. But then they could see me as a pussy-chasing male whore if they so chose. The 'male whore' part was Lynn's analogy as I recall. Not about me, she meant it rhetoricaly. It was all in the eye of the beholder. (A matter of interpretation, and sometimes all is not as it seems. You can write that down if you like). And how we choose to perceive ourselves also. It seems a very odd dichotomy in the male psyche that we see ourselves as being literally unaffected by sex – regardless of how many women we might sleep with if we’re lucky, not to mention we’ll sleep with just about anything for the frisson of sex, often little to do with the person themselves – and yet are intent on seeing a woman – if we 'like' her, as having thrown herself away if she 'fucks' anyone other than ourselves. You explain it. They of course, are well capable of dismissing any dalliances on our part as long as it was only sexual, whereas for blokes, with

their – or our – view of sex as the be all and end all of life, feel that “a day without sex is a day wasted” (I'm paraphrasing from a TV show I saw years ago, I'm not saying I agree with any of this or believe it.) as well as being grounds for murder – which we do in the name of 'love'. Many women of course, think like men and have almost as extreme a reaction. The problem is that sex is seen as or mistaken for intimacy, real joining; but it’s only physical closeness. Genuine intimacy is of the mind. I could tell myself that - as I speculated somewhat masochistically and with prurience aforethought over their sexual encounters rather than getting on with with any of my own. That and indulge in the occasional 'sullen wank' – to use Martin Amis' choice phrase in Success. Jesus I’m not. And far from any saint. What I needed was to balance my emotions, and learn to be more selfish. And intimacy could hardly be genuine if it also involved being seen as a doormat, the recipient of their need to express their hatred through me while they hid behind bo's and acquaintances, expressed in a different way, but equal in hatred all the same That was the problem in a nutshell. There was never really any 'happy medium' for them. It was all extremes, polarized, compartmentalized. Like screwed up porn 'actresses.' This one for sex, that one for conversation and 'intimacy'. But they were incapable of it on any level. It was all hatred in one form or the other. Special 'love' for one, special hate for me, and no doubt some reversals of the roles, metaphorically speaking; but nor always. And I would feel uncomfortable with it, but could never quite fathom the situation and find the clarity I needed to articulate it to myself. Maybe I was enjoying myself too much. That I'd think about it, come to grips with it, at some increasingly vague point in the future. I had been going to say I can at least understand that as 'friends', emotionally intimate acquaintances, this negated any ambiguity they’d have felt if we had been lovers physically. That it demonstrated my 'appreciation' for them as persons. And this is what they wanted and needed. But the problem was as much that they would often compromise it themselves by leading me on – apparent to any good therapist perhaps, but it was all news to me as I was making the mistake of seeing them as emotional equals, which in essence, they are of course, just not at that point in time and insanity. And neither was I their therapist or counsellor, perish the thought. I think this was to prove to themselves I would be happy to exploit them 'like the rest', then they could treat me with us much contempt, expressed in passive, sneaky aggression, while carrying on the pretence that it might still happen when I had lost interest, this in itself compounding their sense of not being treated as an individual but a sexual plaything, while wanting to be 'loved' for themselves. But it was often how they'd set it up.

I think Lynn was aware of this herself, when shortly before I finally got around to saying “fuck it,” she'd put me on the spot in her circular and selfdefeating way by saying “Don’t you ever say “fuck it?” ” As this was a statement in the guise of a question, I haven’t described it as as if she asked it. It was a Catch 22 of course. 'Damned' whether I did or didn't. “The ego’s characteristic impossible situation'. Or situationist, as my spell check had it. And her way of damning herself by seeing herself as superior. And you can only put up with so many put-downs and for some people it's way of life; or what they think life is. I have to stop to remark on the movie I have on in the background, There's Something About Mary. A buddy of Ben Stiller's tells him he should have a handjob – 'spank the monkey, strangle the bishop', whatever – before his big date with love of his life Mary, to 'take the edge off'. This he does, and keeping this short, his come, ejaculation, call it what you like, 'vanishes' – it's hanging from his ear and he answers the door to her like this. She - Cameron Diaz, thinks it's hair gel and scoops it up and applies it liberally to her hair, then when they're sitting in a restaurant, she's sporting this ludicrously prominent, stiff quiff. It's certainly a funny, 'outrageous' idea – scene – but it never worked for me. Simply because there would be no reason to do that, as she wouldn't have with, ah, regular hair-gel. I've seen it before and it was only mildly amusing then too. Otherwise there are genuinely hysterical scenes. And the premise of the movie was a revelation to me of sorts, though I saw it only years after it was released. Lynn seemed to be fascinated by Plath... but this was as much due to her own attraction to guilt... and death; which also expressed itself in murderous if restrained fury. And she was pretty much always furious; many of them were, and probably still are. Just like the fat bint across the street. She’s absolutely livid, my dear. All is not right in her increasingly unhappy world. Once you begin to see the accuracy of Maslow’s statement that society is basically psychopathically oriented, everything begins to fall into place. And these neat little units of unhealthy living and good and carefully law-abiding individuals reveal themselves as cauldrons of barely restrained seething hatred. Of course you wouldn’t know this if all you paid attention to was the news telling you of the possibility of endless terrorists and 'weirdo' Goth kids' shooting up high schools. The only differences is the 'straights' are more adept at concealing their hidden aggression and constant slights and attacks. It is a chronically passive-aggressive society after all. A society that would conspire to provoke and cajole you then see that murderous aggression only in you. I also meant to say I think thoughts of death got the better of Plath. My

purpose, I think, in mentioning the coincidence of coming across such a passage when opening the book at random and to illustrate it. It speaks for itself. And I wanted to include at least another paragraph, though I’m tempted to copy the whole section, it’s so 'extreme' on the face of it. In this climate of denial and projection, often extreme, some of her remarks would be 'reviled' I think, certainly her thoughts on Hitler. I’m going to read it all at some point. Hopefully this year. And hers is an interesting mind to explore I should think. A complex, gifted individual. It's why I bought the books. The huge journal was £15, second-hand, from the bookshop opposite the old University Quad building up Clarke Street (I like to sit in there to eat, as it's a stark contrrast to the busy main road, but also because a scene was filmed there for the movie version of Verne's Voyage To The Moon. There's also scenes filmed on the Mound). And there's less pressure, the awareness of being 'on' as in life – 'real' life'. It’s either this or 'chic-lit' and don’t rule it out. And I do have The Bell Jar somewhere. Anyway, I’ve still the 'funny' novel I came across, on Internet dating to get through; not that I'm thinking of putting it into practice. Match.con. I bet she’d have loved the net. Or would the current political climate just be more cause for despair? These excerpts as with the previous, are from sometime between July 1950 – July 1953. She was 30 when she published The Bell Jar, I know that much. Born in 1932, she's a good bit older than my mother was, but when I read her it's as if time is irrelevant... because in the realm of the mind, it is, to all intents and purposes. That makes her only between 18 and 21 or so, here, come to think on it. And around 23 when she got married to 'Ted' Hughes. And killed herself a year or so after their marriage ended... But that too easily puts him in the position of the bad guy. As much by being there. Who's to say she wouldn't have killed herself whatever the circumstances.... I don't know. But I do know that if you make the mistake of thinking you can solve someone elses problems, you become their problem. She'd allowed thoughts of death to get a grip on her mind until it permeated everything she saw and thought about. It's there from the very beginning of her novel. And on the first page, she worked for the BBC while living in London with her two children, and wrote poetry and The Bell Jar. Must read it. It would be an interesting insight. And it looks as entertaining as it would be interesting. Paragraphs and dialogue and full stops/periods and everything.... Just to kill herself. I can picture her looking on the world... as an increasingly hopeless, desolate place to bring children into... and finding it everywhere she looked, as that's what she'd chosen to see. “I am afraid. I am not solid, but hollow. I feel behind my eyes a numb, paralysed cabin, a pit of hell, a mimicking nothingness (This does

sound to me like an early awareness of the “murderer within”). I never thought, I never wrote, I never suffered. I want to kill myself, to escape from responsibility, to crawl back abjectly into the womb. I do not know who I am, where I am going – and I am the one who has to decide the answers to these hideous questions. I long for a noble escape from freedom – I am weak, tired, in revolt from the strong constructive humanitarian faith which presupposes a healthy, active interest and will. There is no where to go – not home, where I would blubber and cry, a grotesque fool, into my mother’s skirts – not to men where I want more than ever now the stern, final, paternal directive – not to church which is liberal, free – no, I turn wearily to the totalitarian dictatorship where I am absolved of all personal responsibility and can sacrifice myself in a “splurge of altruism” on the alter of a Cause with a capital “C. “ ” You just want to take her in your arms and tell her everything will be alright. Metaphorically. But no one can be everything for anybody. It brings to mind Dead Can Dance's 'In Her Saviour's Arms'. I’ve felt the same myself. Who hasn’t, in all honesty? But suicide is undoubtedly a step backward. It only means having to face the same questions in another form, whether that’s another lifetime as another person or another dimension. Better to get it over and done with now as best one can, but in the best possible sense, a la Gary Renard's Your Immortal Reality. And where would I be without the Course and The Third Millennium and a virtual life-time of the ever positive CW? And in our small ways we’re all Sylvia!, carrying her along as she has us in the past when we have ourselves floundered; at least I’d like to think so. Because the mind is one. Or, as his mother says at the end of the film, The Elephant Man, 'nothing really dies'. If only she had known... and tried to believe it with every fibre of her being. Perhaps she did. I believed it, knew it even, and I believe it now, yet I know how easy it can be for 'reality' to become suddenly circumscribed. Combine that with a pessimistic, even nihilistic outlook and it's a catastrophe waiting to happen. In one way or another. “Now I sit here, crying almost, afraid, seeing the finger writing my hollow futility on the wall, damning me – god, where is the integrating force going to come from? My life up till now seems messy, inconclusive, disorganised”. …And I didn’t even mention Jake Horsley’s Matrix Warrior: Becoming the One, once.