sigmund-freud « WordPress.com Tag Feed

Psykets materialismer I: Underströmmar

iammany — Fri, 05 Sep 2008 18:21:04 +0000

Om det stämmer att all rädsla i grunden är rädslan för döden, den oundvikliga händelse vi inte kan få någon kunskap om i sig, hur ska vi då förstå den rädsla som dominerar oss idag i både inre och yttre betydelse? För det är inte döden i omedelbar bemärkelse som vi är rädda för idag. En slags frånkoppling tycks ha skett, en frånkoppling av våra medvetanden från livet och dess villkor. Men vi vet redan mycket om rädsla. Vi vet hur den fungerar. Vad är annorlunda idag jämfört med exempelvis medeltiden, de mörka åren som Upplysningen skulle rädda oss från?

Problematiken är en bland andra som fått mig intresserad av att ta reda på hur våra psyken egentligen fungerar. I en serie inlägg kommer jag närma mig ämnet och försöka orientera mig mot en förståelse. Vilka vägar detta kan ta är ännu okänt (och följaktligen finns heller ingen tidsplan) men en central figur kommer bli Jacques Lacan. Målen är alltså två: dels en allmän förståelse av psykets materialismer och dels en mer specifik förståelse av rädslans hegemoni i vår samtid.

* * *

Men vi börjar strax efter Guds död, med Nietzsches och Freuds materialismer. Jag har läst båda dåligt. De får gestalta två tendenser som drar och sliter på var sin sida, som ger dynamiken i psyket, i materialismerna om psyket och min ingångspunkt i det hela. Ingen av dem var först även om båda har haft stor betydelse. Det har länge funnits dispyter gällande den förres influens på den andre, om den var marginell eller om den var avgörande. Men den fanns där. Bland andra Paul-Laurent Assoun har skrivit ingående om detta. Men det är inte därför jag börjar hos dessa herrar. Anledningen är ingen annan än den att Herr Nietzsche har varit avgörande för min egen syn på kropp och psyke, och förhållandet däremellan. Man får lätt känslan av att Nietzsches hela tänkande utspelar sig på kroppen. Det finns ett slags parallellförhållande mellan kropp och psyke, och en cyklisk eller pendelartad rörelse mellan friskhet och sjukdom som alltså avspeglar sig i båda. Nietzsche, för mig, har varit en särskild sorts vitalist (begreppet här använt något oortodoxt).

Freud å andra sidan har jag länge, till stor del pågrund av ideologisk trångsynthet, förhållit mig till med misstänksamhet. Hur många kritiserar inte Freud utan att faktiskt läsa honom? Det finns en sida hos honom som tilltalar: hans pessimism. Den är inte svår att förstå. Hans insikter om det mänskliga psyket ledde honom inte till att skönja några ljusglimtar i det krigshärjade Europa. Kanske var det denna erfarenhet av ressentimentets löpeld som omöjliggjorde för Freud att bli en vitalist likt Nietzsche. Det var inte möjligt att bortse från symptomen: situationen var allt för akut. För Freud handlade det såklart om vetenskap. Det var inte ett projekt som för Nietzsche. Freuds betydelse är omöjlig att ignorera eller kringgå, om man nu skulle vilja det, och trots hans avsaknad av nietzscheansk vitalism finns det ändå något oerhört revolutionerande i hans materialism.

Gud är död men grammatiken består. I den symboliska ordning där Gud opererade som transcendental a priori fortsätter språket upprätthålla och strukturera det sköra subjektet, vilket enligt Nietzsche innebär att dekadensen fortsätter att degradera livet. Freud såg en sådan symbolisk ordning i oidipuskomplexet och han förstod också språkets roll i subjektets konstitution (men det var Lacan som, i sin tur, revolutionerade den teorin). Alla likheter mellan Nietzsches och Freuds materialismer till trots råder det dock allmänt konsensus om att Freud mer än något önskade stabilisera och rädda subjektet från libidons destruktivitet. Psykoanalysen kunde enligt Freud frambringa en kompromiss mellan detet och överjaget. Han lät sig inte berusas av Nietzsches livsvitalism. Nietzsche, å sin sida, ställde sina förhoppningar till näringen och den friska luften. Lita inte på en tänkare som inte låtit sina tankar komma till sig under en frisk promenad, sade han. Så vi borde inte lita på Freud när han sitter bredvid divanen och tolkar sina patienters neuroser? Freuds var en med vetenskaplig stringens förfinad materialism, men vi väljer här att behålla Nietzsches vitalism som en tendens, en latent orgiastisk utlösning som hotar att bryta upp psykoanalysens konserverande, och därmed dekadenta, tendens.

Två tendenser, två underströmmar. Men hur ser de ut? Vi har förstått att slagfältet är språket. Olika sätt att förhålla sig till det och använda det. Nietzsches idiosynkratiska skrivsätt, paradoxerna och aforismerna var olika sätt med vilket han försökte utmana språket i och genom språket själv. Språket upprättar enligt honom dualistiska begreppspar – ”gott” och ”ont”, ”kropp” och ”själ”, etc. – som ordnar verkligheten. Men dessa är endast ytfenomen. Under och före allt strömmar viljan till makt, libidon, alltså detet. Utmana språket för att frambringa nya begrepp, nya värderingar:

”Hur idiotiskt är inte antagandet att det skulle räcka med att påpeka illusionernas ursprung och bedrägeriets dimridåer för att ödelägga den värld som gäller för verklig, den så kallade »verkligheten». Vi kan bara ödelägga genom att skapa. Men låt oss inte heller glömma: det är tillräckligt att skapa nya namn, värderingar och sannolikheter för att man på lång sikt ska frambringa nya »ting».”

Också Freud förstod hur språket kunde användas till förändring. Felsägningar och skämt visade enligt honom på språkets betydelse för subjektets konstitution. Genom analys av dessa yttringar kunde man förstå den inre konflikten mellan detet och överjaget. Själva förståelsen i sig kunde sedan fostra ett mer harmoniskt jag.

Freuds perspektiv var terapeutens. Han ville bota sjukdomarna, ytterst dekadensens symptom. Nietzsches perspektiv var excessens, överflödets, i vilken han såg en ny vitalism. Det är utifrån dessa två underströmmar jag nu framöver läser om psykets materialismer.

Determinism being out of place

John Ryan Recabar — Thu, 04 Sep 2008 05:09:42 +0000

Determinists believe that all ostensible acts of the will are actually the result of the causes that determine them thereby demolishing whatever role choice has in the process.

Determinism has a wide array of philosophical possiblities. In classical literature, fate and necessity determine how characters act and think.

For Calvinist writers or those with Christian leanings, it is the predestined will of God.

In literature produced by naturalistic writers, it is the scientific and natural laws that govern the universe; diversions from these laws result to absurdities that can have either humorous or macabre or a combination of both qualities.

In Marxist writings, it may be the inevitable operation of the economic forces and the resulting disparities due to differences in income or access to wealth.

Looking at the events using the orthodox Freudian perspective, all the intricacies of daily life, even the seemingly negligible task of holding a long ball point pen or simple matters such as slip of the tongue can be traceable to latent psychic mechanisms; these seemingly random daily actions may not be as random as we think they are.

In the examples pointed above, determinism plays a strong role in stripping the individual of the ability to effect his freewill over his environment and his life. We, in one time or another, associate so much of the things that happen to us to these phenomena. We refuse to accept the fact that our poverty, ignorance, 'misfortunes', lack of faith, libido are a result of our past actions and freewill and not only by external factors that are beyond our grasp.

True enough, the environment plays a significant role in determining our lives, but like the heroes in classical literature, we can always outsmart Fate. We can always just believe in God but act on our own to materialize our yearnings. We can always defy gravity and go to the moon. We can always leave work and let the economy stagnate if it means a 'de-stagnation' of our lives. We can always transcend beyond our carnal desires, dodge the need to fill with phallus or phalluses whatever void we have.

We always have a choice. Let's make determinism out of place in our lifetime.

Anonymität

Maren Oppermann — Tue, 02 Sep 2008 15:58:10 +0000

Doch scheint mir, daß es so etwas wie einen Sprachkerker gibt, obgleich heute eine Auflockerung der Sprache durch Fremdwörter zu beobachten ist. mehr (Galerie Weishaupt)
Noch einmal Sigmund Freud, was an ihm reizte Sie?
Nicht das Analytische, nur das Sprachliche, also die Frage, wie es dazu kommt, daß er auf französisch völlig unverständlich und auf deutsch völlig klar ist. Was zirkuliert also unter uns Menschen an unerfaßbarer Anonymität? Ich spreche hier von Unfaßbarem, das uns durchzieht und von dem wir nichts ahnen.

Zufällige Auswahl:

El Malestar en la Cultura. Barcelona 2008.

dariosantos — Mon, 01 Sep 2008 20:31:07 +0000

El proyecto “El Malestar en la cultura-BCN” es una propuesta crítica y de reflexión a partir de la obra de Sigmund Freud “El Malestar en la cultura”. Se trata de un proyecto que pretende iniciar una reflexión sobre el estado de la ciudad de Barcelona, entendida como punto de encuentro de la cultura de masas en su máximo apogeo. Sin ninguna pretensión que exceda la voluntad de encender la curiosidad del ciudadano acerca de cómo se relaciona con su entorno, el proyecto revisita una de las obras menos conocidas del padre del psicoanálisis para darle una nueva lectura, una nueva interpretación, aplicada a la ciudad de Barcelona, y así, ilustrar mediante la constitución de unos espacios relaes y virtuales las ideas de una obra que, a nuestro juicio, y después de casi 80 años de ser publicada por primera vez, contiene en su interior algunas ideas todavía reivindicables.

Este proyecto tiene una doble vertiente. Por un lado, la creación de pequeños espacios de reflexión en algunos lugares de la Ciudad Condal, seleccionados previamente, donde se incluirían paneles gigantes con fragmentos del texto de Sigmund Freud, indirectamente relacionados con la zona en si, o con algún aspecto de la misma, ya sea por la constitución de su arquitectura, o por elementos de carácter anécdotico en la génesis del paisaje urbano que podrían llamar la atención. El objetivo del establecimiento de estos pequeños “espacios textuales” es intentar fusionar breves fragmentos de conocimiento dentro de la arquitectura urbana, como pequeñas disonancias dentro del ciclo comunicativo que el ciudadano establece, ya sea el de la simple contemplación estética, o el de un uso práctico de la zona en sí.

Por otra parte, se creará un blog dividido en cada una de las zonas seleccionadas donde se incluirán breves piezas de vídeo con su fragmento de texto correspondiente, a modo de guía del trabajo realizado en la ciudad. De este modo, exisitirá en la red un punto de apoyo al trabajo realizado en la ciudad. Con este blog se pretende reforzar la reflexión iniciada con las instalaciones en la ciudad.

Así, el proyecto queda dividido en tres áreas que confluyen entre si: el espacio literario, que hace referencia a la obra El Malestar en la Cultura de Sigmund Freud; el espacio arquitectónico, con la inclusión de esos paneles gigantes en puntos destacados de la ciudad; y el espacio virtual, esa suerte de resumen multimedia en la red.

melanous — Sun, 31 Aug 2008 09:03:08 +0000

bir insan hayatın anlamını ve değerini sorgulayamaya başladığı anda o hastadır

freud

It Was Just A Matter Of Time

crazybengal — Wed, 27 Aug 2008 02:07:55 +0000

"We should be led by Osama bin Laden...I mean Obama and Biden."

-Charlie Wilson

Biorhythms: Out of Step

Troythulu — Mon, 25 Aug 2008 20:54:18 +0000

Biorhythm theory originated during the nineteenth century from the somewhat fertile imagination of one Wilhelm Fliess, a Berlin doctor, numerologist and for a time, a close associate of Sigmund Freud. For whatever reason, Fliess had developed an obsession with the numbers 23 and 28, which he connected with what he called the Male and Female cycles, lasting 23 and 28 days, respectively, what are now known to modern biorhythmists as the Physical and Emotional cycles. Hermann Swoboda of the University of Vienna was a young patient of Sigmund Freud's, and the second most important figure in the origin of Biorhythm theory. He plagiarized Fliess' idea and added what he called the Mind cycle, consisting of 33 days, what is now known as the Intellectual cycle, as well as having designed the first slide-rule for calculating 'critical' days, more on those as we go. Biorhythm theory is essentially a pseudoscience, purporting to deal with biological cycles ignored by those scientists who study biological rhythms, those in the field of Biochronometry, which among other things, involves the circadian rhythms that govern our sleep and wakefulness cycles. In a nutshell, regardless of the variation of the theory used, the idea is the same: to enable people to forecast whether they are going to have a good day or not. Biorhythm theory is supported primarily by numerological jiggery-pokery, media hype, anecdotal accounts, and what is known as the Forer Effect, the tendency to perceive general statements that can apply to anyone as specifically applying to oneself. In the various mutant strains of the theory that have popped up over the years, a 38 day Intuitional cycle, a 43 day Aesthetic cycle, and a 53 day Spiritual cycle have been added. There are even variants that make use of cycles that are combinations of other cycles, such as a Passion cycle, combining the Emotional and Physical, a Wisdom cycle, mixing together the Emotional and Intellectual and a Mastery cycle, blending the Intellectual and Physical. Supposedly, each cycle has an integral length in days, and it is assumed that the entire cycle of a rhythmogram will repeat itself after a total of 23x28x33 days, which comes out to 21,252, or about 58 years, though for strict Fliessian biorhythmists this would be calculated at 23x28=644 days, before the entire sequence begins anew. The theory claims that the more 'positive' at a particular time a cycle is, the more potent the 'energy' of that cycle is, and the greater the success of the interactions of the one the cycle pertains to. Too bad that science has never been able to find this energy, despite having a good track record for finding other undetectable things, but once again, I digress. Biorhythmists claim that all cycles start at zero at the time of one's birth, and at certain points on these cycles, an individual will experience great success or great failure. A cycle going through the horizontal zero line on the biorhythm chart (ahh, now we're getting to it...) is thought to be at a 'switchpoint', or 'critical point' and this is held to be a time when people become accident prone, on so called 'critical days.' To date, there have been no scientific studies published in any accredited, peer-reviewed journal which supports biorhythm theory, and indeed it has been tested, though as of 1998 (Hines), in the then 134+ studies that were conducted, the theory has failed all attempts to validate it. The claims of critical points have been shown to be false, and in response, many 'expert' biorhythmists have resorted to using questionable math to support their claims. Biorhythm proponents have refused to relinquish the theory even after it has been proven false by empirical data, falling back on the invocation of special pleadings to effectively render the theory unfalsifiable, even to inventing an entire new category of people, the Arhythmic, including the claim that some are arhythmic part of or all of the time. Also, to save their failed theory, biorhythmists have made major reinterpretations of biorhythm's mechanisms, again, effectively making it untestable, and therefore, not science. One purportedly scientific study claimed as a finding that, and I quote, about 60% of all accidents happen on critical days, or about 22% of all days, but there is a problem with their methodology, and the reason this study is not valid: Biorhythmists also count the days immediately before and after the so-called critical day, more like 60% of all days, so the statistic would more accurately be stated as '60% of all accidents happen on 60% of all days', which is what you would expect by sheer chance. Testing biorhythm theory by keeping a journal, and charting each day is useless, as it is subject to a number of methodological problems, such as the well-known phenomenon of the self-fulfilling prophecy, simple suggestibility, and selective validation. As convoluted as biorhythm theory is, with the need to keep track of the rise, falling, and switchpoints of at least two or three cycles, and maybe more, you don't have to be a math major to be able to tell that its child's play to find cases to which the theory seems to apply. Let's look at some of the math used by Fliess himself:

the equation he used is dirt simple, and here it is: 23x+28y

Now, Fliess had a fair understanding of basic math, but didn't realize that if any pair of positive numbers that have no common divisor replace 23 and 28 in the formula, it's possible to get any positive number you want, so it's hardly amazing that he was capable of shoehorning any natural phenomenon into the formula. Here's an example: First, using 23 & 28, find out which values of x & y put out a value of 1, the answer: x=11 & y=-9. Now here's how that works:

[(23x11)=253]+[(28x-9)=-252]=1 Now let's use that to come up with 2, 3 & 4:

[23x(11x2)]+[28x(-9x2)]=2

[23x(11x3)]+[28x(-9x3)]=3

and finally, [23x(11x4)]+[28x(-9x4)]=4

So now you see how easy it is to fit this into anything you want! Note that even leaving out negative values of x & y, you can still come up with positive numbers greater than a certain number, and out of an infinite set of numbers that you can come up with using this formula, what's the largest one? In other words, what's the biggest number that can be arrived at by replacing x & y with non-negative values using this formula? The answer is relatively simple: xy-x-y. Urgh, Hulk's head hurts, hard for Hulk to think!

But seriously, all in all, this is probably going to be one of those annoying things that James Randi refers to as 'unsinkable rubber duckies' and is likely to be around for a while, after all, we still have phrenologists and astrologers as well.

Fun with the Bible: Abraham's Trip to See Sigmund Freud

Jay Solomon — Mon, 25 Aug 2008 16:18:36 +0000

The Situation

Everybody knows about Father Abraham right? That patriarch of all monotheistic people who everyone likes to trace his or her roots to? You remember: God spoke to him, gave him descendants and Canaan and all that jazz?

Do you remember the story where he goes to sacrifice his son Isaac as a test from God (Genesis 22) but before he can do it God stops him? It's a great story. Rather popular, and boy is there a lot to say about it. But do you know the story of Abraham and his other son, Ishmael?

Well, in Genesis 21, (yes, the chapter immediately before he tries to off Isaac), Abraham sends his other son (and his mother) out into the wilderness to, presumably, die. Why? Sarah, Abraham's wife, is getting testy about Ishmael, the son of a slave woman, playing with her son. Jealousy? Maybe. But no matter the reason, we have two back to back stories of Abraham doing things that will kill his sons.

I don't know about you, but when I hear things like this, I start thinking of everyone's favorite mother fucker, Sigmund Freud. Now, there's no real indication that Isaac or Ishmael was trying to sleep with either of their mothers or subsequently tried to murder their father, Abraham. But perhaps this was a preemptive strike on Abraham's part while his sons were still young.

The Approach

There's little that annoys me as much in scholarship as a reductionist approach. That is, the attempt to understand and explain information all through a particular lens without taking account of the entire situation. For instance, like attempting to interpret everything through a Freudian, Oedipal Complex, eye. (By the way, interpreting the entire Old Testament like it's forecasting Jesus is also reductionist.)

However, with two back to back stories about killing sons, I can't help but wonder if we're not getting glimpses of some very long standing emotions about familial relations. We know that the ancient Greeks thought about these things - why not Ancient Near Eastern people as well?

The Questions

One big question internal to the story is, how can Abraham get everything that God has promised him (descendants and land for them), if he is killing his sons (while claiming that God is telling him to kill them - sounds delusional, no?)? So, if these Freudian drives are correct, is this in part a story about Abraham overcoming his internal drives (son-murder) in order to acquire his long-term goals: Id v. Superego? Should he smoke a cigar?

If you like this family murder stuff, Genesis is filled with some great fratricide and attempted fratricide stories too (e.g. Cain and Able, Joseph and his brothers).

Have you read Genesis 21 and 22? What do you think about this Freudian interpretation on the whole thing? What are your thoughts on Abraham's psyche? Are there other places you can think of in the Bible that lend themselves to Freudian interpretation? God does let his only son get murdered, right?

To read more Fun with the Bible about Moses NOT writing the Five Books of Moses, click HERE, or to read about Philippians 4:8, try HERE.

REPUBLICAN BRAND: THE MEAN-SPIRIT

aliceparris — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 18:52:54 +0000

Soon everyone will see just how much negative and mean-spirited energy that the Republicans are capable of. The rash of ads after the announcement of the Obama-Biden ticket are just a beginning. This is not shrewd, clever, noble or decent. This is very misleading; as during a primary in which many are competing for the same job, there will be these type of statements made. Biden did not have a laundry list of criticisms, he had but one. Also, when did the Republicans become an authority on Freudian slips, deeming human error a flagship of Sigmund Freud? Desperate. During the two years that Senator Obama has won a hard-fought battle against Senator Clinton, Obama has gotten plenty of additional experience. He has been above the fray, not because he is an elitist, but because he is a Christian. There was a time when the Republicans were taken over by the "Religious Right" of Jerry Falwell's design. George W. Bush used this same base to make his cronies wealthier.

McCain saw that he was getting nowhere in his earlier bids for the Whitehouse, so he kissed the rings of the reigning powers that be, in order to get the Republican nomination. He wants to be president so very badly. Has anyone ever examined his penchant for blantant envy? Why so many ads about Obama being a celebrity? His strategy team is just as reptilian as he has become. They will cut a throat without batting an eye. They will not win for all of their "clever" tactics nor will the media network, Fox News, which has been annexed by the Whitehouse of George W. Bush. All of them have sold their souls, yet continue to feel justified- or do they feel backed into a corner by the invading "Obama-machine?"

"We can't have gays, stem cell research or abortions! " they cry. Meanwhile, while they hide behind the gospels, they are really a cult of nasty, mammon-worshippers. They have no respect for their fellow human beings and for this reason, they have made America a much poorer nation, not only in fact, but in deed. All of the down and dirty laundry of the Republican party and its surrogates shall be exposed from the utmost to the least most. Don't those sitting in their churches see that most of the "building programs" of their churches have been "bridges to nowhere?" What good does it do to not "...love your neighbor as you love yourself?" All of the works done under this banner shall be exposed to the light of moral truth. With all of the Republicans who have been in charge since Roe vs. Wade, there has not been any over turning of this piece of legislation, although most of the elected officials of the Republican party (since that time) have run on this same platform.

What business do old, shriveled men have telling women what to do with their bodies? Should women, now legislate if a man can have an elective vascectomy? Who is holding up the stem-cell medical research which will help stop much of the suffering of the people that ARE ALREADY HERE? Gays are here. They have always been here. Limiting their freedoms will not make them go away. Those who have run on these "anti-gay" platforms have become quite wealthy and powerful in so doing. According to my Bible, God is the only righteous judge. He alone will judge the nations, not the Republicans, Religious Right, or the self-righteous.

Everytime an ad comes out from McCain's "mean-spirited machine," there will be a gigantic light of moral truth shown upon all of those who engage in these practices. Imagine, McCain would not name his running mate until after Obama did, and I understand that as Senator Obama is giving his acceptance speech of the Democratic nomination, an envious McCain will announce his running mate. This smacks of petty jealousy and desperation for media attention. The Republicans have respect for no one but one of their own. They have ruled for way too long. They are now judged. They will lose. They are not on high moral ground. They need to brace themselves for God's backdraft. Afterall, He is "...an all consuming fire."

Alice Parris

Crisi existencial

mirtres — Wed, 20 Aug 2008 10:41:53 +0000

Que la masculinitat està en crisi és fàcilment palpable en la societat en la que vivim. No tan sols passa amb la masculinitat, sinó que patim una gran crisi de valors, valors, que fins al moment havien ajudat d'alguna manera a la societat a configurar-se en petits nuclis anomenats famílies, famílies nuclears, o si m'apreteu, parelles. Sembla que l'èsser humà viu en un estat d'escepticisme total que no se sap cap a on ens condueix, caiem, en la meva opinió, en el relativisme total, difícil de ser materialitzat. Hi ha qui defensa que la humanitat ha arribat a un punt on ja no es pot evolucionar més i per tant involuciona. Jo no crec que trencar amb els valors i amb la manera de relacionar-se i configurar-se en grups sigui una involució, si bé crec que és un moment difícil i que d'aquí la crisi i el poc saber fer que sembla caracteritzar les noves generacions, on m'incloc. Nosaltres ja no hem de fer les coses ni perquè toca, ni perquè creiem en un ésser superior, ni per pressió parental ni masculina. Això, tot i que sigui evolucionar, suposa un trencament total amb la modernitat i la postmoderniat en la que vivien els nostres avis i pares i ens deixa en una postpostmodernitat amb el cul a l'aire i massa coses a reconstruir, refer, i s'ha de fer bé, i això genera por i inseguretat.

Ja ho deia Sigmund Freud a "El malestar de la cultura": ... [las discrepancias entre las ideas y las acciones de los hombres son tan amplias y sus deseos tan dispares, que dichas relacciones seguramente no son tan simples]...

O el meu estimat Joan Miquel Oliver en boca d'un dels personatges a "El misteri de l'amor": ... [el cosmos ens vol alliberar de la responsabilitat de la procreació, pensa que en darrer terme tot se redueix a la reproducció i que estimar una persona no respon a cap altra conseqüència, fins i tot ens hem de posar preservatius, no ho entens? l'amor és de tots els processos psicològics el primer de tots que s'atrofiarà perquè deixarà de tenir sentit, el teu amic està afectadíssim d'aquest nou estat antropològic, és un dels pioners de la decadència humana, pobre!]...

El meu padrí deia que la feminitat està en voga, que la crisi de la masculinitat més masculina es tant palpable com latent. No parlo de tenir la testosterona elevada, com és el cas de Lucía Etxebarria a "Amor, curiosidad, prozac y dudas", com deia la Diana, no parlem només de sexe. Les dones en general i el col·lectiu homosexual, dones i homes, sembla que hem evolucionat més, problament perquè hem lluitat més que l'home heterosexual i que d'alguna manera el cosmos ens està premiant en detriment a l'home hetero de tota la vida. De totes maneres alguns exemplars ja neixen molt evolucionats, altres els hi costa i uns van una mica lents... el cas és que això genera crisi i s'ha de fer alguna cosa al respecte.

No més per avui. Massa idees a la babalà i poca concreció, ho sento!

A Review: Tarzan And The City Of Gold Part 2

reprindle — Mon, 18 Aug 2008 19:45:53 +0000

A Review

Themes And Variations

The Tarzan Novels Of Edgar Rice Burroughs

#16 Tarzan And The City Of Gold

Part 2

R. E. Prindle

The City Of Gold itself, which is a white and gold city, evokes the image of the red and gold ruin of Opar and the Forbidden City of the same title, as well as The White City of the Columbian Exposition. As Burroughs was writing construction was going on for Chicago's second great exposition on the fortieth anniversary of the first. Chicago, incorporated in 1833, was about to present its Century Of Progress expo of 1933-34. So Burroughs would have had his mind redirected to the scenes of his childhood.

What I am going to suggest may seem far fetched to many but having gained some idea of the way Burroughs' mind worked I think the suggestion plausible. Emmett Dedmon tells the following story about the Great Sandow at the '93 Expo. If anyone doesn't know Sandow by now he was the first great bodybuilder who also performed at the Expo. As Florenz Zeigfeld was representing Sandow there is a no reason to think of the story as other than a publicity stunt, but I leave the judgment to you. (Emmett Dedmon, Fabulous Chicago, 1953, NY, p. 235)

Amy Leslie, the drama critic for the News, described Sandow as a fascinating mixture of brute force and poetic sentimentality. On a walk through the Wooded Island...Sandow snipped a tiny cup from a stock of snapdragon. "now, when we were little in Germany," Sandow told the astonished Miss Leslie, "we took these blossoms and pressed them so, and if the flower mouth opened, why that was a sign they were calling us home." As Amy reported it, "he touched the tinted bud and its rosy lips parted in a perfumed smile." Just as Sandow finished his sentence, a Columbian guard shouted that he had violated the rule against picking flowers. To emphasize the reprimand the guard seized Sandow by the elbow and attempted to push him away. At this effrontery Sandow lifted the surprised guard off the ground and held him at arm's length, examining him as though he were a curious discovery. Miss Leslie, more conscious of the dignity of the law, persuaded Sandow to put the guard down, which the strong man did with an ouburst of German expletives and an explanation (in English) to Miss Leslie that he did not think much of humans as guards. "I prefer nice well-bred dogs," he said.

This made a great story that made the rounds of the fair. The question is did 17 year old Burroughs hear it and did it make an impression on him? Strangely enough we can definitely answer that question in the affirmative. Nearly twenty years later Burroughs borrowed the incident for his first Tarzan novel. Not only that but he has Tarzan play the part of Sandow. So, Sandow, Tarzan; Tarzan, Phobeg.

At the end of Tarzan Of The Apes Burroughs replicates the Sandow scene on the Wooded Island when he terrorizes Robert Canler holding him at arms length with one hand. Thus in this novel Tarzan not only holds Sandow/Phobeg at arm's length but raises him above his head throwing him into the stands. Burroughs usually has his characters going their models one better as Tarzan does here.

As Sandow was strolling through the Wooded Island with Miss Leslie so Tarzan strolls through town with Gemnon. Instead of picking a flower Tarzan notices a lion eating a human while no one takes any notice. Cosmopolitan Tarzan inquires for an explanation. Gemnon calmly explains the quaint custom just as Sandow so pleasantly explained his snapdragon story. Dragons, lions, all the same thing. Burroughs does a neat parody and makes his joke but the original was such a great story he can't let it go.

Indeed, Tarzan's habit of picking men up and tossing them around can probably be traced back to this one arm trick of Sandow's. Like I said, you'll probably think it's a stretcher but I think it both plausible and probable. Can't be absolutely proven of course, but we can and have proven that the incident left an indelible imprint of ERB's memory.

That said and moving along to 1920-24 there is also a flavor of H.G. Wells' utopian novel Men Like Gods to be found here. Once again Burroughs turns Wells' utopia around a bit but the tour of Cathne with Gemnon seems to be a paraody of a similar tour in Men Like Gods. ERB was still in the thick of his literary duel with Wells at the time.

The plot involving Nemone is slightly more complex and better worked out than is usual for ERB. Tomos, Erot, M'Duze and Nemone reflect other influences. The plot has the feel of French overtones. Of course we know that ERB read Eugene Sue's The Mysteries Of Paris, Dumas' Three Musketeers and The Count Of Monte Criisto, while the prisoner behind the golden door points in the direction of The Man In The Iron Mask. We also know that ERB had read Victoy Hugo's Les Miserables.

All these may have provided some inspiration. However more directly influential I believe are two other books found in ERB's library as listed on ERBzine. ( www.erbzine.com ) They are Rafael Sabatini's Scaramouche and Stanley J. Weyman's Under The Red Robe. Never heard of Stan Weyman? Me neither but, believe it or not, there is a Stanley J. Weyman Society on the internet that you may join if so inclined.

Both books were hugely influential in Hollywood, each being filmed several times with at least one version getting very good reviews. Let's start with Sabatini. While Weyman, one would believe is all but forgotten, Sabatini enjoyed an excellent reputation down to at least my graduation from high school. Probably not so much lately although my copy of Scaramouche is the Common Reader edition published in 1999 so there must be fans out there.

Sabatini was Burroughs exact contemporary- 1875-1950. Like Burroughs he had to defend himself against charges of plagiarism. His stuff all reads like you've read it somewhere before, so in Scaramouche he presents an extended defense of himself.

Nevertheless he writes in a simple direct style that is 'easy to uderstand' but cleverly presented. Sabatini was obviously one of the first to understand that stories written like movie scenarios had a better chance of selling to the movies.

Like Burroughs he has his point of view which is admirably presented. Also like Burroughs he was intellectually unsympathetic to Communism. His reaction was less emotional that ERB. Although Scaramouche is about the opening years of the French Revolution Sabatini gives it only a slanting attention as he concentrates on people who are caught up in the flood much against their wishes. In that sense there is very little politics in the novel. The participants are merely caught up in the political events.

Scaramouche is a country lawyer unsympathetic to revolutionary ideology but he becomes a revolutionary fugitive when his Red friend is murdered by a reactionary nobleman. The story is well developed and an exciting one with a lot of swordplay. In fact Scarmouche become the fastest swordsman of France. You can see what drew ERB's attention to the novel.

Of more importance for ERB and an undeveloped subplot of City Of Gold is one that involves Scaramouche's ancestry. Bearing in mind that ERB became a voluntary orphan when he was sent to the MMA I think Burroughs found the mystery of Scaramouche's ancestry compelling. Scaramouch is named after the clown of the Italian Comedia Del Arte which also nests neatly with the clown aspect of ERB's psychology.

It is thought that Scaramouche was the illigetimate son of a village nobleman. The fact that the boy was well looked after by this man seemed proof. In fact, as we learn later in the book Scaramouche is the bastard son of his foster father's sister, the noblewoman, Madame de Plougastel. She bore Scaramouche illegimately then trusted him to her brother. Thus on one side Scaramouche was of noble birth. An orphan or pretended orphan's dream. His father remains a mystery for the moment.

Scaramouche's friend had been murdered by the nobeman Le Tour d'Azyr. Scaramouche had sworn an eternal enmity to him. At a crucial moment in the story Scaramouche learns that this same La Tour d'Azyr is his father. I should have seen it coming from a long way off but I didn't. It is possible that ERB was surprised too. Sabatini handles it well. Thus Scaramouche the illegitimate child is a nobleman by birth on both sides but the Revolution invalidates this advantage.

It would have been normal for Burroughs to have concocted a fantasy in which his parents now dead to him were not his real parents but some mysterious others. In fact he did concoct two fantasies: the one of John Carter who has been alive forever but can remember no parents and Tarzan whose parents were killed with the result that he was raised by ape foster parents. Not exactly noble people in the ordinary sense but his deceased parents were. One imagines the impact this really good story had on him although he first read it in the early twenties.

In any event he attempts to weave in a subplot providing mysterious parentage for Nemone and her brother Alextar. The subplot isn't very well developed. On the one hand we are asked to suspect that Nemone was the child of the old king and a Black M'duze who in her youth was tall and beautiful while on the other hand it is insinuated that Nemone is the child of Tomos and M'duze. The latter through her machinations has placed Nemone on the throne and imprisoned Alextar. So Burroughs throws in some misceganation which has always been the most excing literary topic of America, then as now.

Not convincingly done by ERB he had nevertheless carried the story of Scaramouche around in his head for a decade waiting for the opportunity to employ it.

Another book in ERB's library which is influential here is Stanley J. Weyman's Under The Red Robe. Like Scaramouche this story was very well thought of in Hollywood being filmed more than once. It seems a fact that ERB saw the 1923 silent film. He was so impressed that he went out and bought the 1923 Grosset and Dunlap Photoplay Edition. I obtained an identical copy so as to to have read the same text and viewed the same plates.

I think I'll have to include a few of Burroughs' experiences at the MMA to bring this all together. It would seem that Sabatini considered himself a psychological orphan also. The man was born in Italy to an Italian father and an English mother. As they were traveling actors, not unlike what Scaramouche becomes at one point in his story, they sent young Rafael back to England to live with relatives. As Sabatini's stories often concern orphans it follows that his reaction to being put away from his parents was that he considered himself an orphan.

Burroughs was also put away by his father. Three times. He was sent to Idaho, Massachusetts and Michigan. Thus he too was put away by his parents. As his reaction was to play the clown developing an off beat sense of humor we know that he reacted negatively to all this shuffling about. His exile to the Michigan Military Academy was the straw that broke the camel's back. He rebelled, running away. The incident is treated rather uncomprehendingly by Porges in his biography which of course is my authority.

From ERB's point of view the MMA was an elite reformatory school where bad rich boys were offloaded by their parents. Thus the boy was declassed and slgihtly criminalized in his own mind. As he treated his own sons and the Gilbert boy the same way it is easy to see how seriously he was affected by the experience. ERB was cast adrift with no direction home which happened so many times to characters in his stories, most notably in the original short version of The Lad And The Lion. ERBzine should publish the magazine version of this novel

Having run away from the MMA he was promptly escorted back by his father becoming in his own mind an orphan as in Tarzan's case and a motherless child as in John Carter's. Like the race horse Stewball of musical fame, Carter just blew down in a storm. Another standard orphan's solution to being forced outside society.

Stanley J. Weyman's (1855-1929) novel also meshes with this persona. As a result of his mistreatment Burroughs developed a very negative self-conception. He became, in fact, a ne'er-do-well. Much to his father's satisfaction I might add. This self-conception would explain his eccentric behavior from the time he left the MMA in 1896 through 1903 if not for the rest of his life. The man was conflicted. On the one hand he knew he was very capable and on the other he felt worthless so he sought failure.

A fact easily glided over is his quarterbacking and captaincy of the MMA football team. One's team members don't elect one captain unless they have confidence in you. One also cannot be quarterback without their confidence while quarterbacking requires organizational and executive abilities. In fact the Burroughs led team defeated all comers in their class and while yet high schoolers they played the varsity teams of Michigan and Notre Dame. The Burroughs led MMA fought the U of M to a tie.

As a result he was offered a football scholarship to the University. He might well have become a football hero having an entirely different kind of life. ERB inexplicably declined the U of M offer. He offered some lame excuse that both his brothers had attended Yale and it was Yale or nothing for him. Possible but hardly probable. Most likely he felt comforatable leading the juvenile delinquents of MMA while he didn't feel respectable enought to lead the Wolverines.

Leaving for the Army as an enlisted man instead he and a few other ne'er-do-wells formed a group calling themselves The Might Have Seen Better Days Club. You don't have to be a Freudian to figure that one out. So I think his history in these years can be explained by his negative orphan self-image.

There is one very crucial event, the shame of which never left him, that figures into the Nemone story. That was when in Idaho he gambled away his and Emma's last forty dollars. Certainly this was a turning point in his life.

In Weyman's Under The Red Robe the hero is a ne'er-do-well who has exhausted all his chances but one. Named de Berrault the story opens when he is accused of using marked cards in a French game of the early seventeenth century. "Marked Cards!' are the opening words of Weyman's novel.

Indeed it would seem certain that Burroughs felt he had been cheated of his forty dollars. In my experience of card games I'm certain he was. De Berrault insists he didn't use marked cards but that he used the mirror behind the player. Perhaps Burroughs said to himself when reading this: Yeah. that must have been it. At any rate thirty years later the incident was green in his mind and Why Not?

While The City Of Gold is crtical of Nemone/Emma ERB could never forget that he had done Emma wrong in gambling away those forty dollars. Perhaps as much as anything his shame required a separation. Perhaps he thought Emma was too good for a ne'er-do-well like himself.

And then there is this very interesting passage in Under The Red Robe p. 208:

I stood a moment speechless and disordered; stunned by her words, by my thoughts- so I have seen a man stand when he has lost all, his last at the table. Then I turned to her, and for an instant I thought that my tale was told already. I thought she had pierced my disguise, for her face was aghast, stricken with sudden fear. Then I saw that she was not looking at me but beyond me, and I turned quickly and saw a servant hurrying from the house to us.

Just as I admired ERB's version of this device of looking past the intermediate person so he admired Weyman's.

The line 'I stood there speechless and disordered, stunned by her words, by my thoughts- when I have seen a man stand when he has lost his all, his last, at the table...' must have resonated with ERB from the time he had experienced the same emotion in 1903 as Emma waited for him upstairs.

It becomes seen how ERB wove his various influences into his writing. At this point I would like to bring up another very long novel that formed a backdrop to ERB's writing in general. the novel is the ten volume, five thousand page work of George W.M. Reynolds entitledThe Mysteries Of London or alternatively, The Mysteries Of The Court Of London. Modeled after The Mysteries Of Paris Reynolds lacks the lunacy of Eugene Sue but maintains a fantastic level of excitement all the way through. 'The Master Of Adventure' may very well have learned his own mastery from the pages of Reynolds.

The further one gets into ERB library the more clear things become but to really understand the man I highly recommend the reading of the Mysteries of Paris and London.

Another almost irrelevant theme ERB takes up in this novel is the theme of the Grand Hunt or the Man Hunt. The idea is no way original to ERB; he seems to be in reaction to it, repelled by it. I can't pretend to trace the story back to its origins but the theme has been used repeatedly in movies and on television. The story is attributed to Richard Edward Connell who is credited with writing the original short story in 1924 for which he received the O. Henry Prize for that year, entitled The Most Dangerous Game. Perhaps the story was original to him but it doesn't seem likely.

The story was made into a movie starring Joel McCrea in 1932. Whether this movie was released early enough in the year to influence City Of Gold I don't know, or, perhaps Burroughs saw an advance screening. At any rate ERB gives the idea an extended treatment and prominent place in his novel, actually using it twice.

If Connell did indeed orginate the story in 1924 which seems unlikely than Buroughs treatment comes as close to plagiarism or, perhaps, appropriation as any story could. That he is in raction to the story condemning its implications is obvious.

In his version Tarzan defeats the aims of the hunters by carrying their intended victim to safety while adding the filup that he too was an intended victim. At the very least the Man Hunt is one of the least disguised influences in the corpus. Extraordinary in that no ruckus was raised by his appropriation of the story. Either ERB was not taken seriously or he led a charmed life.

Should I stay, Or Should I Go?

The crux of the story is Tarzan's relationship with Nemone or, in other words, ERb's relationship with Emma. If the oeuvre is a guide ERB had already decided to throw his lot with Florence. That seems clear from Tarzan And The Leopard Men. City Of Gold then is mere procrastination. One imagines that Florence was pestering him to break the news to Emma. He would only muster the courage to do this at the end of 1933. For now he seems torn and indecisive.

The appearance is that Tarzan and Nemone would have gotten together but for two things. The first was M'duze who seemed to exert some sort of hypnotic control over Nemone and the other was her pet lion, Belthar.

M'duze was determined to maintain control over Nemone while Tarzan just left a bad taste in Belthar's mouth. It were well that Tarzan kept his distance.

In point of fact Tarzan was a prisoner on parole. He could easily have escaped or walked away but for two things: one was his fascination with Nemone and the other was that he was bound by oath to Gemnon to not escape. In those days people had a sense of honor.

ERB had constructed an interesting psychological situation in the female image of Nemone. ERB has been really successful in portraying the Xy male construction of the Anima and Animus throughout the corpus but this is his first attempt as far as I know of constructing the XX of the female.

This is always the qustion of whether he knew what he was doing. This is a difficult question to answer but the enidence in the writing seems to imply he did. The situation seems too perfect to be accidental. As I've noted elsewhere when the chromosomal division took place and sexual identities came into existence of the four possibilities, XXX and y, the male received an X and the y with the y making him male. You can't be male without the y, you can't be female with it. Boys are boys and girls are girls. Now, this is not an 'oh wow, isn't that interesting' type of fact; the fact has consequences.

For instance the whole burden of child bearing became the female's portion. I am not interested in all the different possibilites of how young are fertilized, incubated and born, yes, there are myriad possibilities but none of them apply to human beings but this one. The method for human beings is impregnation in the womb, a nine month incubation period and then birth followed by a very long period of helpless development outside the womb.

These simple facts determined the post partum relationship of the role of the male and the female. When paternity was unknown the result was close knit communities held together by the offspring. It was a question of interdependence whether Freud thought so or not.

Physiologically the male required the female for sexual release while the female was attracted by the y chromosome of the male, the penis envy for which Freud was castigated for uttering. He wasn't always right but he was right on this.

While the female is XX chromosomally still one X is received from the mother which is of the passive ovum; the other X is received from the father's mother through him in the form of an active X sperm. The two Xes while both X are not identical. If both were passive the female would be virtually immobile.

Thus ERB posits the ovate X as M'duze who dominates Nemone's Anima, which would be correct, while the male lion Belthar provides the activity of the X of the Animus. Whether Burroughs thought this out or not, it works out. Could be accidental, I suppose.

Lacking the y chromosome which she formerly enjoyed during the sexless period the female has an uncontrollable longing for the male or penis. Thus Nemone and her desire for Tarzan. Now, this is classic, no matter how indifferent or rude Tarzan is to her Nemone continues to have an intense longing, or love, for the Big Guy.

This may or may not reflect Emma's attitude toward Burroughs but Tarzan's attitude toward Nemone certainly reflects Burroughs attitude toward Emma. In point of fact, Emma's fidelity is nothing short of marvelous.

Also in Weyman's Under The Red Robe which is an influence on City a subplot concerns the relations between a Mademoiselle de Cocheforet and the protagonist, de Berrault. The lady distrusts the gentleman, as well she might as Cardinal Richelieu has suborned de Berrault to surreptitiously arrest her brother as a Huguenot. De Berrault conceals his intentions but is found out when he arrests Mademoiselle's brother. Construing the arrest as a betrayal of her trust, which it wasn't de Berrault forfeits the lady's trust.

Thus the novel combines the fateful card game with the forfeiture of Emma's trust. Having lost her trust ERB was never able to gain it back even though Emma continued with him loving, one supposes, the man despite his faults. Quite possibly the situation between Tarzan and Nemone portrays the actual relationship between ERB and Emma in which as they were about to unite the past comes between them.

Thus in Tarzan and Nemone's first encounter Tarzan has fallen under Nemone's spell being about to succumb when M'duze, or Nemone's Anima, appears as though from the past, taps the floor with her staff breaking the spell while ordering Nemone from the room. Belthar, Nemone's Animus, rears up on his chains roaring and clawing the air at Tarzan.

Thus both the Anima as represented by M'duze and the Animus as represented by Belthar interfere in Nemone's attempt to realize her desire for Tarzan.

The scene is repeated in reverse later in the novel as Nemone is about to succumb to Tarzan's spell M'duze appears once again to disrupt the relationship. Thus as in real life neither Burroughs nor Emma could get past that fatal card game.

In the end then Tarzan presumes on Nemone's desire too much. She turns on him in the fury we all saw coming making him the object of the Grand Hunt. One sees the influence of The Most Dangerous Game in ERB's mind. He is given a head start and then Belthar is released to pursue him. Thus he is about to be destroyed by Nemone's Animus. ERB probably felt this way about Emma in real life.

We have never seen the resourceful ape-man so defenceless and helpless before but now without his father's knife to murder virtually defenseless lions Tarzan calmly awaits death after a game attempt to outrun Belthar. He should have played dead; we all know that story by now.

Not to worry. All during the novel a mysterious lion has been tracking the Big Bwana appearing at intervals in the story. Perhaps some people were mystified as to who this lion was but not this writer, no sirree, Bob. I knew it was Jad-Bal-Ja all along. I was just surprised the Golden Lion hadn't brought Nkima with him.

Now just as Belthar rears to cut the Big Guy down to size Jad-Bal-Ja flashes past Tarzan to destroy Nemone's lion. As ERB says, Jad-Bal-Ja won because he was bigger. Does that mean that ERB's ego was bigger than Emma's?

The oeuvre needs a complete analysis of Tarzan and his relationship to animals for on one hand he is a beast. The lion situation is complicated by the fact that originally there were to have been both lions and tigers in the series. That would have changed the complexion of the stories.

However after the magazine publication of Tarzan Of The Apes the readers created an uproar about the fact that there were no tigers in geographical Africa so Burroughs was forced to change tigers to lions for book publication. I am unaware whether changes were made to the newspaper serialization of the story.

The appearance is that Burroughs intended tigers to be villainous while lions were intended to be noble, as witness Jad-Bal-Ja. In that situation most, if not all, the lions Tarzan killed would have been tigers. Thus while as David Adams points out Tarzan kills a lion to put a seal on a sexual situation the very likely killing would have been a tiger.

So the psychological aspect of the story gets skewed. Just as Burroughs has insisted that Tarzan killed deer while there are no deer in Africa so his readers forced him to change Bara the deer to Bara the antelope by Tarzan The invincible.

The climax of the story returns us again to the problem of lions in Burroughs. As David Adams points our Tarzan kills a lion to put a seal on a sexual situation. In this instance Tarzan is helpless but Jad-Bal-Ja his Anima substitute comes to his rescue which is the same as Tarzan killing Belthar. Thus the killing of Belthar seals off Tarzan's relationship to Nemone and ERB's to Emma.

I'm sure David Adams would take exception with me but I see Jad-Bal-Ja as an Anima figure of Tarzan/Burroughs while I see Belthar as the Anumus figure of Emma/Nemone. I know both lions are males but the lion male or female is associatied with the goddess or Anima in Greek mythology. A case can be made that the six gods and six goddesses are generalized archetypes of the character types.

Now, Jad-Bal-Ja came into the oeuvre at a critical time in the lives of ERB and Emma and at a critical juncture. It is known that ERB walked out on Emma several times in the course of their marriage. These instances are not well documented at this time. It would appear that a very serious conflict in the marriage began at the time of Tarzan The Untamed through the period leading up to the writing of Tarzan And The Golden Lion.

As Golden Lion opens Tarzan, Jane and Jack are returning from Pal-Ul-Don from whence Tarzan has retrieved Jane.

As I read the story there seems to be a certain coolness and distance between Tarzan and Jane on Tarzan's part. At this point the lion cub who will become Jad-Bal-Ja makes his appearance standing in the middle of the trail. David's sexual seal of the killed lion would be the cub's mother who was accidentally killed by a Native who stumbled on the lioness and cub. As a defense mechanism against Emme/Jane Tarzan/Burroughs adopts the cub as an Anima surrogate.

In an email to me of 1/23/07 David makes these comments:

Through the first nine Tarzan novels the hero gradually establishes the lion symbol as his own until in Tarzan And The Golden Lion he is completely aligned with his source of power in the merging of lion symbol and self/Jad-Bal-Ja. Even though Jad is described as a glorified dog, this is only his personal devotion to the ape-man being explained in easy terms. Tarzan himself always respects Jad, saying "A lion is always a lion." he is far from the domesticated ones in Cathne in purpose and spirit.

My thinking is that David is right in that the lion symbol and self are united but not within the ego but separately as the Anima and Animus. So what we have is Anima/Jad-Bal-Ja and Animus/Tarzan. Tarzan is sort of doubly armed with two masculine sides with Jad-Bal-Ja being associated with the goddess and partaking in some way of her femininity.

There wouldn't be too much of a conflict between the female Anima and the Male Anima figure as ERB's Anima was subsumed by the male fencing master Jules de Vac of The Outlaw Of Torn. De Vac killed ERB/Norman's Anima figure Maud and then assuming female attire lived with Norman in the attic of a house over the Thames for a fairly long period of time thus becoming a substitute Anima.

Thus the anomaly of a male lion Anima is easily explained. As a symbol of the goddess Jad-Bal-Ja is, as it were, clothed in female attire as was De Vac. Further Jad-Bal-Ja is always indifferent to Jane/Emma. Jane has no real relationship with the Golden Lion.

David once again:

The mad queen of Cathne, Nemone, is an example of negative Anima, a feminine power corrupt and dangerous. Her lion Belthar is the dark shadow opposite of Tarzan and Jad who are symbols of power and light and sun. Her lion is treated as a dark god and is linked to Nemone's own dark soul. When Jad kills Belthar, Nemone kills herself because the source of her power is gone. It is an archetypal case of light overcoming darkness. The masculine power of light overcoming a dark feminine anima.

In the general sense I have no problem with David's analysis although I would argue that Belthar is Nemone's Animus. Nemone is playing the part of Circe in the myth of Odysseus while that story is the triumph of the male ego in freeing itself from matriarchal sexual thralldom. This whole series of novels is related to the Odyssey. So that, in that sense Tarzan is imprisoned by the charms of Nemone/Circe. He is being emasculated, deprived of his will, by the feminine will by one might say, the maneater, Nemone.

In fact Nemone as ruler of Cathne has emasculated the leonine male power. As David Adams sagely observes:

In Cathne lions are employed as domesticated animals for the purpose of pulling chariots, hunting and racing. This is a reduction of the power of the lion symbol to the mundane, even to the point of being ridiculous. It is a degradation and humiliaton of ERB's ultimate symbol of power and virility.

Yes, and that would be in keeping with the story of Circe who turned Odysseus' crew into swine and would have Odysseus except that he had a pocketful of Moly, a charm to set Circe at naught. Likewise the queen of the City of Gold of the Legends Of Charlemagne who enchanted the paladins of that king, except for one who then freed the others.

So, Nemone had Tarzan at her mercy except for the strange situation of the lion of ERB's Anima defeating the lion of Nemone's Animus.

Once this was done the charm of Nemone/Circe/Queen of the City of Gold was destroyed with the City of Gold being restored to male supremacy and Alextar restored to his rightful throne. Things were then returned to their rightful order as in the domains of Circe and the Queen. We are led to believe that a Utopian age begins. This may be a slap at Wells and his Men Like Gods.

Conclusion

This review completes this very important series of five novels. Obviously I consider the key novels to be Tarzan The Invincible, Tarzan And The Leopard Men and Tarzan And The Lion Man. These novels are more directly concerned with ERB's political and religious opinions. A trilogy concerning ERB's sexual problems could be made up of Tarzan Triumphant, Leopard Men and City Of Gold bracketed by Invincible and Lion Man but Triumphant and City Of Gold appear to me to be more minor key than the other three.

Nevertheless these five novels usually treated as the least significant of the series are the most crucial to the understanding of Burroughs while being very good stories in themselves.

Excluding Tarzan And The Foreign Legion that is outside Burroughs' psychological development, although a good story, ERB published only another three Tarzan novels in his lifetime and they were all decidedly inferior to that which preceded them, still good stories, but ERB's concentration had been broken. Tarzan's Quest is the best of the last three but just as Lion Man ends with Burroughs' dreams going up in flames so does Quest. Perhaps eccentric best describes Tarzan And The Forbidden City. The title says it all. He was never to find salvation; the doors of the Sacred City remained closed to him. Tarzan The Magnificent while having exciting episodes just doesn't come together.

Magnificent less Foreign Legion concluded the oeuvre until Castaways and Madman were discovered twenty years later. However Burroughs himself chose not to publish those books so they must be an addendum to the series. The two posthumous novels complete ERB's psychological development being important in that respect for the student.

Further his psychological development was brought to a head during the writing of these five novels. In this tremendous struggle between ERB, the Communists and the Jews ERB was routed by the time he wrote Tarzan And The Lion Man. He didn't think his tactics and strategy through to the end.

Thus ERB's whole life was a prelude to the Gotterdamerung that ended as Tarzan fled the City of God.

ERB's whole life is a magnificent adventure that in itself would make a tremendous movie with the right and unfettered treatment. It could the grandest of grand opera worhty of Mozart. I'd like to see it; even better i'd like to write it.

A Review: Tarzan And The City Of Gold Pt. 1

reprindle — Sat, 16 Aug 2008 22:27:37 +0000

A Review

Themes And Variations

The Tarzan Novels Of Edgar Rice Burroughs #16

Tarzan And The City Of Gold

R.E. Prindle

Tall, magnificently proportioned, muscled more like Apollo than Hercules,

Garbed only in a narrow G-string of lion skin

With a lion's tail depending before and behind,

He presented a splendid figure of primitive manhood

That suggested more, perhaps, the demigod

Of the forest than it did man.

E.R. Burroughs

This novel follows Tarzan And The Leopard Men in the sequence in which the novels were written. Ballantine lists it as number sixteen while placing Leopard Men in eighteen in the sequence in which they were published. In order to understand Burroughs' psychological development however Leopard Men should be read before City Of Gold.

The amazing use of symbolism in Leopard Men is continued in City Of Gold. I am convinced that at this

[caption id="attachment_228" align="alignright" width="158" caption="The Swami"][/caption]

time Burroughs was investigating the Indian religion of Vedantism. Swami Prabhavananda had established a temple in Hollywood at the beginning of the decade which quickly took hold. The symbolism would be employed by the Vedantists while Burroughs' interest in symbolism itself was piqued. Shortly after this novel ERB purchased a 1932 volume entitled The Scientific Dream Book And Dictionary Of Dream Symbols by one Johnathan B. Westerfield. Thus ERB was investigating the psychological origin of his dreams. The man was trying hard.

It is clear that this sequence of novels is heavily influenced by Homer, especially by his Odyssey. Homeric motifs run all through these five novels while as Doctor Hermes and David Adams have pointed out Burroughs uses the Athenian monetary unit, the drachma, as the currency of Cathne.

A third probable source would be from the Legends Of Charlemagne volume of Bulfinch's Mythology. In the last Bulfinch tells of a City Of Gold in which an enchantress keeps the paladins of Charlemagne captive. That story seems to be based on Homer's story of Circe and Odysseus, or Ulysses in the Roman telling, so Burroughs combines both stories in his own enchantress, Nemone, of his City Of Gold. One may take the City Of Gold to be the Sacred City of the Iliad.

The rival kingdoms of Cathne and Athne- my spell check just pointed out to me that Athne respelled is Athen which is very close to Athene or Athens- have Greek sounding names reinforcing the Homeric connection.

While the sexual symbolism of Leopard Men is dark and brooding placed in a swamp not unlike the Lernean Swamp of Greek mythology in which Heracles fought the furious female Hydra, The City Of Gold is much brighter and airier, more intellectual than the darker urges of the subconscious.

Having now read many of the Tarzan novels four-five and even six times I am astonished at how well they maintain their freshness from reading to reading. Rather than weary me, each reading is a fresh experience that opens a whole new vista of possibilities. The more I seem to understand of what I'm reading the more signficance the words have as the story seems to rise from the page to form concrete living images, as it were.

In this novel expecially I am impressed by the pacing, the effort put into preparing the scenes and the masterly execution in which each word assumes its independent value almost as though ERB had put as much care into word selection as, say, the poet Tennyson. Of course we all know ERB read Tennyson as well as other verse and poetry while also being familiar with song lyrics. Thus while writing prose he is able to maintain a poetic intensity.

The opening scene is an excellent example of his skill. Tarzan is out hunting when he is spotted by some shiftas. He's in Ethiopia at the end of the rainy season. We aren't told why he is there but he has commanded Nkima and Jad-Bal-Ja to stay home. As a corollary, just before he leaves Emma two years later he will take a solo vacation to the mountains of Arizona. The spatial arrangement conveyed in this scene is that of Tarzan between the shiftas and the prey he is hunting. While he is silently stalking the prey the shiftas are more noisily stalking him. The movement of the shiftas which can be seen by the prey but not by Tarzan who has his back to them is caught by the prey who looks past Tarzan to the shiftas. Tarzan noticing the prey looking beyond him also looks back to spot the shiftas stalking him.

The spatial concepts involved are astonishing while three views of time are also evident. I only picked up on this aspect with my fifth reading. My interest was thus piqued and heightened so that the novel took on an entirely new aspect. The scene as written is so well paced and spaced that it made a vignette I'm sure I shall never forget, while I now long to duplicate such a scene in my own writing.

The patient lulling slow pace of Tarzan's hunt was now broken. As Tarzan's quarry fled, the action between Tarzan and the shiftas became fast, furious and frenzied, while the sexual symbolism bursts into one's consciousness.

As the shiftas bear down upon him Tarzan realizes that he cannot escape by running. If he could have he would have because as Burrughs never tires of noting there is no disgrace in running from a force majeure. Instead Tarzan shot arrows among the the shiftas. Than as a shifta bore down on him lance leveled:

There could be no retreat for Tarzan; there could be no sidestepping to avoid the thrust, for a step to either side would have carried him in front of one of the other horsemen. He had but a slender hope for survival, and that hope forlorn though it appeared, he seized upon with the celerity, strength and agility that make Tarzan Tarzan. Slipping his bow string about his neck after his final shot, he struck up the point of the menacing weapon of his antagonist, and grasping the man's arm swung himself to the horse's back behind the rider.

Abilities like that make Tarzan Tarzan and I'm sure such a feat could be done in reality as in the imagination although possibly not if Tarzan had had the bunchy muscles of the professional strongman. Smooth ones flowing beneath the skin like molten metal are undoubtedly a prerequisite.

Dispatching the shifta Tarzan is now symbolically seated on a horse. The horse directly plunges into a river to swim to the other side. In mid-stream the horse and rider are attacked by a crocodile that Tarzan kills or disables. Emerging from the river Tarzan gallops into a forest where he abandons the horse for the security of the trees.

There in a short passage we have a wealth of symbolism that tells in a few paragraphs what ERB could have developed in many chapter if told in straight prose.

The horse is a symbol of the female. Thus Tarzan as Animus is symbolically united with his Anima. the horse plunges into the river which is also a female symbol representing the waters of the unconscious. Still mounted Tarzan is in the conscious sphere above water while the horse is submerged in the subconscious. The crocodile also a female symbol representing the greedy, devouring, emasculating aspect of the female attacks. The horse turns upstream in an attempt to flee the croc. Tarzan strings his bow firing an arrow, as a masculine symbol, into the crocodile's mouth disabling it thus escaping the disabling aspect of the feminine while with strange violence sending the arrow down the throat. One has to think about these things.

The horse scrambles up on the opposite bank signifying a change in life, then gallaps into the forst of the subconscious where one goes in search of oneself. The forest here is the same as all those underground mazes in Burrough's corpus.

Once in the forest Tarzan abandons the horse, or Anima for the security of the trees where he is above it all. Apparently there is a deep cleavage between his Animus and Anima. Now begins a very strange encounter. Burroughs apparently felt he left something of himself on the other side of the river so he goes back for it.

Coming upon the camp of the shiftas he notices that they have a bound captive. As this appears to be what he returned for one can only speculate that the bound captive is an aspect of himself. Perhaps the captive represents his marriage to Emma in which he is in the bonds of matrimony wishing to escape them. Tarzan takes action. At this point Burroughs offers this rather remarkable passage describing the Ape-Man. p. 15:

It was difficult for Tarzan to think of himself as a man, and his psychology was more often that of the wild beast than the human, nor was he particularly proud of his species. While he appreciated the intellectual superiority of man over other creatures, he harbored contempt for him because he had wasted the greater part of his inheritance. To Tarzan, as to many other created things, contentment is the highest ultimate goal of achievement, health and culture the principal avenues along which man may approach this goal. With scorn the ape-man viewed the overwhelming majority of mankind which was wanting in one essential or the other, when not wanting in both. He saw the greed, the selfishness, the cowardice, and the cruelty of man; and, in view of man's vaunted mentality, he knew that these characteristics placed man upon a lower spiritual scale than the beasts, while barring him eternally from the goal of contentment.

In the above quote ERB outlines the central problem of mankind. In the evolution of mankind from beast to homo sapiens the much vaunted mentality of HS has failed to make the transition from the pure mentality of the beast to that of, essentially, the god. In orther words his origins are dragging him back as he tries to make the leap to the next stage of evolution and development.

While having a godlike intelligence rather than using it to elevate himself above primal desires as the direction of the nineteenth century was going, in the early twentieth century Freud undercut the drive to perfection dragging mankind back down to primal desires. This is Freud's great crime for which he should be burned in his effigy of Satan once a year in a great world wide holiday. Thus as Man uses his intelligence to get at the root of things, and I think we're very close to understanding all, Man's primal desires lapsing back into the 'unconscious' of Freud, and make no mistake the current conception of the unconscious is of Freuds' personal devising, devise even more fiendish ways of evil as that knowledge increases. Thus rather than aspiring toward a spiritual contentment Man chooses to give in to desires that lower him beneath the hyena.

Thus Tarzan, who has attained spiritual contentment, and become godlike, looks with scorn and contempt on the humanity of his fellows preferring to think of himself as a 'spiritually pure' beast.

While this attitude is a theme throughout the oeuvre and the corpus as a whole perhaps this rant was sharpened by the developing difficulties at MGM. Shortly after this was written Tarzan, The Ape Man hit the screens scrambling ERB's vision of Tarzan forever. The screen Tarzan has no intellect. In the movie Tarzan's Desert Adventure Boy even has to read Jane's letter to him.

On his way to the shifta camp the ever present Numa is between him and the desperadoes. Taking to the trees of the forest to pass over Numa he spots a strangely garbed man in the shifta camp. Still smarting because he lost his quarry and operating on the primitive logic that since the shiftas had deprived him of dinner it would only be right to deprive them of something they wanted, he decides to free the captive.

He was about to fail in his attempt when the ever present Numa saves his skin by attacking the shifta camp. In the confusion Tarzan and the prisoner escape. The man turns out to be an Athnean named Valthor. Having escaped they must put up for the night. Sheeta the panther is abroad. As David Adams is wont to point out, for Burrough Sheeta is a sexual symbol, so the next scene has strong homoerotic overtones.

The question is who does Valthor represent. He is curiously vague in personality. As Burroughs was obsessed with the Jekyll and Hyde notion at this time I suspect that Valthor is an aspect of Burroughs' own personality with some sort of relation to Tarzan as Jekyll to Hyde. Valthor's life is saved as Sheeta leaps for him so that one feels he may be related in some way to Stanley Obroski, another alter ego of Tarzan, who will actually die in the succeeding novel, Tarzan And The Lion Man.

In this novel, in putting up for the night, Tarzan with his superior junglecraft, finds a tree where two horizontal branches fork. He cuts some smaller limbs to form a pallet for himself for the night. He had eaten but he is unconcerned whether the able bodied Valthor has eaten or not. Tarzan does not hunt for other men. If he hadn't already eaten he would have made a kill and shared the abundance.

Valthor lies down on the ground. Sheeta is watching silently. So silently even Tarzan does not hear him breathe, until readying himself to springs, he quietly brushed a leaf or two. Tarzan hears for his ears are not as yours or mine. As Sheeta launches himself on Valthor Tarzan shouts a warning while rolling from the pallet to descend on Sheeta's back.

Now, this scene replicates a similar scene in Beasts Of Tarzan when Tarzan leaps on Sheeta's back in midair as she was about to leap on the ape, Akut. I hadn't thought of homoerotic overtones between Akut and Tarzan but they may be there. It may be signficant that Akut later became the mentor of young Jack Clayton otherwise known as Korak The Killer.

In the instance of Akut, the ape became sort of a vassal of Tarzan, while in this story Tarzan and Valthor become fast friends although the relationship is one of superior to inferior- Batman to Robin. After killing Sheeta, Tarzan takes a more motherly attitude toward Valthor, making a bed for him in the tree because he knew Numa was prowling the forest. That undoubtedly he knew that before was he leaving Valthor for Numa?

They awoke in the morning. p. 26:

Nearby, the other man sat up and looked about him. His eyes met Tarzan's and he smiled and nodded. For the first time the ape-man had an opportunity to examine his new acquaintance by daylight. The man had removed his single garment for the night, covering himself with leaves and branches. Now as he arose, his only garment was a G-string and Tarzan saw six feet of well muscled, well proportioned body topped by a head that seemed to bespeak breeding and intelligence. The wild beast in Tarzan looked into the brown eyes of the stranger and was staisfied that here was one who might be trusted.

Not exactly a description of love at first sight but a definite tinge of homoeroticism. Brown eyes. In fact Tarzan and Valthor become fast friends. Quickly learning each other's language by the point and name system, or at least, Tarzan learning Valthor's language, they are soon chatting away amiably.

Valthor comes from the mountains but after they wander around for a week he admits he is lost. Tarzan gets the general direction then setting out in a bee line. Their goal is the huge extinct volcano, Xarator, which they soon locate. Just as Leopard Men was cast in the erotic swamps of the feminine as Old Timer lusted and panted after Kali Bwana so The City Of Gold is located in a valley high in the mountains where heaven and earth meet and the cold incisive intellect works best. Tarzan is not going to lust; like brave Ulysses he is going to resist the sexual blandishments of his Circe, Nemone.

Both City Of Gold and Tarzan Triumphant take place near or in volcanos so the volcano must link the two stories. The extent of emotion involved in this one is indicated by the atmospheric conditions as the two men enter the valley. Compare this scene with that of Tarzan The Invincible when Tarzan and La leave Opar. the symbolism is ferocious.

The scene is set in the mountains of Ethiopa. The rainy season is about to end but the last and most furious storm of the season bursts on the two. It seems certain here that Valthor is another aspect of Burroughs' Animus in the Jekyll-Hyde sense. In this case the two are not so widely divergent as Jekyll and Hyde but are closer in aspects . Tarzan is still definitely superior and Valthor inferior.

Athne and Cathne are twin cities in the valley but they have to pass through Cathne- The City Of Gold which is to say perfection- to get to Athne. Athneans are Elephant men while Cathneans are Lion Men. As the two begin to cross the valley the great storm breaks. The storm no doubt symbolizes that storm feared by Burroughs of actually separating himself from Emma, certainly one of the most difficult thing he would ever have to do.

The separation must have been terrific internal trauma so that ERB kept putting it off rather than face it. One imagines that as in a situation like this Florence was continually asking him when he was going to tell Emma. It would be another two years before he could force himself to make the break. It is significant that just before he left he took a leave of absence from Emma returning to Arizona where, as here, he stayed in the mountains, the White Mountains of the Apaches. Thus his time in the Army must have had more significance for him than we credit. He must have thought, as miserable as he appeared to be, that those were the happiest days of his life.

In Cathne the rains came down. This was the mother of all storms. Between the thunder, lightning and literal sheets of rain the two were severed from all reality. They were walking ankle deep along the road. Once again they have to cross a stream. ERB has seen such a stream in Arizona, so this whole situation seems to be recalled by his Army days. Actually the nine months he spent in Arizona was a fairly rainy period of fourteen inches. In February 1897, I believe, four and half inches fell probably in one stormy period. ERB records a stream that became a raging torrent in his last Western novel. To some extent then he was writing from experience but already thinking of the good old days before he married.

As hard as it was raining in Cathne the river should have been unfordable but art has its demands.

Valthor knowing the ford begins to lead Tarzan across. He gets too far ahead. Tarzan in his uncertainty misses a step being swept away by the flood. He is now in the possession of the waters of the feminine, that is, his female problems, just barely able to get his breath. He is swept from side to side by the violent action of the waters, tumbled head over heels, but he keeps his mental presence. There is a great waterfall ahead of him which threatens certain death. The symbolism should be clear. In a last ditch effort Tarzan catches a rock hauling himself from the water, if I am correct, on the same side of the river, in other words, Emma. He doesn't cross which is symbolically important. Refer that back to the earlier crossing in which he actually crosses but then returns.

Gathering his senses about him he sees some lights, going to investgate. He unwittingly stumbles into Nemone's garden. Out of the frying pan, into the fire so to speak.

Brave Ulysses has found his Circe.

The scent of the big cats fills this book. Already Sheeta and Numa have had nearly equal billing with Tarzan and Valthor; now lions are given prominence. Now Tarzan emerges from the flood, which symbolizes a major life change, into the land of lions and lion worship. the ownership of lions is a mark of distinction in Cathne, Cahtnean chariots are even drawn by lions which brings to mind the chariots of goddesses like Cybele, Harmonia and Cadmus. Nemone will promise to reward Tarzan with three hundred lions, apparently an incredible number making him the top Lion Man. Remember the next novel Tarzan And The Lion Man will continue the theme.

Continuing an old theme from Tarzan And The Golden Lion a lion is even the god of Cathne. The symbol of Nemone's Animus is a great black maned male lion named Belthar. The novel will devolve into a battle between Nemone's lion, Belthar, and Tarzan's lion, Jad-Bal-Ja. Also continuing an old device employed in Tarzan And The Jewels Of Opar by the jewels and in Tarzan And The Ant Men by Tarzan's locket this story is unified by the image of a great lion drawing ever nearer to Tarzan. So amid all these lions is the true Lion Man, Tarzan's personal lion. His own guardian animal.

It does seem clear that ERB associates the big cats with sexuality.

ERB is building this story very carefully with great attention to spacing and pacing. Captured by the

[caption id="attachment_230" align="alignright" width="269" caption="Gordon Scott As Tarzan"][/caption]

Cathneans ERB takes care to ingratiate the Big Bwana with the troops. He has Tarzan and the Cathnean soldiers enter into a spirit of camaraderie as he introduces them to and instructs them in the use of the bow. Nemone is instroduced but seems to take little notice of the Big Guy condemning him to fight in the arena.

Taken to a prison cell he and we are introduced at some length and in some detail to a character named Phobeg. Phobeg is billed as the strongest man in Cathne.

ERB devotes an amazing amount of space to his confrontation between Phobeg and Tarzan. His development of such a minor character is unusual. I think what we have here is a confrontation between Tarzan and the actual man who inspired Burroughs to create Tarzan, the man who was the physical basis of the Lion Man. Phobeg can be no other than the first important body builder in the world- The Great Sandow. Just as in Tarzan The Magnificent Burroughs takes care to indicate that Tarzan has now replaced H.M. Stanley as the symbol of Africa, so here he puts down 'the strongest man in the world' in favor of his hero.

Sandow (1867-1925) had died a few years earlier. While other muscle men had replaced Sandow, most notably Charles Atlas, Burroughs was still obsessed by the man he had seen at the Columbian Expo of 1893. It would seem certain that ERB occasionally picked up a copy of Physical Culture Magazine to keep up on the latest builds. He couldn't have missed the memorial copy devoted to Sandow, the greatest and still the greatest of the body builders. The award given to Mr. Olympia is called the Sandow.

While bowled over by the strongman, and strongmen, ERB was always offended by the bunchy muscles created by body building. he repeatedly makes allusions to strongmen throughout the corpus while Tarzan himself is both the antithesis and the perfection of the strongman. That is why Tarzan has smooth muscles flowing like molten metal beneath his skin while in this case Phobeg as a Sandow surrogate has the knotted muscles of the body builder.

If Burroughs found Sandow's build offensive he would have gone apoplectic at the most recent champions who seems to have developed musculature as far as it can go. Unlike builders like Charles Atlas, Gordon Scott or Arnold Schwarzenegger who aspired to the Apolline figure, Ronnie Coleman and his successor Jay Cutler have opted for muscle upon muscle until there is nothing but muscle with no attention to a human shape. As an example check out Jay Cutler the current Mr. Olympia and holder of the Sandow at www.emusclemag.com. This guy is only 5'9" but bulks up at 320 lbs., paring down to 275 for performance. And that is literally all muscle. One look at Cutler and ERB would have been foaming at the mouth

Just as Sandow was billed as the strongest man in the world, so Phobeg is billed as the strongest man in

[caption id="attachment_233" align="alignright" width="154" caption="Jay Cutler In Full Pump"][/caption]

Cathne. ERB makes him a braggart in relation to Tarzan but if he was the strongest man in Cathne he had little reason to respect Tarzan's physique which was more like 'Apollo than Hercules.' Tarzan's strength though greater than Phobeg's was disguised.

At they are to fight each other to the death in the arena this allows Burroughs to introduce another of his interests which may be related, that of professional wrestling. Burroughs had Tarzan jokingly suggest that they stage the fight much as professional wrestlers. Burroughs who still attended the matches was disgusted becasue the matches were pure entertainment, something he should have applauded. Then as now the professional wrestling matches were staged. Professional wrestling then as now has more to do with entertainment than sport. Either you can get caught up in the fun and drama or you can't. ERB obviously did although as he still thought of the shows as wrestling he felt put upon.

After several pages of Phobeg's bragging and Tarzan's false humility the 'really big shoo' begins. Tarzan and Phobeg are the last act on the program and they would have been a difficult act to follow.

ERB must have loved this part as the lenghty description of the gambling taking place is many times more detailed that he usually is. Whether the gambling aspect went on at the wrestling matches he attended or not, I don't know. The odds naturally are for Phobeg, whose Cathnean reputation is immense and accurate as concerns the past. Everyone expects the inveterate gambler Nemone to bet on the sure thing as was her custom. They hedged their bets when they could at fantastic odds. Nemone then surprised them by betting on Tarzan. Nearly bankrupted the whole coterie of Lion Men.

Tarzan wins of course but refusing to kill Phobeg he instead does his trademark thing lifting Phobeg above his head and tossing him into the stands at Nemone's feet. Now that is one hard act to follow.

Having now won his liberty, a lion man named Gemnon is assigned custodian of Tarzan taking him under his wing. Up to this point there seems to be no reference to contemporary affairs except for Sandow and wrestling. At this point ERB displays a numerous and surprising set of literary references.

Go To Tarzan And The City Of Gold part two.

O Super-Homem em mim

anadidonet — Sat, 16 Aug 2008 18:00:31 +0000

A Liége me enviou Sargento Pimenta Forever, um livro que analisa, sob o olhar psicanalítico, os efeitos e sentimentos que Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band causou em 15 autores de diferentes gerações, através da releitura de músicas do disco homônimo em forma de ensaios, memórias ou crônicas.

Publico aqui parte da história que Oscar Cesarotto imaginou, com Freud no palco - antes de descrever a também irreal e fantástica apresentação dos Beatles em um festival dos anos '60 -, tudo registrado em película:

“Sigmund Freud era um grande orador [...]. Por isso, as Novas Lições, as conferências da década de 30, tinham tudo para dar certo. Na platéia, discípulos, pacientes, colegas, curiosos e detratores[...].

Freud falava sentado, oferecendo seu melhor perfil, levantando algumas vezes para escrever na lousa. Fumava o tempo todo, e bebia água cada tanto. Fato inédito na história – tanto do cinema quanto da psicanálise -, as apresentações foram filmadas por uma equipe dirigida por Fritz Lang.

A última noite foi o máximo. O programa anunciava um assunto instigante: o problema da concepção do universo. Criando um clima onírico, o espetáculo iniciou com Assim falava Zaratustra, executado por uma orquestra completa, enquanto eram projetadas, num telão, imagens aleatórias de filmes expressionistas. Freud discursou durante uma hora, e depois respondeu as perguntas da galera. No auge, não se conteve, e apesar dos anos e dos ossos, arriscou um stage-dive e se deu bem, sendo carregado pelos fãs de volta ao palco, para cumprimentar, se despedir e assinar autógrafos. Esta foi sua última aparição oficial ao vivo.”

Mana, obrigada pelo presente e por me levar de novo ao museu do Freud. Adorei a visita e o café.

Into the void

Maria — Fri, 15 Aug 2008 21:12:10 +0000

I've no idea where to start. I am writing this because there is probably one person somewhere out there to whom I'd like to address and I don't really think that snail mail – the only communication I have to him – would work this time.

So I am writing here. My problem is that this person out there is unacquainted with me. It's a male. He is not aware of my very existence. Let alone my feelings. And those are complicated. I haven't seen him alive ever. No, he is not dead. He is just famous. Now you say: "Dah, another groupie." Well, here you are to certain extent right.

I tend to have celebrity crushes lately. Since I've got my heart broken, I mean, really broken. In pieces. Like that man in a movie I saw today said: "You broke my heart to a million pieces." So that's what happened to me.

And during my getting over it I fell for this one rock-singer, real charismat. And since then I fall for those famous and talented non-stop. They all seem just right. Of course, their agents, producers, studios and whoever helping them to earn money do their best to sell those guys.

I've been unlucky yet – most of my crushes were out of country, residing mainly in US, being too famous, rich and married to consider anyone like me.

Not that I am not good enough. I am just way out of reach. And I am way too unstable – it's not like I fall for one of them and go down to the end in my attempts to meet him and get him.

I don't really like this my tendency. And who would? I need a man in flesh and blood, not a poster. I mean a picture or video are not what they seem. I am an amateur in photography and cinematography plus my mum works for local tv, so I am the one who knows.

My interests are as unstable as my addictions. I like photography. But I tend to quit from time to time for something I feel more driven to at the moment. Like watching movies, creating videos, filming stuff, writing poetry, writing novels (none finished), essays and short stories (some finished finally, thank god)... I sometimes quit all of it and do something else. Modeling. I learn some texts by heart so that I could feel myself like an actress. I read aloud – to improve my voice skills. I do web-design of my own site. Dedicated to, well, myself. Perhaps, I just need someone to adore me. There was time I learned to sing. Zillion things tried. I come back to some. Photography, film-making, anything connected to self-improvement – these tend to keep on.

But all of it would be great if there were some more time left for my personal life. I hate to say it but I have never been loved. I know not a single man who ever loved me! I mean, LOVED not just said so. And I get more and more critical about men around me. No one suits me fine. And even those my celebrity guys – they tend to fade away, turn out to be not good enough for me. They are either too stupid, or... too stupid.

Yes, I think that I am smarter than I really am. I know that. And the same about everything else. I know that I think too much of myself but not far too much.

The greatest vice of mine is my unforgiving nature. I just can't grant forgiveness. I can consider all the circumstances, think the guilt over, reconsider, but unless I understand the hidden drives of the abuse as tolerable for me (and thus NOT abusive) I just cannot forgive.

And I do not tolerate things I really dislike. If a person has features I don't like, really don't like, I can't go on being nice and polite with that person on the level of close relationship.

So what I am left with is I am lonely and desperate to find LOVE. Not that I want it right now – I find 'LOVE' too binding to be willing to submit to that pressure right away when I am so young – but I guess I want to be loved, I want to see the perspective for myself in some years to find this one and only Mr. Eternally Near.

So if I've came across Mr. Eternally Near let me clear to you why it's E and N in Mr. E. N. It's because currently I have sort of a crush on somebody named Edward Norton.

He is an American actor, very famous and obviously talented. When you see him on screen you believe his every word and it feels like that person, that character he depicts is someone who is really alive.

During last two months I've seen 15 films where he performed. Fifteen. And they aren't short. Not that I felt the time running.

I enjoyed performance of Edward Norton in almost every single piece I'd seen.

By the way, it's his birthday on August 18. He is turning his last year in thirties. 39. I wish I could express my admiration and greet him. Not just a card and a birthday cliche to come with it but something special. To let him know that at least one person appreciates his art. But I believe I am not the only one. I wrote a poem for him. I would've send it if there was any email available. But I don't really feel like sending a snail mail letter. I am thinking about it though.

I wish he was long married. Those men who are married they feel safely locked from me and my admiration. I feel that all my excitement and infatuation won't attract them anyways. Because they've already found someone they mean to love for the rest of their life. And so often these marriages really seem to be happy. And thus I just feel happy for them.

It's not the same if a man is in a relationship. It just sounds too vague, to ephemeral.

So I wish Edward Norton was married. Because since he is not it feels like he is someone you could meet. This tears me apart. I know that it would be stupid to try and get to meet him. Just because you never know whom you are going to see when you meet a stranger, and I believe that celebrity status and news about a person on every piece of media give you nothing but a vague image of person's appearance and some of his habits, features, talents. Only some. Often untrue, or distorted.

I believe many of famous people are wonderful personalities only they could well be not somebody I should like after ten-minute talk. Only they may turn out to be not the people I fell for.

So I hate these my 'little infatuations'. They are hopeless. They are ridiculous. They are primitive tools to make myself protected from real people, real males who might break my heart one more time.

And having my heart broken is the last thing I want.

I seem to be the person who wastes too much time on getting over somebody. I suffer on and on. blame myself and do and think all the typical stuff they write about in those psychological journals. I just don't easily forgive myself that I let somebody leave me, that I was unable to make someone love me.

So I just don't want to waste my life, my talent, my health again. If you'd seen how thin I turned after one year of self-torturing you would've agreed.

I believe some of you might advise me seeing a psychiatrist. A valid suggestion. Let me tell you my psychiatry story.

Not that I believe I could easily find a good specialist who would really help me and not just take my parents' money. I tried to help myself. I read some psychological literature that didn't help me much until I came over Freud for the second time in my life.

I believe that Sigmund Freud was larger than psychiatrist, philosopher, genius, or whatever titles they give him. His works helped me a lot. Now I understand people and myself better. I believe I don't see deep below the surface of human conscious but that turned to be enough not to drown and even more. I am really into psychoanalysis now (among all the stuff mentioned above, the number of Freud's books read and those on my shelf still waiting to be read exceeds that of Edward Norton films seen).

Luckily, now I am quite happy with myself on the whole but one thing. I want to be loved. By a great, outstanding, to a reasonable degree celebrated man. Somebody I would at least spend some great time together.

That's basically what I wanted, needed to say.

I can print this thing out and hang it on my ass so that those around might notice it. I could have send this letter to Mr. Norton to his fan-listing address so that one of his assistants might throw this wasted piece of paper into his office-I-believe-recycle-paper-bin after the second paragraph read at best. I could've waited until I fall for someone less famous and detached, some Ukrainian, or Russian, or Polish, or whatever else is close to me... celebrity and send this to him then with vague hope he reads English. And I can just post it here, to this blog, which address no one of my acquaintances knows, so that some anonymous nobodies would read it some day and feel the same or call it shit.

But I guess what I really needed is putting my wandering undercover thoughts into this online message into the void. Have it typed and posted in public. Thank you for reading and feeling with me.

They say paper endures anything and does not blush*. I am glad now we need not even that waste of the oxygen-providing source.

*a mix of Russian proverb literally translated as Paper will endure anything and Cicero's quote A letter does not blush.

Psychoanalysis, All too Human

Bonni Rambatan — Thu, 14 Aug 2008 14:51:58 +0000

Family failing of philosophers: All philosophers have the common failing of starting out from man as he is now and thinking they can reach their goal through an analysis of him. They involuntarily think of 'man' as an aeterna veritas, as something that remains constant in the midst of all flux, as a sure measure of things. Everything the philosopher has declared about man is, however, at bottom no more than a testimony as to the man of a very limited period of time. Lack of historical sense is the family failing of all philosophers.

Friedrich Nietzsche, Human, All too Human

We all know that historical consciousness starts in the beginning of the 19th century with Hegel, before strongly re-emphasized by Marx and Nietzsche in the late 19th century. But Hegel never got around to reading On the Origin of Species, which was published 28 years after his death. The stupid straightforward question I would like to pose is thus embarrassingly simple: what would Hegel have thought if he had had a chance to read it? What if he had books of Dawkins beside his collection of Thucydides lying on his bookshelf? Would he perhaps extrapolate his Phenomenology of Spirit to a Phenomenology of Species?

When did the self begin? When did the unconscious begin? When did Freudian triad and Lacanian Borommean rings begin? Psychoanalysis is bound to be hit by these questions, as new researches show mirror recognition in animals and robots, various perverse acts of animals (homosexuality, oral sex, prostitution, even necrophilia), beside older findings of animal dreams and stress disorders. While I am old enough to not entertain the possibility of psychoanalytic therapy for a poop-eating dog or your future Roomba, psychoanalysis for me has so much more to do than individual therapy and, as such, is the basis of my philosophical ontology.

A xenolinguistic psychoanalysis is thus only prudent considering the fact that we are currently in the midst of news about all the achievements of bioengineering and cybernetics (the Haylesian posthuman, the Mitchellian age of biocybernetic reproduction). Lacan was certainly aware of a historical sense of man, as were his intellectual contemporaries -- but he was not, I would claim, at the very least, entertaining the possibility of a serious interrogation on Love and Sex with Robots. A recurring subject in my researches is thus an evolutionary Lacanian psychoanalysis by way of a deeper linguistic and communicational research in new realms -- new media, psychedelics, animal communication, artificial intelligence, virtual sex....

As with Hegel and Nietzsche, we cannot forget that man has become. If we are to make a comprehensive cognitive mapping, we should avoid falling into the trap of non-historicity, or, in this posthuman age, the trap of non-evolutionarity. Modifying Nietzsche, I would claim that lack of evolutionary sense is the family failing of all psychoanalysts.

Now Reading: The Interpretation of Murder

aalasanthosh — Wed, 13 Aug 2008 17:54:13 +0000

"The pleasure of satisfying a savage instinct
is incomparably more intense than satisfying a civilized one."
- Sigmund Freud

[caption id="attachment_235" align="aligncenter" width="164" caption="Interpretation of Murder by Jed Rubenfeld"][/caption]

An excerpt from the official website of the book.

The Interpretation of Murder leads readers from the salons of Gramercy Park, through secret passages, to Chinatown—even far below the currents of the East River where laborers are building the mammoth towers of the Manhattan Bridge. Even as Freud fends off a mysterious consipiracy to destroy him, it is Younger who is drawn into an equally thrilling adventure that takes him deep into intricacies, masks and subterfuges of the human mind.