Response to Orhan Pamuk's "The White Castle"

Orhan Pamuk’s The White Castle, like many of the works we’ve read this semester, is about a crisis of identity.  The novel’s narrator, a young Italian, is captured by an Ottoman ship while sailing from Naples to Venice.  After impersonating a doctor in an attempt to save his own life, the narrator eventually end up a slave, working for a scholar named “Hoja” (meaning master) who is nearly identical to him in physical appearance.  Much of The White Castle focuses on the complexity of the slave-master relationship between the unnamed narrator and Hoja, a relationship that is made more complex by the remarkable similarities between the two men.  Both Hoja and the unnamed narrator are intellectual figures, though each has a markedly different worldview, and as they work on building a weapon to destroy the white castle for which the novel is named, they seem to learn from each other in the process.  As the story progresses, the slave-master relationship becomes less and less pronounced, and though the narrator initially thinks that he has nothing to offer Hoja, he slowly becomes aware that the similarity between himself and his master is so profound that the two could easily trade identities.  This realization becomes bothersome to the narrator, and it calls into question, in a more general sense, the nature of human beings as individuals. 

Near the end of chapter 9, the narrator speaks of a recurring dream in which he and Hoja are “at a masked ball in Venice reminiscent in its confusion of the feasts of Istanbul.” (125)  Recognizing his mother and fiancée in the crowd, the narrator removes his mask in hopes that they will recognize him but realizes to his horror that his family is pointing to a man standing behind him.  “When I turned to look,” says the narrator, “I saw that this person who would know I was me was Hoja.  Then when I approached him, the man who was Hoja took off his mask without a word and from behind it, terrifying me with a pang of guilt that woke me from my dream, emerged the image of my youth.”  (125)  The narrator’s identity is so caught up in Hoja’s that the lines are blurred, and even for the narrator, separating the identities of the two men becomes difficult.  This ambiguity related to the identities of Hoja and the narrator is most extreme in the novel’s final chapter, in which the narrator, whose identity is not disclosed, claims to have heard the story from a traveler and written it down.  There is some doubt at this point about whether or not the previously recounted events ever took place, and neither Hoja nor the unnamed narrator are mentioned in the final chapter, only an ambiguous and always capitalized “He.”  It is this section, perhaps, that most powerfully presents the issue of identity and human individuality (or lack thereof), as it causes even the reader to blur the line between Hoja and the narrator. 

Response to Orhan Pamuk's "Istanbul"

Orhan Pamuk’s Istanbul is a memoir detailing Pamuk’s life and upbringing, an autobiographical account of the author’s experience in a city where East and West collide and where the older, wealthier, western way of life is slowly being replaced by a newer, eastern way of life. Pamuk’s family is part of this dying upper class, a remnant of the old city, and his childhood home, a large apartment building inhabited by the majority if Pamuk’s extended family, is described as a “museum.” This description seems to parallel Pamuk’s view, at least in retrospect, of the entire city at the time of his upbringing. In the midst of the dying remnants of the Ottoman Empire and the rise of the Republic of Turkey, Pamuk is walking through a museum, in a sense. He is living in a time and place with significance beyond the present. Instabul, as a city, is incredibly old, with a history much longer and more complex than the American cities with which we might be more familiar. This city, in many ways, tells a story, and rather than a strict autobiography, Istanbul seems like Pamuk’s way of inserting himself into this larger story and telling as best he can based on his own eyewitness account.

One of the most important ideas that Pamuk presents in Istanbul, by my observation at least, is the concept of shared melancholy. “Hûzûn,” a Turkish word that seems to go beyond the traditional English meaning of “melancholy,” is described as a sort of all-encompassing sadness shared by the city. Hûzûn, however, is not merely an emotional experience, it is a state of existence in which Istanbul exists, a mass knowledge and recognition of loss and of change, of the old way of life that is being forgotten. The word “melancholy” comes up again and again in Pamuk’s memoir, and more often than not, Pamuk seems to be using it to refer to the loss, or at least the ignorance, of the city’s past. Istanbul is a city with a story, and this story has not always been a happy one. The change occurring in Pamuk’s own lifetime is one that comes with a profound sense of loss and a somber recognition that the influx of a new cultural era means the loss of an old way of life, one that Pamuk and his family are still part of.

These larger ideas seem the primary reason that Istanbul is a successful piece of literature and an autobiographical account that manages to avoid becoming a self-serving rant or a volume full of unnecessary and vain detail relating to the life of the author. While the book is certainly autobiographical in many ways, it is not a book about Pamuk, and using the name of the city as the book’s title seems an appropriate choice. Istanbul is about the story of the city, a sort of museum in which Pamuk is only a visitor.

Identity Crisis in "Please Look After Mom," "Arabian Nights & Days," and "My Michael"

                In many of the works we’ve covered during the course of our Contemporary World Literature class thus far, the issue and crisis of identity has been a central theme, often contributing to relational and social issues that profoundly affect the characters.  The father in Kyung-Sook Shin’s Please Look After Mom struggles with contentment and a feeling that he wants to be and experience something more.  Many of the characters in Nagib Mahfouz’ Arabian Night and Days struggle with the issue of identity as they find themselves engaging in acts that seem inconsistent with the identity they have created.  This identity crisis again exists in Amoz Oz’ My Michael, this time appearing in the form of Hannah’s false expectations and hasty actions.  In all of these stories, characters engage in actions harmful to themselves and others as the direct result of either the search for or the loss of identity. 

                While Please Look After Mom is, on the surface, the story of a wife and mother who disappears in a Souel subway station, the reader learns much more about the missing woman’s family than the woman herself.  Written in the second person with recipient of the narrator’s speech shifting between the woman’s surviving family members, a substantial portion of Pleas Look After Mom details the thoughts and actions of the husband and father whose wife has been lost in the subway.  It is quickly apparent that this unnamed father and husband is an incredibly conflicted man, struggling to meet the cultural expectations placed on him by Korean tradition while longing to escape in some way and be free of the bondage that is cultural and traditional responsibility.  “All you wanted in life was to leave this house,” says the narrator, “when you were young, when you were married, and even after you had children.  The isolation you felt whenever it struck you that you would spend your entire life in this house, in this dull town stuck in the south of the country, in the place of your birth – when that happened, you left home without a word and wandered the country.”  (130)  The father in Please Look After Mom is a suffocating character, a character whose perception of his own identity is so different from the identity given to him by his culture that he feels a deep need to act, often in seemingly harmful and irrational ways.  He abandons his wife and family in the attempt to close the gap between his reality and his imagined identity, trying desperately not to be the sort of person who lives in the dull little town of his birth.  His self-image is larger and more complex than this culture or circumstances allow for, but his actions to try and correct this problem invariably backfire, worsening his discontentment and sorrow.  “One winter night,” says the narrator, “you came home and your children had suddenly grown up.”  The father’s search for identity has destroyed his family and stolen away his chance to be a caring father, to be present in the lives of his children.

                Naguib Mafouz’ Arabian Nights & Days, a collection of stories focused mainly on the interactions between human beings and genies who tempt the protagonists to act strange and out of character, is also, in many ways, about the question of identity and how one’s identity affects one’s actions.  Sanaan-al-Gamali, a gentle-spirited merchant man who steps on a genie in the night and is asked to kill the governor , struggles with a profound and seemingly uncontrollable change in his actions and demeanor that lead him to question his own identity.  “All his feelings were charged with anger and resentment, while his nature deteriorated as though he were being created anew in a form that was at variance with his old deep-rooted gentleness.”  (15)  The encounter with the genie seems almost to steal away his identity, leading him to question the relationship between his identity and his actions and creating a sense of distance between his actions and his perception of self.  When Sanaan-al-Gamali, driven to a state of madness, rapes and murders a young girl, his loss of identity is so profound that that the event seems like an out-of-body experience.  “He was another person; the killer-violator was another person.  His soul had begotten wild beings of which he had no experience.”  (19)  Sanaan-al-Gamali’s actions are a testament to the danger of losing one’s sense of identity and acting outside of one’s principles and sense of self.  After choosing to obey the genie’s command to kill the governor, al-Gamali steadily drifts farther and farther away from the person he once was, and it seems that Mafouz intends to leave some question as to whether this profound change is the result of the genie’s manipulation or al-Gamali’s free choice.  Whether or not al-Gamali chooses his actions, however, Mafouz shows us just how controlling a crisis of identity can become.  It is a sort of snowball effect, difficult to reverse once set in motion.

                Amoz Oz’ My Michael tells the story of a marriage in crisis, a crisis that is, in many ways, similar to the martial struggle seen in Please Look After Mom and caused by the same sort of struggle with identity seen in both Shin’s novel and Mafouz’ collection of short stories.  Hannah, the wife of a quiet, reserved professor named Michael, struggles to reconcile the reality of her life with her idealized concept of self.  Hannah’s identity, it seems, is deeply rooted in circumstance.  She has constructed a life for herself, planning her life and her relationships in such a way that her value and her happiness depend on the fulfillment of those plans.  This is especially true as it pertains to her marriage, and the central conflict in the novel, one that exists within Hannah’s mind, is the lack of fulfillment she experiences when her plan succeeds.  “I had never wanted a wild man.  What had I done to deserve this disappointment?  When I was a girl I had always thought deep down that I would marry a young scholar who was destined to become world-famous.”  (48)  Michael is a scholar, a hard-worker, and a good man.  He is everything that Hannah hopes for and dreams of, yet she often finds him dull, cold, and boring.  She wishes that he would do something crazy, something out of the ordinary, yet he is always there, always steady, always the same, always Michael.  This discontent, for Hannah, is not only relational.  It is about something much more significant, even, that Michael.  For Hannah, the fact that the fulfillment of her imagined life leaves her empty and discontented calls into question her knowledge of self.  If her desires are fulfilled, yet she remains unhappy, the validity of those desires, of that ideal concept of her life and identity, is called into question.  Hannah struggles to figure out who she is, and as a result, she struggles to know what she wants.  It is this very struggle that continues to increase the emotional distance between Hannah and Michael until their marriage is merely a functional arrangement, devoid of any real passion, love, or devotion. 

                Though entirely different in setting and plot, these three works share the thematic element of identity crisis.  When human beings struggle to know themselves, their relationships and actions begin to deteriorate.   Self-knowledge and a well-formed sense of identity are crucial for a person to be whole and functional, and when some disruption or doubt occurs that affects one’s concept of identity and self, the results can be catastrophic.  The deterioration may be slow and subtle, but it is powerful enough to destroy families, create criminals, and cause unimaginable despair. 

Response to Amoz Oz' "My Michael"

Amoz Oz' novel My Michael is the story of rather distant and dysfunctional marriage between Hannah, a demanding, intense, and complex woman, and Michael, her dependable yet often uninteresting husband.  The novel, set in mid-twentieth-century Jerusalem, begins with Michael and Hannah's courtship and progresses through their strange and often difficult marriage.  Hannah is both the leas trustworthy character and the narrator of the novel, a dynamic that proves interesting for the reader.  Oz' decision to tell the story of Hannah  and Michael's relationship through Hannah does not seem an unreasonable one, but it does emphasize Hannah's discontentment and emotional confusion, making the reader unsure how much to trust her narration.

The central problem in Hannah and Michael's marriage seems a combination of poor communication and false expectations, primarily on Hannah's part.  The marriage begins quickly, with an engagement period of only a few months, and while Michael is exactly the sort of quiet, intelligent, trustworthy professor Hannah dreams of marrying, she comments often that he is dull, uninteresting, and seemingly quite unattractive to her.  Hannah is a restless character, and it is evident very early in the novel and in her life with Michael that she is not nearly content with him or with her life in general.  Oz portrays Michael a faithful and consistent husband, but faithfulness and consistency seems unrelated to happiness for Hannah, and she long for Michael to do something, anything, surprising our out of the ordinary.  She longs for him to be thrilled, or angry, or somehow emotionally charged, but despite her longings, he is always there, always steady, always boring, always Michael. 

A central problem in My Michael is, I think, the problem of silence.  Silence..often the silence of Michael and Hannah in each other's presence, is mentioned over and over again.  Hannah bottles up her desires, her hopes, and her wishes, and Michael goes about a daily routine so predictable that very little conversation is necessary.  He is not necessarily a cold man, but he can seem so, especially to Hannah.  "[We were] so silent and good-natured," says Hannah, "that a stranger might have mistakenly supposed that we were at peace."  (144)  Oz tells the story of a marriage that decays not as the result of harsh words, but few words, and somehow, the destructive force of silence is more terrifying.

Response to Naguib Mahfouz' "Arabian Nights & Days"

Naguib Mahfouz' Arabian Nights & Days is not so much a cohesive novel as a collection of short stories recounting events that are often seem mythical or fantastic.  The collection of stories and myths deals with both natural and supernatural characters, often mentioning the interactions between humans and genies and raises questions about the freewill of human beings as they are manipulated by powerful supernatural or fantastical beings.  In many ways, the questions of choice and freewill seem to me of central importance to Mahfouz' collection of tales, and perhaps the primary question we are meant to ask is whether or not we truly have control over our actions and even our destinies.

Without detailing the plot of each shorter story that makes up Arabian Night and Days, it is safe to say that the vast majority of the collection deals with genies manipulating human beings do commit various crimes and engage in activities that they would not normally engage in.  The first tale in collection that deals with the influence of a genie is that of Sanaan al-Gamali, a mild-mannered merchant who is asked by a genie to kill the governer of quarter after he steps on a genie while walking home one night. The genie Sanaan al-Gamali the option of dying instantly instead, but out of concern for his family and a desire to live, al-Gamali chooses to make an agreement with the genie and carry out the murder so that he might escape death at the hands of the genie.  After making this agreement, al-Gamali becomes inceasingly hostile and unlike himself.  His family and his business associates soon notice the marked change in his demeanor, but nothing the influence of the genie is strong, and al-Gamali seems to slip into a kind of madness.  In one the more shocking passages in Mahfouz' collection of tales, al-Gamali rapes and murders a young girl in the midst of some sort of violent, lustful trance. 

Many of the other tales in Arabian Night and Days also include violent acts committed by humans who are influenced to commit such crimes by manipulative genies, and it is relatively easy to view the genies as some definite force of evil, existing only to tempt, manipulate, and otherwise destroy humanity.  I do not think, however, that Mahfouz intends to convey such a simple message as "genies are evil."  The fact that the humans in Mahfouz' tales have the ability to choose is easy to miss yet crucially important to understanding the series of stories and their overarching theme.  Humans are certainly manipulated by genies in these tales and made to commit actions they would never commit on their own, but their obedience to evil is the result of conscious choice, and though the motivators for obeying the genies are strong, it seems, perhaps, that death at the hand of a genie might be the morally preferable course of action when compared to the murders, rapes, and other terrible crimes committed under the influence of the genies' power.  These tales are so much about choice and freewill, in fact, that it seems appropriate to question whether the "insanity" of the human characters is truly the result of some sort of possession or evil influence.  Perhaps at least part of the insanity exhibited by Mahfouz' characters exists within their own minds; their fears, their passions, and yes, their freewill.

The setting of Arabian Night and Days is never explicitly mentioned, and perhaps the fact that his information is undisclosed to the reader suggests Mahfouz' desire to say something of universal significance.  Though we do not live in isolation from outside influences, our actions are ultimately the result of an internal choice, not an outside force.  Mahfouz' tales are not a denial of the existence of the fantastical, the supernatural, or any other influence that might cause a change in human actions, but they are an affirmation of the importance of choice, and a reminder that our actions are always a choice.

Respone to Kyung-Sook Shin's "Please Look After Mom"

Kyung-Sook Shin's "Please Look After Mom" is, perhaps, one of the strangest books I've read, though I don't mean to belittle Shin's work by saying so.  The novel is strange in all the right ways, written almost entirely in second-person perspective and shifting viewpoints between four different characters.  This is certainly an unusual technique, especially in a work of this length, yet somehow, Shin pulls it off without a hitch.  The book explores the history of mom's interactions with her family members after she mysteriously disappears in a Soeul subway station and is written primarily as a series of thoughts and memories.  Many of these memories involve a combination of fear, nostalgia, and regret, and as a result of Shin's use of second person, the reader is quickly thrown into the situations and emotions that mom's family find themselves dealing with.  In some way, the constant use of the pronoun "you" seems both inclusive and alien for the reader.  We truly feel what the characters are feeling, yet we somehow simultaneously experience a strong sensation of disconnectedness, a feeling that we are spiraling out of control as a result of difficult circumstances and are trapped in an almost out-of-body experience.  It seems to me that Shin must intent this response in her readers as a means of communicating these truths about grief and loss, and if so, she succeeds brilliantly. 

Even more impressive than her successful use of second-person perspective is Shin's success at introducing and developing complex characters within that stylistic approach.  The husband of the lost mother, in particular, is an intriguing character for me, trapped in some sort of restless tension and a slave to his own ever-changing desires.  It would be easy to cast and often-absent father as the villain of the story, but Shin instead introduces us to a man living in deep regret and trying to make sense of both his love for his family and his desire to be free of the seemingly oppressive and unceasingly dull obligations of a first-born son in traditional, rural Korean society.

"Please Look After Mom" is not, as a whole, what I expected it to be, yet it is an incredibly rich and cleverly crafted piece of literature, impressive in it's subtle complexity and technical excellence.

Don't Miss the Point

Literature, for me, is perhaps one of the most "human" things we do, yet the task of creating literature is one that not even those with much practice and experience fully understand.  Literature is, in the most basic sense, concerned with digging through the layers of our humanity; churning up the soil, and trying to point out, using whatever means necessary, something true about humans.  Literature, or at least good literature, asks questions about why we live, how we live, and how we live with each other, and the best literature can take on a life of its own, providing the author with some fresh perspective on our humanity even as she writes.

Because literature seems to possess an almost prophetic power, it has been the subject of human fascination for centuries.  Even before human beings wrote stories down, oral traditions carried on tales through generation after generation, holding them in the highest esteem because they connected both listener and storyteller to some greater reality, some larger picture than the mundane, the understandable, and the close at hand.  This connection to some higher reality and this ability to transport a reader or storyteller beyond himself also makes great literature, in some sense, timeless.  In the year 2012, in Upstate New York, we read Homer, Shakespeare, and Steinbeck, not because we are disproportionately concerned with ancient Greece, Elizabethan England, or the Depression-era Southwest, but because each holds within its pages something profoundly true about our experience as humans, something that makes us laugh and cry and wonder despite the fact that we are far removed in both time and place. 

These concerns, I think, are central to our understanding of literature.  We can, in the academic community, spend incredible time and effort dissecting a text, searching word-by-word for the author's intent, her clever use of language, and her manipulation of the readers' response.  These activities may, for a time, be worthwhile, but if authors wrote novels, plays, and poetry merely as a technical exercise,  as a way of manipulating worlds to flex their intellectual muscle, literature would carry little merit outside the academy.  Thankfully, the elements we so carefully deconstruct and analyze are mere tools that serve the greater purpose of communicating that someone, somewhere, at some time thought profoundly worthwhile. 

As I read a number of works for three different literature courses this semester, my goal is to keep in mind the purpose of literature and to always reference that larger concern even as I examine the details before me.  I hope that as an English major, I take a magnifying glass to the details, the tools, in order that I might better understand how the larger purpose is successfully accomplished.  I hope that I can always be sure to make connections that broaden my perspective and teach me about something greater, even, that literature itself.  I hope I don't miss the point.