3 posts tagged “patrick suskind”
It's possible that while we were dreaming
the hand that casts out the stars like seeds
started up the ancient music once more
-like a note from a great harp-
and the frail wave came to our lips
in the form of one or two honest words.
- antonio machado
I was sitting at a starbucks in downtown Brisbane on a moderately gorgeous day last week with a stack of books acting all poser intellectual like in a sea of beautiful people. I've promised myself that I will make progress on at least two or three books before I head back but I'm falling behind. I've been side tracked working on some code for a facebook app. However, let me get back to the story I was trying to tell before I so rudely interrupted myself. I was reading the Pigeon by Patrick Suskind which I picked up on a whim after re-reading On Love and Death. I enjoy Suskind's writing because his approach towards isolation and neuroticism and wrapping them up in interesting characters. His characters are usually pretty self absored (honest, i'm not like that :P) and perhaps the best example is in Perfume with his most fiendish of characters Jean-Baptiste Grenouille. In the Pigeon the main character is thoroughly neurotic and has built a wall between him and the world but he draws you slowly to his own internal mad house. As I was reading it the following seemingly innocuous lines had me stop and think for a few moments.
"Good day, Monsieur Noel," she said as he passed her at an intentionally vigorous pace.
"Good day, Madam Rocard," he muttered. They never said more than that to one another. For ten years - as long as she had lived in the building - had never said more to her than "Good day,madame" and "Good event, madam" and "Thank you, madame when handed him his email.
I was giggling (like a little school girl) to myself about how there are many of these types of relationships in our lives. In the building I live in I share this relationship with many people. We'll say hello and make small talk but beyond that we don't know anything significant about the other person. It's possible to live years in one place and not really know the people who live next door to you. I wonder if it is a symptom of modern living that we have become quite isolationist. Only seeking refuge in a minimal set of people and otherwise leaving all others at bay with chit chat. I don't really have a good reference point but I'm going to assume there are other cultures out there that do manage to make a stronger community but that could just be because of homogeneity of the people. Do we only seek people who are more like us?
I remember when I used to go home from work late at night the security guard would always say goodnight to me. One day I stopped and decided to talk to him just to find out about his life. It turned out he had lived in lots of cities and had kind of bounced around in life. He was also a huge fan of music (much like myself) and he got very animated when he started talking about playing his guitar. I made it a point after that to spend five minutes with him before I left just to get another story about his life. One day he wasn't there anymore and the new security guard didn't like talking much. I have no idea where the guy is now but I still remember all the stuff we talked about.
One more story before I bore you to death. I used to take a bus home from work in Brisbane many years ago. One day this girl sitting next to me asked me where a particular stop was. I told her it was my stop (perhaps this would have been a great pick up line) and she asked me if I could remind her when to get off. She said she might miss the stop because she was so engrossed in the book she had. When it was time to get off I reminded her and as we walked from the bus stop she started talking about her life. She had come from India to study at a local university and was visiting her cousins for the weekend. She talked about how she was adjusting to life in the dorms and how her one big dream was to become a journalist in NY. After seeing her off at her cousins place I headed home and put the conversation away as another random meeting. A week later I bumped (no, I wasn't stalking her) into her again on the bus and we kept chatting and did the same thing we did before. This continued a few more times and then I never saw her again. The strangest thing was that neither one of us ever asked the other person their name. I guess we were both content having a random conversation with a stranger and leaving it at that. I was reminded of the event when I was walking home after going downtown and passing the same house where the girl had gone to visit her cousins. I was wondering if she ever made it to NY and what her life is like now.
I finished Perfume on the weekend and was spellbound by it. Like all the books I really love I read them very slowly so I can absorb each word and ponder the scene in detail. The story revolves around Jean-Baptiste Grenouille who is born without a scent but has a hypersensitive sense of smell. He is born unwanted and unloved and grows up with a great deal of trauma. His outward appearance is reflects his inner darkness. He does not feel and lives in his own world of smell where he is king. His obsession with smell leads him to murder and most of the story is about journey from a ghost where he is unnoticed to a spectacle. Ultimately this is a story of an outcast who creates his own world and lives by his own rules. He knows enough to manipulate others into getting what he needs and in that he is the perfect sociopath. The notion that he lacks any odor seems to be more of a metaphor that he is unable to truly understand his own nature and therefore can never be at peace with himself. Even when he is lost in the world of smell he is brought back to earth by the face he will never smell himself. I don't want to give away too many details but it's a good read and perfect for the great weather we're having in San Francisco.
The Solitary Man
No, what my heart will be is a tower,
and I will be right out on its rim:
nothing else will be there, only pain
and what can't be said, only the world.
Only one thing left in the enormous space
that will go dark and then light again,
only one final face full of longing,
exiled into what is always full of thirst,
only one farthest-out face made of stone,
at peace with its own inner weight,
which the distances, who go on ruining it,
force on to deeper holiness.
- rilke
I was wandering through borders yesterday when I picked up Love and Death by Patrick Suskind (yes, there's supposed to be an umlaut there but I can't be arsed putting it in). It's a sublime meditation on love and its deep connection with death. He provides examples from his own life but focuses heavily on what other writers through out time have had to say. He's the kind of guy that has this deep appreciation for everything that happens in front of him. I see him as insightful as Rilke about the human condition. There's a certain depth to him that lets him penetrate words and meanings and provide moments of clarity when you read what he has to say. It's a very quick read but something that has to be read slowly to truly appreciate the weight of his words. I was out reading in the sun so I had plenty of time to read and meditate. It prompted me to pick up perfume which I haven't started yet but if it contains the same kinds of insights I know I will love it.
