My Years With Proust - Day 505

   The reader may remember that Morel had once told the Baron that his great ambition was to seduce some young girl, and this one in particular, and that to succeed in his enterprise he would promise to marry her, but, the rape accomplished, would "buzz off; but what with the declarations of love for Jupien niece which Morel had poured out to him, M. de Charlus had forgotten this confession.  What was more, Morel had quite possibly forgotten it himself.  There was perhaps a real gap between Morel's nature - as he he cynically admitted,  perhaps even artfully exaggerated it - and the moment at which it would regain control of him.  As he became better acquainted with the girl, she had appealed to him, he grew fond of her; he knew himself so little that he even perhaps imagined that he was in love with her, forever.  True, his initial desire, his criminal intention remained, but concealed beneath so many superimposed feelings that there is nothing to proved that the violinist would not have been sincere in saying that this vicious desire was not the true motive of his action.  There was, moreover, a brief period during which, without his admitting it to himself precisely, this marriage appeared to him to be necessity.  Morel was suffering at the time from violent cramp in the hand, and found himself obliged to contemplate the possibility of having to give up the violin.

Marcel Proust, The Captive, pp. 44-45

Proust continues to unravel the bizarre events around the planned wedding between Morel and Jupien's niece.  Remember, both men are former lovers of M. de Charlus, and they clearly hope to use this event as a mechanism for remaining in his orbit, if not his bed.  Proust reports, "The reader may remember that Morel had once told the Baron that his great ambition was to seduce some young girl, and this one in particular, and that to succeed in his enterprise he would promise to marry her, but, the rape accomplished, would "buzz off . . ."  He certainly didn't have to remind this reader because Morel's outrageous comment is still fresh in my mind.  Apparently now Morel has fallen in love with the young woman, and she was in love with him, so no one, other than Marcel, seems to remember the initial declaration.  Proust notes that Morel "knew himself so little that he even perhaps imagined that he was in love with her, forever."  Even this fleeting love is tainted by the fact that Morel is facing the possibility of having to give up the violin and is looking for someone to take care of him.  Once again, women are portrayed as inert objects, and we have another parallel relationship: Morel is physically incapacitated and needs to control Jupien's niece to assure her love and support just as Marcel's is emotionally incapacitated and needs to control Albertine to assure her love and support. I feel like I'm reading The Handmaid's Tale, or the GOP platform.

Mercury's

And after the last somber post, and as a reflection of the fullness of life, I should write about something more joyous.  During our recent trip to Zanzibar we finally made it out to Mercury's Bar.  As a goodly number of people know, Freddy Mercury of Queen fame was born in Zanzibar.  His family were Zoroastrians, and Zanzibar used to be a center for the faith (although sadly all you have now are ruins of Zoroastrian fire temples).  There is a cottage industry there in showing gullible around to the boyhood home of Mercury, which tends to have the validity of most cryptozoological studies.  We ended up there because we were trying to figure out exactly how long it took to walk from the Flamingo Guesthouse to the port to catch our ferry back to Dar Es Salaam, and it's along the way.  It's odd I went there since I won a very famous dart contest (also chronicled on this blog) with Sanford Zale wherein no one is ever allowed to sing or even mention the Queen song Bohemian Rhapsody. Nevertheless, we visited it, despite my objection to shameless tourist spots,  Nevertheless, it was a nice spot and had good food, so, despite my better judgment, I'm sure I'll be back on some future trip to Zanzibar.

I sent this picture to Sanford Zale with a question about why he wasn't there with us.  His response was what you might expect: "because I'm a poor boy from a poor family, nobody loves me."  He was immediately disqualified.

The interior of Mercury's.  It was before noon on a run of the mill monsoon day, so it was empty.  I'm sure that's not the case at night.

This may look like we're partaking in exotic drinks, but instead we're sensibly replacing electrolytes by drinking coconut juice straight from the young coconut.  It's an oddly sensible thing to do.

Doubtless Sanford would have ordered the Bohemian Rhapsody.

If nothing else it was a great place to wait out another monsoon downpour.

Tower of Peace

Trying to organize my generally messy life, I was working my way through some old boxes and came across this flyer from the hotel where I stayed in Sana,a, Yemen.  I suspect I initially came across the Burj al Salam Hotel through a Lonely Planet guide, which is my traditional go to series.  This was over five years ago, a more peaceful time (at least by Yemeni standards), but even then the common wisdom was that you stayed inside the old city center (and, remember, this is Yemen, so we're talking ancient), so I chose this family run hotel in the center of town as compared to the hulking modern monstrosity encamped above the city.  It was a great, although decidedly short, stay, despite my documented struggle with the door.  The horror inflicted upon Yemen by Saudi Arabia and ISIS and AQAP and, yes, the US, over the last couple years made the discovery of the flyer all the more poignant.  Immediately I visited their website, which was still up but didn't seem to be working, and another more general travel site, and attempted to reserve rooms.  The message I received was that there were no rooms available, no matter what days I chose. The best news I received was a running message on the hotel website that read "Testing news coming soon."  It would be sad if the grand old building were destroyed, but the word tragedy is better reserved for the death and destruction of the people of Yemen.

The term Burj al Salam could be translated as Tower of Peace, which seems painfully ironic at this point in time.

My Years With Proust - Day 504

For whereas Morel by himself, naked so to speak, often resisted the Baron whom he felt certain of winning back, once he was married he would soon fear for his household, his bed and board, his future, would offer to M. de Charlus's wishes a wider target, an easier hold.  All this, and even at a pinch, on evening when he was bored, the prospect of stirring up trouble between husband and wife (the Baron had always been fond of battle-pictures) was pleasing to him.   Less pleasing, however, than the thought of the state of dependence upon himself in which the young people would live.  M. de Charlus's love for Morel acquired a delicious novelty when he said to himself: "His wife too will be mine just as much as he is; they will always behave in such a way as not to annoy me, they will obey my every whim, and thus she will be a sign (hitherto unknown to me) of what I had almost forgotten, what is so very dear to my heart - that to all the world, to everyone who sees that I protect and house them, to myself, Morel is mine." This testimony, in the eyes of the world and in his own, pleased M. de Charlus more than anything.  For the possession of what we love is an even greater joy than love itself.  Very often, those who conceal this possession from the world do so only from the feat that the beloved object may be taken from them.  And their happiness is diminished by this prudent reticence.

Marcel Proust, The Captive, p. 44

Ah, the complexity of relationships, especially if the puppet master is M. de Charlus.  Proust reflects more on the upcoming marriage between Morel (his former lover) and Jupien's (another former lover) daughter.  Morel, we are told, "often resisted the Baron whom he felt certain of winning back."  There are many bad reasons to go into a marriage, but it's difficult to imagine a worse one - unless it would be for love.  For the Baron this seems to be about nothing more than control, as Morel and his young wife would be utterly dependent upon him, as the Baron considers, "His wife too will be mine just as much as he is; they will always behave in such a way as not to annoy me, they will obey my every whim."  As Proust summarizes the situation: "For the possession of what we love is an even greater joy than love itself."  Appropriately, this is in a volume entitled The Captive, which deals with Marcel's control over Albertine, and forms another of the parallel relationships that run throughout Remembrance of Things Past.

Old Man

Cue the Neil Young song.  Here's a picture my cousin Nick sent a while back, and one that I've been meaning to post.  It's my Dad, sometimes back in the 1970s.  And, yes, I'll note the similarity. My father just turned eighty, and despite the structural damage caused by his infamous fall out of a tree he's doing well physically.

I don't think I can be too accurate with the year, although I'm guessing more earlier 70s than later, which would make him around fifteen years younger than I am now.  It's strange to imagine Young singing Old Man almost fifty years after he wrote it, but then it's strange to think that I'd ever be fifty-seven.

My Years With Proust - Day 503

   The day may come when dressmakers will move in society - nor should I find it at all shocking.  Jupien's niece, being an exception, cannot yet be regarded as a portent, for one swallow does not make a summer.  At all events, if the very modest advancement of Jupien's niece did scandalise some people, Morel was not among them, for on certain points his stupidity was so intense that not only did he label "rather a fool" this girl who was a thousand times cleverer than himself, and foolish perhaps only in loving him, but he actually to be adventuresses, dressmakers' assistants in disguise playing at being ladies, the highly reputable ladies who invited her to their houses and whose invitations she accepted without a trace of vanity.  Naturally these were not Guermantes, or even people who knew the Guermantes, but rich and elegant middle-class women broad-minded enough to feel that it is no disgrace to invite a dressmaker to your house and at the same time snobbish enough to derive some satisfaction from patronising a girl whom His Highness the Baron de Charlus was in the habit, in all propriety of course, of visiting daily.

Marcel Proust, The Captive, pp. 41-42

Throughout this discussion of Remembrance of Things Past we have dealt, endlessly, with issues of class and of masks, and in this section, both. In yesterday's post we saw the Baron's anger at the common turn of phrase that Jupien's niece had used in talking to him, but at the same time M. de Charlus favored her, even supporting her marriage to the violinist Morel.  We need to keep in mind that both Morel and Jupien are ex-lovers (or maybe not even ex) lovers of the Baron, so this all comes together as a very chummy, and incestuous, charade.  Obviously, the concept of marrying a "beard" is not new.  All this also shows the complex, and decaying, social world of the time.  Yesterday the Baron was pitching a fit about her common language, but he's happy with her marrying into his "family," and that engagement has opened all sorts of social doors for a dressmaker that would normally be off-limits.  Now, it could simply be, at least partially,, as Proust suggests, that it is a case of "elegant middle-class women" wanting to please the Baron, but it's also true that they are "broad-minded enough to feel that it is no shame."  As Proust himself tell us, "The day may come when dressmakers will move in society - nor should I find it at all shocking."  The times they are a changin'.  One has to wonder how much, despite Proust's comment to the contrary, they are a changin' for him.  He's very much a critic, although a subtle one, of societal norms, but he's also clearly a product of those very same norms.

How to Make a Dhow

As we've discussed, on our recent trip to Zanzibar Steve and I explored many new activities to share with the students, not all of them related to spirit possession. One day our friend Abdul brought us to the edge of a mangrove swamp to see how dhows, the traditional boats that have been sailing the Indian Ocean for centuries, were constructed.  In many ways the dhows are still being constructed as they always have.  We found out that a dhow costs around $3000 to construct, which has dramatically changed our retirement plans as we've planning on purchasing one and becoming full-time residents of a W. Somerset Maugham novel (it's always been my plan, but I think I've won Steve over).

The shipyard, around twenty minutes outside of Stone Town, on the edge of a mangrove swamp.

Our great friend Abdul explaining the process to Steve.

The man who is putting the finishing touches on this dhow.  Anyone can stop by and they're more than happy to chat with you, although, and appropriately, they don't mind you leaving a little tip.

The beginning of the process as you lay out the skeleton of the dhow.

And this one is about finished.

It was May, so we didn't escape before having to take cover under a roof constructed out of metal sheeting with the workers as we waited out another monsoon downpour.