Tuesday, November 13, 2007

Mantissa

For my close reading on Mantissa, I'm chose the passage on page 164 where Erato says, "'Everything must be 'real,' or it doesn't exist. You know perfectly well the real 'real' me is imaginary. I'm only being real in your sense because you want me to be.'" I read this as both postmodernism (more specifically Baudrillard's idea of hyperreality), and as Lacanian, concerning the real and the imaginary.
Lacan came to mind when I read this because Lacan says the imaginary is the split between the real self and the incoherent self, between self and other. While reading this book, I've been reading it in a few different ways. One of which being that Erato is Miles Green's feminine half, and full recovery would mean a merging of these two characters, which is shown through sexuality. However, Erato is also Miles Green's fantasy(ies), and Lacan says that the 'real' is the end of fantasies, but it would be traumatic for the individual if they ever did reach the 'real.' This could be seen as an outline of the relationship between the two throughout the story.
Lacan also says that one will journey through life judging through "the other" - Erato may also stand as "the other," and Miles is judging his life through her...also, the 'symbolic' comes into play because once one moves into the symbolic, one becomes a subject of language and representation, and how we experience ourselves is not through the 'real' - it is through the symbolic - and although this is not part of the passage I chose, at the end of the novel Miles and Erato are talking about how they want to enter a "text without words" - they want to be void of all dialogue. I see this as a desire to leave the symbolic and enter the real, no matter how traumatic and impossible it may be. They see that as the ultimate goal, as Lacan saw it, but something impossible to capture.
I thought of it in a hyperreality sense, too, especially when she says, "'You know perfectly well the real 'real' me is imaginary. I'm only being real in your sense because you want me to be.'" This made me think kind of the Matrix where Neo finally realizes that he can stop the bullets, that he can create his own reality, kind of like Miles at times in Mantissa, and Erato fits into this because Miles imagines her into his reality, even though she herself is imaginary in the 'real.'
The relationship between Erato and Miles is a very interesting one. Maybe the entire novel is a similacrum. Maybe its a play on the self and the other; they are split and its creating a repetitive "that's me, but not me" as Miles struggles to see himself as a coherent self, while trapped in his own mind, battling and loving this Erato character, who could be his feminine half, could be his ID, his subconscious, his "ideal image" of himself...I'm curious as to what others think. I feel as though I need to reread this book again, that it barely clicked the first time and maybe a second reading would bring things together more. Are we even supposed to arrive at answers?

7 comments:

Nick Adams said...

Wow, this is a great reading of that passage. I totally agree, I just didn't know I agreed until I read it. I hope we talk more about this in class. I know Dr. M was talking about the self and other today in the beginning of the novel, but I think it can be applied in this passage as well. I think you are really on to something about Erato being Miles fantasy. Dr. M said something about desire coming from fantasy or maybe it was the other way around? It seems what she was saying may connect closely with what you are saying. Good job with the blog, I'm glad I read it.

Richard Grayson said...

"While reading this book, I've been reading it in a few different ways. One of which being that Erato is Miles Green's feminine half, and full recovery would mean a merging of these two characters, which is shown through sexuality."

I thought this was probably the best part of your post. I am 100% down with this idea, although it may just be that I am thinking in terms of Fight Club... And the Spice Girls. A lot of the theory we have been doing makes me think of their hit, 2 become 1.

Lets take a look at these lyrics... seriously.

"Candle light and soul forever
A dream of you and me together
Say you believe it, say you believe it"

Free your mind of doubt and danger
Be for real don't be a stranger
We can achieve it, we can achieve it"

If you look at these lyrics in terms of Baudrillard and/or the Matrix, You can say that the Spice Girls are examining reality like neo when he is waking from the Matrix.

To Keep going...

"Silly games that you were playing
Empty words we both were saying
Let's work it out boy, let's work it out boy"

What games are they playing??? I think it is a post-structuralist game called "deconstruction". The words are empty because they have no real connection to the signifier.

The last couple of verses are arguably the worst and the least involved in theory.

" Any deal that we endeavour
boys and girls feel good together
Take it or leave it, take it or leave it

Are you as good as I remember baby, get it on, get it on
'Cause tonight is the night when two become one"

at first this may seem like a heteronormative statement on behalf of the Spice Girls, but in terms of Mantissa, I think it is saying that the feminine (girl) and masculine (boy) sides "feel good together".


I don't know, I was just wondering what your thoughts on the Spice Girls and their possible contribution to theory may be.

<3 Dick Grayson.

barrowme said...

Your Lacanian analysis is very strong. Am I sold on the idea that Miles and Erato are in opposition to each other because they are opposite half’s of the same person…. I think so. I think that is just great analysis; Miles and Erato are both crazy nuts. However, their dynamic of control over one another could confuse this a bit. I am not sure how but I feel as though Erato’s personality split in the book could have something to do with them being too opposite. Then again perhaps they never are in accord because of the dichotomy between the real and the imaginary. However, if Miles reached the real and these forces combined wouldn’t his writers block be cured?

Also, the idea of Mantissa being a simulacrum is indeed interesting… I am not sure I get it though. Isn’t his struggle to understand himself just the mirror stage business??

I think a second reading is Mantissa is necessary for all of us. Finding the time however….that’s an interesting one…

Also, Ben you and the spice girls… What’s going on with you today?? I hope next week we can have an N’Sync reference (they were my favorite).

Ryan Murphy said...

I really loved how you said, "Lacan says the imaginary is the split between the real self and the incoherent self, between self and other." This has been one of my favourite points brought up in our class so far in that it addresses the idea of imagination in terms of creativity and creation. I know that neither creativity nor creation are directly addressed in the quote, but I feel that they are strongly implied by the fact that there must be action in some way (AKA creativity) if there is a tension between the self and the other.
I also really like how you showed that actually meeting the fantasy was traumatic and how Lacanian "real" is therefore traumatic.

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