XIX Century Gossip Girl

After reading chapters 7 through 17 I can´t but notice the great amount of pleasure reading about human defects and tangled, messed up relationships brings to me and well, I hope, the rest of the troubled humans I share existence with. Oh…the ecstasy of hypocrisy, arrogance and human imperfection!  How enthralling it has been to read about back stabbing, failure, mere ambition and dark backgrounds.  If you’re another fan of drama and bitter sweet gossip, you must have probably noticed I recently defined the series Gossip Girl.  Yes, the one and only. Were all characters but a very few lack some sense of morality and not one escapes sleeping with the best friends long lost love, kissing some sketchy drug dealer, hiding bankruptcy or a rather illicit business, drinking a little too much or having an occasional threesome with their girlfriend and best friend/ possible future wife.   Can you see the relationship?

            
   Pride and prejudice is just a softer version of this nerve wrecking series with a little less partying and a lot more clothing. Yes…, I went there.  As I read further into the story I have come to know the different characters better and see in them many of the characteristics described above.  Miss Bingley, for instance, has revealed more of her judging and easily detestable   personality. It is not at all surprising that as Elizabeth left the room to take care of her sister Jane she, in great pleasure, talked ill about her arrival earlier in the day and criticized her manners. I can´t deny Jane Austen does an exquisite job evoking strong feelings of hatred in the reader.

Furthermore, I found myself extremely pleased to see that Mr. Darcy, despite all her efforts to gain his favor, keeps his admiration for Elizabeth.  I rejoice in how pathetic Miss Bingley’s attempt to impress Mr. Darcy with her annoying comments is. His reactions, on the other hand, improve my view of him, rather negative at the beginning of the novel. Apparently he does have good criteria when it comes to women.  

 Finally some new characters jump into the scene. Mr. Collins, Like Georgina from Gossip Girl, suddenly appears with quite unclear and suspicious intentions. While he is described as humble and obedient he is also known for thinking highly of himself and being the heir to Mr. Bennet’s property.  Let the gossip continue…

Under the Surface

“Pride and Prejudice”, could Jane Austen have chosen a better title for her thrilling, globally distinguished Novel?   The first chapters very well prove the efficiency of the book’s title, as the ardent prejudice that reigned in the time, is revived. How judging, arrogant, superficial and ambitious creatures we are.  Let me not forget fake and lousy for, even though times have changed, we don´t really bother to hide these features.  In Austen’s Pride and Prejudice we find these dispositions implied through dialogue between characters as well as in descriptions of how they view each other. For instance, Darcy makes a good first impression due to “the report which was general circulation within five minutes after his entrance of his having ten thousand a year.” (pg.6)  As a mother, she feels her role is to find a wealthy, honorable husband for each of her daughters and is greatly enthralled by Mr. Bingley’s income and background.   

           
  These attributes so characteristic of the human species are very well embodied by the different characters presented in the beginning of the book.  Mrs. Bennet for example, doesn´t show any remote effort to hide her attraction to money that proves prominent every time she opens her mouth to say something other than “my poor nerves”.  

               

Today, it may seem absurd how love was defined by money and convenience rather than passion and fond feelings of affection and allegiance. One may argue past times of superficiality and shallowness are nothing but that, part of the past, and yet, we keep pointed at different people because they have or not followed fashions latest norms, bought Apple’s latest technology etc…  

Beauty sells. I can most confidently affirm that the success of a movie when released to the public lies on the appearance of the actors featured. Sure, some few judge books for their content rather that their cover, but most are likely to return the book to the dusty shelf where it belonged. Companies all over the world struggle to make their products most alluring to the eye and, millions of beauty shops around the world feed from human vanity and pride.

And so, … are we really that different from the characters of the novel?

Walking Down the Street of Self-Destruction

The theme of self-destruction has a great role throughout the story of Buddy Bolden. It was illustrated in his drinking, his friend Bellocq’s suicide, the physical harm he caused to himself and the constant defiling of the beauty of art  described in the quote, “…The making and destroying coming from the same source, same lust, same surgery his brain was capable of.” (pg.55)  Bolden was a slave of his drinking and his fears, both sources of his art and his ruin.  This self-induced damage is what ultimately leads a life of art and talent to its end in the loneliness of a mental asylum.   

It is near the end, when the narrator reflects walking on Gravier Street, that one is able to see a strong connection between the narrator and the main character.  The phrases, “When I read he stood in front of mirrors and attacked himself, there was the shock of memory. For I had done that…” (pg. 133), explicitly proves that the person speaking identifies with Bolden’s suffering and discontent, with his emptiness. The passage communicates Bolden’s lack of satisfaction towards who he was, as it narrates that he stood in front of that mirror “defiling people he did not wish to be.”(pg.133) The quote, “this way he brings his enemy to the surfaceof his skin”, reminds me of the ideas presented by the movie Fight Club.  Through pain and destruction the characters of the movie intend to find the truth, perfection, power and, a feeling of aliveness.

Finally, the author’s description of Gravier Street, “the coke signs almost pink”, is an allusion to Bolden’s life and how it ended. The coke signs, bleached by the sun, are only the shadow of what they had been before. The signs, as Bolden, have faded. The color has been drained out of them.

Bolden's Music, a Mere Reflection of his Life

“But there was a discipline, it was just that we didn´t understand. We thought he was formless, but I think now he was tormented by order, what was outside it.  He tore apart the plot- see his music was immediately on top of his own life. Echoing. As if, when he was playing he was lost and hunting for the right accidental notes. Listening to him was like talking to Coleman. You were both changing direction with every sentence, sometimes in the middle, using each other as a springboard through the dark. You were moving so fast it was unimportant to finish and clear everything. He would be describing something in 27 ways. There was pain and gentleness everything jammed into each number."

               

As the story progresses we come to the realization that the way in which the text is organized, the newspaper The Cricket, and Buddy’s music itself, all represent his life and how messy and fragmented it was. The book seems to be a collection of versions from different characters, of multiple stories and random titles of songs and fragments of lyrics, among others.  In the same way the reader fights to make sense out of the writing, Bolden fights with order and a constant fear of connecting the past and the future.

In the passage above we are able to witness the strong bond between his music and his personality.  The first two phrases imply that Buddy was not understood and that his music had a form of order and discipline that did not fit the common definition. By the quote, “we thought he was formless”, on the other hand we come to understand that the narrator has changed his mind about Buddy.  The word “formless”, brings up other concepts like flexible, different, and undefined as well as creates a feeling of instability about the subject.  Bolden’s mood varies in many ways and, it is hard to anticipate how he is going to react to a certain thing or what he is going to do next. It is that  same suspense created by his improvisation, the same uncertainty other characters point out in his music, that is strongly represented in the fragment above. The passage also illustrates how overwhelming the rhythm of his life was. When reading, it felt like there was going to be no break, his life and music went so fast that there was no time to think, and no end in mind.

Another important theme that was portrayed in this passage is Bolden’s tendency towards self-destruction. His drinking, and ultimately his final display at the parade, prove the reality of the previous statement.  The phrase, “He tore apart the plot- see his music was immediately on top of his own life.” , accurately describes how Buddy’s  habits and the art he performed, lead his talented life to the abyss.   

Row, Row, Row...Your Almost There!

F. Scott Fitzgerald ends the story of Gatsby, a man who very well represents the tendency to hold on to hope that characterizes our human kind, with Nick’s final reflection on life:

“So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past.” (180)     

The phrase as a whole describes our constant but ultimately futile effort to fight our reality and leave our past behind in order to reach the future ahead of us… always ahead of us. The word “we” indicates he is talking, not only about Gatsby, but about himself, the reader and every other human being.  He compares us to boats, fighting against the current. As a reader one can infer that the current described is taking us into the past, pulling us away from an intangible goal. We are always close to the future, waiting for it to come, but when the time finally arrives, what we find is no longer the future, it is the present and simultaneously the past. The ending also portrays how Gatsby was pursuing a  future born long before, Daisy.  As he struggles towards his dream, rooted in the past, he is reviving ancient memories.  Thus, “we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past.”