Текст книги "The Schopenhauer Cure"

Автор книги: Наталия Май

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15

Pam in India

_________________________

Itis noteworthy and remarkable

to see how man, besides his

life in the concrete, always

lives a second life in the

abstract...(where) in the sphere

of calm deliberation, what

previously possessed him

completely and moved him

intensely appears to him cold,

colorless, and distant: he is

a mere spectator and observer.

_________________________

As the Bombay–Igatpuri train slowed for a stop at a small village, Pam heard the clangs

of ceremonial cymbals and peered through the grimy train window. A dark–eyed boy of

about ten or eleven, pointing to her window, ran alongside holding aloft a raised rag and

yellow plastic water pail. Since she had arrived in India two weeks ago, Pam had been

shaking her head no. No to sightseeing guides, shoe shines, freshly squeezed tangerine

juice, sari cloth, Nike tennis shoes, money exchange. No to beggars and no to numerous

sexual invitations, sometimes offered frankly, sometimes discreetly by winking, raising

eyebrows, licking lips, and flicking tongues. And, finally, she thought, someone has

actually offered me something I need. She vigorously nodded yes, yes to the young

window washer, who responded with a huge toothy grin. Delighted with Pam`s patronage

and audience, he washed the pane with long theatrical flourishes.

Paying him generously and shooing him away as he lingered to stare at her, Pam

settled back and watched a procession of villagers snake their way down a dusty street

following a priest clad in billowing scarlet trousers and yellow shawl. Their destination

was the center of the town square and a large papier–mГўchГ© statue of Lord Ganesha, a

short plump Buddha–like body bearing an elephant`s head. Everyone—the priest, the men

dressed in gleaming white, and the women robed in saffron and magenta—carried small

Ganesha statues. Young girls scattered handfuls of flowers, and pairs of adolescent boys

carried poles holding metal burners emitting clouds of incense. Amid the clash of

cymbals and the roll of drums, everyone chanted, «Ganapathi bappa Moraya, Purchya

varshi laukariya.»

«Pardon me, can you tell me what they`re chanting?» Pam turned to the copper–skinned man sitting opposite her sipping tea, the only other passenger sharing the

compartment. He was a delicate win–some man dressed in a loose white cotton shirt and

trousers. At the sound of Pam`s voice he swallowed the wrong way and coughed

furiously. Her question delighted him since he had been attempting, in vain, since the

train commenced in Bombay to strike up a conversation with the handsome woman

sitting across from him. After a vigorous cough he replied, with a squeak, «My apologies,

madam. Physiology is not always at one`s command. What the people here, and

throughout all of India today, are saying is ‘Beloved Ganapati, lord of Moraya, come

again early next year.`”

«Ganapati?»

«Yes, very confusing, I know. Perhaps you know him by his more common name,

Ganesha. He has many other names, as well, for example, Vighnesvara, Vinayaka,

Gajanana.»

«And this parade?»

«The beginning of the ten–day festival of Ganesha. Perhaps you may be fortunate

enough to be in Bombay next week at the end of the festival and witness the entire

population of the city walk into the ocean and immerse their Ganesha statues in incoming

waves.»

«Oh, and that? A moon? Or sun?» Pam pointed to four children carrying a large

yellow papier–mГўchГ© globe.

Vijay purred to himself. He welcomed the questions and hoped the train stop

would be long and that this conversation would go on and on. Such voluptuous women

were common in American movies, but never before had he had the good fortune to

speak to one. This woman`s grace and pale beauty stirred his imagination. She seemed to

have stepped out of the ancient erotic carvings of the Kama Sutra. And where might this

encounter lead? he wondered. Could this be the life–changing event for which he had

long sought? He was free, his garment factory had, by Indian standards, made him

wealthy. His teenaged fiancГ©e died of tuberculosis two years ago, and, until his parents

selected a new bride, he was unencumbered.

«Ah, it is a moon the children hold. They carry it to honor an old legend. First, you

must know that Lord Ganesha was renowned for his appetite. Note his ample belly. He

was once invited for a feast and stuffed himself with desert pastries called laddoos. Have

you eaten laddoos?»

Pam shook her head, fearing that he might produce one from his valise. A close

friend had contracted hepatitis from a tea shop in India, and thus far she had heeded her

physician`s advice to eat nothing but four–star–hotel food. When away from the hotel she

had limited herself to food she could peel—mainly tangerines, hard–boiled eggs, and

peanuts.

«My mother made wonderful coconut almond laddoos,” Vijay continued.

«Essentially, they are fried flour balls with a sweet cardamom syrup—that sounds

prosaic, but you must believe me when I say they are far more than the sum of their

ingredients. But back to Lord Ganesha, who was so stuffed that he could not stand up

properly. He lost his balance, fell, his stomach burst, and all the laddoos tumbled out.

«This all took place at night with only one witness, the moon, who found the event

hilarious. Enraged, Ganesha cursed the moon and banished him from the universe.

However, the whole world lamented the moon`s absence, and an assembly of gods asked

Lord Shiva, Ganesha`s father, to persuade him to relent. The penitent moon also

apologized for his misbehavior. Finally, Ganesha modified his curse and announced that

the moon need be invisible only one day a month, partially visible the remainder of the

month, and for one day only would be permitted to be visible in its full glory.»

A brief silence and Vijay added, «And now you know why the moon plays a role in

Lord Ganesha festivals.»

«Thank you for that explanation.»

«My name is Vijay, Vijay Pande.»

«And mine is Pam, Pam Swanvil. What a delightful story, and what a fantastical

droll god—that elephant head and Buddha body. And yet the villagers seem to take their

myths so seriously...as though they were really—”

«It`s interesting to consider the iconography of Lord Ganesha,” Vijay gently

interrupted as he pulled from his shirt a large neck pendant on which was carved the

image of Ganesha. «Please note that every feature on Ganesha has a serious meaning, a

life instruction. Consider the large elephant head: it tells us to think big. And the large

ears? To listen more. The small eyes remind us to focus and to concentrate and the small

mouth to talk less. And I do not forget Ganesha`s instruction—even at this moment as I

talk to you I remember his counsel and I warn myself not to talk too much. You must

help by telling me when I tell you more than you wish to know.»

«No, not at all. I`m most interested in your comments on iconography.»

«There are many others; here, look closer—we Indians are very serious people.»

He reached into the leather bag he wore on his shoulder and held out a small magnifying

lens.

Taking the glass, Pam leaned over to peer at Vijay`s pendant. She inhaled his

aroma of cinnamon and cardamon and freshly ironed cotton cloth. How was it possible

for him to smell so sweet and so fresh in the close dusty train compartment? «He has only

one tusk,” she observed.

«Meaning: retain the good, throw away the bad.»

«And what`s that he holds? An ax?»

«To cut off all bonds of attachment.»

«That sounds like Buddhist doctrine.»

«Yes, remember that the Buddha emerged from the mother ocean of Shiva.»

«And Ganesha holds something in the other hand. It`s hard to see. A thread?»

«A rope to pull one ever closer to your highest goal.»

The train suddenly lurched and began to move forward.

«Our vehicle is alive again,” said Vijay. «Note Ganesha`s vehicle—there under his

foot.»

Pam moved closer to look through the lens and inhale Vijay`s scent discreetly.

«Oh, yes, the mouse. I`ve seen it in every statue and painting of Ganesha. I`ve never

known why a mouse.»

«That`s the most interesting attribute of all. The mouse is desire. You may ride it

but only if you keep it under control. Otherwise it causes havoc.»

Pam fell silent. As the train chugged on past scrawny trees, occasional temples,

water buffalo in muddy ponds, and farms whose red soil had been exhausted by

thousands of years of work, she looked at Vijay and felt a wave of gratitude. How

unobtrusively, how gently, he had taken out his pendant and saved her from the

embarrassment of speaking irreverently about his religion. When had she ever been so

graced by a man? But no, she reminded herself, don`t shortchange other dear men. She

thought about her group. There was Tony, who would do anything for her. And Stuart,

too, could be generous. And Julius, whose love seemed unending. But Vijay`s subtlety—

that was uncommon, that was exotic.

And Vijay? He too fell into a reverie, reviewing his conversation with Pam.

Uncommonly excited, his heart raced, and he sought to calm himself. Opening his leather

shoulder pouch, he took out an old wrinkled cigarette package, not to smoke—the

package was empty, and besides he had heard of how peculiar Americans were about

smoking. He merely wished to study the blue–and–white package, which bore the

silhouette of a man wearing a top hat and, in firm black letters, the brand name, The

Passing Show.

One of his first religious teachers had called his attention to the Passing Show, a

brand of cigarettes his father smoked, and instructed him to begin his meditation by

thinking of all of life as a passing show, a river carrying all objects, all experience, all

desires, past his unswerving attention. Vijay meditated on the image of a flowing river

and listened to his mind`s soundless words,anitya, anitya —impermanence. Everything is

impermanent, he reminded himself; all of life and all experience glide by as surely and

irrevocably as the passing landscape seen through the train window. He closed his eyes,

breathed deeply, and rested his head upon his seat; his pulse slowed as he entered the

welcome harbor of equanimity.

Pam, who had been eyeing Vijay discreetly, picked up the wrapping that had fallen

to the floor, read the label, and said, «The Passing Show—that`s an unusual name for

cigarettes.»

Vijay slowly opened his eyes and said, «As I said, we Indians are very serious.

Even our cigarette packages have messages for the conduct of life. Lifeis a passing

show—I meditate on that whenever I feel inner turbulence.»

«Is that what you were just doing a minute ago? I should not have disturbed you.»

Vijay smiled and gently shook his head. «My teacher once said that one can not be

disturbed by another. It is only oneself who can disturb one`s equanimity.» Vijay

hesitated, realizing even as it happened that he was awash in desire: he so craved the

attention of his traveling companion that he had turned his meditation practice into a

mere curiosity—all for the sake of a smile from this lovely woman who was simply an

apparition, part of the passing show, soon to pass out of his life and to dissolve into the

nonbeing of the past. And knowing, too, that his next words would only take him farther

from his path, Vijay nonetheless rashly plunged ahead.

«There is something I would like to say: I shall long treasure our meeting and our

conversation. Shortly I shall depart from this train to an ashram where I must face silence

for the next ten days, and I am immeasurably grateful for the words we have exchanged,

the moments we have shared. I am reminded of American prison films where the

condemned man is permitted to order anything he wishes for his last meal. May I say that

I have had my wishes for a last conversation fully granted.»

Pam simply nodded. Rarely at a loss for words, she did not know how to respond

directly to Vijay`s courtliness. «Ten days at an ashram? Do you mean Igatpuri? I`m on

my way there to a retreat.»

«Then we have the same destination and the same goal—to be taught Vipassana

meditation by the honored guru Goenka. And very soon, too—it is the next stop.»

«Did you say ‘ten days of silence`?»

«Yes, Goenka always requires noble silence—aside from necessary discussions

with the staff, the students are to utter no words. Are you experienced in meditation?»

Pam shook her head no. «I`m a university professor. I teach English literature, and

last year one of my students had a healing and transformative experience at Igatpuri. This

student has become very active in organizing Vipassana retreats in the United States and

is currently helping to plan an American tour by Goenka.»

«Your student hoped to offer her teacher a gift. She wished that you, too, would

undergo a transformation?»

«Well, something like that. It wasn`t that she felt I needed to change some

particular thing about myself; it was more that she had profited so much that she wanted

me, and others, to have the same experience.»

«Of course. My question was ill put; in no way did I mean to suggest that you need

transformation. I was interested in your student`s enthusiasm. But did she prepare you for

this retreat in any way?»

«She pointedly did not. She herself stumbled upon this retreat quite by accident and

said that it would be best if I too entered it with an entirely open mind. You`re shaking

your head. You disagree.»

«Ah, remember that Indians shake their heads from side to side when they agree

and up and down when they disagree—the reverse of the American custom.»

«Oh my God. I think I`ve sensed this unconsciously because so much of my

interaction with people here has been slightly askew. I must have confused people I

spoke with.»

«No, no, Indians who come into contact with Westerners make that adaptation. As

for your student`s advice to you, I am not certain I agree that you should be entirely

unprepared. Let me point out that this is not a beginner`s retreat. Noble silence,

meditation beginning at fourA.M. , little sleep, one meal a day. A difficult regimen. You

must be strong. Ah, the train slows. We are at Igatpuri.»

Vijay stood, collected his belongings, and lifted Pam`s valise down from the

overhead rack. The train stopped. Vijay prepared to leave and said, «The experience

begins.»

Vijay`s words offered little comfort, and Pam was growing more apprehensive.

«Does that mean we will not be able to speak to one another during the retreat?»

«No communication, not written, not sign language.»

«E–mail?»

Vijay did not smile. «Noble silence is the correct path to benefit from Vipassana.»

He seemed different. Pam felt him already drifting away.

«At least,” she said, «it will offer me comfort to know you are there. It`s less

foreboding to imagine being alone together.»

«Alone together. A felicitous phrase,” Vijay responded without looking at her.

«Perhaps,” Pam said, «we may meet again on this train after the retreat.»

«Of that we must not think. Goenka will teach us that it is only the present we must

inhabit. Yesterday and tomorrow do not exist. Past remembrances, future longings, only

produce disquiet. The path to equanimity lies in observing the present and allowing it to

float undisturbed down the river of our awareness.» Without looking back, Vijay hoisted

his bag onto his shoulder, opened the doors of the compartment, and walked away.

16

Schopenhauer`

s Main Woman

_________________________

Onlythe male intellect,

clouded by the sexual impulse,

could call the undersized,

narrow–shouldered, broad–hipped, and short–legged sex

the fair sex.

–Arthur Schopenhauer on women

Youreternal quibbles, your

laments over the stupid world

and human misery, give me bad

nights and unpleasant dreams....

I have not had a single

unpleasant moment I did not

owe to you.

–A letter to Arthur Schopenhauer

from his mother

_________________________

The most important woman, by far, in Arthur`s life was his mother, Johanna, with whom

he had a tormented and ambivalent relationship which ended in cataclysm. Johanna`s

letter liberating Arthur from his apprenticeship contained admirable motherly sentiments:

her concern, her love, her hopes for him. Yet all these required a proviso: namely, that he

remain at a convenient distance from her. Hence her letter of liberation advised him to

move from Hamburg to Gotha rather than to her home in Weimar, fifty kilometers away.

The glow of warm feelings between the two following Arthur`s emancipation from

servitude evaporated quickly because of the brevity of Arthur`s stay at the preparatory

school in Gotha. After only six months the nineteen–year–old Arthur was expelled for

writing a clever but cruelly mocking poem about one of the teachers and beseeched his

mother for permission to live with her and continue his studies at Weimar.

Johanna was not amused; in fact the prospect of Arthur living with her sent her into

a frenzy. He had visited her briefly a few times during his six–month stay at Gotha, and

each visit had been the source of much displeasure for her. Her letters to him following

his expulsion are among the most shocking letters ever written by a mother to a son.

...I am acquainted with your disposition...you are irritating and unbearable and I

consider it most difficult to live with you. All your good qualities are darkened by

your super–cleverness and thus rendered useless to the world...you find fault

everywhere except in yourself...thereby you embitter the people around you—no one

wishes to be improved or illuminated in such a forcible manner, least of all by such

an insignificant individual as you still are. No one can tolerate being criticized by

someone who displays so many personal weaknesses, especially your derogatory

manner which, in oracular tones, proclaims that this is so and so, without even

suspecting the possibility of error.

If you were less like you are, you would only be ridiculous but, being as you

are, you become most annoying.... You might have, like thousands of other students,

lived and studied in Gotha...but you did not want this and so you are expelled....

such a living literary journal as you would like to be is a boring hateful thing because

one cannot skip pages or fling the whole rubbishy thing behind the stove, as one can

with the printed one.

In time Johanna resigned herself to the fact that she could not avoid accepting

Arthur at Weimar while he prepared for the university, but she wrote again, in case he

missed the point, and expressed her concerns in even more graphic terms.

I think it wisest to tell you straight out what I desire and what I feel about matters so

we understand one another from the outset. That I am very fond of you, I`m sure you

will not doubt. I have proven it to you and will prove it to you as long as I live. It is

necessary for my happiness to know you are happy but not to be a witness to it. I have

always told you that you are very difficult to live with.... The more I get to know you

the more strongly I feel this.

I will not hide this from you: as long as you are what you are, I would rather

make any sacrifice than consent to be near you.... What repels me does not lie in your

heart; it is in your outer, not your inner, being. It is in your ideas, in your judgment,

your habits; in a word, there is nothing concerning the outer world in which we agree.

Look, dear Arthur, each time you visited me only for a few days there were

violent scenes about nothing and each time I only breathed freely again when you

were gone because your presence, your complaints about inevitable things, your

scowling face, your ill humor, the bizarre opinions you utter...all this depresses and

troubles me, without helping you.

Johanna`s dynamics seem transparent. By the grace of God she had escaped the

marriage that she had feared would imprison her forever. Giddy with freedom, she

exalted in the idea of never again being answerable to anyone. She would live her own

life, meet whomever she wished, enjoy romantic liaisons (but never marry again), and she

would explore her own considerable talents.

The prospect of relinquishing her freedom for Arthur`s sake was unbearable. Not

only was Arthur a particularly difficult, controlling person in his own right, but he was

the son of her former jailer: the living incarnation of too many of Heinrich`s unpleasant

features.

And there was the issue of money. It first surfaced when Arthur, at nineteen,

accused his mother of lavish spending, which imperiled the inheritance he was to receive

at the age of twenty–one. Johanna bristled, insisted it was well known that she served

only bread–and–butter sandwiches at her salons and then excoriated Arthur for living far

beyond his means with expensive dining and horseback–riding lessons. Eventually, such

quarrels about money were to escalate to unbearable levels.

Johanna`s feelings about Arthur and about motherhood are reflected in her novels:

a typical Johanna Schopenhauer heroine tragically loses her true love and then resigns

herself to an economically sensible, loveless, and sometimes abusive marriage but, in an

act of defiance and self–affirmation, refuses to bear children.

Arthur shared his feelings with no one, and his mother later destroyed all his

letters. Still, certain trends seem self–evident. The bond between Arthur and his mother

was intense, and the pain of its dissolution haunted Arthur his entire life. Johanna was an

unusual mother—vivacious, forthright, beautiful, freethinking, enlightened, well read.

Surely, she and Arthur discussed his immersion in modern and ancient literature. Indeed

it may be that the fifteen–year–old Arthur made his momentous choice in favor of the

grand tour rather than university preparation because of his desire to remain in her

presence.

It was only after his father`s death that the tone of the mother–son relationship

changed. Arthur`s hopes of replacing his father in his mother`s heart must have been

crushed by her hasty decision to leave him in Hamburg and move to Weimar. If his hopes

were revived when his mother liberated him from his pledge to his dead father, they were

again shattered when she sent him to Gotha, despite the vastly superior educational

resources available in Weimar. Perhaps, as his mother suggested, Arthur intentionally

arranged to be expelled from Gotha. If his actions were based on his wishes to rejoin his

mother, he must have been disheartened by her unwillingness to welcome him in her new

home and by the presence of other men in her life.

Arthur`s guilt about his father`s suicide had its origins both in his joy of liberation

and in his fear that he may have hastened his father`s death by his disinterest in the world

of commerce. It was not long before his guilt transformed into a fierce defense of his

father`s good name, and to vicious criticism of his mother`s behavior toward his father.

Years later he wrote:

I know women. They regard marriage only as an institution for supply. As my father

grew wretchedly sick, he would have been abandoned except for the loving charity of

a faithful servant who performed the necessary basic acts of caring. My mother held

parties, while he lay down in loneliness; my mother had fun, while he was suffering

painfully. That`s the love of women!

When Arthur arrived in Weimar to study with a tutor for university entrance, he

was not permitted to live with his mother but in separate lodgings she had found for him.

Awaiting him there was her letter laying out, with ruthless clarity, the rules and

boundaries of their relationship.

Mark now on what footing I wish to be together with you: you are at home in your

lodgings, in mine you are a guest...who does not interfere in any domestic

arrangements. Every day you will come at one o`clock and stay until three, then I

shall not see you again all day long, except on my salon days which you may attend if

you wish, also eating at my house those two evenings, provided you will abstain from

tiresome arguing, which makes me angry.... During the midday hours you can tell me

everything I need to know about you, the rest of the time you must look after

yourself. I cannot provide your entertainment at the expense of mine. Enough, now

you know my wishes and I hope you will not repay me for my motherly care and love

by giving me opposition.

Arthur accepted these terms during his two–year stay in Weimar and remained

strictly an observer at his mother`s social evenings, not once engaging the lofty Goethe in

conversation. His mastery of Greek, Latin, the classics, and philosophy progressed at a

prodigious rate, and, at the age of twenty–one, he was accepted into the University at

Göttingen. At the same time he received his inheritance of twenty thousand Reichstalers,

enough to provide a sufficient but modest income for the remainder of his life. As his

father had predicted, he would have great need of this inheritance—Arthur was never to

earn a pfennig from his vocation as a scholar.

As time passed, Arthur viewed his father as an angel and his mother a devil. He

believed that his father`s jealousy and suspicions about his mother`s fidelity were well

founded, and he worried that she would fail to revere his father`s memory. In his father`s

name, he demanded that she live a quiet sequestered life. Arthur vehemently attacked

those whom he considered his mother`s suitors, judging them lesser, «mass–produced

creatures,” unworthy of replacing his father.

Arthur studied at the Universities of Göttingen and Berlin and then obtained a

doctorate in philosophy from the University of Jena. He lived briefly in Berlin but soon

fled because of the impending war against Napoleon and returned to Weimar to live with

his mother. Soon, the same domestic battles erupted: not only did he upbraid his mother

for misusing the money he had made available for his grand–mother`s care, but he

accused her of an improper liaison with her close friend MГјller Gerstenbergk. Arthur

became so brutally hostile to Gerstenbergk that Johanna was forced to see her friend only

when Arthur was absent from the home.

During this period an often–quoted conversation occurred when he gave his mother

a copy of his doctoral dissertation, a brilliant treatise on the principles of causation titled

«On the Fourfold Root of the Principle of Sufficient Reason.»

Glancing at the title page, Johanna remarked: «Fourfold root? No doubt this is

something for the apothecary?»

Arthur: «It will still be read when scarcely a copy of your writings can be found.»

Johanna: «Yes, no doubt the entire printing of your writings will still be in the

shops.»

Arthur was uncompromising on his titles, rejecting any considerations of

marketability.On the Fourfold Root of the Principle of Sufficient Reason should have

been more properly titledA Theory of Explanation. Nonetheless, two hundred years later,

it is still in print. Not many other dissertations can claim that distinction.

Ferocious arguments continued about money and about Johanna`s relationships

with men until Johanna`s patience was exhausted. She let it be known she would never

break off her friendship with Gerstenbergk or anyone else for Arthur`s sake. She ordered

him to move out, invited Gerstenbergk to move into his vacated rooms, and wrote Arthur

this fateful letter.

The door which you slammed so noisily yesterday after your improper behavior

toward your mother is now closed forever between you and me. I am leaving for the

country and shall not return until I know you are gone.... You do not know what a

mother`s heart is like—the more tenderly it loves, the more painfully it feels every

blow from a once loved hand.... You yourself have torn away from me: your

mistrust, your criticism of my life, of my choice of friends, your desultory behavior

toward me, your contempt for my sex, your unwillingness to contribute to my

contentment, your greed—this and a lot more makes you seem vicious to me.... If I

were dead and you had to deal with your father, would you have dared to

schoolmaster him? Or try to control his life, his friendships? Am I less than he? Did

he do more for you than I did? Loved you more than I did?...My duty toward you is

at an end. Go your way, I have nothing more to do with you.... Leave your address

here, but do not write to me, I shall henceforth neither read nor answer any letter from

you.... So this is the end.... You have hurt me too much. Live and be as happy as you

can be.

And the end it was. Johanna lived for another twenty–five years, but mother and

son were never again to meet.

In old age, reminiscing about his parents, Schopenhauer wrote:

Most men allow themselves to be seduced by a beautiful face.... nature induces

women to display all at once the whole of their brilliance...and to make a

«sensation»...but nature conceals the many evils [women] entail, such as endless

expenses, the cares of children, refractoriness, obstinacy, growing old and ugly after a

few years, deception, cuckolding, whims, crotchets, attacks of hysteria, hell, and the

devil. I therefore call marriage a debt that is contracted in youth and paid in old

age....