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VIKTORIJA KROMBHOLC i ARIJANA L. CVIJANOVIĆ University of Novi Sad, Faculty of Philosophy – Department of English Studies, Novi Sad DOI 10.5937/kultura1650115K UDK 821.111.09-31 Винтерсон Џ. originalan naučni rad WHATAPPEARSISNOTWHAT IS:JEANETTEWINTERSON’S ART&LIESANDTHEPASSION Abstract:Itwouldbenomistaketostatethatamongthecommonest routes contemporary literature in English takes is one of asserting history’sandreality’sfictionalityanddissolvingtheboundarybetween real and imaginary. The route is certainly common enough in the work of the controversial British author Jeanette Winterson, whose proseisaneverendinginterplaybetweenfactandfiction,realityand fantasy.Winterson’scriticallyneglectedArt&Lies(1995)epitomises thedisintegrationofclearcutlinesbetween(auto)biography,history andfictionthroughasetofbinarieslikeart/life,art/lie,orfact/fiction, transformingourideasoftruthandlie.SimilarconcernsinformThe Passion (1987), which is more universally praised. The parallels between the two works suggest a continuum in Winterson’s literary explorations of the nature of truth and reality, the status of fiction andhistoricalrecord,andtheusefulnessofbinariesandlabels.This paper aims at exploring how these polyphonic prose pieces rebel againstsinglepointsofview,redefinethenotionsofhistoryasfactand storytellingasfabrication,andexhibitapreferenceforthetruthofthe imaginationandunofcialperspectives. Key words: Art & Lies, fiction, history, Jeanette Winterson, The Passion. For decades now, literature has been indulging in an “assault onthedividinglineoffictionandnonfiction”1,resultingina hostofnonfictionnovelsorfactionnarratives,autobiographical fictionandfictionalautobiographies,aswellasotherhybridtexts combiningfictionalandnonfictionalresources.Thistendency 1 Cobley,P.(2001)Narrative,LondonandNewYork:Routledge,p.182. 115 VIKTORIJA KROMBHOLC i ARIJANA L. CVIJANOVIĆ goeshandinhandwiththedeclineofgrandnarrativesasself perpetuating phenomena advertising their own truths, partly promptedbyanincreasedinterestinidentitypolitics.2Although JeanetteWintersondoesnotwishtobealignedwithanyparticular political agenda, her writing is imbued with open critique of metanarratives from a variety of standpoints, of which the feministandthelesbianarebyfarthemostfrequentlydiscussed. Thestridenceofhercriticismjustifiesthewidespreadviewthat Jeanette Winterson is arguably one of the most provocative Britishauthorstoday,wellknownforher“metanarrative,self reflexivetextsthatdeconstructthedivisionsbetweenfactand fiction,realityandfantasy,andmasculinityandfemininity,and rewrite intertextual references from the Bible to fairy tales”.3 ThisisespeciallytrueofherwritingsinceThePassion(1987),a workwhichmarksashifttoward“amuchmoreopenlyfantastic andlyricalkindoffiction”.4BothThePassion,animaginative dancebetweenhistoryandstorytelling,andArt&Lies(1995), afragmented,scatteredtreatiseonart,history,fictionandlies, tonamebutahandfulofthemes,moveinthisdirection.The onecriticallypraised,theotherunjustlydiscredited,theyfreely combinefictionandnonfictiontounderminethemetanarratives ofhistory,science,religion,progressandpatriarchy,sometimes makingitimpossibletodistinguishbetweenfactandfabrication, truthandlie. DespitetherichnessofWinterson’soeuvreonlyhintedatinthe abovequote,hercareerservesastestimonytothesometimes taxing“culturaltrendtowardstreatingwritersascelebrities”.5 Like MartinAmis’s The Information (1995), her prose work Art & Lies suffers the fate of books by authors involved in media scandals, and is disregarded by critics primarily for reasonsoutsideliterature,butalsoforitsseemingly“pretentious andarty”6nature.Art&Liesisacomplexandsombrepiece, introducedbyanexcerptonthenatureofartfromtheOxford lecturesonpoetrybyA.C.Bradley.Aworkofartisnotintended tobeapartoracopyoftherealworld.Itisanindependent, completeandautonomousworldinitselfwhichpassesitsown laws. Entrance is granted only to those who abide by these laws, leaving behind the beliefs and conditions of the other 2 Ibid.,pp.183189. 3 Makinen,M.(2005)TheNovelsofJeanetteWinterson,Basingstoke:Palgrave Macmillan,p.3. 4 Onega, S. (2006) Jeanette Winterson, Manchester: Manchester University Press,p.54. 5 Andermahr,S.(2009)JeanetteWinterson,Basingstoke:PalgraveMacmillan, p.40. 6 Onega,S.op.cit.,p.131. 116 VIKTORIJA KROMBHOLC i ARIJANA L. CVIJANOVIĆ world of reality. Winterson’s narratives at the intersection of modern,postmodern,feministandlesbianwriting,yeteluding eachandoneoftheselabels,favouringaestheticsoverpolitics, historiographic metafiction over history, fantasy over realism, write their own rules and expose truths inherent to them. Art &LiesispartofthisBlakeanefforttodisintegratetheworld weliveinandcreatenewones,“connectedtotherealityofour desires”7andorganisedaroundtheprinciple“[w]hatappearsis notwhatis”.8AsHandel,thesinglemalenarratorinArt&Lies, disclosesearlyon,“[i]tcouldbethatthisrecordsetbeforeyou nowisafiction”.9Therecordisofferedupasatruthinitself–“I trytotellthetruth,”10saysHandel–whichiswhyitonlycould poseasfiction.SuchstatementsrevealHandel’sattempttobe acontributiontothesubversiontypicallyfoundinWinterson’s work,“oftheliberalhumanistgrandnarrativesofKnowledge, Truth,MeaningandHistory”.11 To question them, Art & Lies, Winterson’s most difficult, hermetic and inaccessible work, employs fantasy as “a social imaginary that does not offer a singular metadiscourse” and as a powerful “critique of contemporary desensitization and alienation”.12 The fact that it is also one of her most poetic worksaddstothiscritiquebyfightingdesensitisationwithan abundanceofpoeticimages,aswellaswordsandphraseswhose soundcontributestothemeaning. “Thenotebellsthebeautyofthestretchingtrainthatpulls the light in a long gold thread. It catches in the wheels, it flashesonthedoors,thatopenandclose,thatopenandclose, incommuterrhythm.”13 Weshallseethatsuchsentencesspeakofastylewhichcreates astrongbondbetweenbodyandword,emphasising“the‘body’ oftheword[…]throughrepetitionofsoundsandanelaborate incorporationofrhythm”.14Theheightenedlyricismof Art& Liesrepresentsaverbalcounterpartofthecompositionwhich inspiredthestructureofthisvirtuallyplotlesspieceoffiction, RichardStrauss’sDerRosenkavalier,anditspoeticflavouris 7 Burns,C.L.(1996)FantasticLanguage:JeanetteWinterson’sRecoveryof the PostmodernWord, Contemporary LiteratureVol. 37, No. 2, Madison: UniversityofWisconsinPress,p.302. 8 Winterson,J.(1995)Art&Lies,London:Vintage,p.52. 9 Ibid.,p.30. 10Ibid.,p.32. 11Andermahr,S.op.cit.,p.19. 12Burns,C.L.op.cit.,pp.286,292. 13Winterson,op.cit.,p.3. 14Burns,C.L.op.cit.,p.280. 117 VIKTORIJA KROMBHOLC i ARIJANA L. CVIJANOVIĆ onlypartofthereasonwhythisworkisdeniedthestatusofa novel.Namely,Wintersonavoidsusingthetermtorefertoher works, preferring “fiction”, as she believes the novel belongs to nineteenthcentury realism. In that sense, the novel is now deadandreplacedbyworkssodiverseinformandcontentthat theyloseacommoncharacter.15Hence,thishighlyintertextual andselfreferentialworkisdefinedbyitssubtitleas“APiece forThreeVoicesandaBawd”,withalternatingandoverlapping voices of characters who represent transpersonal minds switchingfromfirstpersonnarrationtothirdandback. Art&Liesthereforepartakesinquestioningthestatusoffiction, ormorespecifically,ofthenovelasformandgenre,throughthe nowfamiliar,yetoriginal,slippingacrosstheborderbetween literatureand(auto)biography.Handelisandisnotthefamous composer,Picassoisandisnottheartisticgenius,andSappho isandisnotthelegendarypoet,which“effectivelyerasesthe differencebetweenrecollectionandinvention”,16withthemany transformationsofgender,voiceandidentitycomplicatingthe matter.Winterson’streatmentofhistoryasafictionillustrates her lack of belief in the truth of history17 and prompts her to rewrite it through fictional symbols of arts – music, painting, andliterature–modelledonhistoricalfigures.Literatureisno strangertorearrangingandremouldingfacts,publicorpersonal, andinaninterviewforTheGuardian,Wintersoncommentson theneedto“sacrificeafairbitoffact”ifyoucan“tellagood story”,18whichequallyappliestohistoricalandautobiographical facts. Like the rest of her fiction, Art & Lies is certainly but unmeasurablyseasonedwithnumerousdetailsfromWinterson’s life,fromhersexualorientationtoherinterestinthelifestories