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Race, Psychoanalysis, and Borderline Jean Walton University of Rhode Island, Jwalton@Uri.Edu University of Rhode Island DigitalCommons@URI English Faculty Publications English 1997 "Nightmare of the Uncoordinated White-Folk": Race, Psychoanalysis, and Borderline Jean Walton University of Rhode Island, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.uri.edu/eng_facpubs Terms of Use All rights reserved under copyright. Citation/Publisher Attribution Walton, Jean. “‘Nightmare of the Uncoordinated White-Folk’: Race, Psychoanalysis, and Borderline.” Discourse, vol. 19, no. 2, 1997, pp. 88–109. JSTOR, JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/41389446. Available at http://www.jstor.org/stable/41389446 . This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the English at DigitalCommons@URI. It has been accepted for inclusion in English Faculty Publications by an authorized administrator of DigitalCommons@URI. For more information, please contact [email protected]. "Nightmare of the Uncoordinated White-Folk": Race, Psychoanalysis, and Borderline Author(s): Jean Walton Reviewed work(s): Source: Discourse, Vol. 19, No. 2, The Psychoanalysis of Race (Winter 1997), pp. 88-109 Published by: Wayne State University Press Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/41389446 . Accessed: 28/02/2013 14:59 Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at . http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp . JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected]. Wayne State University Press is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to Discourse. http://www.jstor.org This content downloaded on Thu, 28 Feb 2013 14:59:48 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions "Nightmare of the Uncoordinated White-Folk": Race, Psychoanalysis, and Borderline Jean Walton Among Europe's experimentalfilms from the 1920s and 30s, per- haps none offersa more fascinatingconjunction of psychoanalysis and representationsof race thanBorderline , the expressionist,inter- racial melodrama produced by the POOL group and directedby KennethMacpherson. The filmstarred Paul and Eslanda Robeson, imagistpoet H. D., and her lesbian companion,Bryher. The POOL group derivedfrom an artisticand domesticmén- age à troisamong H. D. (Hilda Doolittle),Bryher (Winifred Eller- man) , and writer-photographerMacpherson, who marriedBryher to conceal his romanticinvolvement with H. D. in the late 20s. This group published several books on cinema and the firstEnglish- languagejournal devotedto filmas an artform, Close-up (1927-33) ; it also produced fourexperimental films, of which Borderline seems to have been the mostambitious. Much of the POOL group'sinter- est in filmconsisted in exploringits potentialas a psychoanalytic apparatusfor rendering unconscious processes. Among the contributorsto Close-upwas analystHanns Sachs, who wrote regularlyon psychoanalysisand film;the group was particularlyexcited by Secrets of a Soul, Germandirector G. W. Pabst's expressionisticattempt to translatethe rudimentsof Freud's "talk- ing cure" intovisual narrative (See Konigsberg). All of thefilms the Discourse,19.2,Winter 1997, pp. 88-109. Copyright by© 1997 Wayne State University Press, Detroit,Michigan 48201-1309. 88 This content downloaded on Thu, 28 Feb 2013 14:59:48 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions Winter1997 89 POOL group made explicitlyconcern psychoanalytic concepts (see Friedberg). Less consistently,the group preoccupied itselfwith the politicsof racial representationin film,devoting at least one issue of Close-upto reviewsand articlesabout problematicdepictions of blacksin popularAmerican and Britishcinema.1 As Susan Stanford Friedman observes,Macpherson and Robert Herring (the latter anothercontributor to were also of the whitecrowd 4 Close-up) "part forwhom the Negro was in vogue.' They regularlyvisited Harlem on theirtrips to the Stateswith Bryher and broughtback to Europe all the latestin black writingand music" ("Modernism"98). Herringintroduced Paul and Eslanda Robeson to H. D.'s circle in the late 20s, and eventuallythe POOL group persuaded the Robesons to take time fromtheir hectic touringschedule to act in Borderlinewhile it was shot in Switzerland.It was Paul Robeson's second filmrole sincehe had appeared in Oscar Michaux'sBody and Soul in 1924. Though Borderlinewas not particularlywell received when it was firstreleased (owing as much to its psychoanalytic preoccupations as to its putativeantiracism), the filmhas since drawnthe attentionof a numberof scholarswith divergent critical concerns. A brief synopsisof its diffuseyet significantplot, its explicitengagement with psychoanalysis, its avant-gardeaesthetic, and itsinterracial content will clarify this interest. Borderlineis an expressionisticdepiction of the sexual and racial tensionsthat develop in a smallEuropean villagewhen twohetero- sexual couples- one white,one black- play out the interpersonal problems arisingfrom the white man's sexual involvementwith the black woman. In the short"libretto," passed out at the initial screeningsof the film,we are told that ina small"borderline" town, anywhere inEurope, Pete, a negro,isworking in a cheaphotel café. His wife,Adah, who had lefthim some time previously,hasarrived also in the same town, although neither isaware of thepresence of the other. Adahis staying inrooms with Thorne and Astrid. Thorne is a young manwhose life with Astrid has become a tormentto themboth. Both highlystrung, their nerves are tense with continuous hostility evoked by Thome'svague and destructive cravings. He hasbeen involved in an affairwith Adah, and the film opens with the quarrel which ends their relationship.2 As Pete (Paul Robeson) reconcileswith Adah (Eslanda Robeson) in a series of outdoor scenes, Astrid(played by H. D., using the pseudonym"Helga Doom") and Thorne (Gavin Arthur)quarrel until Astridis accidentlystabbed to death. The drama between the twocouples is intercutwith scenes fromthe hotel's restaurant, This content downloaded on Thu, 28 Feb 2013 14:59:48 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions 90 Discourse19.2 over which a lesbian couple seems to preside (a butch-looking, cigar-smokingBryher plays the café's manageress,while Charlotte Arthuris the femme barmaid). In this interiorsetting, we see townspeople discussingthe interracialaffair while the barmaid encourages general drinkingand merrymaking,the manageress soberlykeeps the books, and a gay-codedpiano player (Robert Herring), witha photo of Pete propped next to him,accompanies the action with what is doubtlessjazz music. Before her death, Astridjealously castigatesThorne in the cafe,stirring up the racist sentimentsof the villagersby calling him a "NiggerLover" and seeming to make a pact witha witchlikeold lady,who later says thatif she had her way,"not one negro would be allowed in this country."These scenes are intercutwith exterior shots of thevillage and surroundingcountryside, where the black couple reconcilesin natural,rustic settings. Astrid' s death leads to furtherracial hatred by the townspeople until Adah voluntarilyleaves and Pete is ordered to depart by a letterfrom the Mayor.Before leaving, Pete appears withThorne in a scene ofmutual forgiveness; they shake hands,and, as thelibretto putsit, "they both realisethat what has happened has been beyond them,and broughtabout by externalcircumstances - thatenmity has been among others,and theythemselves mere instrumentsfor its consummation"(150). We next see Pete waitingalone at the train station.Final shots inside the café indicate that "order" is restorednow thatthe black charactershave been exiled fromthe whitevillage. Overall, the filmindicts the villagers'racist triumph; it also implies,however, that Thorne (unlike the othercharacters) has undergonea transformationas a resultof theseevents and has workedthrough his innerconflicts. In thissense, the film privileges his subjectivityover thatof the othercharacters. Criticalattention to Borderlinehas been diverse,characterizing the film as feminist,modernist, a psychoanalyticexperiment, a lesbian or queer text,a whiterepresentation of blackness,and as a significantmoment in Paul Robeson's filmcareer (see, respectively, Friedberg;Friedman; Morris; Weiss; Cripps; Dyer) . Yetin almostev- erycase, emphasison one aspectof the film's significance inevitably eclipses itsother elements by downplayingtheir interdependency. For example, Anne Friedberg'sdiscussions of the film,arguably the mostdetailed and exhaustiveof sourceson the POOL group's activities,focus on Borderline'sproduction, contexts, and troubled reception,but do not extensivelyinterpret its racial diegesis. On the otherhand, RichardDyer's treatment of Paul Robeson's crossover star status in HeavenlyBodies provides perhaps the most astute, thoughbrief, analysis of the film'sracial politics,noting how "little This content downloaded on Thu, 28 Feb 2013 14:59:48 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions Winter1997 91 an active role the Paul Robeson characterhas in the narrative" and how the "highlycomplex use of montage onlyreinforces this inactivity"(132) . Whilehis treatmentof thefilm focuses on itswhite constructionof black masculinity,Dyer also notes in passing the presence of gay-or lesbian-codedcharacters in the film("the dyke styleof the
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