Voicelessness and Emotional Survival Message Board
Voicelessness and Emotional Survival => Voicelessness and Emotional Survival Message Board => Topic started by: Marta on August 08, 2005, 07:01:04 AM
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Hello,
Has anyone seen White Oleander, the film where Michelle Pfeiffer plays an N mother? I have no read the book, but what struck me about the movie was the daughter's clear perspective early on about who her mother was. Can anyone identify with that?
I can see how kids whose parents are all Mr. Hyde all the time can hate them from a young age. However, my own mother was Jekyll and Hyde, and it was not until I was well into my thirties that I understood the extent to which my family was screwed up, so all along before that I thought that I was the one who was a problem.
When I first read Kafka in my twenties, it was as though someone had dropped a bomb shell on me. I cried and cried, without quite knowing why at the time. At the time, I had not identified the dysfunction of my family. Now I know why. That horror of Kafkaesque world was what we lived through.
Another N book is supposed to be Stendahl's Red and Black, but I did not care for it so much. Somehow we don't get to know Matilde well enough for Julien to conclude that she would not love her child.
Any other examples from literature?
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Any other examples from literature?
Scarlett O'Hara from Gone With the Wind. She was toned down to loveable for the film, but is really nasty in the book.
Also, Vanity Fair; Becky Sharp is very N in her behaviour. Again, toned down into a misunderstood heroine in the recent film.
Mr Rochester in Jane Eyre is pretty selfish and manipulative.
Raskolnikov in Crime and Punishment, who only feels remorse for being found out.
Miss Haversham in Great Expectations.
I am sure here are millions of them, once you start to look. : )
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hello!
here are my contributions:
Cathy in East of Eden
The father in Poisonwood Bible
As far as recognizing Nhood of the parents as a child, I think it depends on how much ambivalence and back-and-forth behavior there is confusing the atmosphere. (I was very confused and didn't have a clue.)
MP
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The no.1 narcisissistic book / film that kept me awake for nights afterwards with uncomfortable recognition was Mommie Dearest by Christina Crawford. It was like a flashback to my own crazy childhood. Uuuugh!
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I think the reason there is some clarity in the children of N's in literature and film (any Dickens, oh my!) is that it is fantasy, based on life. Nothing is scarier than real life. In a book, children can become heros and are empowered like semi-adults....it would be too hard for us all to read how it more frequently really is, with the child confused and scarred, only to heal much later in life...
I am glad these hero/children are there for us to emulate. How I loved when Nicholas Nickelby took control! Made me think I might be so brave in that situation. I think they are empowering role models, perhaps.
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All the books by V.C. Andrews (or is it Anderson?) are chock full of Ns and dysfunction. I loved them all. Especially the first one: Flowers in the Attic. Not classic lit but definitely a page turner.
Plucky
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Henry James' "Beast in the Jungle" -- grandiosity and asexual "romance"
Terrifying.
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Also, Ignatius Reilly in John Kennedy Toole's A Confederacy of Dunces, working on a "monumental indictment against our society."
Recommended this book to someone because his own book reminded me of Ignatius Reilly's magnum opus. Several painful months later realized my "friend" is an N.
Also and especially Dostoevsky's Notes from Underground.
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Postscript:
Naturally he didn't like the book at all.
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Oh my. I loaned A C of D to two people who had very negative reactions to it - both also turned out to be camouflaged Ns.
Maybe it can be validated for use as "N litmus paper". !
What terrified me most about the James short story wasn't so much the narcissism of the male, but the woman's slow emotional starvation as she waited for him to 'get it'. They never 'get it'...
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Mildred Rogers in "Of Human Bondage" by W. Somerset Maugham is a totally destructive N. Story of obsession and repeated betrayal.
"Emma Bovary" was very much of an N too, but a boring one.
The protagonist, Nicholas, in "The Magus" by John Fowles is very Nish, but gets a severe commupence. A great book.
"Nana" by Emile Zola.
The father in "The Thibauts" by Roger Martin du Gard is a total N autocrat and is ruinous to his sons' spirit.
"The Buddenbrooks" by Thomas Mann-a study of a deeply narcissistic family caught in world changing events.
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Amethyst, that is so funny that you say that about Emma Bovary! I thought the same thing-- I had to read it in French and English and I was really tired of that poor girl (I can't call her a woman) by the end.
Othello is an example, I think, of a bullying N. I always hated that we were supposed to feel sorry for him. Desdemona is so codependent. Not that it isn't great literature, of course, but I always had this desire to run into the play and tell her to just run away from that nutcase.
Richard III, although maybe at the end he is supposed to be having remorse (it's tough to tell if it's remorse or just comeuppance).
Well, gosh, now that I'm thinking about it, I would say MANY of the folks in Shakespeare :) He does a good job of writing a pompous soliloquies full of narcissism.
Most of the men in The Color Purple were very N. I guess if I were a man reading that book I might not like it much.
I love Richard Ford and I think one interesting aspect of his work is how he explores the life of fairly immature men who have very selfish tendencies without making them into villains, or at least while making them interesting villains. It's in some ways a nice exploration of how a regular person could end up behaving very N-like due to lack of self-insight and maturity.
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What terrified me most about the James short story wasn't so much the narcissism of the male, but the woman's slow emotional starvation as she waited for him to 'get it'. They never 'get it'...
I always thought the relationships described in Henry James' short stories were rarefied and intensely beautiful. Now (after a bad burn from a particularly pure specimen of N-ism) I understand rather more.... Your comment makes me realize this. I had never thought of the woman's condition (in "The Beast in the Jungle") as one of "starvation." Ow. Ow. Read in Edel's biography that James had a saint-or-predator view of women, typical of N-ism, though a gay friend tells me HJ was homosexual.
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Interesting that James 'split' women like that - I'll have to look at the characters more. I'd noticed the emotional anorexia, if you can call it that, because that is still advocated for women (waiting bravely & fruitlessly to be fully appreciated, etc.).
What do you make of Daisy Miller? I had thought of it as a sort of 'tragedy of manners', like the tale (title eluding me) about the incredibly clueless family with the delicate, wise-aware child who, of course, does not survive and whose true worth, of course, is never grasped by any member of his own uncouth family... James wrote a great deal on that theme, didn't he? It fits with what you were saying about him possibly being homosexual - he would have felt endangered and unprized...
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About Henry James and women -- I was talking about James' own life -- as Edel describes it, anyway. Apparently there was a certain "idealized" literary woman (a descendant of James Fenimore Cooper) in his life who may have committed suicide because she realized they couldn't be together. I think that's it. Not clear on the details.
Haven't read DM for a long time. Will have another look.
Someone recently told me that HJ was very much affected by a "mystical" experience which oppressed his father in HJ's early childhood: HJ Sr. became convinced that he was haunted by a malevolent spirit. Was cured of this belief only by the study of Swedenborgianism. There is an interesting account of this in Edel's first vol., "The Untried Years." Anyway, the experience is believed to have inspired HJ Jr.'s interest in the supernatural.
Thanks for the literary chat....
-s
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The mother, Enid, in the family in Jonathan Franzen's "The Corrections" seems to be a martyr covert-N.
In one scene, one of her sons has been told to stay at the dinner table until he finishes his meal, and has then been "forgotten"...
"Enid skirted the dining room. She reasoned that if the problem in the dining room was her responsibility then she was horrendously derelict in not resolving it, and a loving mother could never be so derelict, and she was a loving mother, so the responsibility must not have been hers."
Sounds exactly like N-reasoning to me.
jemima
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Hello everyone,
That is an interesting observation about Cathy in East of Eden. I didn't read it until after a huge falling out and endless pain with a Cathy type. I had experiences with extremely selfish people but had not dealt with the real damage and seemingly endless lying and manipulation they are capable of until an adult. So, I think I would have had trouble believing such a character could exist also. But since I only just read it a few years ago, my eyes were glued to the pages.
I forget which male character (the "good" straight one) who loses the girl, because he has to be "right" and proper all the time. But he reminded me of many guys I know who have to "tear up the world" when things don't go the way they "should" or are "supposed to". I thought that was another very interesting thing to draw out of the story. He expected perfection from everyone around him and was constantly disappointed.
MP
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I remember in the movie "The Prince of Tides", the Nick Nolte character recalling the pathology of his mother, how she privately told each of her three children that they were her favorite child. She told them to keep that secret from the other two. They all believed that she favored themselves until after she died and they compared notes. Yuk! Reminds me how my mother manipulates and pits her three kids to keep all hopping for her favor.
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I saw White Oleander last year. I remember being deeply affected by the daughter's strength in the face of what she experienced in the different foster homes. I love how she manifested her experiences into art. That movie really stuck with me and I didn't know anything about NPD during that time. Thanks for bringing it to my recollection. I'm a real movie buff. Some other N's in Hollywood pop culture:
Brenda-Six Feet Under
Tony's mother-the Sopranos
Tia Leone's character-Spanglish
Whitney Houston-Being Bobby Brown
Sandra Bullock's character's mother-Ya-Ya Sisterhood
Michael Baldwin's father and Sheila in the Young and the Restless
Tiffany
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I am reading Diaries of Anais Nin. Boy, is she an En or what!! “Underlying melancholy though, my life is beautiful. Hundreds of loving letters. Interesting visitors. Work on the film. The sun. Indian cotton dresses in the closet.” “Those who have continued to grow with me remain permanent friends.” “When a friendship breaks, the good is erased.” “There was no ego in [my] diaries, only a voice which spoke for thousands, made links, bonds, friendships. “
Sends chills down my spines.
This is what I call a Las Vegas life!
Marta, Thank you. You just explained something that has puzzled me for years. I read the diaries a long time ago and found them beautifully written, but almost static. I kept thinking at the time that I should appreciate them more than I did and I tried to keep in mind that a diary is a personal record and may be enigmatic simply because it was not destined to be shared. I was frustrated because there seemed to be nothing to grab on to....she never could make another person come alive for me...or a situation, but her descriptive ability, especially when it came to beauty, was breathtaking. I always felt that somehow there was no boundary between her and others, except for her love of the natural world. I always felt that in any situation, Nin was always the central figure in her idyllic landscape and that people were projections of her internal states. Very eerie, almost as if she is writing in a dream. The same feeling exists in her books.
On the other hand, I am sure Gertrude Stein was more than a bit of an egomaniac, but I loved her writings, idiosyncratic as they could be. She was absolutely fascinated with people and their relationships...how people ticked, and she took great pleasure in her friends and acqaintances. Delight, humor and sometimes rather wicked amusement just bubbles through her writings. She greatly admired the artists she knew and whose work she collected, which no true narcissist would ever be able to do. She brought Picasso and many other people to life...foibles and all. I also felt that she left an honest record.
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I am having huge difficulties in seeing the N in those quotes from Nin?
:(
Hmmmm....
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Hi Amethyst,
What a pleasure it is when you find others who’ve read the same books as you! I agree with you re. Stein I think Stein was what you call a big bully, who liked to dominate others. But inside she was soft. I read her Three Lives when I was twenty three and it made me cry. BTW, Nin does not like Stein, finds her too dominating.
My N ex-best friend is a writer who writes about indigenous people. Her book is full of self-references. Like she devotes several pages in her book about how all the men kept flirting with her in jungle!
As for Nin, I think she is a more confident, more productive version of Charlene from Scott Peck’s book. Here are a few more gems from the autobiography. She really does fit the classic profile of an NPD.
“Narcissism is but self-doubt”
“I must always have had a need not to see the ugly side of a person or a place. I must have always created my own world and selected those who fitted in.”
“My work only attracts people I can love in return.”
“And those who wish to come as disciples, to help me, type for me, or cook, or garden, live in my presence. A symbol. So Anais, you are a symbol.”
“Because of ill-health I cannot attend your memorial service for Caresse Crosby, but I am enclosing one of her last letters, a few days before her death, showing her pleasure at the tribute I paid her. I feel it is in this way she always wanted to be remembered.”
What do you think of Hemingway? I think he is more of a misogynist than anything else.
Hi Marta, This is wonderful to go over these books and these authors with someone that is familiar. You are right about Stein...she was a big softie. She also loyal to her partner, Alice Toklas, her whole life through, unlike Nin, who was constantly trying to find different parts of her personality in different relationships. I also believe that Gerty and Alice were very happy together, and that Alice, the wife, was just as happy as Gerty.
Gerty's rather masculine appearing and unadorned prescence would have been anathema to Nin, who was exactly the opposite. I have not truly been able to understand why Nin is considered a feminist hero, unless it is because she explored her own psyche to the extent that it brought to light many things women have struggled with, like how we can mirror ourselves in others.
I am amazed by Stein for several reasons. I think Stein was probably one of the most well-adjusted and goodnatured people I have ever heard of. First of all, she never seemed to have any struggle coming to terms with being a lesbian, which is incredible, considering the times she lived in. She was comfortable with her sexuality and because she was comfortable with it, everyone else was too. During the WWI, the couple drove a vehicle that was equipped as an ambulance and delivered medical supplies to French hospitals, so they certainly were not prima donnas. Far from it. During WWII, Toklas and Stein had to leave Paris because of the German occupation (they were Jewish). In the south of France there was always the threat of being interned in a concentration camp. However, their relationships with their neighbors were so good that the neighbors protected them. When they returned to Paris, they became very close to some regular GI's and welcomed them into their home and their lives, almost like surrogate mothers or grandmothers. Gerty obviously did not have a snobbish bone in her body.
I have a real fondness for Gerty. Because of her, I learned to turn the tables on a bully. I look like Gertrude Stein. My N ex, who was an art historian, went out of his way to put me down for that, calling Gerty "ugly and masculine," after pointing out the resemblance. I was supposed infer that I was also "ugly and masculine." When I saw her photos, I had to agree that my N ex was right about the resemblance, which is very strong. However, my reaction to Gerty's photos was that she was handsome, striking and unadorned, a real presence. Because of the "teasing", and because I am interested in writing, I began to read everything about and by Gerty that I could get my hands on. All I had really known about her before being "teased" were the phrases "a rose is a rose is a rose" and "there is no there there." The more I read, the more I liked her. I was surprised to discover that we shared the same birthdate, February 3rd, and that I was born about six months after her death. From the reading, I also realized that my paternal grandmother and her family had been friends with some the same families that Gerty had known in Baltimore and that my grandmother and I had paid a visit to some of them when I was about four or five. I thought,"Man, I am going to have some fun with this." I practically was rolling on the floor with laughter.
Soooo....I told my ex that not only did I look like Gerty, but that I shared her birthday and had been taken to visit her "friends" when I was a little girl. I told him that he'd better watch out, that I might be the reincarnation of Gertrude Stein, and that if he kept saying that she was ugly and masculine, he might be terribly sorry, especially careerwise...lol. I said this quite seriously, with a straight face, and I think it scared him; he could be a silly and superstitious N. I also told him that it was horrible of him, as an art historian, to say such things about a woman who had informed the world about so much art. Anyway, the "teasing" about that particular issue stopped, but being who he was, he always found new stuff to pick on. I often used what I called the "Gerty technique" to turn the tables and will still use it if need be in dysfunctional situations. The kicker is that I am now married to a Stein (no relation to Gerty) who thinks my resemblance to Gerty is just terrific.
Now about Hemingway, who also met and was influenced in his writing style by Stein, btw. Probably an N. Ernest was a relationship junkie and maybe a sex addict, married four times, became an alcoholic later in life, a suicide, an excitement addict, an adventure junkie. I have read most of his books but they have never resonated with me, although some of them are beautifully written. I always felt there was a muscular shell surrounding and almost protecting his work from getting too deep, of becoming vulnerable. I have the feeling that Hemingway was a homophobe, very concerned about his physical prowess, and may have been a misogynist because he was cut off from his tenderness. He was also a projective personality. What negativity he saw in himself, he put onto others.
On the other hand, I loved everything F.Scott Fitzgerald, a raving drunk, but the opposite of N, ever wrote. Fitzgerald seemed to have a great sympathy and tenderness for his characters. His stories are romantic, and yet his stories are very cautionary about being misled by romance, by appearances, by the dream, the glamour, the stardust. Look how Gatsby, an outsider, is totally schnookered, undone, and destroyed by the carelessness and the callousness of Tom and Daisy. FSF is also very sympathetic to women. When Nichole, in Tender is the Night, leaves Dick Diver (another outsider) for Tommy, even though Diver is the protagonist and has "put up" with Nichole's bouts of insanity, he clearly feels that she is right to leave Diver, who is of course a thinly disguised autobiographical figure. In everything I have ever read, FSF's humanity comes shining through, and I don't feel that with Hemingway. It's obvious that FSF is very aware of his character flaws and is full of self doubt....not an N. An introjective personality.
FSF stayed married to his insane, probably schizophrenic, institutionalized wife Zelda and paid for her care. He was in Hollywood working to pay for his child's schooling when he died of heart disease which was probably brought on by a lifetime of alcoholism. The tragedy of Fitzgerald is that he was a genetic and hardcore alcoholic...a true drunk...and couldn't stop. It's very sad; even though he knew that the stardust and the romance was a lie, he looked for it every day in the bottle. If he hadn't suffered from the disease of alcoholism, which certainly cut short his life, can you imagine what he could have written?
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Hi Amethyst,
Funny to hear your story of Stein connections!
I loved the Old man and the sea, but not much else by Hemingway. For example, I never understood why the writer from Snows of Kilimanjaro hated his companion so much. There was so much unnecessary hatred in that story. You are right about him projecting negative qualities. I guess there is a history of depression and suicides in his family, so there is not much he could do about that. I wonder what is it about him that resonates with people though.
I'll look up Fitzgerald again.
Later, Marta