Rameau's Niece

by Cathleen Schine

  "They leave their telltale signs everywhere," Lily continued, looking at her own menu in its dark green plastic cover. "The text of their exclusion is so public. Oh, I like your do, Margaret," she added, patting Margaret's hair, which had just been cut. Then she leaned forward, and continued, "You know, I wake up in the morning and I feel like a sex object."

  Because she thought this sounded glamorous, Margaret examined Lily more closely. The tight black leather skirt was de rigueur for a feminist art critic, she supposed. But the red lace bodice seemed a more personal statement. Well, if one had shapely shoulders and beautiful breasts, the left breast blessed further with a beauty mark, why shouldn't one display them? If this caused men to leer at one and treat one as a sex object, it was a reflection on them, the men, wasn't it? There was something wonderfully innocent and nearly tragic about Lily, Margaret thought, like a flower, bursting with gaudy color and health, swaying in the garden breeze, alluring by nature, but shy of every admiring glance, seeing there its own—pluck!—mortality.

  ***

  We determined that we could do no better, in the pursuit of enlightened understanding, than to examine the nature of friendship using our own growing friendship as a model. My pupil, my "friend," had already set for herself a course of reading of such a noble and ambitious tone, a road leading to such heights and yet lined with such pitfalls, that I felt compelled, as a friend, to accompany her, to act as her guide, to take her hand and lead her.

  MYSELF: Education determines a man. Men are born ignorant, not stupid. They are made stupid by education. But you, you have somehow escaped and remained as un-stained as a chad. Now your education can begin. First, your senses will awaken. You will see and hear and smell, you will taste and you will touch. And then, ah! As your senses awaken, all the inlets to the mind are set open; now, now, all the objects of nature will rush thither.

  SHE: Thither?

  MYSELF: Thither.

  SHE: To the inlets?

  MYSELF: They will rush into the deepest inlets. To all the inlets of the mind.

  Rameau's niece, formerly a wretched, sniveling infant (as I vividly recalled when once she identified herself), an indefatigable nuisance, petulant, weeping, quarreling with other little nuisances, a graceless, unruly thing, who had yet been worshiped as a goddess by her parents, blinded as they were by nature, was now truly a goddess. Please, do not deceive yourselves that my judgment was likewise clouded by parental sentiment. I felt not at all like a parent to this exquisite little girl whom any man of discernment would have described, as I often did to myself, as a figure of such elevating charms that just to look at her, the way her shoulders curved in relation to the equally elegant curve of her white neck, and the manner in which her waist, with its own, quite unique little curve, yet was bound up so eloquently with the rest, was to experience that these curves achieved a most pleasing unity of effect, an effect of beauty so powerful that I confess that during one of our meetings (this time in the library, for it was raining), before I could even realize what I was doing, I had flung myself to my knees before her.

  Alone in the room, the others having retired, we faced each other, she seated, still clutching the volume she had been reading, myself at her feet, wondering what I had done and fearing more than anything her displeasure at my intemperate behavior, when suddenly the silence was broken by her soft, pure voice. My pupil began to read aloud.

  SHE [reading]: When I observe the relation objects have to me [here she glanced at me, then lowered her dark, bright eyes to the page], I am in like manner attentive to the impressions I receive. [She paused, and I, heeding what I took to be the import of her words but even more her agitated expression, placed my hand on hers. She trembled, dropped the book upon her lap, then quickly recovered it and resumed reading.] These impressions are either agreeable [her breathing seemed to change to a rhythm of particular intensity] or disagreeable. Now, in either case, what is judgment? [She closed her book, put it aside, took my hand in both of her own.] To tell what I feel. [Reciting now from memory, my pupil drew my hand to her breast.] To judge [she was whispering now] is to feel. To judge is to feel.

  SO YOU HAD LUNCH with your lady friends," Richard said. "Did you wear hats?"

  "Yes, and we counted out the change and loudly discussed how we would divide it." It was her evening call to him, when she lay back in bed with pages piled beside her and reviewed the day that was nearly done. She smiled, accidentally pressing several of the phone's buttons with her cheek, triggering a long series of clicks and beeps through which she could hear Richard muttering.

  "Richard," she said, when the phone was quiet. "Men are born ignorant, not stupid. But what if you remain ignorant?"

  "I wouldn't know."

  "It's very difficult being an ignorant intellectual."

  "Well," Richard said thoughtfully, "I suppose it's better than being a stupid intellectual."

  Margaret sighed. Then she read to Richard from Rameau's Niece.

  "'I must compliment you on the great care which you take of my education,' says the little girl, 'and on your unwearied perseverance, my dear teacher, and the pains which you bestow on me. You are no more wanting, I am persuaded, in skill than in industry.' That's Hume, Richard. My author stole that from Hume, from Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion. Just listen to what he's done to poor Hume! 'By continual precept and instruction,' replies the philosopher, 'and I hope, too, by example, I shall imprint deeply on your tender mind, and your equally tender lips, an habitual reverence for these principles of kissing. Then at last, having thus tamed your mind to a proper submission, I will have no longer any scruple of opening to you the greatest mysteries of all.'"

  "No one ever speaks to me like that," Richard said.

  "I am," Margaret said. "I do." The pillow was cool against her cheek. Richard's voice was soft and alluring, and she felt suddenly very tenderly toward him, always there on the other end of the phone when she needed him, when she wanted him. She felt tenderly toward him and toward the World at large, she realized when she'd hung up, as she lay in wait for Edward, toward whom she felt most tenderly of all, most tenderly indeed.

  "I have no longer any scruple," she said when he came in looking for a pencil, "of opening to you the greatest mysteries of all."

  "Reading that smut again, eh? That's a good girl."

  So that our thoughtful discussions should be neither hindered by inclement weather nor interrupted by other, less philosophical members of the household, we began to meet indoors and at night, and in our search for privacy decided on my bedroom as the best location.

  Philosophy was a pursuit that came naturally to her. Having taught herself Latin at a tender age, she was knowledgeable of the classics and eager to learn more. I was eager to teach her.

  MYSELF: Take nothing on trust. That is the first lesson. Seek whatever instruction is to be obtained from observation and experience.

  SHE: Let me begin, then, to observe and to experience. I long to begin, for all have an equal right to be enlightened respecting their interests, to share in the acquisition of truth.

  My pupil, seeing no other piece of furniture on which to rest her charming figure, had sat upon the bed and, then, recognizing how unnatural was that position in that place and seeking, as always, to achieve the harmony and balance necessary to beauty, she lay down.

  Seeing her thus attending to the laws of aesthetics so dutifully, it occurred to me that I could do nothing less than join her in order to help her to acquire whatever understanding she sought in any way I was able to. I began to contemplate those various ways, thoroughly enjoying the exquisite anticipation of the intellectual exchange I foresaw. For it is often true that foresight of an approaching pleasure is in itself an actual pleasure, and I was soon transported by my imagination.

  But presently, as I stood and pondered these lovely issues, I noticed that she, on the bed, seemed to become what I can describe only as agitated, her cheeks taking on an unnatural but nonetheless delightful
flush, her breathing quick and strained, so that I feared she might faint and quickly bent over her reclining figure and loosened her garments, whereupon she gratefully pulled me to her and expressed again her impatient desire to begin her lesson.

  This without further mental preparation I therefore commenced.

  MYSELF: I will begin with the senses. I must, naturally, consider the objects of my sensations. Recognizing the necessity of experience for understanding and hoping to impart this important value to you, my pupil, I will now consider the particular objects before me with great attention.

  As I began carefully to investigate the immediate objects of my sensations, that is the ravishing graces and delights of a young girl reclining upon my bed, this activity seemed to stir her intellectual faculties in a highly agreeable manner, just as I had hoped and anticipated. Our lesson had at last begun in earnest.

  MYSELF: There are two kinds of perception. First, I will demonstrate to you the meaning of 'impressions.' Impressions are perceptions that are forceful and violent, external objects pressing in upon you.

  SHE: At this moment, not only do I sense a glorious external object forcefully pressing in upon me, but in truth I feel myself to be nothing but a bundle or collection of different perceptions...

  MYSELF: ...which succeed each other with inconceivable rapidity?

  SHE: Yes! Exactly! They are in perpetual flux and movement!

  After some time, during which we continued our investigation into the nature of perception with a mutual interest and single-minded devotion to experience which precluded for the time being any discussion other than the occasional cry that signified the perception of a particularly forceful impression, I felt true friendship to be within our grasp, and I experienced a flash of understanding, of sublime illumination (a flash, I concluded from various observations, that I thoroughly shared with my pupil), and in my sudden enlightenment, I cried out these words:

  MYSELF: The end of the social art is to secure and extend for all the enjoyment of the common rights which impartial nature has bequeathed to us all!

  She answered in a voice thick with understanding.

  SHE: Your logic, sir, is rigorous, your assertions sublime.

  DON'T YOU GET TIRED of all the stuffy academics you hang around with?" Margaret asked Edward one morning. She lay in bed, turned on her side, looking at him.

  "Are you tired of them?"

  "No. But I like stuffy academics. That's why I married you."

  Edward smiled.

  "But what about the trendy ones?" Margaret went on. "Like my friends? Like Lily? Imagine Lily as a colleague. She's bad enough as a friend, but at least I don't have to take her seriously. I don't have to argue with her at department meetings. Your department is crawling with Lilys. How can you stand it?"

  Margaret was actually envious of Edward, envious of the regular, comfortable world of academia. If only one didn't have to teach! She too could be a professor with a little office, with rumpled colleagues and spiteful intrigues and adoring students. But one did have to teach, and Margaret preferred to live in unstructured solitude rather than face a sea of students, arrogant and needy.

  "Stand it? I live for it!" Edward said. "'All men by nature desire to know,' said Aristotle. And I am in a place dedicated to the desire to know. I fulfill the desire to know, I satisfy it. Even Lily, the eminently silly Lily, desires to know. She's wrong about everything, isn't she, but on she rushes, determined, lusty, indomitable in her quest, a creature of desire, of the desire to know. Ah, Lily. How many of her students desire to know little Lily, I wonder."

  "Oh, please," Margaret said, and then she cupped her chin in her hand.

  Sometimes she felt as small and aloof as a spider, hanging by its thread. No ground beneath its several feet, nor water. But at least a spider could spin a web, a frail sticky gathering place for stray passersby. Till had spun a web, drawing people to her simply by the strength of her desire, her desire to have them there. Edward had spun a web of enthusiasm and pleasure for all around him. Of course, this was a perverse and counterproductive way of viewing friendship: as a trap for struggling, buzzing prey. Still, Margaret thought, shall I spin a web? Isn't that better than being the struggling, buzzing prey in the nets of others?

  "Margaret, you're so competitive," Edward said when she voiced these ideas on the nature of sociability. "And you're so serious. You're even more earnest than I am, and no one is more earnest than I. Friendship! It's not a commandment, my darling."

  "Yes, but you hear people talking of falling in love, don't you? When you talk of friends, though, you don't fall at all. You make friends."

  "Well then! To work!"

  Margaret sighed.

  "Anyway, I'm your friend, aren't I?" Edward said.

  "That's just the trouble, Edward." She looked at him and thought how large he loomed in her life, filling it with interesting talk and real understanding and tender exchanges and good sex and irritating habits and jokes and obscure quotations. He helped her in her work and liked her and cherished her. She wanted nothing else. It didn't seem right. "It doesn't seem right. To be satisfied. Don't you want more?"

  "'I exist as I am—that is enough; if no other in the world be aware, I sit content; and if each and all be aware, I sit content.'"

  "Oh, Edward, for heaven's sake. You go ahead and sit content. And get obscenely fat on oysters like Walt Whitman. Is that who you quoted? Well, he's dead now. And I'm not."

  "Margaret, bless you, you've gone mad at last. How I've longed for this moment. A mad wife! Lock her in the attic. Chain her! Feed her oysters— against her will. Ravage her till dawn. Till noon! Quite my ideal, a mad wife."

  Oh well, Margaret thought, as Edward pulled her to him. Dissatisfaction can wait.

  Edward sometimes brought students home for dinner, and Margaret had always welcomed these gatherings, for they pitted her against amateurs only, an enemy far more frightened of her than she was of them. At one of these pleasant, unthreatening dinners, Margaret listened with some interest as a student of Edward's, a boy from Oregon, described his father's mink farm, and as she listened she watched the other student guest. She was from some suburb of Boston, pretty, a little shy, and she had not taken her eyes off Edward all evening.

  I used to be a girl from some suburb of Boston, pretty, a little shy, and I used to gaze with longing at my professors, Margaret thought. Have you come here to haunt me?

  Edward smiled indulgently at the girl, but then Edward smiled indulgently at the world. Still, Margaret thought. And she turned away from the girl with a sinking feeling, as a man turns hopelessly from his fate, and then stared at Edward without realizing it, until he turned and smiled at her and reached for her hand and squeezed it.

  MARGARET HAD BEEN talking to Till for almost forty minutes, which for her pretty much obviated any need to see Till for at least two months, when it occurred to her that people like Till and Edward didn't let that happen. They never allowed the comfort of the telephone to overwhelm the pleasure of companionship, never let the phone keep them from their duty to appreciate all around them, to celebrate the existence of their friends by glorying in their company, never sunk to that enervated state in which one wondered if going out to keep a date might horribly disturb the aimless tranquillity of one's day.

  "Have you and Lily gotten together again?" Till asked.

  "No."

  "Oh. You seemed to hit it off. Are you planning to see her soon?" Till said.

  "I don't know," Margaret said. "What about you? Do you want to have lunch again? I think I'm becoming an eccentric. I think I have to become a better socialized person."

  "No, no," Till said in a determined voice. "You and Lily have lunch without me. That will be better."

  "Ah. You think I should strike out on my own, blaze new trails. But I never know what Lily is talking about. Still, there's something sweet about her, don't you think?"

  Till said, "Like fruit."

  "Fruit?" Margaret had not thou
ght of fruit. But there was something so charming about Lily, an utterly benign person chattering happily about the oppressive, phallocentric monstrosity that was modern existence. What a mess, she seemed to be saying. Isn't it grand?

  "So you like Lily?" Till said.

  "Don't you? She's your friend."

  "You know that Lily and I lived together for four years?"

  Margaret was puzzled. Of course she knew that. They had been roommates after she and Till had been roommates, and had shared an apartment for one year after school.

  "Anyway," Till went on, "when will you two get together? I think this week would be fine. Do you want me to call her for you? I have to call her anyway. If you like her, and she likes you, I think this is a good thing. This friendship."

  "Well, I don't know. I can call her, I guess. If I want to. Thank you for taking such an interest in me and my socialization."

  Margaret did meet Lily that week, at the same coffee shop. Why not? Lily blew in wearing a short swirling coat held closed by one large button and black spandex leggings, her complexion tinted by the cold, fresh air. Margaret noticed her teeth, which were small, all the same size, and white, like little tiles.

  "Hello, doll," Lily said, lighting a cigarette and exhaling a cloud of smoke straight up into the air, 1930s style. "Have you read your Ovid, yet, Margaret?" She reached for a menu. "The menu!"