by Walker Percy
(b) Is it because, since one person, friend or stranger, is often difficult to deal with, 50 people are 50 times more difficult?
(c) Is it because, say with an audience of 500, you are being looked at by at least 499 people whose gaze you cannot defend against by looking back, that is, you are being seen from this or that vulnerable angle where your mask or persona may not be in place?
(d) Is it because you fear a total failure of performance such as never happened in the history of the world, so that not one word will come to your mind and world chaos will follow? As evidence of such a danger, note the uneasiness of a playgoing audience when an actor forgets his lines or a congregation when a preacher falls silent for no apparent reason. The escalating terror of such a silence is a public phenomenon: five seconds of such silence is a very long time, ten seconds is almost intolerable.
(e) Is it because you know that what you present to the world is a persona, a mask, that it is a very fragile disguise, that God alone knows what is underneath since you clearly do not, perhaps nothing less than the self itself, and that if the persona fails, what is revealed is unspeakable (literally, because you can’t speak it), like what was revealed when the Phantom of the Opera had his mask ripped off, a no-face, a vacancy, a hole which is much worse than the ugliest face—so frightening, in fact, that you remember, as a child, crawling under the seat in the movie?
Thought Experiment: If you are a shy person, which of the following situations is the most terrifying to you? Which is the least terrifying?
In the first, you are a mid-echelon executive in the sales division of a large company in which you are both successful and well liked. You are scheduled to deliver a speech at the annual banquet, an honor. You have months to prepare.
In the second, you are the character Richard Hannay in Hitchcock’s The Thirty-nine Steps. Pursued down a street by his enemies, he ducks into a doorway which happens to be a stage door and finds himself on stage at a political rally where he is mistaken for the guest speaker and introduced. He has not the faintest idea what he is supposed to talk about.
In the third, the world’s population has been destroyed by nuclear wars. Only you have survived. The earth is invaded by extraterrestrial beings. They capture you and haul you up before a large tribunal and make it known to you that you must give an account of yourself, what you are doing here, why you should be spared, etc.
Explain your choice.
Thought Experiment (II): Explain why Moses was tongue-tied and stagestruck before his fellow Jews but had no trouble talking to God.
Explain on what grounds Christ told his followers not to worry if they were arrested and required to testify before a court of their enemies. You will know what to say, he told them. Did he imply that it is easier to talk to enemies than to friends and that the real problem arises when one is required to address one’s fellow Christians in the church at Corinth?
(5)The Fearful Self (II):
Why the Self is so Afraid of Being Stuck with Another Self
JOHNNY CARSON, WHEN QUESTIONED about his aplomb on the stage before a TV audience of millions, replied: Sure, I’m at ease up here—because I’m in control—but when I’m at a cocktail party and caught in a one-on-one conversation: panic city!
Question: What do Johnny Carson and other shy people fear when they are caught in a “one-on-one” conversation at a cocktail party? That is, what is the worst case, the worst thing that can happen?
(a) That you can’t think of anything interesting to say and the other person will be bored?
(b) That the other person has nothing to say that you want to hear and you know you will be bored?
(c) That neither of you has anything to say and therefore the world will come to an end, or rather, something worse than the end of the world, or, as Carson would say, panic city—that is, a predicament in which all options open to you are more intolerable than the end of the world?
(d) That there are only two means of escape, both of which are intolerable: either you leave, which will hurt the other person’s feelings, or the other person leaves, which will hurt your feelings?
(e) That you will be exposed, that is, that the unique unformulability, the singular nought, which you secretly believe yourself to be, will be exposed at last, the one black hole among a billion other ordinary stars?
(CHECK ONE)
Thought Experiment: Imagine that you are Johnny Carson and find yourself caught in an intolerable one-on-one conversation at a cocktail party from which there is no escape.
Which of the two following events would you prefer to take place: (1) That the other person become more and more witty and charming, the music more beautiful, the scene transformed to a villa at Capri on the loveliest night of the year, while you find yourself more and more at a loss; or (2) that you are still in Beverly Hills and the chandeliers begin to rattle, a 7.5 Richter earthquake takes place, and presently you find yourself and the other person alive and well, and talking under a mound of rubble.
If your choice is (2), explain why it is possible for a true conversation to take place under the conditions of (2) but not (1).
(6) The Fearful Self (III):
How the Self Tries to Escape its Predicament
QUESTION: IF YOU ARE a shy person, is it better to accept your shyness, or to seek help from a psychotherapist in order to become an assertive outgoing person, or perhaps to read a book about overcoming shyness?
(a) It is better to seek help from a psychotherapist because it is better not to suffer than to suffer. Psychiatrists and psychologists treat disorders. Shyness is a symptom of such a disorder. Therefore, it is reasonable to seek such help.
(b) It is better to read a book about how to get over being shy, anxious, insecure, and so on, than not to read such a book, because one might learn a helpful thing or two, even from a book.
(c) It is better not to read such a book because the effects of such books last only during the reading of the book and perhaps fifteen minutes after finishing it, and therefore your despair is only increased.
(d) It is better to listen to Leo Buscaglia, because he speaks of such things as love, hugging, and being open to people.
(e) It is better not to listen to Leo Buscaglia, because though Leo’s entertaining, both you and Leo are going to feel worse afterward.
(f) It is better to read the book you are presently reading, though not much better, because it does not tell you how to get over shyness, anxiety, and such, but only raises them as subjects between writer and reader and renders the unformulable formulable, for a while perhaps even tolerable.
(g) It is better not to seek help from a psychotherapist but to accept your shyness, painful though it is, because it is better to be your shy self than the sort of person the psychotherapist may want you to become, i.e., like the psychotherapist.
(h) It is better to seek help from a psychotherapist if the psychotherapist knows what not many psychotherapists know, namely, that the shy person may know something the non-shy person does not know, that your self is indeed unformulable to yourself, that you are entitled to your shyness, that, indeed, varying degrees of idiocy are required not to be shy, that the very unformulability of your self is the only clue you have to the uniqueness of yourself, that otherwise one will become yet another Ralph among a thousand Ralphs, or worse still, become an imitation of the psychotherapist.
(CHECK ONE)
Thought Experiment: In which of the two following situations would you find yourself more shy?
(1) Addressing an audience of 500 of your fellow townsmen
(2) Journeying to the Valley of the Blind, described in H. G. Wells’s story, and addressing 500 strange people who cannot see you
Explain your choice.
Thought Experiment (II): You are invited to a party. You have a choice of going as any one of these four people. Which would you choose?
(a) Mickey Rooney, who (let us say) is not shy (though who knows for sure?), who comes into a room like a tor
nado
(b) Johnny Carson, who is terrified, who sidles along the wall in dark glasses hoping no one will speak to him and then is miserable because no one speaks to him
(c) Yourself, who is shy and don’t think you should be, therefore you spend all your energy concealing your terrible malady and trying to figure out how to correct it
(d) Yourself, who is shy, but who knows you’re entitled and that everyone else is likely to be in the same fix, and who therefore accepts it like a prisoner thrown into the drunk tank with ten other people all strange to each other—which is what in fact you all are—and so are free to gaze at the others with a mild curiosity and free to ask simple-minded questions and make simple-minded requests, such as: What are you doing here? or: I notice you seem a little uptight and are breathing shallow—come over here, I’ll put my hand on your diaphragm, take a deep breath; or: Let me tell you something interesting that happened to me today—nothing; or: My head is killing me, would you mind massaging my neck? or: My name is Jon Johnson and I come from Wisconsin—that’s a fact—and I’m wondering whether I made a mistake in leaving, so I’m having two quick drinks, can I fix you two? or: You’re good-looking and since there is clearly nothing for us to talk about, would you care to step outside to my car and fool around?
(CHECK ONE)
(7) The Misplaced Self:
How Two Selves Confronting Each Other can Miscalculate, Each Attributing a Putative and Spurious Reality to the Other and Trying to Match it, with the Consequence that Both Selves Become Non-selves
A FILMMAKER REPORTED the following experience with his film company, especially the actors, while on location in a small Midwestern town.
The townspeople showed a tremendous excitement about the presence of the film company in their midst. Not only did they make the town and even their homes available to the film crew, allowing their very lives to be disrupted, some town folk even expressed the strongest possible desire to be in the film, if only in the most insignificant roles. A quiet woman, the librarian, said that it would be the greatest event of her life.
The actors also enjoyed their stay in the town and the attention they were getting. Even though they, the actors, were not held in the highest regard by the filmmakers—producers, directors, cinematographers, etc.—were in fact often referred to by the latter as “pieces of meat,” “talking faces,” “hollow heads” among other uncomplimentary expressions—they, the actors, found themselves playing enjoyable roles in the town. What roles? They were playing the roles of the superb human beings the town folk believed them to be. Everyone in town remarked what nice people they were. So they became nice. They became nicer than saints. One famous actress in particular, noted for her childish and difficult ways, became a very model of friendliness and graciousness, astounding even the film crew and the town folk by her small acts of kindness, such as inquiring after the health of a stagehand’s sick child, remembering the name of the A & P checkout lady.
Question (I): Which of the two, the actors or the townspeople, are the more real, that is, perceive themselves as more nearly what they are?
(a) The townspeople because they have no illusions about themselves, their humdrum lives and workaday selves, whereas the actors not only live in a tinsel world but are themselves forever playing roles, are always “on” even when they walk into the town drugstore.
(b) The actors, particularly the actress who, by very reason of her finding herself in a real place among real people and removed from the fakery of Hollywood, is able for once in her life to become herself, her true best self.
(c) Neither town folk nor actors, because both are equally displaced, equally deprived of themselves, though in different ways. The town folk are deprived because, though they live in a “real” town, through an optical illusion they perceive the actors to be more splendidly real than they themselves and perceive the actors’ lives to be both more glamorous and more of a piece (to judge from the films) than their own, which seem somewhat dim and tentative by comparison. Through a different sort of optical illusion, the actors are able for a while to take on the very reality imputed to them by the town folk, wear it like a costume and with the greatest of ease because they’ve been doing nothing else most of their lives. Thus, they cloak the nought and nakedness of their selves, which are perhaps no different in kind from anyone else’s but perhaps more acutely felt.
Note that the felt “reality” of the actors in the town is as brief as any other performance. After six weeks on location, even the gracious actress said she “couldn’t wait to get out of the boonies.” For their part, too, the town folk might get sick and tired of the antics of, say, Mel Brooks.
Though both actors and town folk have reached for what they perceived to be a heightened reality, it, reality itself, has somehow fallen between them, like a dropped ball.
Question (II): Test your own index of misplacement.
(1) Imagine meeting Robert Redford under the most ordinary circumstances: you’re a bank teller and he comes in to cash a check. He is very nice, almost preternaturally nice. You perceive that Redford’s self has, perhaps by virtue of his film image, a higher or at least a different reality from your own.
(2) Imagine that you are a movie star finding yourself in a small town, you with all the well-known self-problems of movie stars—What if these people recognize me and hassle me, about autographs? What if they don’t recognize me?—and all the anxiety caused by three failed films, dearth of good scripts, unsympathetic directors, producers, and moneymen. Now imagine you as such a movie star watching the locals at work and play; you envy the A & P manager perched in the manager’s box keeping an eye on the checkout lines, watering the lawn of a late summer evening.
Which of the two would you rather be, the bank teller or the movie star?
(CHECK ONE)
Thought Experiment: Imagine you are walking down Madison Avenue behind Al Pacino, whom you have seen frequently in the movies but never in the flesh. He is shorter than you thought. His raincoat is thrown over his shoulder. Hands in pockets, he stops to look in the window of Abercrombie & Fitch. His face takes on a characteristic expression, jaws clenched, eyes dark and luminous, like young Corleone in The Godfather. The sight of Pacino in the flesh acting like Pacino on the screen gives you a peculiar pleasure. Then you become aware that though Pacino is looking at the articles in the window display, he is also checking his own reflection in the glass. This, too, gives you pleasure, though of a different sort. Explain the difference. (Hint: The esthetic pleasure of seeing an instance of a symbol, Pacino in the flesh at Abercrombie’s, measure up and conform to the symbol itself, Pacino on the screen, and the different pleasure of seeing the instance, Pacino, rescued from the symbol and restored to human creatureliness, the self in all its vagary, individuality, and folly. The first case: Ah, there is Pacino acting just like Corleone! The second case: Ah, there is Pacino acting just like me!)
(8) The Promiscuous Self:
Why is it that One’s Self often not only does not Prefer Sex with one’s Chosen Mate, Chosen for His or Her Attractiveness and Suitability, even when the Mate is a Person well known to one, knowing of one, loved by one, with a Life, Time, and Family in common, but rather prefers Sex with a New Person, even a Total Stranger, or even Vicariously through Pornography
A RECENT SURVEY in a large city reported that 95 percent of all video tapes purchased for home consumption were Insatiable, a pornographic film starring Marilyn Chambers.
Of all sexual encounters on soap opera, only 6 percent occur between husband and wife.
In some cities of the United States, which now has the highest divorce rate in the world, the incidence of divorce now approaches 60 percent of married couples.
A recent survey showed that the frequency of sexual intercourse in married couples declined 90 percent after three years of marriage.
On a talk show a female sexologist reported that a favorite fantasy of American women, second only to oral sex, was having sex with t
wo strange men at once.
According to the president of the North American Swing Club Association, only 3 percent of married couples who are swingers get divorces, as compared with over 50 percent of non-swinging couples.
In large American cities, lunch-break liaisons between business men and women have become commonplace.
Sexual activity and pregnancy in teenagers have increased dramatically in the last twenty years, in both those who have received sex education in schools and those who have not. In some cities, more babies are born to single women than to married women.
A radio psychotherapist reported that nowadays many young people who disdain marriage, preferring “relationships” and “commitments,” speak of entering into simultaneous relationships with a second or third person as a growth experience.
In San Francisco’s Buena Vista Park, to the outrage of local middle-class residents, homosexuals cruise and upon encountering a sexual prospect, always a stranger, exchange a word or a sign and disappear into the bushes. In a series of interviews, Buena Vista homosexuals admitted to sexual encounters with an average of more than 500 strangers.
A survey by a popular magazine reported that the incidence of homosexuality in the United States had surpassed that of the Weimar Republic and is approaching that of England.
Question: Do Americans, as well as other Westerners, prefer sexual variety, both heterosexual and homosexual, because
(a) The sexual revolution has occurred, which is nothing else but the overthrow of the unnatural repressions and taboos of 1,900 years of Christianity and the exploration of the free and healthy practices of a sexually liberated society.
(b) Humans are biologically as promiscuous as chimpanzees. It is only the cultural constraints of society, probably imposed by the economic necessities of an agricultural society, which required a monogamous union and children as a reliable labor source.
