by Susan Sontag
Pham Van Dong [then prime minister of North Vietnam]: speech of 2–3 years ago against the “disease of rhetoric” among cadres—generalities—advises political cadres to pay more attention to literature—wants to improve Vietnamese language …
Revolution betrayed by its language
…
Sentimentality
Austerity: Vietnamese ingenuity—a society … [in which] everything [is] for use
Chastity: nurse slept in room w[ith] the guides, drivers Fidelity
No shorts or bare chests as in Cambodia
AK [Andrew Kopkind] wonders: where is Ego set among Viets?
[In Hanoi:]
No bonzes
The poverty of [the city]—same colors (no green, red, yellow) —dark blue, beige, khaki
Organization of DRV [Democratic Republic of Vietnam] life—discipline—elitist?
Militia unit training in garden square
Sirens on opera house use
*Contrast: independence of DRV + independence of East European satellites
Loudspeaker goes on at 10:30—announces alerts + music—song by printing workers
Adults shooing away kids who follow us
5/7/68
Evening: 8–11 pm
Visit to exhibit of US weapons used in North Vietnam.
Regular bombs (explosive)—100 to 3000 lbs.
Anti-personnel weapons—a) dum-dum bullets, b) fragmentation bombs—CBU, i) cylinder, ii) round—shrike, butterfly bombs—c) incendiary weapons, i) white phosphorous, ii) napalm—Napalm A, Napalm B, iii) thermite, iv) magnesium
CBW—chemical-biological warfare—defoliants, toxic chemicals, poison gas
Photos of victims, skulls, cross section of brain, napalmed rice
5/10/68
Mr. Trung, editor of Nhan Dan [the official newspaper of the Communist Party of Vietnam]:
Love for US
Very soft-spoken
Effect of US movement—LBJ wrong in evaluating our struggle and sentiment of US people. Those in US for aggression a minority
To make war you must have finance, troops, weapons, support of large masses of people—people’s war—started w[ith]o[ut] weapons.
Likes teach-in—draft resistance—“tradition of freedom in the US”—likes signatures + ads in paper—different forms + tendencies in the movement, but richness in character—500,000 April 15 or storming of Pentagon—must have strong organizational character—able to call the movement Communist—
[“]We know our Communist friends in the US are not in great number[”]—
Movement to safeguard the freedom + prestige of the US—“the other America”—not just US troops
[“]Movement helped send Mr. Averell Harriman to Paris[”]
5/12/68
from Writers’ Union evening:
Morrison [Norman Morrison, the Baltimore Quaker who immolated himself on November 2, 1965, below Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara’s Pentagon office in protest against America’s involvement in Vietnam; he was a hero in North Vietnam during the war] is patriot + benefactor for DRV.
Ho [North Vietnam’s leader, Ho Chi Minh] in 1945: “People are good, only governments are bad.”
…
Morrison is a great man because he solved the problem outside of himself—he is not Viet, he is not a Communist—he did not (have to act) in that way.
…
[The following notes were made by Andrew Kopkind and recopied into the notebook in SS’s hand. I have included only a few excerpts, among them some references to SS’s activities in North Vietnam as recorded by Kopkind.]
5/13/68 Morning
Coffee—Discuss with Oanh about Russians. Oanh says “we know” that there are divisions in Russian embassy. Some Russians “depraved”—[Tom] Hayden says they’re like “Americans in Saigon”—Oanh says Viets were surprised to find out about Russia—“product of bad education” in USSR—Oanh also has news of 2nd Paris [peace talks] meeting; agreement on question that only N. Viets + US citizens [sic] be allowed. Also news of general strike in France in support of students.
An alert—all clear in a few minutes—no time for shelter (or interest)
Raining lightly—drove few blocks to ministry of education … old French villa or bureau—Ushered in to meet smiling director and six young teachers—khaki, green and blue shirts—around long table—tea, cookies, candies, cigs—bare electrical connections on wall—teachers in various disciplines.
Prof. Ta Quang Buu—signed Geneva agreement
Professor: Before 1956, no higher education—go back to 17th C. + before—then higher education w[ith] national characteristics—French made effort to wipe out trad[ition] (Prof. corrects Oanh’s translation)—I have been formed under French domination—know French + English. Students educated since ’54 … know Russian
…
Despite atrocities of war, profs and students have not been mobilized [this sentence is highlighted]—6000 teachers in colleges—5000 teachers in [secondary] voc[ational] schools—c. 200,000 students in all (voc. [schools] + college[s]) not drafted. Gov[ernmen]t + party pay special attention to formation of technical + eco[nomic] planning cadres, + improvement in quality—
[Professor:] Most important difficulty is intellectual isolation—but we have been developing in both theoretical + applied science—
…
SS gives outline of US edu[cation]—educ[ation] for first 12 years but not serious—needs rev[olution] to change society + polit[ical] conditions that produce it
…
Meeting hall in hotel—near shelter—long table—c. 30 people, mostly men, few women—v. light room, fans spinning, Hien translates—man w[ith] wires out of ears alongside (deaf?)
…
(interruption by long—10 mins.—alert. No one goes to shelter, but conversations stop)
Q[uestion]: Poor people’s march [This is referring to the mass protest in the United States in the spring of 1968 organized by Reverend Ralph Abernathy, who became the leader of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference after Martin Luther King’s assassination.]
Psychology of the US (long SS answer).
[Q:] What do common people think of war, effects of Tet double standards for US people + Viet? Does SS expect US people not to believe propaganda?—Vast majority of Viets don’t question propaganda either.
…
Dinner + then to small theatre … R[obert] G[reenblatt] + I left at half time … SS stayed—came back + talked w[ith] Swedes + students. [The American journalist] Mark Sommer v[ery] naïve—at dinner we had talked again about his patronizing attitude—he had complimented the Viets on their humanity (their not being dehumanized by the war, the cruelty of the Americans)—like praising Negroes for their sense of rhythm—Viets’ humanity is not at issue; ours is. Long discussion of our complicity in US society—SS attacked Mark—he really is rather callow + mindless—After SS returned, we talked again about the “barrier” here—but the barrier is itself an expression—surface reflection—of the Viet reality. There is also something else beneath, but we cannot discount what is on the surface—
…
SS goes to see [U.S.] prisoners—2 of them, 1 in for 3 years, 1 for 1 year—No place given or no indication of where they were being kept—both bow—one (3-year) very low, the other perfunctorily—both in “pyjamas” but different—striped + solid
3-year was more “obsequious,” other curt. Oanh + three others in room, at small military post, about 10 men from hotel …
Both [POWs] said they got mail from the US at regular intervals—pictures of family
High rank Lt. Col. and Maj[or], both w[ith] long Air Force service—Korean War + older—in WWII. Older said he knew nothing of Geneva Accords. They get information—They know about Poor March, Abernathy, RFK, etc.
SS told them about US political changes—
SS saw them separately …
One understood a little Vietnamese—responded when officer said in Viet tha
t he could take fruit + candy
[The POWs] were given material to read about [the] war—Felix Greene book [Greene, a cousin of Graham Greene’s, was a reporter for the San Francisco Chronicle in the early 1960s, an opponent of U.S. involvement in Vietnam, and a North Vietnamese sympathizer], Vietnamese Courier.
[The POWs] bow as they leave.
…
[From here, the entries are SS’s.]
Love of “revolution” for Westerners: final romance of primitivism, simple life [/] people
decentralized, honest society w[ith] love
…
[Undated, June]
Diana [Kemeny]—no neg[ative] transference; doesn’t permit anger, tears; my accomplice; tell me something in detail
One of my strategies:
Disarm people: people are dangerous, must be placated
…
[Undated, other than “July 1968 Paris”]
“Minimal” cinema
(Warhol’s aleatory cat in Harlot)
Bertolucci: Make each shot autonomous; thereby reduce montage
Make film about language—each person speaking his own language.
…
Keats: “Though a quarrel in the streets is a thing to be hated, the energies displayed in it are fine.”
Buy Barbara Miller Lane, Architecture + Politics in Germany 1918–1945
…
8/7/68 Stockholm
I see now that my pattern of association with male homosexuals has one more, very important meaning than those I’ve already understood (de-sexualizing myself; having male company—which I long for—that’s still safe, not threatening, etc.). It also means the roundabout recovery or preservation of my femininity! Everything “feminine” is “en principe” [“in principle”] poisoned for me by my mother. If she even would … do it, I don’t want to do it. If she liked it, I can’t like it. That includes everything from men to perfume, attractive furniture, stylish clothes, make-up, fancy or ornate things, soft lines, curves, flowers, colors, going to the beauty parlor, and having vacations in the sun!
[In the margin:] Not to mention alcohol, card games, + TV. Thank God my mother didn’t like children, food, movies, books, and learning!
Poor me. But I’ve rather cleverly found a back door to some of those things by becoming close to a series of men who admire and imitate “feminine” things. I accept that in them. (They—not women, not my mother—validate it.) Therefore, I can accept it in myself. And so in the last decade I have gradually been adding more “feminine” things, tastes, + activities in my life. I can love “art nouveau” (all curves, opalescent glass, insane flowers). I can enjoy flowers. I love to dance. I love beautiful clothes. I want to (well, in my head I do, though in fact I don’t!) go to and give parties. I want a beautiful apartment with stunning furniture. I [enjoy] wearing bright colors.
How different I was until eleven years ago (through the end of my marriage): no flowers, no colors (my clothes were just black, grey, + brown material to hide in—to cover up as much of myself as I could), no lightness of any kind. The only good was work, study, my intellectual + moral ambitions, becoming “strong” (because my mother is “weak”).
So, as I suddenly saw this morning—it was just waking up in the hotel here, picking up an already read issue of La Quin-zaine Littéraire, glancing at a review of the new [Carlos] Fuentes novel, reading a description of a woman character who collects “art nouveau”—my involvement with the male homosexual world in the last eleven years isn’t just something bad for me, a neurotic symptom, a retreat, a defense against the emergence of my own sexuality + full maturity. It’s also been—given my initial problems—something very positive. I’ve been helped by it—though I think I’ve gotten all I can from that unconscious strategy by now, and it’s of no further use to me. Because I can be more genuinely a woman (but still strong, still autonomous, still an adult) more genuinely than any man can!
How odd to have thought of all this—instantaneously, though it’s taking me a half hour to write it down—just on seeing three sentences about “art nouveau.” (When I think of the many whole books I’ve read, + own, on “art nouveau”—the conversations with Elliott [Stein], etc.)
I’ve had such enormous difficulties thinking about myself, being connected with myself this last year. Only the same old stale reflections. No new ideas or insights since the big package a year ago in Martinique …
It’s mostly to do with Diana’s absence from my life, I suppose. Never have I written so little in my journal—so that I’ve had the same notebook—this one—for over a year, + still am not close to filling it up.
Another mini-thought. When I had this idea (me with a new idea!) this morning in bed, I was so delighted at having a new thought—it’s been so damned long! I’ve been sure this year that my mind was shot to hell, + I was becoming just as stupid as everybody else—I wanted to do something to express my pleasure. So I spoke out loud, rather self-consciously: “Well, what do you know. An idea!” Or something like that. And the sound of my voice in this room with nobody but me here profoundly depressed me.
I never talk out loud to myself—I never even try—and now I see why I don’t. I find it very painful. Then I really know I’m alone.
Maybe that’s why I write—in a journal. That feels “right.” I know I’m alone, that I’m the only reader of what I write here—but the knowledge isn’t painful, on the contrary I feel stronger for it, stronger each time I write something down. (Hence, my worry this past year—I felt myself terribly weakened by the fact that I couldn’t write in the journal, didn’t want to, was blocked, or whatever.) I can’t talk to myself, but I can write to myself.
(But is that because I do think it possible that someday someone I love who loves me will read my journals—+ feel even closer to me?)
“I want to be good.”
“Why?”
“I want to be what I admire.”
“Why don’t you want to be what you are?”
9/19/68 Stockholm
Italian Trotskyist magazine, La Sinistra (ed. Savelli)
Read in the last month: eleven stories of Chekhov; Melville, The Confidence Man; [Maxim] Gorky, Mother; [Evgeny] Zamyatin, We; Tolstoy, The Kreutzer Sonata; Nabokov’s The Waltz Invention; Conrad’s Nostromo; three Agatha Christie’s
Get Schoenberg, Style and Idea
Essays still to write: Artaud, Adorno, Psychotechnics (Spiritual Liberties + Psychological Disciplines), Notes Towards a Def[inition] of C[ultural] R[evolution]
…
1969
[Undated, June. The journal in which these entries appear is marked “Politics” on the front cover.]
“Without revolutionary theory there can be no revolutionary movement.” Lenin (1902)
Was Rosa Luxemburg “a spiritual ally of the Mensheviks” (Lichtheim) or a good communist ([the American antiwar activist ] Staughton Lynd)? How to decide this.
The double experience of 1968—The French May, the Czechoslovak August.
“The solution lies in the effective insurrection of minds.” Saint-Just. Read Saint-Just’s Esprit de la Révolution, etc.
(“Insurrection … must be the permanent state of the republic.” Sade)
“1848 was amusing only because people make utopias like castles in Spain.”—Baudelaire
