A Whistling Woman

by A. S. Byatt

  And then, “raw” describing sunlight—where did he find that? Raw is cold, not heated, raw is bare and open, raw is unripe and with “scarcely created” it suggests a virgin world either at the shivering beginning or the end of time, when it doesn’t hold together. And from these sensuous adjectives—grotesque, raw—we move to mental ones—new, material, not real—and the solid creation disintegrates into phantasmagoria, fantasms, ghosts, dreams—like air, not even really air, and then finally, the wonderful rendering of shapelessness, the “amorphous” trees.

  And if you use the negative Greek word, amorphous, you carry with it all the positive Greek words for shape, and form, metamorphosis, morphology, Morpheus the God of Sleep. What Fitzgerald has done, quickly, briefly, and clearly, is to undo what art and literature have done over and over again, the image of the human mind at home in the beauty of the created garden, with the forms of trees and the colour of the sky and the grass, and the intricate natural beauty of the rose.

  Frederica stared almost wildly at the class, which stared back at her, and then smiled, a common smile of pleasure and understanding. For the rest of her life, she came back and back to this moment, the change in the air, the pricking of the hairs, of really reading every word of something she had believed she “knew.” And at that moment, she knew what she should do was teach, for what she understood—the thing she was both by accident and by inheritance constructed to understand—was the setting of words in order, to make worlds, to make ideas. Smiling at cameras was tawdry, compared to this real skill, which revealed things.

  And yet, and yet. The Golgi-stained slide, the flashing movements of the snooker balls, the new-born child sliding out in its bloody caul, the killing of the countryside (her next Looking-Glass project)—these existed, outside the classroom, outside the book-covers. These were real. These were also real.

  Chapter 18

  The detailed planning of the Body and Mind Conference was on the agenda of the General Purposes Committee of the UNY which met at the beginning of the Spring Term. The Committee included the Vice-Chancellor, Hodgkiss the Dean of Students, various Heads of Department from all the faculties, and two student representatives, Nicholas Tewfell, the President of the Students’ Union, and Maggie Cringle. The activities of the Anti-University were also on the agenda.

  The Meeting was in the Council Room, which was at the top of the octagonal Administration Tower, and contained an octagonal table covered in blood-red leather, a number of throne-like chairs, and some lonely-looking Chinese vases on octagonal pedestals. Vincent Hodgkiss chaired the meeting. Over coffee, before they began, he said quietly to Wijnnobel “I’ve got a rather disturbing letter here from Hodder Pinsky. I think you should see it, but I think it would be inadvisable to discuss it on this occasion.”

  “He is still planning to come?”

  “Oh, I think so. I think so. He has a moral problem. I think you should cast your eye over this.”

  Nick Tewfell, who was within earshot, and talking to no one, overheard this remark. He had come with concerns of his own—of those he represented—about Pinsky. It had been suggested to him by Jonty Surtees, who had it authoritatively through several international student sources, that Hodder Pinsky’s work on thought processes, memory and memory loss was secretly funded by the CIA and had possible applications in techniques of interrogation and brainwashing.

  “Table a question, do it lightly, see what they say, don’t make an issue of principle out of it just yet,” said Surtees. “We don’t know yet whether we want to protest his coming at all, or let hell loose when he does. If he does. Find out. Worry them a bit.”

  Nick Tewfell did not like the way in which Jonty Surtees spoke to him. Surtees threw back his great red mane, and laughed, and issued orders, like a leader of men, like an aristocrat, Tewfell thought sharply, an anarchist with the carelessness of the “well-bred.” At the same time, he saw that Surtees had the quality he admired above all others, the capacity to get things done. The sprawling caravanserai of the Anti-University was something that was clearly working, if by working you meant swelling and spreading and attracting students and always having some new Happening from fireworks to group sex, from three-hour lectures on Kropotkin to psychological experiments in sense-deprivation or sense-overwhelming, buckets of sewage and buckets of hyacinths, strobe lights and pinhole shadows, touchy-feely crawls through damp fleshy tunnels with occasional pinpricks.

  Nick Tewfell was the son of artisans and socialists. His father worked in a power station, his mother took in dress alterations. He believed in a world where there should be no social distinctions, where everyone would live in more or less the same size of house with the same reasonable garden, and be educated with their next-door neighbours as a matter of course. He believed in unionism and had lost any real hope for anything from the Soviet Union after the tanks rolled into Prague. He had what would loosely have been described as an “instinctive” dislike for the exaggerated Oxford bleat of voices like that of Vincent Hodgkiss, and this bristling reaction of his was to have its effect on the events to come.

  His belief in getting things done had led to the great library sit-in at UNY. The library was still in the process of construction. Some rare books were held in the original library at Long Royston, an elegant place to which access was restricted. The new library was in the Ziggurat Tower, with underground storage and, at that time, a smallish reading-room area with a limited number of tables and chairs. Librarians do not like readers, and the library had (as Sir Gerard Wijnnobel ruefully acknowledged) been designed on the recommendations of librarians. Deputations of students went repeatedly to tell the Vice-Chancellor that there were not enough chairs, or tables, and for that matter—since the University was a new foundation on a remote site not near any major city library—not enough books. Books would come, in due course, the authorities said. A student had not time to wait for books to come in due course, Tewfell said. He himself was so busy with Union matters that he rarely sat down with a book, but he meant to, and those he represented did. In the days before the Anti-University, Tewfell organised a sit-in in the library Tower when every available stair and patch of floor space was occupied. They sat for ten days. They were peaceful and clean. The University then found it possible to buy up various libraries at sales, to replan the issue-desk and cataloguing areas, and to double the reading-space for readers. Both Wijnnobel and Tewfell learned from this episode. Wijnnobel learned that Tewfell was reasonable and determined. Tewfell learned that it was no good talking, you had to act. He was pleased, but wary, when the students were put on committees. That was talking. He needed to see where it led to. Then action might be necessary.

  It was also true, and this was also part of subsequent events, that group feelings are infectious and change thoughts. Nick Tewfell was middle-of-the-road English Left, canny, suspicious, pragmatic. But the drum-beat rhetoric of the Anti-University, the idea that Revolution might be possible, might be possible now, this year, this month, the idea that all authority was bad (was evil, Jonty Surtees said) and must be brought down, that teaching itself was an inordinate exercise of power by one human being over equally valuable, equally endowed others, stirred in his blood. At that time, most of the young felt guilty over most compromises. And Nick felt that the grudging, sparring respect he felt for the Vice-Chancellor was a compromise, and suspect. He was glad he hated Hodgkiss’s bleat. He was very interested in what was in Hodgkiss’s letter from Pinsky which Hodgkiss did not propose to share with the Committee.

  Arrangements for the conference, Hodgkiss said, were advancing in an encouraging way. He asked the Vice-Chancellor to speak to the list of proposed papers and speakers, both those now definite and those still provisional. A xeroxed sheet was distributed.

  There was general approval of the list—Tewfell kept quiet about his doubts about Pinsky—and discussion ranged on, as it must, to what was missing. The Professor of English Literature, Colin Rennie, pointed out that literature was conspicuousl
y absent from the idea of human nature presented in the list. Vincent Hodgkiss said he had just heard from the distinguished scholar, Dr. Raphael Faber, who was prepared to speak on Proust and memory, biological and cultural. Colin Rennie said that was good news, but he felt that English literature should not be absent. D. H. Lawrence, said Lyon Bowman, was always going on about blood and semen. Was there something there? Nick Tewfell could never tell, from Bowman’s engaging, fleshly smile, how far he was trouble-making, and how far he was serious. Colin Rennie said there was a distinguished Lawrence expert in Edinburgh who had written, precisely, on Lawrence and blood-consciousness. It was agreed that this person should be approached. Bowman made a light remark about fascism, and dangerous theories of superior and inferior bloods. Hodgkiss asked quickly what other areas were not covered. The only woman present, Minna Lascelles, Reader in Anthropology, said you could hardly hold such a conference without including an anthropologist. She proposed herself—she would like to speak on body-ornament and body-language in different cultures. Including decorative mutilation and modern hairstyles, she said. She added that there should also surely be psychologists, not to speak of psychoanalysts. Someone should speak on Piaget’s ideas about child-development. Wijnnobel said there had been an excellent man on the Steerforth Inquiry into language-teaching, whom he would approach.

  “And psychoanalysis?” said Bowman. “Very à la mode. Why don’t you get Elvet Gander? He draws audiences. Like a snake-charmer.”

  Hodgkiss said, with a trace of discomfort, that Gander had indeed been approached, and had offered what sounded a stimulating paper on “The fairground mirror: Schizophrenics’ perception of their own body-parts.” But he was now spending much of his time with “those encamped around us” lecturing on expanded consciousness. Hodgkiss’s voice was a little more fluting than usual. Nick Tewfell said he didn’t see that that mattered. Lots of people were giving interesting talks in the Anti-University. Encouraged by the crisp sound of his own voice, he added that history and politics were conspicuously absent. He proposed that someone should give a paper on the history of the factory-metaphors for human beings—“hands, heads, mouths to feed.” Wijnnobel raised his head and smiled at Tewfell. That, he said, was an excellent idea. Would Mr. Tewfell even consider speaking himself—as a university representative. Nick said hurriedly that he wouldn’t have time, he wasn’t ready, he had his work and his degree, his exams. His own voice suddenly annoyed him. He stopped, redly. Bowman said “And thinking of the Anti-University which surrounds us and interpenetrates us, should we not have a talk on astral and etheric bodies, to complete our sphere—”

  There was a rustle, a tension. Nick Tewfell was really annoyed by his own incapacity to work out where Bowman was coming from. Bowman smiled a small smile to himself. Wijnnobel said

  “As many of you may know, my wife is putting a great deal of energy to talking on just those topics to—to the alternative audiences. Everyone has a right to their own beliefs, and to free speech. I’m afraid I cannot bring myself to think that a talk on those topics will enhance our conference.” He frowned a little. “Everything has its interest, of course—”

  Hodgkiss watched the Vice-Chancellor silently thinking out, with frightening justice, ways in which lectures on astral and etheric bodies might indeed be of interest to the assembled academics. It could be done. One of the reasons for his great respect for the Vice-Chancellor was the judicious way in which Wijnnobel found everything interesting. He himself had a clear vision of Lady Wijnnobel in her black and purple velvet cloak, radiantly surveying the assembled grandees.

  “I think the consensus is, that it is outside our purview—” he said. “It looks very good as it is. Let us agree to leave it there and adjourn for coffee.”

  The coffee-room was one floor lower than the Council Room. Everyone trooped into the lift. Nick Tewfell lingered. Hodgkiss had left his papers on the table. He wondered if he could risk looking at the “rather disturbing” letter from Hodder Pinsky. He listened for the end of the lift machinery whirr, and then flicked rapidly through Hodgkiss’s papers. He was partly impelled by his failure to ask the difficult question recommended by Jonty Surtees.

  Dear Vincent,

  I am happy, as I have said, to speak at what promises to be a rich and exciting conference. There is however, a problem, to which, after much deliberation, I think I should draw your attention. It concerns Theobald Eichenbaum. I do not know whether or not you are aware that, like other scholars who retained their posts in Germany and Austria during the last war, he has been accused of having what is referred to as a “brown past.” This has not been much discussed, in his particular case, but there is evidence waiting to explode, in my opinion. I enclose a paper he wrote in 1940 on herd mentality and innate slavishness, and the desirability of breeding improved individuals, which I personally find distasteful because of its uncritical social-darwinism and eugenicist near-fervour. As you will see—it was published only in German, and only in periodical form—the vocabulary echoes from time to time certain terms of exhortation and approbation which form part of the National Socialists’ detestable vocabulary. It could be argued very plausibly that it was designed to obtain favors. It is certain that Eichenbaum’s work was uninterrupted by the Party, whereas Tinbergen, for instance, was incarcerated in a Dutch concentration camp for protesting the dismissal of Jewish professors.

  I am not saying that I refuse to appear on a platform with this man, whom I have never met. He has done good work, and has never been asked to speak in his own defense. I am also not saying—cave canem—that I shall not confront him with his own words, if that seems necessary.

  What I am mostly concerned with is the volatile student reaction to many kinds of speaker at the present time. In my country, they believe it right to deny a hearing to right-wing politicians, believers in differences in inherited intelligence, military historians, and others. I hear that your own students are becoming more vociferous and more active. I believe first of all in free speech. They often do not. I think you should read Eichenbaum’s paper, and reflect on all these things. It would be most improper for me to pre-empt any decision you might then make.

  Cordially,

  Hodder

  Nick Tewfell did not read German. He looked at the photocopied pages of Eichenbaum’s Helder und Herde. He had the idea of stealing the whole document, or attempting to descend in the lift and find a xerox machine. This seemed too dangerous. He took out his diary and copied out the German title, the name and date of the periodical, read the letter twice again, noted the phrase “National Socialists’ detestable vocabulary” and went down to coffee, which was almost over.

  After coffee, the Vice-Chancellor said that he felt that real progress had been made. The Conference would show the new University to be what it had been designed to be—a paradigm, a web, a microcosm of interconnecting studies and ideas. Hodgkiss, looking at Wijnnobel with exasperated affection, knew what he was imagining. New intricate relations between the flow of the blood, the history of the genes, theological certainties and uncertainties, languages of men and beasts, flesh, bone, brain, thought and feeling. Wijnnobel was a polymath who had a very unusual recall of detail in very many contexts simultaneously. This passion for detail extended to the planning of the university community. He was interested in the design of chairs and walkways, and the meanings of those for the life of his small world. He was interested in microscopes and telescopes, computers and aesthetic theories. He was, Hodgkiss often thought, an innocent idealist who did not understand that the brute powers that really controlled the universe were not interested in—were alarmed by—his sphere of knowledge and understanding. He was not as aware as most Vice-Chancellors would have been that most of his colleagues saw the Conference in terms of the advancement or the overlooking of their own areas of expertise and political power. He noticed these things when they were brought to his attention.

  Nick Tewfell said he thought he should say there was considerable unr
est amongst the student body about the stresses placed on them by the four-year multi-subject course. They did not enjoy—many of them—being required to do maths and a language. It was hard on them.

  Hodgkiss said that he was always ready to discuss this with them.

  The Anti-University was discussed. It was growing. There were two fields now of caravans and tents. There was a lot of persistent noise—music, drumming. The UNY students were sampling classes on sex and astrology and anarchy, despite not having time to learn maths and languages.

  “They are not breaking the law,” said Wijnnobel.

  “Technically, they are,” said Hodgkiss. “The original cottages they set up in are on land belonging to the University. I don’t know where we stand as far as all the bill-sticking and paint goes.”

  “You ought to know,” said Lyon Bowman.

  Hodgkiss wanted to say that provoking universities into calling in the police was a recognised aggressive tactic. He then decided not to. It was probably up to him, as Dean, to have been more vigilant about things, both on the University land and on the adjacent farmland, which might be thought of as nuisances, or health hazards, which might spontaneously, without any action from the University, attract the interest of the police. He said “I should probably pay them a courtesy visit.”