The Benefactor

by Susan Sontag

  “Well, Maestro, I have had a dream,” I finally said. “I learn very much from my dreams, and in this dream I saw that both attraction and repulsion exist between youth and age. If an older person pursues too shamelessly, the younger will be repelled. Youth must woo and age must yield.”

  He frowned. “I take it you are advising me to be less ardent. But frankly I am afraid to visit the Anders’ house less often, or to write fewer letters to my shy darling. The only respect in which I am confident I can outdo a younger man is in the tenacity of my wooing. Reserve is a great gamble for an older man. It can be misinterpreted as debility.”

  “Perhaps there’s no chance you will be misinterpreted,” I said, trying to be helpful. “May I ask if you are her first lover?”

  “Alas, no,” he said. “Our estimable hostess has seen to Lucrezia’s education long before my advances were sanctioned.”

  “And do you think that at the present moment you alone enjoy her favors?”

  He paled and I could observe that the question was distasteful to him. “I do not know my rivals,” he said. “And surely these are unnecessary questions from someone who frequents the household more than I do. Although”—he collected himself—“Frau Anders tells me that you have been acting strangely of late, that you withhold yourself and do not call as regularly as before. Is there some young woman who occupies your time? I should not burden you with an old man’s problems.” He put on his glasses again. The lenses were thick, and made his eyes look round and empty. “You must have problems of your own that you would like to discuss with me,” he continued. “In fact, my little remarks just now—which I know you will treat in the strictest confidence—were less an expression of my own thoughts and problems than they were—I hope you are not offended—directed to make you repose an absolute confidence in me and promote a more intimate atmosphere between us. I had intended to bring this up tomorrow, perhaps at lunch, though I really should not be distracted before the concert, so perhaps this is a more propitious occasion. There is something troubling you, Hippolyte. And if I can be of any….”

  His thin monotonous voice stopped. I had been watching the dawn break through the window behind the Maestro’s desk.

  “No sir,” I said. “There is nothing. Except, perhaps, too much solitude.”

  “But it is your solitude which is the result, I am sure, of some inner unhappiness; and not the solitude which causes your present manner, a manner which distresses all your friends. Allow me to….”

  “My solitude is entirely voluntary, I assure you.”

  “I beg your pardon but….”

  “Let me tell you, Maestro,” I exclaimed, “that I am having experiences of a purity, albeit of a great narrowness, such as cannot be shared. Only in myself—only in himself I might say, if you permit the locution—do I savor them.”

  He tried to soothe me, and only succeeded in being patronizing. “My young friend, ever since I first saw you in Frau Anders’ drawing room I have felt you had the makings of an artist. But we artists,” he smiled at his generous gift, this ‘we,’ “we artists must avoid the temptation to isolate ourselves, to lose contact with the….”

  “I am no artist, dear Maestro. You mistake me.” I decided to patronize him in return. “I have no inner burden which I wish to unload upon a passive audience. I do not wish to contribute one jot to the fund of public fantasy. Perhaps I have something to reveal, but it is of so intensely private a nature that it could not possible interest anyone else. Perhaps I will reveal nothing, even to myself. But I know I am on the trail of something. I am crawling through the tunnel of myself—which takes me farther and farther from the artist’s base craving for applause.” Since he refused to be offended at my pointed words, I continued. “I am looking for silence, I am exploring the various styles of silence, and I wish to be answered by silence. You might say,” I concluded gaily, “that I am dis-embowelling myself.”

  I detest what are called looks of understanding. “Dear Hippolyte,” he said, without even trying to understand what I had said, “all young artists go through a period of….”

  I stood up and walked to the door, determined to take this very morning’s train back to the capital. I became inexcusably hilarious at that moment; it was the excitement of the new dream. “Maestro,” I shouted at him as he rose to follow me, “Maestro, does Lucrezia give you pleasure? Does she make you jump?” He scowled with disbelief at my rudeness, and stood still. I sped down the hall and took the stairs two at a time, roaring with laughter. “Does she make you dance, old man?” I called over my shoulder. “Do you wave your baton? Do any of the instruments play for you alone?”

  Once back in the city, I unwearily went about my new project, the seduction of Frau Anders. The source of energy tapped in my new dream, which I fondly denominated “the dream of the unconventional party,” was not illusory. That zest which had begun inauspiciously with my rudeness to the Maestro continued. I felt more lively than I had in months. And I had need of much energy. For while I was courting my patronness with all the smiles and winning words I could muster, she professed to see only the evidence of my recovery from melancholy. It took the most shameless, the least subtle glances to refine her neutral complicity into a state of sexual awareness of my intentions. Flattery had become for my mistress a drug administered in such large doses that her system had become immune to anything less. To convert flattery into, seduction it was not enough merely to sleep with her. The sexual act itself was to her like the gift of a rare objet d’art or a bouquet of flowers, or a verbal compliment. Only with difficulty, with the crudest insistence, could she brought to understand the sexual act as a gesture different from these. The point had to be made again and again that she was not being flattered, not being given anything at all. The despair of my campaign was that she did not believe anything had changed between us!

  I realize there was something contradictory in the management of our affair. I wished to make Frau Anders realize that my love for her was not something that was her due. Nothing was more frustrating to me than that she should take my feeling for her, the surprising and unexpected command of my dreams, for granted. The only way in which I could shake her exasperating self-assurance was by insinuating to her that she was not altogether desirable to me. I dropped remarks on the difference in our ages, her tendency to gain weight, the stridency of her laughter, her color blindness, the imperfections of her accent—none of which in fact was the least unattractive to me. I did not wish to humiliate her. Therefore I only insinuated these things, always short of the point of conviction. You see my dilemma. I am not an unkind person. But I regretted that she was deprived of the pleasure of knowing herself the recipient of a love different from, and stronger than, what she wanted to arouse.

  I did not wish gratitude from Frau Anders, you understand—only seriousness. It was not enough that she pleased me in bed. I hardened myself against her easy responsiveness. Thus in the newly opened but complacent arms of my mistress I found a portion of pleasure but not happiness, and she found in me happiness but little pleasure.

  You may conclude that our affair did not take me outside the curious questions which preoccupied me, but rather provided me with new material. My feeling for Frau Anders was an exploration of myself. Our affair ran parallel to the successive editions and variations on my second dream, “the dream of the unconventional party.” Sometimes I lost the bending-over game, sometimes I never reached the party, sometimes the irate man in the bathing suit pursued me, sometimes Frau Anders gave up the search for my hair and lay, voluptuous and adorable, in my arms. In order to wait for the secret and unpredictible cues from the dreams, I had to impose a rigid discipline on our liaison. It was only by keeping some reserve with Frau Anders, that I managed to continue my feelings at their height. The art of feeling, as of erotic performance, is the ability to prolong it; in my case duration depended on my ability to refresh my fantasies. To insure privacy, I did not let her do me favors. Neither did I move into a
house on her estate, as she wished me to do; and in all I insisted on discretion and tried to maintain as correct an exterior as possible. The role of the lover of a married woman has its conventions, like any other role, and I wanted to observe them. Unconventionality for its own sake does not attract me. Such differences from other people as I do display force their way to the surface of action from the depths of my character without my being particularly pleased at the result.

  My mistress’ unconventionality was, by contrast, entirely superficial. The lies entailed by her frequent adulteries had been perfunctory; nothing except truth could disturb the life of the salon and its incessant conversation. Having the fortune to live in a milieu where unconventionality was encouraged and appreciated, she was, outwardly, unconventional. Inwardly she was full of respect for society’s law; only it hardly ever applied to her. No wonder that consistency always surprised her, the arbitrary never.

  Thus she was not surprised by the ebb and flow of my desire for her, according to the secret tides of my dreams. Nor did she complain when for a week or more at a time I occupied myself in the city, and endeavored not to think of her. These activities often kept me in my room, where I felt most at liberty. Besides reading and meditating on my dreams, they included various exercises which I practiced for the care of my body, and such cerebral amusements as tracing hieroglyphs, memorizing the names of the two hundred and ninety-six Popes and Anti-Popes, and corresponding with a Bolivian mathematician on a logical problem on which I had been at work for several years.

  The dream-life which was never absent from my thoughts subsided into curious variations on my nights with my mistress—no new dream yet, but a lengthy entr’acte as it were. I found that the excitement of my dreams surpassed that of my meetings with Frau Anders. It was never she who aroused my sexual feelings. Such feelings were born in me and perished in her. She was the vessel in which I deposited the substance of my dreams. But this did not make her any less important to me. To me she was unique among women. The puzzles and variations in erotic technique proposed by my dreams were solved on her body—on hers, and on no other. This I took as a good omen for our affair, which, however, I had determined would last no longer than it should.

  When, finally, the energy of my dreaming was attenuated and it occurred to me to break off our connection, I found myself with less energy to be cruel than I had counted on. I even contemplated leaving the city without telling her. Luckily, just at this time, Frau Anders’ husband returned from one of his long business trips abroad and—to her surprise—asked her to accompany him on the next. She urged me to forbid her to go. This was the first of her infidelities, she told me, in which she wanted to tell her husband everything. But I, pleading respect for her reputation and comforts, declined to rescue her permanently from her conjugal bonds.

  Thus I was entirely at liberty in my adopted city, for the first time in six months. I returned to the seduction of Frau Anders in my dreams, until one night a new dream, revolved into my view.

  FOUR

  In the dream I was standing in the cobblestone courtyard of some building. It was noon, and the sun was hot. Two men, wearing long pants and naked to the waist, were violently locked together. At times they seemed to be fighting; then it seemed to be a wrestling match. I wanted it to be a wrestling match, even though there were no spectators other than myself. And I felt encouraged in believing this by the fact that the two men were of equal strength; neither could force the other to the ground.

  To insure that this was sport and not private violence I decided to wager some money on one of the wrestlers, the one who looked somewhat like my brother. But I couldn’t find a booth where I could place my bet. Then both men suddenly fell. I was frightened. I suspected that this had been a personal fight, even a fight to the death. There were several other spectators now. One of them, a child, nudged the prostrate men with a stick. She poked her stick in the face of the one who resembled my brother. Both men, pale and motionless, had their eyes closed.

  I realized that I knew a secret of which the other spectators were ignorant and tried to compose my face, lest I give the secret away. The effort made my face very warm, and I decided I was doing myself an injury by being so discreet. I wanted to tell my secret to another person, and looked about for someone I knew. I recognized the man in the black bathing suit, and it seemed to me that he was my friend. Reassured, I smiled and beckoned to him. He approached me, but made no gesture of salutation. But he was only pretending not to know me.

  “The outcome remains quite clear,” I whispered into his ear. I felt as if we were fellow conspirators. Although his head was turned away from me, I was sure he was listening.

  “That’s because they are dead,” he said.

  “The contest was unfair,” I replied. There was an idea which I was struggling to express. “At least one of them must be alive. The other may or may not be dead, as he chooses.”

  He turned and put his face next to mine. “In a moment,” he shouted, “I am going to dispose of the bodies.”

  “Don’t shout,” I answered boldly. “Shouting has never made me understand anything.”

  He yawned in my face. I reflected that I had no right to demand courtesy from this man, and should have been grateful that he did not abuse me.

  He had something with him that looked like a large drum. He slit open the skin of this drum with a knife. Then he lifted the wrestlers one at a time and stuffed them into the drum, hoisted the drum on his back, and carried it out of the courtyard. I watched his efforts, and saw that the load was much too heavy for one man, lame at that. But I determined to let him labor alone since he would not acknowledge me.

  When he was gone, however, I regretted not offering to assist him. I felt I had been harsh and spiteful. The fault swelled to the size of a sin, and I wanted to be absolved of it. No sooner had I entertained this thought than I was entering a small building with bronze doors and a low roof. I was surprised at how easy it was to find a church. Inside, I looked about for the man in the black bathing suit, in order to apologize to him. I could not find him.

  I went to a side altar, with the intention of lighting a candle. On the altar there was a statue of the Virgin, and astride or rather straddling the shoulders of the Virgin sat a priest who was nodding gravely and blessing the people who passed in the aisle with a pink flower he held in one hand. I noticed the flower particularly because ever since I entered the building I had been aware of a strong sweetish odor, and I now supposed that the smell came from the flower. Then I saw that it could not, because the flower was artificial, made of alabaster. More curious than ever, I left the altar and went looking, without success, for the choir boys swinging their brass incense-holders. It then occurred to me that the smell was not provided for the pleasure of the worshippers but to conceal a bad odor which I could not yet detect. I decided to remain in the church until I discovered where the smell came from. I should have liked to sit quietly in a pew, but I felt that I should be more useful to the church if I moved around and acquainted myself with the monuments and statues, for I dimly remembered that this was an ancient building and contained much that was worth seeing for anyone, like myself, who is interested in architecture.

  At some point later in the dream, I discovered that the smell came from the central sanctuary where, lying in state, was the corpse of a bearded man wearing a gold crown. People milled about the coffin and bent down to kiss the king’s nostrils. This is why there was no one to watch the wrestlers, I thought. I approached the coffin respectfully, and tried to imitate the others. But when I bent over, I was felled by a great weight in my body. As I rolled and turned on the floor, unable to get up, an old man sternly admonished me. “There is a room for that sort of thing,” he said. He conferred with the others briefly. “Put him in the room,” another said, “before he does it here.” I thought they meant they were going to take me to the confessional.

  Someone else said, “Put him in the chair.” I was seized forcibly and
seated in a black electric chair such as I had seen in American gangster films. With horror I realized this was not for a confession. But while I waited, trembling, for the switch to be thrown, the chair seemed to rise with me in it. I dared to look down and saw that the chair was still bolted to the floor. It was I alone who was soaring, rising higher and higher in what was now an immense cathedral with rose and blue windows. I was rising toward an opening in the vault still far above me, buoyed up by a dense wet substance which lapped about my face.

  “It’s only a dream,” I called to those below me, who were now tiny black figures on the great cruciform stone floor. “I’m having a religious dream.” I rose still higher until, just as I had pierced the cathedral roof, I awoke.

  This dream, arriving as I reposed from my calculated felicity with Frau Anders, informed me that I was not to have rest also from my labors of investigation. In certain ways, I found the dream puzzling. This new dream, perhaps because it was the most recent, seemed to offer matter more challenging than the torments and delights of what I had interpreted as my erotic dreams of the past year. Was not my first dream, “the dream of the two rooms,” about two species of love and domination, in both the masculine and the feminine styles? And did not my second dream, “the dream of the unconventional party,” furnish me with a direction for my erotic life in the person of Frau Anders? But what did this third dream—the wrestlers, my old friend the bather, the king, the cathedral, the ascent—dictate for me to do?

  Certainly, this dream was no less enigmatic than its predecessors, despite the odd fact of my having shouted into the dream, as it were, an interpretation before I awoke. This could not be what the dream really meant, but must be interpreted along with what else lay within the brackets of the dream.

  Still, the remark could not be denied a certain privileged position in the order of dream thoughts. Besides it was, so clearly, “a religious dream,” the dream of a devout person, lame with guilt, hungering for absolution.