by Umberto Eco
Social life was reduced to the exchange of a few monosyllables, given that silence is golden, it often speaks louder than words, one word is enough to the wise, a closed mouth catches no flies, give every man your ear but few your voice, and man is weakened by the words he speaks and strengthened by those he doesn’t (better safe than sorry). What is more, it was well known that when the wine is poured, the wit is gone, that wine brings out joy but also secrets, that drink and bad luck follow the same path, so that convivial gatherings were therefore avoided—and on the rare occasions they took place, they ended in furious violence, since he who strikes first strikes twice. Gambling was also impossible, as a result of a misunderstood principle of cooperation, since he who trusts in chance takes a blind man as his guide, and it was difficult to find a blind man for every player—and then it was enough for someone with one eye to arrive for the game to end in his favor, since in the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king. Games involving skill, such as archery, were forbidden since, sooner or later, the arrow strikes back at he who shoots it.
It was difficult to run any kind of shop: difficult for confectioners, since you get what you deserve, and they were continual victims of their customers’ custard-pie humor. Negotiations degenerated into unpleasant arguments since, it being true that it’s the rudest one who does the buying, when a customer entered the shop asking how such rubbish could possibly be on sale, the angry shopkeeper would reply, “You’re the rubbish, and that whore your mother!” thus provoking what has been called the Zidane syndrome. Finally, as we know, there’s always a time to pay and a time to die, and shopkeepers were being ruined by their customers’ habitual failure to honor their debts.
In any event, little work was done, because for every saint a feast, so that there were 365 feast days a year (though when the feast is over, the saint’s forgotten) with continual celebration, and at table you grow young (and of course, on Saint Martin’s Day the must turns to wine). Due to this excessive veneration of the saints, at carnival time, when anything goes, joking was limited to the confines of the barracks, bringing disorder among the entire army. Indeed, starting off from the conviction that I can protect myself from my enemies, but may God protect me from my friends, the armed forces were then disbanded.
Religious life was fraught with difficulties: first of all, it was difficult to recognize priests because clothes don’t make the man, and these clerics were always traveling around in disguise. Secondly, bearing in mind that God speaks to those who stay silent, prayer was discouraged.
The administration of justice was a real headache. A criminal conviction was almost unheard of, since confession is halfway to forgiveness, and in any event it could not be made public, since as they say, judge the sin but not the sinner. It was far too expensive to go to lawyers since good advice is beyond all price, and judges were reluctant to call witnesses to trial, claiming that the more you listen the less you understand (and the few to be summoned were terminally ill, as it was thought that those leaving hospital or the graveyard are always more sincere). Crimes committed against other members of the family could not be punished (everyone is king in their own home) and industrial injuries could not be investigated as it was taken for granted that the higher you climb the farther you fall (suddenly and at great speed). There was plea-bargaining for the more serious crimes, and convicts could avoid the death penalty by having their tongue cut out (a still tongue makes a wise head, and a raw deal is better than none at all). Sometimes there were beheadings followed by barbarous attempts to organize races between those executed (those who lose their heads have strong legs), with results that were obviously disappointing. What is more, it was very hard to convict robbers, who, believing that courtesy is the key that opens every door, rather than arriving armed, managed to take money and possessions through simple persuasion and then used the defense that the victims had willingly handed over their property. Generally speaking, however, there was a reluctance to inflict any penalty, since those who fear not the sermon heed not the punishment.
At a certain point it was recognized that he who lives by the sword dies by the sword, and the law of retaliation was established and carried out in public. This method brought effective results for crimes such as murder but caused some embarrassing situations in the carrying out of public punishments for the offense of sodomy, and the practice was soon abandoned.
Desertion was not a crime, since he who fights and runs away lives to fight another day, though strangely enough it was a crime to use invisible ink, given that only fools can’t read their own writing. Pictures of the dead could no longer be shown on tombs: since all those you think are dead keep cropping up when you least expect them, therefore those who really are dead are better not seen at all. Finally, the judges enjoyed the worst possible reputation by reason of the so-called First Principle of the Bandana: the wrongdoer always blames his accuser (according to the Second Principle the petty thief ends up in prison while the big-time crook ends up in power).
In a republic based on such blatant injustice, the position of women was tragic: popular wisdom had never treated them kindly, establishing that when it comes to fire, women, and sea, there is little to joke about; keep your wife well away from your priest, your best friend, and your brother-in-law; a crying woman and a sweating horse are more false than Judas; woman is a fickle thing; there’s no point in locking your doors when women fall in love; women know more than the devil; a woman is first sweet as honey, then bitter as gall; there’s no peace in the chicken coop when the hen crows and the rooster stays silent; woman is woe.
Every single day, wives were condemned to hear complaints about their husband’s mother, since it was thought that the best way to get through to the mother-in-law is through her daughter-in-law. When they had the misfortune to marry a loving husband, they would be subjected to continual ill-treatment since those who love hard, fight hard (all is fair in love and war), and spinsters couldn’t even hope to find an older, less fiery husband since men after the age of fifty-nine leave the women and take to wine.
This basic misogyny made sexual relationships generally difficult: indeed, it was known that wine, women, and tobacco are the undoing of all men—better alone than in bad company—and there was a general mistrust of amorous behavior, since warm caresses are the sure sign of a guilty conscience. Conversely, adultery was commonly practiced—best make love with the woman next door; you’ll save on travel and see her more. As the New Year brings new life, it was thought that children should all be born in January and therefore conceived in early April. But since Christmas is for family and Easter for friends, all conceptions were adulterous, so that the Republic of Happiness consisted almost entirely of illegitimate children.
These sexual difficulties were not even compensated by onanistic practices or the sale of pornography, since (though it is true that a contented mind is a perpetual feast) to look and not to touch is one hell of a task. Cases of homosexuality were not infrequent, since it was thought that birds of a feather flock together (why not? beauty is in the eye of the beholder).
Nor was it felt that many problems could be resolved by doctors, in relation to whom there was the greatest distrust. It was thought, above all, that anxiety was worse than the ailment, that no doctor can cure fear, that doctors’ mistakes end up in the graveyard, that the dentist gets fat with other people’s teeth, and finally, that not all that’s bad is harmful, and where there’s life there’s hope (at worst they resorted to euthanasia, since desperate ills require drastic remedies). An apple a day keeps the doctor away, and shaving makes you feel good for a day, a wife makes you feel good for a month, and a pig makes you feel good for a year, so people used to kill a pig rather than go to the doctor. The heart cannot be commanded, so there wasn’t much work for cardiologists; ear, nose, and throat specialists were notorious for cutting off the nose to spite the face, and veterinary surgeons did not enjoy a particularly fine reputation as they were always looking a gift horse in the mo
uth and would treat only the most expensive stallions. Doctors preferred to avoid visiting the hospitals, thinking that those who walk with the lame man end up limping.
The last consolation for these unfortunate people would have been games and entertainments. But any sports competition was always decided before it began (when you have them by the balls, their hearts and minds will follow). Since a good horseman is never without his lance, horseracing was practically impossible, given the way that the lance impeded the jockey. Traditional mud wrestling was hardly worth it, since when you fight with mud, win or lose, the mud will continue to stick.
The only game that was actually played involved a sort of tall greasy fairground pole, at the top of which a chicken bone was placed (nothing ventured nothing gained).
But do not imagine that citizens, due to the lack of sporting and sexual activity, would take solace in education. First of all, they were mistrustful of schooling, since experience is more important than learning, and they were mistrustful of logic, since ifs and buts don’t make history. The teachers were terrible, since those who can, do, and those who can’t, teach (nor were the pupils aware of it—he who asks the question makes no mistakes). The study of mathematics was reduced to a minimum, since children got only as far as learning that two’s company but three’s a crowd. Advanced math was worse still, since there was a taboo against squaring the circle (those who are born round cannot die square). The brighter students were at a disadvantage (those who speak first know least) and quickly fell ill—a little knowledge is a dangerous thing. So they decided it is better to be a live ass than a dead doctor.
Once they had completed their studies, students could not present a curriculum vitae when applying for a job, fearing that pride comes before a fall. This tended to lead to unemployment or underemployment (learn an art and keep it apart). There again, he who at twenty doesn’t have it, at thirty doesn’t do it, and by forty has lost what little he had.
Technological skills were minimal: recycling systems were forbidden (water that has passed the mill can no longer turn the wheel) and only very slow traditional methods were followed (the seas fill up drop by drop, while the horse lives the grass grows, and haste makes waste).
In short, it is clear that the people of the Republic of Happiness were most unhappy, so that they gradually abandoned the island and its Legislator, who had to recognize that his utopia had failed. Better late than never. As the anonymous author of this pamphlet wisely states, in criticizing the excessive trust in proverbs, old wisdom does not nourish the hungry man, between saying and doing many a pair of shoes is worn out, and you can have too much of a good thing. The Legislator thought that one thing would lead to another, but we recognize the tree by its fruit, and sooner or later the comb finds all the knots. If all’s well that ends well, and slow and steady wins the race, conversely, all that’s bad ends badly, and he who makes his bed must lie on it, since he who is born miserable dies disconsolate and he who sows when the wind blows, harvests only confusion. All good things come to an end.
It would have been better to know from the very start that there’s woodworm in every plank and two sides to every coin. But there’s no point crying over spilled milk, and so long as you have your own teeth, there’s no telling what the future holds.
And this is also true for our anonymous author of long ago. Let the dead bury the dead. And I have described only what I have read, so don’t shoot the messenger.
[A spurious review that appeared in Almanacco del bibliofilo—Viaggi nel tempo: Alla ricerca di nuove isole dell’utopia, edited by Mario Scognamiglio (Milan: Rovello, 2007)].
I Am Edmond Dantès!
SOME UNFORTUNATES HAVE been initiated into literature reading someone like, say, Robbe-Grillet. You can read Robbe-Grillet only after you have understood the age-old narrative structures he violates. To enjoy the lexical inventions and distortions of Gadda, you need to know the rules of Italian and be familiar with the fine Tuscan of Pinocchio.
I remember that when I was a child, I found myself in continual competition with a friend from an educated family who read Ariosto, and I spent what little money I had on a copy of Tasso from a secondhand bookstall to keep up with him. I dipped into it from time to time, but was secretly reading The Three Musketeers. The boy’s mother, visiting our house one evening, spotted the incriminating book in the kitchen (future men of letters did their reading in the kitchen, propped against a kitchen cupboard, with our mothers shouting at us that we would ruin our eyes and ought at least go outside and get some fresh air). She was scandalized: “But how can you read trash like this?” That same lady, it should be said, told my mother that her idol was Wodehouse, whom I also used to read, and with great enjoyment but—one lightweight author against another—why was Wodehouse more noble than Dumas?
A century-old sentence hung over the serialized novel, and its demise was threatened not only by the Riancey Amendment of 1850, which imposed a punishing tax on newspapers that published these feuilletons, but also by the general opinion among God-fearing people that feuilletons were the ruin of families—they corrupted the young, drove adults to communism, and undermined the throne and the altar. See, for example, the two-volume Études critiques sur le feuilleton roman, almost a thousand pages that Alfred Nettement devoted in 1845 to this devilish literature.
And yet it is only through the serialized novel that, from early childhood, we learn about classic narrative devices. Here they appear in their purest form, often brazenly, but with an overwhelming mythopoeic energy.
And so I would like to consider not a particular book, but a particular genre (the feuilleton) and a specific device: anagnorisis, or recognition.
If it were necessary to remind you, as I have just done, that the feuilleton makes use of timeless narrative devices, then we would cite Aristotle (Poetics, section 1452 a–b). Anagnorisis is the “change from ignorance to knowledge,” and in particular the recognition of one person by another, as when a character unexpectedly discovers (by another person’s revealing it, or by discovering a necklace or a scar) that someone else is his father or son or worse still, as when Oedipus realizes that Jocasta, the woman he has married, is his mother.
One reacts to anagnorisis either with a simple willingness to play the narrator’s game or in accordance with the rules of narrative. In the second case, some think the effect is in danger of being lost, but that is not correct—and to prove this I will make a few observations about narrative before turning swiftly to look at the miracles of anagnorisis at first hand.
A double anagnorisis must take not only the character but also the reader unawares. This surprise may have been prepared through hints and suspicions or it may arrive quite unexpectedly even for the reader, and the way these subtle, almost imperceptible clues or sudden coups de théâtre are handled depends on the skill of the narrator. A simple anagnorisis, on the other hand, occurs when a character is taken completely by surprise at a certain revelation, but the reader already knows what is going on. Typical of this category is the multiple unmasking of Monte Cristo to his enemies, which the reader has been eagerly awaiting since halfway through the book.
In a double anagnorisis, the reader identifies with the character, sharing his joy and suffering as well as his surprises. But in simple anagnorisis the reader projects his own frustrations or hopes of revenge onto the character, whose secret he already knows or can guess, and anticipates the turn of events. In other words, the reader would like to deal with his enemies, his boss, or the woman who has walked out on him in the same way that Monte Cristo does. “You used to despise me? Well then, now I shall tell you who I really am!” And he licks his lips, waiting for the final moment to arrive.
A useful element for the successful outcome of an anagnorisis is disguise: by removing his mask, the person disguised increases the other characters’ surprise; and the reader either shares that surprise or, having seen through the disguise, enjoys the surprise of the unsuspecting characters.
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sp; For the two types of anagnorisis there are then two sorts of degeneration—when the recognition is redundant or pointless. Revelation is, in fact, a currency to be spent thriftily and should provide the clou to a respectable plot. The case of Monte Cristo, who reveals his identity many times and, in turn, gradually learns of the plot in which he has been victim, is a rare and masterly case of revelation that, though used numerous times, is no less satisfying for it. In the popular feuilleton, however, since revelation “sells well,” it is repeated to the point of excess, thus losing all dramatic power and acquiring a purely consoling function, in the sense that it provides a drug that the reader comes to depend on and cannot do without. The overuse of this device reaches extreme proportions when the revelation is obviously completely pointless in terms of plot development, and the novel becomes stuffed with it purely for publicity purposes, so that it can be promoted as the ideal serial novel and worth every penny. A patent example of pointless moments of anagnorisis, one after the other, is Ponson du Terrail’s Le forgeron de la Cour-Dieu. Note that the pointless anagnorises in the following list are those marked with an asterisk (and, as you will see, they are in the majority). This is the story: *Dom Jérôme reveals who he is to Jeanne; Dom Jérôme reveals who he is to Mazures; *the comtesse des Mazures, from Valognes’s description, recognizes Jeanne as the sister of Aurore; *from the portrait in the small box left to her by her mother, Aurore recognizes Jeanne as her sister; Aurore, while reading her mother’s letter, recognizes old Benjamin as Fritz; *Lucien learns from Aurore that Jeanne is her sister (and that his mother killed their mother); *Raoul de la Maurelière realizes that César is the son of Blaisot and that his temptress is the comtesse des Mazures; *Lucien, after wounding Maurelière in a duel, discovers under his shirt a medallion with the portrait of Gretchen; *the gypsy girl realizes from a medallion found in Polyte’s hand that Aurore is free; *Bibi recognizes Jeanne and Aurore as being the aristocrats described by the gypsy girl; *Paul (alias the chevalier des Mazures), having seen the medallion of Gretchen that Bibi shows him (after having received it from the gypsy girl who received it from Polyte), recognizes that the aristocrat he should be arresting is his daughter Aurore; *Bibi reveals to Paul that his daughter has been arrested in place of Jeanne; Bibi, who has escaped, learns that the girl saved from the guillotine is Aurore; Bibi discovers that his fellow stagecoach passenger is Dagobert; *Dagobert learns from Bibi that Aurore and Jeanne are in Paris and that Aurore is in prison; Polyte recognizes Dagobert as the man at the Tuileries who saved his life; *Dagobert recognizes the gypsy girl who had once foretold his fortune; *Dagobert’s doctor realizes that the German doctor who arrives unexpectedly—sent by the Masques Rouges—is his old master and he recognizes him to be his pupil and Polyte to be the young man whom he had just saved on the road; years later, Polyte recognizes a stranger who comes up to talk to him as Bibi; both recognize the gypsy girl, and Zoe to be her assistant; Benedict comes across and recognizes Bibi; *Paul (who has been mad for years) regains his sanity and recognizes Benedict and Bibi; the old hermit is recognized as Dom Jérôme; *the chevalier des Mazures learns from Dom Jérôme that his daughter is alive; *the gypsy girl discovers that her manservant is none other than Bibi; *the republican (lured into a trap) realizes that an attractive German lady was the young girl whose parents he had sent to the guillotine (her identity was revealed to the reader two pages earlier); *the gypsy girl (condemned by the gypsies) recognizes Lucien, Dagobert, Aurore, and Jeanne as those who have trapped and ruined her.