by Lars Iyer
How disgusting we are! How filthy—morally speaking! Actually speaking.
We’re stupid, he says. Shallow. We’re without soul. Without insight.
Do we know it?, he wonders. Do we have any idea of it? Do we sense what we lack? Do we understand that life’s seriousness lies far beyond us? Is that why we drink ourselves into insensibility? Why we deaden ourselves? Is that why we half destroy ourselves, and leave the contents of our stomachs on the courtyard flagstones?
No, we have no sense of what we lack, he says. Life’s seriousness means nothing to us.
Pints of Weissbier in the Free Press.
KIRWIN A: Why does Wittgenstein think we’re such idiots? We got into Cambridge, for fuck’s sake! That’s got to count for something.
MULBERRY: Well—he’s obviously suffered for his thought. Now it’s our turn.
KIRWIN B: But why should we bother to suffer? It’s not as if he’s a great advert for the philosophical life.
ME: Maybe we are a bit too proud. Or stupid. Or whatever else it is he says. Maybe we do need some discipline.
EDE: You, Peters, are a masochist. I don’t mean a sexual masochist. You’re a thought masochist, which is much worse.
MULBERRY: Peters thinks Wittgenstein is our very own genius. I’ve seen the way you look at him, Peters! Like a swooning schoolgirl!
ME: And what if he is a genius?
KIRWIN A: I don’t know … I think it’s all theatre, all smoke and mirrors.
MULBERRY: It probably takes a genius to know a genius. Otherwise, it’s just blind faith.
ME: Then I have faith. We all do—why else do we come to class?
KIRWIN B: To watch a nervous breakdown, that’s why. A slo-mo nervous collapse. We’re voyeurs.
EDE: No—we come to class to try to discover why it is we continue to come to class.
KIRWIN A: Oh, very fucking clever, Ede.
Benwell’s mutiny.
Wittgenstein wants to become a kind of mirror for us, he says. A mirror in which we can see the shortcomings of our own thinking. Of our own temptations of thought. Of our own philosophical temptations.
Benwell, clicking and unclicking his pen. Benwell, tutting. Shuffling his papers.
BENWELL (interrupting): This is all nonsense! None of this means anything!
Wittgenstein looks at him calmly.
BENWELL: I’m tired of all this posh boy SHITE.
DOYLE: Do shut up, Benwell!
BENWELL (to Doyle): Don’t you fucking start!
DOYLE: Start what?
The Kirwins stir menacingly in their seats.
BENWELL (leaving): Fuck the lot of you.
The Maypole, after class.
Benwell’s going to kill us all, Doyle says, he’s sure of it. Ede says he’d quite like to be poor and northern, and full of bitterness. He’d start a band. He’d sing about being poor and northern, and full of bitterness …
Discussion of Benwell. Is it just that Benwell is very, very bad at doing good, or is his evil something real, like Voldemort, or something? Was Benwell always evil? Was he an evil child? An evil five-year-old? At what point did Benwell become evil? When did Benwell go over to the dark side?
Or is it just that Benwell’s poor (Ede’s view)? A victim of the class system (Ede again)? Is it that Benwell’s had none of the advantages of the rest of us, even Peters (Ede)? Is it that Benwell will only come into his own after the revolution (Ede, for a final time)?
In Doyle’s rooms, before the Pembroke College toga party. We’ve each brought a bottle of white spirits, as instructed: vodka, gin, tequila, Bacardi. Doyle mixes them up with pastis and coke. The Black Zombie: Doyle’s favourite tipple.
A performance of the death of Socrates, inspired by David’s painting. Guthrie as Socrates, sitting upright on the bed, one hand gesturing wildly, the other reaching out for the cup that Ede passes him. The rest of us as Socrates’s followers, our eyes full of tears.
Guthrie looks so dignified, we all agree. Guthrie is fully believable, reaching out for the cup of hemlock/Black Zombie the jurists of Athens had condemned him to drink—his sentence for corrupting the young. The real Socrates drained the cup willingly, claiming that there was nothing for the philosopher to fear in death.
GUTHRIE/SOCRATES: Give me the hemlock, jailer! For I am unafraid of death, as all philosophers should be. (Turning to us.) And you lot, stop your weeping! Cease your lamentations! What a display you make of yourselves! Don’t you know dying is something to be done in silence!
Guthrie drains the cup without flinching. He falls to the ground. Ede (playing the part of Phaedo) closes Guthrie’s eyes.
EDE/PHAEDO: Truly we have lost the best of the men of Athens, the wisest! The most just!
Applause from everyone. Guthrie rises, grinning like a fool. Another round of Black Zombies. Toasts to Socrates! To Plato! To the eternal soul! To Beauty as such and in general! To the sun! To the Greeks! To philosophy!
MULBERRY: To homosexuality!
Have we ever wondered why all the Greek philosophers were gay?, Mulberry asks. It was a hangover from the ancient warrior cult: the older man takes a younger one as both tutee and lover. You learned, you fucked, you fucked, you learned. And the ones who learned most (and fucked most) became philosophers.
Mulberry says he hasn’t learnt anything from fucking. And he hasn’t taught anything either. Quite the opposite, in fact.
The Greeks spoke of ascending the erotic ladder, Mulberry says. Of moving from the love of beautiful boys to the love of beautiful forms in nature, to the love of mathematical laws, to the love of beauty itself …
For his part, Mulberry’s descending the erotic ladder, he says. Love has no lessons for him, he says. He’s going all the way down to the abyss. All the way to hell, to brimstone and black flames.
Mulberry riding bareback, and boasting of riding bareback … Mulberry, courting death. Asking for it … Mulberry toying with death, because he wants it to toy with him. He wants death to wrestle him down, to hold him down. He wants to take death itself as his lover, he says, to be loved by death, all the way to death. For death’s black lips to kiss his own.
Mulberry speaks of the desire for death to explore him with its tendrils. For death to reach into his mouth. His arse-hole. He speaks of his desire to take death into his body. For real death to free him from the desire for death. For death to stir him, wake him, return him to life … For death to grow inside him, a dark flower … For death to open its fist inside him … For death to flume up, black. For death to fill his sky.
Now death is all round him, black, roaring, and he is tiny. Now death is the black hole that swallowed the sky. Now death’s black pupils are looking into his. Now death’s dark mouth is laughing in his own …
General amusement. Black Zombies bring out the Mephistopheles in Mulberry.
The phases of Guthrie’s drunkenness. Amiability. A smiling be-toga-ed Guthrie, sitting with an arm round his be-toga-ed neighbour. Guthrie, nodding and laughing. Guthrie, all hail-fellow-well-met. Guthrie, buying round after round at the bar. Guthrie, flush-faced and cheery. Guthrie, full of smiles and bonhomie.
Then excitability, barely containable. Euphoric Guthrie, keen to stay out and never go home. Guthrie, still dancing as the house lights come on. Red-eyed Guthrie singing in the streets on the way home. Guthrie, juggling. Guthrie, walking on his hands. What life there is in Guthrie! Guthrie, inexhaustible! Guthrie, bubbling over!
Then, frenzied drinking. Guthrie, his face glowing. His eyes staring maniacally. Guthrie, trembling, laughing wildly. Guthrie, becoming mad. Becoming animal! Guthrie, wanting more, even when the bar’s already closed. More! Guthrie, pointing accusatory fingers. Guthrie, declaring war on each of us. Guthrie, dealing out insults. Guthrie, promising revenge. Guthrie, telling us we’ll all come to dreadful ends. Guthrie, speaking of judgement and deserved punishment. Guthrie, taking himself for an avenging angel. Guthrie, swiping at us, missing, knocking pint glasses onto the floor …
/> Then Guthrie calming down, on the walk home. Guthrie, waxing philosophical. Quoting Heraclitus, reaching back into the origins of European thought: the way up is the way down! Shouting out the one word we have left from Anaximander: aperion! Quoting Thales in Greek and then in English: everything is water! Lying on the green grass of the quad, whispering of the great tragedies of antiquity. Of the story of the Persian defeat at Salamis. Of the horrors of the siege of Hadrianopolis. Guthrie, taking the part of Antigone addressing Creon; of Oedipus, addressing the gods. How poignant he is! How moving!
Guthrie, his head falling back. Guthrie, asleep amidst the flowers, snoring loudly. Guthrie, unconscious in the mud, his toga undone.
DOYLE (pointing): What the fuck is that?
EDE: Guthrie’s third nipple.
DOYLE: Why is it so hairy?
Ede googles third nipple.
EDE: Supernumerary nipples. They can grow anywhere on the body, apparently.
MULBERRY: For example you, Doyle, are nothing but a supernumerary nipple.
Once upon a time, Guthrie would have been burnt as a witch, we agree. Then again, he might have been revered as a seer … Does a third nipple give you second sight?, we wonder. It’s a sign, at any rate, we agree. Guthrie’s been chosen! But for what?
We should start a new religion, we agree, with Guthrie as our mock king, our Lord of Misrule, at the head of the feast. We should crown Guthrie as our Bacchus, our Pan …
A final toast to Guthrie and his third nipple, as the day begins around us. Doors slam and showers steam. Students’ footsteps on the stairs. Students pouring into the courtyard, heading to lectures.
Jesus Green, after class.
Wittgenstein is certain that he is in immediate physical danger in Cambridge, he says. That he will be stabbed by a poisoned umbrella tip, like a spy. That he will be bitten by a mad dog. A mad Labrador. He is certain that a gust of wind will blow him into the River Cam. He is certain that he will be driven to suicide by the dons.
His brother warned him that it was only a matter of time before the dons expelled him from Cambridge. The only question was how long he could work unnoticed. Because if they found out what he was working on—really working on—they’d get rid of him in an instant.
His brother told him to see himself as an illicit thinker, Wittgenstein says. As a secret scholar. There was his ostensible work, concerned with metatheoretic reasoning and idempotence, on which he would no doubt publish a few articles, which he would discuss at a few learned symposia, Wittgenstein says. And then there was his real work, of which he must tell no one, his brother advised. Work only for after hours, when everyone is asleep. There was the work he’d told the Cambridge dons he’d come to the university to do; and there was his real work, of which he should say nothing to the dons …
If the dons only knew of their secret work!, his brother said. If they only knew where their fundamental work in philosophical logic was leading them! If they only knew that their logical project could only mean the destruction of Oxford, of Cambridge, of the dons, of it all!
• • •
We stop by the duck pond.
His brother warned him about the dons, Wittgenstein says. Don’t trust them!, his brother said. Keep an eye on them!
The dons of Cambridge would be his warders, his brother said. His prison guards. (Just as the dons of Oxford were his warders, his prison guards.) Oh, they’d seem very gentle; they’d seem to be the easiest-going people he could find. They’d be full of soft skills, the dons of Cambridge (just like the dons of Oxford). They’d be full of words of kindness. But that would be when they were at their most deadly, his brother warned: when they were speaking words of kindness.
He shouldn’t be fooled by a smiling don, his brother told him. He shouldn’t allow himself to be lulled by a don. Charmed by one. He should never get too close to a don, his brother said. Never allow himself to be befriended. He shouldn’t take tea with a don, or join a don at the high table, his brother said. There should be no after-dinner drinks with a don. No evening constitutionals.
He should isolate himself, his brother said. He should become an island. Turn up for events to which he was required to turn up; speak when he was expected to speak, and leave it at that. Render unto Caesar the things of Caesar, and keep his soul for his work.
His brother spoke of the danger of the dons, Wittgenstein says. Of the threat of the dons. Dons were more dangerous than they seemed, his brother said. Dons could go for the throat, his brother was sure of that.
His brother had heard of scenes of savagery among the dons. Scenes of violence. Whole packs of dons would go out to hunt, in the guest lectures and seminar series of Oxford. Donpacks, out to bring back meat to feast upon.
He’d seen them in his mind’s eye, his brother said: great dons, like lions, chewing on bones; lesser dons, like hyenas, sucking on the bones left by other dons; still lesser dons, like birds of prey, flapping round the corpse …
Of course, dons could be gentle, too, his brother acknowledged. Dons could be tender, even kind. When they first scented spring in the air, dons would become dreamy and sentimental. When the first spring breezes ruffled their hair, dons would close their eyes and sigh …
In the high summer, dons would sit out on the grass like resting lions, his brother said. They’d picnic on the lawn, like kings at peace. They’d recline in their deckchairs, laying their Loeb editions facedown on the grass.
Autumn lent the dons a valedictory air, his brother said. In autumn, when the first leaves were falling from the trees, the dons would know a gentle melancholy. Sometimes a tear would appear in the eye of a melancholic don. Sometimes a don would let out a great sigh, as he sat in his leather armchair by the fire.
In winter, the dons were inert, eyes glazed over, his brother said. Drowsy, like a winter wasp. Half hibernating by the fire, a glass of sherry in the hand …
But he should never be fooled, his brother told him. He should never let down his guard.
The mood of the dons could change quickly, his brother said. Like a bushfire that suddenly changes direction. You couldn’t predict them. You couldn’t anticipate them. Their moods were unstable. They were easy to stir, easy to panic. They were susceptible to rumour, to gossip. They were as sensitive as antelopes. A sudden movement, and they’d bolt—a herd of dons leaping over the savannah.
Above all, he should never show fear to a don, his brother said. He might be afraid of them, but he should never show his fear. That’s what his brother had learnt. The best thing would be for the dons to take him as one of their own. As a kind of honorary don, an honorary fellow. He should try, as best he could, to mirror the dons. His brother advised him to ape their gestures, their turns of phrase. To mimic their body language. Their dress. To try to blend in with the dons—they’d appreciate that.
Of course, not for one moment would they take him for a don—they would not be so easily fooled, his brother said. Not for one moment would they take him for one of their kind. But they’d appreciate the gesture of his would-be donnishness. They’d smile when they witnessed his no-doubt inept attempts at becoming a don. It would be as though he were a child, playing at dressing up, his brother said. And the dons, despite everything, are fond of children …
Doyle’s rooms. A soirée.
Tonight’s performance: the madness of Nietzsche.
Guthrie, the star, is unconscious. Doyle smears mustard under his nostrils. No response. Doyle squirts wasabi through his lips. Still nothing. Titmuss volunteers for the part, and sellotapes a moustache under his nose.
Titmuss/Nietzsche’s last moments of sanity, watching a horse (Benedict Kirwin) being beaten in the Turin marketplace. Titmuss/Nietzsche, flinging his arms round the horse, and weeping.
TITMUSS/NIETZSCHE: You must have chaos inside you, if you are to give birth to a dancing star. What doesn’t kill you makes you stronger. When you look into an abyss, the abyss also looks into you.
Titmuss/Nietzsche slumps. App
lause from the audience.
Change of scene.
The demented Nietzsche never regained consciousness, Doyle says. Everyone ponders Guthrie.
EDE: He’s actually drooling.
MULBERRY: You go, Guthrie! Give an Oscar to droolio!
Guthrie has something, we agree. Presence. He’s like an Olivier of the immobile. Even his inertia is profound. As though he bore all the weight of existence! All the burden of being!
DOYLE (playing Nietzsche’s sister): Friedrich! Friedrich! Wake up!
Guthrie half snores. Sniffs.
DOYLE/NIETZSCHE’S SISTER: Friedrich! Herr Hitler has come to see you!
Guthrie seems to stir. His eyes half open. Then his head slumps onto his chest.
More applause. Doyle bows. A triumph! Bravo!
Black Zombies all round.
TITMUSS: Do you reckon you have to be mad to really think?
MULBERRY: Wittgenstein’s mad. Quite clearly.
EDE: Wittgenstein’s brother went mad. Then killed himself.
DOYLE: It must run in the family.
EDE: I had a mad uncle.
MULBERRY: Mad uncle Ede—must be from all that inbreeding. Did he really think?
EDE: I don’t know. He really thought he was a parrot. Or a squirrel, depending on the day.
Another round of Zombies.
Spin the bottle.
The usual questions: Ever done it out-of-doors? Anally? With a member of the same sex? The opposite sex? Favourite sexual fantasies?: the secretary (Chakrabarti) … the nurse (Titmuss) … the dominant woman (Alexander Kirwin) … the virgin flower, atremble in your arms (Benedict Kirwin), the threesome (Benedict Kirwin again), the foursome (Benedict Kirwin yet again), a Roman orgy of women (Benedict Kirwin has a lot of fantasies) …
MULBERRY: No prizes for guessing your fantasy, Peters.
EDE: Yeah. Germanic genius all dressed up in leder.
The Kirwins are quizzed about their brief encounters at the derangement of the senses party. Mulberry is quizzed about the ethics of riding bareback. About the sex/death relationship. We explore the topics of fisting, of auto-erotic asphyxiation. We discuss the effects of various drugs on sexual performance. On methods of relaxing the anal sphincter (Mulberry). Of engorging the reluctant cock (Doyle).