The Stories of Paul Bowles

by Paul Bowles

  I now have a vague concept of where you are: on the north shore of Maui. I’ve even found Kahului and Paukókalo. As I studied the map I couldn’t help noticing that the entire west coast of the island of Hawaii is decorated with lava flows, as you no doubt know. What amuses me is that each one is named after the year the stuff slid down the mountainside, so that you get Lava Flow of 1801, Lava Flow of 1859, Lava Flow of 1950. It puts me in mind of the streets in Latin American countries, named after important dates. “He lives on the corner of the Fourth of April and the Nineteenth of October.”

  I remember, when people used to ask me what Pamela was doing, I’d reply: Oh, she’s busy being beautiful. I remember, also, being taken to task for my flippant answer. But what’s wrong with it? Isn’t it true? You are beautiful (as we know) and you’ve remained beautiful thanks to your determination to do so. That requires concentration and effort. How otherwise would there have been a Loeffler?

  Now I’m trying to imagine you in the un-American decor of our fiftieth state. Do you wear jodhpurs, like Karen Blixen in Kenya? When you have a moment, send a snapshot. I’ll be waiting for it.

  (sent to Pamela Loeffler)

  No, a three-month silence is quite forgivable. I wonder you were able to find the time even when you did. Most of the matters I felt like asking you about in my last, but refrained from mentioning out of tact, seem to have been arranged more or less happily: plumbing, staff, provisions, neighbors. The last named would be rather important, I should think. Great that you should have discovered the Hollywood people only six miles up the road. I don’t remember ever having seen his name. But then, he could have been the most famous director in the U.S. and I still wouldn’t have heard of him. As you know, I was never a film enthusiast. Anyway, it’s nice that they’re there, and companionable to boot. They sound echt Beverly Hills, but that may be only because I’m relying on your description.

  Above all I was happy to hear that a few old friends will be visiting you soon. If Florence actually arrives (does she ever know what she’s doing?) give her my love. I can see her getting to San Francisco and deciding to go to Carmel. instead of Honolulu, and then two months later suddenly arriving at your place without a word of warning, just when the house is archicomplet. I remember one winter when she kept the house in Turtle Bay open, with the housekeeper in residence, to take care of her cat while she was away (but for six months or more) because she believed that cats grow fond of places rather than people, and the cat would have been too unhappy if it had been taken away from the house. Then as soon as she got back home she gave the cat to somebody who lived in Connecticut.

  Tell me—you ought to know this by now, being surrounded by exotic flora—is frangipani the same tree which is known in the Philippines as ylang-ylang, and in India as champak? I’m not trying to test you; I don’t know myself, and there’s no reason why I should expect you to. And yet it’s just the sort of thing you might know. If you don’t, perhaps one of your friends from Boston will. Bostonians often know the most unlikely things. At least, they used to. Or are there no true Bostonians left?

  I see you understand the pleasure that can be got from writing letters. In other centuries this was taken for granted. Not any longer. Only a few people carry on true correspondences. No time, the rest tell you. Quicker to telephone. Like saying a photograph is more satisfying than a painting. There wasn’t all that much time for writing letters in the past, either, but time was found, as it generally can be for whatever gives pleasure.

  And when you find the time, send me a few recent snapshots of yourself and the place. I imagine they’ll have to be Polaroids, since from what you write you haven’t easy access to what we like to call the amenities of civilization. It sounds to me as though most of your supplies had to be flown over from Honolulu. That’s all too reminiscent of the situation here. “We’re waiting for a new shipment. Maybe in three or four months.” Those are the honest baqals; the others say: “Next week, incha’ Allah,” knowing it’s untrue. You may, or you may never, get your saucepan or your powdered milk or your trowel or your broom or your Gruyère or your spatula. More likely you never will, for such things are not allowed entry into the country these days. Tant pis et à bientôt.

  (sent to Pamela Loeffler)

  Thank you for the year-old photo of the house-in-progress. Even without its finishing touches I can see how handsome it must be now. It’s really very sumptuous, very grand. You must have room for a dozen visitors, in case you ever should feel afraid of succumbing to melancholia. But I see no sign of you, nor of anyone else. Incredibly fine vegetation.

  What makes you think I should be able to interpret your dream? In the first place, I don’t believe X can explain to Y what Y dreamed. How do I know what the act of running along a pier represents to you, or what your usual reaction to seaweed is? I don’t understand my own dreams, much less those of others. I do notice that people have a tendency to recount dreams in which there is action, to such an extent that I often wonder if they don’t unconsciously supply the action in the telling. Because I can’t ever recall any narrative content in my own dreams. They’re more like a succession of unrelated still photographs, rather than a film. But dream tellers go right on saying: “And then. And then.” I’d like to know if it’s really that way with them, or if they only feel that it should be that way.

  And besides, why interpret a dream? If it’s a warning from your unconscious mind, you’ll get the message eventually in any case. Tell me, can you force a dream to recur? I can’t. Anyway, good dreaming.

  (sent to Pamela Loeffler)

  Still at me about dreams? Why do you say that I “of all people” should know about them? I don’t think about them in the way you do. For me they’re a psychic barometer, useful only to the person who does the dreaming, in the way a clinical thermometer is useful to the one running a fever. It seems a mistake to attach particular importance to one image rather than another (no matter how significant it may seem at the time of dreaming) since the images themselves are only delegates for other, unformulated images. How can you expect anyone to give you the “meaning” of masses of red seaweed floating in the water? Seaweed means seaweed. You also claim that there was a total lack of affect connected with the sight of it. Then why in God’s name are you interested in discovering its “meaning”? If it meant nothing to you in the dream, how can it mean anything in retrospect?

  You ask if the Moslems here have a system for explaining dreams. They have, of course, as they have (theoretically) a system for everything, but it’s divination using approved religious symbology. I can’t see that it’s in any sort of agreement with Freudian theory. (How could it be?) It all might have come out of a little book called Ali Baba’s Dream Almanac. But they believe it, just as the Hindus believe in that idiotic zodiac with its twelve signs. (And not only the Hindus, alas.)

  Dear Pamela, the value of a letter can’t be measured quantitatively. If you haven’t time to write what you call a “real” letter, then write a few lines. I don’t expect anyone to compose long-winded epistles, as I sometimes do. I write letters because I enjoy doing it. It doesn’t even matter too much whether the recipient takes pleasure in reading what I write; I’ve had my pleasure.

  So don’t decide not to write merely because you know it can be only a few lines. You could send me a note that read: “A muggy day and I’m depressed. I had baked ham and fruit salad for lunch.” And I’d be delighted. But if you send nothing at all, you leave the field to the imagination, which is always ready with its angst. I want to hear how you feel about the house, as well as about the guests who are staying with you. You wouldn’t need much time to tell me that, would you?

  (sent to Pamela Loeffler)

  I think Tangier is getting less and less livable. One of the principal reasons why I’ve continued to stay here has been the good air that we breathe. But the traffic has increased tenfold in the past five years, and with practically all the recent cars equipped with diesel engines, th
e streets are full of smoke. The buses and trucks constantly whoof out fat black columns of it. At home it doesn’t bother me, because I live high up. It’s walking in the street that’s troublesome. Apart from the pollution, the sidewalks are crowded with obstacles: cars parked in the middle, groups of students sitting along the curb, and beggars installed against the walls. If you mention the beggars to a Moroccan, he’ll tell you: Not one of them is from Tangier. They’re all down from the mountains. Don’t give them anything.

  You underestimate the intelligence of the Moroccans at your peril. They know when you’re lying and when you’re only exaggerating, they know when you mean what you say and when you’re only talking, and these things they know directly and not as a result of deduction. It’s true that they sometimes scent deceit where there is none. I’ve argued with Moroccans who refuse to believe that anyone has been to the moon. “Just America advertising.” Others, admitting the moonwalk, think the money should have been spent feeding hungry people. “What good did it do?” They’re not fascinated or excited by the idea of exploring space, because they have no concept of historic movement or growth; for them time is an eternal stasis. Everything is as it always has been, and will remain thus forever. A comforting philosophy, if you can subscribe.

  (sent to Pamela Loeffler)

  Your letter about the Palmers very amusing, I thought. Surely you’re not encouraging Dick to look for property in your vicinity? That would be catastrophic, wouldn’t it? I agree that it’s nice to have acquaintances living only fifteen or twenty miles away, if your first reaction each time you see them doesn’t express itself as a sudden sinking sensation. It takes such a lot of energy to fight that. I’ve got to the point of preferring solitude to being under that sort of stress.

  Of course Ruth was always a negative quantity, even before she married Dick. Collecting potsherds, pieces of quartz and crinoids, when I knew her. So the butterfly business is quite in line. It must be marvelous to see her bounding around as she wields the net! Hyperthyroid and graceless. Dick is merely obstinate and dictatorial; that’s how I remember him. (I haven’t seen him in fifteen years, more or less, but I feel pretty certain that he hasn’t changed much. Perhaps extra years have decreased his energy, but it doesn’t take much energy to be egotistical if that’s one’s nature.) When he had a flat here he was completely wrapped up in the Rolling Stones, who were friends he’d known in London. The name meant nothing to me, but Dick insisted they were the greatest rock group in existence. He got me out of bed one night at one o’clock, came pounding on my door, very excited. I must go with him to his flat because he had the Stones there. I, sleepy: “What stones?” He explained, and I went. A man named Jagger, dressed for a costume party, reclined on the bed, gnawing on a leg of lamb. A girl lay face down at his feet, and there were other people spread out asleep on the floor. It wasn’t bright enough in the room for me to see their costumes in detail. Mr. Jagger said nothing. His muzzle was shiny with lamb fat. Dick saw my surprise at the sight of the inert bodies on the floor, and confided that everyone had taken a new drug which apparently induced a comatose state. It’s strange: Dick has this air of breathless enthusiasm. It’s a physical attribute which ought to be contagious, but isn’t. Instead, it comes across as a sales talk, and creates next to no empathy.

  After about an hour I thanked him and said I was off to bed. This didn’t go down at all well. He took it as an offense, assuming, quite correctly, that I hadn’t appreciated my great opportunity of meeting the Stones. I considered that I had been patient, but as I went out and turned to thank Dick again, he drew himself up and, pretending to be a very proper English governess, said: “Oh, urfty turfty wiffy bibben bibben, oh yes!” and slammed the door.

  If the moment seems right, you may mention this episode to Dick, and see if he remembers it. What he’s sure to remember is that they all went to Marrakech the next morning at seven o’clock, Dick included. That was in the pre-Ruth days.

  I’m not surprised that Florence postponed her visit; in fact, I predicted it. What does strike me as strange is that you should have Dick and Ruth Palmer there, because I know they’re not the ones you’d most like to have staying with you. But of course that’s what happens when one has a large house in a remote place. Still, it’s certainly better for you to have guests than to be alone. This next guest of yours, Fronda Farquhar, who is she and what is she? And that name, at the far end of credibility! You speak of her as if I should know who she is, but I don’t. What does she do? Or is she another Ruth, searching for arrowheads and shells?

  Well, it all sounds like fun.

  (sent to Susan Choate)

  Now what? Hippocrates strikes again. I wondered at your long silence, and now I understand. Hepatitis B is not so amusing. What astonishes me is that you got rid of it in a hospital, which I thought was a place where one contracted it rather than cured it. Do you think it’s really gone? I must say I hope so. That hospital bill you enclosed is staggering. How can you be sure that I’ll be able to pay it? Clearly I can’t keep sending larger and larger amounts. All your expenses grow like weeds. I realize that you can’t help it; money has less and less value, but that simply means that people like me can buy less and less. I’m not lecturing; I’m just bewailing this hospital bill. It’s surprising they let you out of the institution without some sort of guarantee that it would be paid. Naturally you took it for granted that I could pay it, without considering the possibility that I might be short of funds. And I can pay it, yes, but not with pleasure. How did you ever get hepatitis? Did they have any theories as to the origin? I hope they gave you some pointers as to how to avoid it in the future.

  Did you get the caftan? It should be ideal for dressy occasions in New York or Boston, if indeed there are any more such things. (Although I’m told that girls are becoming interested once more in clothes, and can conceive of wearing something besides those proletarian blue jeans they’ve been affecting for the past few decades.) Anyway, the caftan is a museum piece. That very heavy silk brocade is no longer woven—not even by Fortuny. I bought it from a Moroccan friend in whose family it had been since the turn of the century. I know you’ll look superb in it, and I only hope you’ll wear it. (Not in a hospital, however!) I hope to hear from you.

  (sent to Susan Choate)

  Glad to hear you’ve had no further trouble with your liver. But Good God, Suky, no wonder you came down with hepatitis. Haiti, of all insane places to go, even for a short holiday. I’m not surprised you didn’t mention it to me. You must have known I’d do my best to discourage you. You seem to think it was all right because you were invited, so that it cost you nothing. But it did cost you six weeks of classes, not to mention that it cost me a fortune to pay for it.

  You say Haiti was picturesque, and I’m sure it is. But it’s precisely in this sort of poverty-induced picturesqueness that diseases are rampant. I myself have spent plenty of time enjoying the poverty of others in exotic places, and have paid for it with ailments and aches, as you know. But the point is that hepatitis is a serious disease, and you must take it seriously, something I suspect you don’t do, to judge by your flippant references to the experience. Remember that your great-grandmother Gray caught it on a trip to Mexico and died of it, and very quickly. So for God’s sake stay put, there at Mount Holyoke, and don’t add to my insomnia by going to places you know may be dangerous.

  It’s a help to know you don’t drink. A heavy diet of cannabis can be almost as harmful to the liver, you know. (Likewise tobacco and coffee!) Your doctor must have told you all this, but that doesn’t mean that you listened. Having withstood an attack doesn’t make you immune; on the contrary, you’re more vulnerable to another attack.

  Forgive me if I lapse into pedantry, but you spoke of “convincing” the manager of the bookshop to extend credit. It’s not possible to convince “to.” If you’re going to use convince, you need either “of” or “that.” Otherwise use persuade. End of lecture, and until soon.

  (se
nt to Pamela Loeffler)

  There’s no point in asking for news from here. News isn’t generally made in this part of the world, or if something occurs here which becomes news in the rest of the world, we hear about it in foreign broadcasts. And the broadcasts of course are full of talk about terrorism. For most Europeans and Americans the word terrorist is unqualifiedly pejorative; while to the people here it suggests a patriot. Thus actions some consider criminal and contemptible are to others heroic. How can the two ever see eye to eye?

  A theatrical agency in Sydney! I didn’t know they had them. I understand her being called Fronda Farquhar if that’s where she’s from. You make the picnics sound like something out of Waugh or early Angus Wilson. How did you weather three of them, all with F. Farquhar as well as Ruth P.? My suspicion is that the reason Dick refused to go with you is that he was loath to get too far away from the source of supply: your refrigerator. He’s always been a glutton. I shan’t ask your opinion on that: you’re too far away to put irrelevant questions to. But it must be something of a relief to have all of them gone, in spite of feeling alone and missing them. I can’t believe you actually miss those three particular people, though. Isn’t what you miss the presence of someone, anyone, to talk to now and then? That’s not an irrelevant question, by the way, and I do put it to you. Because it’s occurred to me that Sue Choate, my father’s sister’s great-granddaughter, will be visiting a college friend in Honolulu, and might enjoy a visit with you. (I think I told you I was financing her education, so it’s of great interest to me where she spends her vacations.) The last time she was out of the States she went to Haiti and caught hepatitis. One can’t ask a seventeen-year-old to be circumspect in matters like that, of course. Haiti was there, she was invited, it sounded exciting, so she went.