Chapter XXXI – “The Dryad”
“You could not discover the limits of soul, not even if you travelled down every road. Such is the depth of its form.”
- Heraclitus, Pre-Platonic Philosopher (late 6th century BCE)
"It seems to me we can never give up longing and wishing while we are still alive. There are certain things we feel to be beautiful and good, and we must hunger for them."
- George Eliot, English Novelist and Poet (1819-1880)
The moment of conciliation that unfolded in Chapter XV (in the third blog in this series) leads to a fostering of their association in daily life; a deepening of their mutual understanding—Lucy slowly coming to realize that she loves M Paul, at least as a friend. The scene we examined in that blog is one of several that background what takes place in Chapter XXXI, “The Dryad,” wherein the Alley in the Garden is once again the setting of a significant ‘rendezvous’ between M Paul and Lucy. Here Lucy is struggling with two relationships; that with John Graham Bretton and that with M Paul Emmanuel. As in the earlier blogs in this series, close reading of the text reveals much about Lucy and her relationships with these two men; especially with regard to her evolving friendship with M Paul.
On the particular night when this rendezvous took place, Lucy had gone to the Garden and walked down the Forbidden Alley to the foot of Old Methuselah. She had had a tiring day; the Spring weather had turned too-warm and, after hoofing it to the Protestant Church in the morning and then back to the pensionnat, she there saw something which unsettled her: M Paul in the Garden with a young woman whom Lucy ‘realized’ was probably a person she had heard about; his god-daughter. This is important for the analysis of the scenes following, as she experienced a peculiar sensation in witnessing this; then went to a classroom where it was cooler_ there falling asleep at a desk. I see this as more than simply a giving-in to sleep after exertion, an idea I hope to unpackage in what follows.
What did she experience in seeing M Paul with his god-daughter? I would suggest that seeing a young, probably good-looking young woman hanging on the arm of the man with whom she was becoming friends, stirred perhaps a small eddy of jealousy on her part? Or perhaps simple envy_ as she might have imagined herself in the place of that god-daughter; being out in the Garden with the man who has solicited her friendship and, by this point in the narrative, has become a mentor and tutor to her?
Friendship, as it evolves, can find itself immaturely expressed in this kind of envy and a resultant possessiveness; wanting to have the other totally and wholly to oneself—though once approaching the “true” or “perfect” state – as Aristotle would call it – this pettiness will naturally fade out of the relationship with the insecurity it manifests. The sanctuary of the relationship – in souls becoming bonded with another[1] – flushes out such doubts and frustrations; the greed of “you’re only for me,” or worse yet “you’re mine.”
Lucy slept most of the afternoon, and when she awoke it was evening. While she slept, someone had put a shawl under her head and covered her with another to keep her from getting chilled as the day cooled down. She believes the only person who might have done this to be Madame Beck, and with that in mind as the ‘answer’ she left the classroom, not thinking any more about it until later_ making her way out into the Garden.
There, she immediately goes to her “own alley,” (¶ 10) as is often her habit near nightfall. It is a ‘sacred place’ to her; one wherein she can recollect herself and also reflect on her life and the daily happenings around the school. It has been a place of memory, inspiration and recollection. It has been a place of conciliation and an invitation to friendship. Walking up and down the Alley, “pacing” (¶ 10), she begins to ruminate on her burial of John’s letters.
I see this scene as being in complementary tension with the scene of M Paul and the god-daughter in the Garden earlier that day. Suspended betwixt the afternoon scene and this evening retreat into the “allée défendue,” she becomes conscious of the fact of a burial near her – one very significant to her; one which still haunts her – beneath Old Methuselah, where she had interred letters of a friend she had let go of_ and said her goodbyes to, at one level, at least. It was here at the end of the Alley – beneath the Old Tree – that she had attempted to lay her grief to rest. Coming near the grave, she is now inspired to reflect on what she did and then consider her options for the future, as when she had first buried them. Why? Because of the scene she witnessed in the afternoon, before her potentially ‘chilly’ sleep.
She knows she did not bury John’s letters without sufficient reason, yet she is still somewhat under their ‘power;’ i.e., the reach of grief transmuted into false hope. The letters are a touchstone of a previous relationship that spanned probably a decade of her life; from her early years in Bretton to her life at the school in Villette. Now she has been befriended by M Paul; benefitted by him – in his becoming her “ally,” as well as in his tutoring and mentoring of her—but is perhaps made a bit ‘taut,’ emotionally, having seen him in the Garden with his god-daughter?
Does she doubt that the young woman was who she thinks she was? If Lucy is not sure that the young woman was the god-daughter, she might be wondering if it was some other young woman that M Paul knew well enough to let her hang on his arm in public. Surely this would not be an improbable thought to have for someone of her age in her position? It could well stir anyone in such a situation to some degree of doubting_ Hence, having come to the Alley; possibly drawn to it by this subconscious tension—she finds herself thinking again about John. _But not for long. She says:
I paced up and down, thinking almost the same thoughts I had pondered that night when I buried my glass jar—how I should make some advance in life, take another step towards an independent position; for this train of reflection, though not lately pursued, had never by me been wholly abandoned; and whenever a certain eye was averted from me, and a certain countenance grew dark with unkindness and injustice, into that track of speculation did I at once strike; so that, little by little, I had laid half a plan.(¶ 10)
Once again, she considers whether or not she should start a school of her own (¶ 11), and whether or not it would have any more than a material benefit (¶ 12). That is, she would want a situation – and so many of us do – that would have more beneficial aspects than just her pay, room-and-board. In a more modern idiom, I’d suggest that she seeks a place where she can flourish; i.e., ‘live’ and not just ‘survive.’ She speculates again – as she did on the night she buried the letters – how to make something more of her life; to become independent. She does not want to be dependent on others; to be independent perhaps being a way of fulfilling her desire for solitude—independence and solitude being two of the things she most values.
In Chapter XV she admitted she was in need of a friend; and glad to have one—especially since having let go of John. If she now thinks her relationship with M Paul to be ‘not what she thought it was’[2] and, considering her potential loss of Paul to another, leaving her alone again, is it any wonder she begins thinking of pursuing a new situation? Here she is suspended between a friendship she thought she had had with John and the one she now has with M Paul? What kind of friendship was it?
Having friends of any of Aristotle’s three “types” can help us – as well as our friends – toward living life well; those of utility and those of pleasure, each in their own limited way — “true friendship,” however, surpassing and at the same time embodying the first two types.
She knows the place of interment of the letters; it is quite nearby. She paces back and forth as she reflects. While this intention of seeking a new mode or place of life has not left her, it now recurs whenever “a certain eye” is not upon her; when that person has grown “dark” with “unkindness and injustice.” Who is that person? This surely now refers to M Paul, who is still sometimes harsh with her and even unresponsive to her presence as well as to her queries—not withstanding his invitation to friendship with him. This gives further motive to her speculating about the future, brought to the fore again by now having seen him in the afternoon in the company of the young woman. It has prompted a subtle yet resonant doubt in her Mind and Heart.
For herself, she has by this point “half laid a plan.” We never are told what that plan was, or what would have happened had it come to fruition, but her relationship with M Paul is certainly a key to Lucy’s having ceased for a while to think of an independent position, just as he may now be the impetus for her beginning to think of it again. She avers that it is not something that she has given up; laying this “plan” – and yet, I think the text suggests, it is something to which she turns, naturally, when things are not going well? Disappointment often leads to doubt and may foster displacement; emotionally – as well as in terms of ‘from a physical space.’
Such doubts often arise in the emerging stages of friendship; before the souls of the friends have “become one.” It is the resonance of existential doubt arising out of difference between one soul and another; as we can never truly or fully know another—a theme that is struggled with throughout this novel.
After pacing and reflecting, she turns to the Old Pear Tree, seeking connection or communion in an attitude that indicates she desires resolution and even consolation. She says:
Pausing before Methusaleh—the giant and patriarch of the garden—and leaning my brow against his knotty trunk, my foot rested on the stone sealing the small sepulchre at his root; and I recalled the passage of feeling therein buried; I recalled Dr. John; my warm affection for him; my faith in his excellence; my delight in his grace. What was become of that curious one-sided friendship which was half marble and half life; only on one hand truth, and on the other perhaps a jest? (¶ 14)
Lucy is thinking warmly of Dr John, at least in this nostalgic moment, in contrast with the man with whom she is now becoming friends. She laments the fate of her earlier relationship, much to her credit, asking what had become of it, knowing that it was what she had eventually realized about John – her growing knowledge of him and his character – which led Lucy to her burying his letters.
She knows the truth concerning John in relation to herself, as well as why she had to do something to distance herself from the grief to which those epistles gave an emotional substance. The burial of the letters was coterminous with a “passage of feeling” connected to that relationship. She is still, however, apparently and quite naturally, haunted by her feelings for the man. How many good friends a person has had can be tallied in the memories that remain with us. They may even be said to ‘haunt’ us, as time goes by, memory becoming an ever more salient touchstone of our own being-in-the-world as we grow older.
That their relationship was “one-sided” as made resonant in the assertion of it being “half-marble” and “half life.” Being marble is indicative of the relationship being as one with a statue; a handsome and noble young man—but a statue nonetheless. An elegant and adorable statue; but one which has no feeling for the one admiring it. It being only half a life; i.e., a half life—is her part played in it; she is alive, but the object of her affection was like a statue; however beautiful and indicative of nobility. Following on this, the metaphor of it being on the one hand “truth” refers to John; he was true to himself and was a real person—whereas the “jest” she refers to is how Lucy now feels toward the ‘relationship’ she eventually realized was not mutual.
Her position and posture at the Tree are very suggestive of supplication and connection; the seeking of a moment of comfort in a stance of communion_ if not dependency_ upon something greater; in this instance, the centuries-old Tree! Her brow against the bark of the Old Patriarch of the Garden suggests a ‘devout person’ leaning against the statue of a saint or perhaps their god or goddess. A person’s “brow” touching such a statue or icon in this attitude indicates an appeal for aid; a petitioning in dependence upon the being invoked—which attitude is clearly expressed by her posture in the act; her foot upon the stone – i.e., the ‘tombstone’ – she laid over the grave of the buried letters—suggesting her awareness of them, bringing a spectre of John into her consciousness, a ghost to grapple with, once again. _Another ‘ghost’ that inhabits this Garden for Lucy!
By this posture she is ‘appealing’ to Old Methuselah, enacted with an embodied humility. The stone on which she stands “seals” the sepulchre with the letters in it, though it did not prevent the one interred from affecting the living applicant; haunting her. Their relationship has been “buried alive” in some sense. She asks her question, addressing it to her readers, though one can imagine her petitioning Old Methuselah in the moment with it, seeking an answer. Lucy ruminates over both the question and its object—
Was this feeling dead? I do not know, but it was buried. Sometimes I thought the tomb unquiet, and dreamed strangely of disturbed earth, and of hair, still golden, and living, obtruded through coffin-chinks. (¶ 15)
Yes, Lucy_ it was buried, but you are not yet at peace with the loss! Lucy dreams of a disinterment of the letters personified as John, with his golden hair protruding through chinks in a coffin! This is nightmarish stuff; a classic ghost-story motif—intimating the return of the dead as living entities. But how ‘alive?’ we are inclined to ask (having seen how many ‘zombie’ and ‘living dead’ movies?). When the dead return, are they truly alive? And just like characters in various revenant and zombie stories, Lucy ruminates over the one she has lost, asking, ostensibly of the Tree as of her own deep self:
Had I been too hasty? I used to ask myself; and this question would occur with a cruel sharpness after some brief chance interview with Dr. John. He had still such kind looks, such a warm hand; his voice still kept so pleasant a tone for my name; I never liked “Lucy” so well as when he uttered it. (¶ 16)
She still responds to John’s warmth and affection when she encounters him, however briefly. The resonance of former relationships; with former friends—often haunts Heart and Mind. The temporal situation here is complex. She may be reflecting on this scene from the place and time wherein she is writing her story, for she says she “used to ask herself.” Is she still feeling a resonance of her friendship with John even at this late point in her life? Could well be. Or this might just as well refer to how she stood in relationship to John at the time of the events being narrated.
Being in this supplicant posture in relation to the Tree, standing over the “sepulchre,” she comes to an answer to her own question, however, giving a description of John’s character and the way he was with other people arising out of long observation of her former friend. She says:
But I learned in time that this benignity, this cordiality, this music, belonged in no shape to me: it was a part of himself; it was the honey of his temper; it was the balm of his mellow mood; he imparted it, as the ripe fruit rewards with sweetness the rifling bee; he diffused it about him, as sweet plants shed their perfume. Does the nectarine love either the bee or bird it feeds? Is the sweetbriar enamoured of the air? (¶16)
How she characterizes John here indicates a person who exudes kindness and care, but does not necessarily or always ‘care for’ those positively affected by this emanation from his being. _Though he well might, and probably does with certain people in his circle of acquaintance. Yet she was not really among those; not in the way she wanted to be. His “mellow mood” and all the rest were “balm” to her; though she believes it was not a show of affection or love toward her in the sense she thought it had been. She was like a recipient of a goodness that did not imply love of a romantic kind; something she came to realize she had felt for – and wanted from – John. Now she feels like someone who had been in love with a marble statue.
That she learned this “in time” might also indicate that she is reflecting on this at the time of her writing her story; perhaps not describing how she actually felt in the present moment of the narrative? _Though that would also fit the sense of what she says. Alternately, however, could it mean she learned it “in time,” as in ‘just in time’ – before it was too late? Whether, and from what vantage point, she is reflecting, however, there is indicated here a period of learning and growing self-understanding; suggested as between the time she buried John’s letters and this moment in the story—but also between this moment and the moment of the writing of her story. However you want to understand the “in time,” Lucy was empowered in that moment to let John go:
“Good-night, Dr. John; you are good, you are beautiful; but you are not mine.
Good-night, and God bless you!” (¶ 17)
John is “good” and “beautiful;”[3] two things that characterize true friends in Aristotle’s terms. However, Lucy now realizes and accepts that John is not ‘for her.’ She asks God to bless him, and at this point manages, I believe, to move beyond being haunted by him. I do not find another similar scene in the rest of the novel in which Lucy is in a quandary over her loss of John as a friend. He nearly vanishes from the novel after his marriage to Mademoiselle de Bassompierre.
This series of reflections being concluded with a certain finality, her wishing “good night” to John is then followed by a sudden and unexpected greeting:
“Good-night, Mademoiselle; or, rather, good-evening—the sun is scarce set; I hope you slept well?” (¶ 19)
It is M Paul Emmanuel! He has come into the Alley and is standing in some proximity to Lucy, stationing Lucy, emotionally and psychologically, between the two men who have played a significant role in her life since coming to Villette. As I read it, seeing M Paul in the Garden earlier in the afternoon set up a dialectic leading to her visit to the place of interment of John’s letters in the evening; the tension between them being suspended in the hours she spent asleep. The fulcrum has now swung; between thesis and antithesis—she is standing at the Old Methuselah Tree and M Paul has come into that quiet, secluded space, as a synthesis to the dialectic. Lucy has now let go of the ‘thesis;’ her relationship with John—and will accept M Paul as the resolution of the dialectic.
Lucy is caught by the reference to her having “slept well.” When she asks Paul about it, he reveals that he was the one who put a shawl over her and another under her head in the classroom. Lucy then realizes it was not Madame Beck, and accepts his care. It was done without reward and with no need for acknowledgment. He does ask “Did the shawls keep you warm?” (¶ 24) to which she replies “Very warm. Do you ask thanks for them?” (¶ 25). To which he replies, “No. You looked pale in your slumbers: are you home-sick?” (¶ 26). If she had not queried him about it, she might have just continued to think it was Madame Beck who comforted her with the shawls while she slept. I do not believe M Paul would have sought recognition; he does not need his ego stroked in such a way—though in meeting her he did admit that he knew she’d slept during the afternoon.
To his question she honestly replies: “To be home-sick, one must have a home; which I have not.” (¶ 27) this admission eliciting a further affirmation of concern and compassion from M Paul. He says, in a mode of care that he has expressed more than once in the story:
“Then you have more need of a careful friend. I scarcely know any one, Miss Lucy, who needs a friend more absolutely than you; your very faults imperatively require it. You want so much checking, regulating, and keeping down.” (¶ 28)
Remember M Paul calling her a “poor soul” in Chapter XV when she admitted that she was glad of a friend? That M Paul believes he sees ‘faults” in Lucy may in part inform why he thinks her soul “poor.” And from his perspective, she does have faults. She seems to him willful and in some ways unable to comport herself according to the standards of his society and his beliefs. Lucy has grappled with him about this, and here affirms for the reader that this “keeping down” that he asserts to be a recurrent theme in their interactions. In some ways she sees – perhaps incorrectly – that it ‘sums up’ his care for her.
This care for her includes trying to bring her into conformity with his version of the ‘strait and narrow,’ “checking” and “regulating” her when necessary. This usually involves calling her out when he thinks her behavior un-becoming to a young woman of her station in life; sometimes criticizing her attire and at other times her lack of awareness of social norms (as in the Art Museum). She ‘accepts’ his care as given, though, almost because it seemed a relief to him in some way, whereas, had she contested it, as she sometimes did, she believes he would have been left him with no ‘occupation’ concerning her.
Such attitudes; resulting from a too quick summing-up of what another person thinks about you or feels toward you—are things that those becoming friends oft struggle with in getting to know one another. Her perception of him does not clearly bring M Paul’s understanding of her fully to light—yet certainly makes up some part of it. She is being considerate of his assertions, without giving-in to his observations uncritically. He is trying to understand her, and she is dealing, once again, with possible limitations in how he sees her. His “checking” and “regulating,” while irritating to her at first, is in one sense legitimate; as she is a foreigner in Villette and is being tutored in the customs of her new world—at least according to one man’s interpretation of them! A man with whom she is entering into the pathways of a friendship. _Interacting with M Paul Emmanual is never like interacting with a statue!
M Paul then turns to himself, giving Lucy a broader view of his ‘care,’ which goes beyond her, affirming that it extends to the whole school. He lets her know that he engages in surveillance of the Garden from a room high-up in the boy’s school. This confession carries a degree of ethical ambivalence for Lucy. In his defense, he avows that he watches over the students and teachers for their benefit and protection, to which Lucy still asserts, “Discoveries made by stealth seem to me dishonourable discoveries.” (¶ 35). As a way around – or to soften – this evaluation of his surveilling, he tells her what he had learned of one of the teachers, Miss St Pierre, who had been attempting to woo him. By his observations he found out her true character and was “spared the pain of embarrassment.” (¶ 38).[4] Lucy still thinks his surveillance problematic, if not immoral.
She then asserts that she has never seen him embarrassed, to which he confesses his susceptibility, averring, “I can be embarrassed as a petite pensionnaire.” (¶ 40). He urges that Lucy should have seen this, and, knowing him, should recognize his being at home in the public element, though disdaining to be “worsted” by it. In other words, he does not like to be embarrassed in public. If he had continued in his relationship with the teacher whose ‘true self’ he had found out – via his surveillance – would have tarnished that public reputation. He wants to be well appreciated by the public and well-thought-of.
As their dialogue continues, a question of his modesty arises. M Paul urges his own being modest, arguing, however, that it is not the kind to be excited by the approval of kings and queens. In terms of his relationships with women, he then says, plainly and significantly:
“If, Mademoiselle, I were a marrying man (which I am not; and you may spare yourself the trouble of any sneer you may be contemplating at the thought), and found it necessary to ask a lady whether she could look upon me in the light of a future husband, then would it be proved that I am as I say—modest.” (¶ 44)
Here we have M Paul’s vocation alluded to in his being committed to a celibate life, or at least a life of abstinence. This was not always so, but he has taken on the mantle of who he now is after a romantic crisis in his days as a young man. He expects Lucy might “sneer” at his not being a man inclined to marriage, though we are not told that she does—or why she would. His avowal intimates that he is not intending to marry; unless it was necessary—which carries its own ambiguity. What could possibly arise that would make it necessary for him to propose marriage to a woman? His admission probably helped temper Lucy’s thoughts about their friendship. She might be thinking, would he ever find her someone he could look upon as a future wife?
M Paul’s assuming she would “sneer” may allude to the then current Protestant contempt for monasticism and the celibate life. Lucy is unexpectedly impressed, however, and finds M Paul’s declaration acceptable. She affirms:
“I quite believed him now; and, in believing, I honoured him with a sincerity of esteem which made my heart ache.” (¶ 45)
This is quite an affirmation of him! She is stirred to a “sincerity of esteem,” such as one friend should surely hope to experience toward and with an Other. She felt this deeply; her heart ached—indicating an emotional state and not just a cold Lucy Snowe-like response. She felt esteem for him. Her response increases the ambiguity of their relationship. M Paul’s assertion, here, might well limit their relationship to true friendship without marriage. Whether his vows would ever have changed at some point in the future of their friendship Lucy never reveals to us.
Having come this far with Lucy, M Paul confesses other things he has discovered via his surveillance of the Garden, perhaps still trying to gain her understanding if not full acceptance of his behavior. He calls the Garden his “book,” making its inhabitants like the characters in a story. He has watched the “meek” and “mild” female students “romp like boys” (¶ 47), “snatch grapes and pull pears from the trees.” M Paul then mentions his notice of Lucy upon her arrival at the school, at which point he played a key role in her admittance and initial employment. He intimates that he has been ‘aware’ of her ever since; keeping an eye upon her. He eventually noticed her penchant for the Alley; this all from a time before they actually became acquainted. This long-standing interest in her has only recently been revealed to Lucy as part of the flux and flow of their growing friendship. I was nevertheless surprised at his next question when I read it:
“… do you recollect my once coming silently and offering you a little knot of white violets when we were strangers?” (¶ 47)
Lucy acknowledges the moment[5] and relates that she has dried and kept these flowers. As I discussed in “The End of Villette, Again” (20 June 25) she has kept these flowers in a small drawer where she sequesters away other things of value to her. The letters she had received from John Bretton were also kept in this same drawer. Imagine, the then cherished letters from John being scented by the dried violets given to her by M Paul!
M Paul is in this scene revealing more of himself to Lucy; his character, his habits and his concern for her. By this point in the dialogue, Lucy is becoming cautiously accepting of her friend’s surveillance, opening the way to M Paul warning her about someone else who reconnoiters the Garden when she is walking there and lingering in her Alley. Madame Beck! He wants to make sure Lucy knows she is not always alone in her solitude; down at the end of the Alley near the Old Methuselah Tree.
Lucy questions whether M Paul could actually see all these things in the Garden in the dark, in response to which question he informs her that he has a “glass” – a magnifying glass? Perhaps a small hand-held telescope? – that allows him to see much, at least when the Moon is out and shining. He is like a Romantic Galileo, able to see beyond the normal reach of his eyes, into the lives of others—for their own sake, of course, as he asserts and believes!
These confessions by M Paul contribute to Lucy’s growing awareness of the character of the man with whom she has entered into the pathways of friendship. And even here, at this point, he is not done with these revelations. He next admits that there is a door communicating between the Garden and the boy’s school; which he uses to access the Garden—and through which he has come to meet with her this night! Might we assume that he came down to the Alley to rendezvous with her intentionally, then, having been up in his room and saw her entering the Garden? It’s possible, but not necessary. To this revelation, Lucy tells us:
I could not help saying, “If you were a wicked, designing man, how terrible would all this be!” (¶ 42)
This suggests that she does not think M Paul a “wicked man” at this point, which is probably an improvement over how she sometimes saw him earlier in the story. At this admonition, as M Paul then lit his cigar and stood gazing at her intently, not replying, Lucy took the opportunity to continue “sermonizing him” about this activity of surveillance, saying:
“The knowledge it brings you is bought too dear, Monsieur; this coming and going by stealth degrades your own dignity.” (54)
He throws the term “dignity” back at her, becoming a bit more cantankerous, expounding:
“My dignity!” he cried, laughing; “when did you ever see me trouble my head about my dignity? It is you, Miss Lucy, who are ‘digne.’ How often, in your high insular presence, have I taken a pleasure in trampling upon, what you are pleased to call, my dignity; tearing it, scattering it to the winds, in those mad transports you witness with such hauteur, and which I know you think very like the ravings of a third-rate London actor.” (¶ 55)
Lucy’s admonition regarding his surveillance has now touched-off an aspect of M Paul’s own sense of himself in relation to Lucy! In this response we can see that M Paul often feels mis-understood by Lucy; his assertion now hanging-in-tandem with her assertions that he does not truly “know her.” He says she has a “high, insular presence,” which makes her seem to be – to him – on a mountain top or heath, all alone – “insular,” like an island – and from that vantage leading him to ‘trample’ on his own ‘dignity.’ She is the one who has ‘digne.’ She is high over him, in his imagining of her, he beneath her—scattering his dignity to the wind in his “mad transports,” which she often ignites. This is a significant self-revelation on M Paul’s part; a self-humbling admission—especially depending upon how Lucy responds – the positive resolution of which surely aiding in the deepening of their friendship.
M Paul’s attitude here reminds me of the troubadours and others in the High to Late Middle Ages who saw “Woman” as up on a pedestal; unattainable yet always lovable—being an “object” worth dying for, if need be. It would seem M Paul has put Lucy on such a pedestal, though perhaps not to the same extent or degree as those mediaeval amours. He senses at the very least a kind of superiority in her; that he has to ‘look up to.’ He then admits of his “mad transports;” his tendency to ‘boil over’ or ‘get all wound up’ in his interactions with Lucy—implying that she may be in part the cause of it, though not blaming her for his eruptions.
There may be simple transference here; it’s not unusual when people of differing character, personality and background begin to come together in a relationship, that rough moments arise and blame gets misplaced, unintentionally. Whatever the cause of the “mad transports,” it would seem M Paul thinks of her looking down on him, from that “high insular” place where she resides.
He then accuses her of having “hauteur” – an arrogance, or defiant aloofness – in response to his “mad transports” and probably in relation to himself in general? Witnessing his passionate nature, his wild outbursts, he assumes she thinks, is like watching a “third-rate London actor.” This signifies someone who is ‘putting on a performance’ without due heft; someone merely ‘play acting’ but not acting out genuine emotions or thoughts? He even indicates that he feels his passionate behavior to be out-of-place at the pensionnat, and so, at some level, that Lucy must see him as someone putting on an act; badly acted—as she is, herself, a kind of icon of quiet passivity. (M Paul has not seen her on one of her passionate flights of self-transcendence!) This confession reveals a significant element of what M Paul has been feeling and thinking in relation to Lucy, and his confessing it is an act of self-divulging humility. It is self-revealing in a way that renders him even more vulnerable than do even his previous confessions about his surveillance of the Garden!
Friendship, as it develops, deepens and becomes more of a flowing stream—once the obstacles to that flow are recognized, resolved and removed. This is not the only scene in which M Paul reveals things to Lucy about himself and the way he sees her, but it is a concentrated moment in the Alley in the Garden near the Tree that contributes significantly to their growing into friendship with one another.
Lucy responds to this confession with a degree of accusation, suggesting that perhaps Monsieur Paul was in danger of tasting “Eve’s Apples” (¶ 56) and that she wishes he were a Protestant_ as if that would solve the problem!? They have recognized from the start – and have discussed – the religious differences between them, over time beginning to come to a détente; accepting the differences in their systems of belief and yet affirming the value of each person’s faith by the end of the story. Here, the reference to “Eve’s Apples” is something they each would have understood, though perhaps in different ways.
It is, however, another ambiguous reference. If he tastes “Eve’s Apples,” would it be through the agency of Lucy? Does this suggest that M Paul may be tempted into some version of a ‘Fall?’ If so, then she is his Eve? This reference also ambiguates the question of the nature of their relationship; would they as true friends ever enter into a romantic relationship? If so, then “Eve’s Apples” might well reference M Paul’s ‘fall’ from his lay-Jesuit vows? They are meeting, after all, in the “Forbidden Alley.” Could this be a potential ‘fruit’ of that encounter?
Otherwise, has M Paul partaken of some “Forbidden Fruit” in ‘falling’ into this state wherein he thinks of her as aloof and unattainable? Unattainable how? This revelation about himself shows an insecurity that he – by making this confession – is gesturing toward its resolution. The mythic scene of Eve tempting Adam with the Apple is one symbolic crucible of ‘sin’ (i.e., “missing the mark”)[6] at the personal level as well as referencing our existential condition as a species.[7] The text leaves all of these options wide open! Ambiguity pervades this novel!
Themes connected to the Garden—Tree—Alley:
Here we have continued to see the Alley near the Tree in the Garden continuing to be a locus of discernment, self-revelation and the weaving of two mortals into a deepening friendship. Revelations abound in this scene. Lucy and M Paul are still moving toward a fuller conciliation as they continue to try and fathom one another. This is the path into true friendship. We will continue with the analysis of this scene and what happened next in the final blog in this series.
Until then_
finis
[1] As I have stated in the previous blogs, I tend to disagree with Aristotle when he says that the communion of souls can only subsist between two individuals. I believe it possible – as has happened to me – that three and sometimes even four people can become so bonded. I do agree that the more individuals involved, however, the less the intimacy they may experience. – MW
[2] And what would that have been? As a reader I am never quite able to parse their ‘friendship’ in terms of where it might lead. Is there a romantic element? Would one emerge later, had not M Paul died? What do you think?
[3] The beauty referred to here is not simply superficial, bodily beauty, but the beauty of the soul one can come to see in another person.
[4] Just as Lucy got out of her relationship with John just “in time,” so here M Paul admits that he, too, had been in a relationship with someone who was not what she seemed; perhaps just not what M Paul expected or hoped—and got out of it ‘just in time’ – though he does not use those exact words.
[5] Though not narrated, Lucy in Chapter XIII ¶ 13 refers to “a certain little bunch of white violets that had once been silently presented to me by a stranger (a stranger to me, for we had never exchanged words), and which I had dried and kept for its sweet perfume between the folds of my best dress…” I assume these to be the violets in question.
[6] “Missing the mark” is one translation of the Greek word “hamartia” (ἁμαρτία, ἁμαρτάνειν “hamartánein”) which is often translated too simply and monovalent as “sin.” It can also have the sense of not achieving one’s goal. In Greek tragedy it is the word used for what many interpreters refer to as “the tragic flaw.” – MW
In spiritual and theological terms, I prefer this sense of sin as “missing the mark” as it does not imply anything superstitious about human nature; as in a general “Fall” of all humanity and Creation caused by someone who couldn’t resist a succulent (it had to be succulent, right, or why else be tempted by it?) apple (or pear_ or fig). The “fall” that we each experience differs according to our own personal experiences; the choices we make—once we begin to make them on our own, in the situation in which we find ourselves living as we come to consciousness of ourselves in this world into which we have been ‘thrown’ by being born. In this sense the “Fall” is an existential state; not a superstitious one—and does not need a religious framework to be understood. This is at least how I have come to understand it. - MW
[7] From a naturalistic existential point of view, we have all ‘fallen’ in the sense of awakening from our innocence, behaving in ways that we later find to have been immoral or at least immature, and passing through our lives increasingly realizing how broken we are, have become, or can be. This is not a religious understanding of human nature, but a philosophical And naturalistic one.
