Family

It was brought to my attention recently in the course of a conversation with a friend that John Berger, the Arts Writer who wrote Ways of Seeing, had written a novel. In it he had used a family tragedy concerning his daughter-in-law. This resulted in his son’s estrangement from him.

 Although I am uncertain about the accuracy of this statement, it still gave me an insight into the negative reactions I might expect to the writing of an essay on the death of a relative. Many would agree that it is unacceptable to use one’s family’s tragedy in one’s writing; it shows little consideration. It shows insensitivity.

It is true that many great authors have translated tragic occurrences in their lives into works of fiction. As Truman Capote said, “That is all I have”. In doing so, the more skilful and creative writers of fiction have drawn deeper philosophical meaning from their experiences for the greater good.

I have no novelistic pretensions. The form I have chosen to use is non-fiction; because to create fiction out of something as personal as this would take time and skill, and whether that is appropriate or not is not for me to say.  Anyone is allowed to register her thoughts concerning an occurrence -however private and difficult- if she chooses to, with discretion. But when a tragic event sends out sound waves which may resonate with others, then the personal becomes the political.

 Because I believed that what happened to my nephew here in Australia in 2010 might have some future significance in Australia, I decided to write for a wider audience.

 Mapping the Edges of the Night was first conceived with only my Malaysian family in mind. It outlined what happened in November 2010. I planned to write of the events  exactly as they were reported to me; how I received the news and all that happened afterwards together with the information uncovered during the investigative process which followed. This was in order to give every member of my family in Malaysia the opportunity to ask us here in Australia the questions they might have wished to ask about this distant, unnatural and untimely death.

The research this required necessitated a request to view the Brief of Evidence which the Officer in Charge had sent on to the Coroner’s Court without the signatures of those of us who had been interviewed and whose words had contributed to the evidence.

In reading the Brief, however, two disturbing facts emerged: first, the suspicion that nothing we could have done would have stopped this death from occurring; and a second, more concerning suspicion that the events which led up to this death showed that in less unfavourable circumstances, it might have been prevented. More and more I became convinced that this tragic event need not have occurred; that the personal reasons for it, if there were any, must have been exacerbated by a certain degree of inhumanity.

And so I wanted a wider audience, in order to stimulate a discussion on the position of foreign students in Australia. Otherwise the writing of such an essay would be simply sensational and inappropriate.

In my opinion, it is the duty of every overseas student to know the requirements of the Australian Immigration Department and to be alert to the changes, if any, in Immigration policy during their time of study here. Furthermore, it is crucial that they be thoroughly briefed on the limitations of Student Visas. They have to be well-informed regarding the requirements of their courses, and they have to know where to get help when help is needed. Above all, they must have someone to appeal to who can help them in the difficulties they face alone in a foreign country.

 Registrars in Colleges –especially Private Colleges should be engaged in advice and guidance rather than complaints to Immigration Authorities of a student’s non-compliance. This has occasionally resulted in the cancellation of visas, a drastic measure taken by the Immigration Authorities which has had devastating consequences for some foreign students.   

If these requirements are ignored, then the recruitment and acceptance of Foreign Students into Australian Colleges amounts to no more than financial exploitation if not deceit. And in a Civil Society like Australia which honestly strives to maintain a good Human Rights record, this careless attitude is unacceptable.

Out of every tragic circumstance something good should emerge. I hope that this essay will stimulate some discussion on the subject of foreign students in Australia.

Gentleman or artist

It is very hard to be a gentleman and a writer –Somerset Maugham 

My promise to write the final blog on Truman Capote Gentleman or Artist came to a standstill when I was summoned for jury duty this month, and the further away I got from the subject the more difficult it became to pick up the threads and continue weaving the story of Truman Capote to its tragic end.

 At first I thought of writing a short dissertation in defence of art based on Somerset Maugham’s words: It is very hard to be a gentleman and a writer. But it wasn’t as easy as I imagined because in a civil society that licence really does not exist. Secondly, whoever heard of a short dissertation? It’s a contradiction in terms; the subject at hand being too wide.

So the next best thing I thought might be to relate the circumstances of Truman Capote’s end. 

What were the circumstances which drove him to leave himself open to condemnation over his writing? Was it naivety, disappointment at not winning the Pulitzer Prize; remorse? Was it guilt over his betrayal of the two murderers in the writing of In Cold Blood? Whatever it was -and maybe it was a combination of all of these- he became unsettled. He boasted that he would show the world what a good writer can do by writing the best book ever –a memoir Answered Prayers. The title was based on words attributed to St Teresa of Avila that more tears are shed over answered prayers than those that remain unanswered.

 That’s when the writers’ block hit him. He couldn’t settle down to write; flitting about and dabbling in petty controversies instead. But he was bound to the scandal of contractual agreements involving big money and therefore compelled to write, and he wrote La Côte Basque.

 Supposedly a work of fiction for a magazine, the piece which was to be part of the memoir Answered Prayers, was instead a thinly disguised fictional delineation of some very well-known personalities of New York High Society some of whom had been his closest friends.

 Immediately on the publication of the piece; the gossip columns ran wild, the phones ran hot and the cries of outrage and screams for revenge were rampant as one by one, his friends saw their words and their affairs –innocent and sordid- acted out by thinly disguised characters on a page which resembled them. One person, already suffering from depression, couldn’t face the dredging up of her long forgotten sins and overdosed.

One door after another began to slam shut in his face, concealing deeply hurt people standing firmly behind them refusing to open up to him. He had betrayed his life-long friends who had supported him and confided in him. He had chosen to be the writer at the cost of friendships and he could not sustain the haemorrhage that followed. Besides, the controversy quickly attracted the sharks in the art world. Long consumed with jealousy over his talent and successes, they joined the attack.

Surprisingly, the person most puzzled by the reaction was Truman himself. “I’m a writer,” he cried, “I don’t understand it.” One or two loyal friends stood by him. Someone tried to ring those who were outraged and explain: “He’s an artist, and you can’t control artists.” But they were not mollified.

The deepest mutual wounds were inflicted when his closest friend and the love of his life cut him off. In an attempt to redress the wrongs done to her as she lay ill with lung cancer, Truman lampooned her philandering husband and mentioned his affair in La Côte Basque. She never forgave him that indiscretion and refused to speak to him again. She died shortly after. They were never reconciled.

 In the deep silence which followed, Truman talked about Art. He quoted Proust: “In Society, a great friendship does not amount to much”. But this cynicism did not help in his case as he lost his friends. “The artist is a dangerous person because he’s out of control,” he said, “He is controlled only by his art… All a writer has for material is what he knows…At least, that’s all I’ve got –what I know.” But these public, high-minded lectures gave way in private to insomnia, alcoholism and tears of regret: “I never meant to hurt anyone,” he said.

It seemed as if the disappointments inflicted by soulless individuals in his life had hit him so hard that he no longer had the energy to make appropriate choices. In the naïve, misdirected cynicism of La Côte Basque, Truman Capote had underestimated the power of the written word. 

He died alone in the home of one loyal friend. Answered Prayers was never finished.

Losing Capote: Unexorcised Demons

Ironically, the downward slide of Truman Capote, the brilliant young genius who with the publication of In Cold Blood made it to international fame, began soon after its publication. Still in his mid-twenties and with no formal academic background, he had invented a new form of non-fiction writing. “Journalism” he said, always moves along a horizontal plane, telling a story, while fiction –good fiction, moves vertically, taking you deeper and deeper into character and events.” And so, to write compelling non-fiction, a writer must be “in control of fictional techniques”. Unless a journalist learns to write good fiction he would not be able to handle real events with fictional techniques. Truman didn’t have to learn to write good fiction: it was in his blood; it was something he was doing for almost as long as he could write

 In Cold Blood is a compelling read because of the way in which the story unfolds. Truth, it has been said is far superior to all fictions; all you need is the genius to interpret it. In the writing of In Cold Blood, Truman Capote presents the truth: the chronological order of events; the meticulous attention to details of time and place. He assembles the events leading up to the murder of the four members of the Clutter family and the research into the lives of the murderers, and weaves them together into a seamless narrative. We see the last days of the Clutter family and the peaceful regularity of their lives side by side with a look into the disordered lives of their murderers. He draws these parallel lives closer and closer together to the vanishing point of the final outcome as if he was writing a novel, gathering the facts, verifying and presenting them with surprising economy in short sharp deliveries of information. Nothing is spelled out; no judgements are made and the pathology of the criminal mind is not examined. The writer’s interpretation is through the presentation of the events and the way in which he presents them, and that triggers the reader’s understanding and interpretation. “Like God in the universe the writer is present everywhere and visible nowhere” said Flaubert, and on every page of In Cold Blood we sense Capote’s presence but nowhere does he mention himself.

Truman Capote had broken new ground. This was him at the top of his art. But in the year of its publication, despite its innovative method, critical acclaim and unprecedented commercial success, In Cold Blood won neither the Pulitzer Prize nor the National Book Award. It was bypassed and the acclaim given to less significant works. On hearsay he learned that the recognition that escaped him was the work of one man on the panel who had decided that the book was merely a commercial success. He had invented a new literary form; but he had been bypassed by the literary establishment whose recognition he craved. He was the outsider.

You could see it coming: that he was bound to see this as a rejection and failure and you secretly hope he would let it pass and do the thing that he did best –write. Instead, he put aside the universal and international acclaim and adulation he was receiving, shoved Unanswered Prayers, the books he intended to write next on the back burner and focused on this failure. It played demon tricks on his mind, continuously demanding that he explain the reasons for his rejection; continuously taunting him as the outsider.

 This and the strain of the years of intense writing and research combined with the madness of fame overwhelmed him. He had become public property: having to cope with public adulation which could turn vicious when fans were unsatisfied. The trauma of having been so close to such terrible events; of having to view graphic and detailed photographs of the deceased, was physically and mentally exhausting. The once beautiful 17 year old Nancy Clutter’s head, he said, was shattered like jagged mountain peaks –something he could not forget.

 To compound matters, it didn’t help when the book started an international debate on the Death Penalty in America. It matched his ambivalence regarding the matter. He had seen the two murderers hanged after befriending them during the years of their incarceration and he was unable to save them. The sighs of relief he breathed when the last stay of execution was denied and sentence was finally passed seemed to him like a betrayal of their trust in order to get his story. The weight of all this played on his mind, making the disappointment of rejection unbearable, and the demons of childhood rejection which still lurked in his soul unexorcised, were unleashed.

 He began slip-sliding on dangerous ground and no amount of alcohol could give him solace.

Blog to come: Truman: Gentleman or artist?

Perceiving Truman

My reading of Truman Capote’s biography continues. I’m a slow reader who has been forced to become a very slow reader. I have to shut the book after 15 minutes and close my eyes to prevent the assault of print and light from causing a burning sensation in my eyes

 Yesterday the ophthalmologist while complimenting me on my excellent health, very discreetly let go of the word ‘Glaucoma’. He then wrote me a prescription for some eye drops. Clutching my prescription as if it was a cheque for a hundred dollars, I hurried out the door no questions asked. Then, in my  semi-blinded state–because of the eye drops they instil into your eyes to dilate the pupils and to confuse you a little so you won’t panic at the diagnosis- I hailed the wrong bus.

 After travelling a considerable distance through unfamiliar urban landscapes like a sightless sightseer, I arrived home and dived into the dictionary to find the definition of the word ‘glaucoma’

Only this morning did its meaning hit home. According to the dictionary: “‘Glaucoma’: (glô kō / mə, glou-) is a disease of the eye characterised by increased pressure within the eyeball and progressive loss of vision.  [<Gk  glaǔkōma, opacity of the eye lens etc.]”  I just cannot believe this ‘progressive loss of vision’. Those Greeks have a lot to answer for. Maybe if they hadn’t invented a word for it, it might not have existed. So I’m typing with my left eye shut the way people save on electricity by switching off the lights, to prevent my vision from petering out too soon.

Truman Capote is now in search of something he can write about that he can get his teeth into; something meaty. He wants the truth to be the truth, of something happening ‘beyond and about’ himself -a truth he cannot change. To be sitting there writing fiction he said was “as though there were a box of chocolates in the next room, and I couldn’t resist them. The chocolates were that I wanted to write fact instead of fiction…Suddenly the newspapers all came alive, and I realised that I was in terrible trouble as a fiction writer.”

It was in this state of tension, almost as if he were led to it, that he opened The New York Times on November 16, 1959 and read about the murder of four innocent people from an exemplary family, the Clutter family of Kansas. And so began his writing of In Cold Blood, a piece of journalism which was not just a report but something about the town in which the murders happened, its inhabitants’ and the impact the event had on them –their reactions to the tragedy. Had he known, he said how difficult and harrowing the entire exercise was to be and how long it would take and how it would haunt him for years, he would have driven past that town of Holcomb, Kansas. “Like a bat out of hell.”

In Cold Blood is a masterpiece of non-fiction writing which everyone should read. He brought all his discipline as a great writer to bear on it and plodded through it despite the difficulties it presented: his ambivalence regarding the Death Sentence and the execution of the two murderers who, through the years had looked to him as their only friend after his visits and his correspondence with them as they waited on Death Row.

Although he did look out for places to rent where the atmosphere was conducive to writing, it appears that he was a man who could write anywhere and under any conditions although in the case of In Cold Blood, there were times when he just couldn’t write, because the horror of the entire episode absorbed him so much -he just wanted to think about it constantly rather than write about it. But every work was done with an enviable intensity of concentration. A bomb could go off beside him says the biographer and he would be unfazed as he wrote a single sentence. Each sentence demanded the time and energy which transformed his entire features until the muscles in his cheeks twitched.

In Cold Blood took six years of work, rising every morning between 3 and 4 to write; travelling back and forth from Europe where he was writing to England to interview psychiatrists and psychologists and returning to New York, then travelling out to Kansas to interview friends and family members of the deceased and further out to interview the family of one of the murderers in order to get an insight into his childhood and adolescent years.

I believe it takes not only concentration and discipline but genius for a writer to write words like these which seem to come from some place distant and unfamiliar to us:

A leaf, a handful of seed –begin with these, learn a little what it is to love…First, a leaf, a fall of rain, then someone to receive what a leaf has taught you, what a fall of rain has ripened. No easy process, understand; it could take a lifetime, it has mine, and still I never mastered it –I only know how true it is; that love is a chain of love, as nature is a chain of life.

These words, said by the Judge in Truman Capote’s semi-autobiographical fiction The Grass Harp could have applied to Truman himself: that as ‘nature is a chain of life’, so is love a chain of love. That was something the murderers missed: the lifetime’s understanding that the single encounters of love need to be recognised and continued in ‘a chain of love’.

Finding Capote

Of the Canterbury Road and below the railway line is Maling Road. Narrow and tree-lined, it runs the length of the shopping centre like an old back road. It is flanked by cafes and shops with generous cast iron verandas which encourage ambience and window shopping. This is not a loud, fast and furious Shopping Town. A friend told me about it. She knew the place. I was new to it. There are Antique Shops on Maling Road where we roamed through a paradise of memorabilia: among umpteen cases of old jewellery and quaint furniture, embroidery and objects alien to my experience.

I was after old books. I was looking out for books that were hand made, cloth or hide bound; battered books which have been held in their lifetime by a hundred hands or several times a day for hundreds of days by a single pair of hands. An old book doesn’t have to be a hundred years old, but it has to create a spark of recognition simply by being what it is. Your heart skips a beat when you find one. Its beauty is in its history.

I don’t find any old books in this Antiques shop, but at the back of the shop I discover a shelf of discarded books, paperbacks and new Penguins read once and sent away for resale at less than half price. I see the name CAPOTE on the spine of one of these and I pay $4 for it: the Biography of the writer Truman Capote which the biographer, Gerald Clarke took 12 years to write. And what a major re-creation of a life he came up with.

Out of the darkness and bewilderment of a sad infancy and childhood -his early days marked by unsettled parental relationships and his constant fear of their separation –every child’s nightmare which in the end became his reality- he was sent to live in a household of bickering old maid aunts and a silent uncle where his mother left him while she found her own way in the world. It was the very house from which she thought she could escape by making a bad marriage that she condemned him when his feckless father failed to provide for them. There, Truman Capote found pleasure in another world, the world of books; and he wanted to write them. Finding himself a quiet space in that lonely household of individuals who each expressed their frustrations in unique ways, the child, Truman, set himself up with pen and paper and a space to write. His father visited from time to time with bright promises about outings which never eventuated or invariably fell through.

 If nothing is more disappointing to a child than broken parental promises, nothing is more utterly devastating than parental abandonment. The disturbance this caused the child was inevitable and showed in his character for many years to come, not to mention in that strange voice of his which locked him forever in childhood.

But out of this muddy pond of instability in which he floundered all through his childhood and for years after that, there bloomed the lotus of his luxuriant prose. It became his self-imposed job from day to day to fill a blank page with words. Nothing else mattered but his determination to become a writer. It wasn’t only about happiness, or in his case, about happiness at all. It was simply about doing something that mattered to himself, something that made him feel good.

More to come.