Readings

by Rick Dietrich

The Hours, Revisited

Ihear from many of you about the columns that I write for Presbyterian VOICE. Most often, it is when I run into one or another of you. “Oh,” you say, “I know you. I read you in the VOICE.” And you mutter something that I take to be a word of appreciation. Often, I think, it is. In my experience, people like to be kind to one another.

Book reviewers are creatures of a different sort. They, too, like to be kind to people, but they don’t like to be too kind. Too much kindness interferes with their natural, and their cultivated, cynicism. Last issue I wrote a cynical and not-particularly-kind review of Michael Cunningham’s much praised The Hours. I didn’t agree with the praise. I didn’t like the book, though, I acknowledged, many of my friends did.

One of you wrote me about that review — a long and thoughtful letter. I want to thank the letter writer and take this opportunity to respond. That will require, I’m afraid, putting cynicism aside. (“Fortunately,” I’m thinking, “just for a moment.”)

The letter-writer began by thinking about the courage of his wife, who had recently died after a long battle with cancer. He was wondering, as I read his letter — he was in wonder — not only at her courage in that last illness but at all she was able to accomplish in her life despite ongoing difficulties with depression. That, too, took great courage.

“The courage of others,” I wrote back to him, “both consoles us and saddens us, doesn’t it? We admire the courage; and we ache because we can imagine — and we cannot quite imagine — the strength behind it. ‘How did she manage?’ we wonder. ‘How did she manage?’ And, we think, too, inevitably, “Did I do enough to help?”

I was thinking, when I wrote that, not only of his situation, but my own. Book reviewers are not only cynical; they are selfish. But I admitted that last time, when I turned from writing about Cunningham’s book to writing a “provocation” about suicide. I had written about what I took to be the selfishness of the characters in The Hours — all the characters, in my view. Then, I wrote, “Perhaps I am being selfish. This has turned out to be less a review than a provocation. And that may be because I am so provoked by suicide, about which, it seems to me, the Church has been right: it is the unforgivable sin. It is unforgivable, however, in my view, not because we cannot repent of it before God who is ever with us, but because we can’t repent of it with those we leave, repenting not only of our desertion but also of all that it poisons, an entire shared past.”

I was thinking, when I wrote that paragraph, (selfishly) of a close, friend of mine from childhood, also a woman who suffered from long-term, what my correspondent called “involutional,” depression. For, at the end of the day — at least, at the end of her day — my friend took her own life. Does that mean she lacked the courage to go on living? That seems to be true. It seems to me to be true — on the face of things. But, it is not the whole truth. It doesn’t take into account how chemistry and environment can overcome courage, even great courage. So, I am left wondering always, too: “How did she manage for as long as she did?” And: “Did I do enough to help?”

My correspondent went on to point out how aware he was, especially as he watched the movie, of the roles the men played in all three stories that make up The Hours. There is Leonard Woolf, who tries to understand Virginia and to do what is best for her; but, finally, because he does not, he cannot. There is Laura Brown’s “perfect” husband, who overlooks his wife’s desperation, in part because she hides it so well, but in part because he isn’t looking. And there is the great poet, Laura Brown’s son, Richard, who, for all his gifts, takes Clarissa’s love and care completely for granted, finally rejecting it.

My correspondent is right, in short: the male characters all suffer from a certain self-centered blindness, especially with regard to the women closest to them. This male reader may have been blind to them as well. My friends who liked the book most likely think so.

Mea culpa. One of the reasons we read, I believe, is because reading offers us insights into the insides of others, which insides we too often ignore in our day-to-day and hour-to-hour lives. We become so caught up in our own stories, that we forget sometimes — even for long periods of time — that others have stories, too. This is a thank-you note to my correspondent for seeing a part of The Hours that I ignored, perhaps even willfully.

It’s a thank-you note, as well, to all of you for continuing to read “Readings.” I look forward to hearing from you, too.

2003 PEACEMAKING OFFERING
Sunday, October 5
“May righteousness flourish and peace abound.” Psalm 72:7