The Following Story

I cannot help but fully agree with Jennifer’s blog regarding the uncanny similarities between The Following Story and Beckett’s trilogy. Reading the first page, I could’ve sworn I had picked up the wrong book (which is a complete exaggeration, considering what a pamphlet Nooteboom is compared to the weighty, nonsensical abysm of Beckett—but go with me).

Certainly the first thing that struck me was the likeness of the characters tendencies. Both are self-centered, in a way that initially seems like some form of weird humility, but that you quickly realize is truly narcissistic in a deep-seeded, lonely, disturbed, emotionally underdeveloped sort of way. And it makes you sad. Then it makes you angry. And then it makes you confused, because you see this character who is struggling so deeply within themselves, that the outer world becomes nothing but a dream at best, and the inner world is a stagnant and troubled reality, which we find ourselves understanding all to well by the end of the story. Shall I go on? Surely I have no choice.

I’ve already mentioned the lack of emotional normalcy that both Herman Mussert and the trilogy of characters display. Whether it’s all those highbrow academic books Mussert is reading or the intrinsic impotence that plagues the characters, there are undeniably some developmental issues. That being said, where would we be if these characters were standard, functioning members of society? We wouldn’t be reading highbrow lit, that is certain. They guide us to another plane of thinking.

Their time is no time at all, “Days! Now that I say the word out loud I can hear how insubstantial it sounds. If you were to ask me what is the worst predicament of all, I would say the dearth of measure” (Nooteboom 66) and “That passed the time, I was time, I devoured the world. Not now, any more. A man changes. As he gets on.” (Beckett 202). Our sense of time dictates the reality into which we wade. Lying unmovable in a bed for inordinate amounts of time would undoubtedly alter the pace of the day, as would something more common like daydreaming or traveling. Removing oneself from the pattern of the day, or becoming lost in a maze of self-centeredness as it may be, opens up a whole other world in which day and night are simple observances and the present is synonymous with the past and future.

Along with the pervading sense of timelessness is that also of darkness. It is spoken of much as time is—erratic, unending, all encompassing. “Sometimes there was just the unending night, and then the days would flit by like nervous moments across the horizon, pausing long enough only to paint the ocean twice over in all shades of red and then to restore it to darkness.” (Nooteboom 67). As I mentioned, time, light and dark, conscious and dream, all revolve around each other, and are rather inseparable. This obviously follows along the lines of the eternal return and the world as myth and dream, not to mention kenosis and plurosis…and honestly by now I feel a little silly even pointing these themes out, they pervade every book we’ve read, and of course Beckett and Nooteboom are no exception. But I think it is interesting to look at these themes in light of their similarities throughout two different texts. After all, we struggle with them ourselves, so any basis for comparison and absorption is not to be overlooked. And with two initially insane characters acting so much alike, all the better to make us second guess (or to continue guessing) what we perceive as real and timely.

There is so much more to unpack with these texts, both together and apart, and more will surely follow on the subject. But I must end this particular blog now, for fear that I ceased making sense around paragraph two.