The thing that stood out as the biggest departure from the play in Jeanette Winterson's The Gap of Time was her concentration on the relationship between Leontes and Polixenes (Leo and Xeno). At first, I really appreciated this. Their boarding school relationship was more interesting than the whole baby drop episode. And over time, I thought Winterson did a great job fleshing out Leo's character into something recognizable and believable. He's a narcissist and materialist (very Trumpian) who only grudgingly and almost imperceptibly gains some small wisdom through the extraordinary and implausible action of the play. But it seemed to me that Winterson set up Xeno as something more; more self-aware, more depth, more understanding. But for me, the follow through on his character just wasn't there. After the action shifts to the younger generation, which wasn't all that compelling, I kept waiting for Xeno's return, but it came with a whimper, rather than a bang. It just never seemed resolved. I found the denouement "Xeno came and stood beside him. He put his arm around Leo. Leo was crying now, long tears of rain. That which is lost is found." a trite and insufficient resolution.
Winterson writes (pg. 270) "Polixenes, who has our sympathy in Act One, proves himself as conventional and irrational as Leontes, when in Part Two he tries to wreck the love between his son, Florizel, and Perdita with death threats as sexually sadistic as anything dreamed up by Leontes". In the play perhaps, but this is largely missing from the cover version! I liked her general point that the Romances are about forgiveness, and overall I enjoyed the book. But I've never seen The Winter's Tale as she does - "a private text for me for more than thirty years". I'd put it way down the list of plays that remain in my consciousness and occasionally surface. Perhaps that's why I didn't appreciate this more.
But I remain engaged and enthusiastic about the Hogarth series; and to this blog, dedicated to its exploration and discussion. I put aside Shylock Is My Name, but will gladly pick it up once everyone has weighed in on The Gap Of Time.
Here's my story so far:
ReplyDelete1) I read the first 100 pages sitting in a B&N waiting for one of Imogen's performances to begin.
2) A week later, I got the book from the Appleton Public Library.
3) I read some more, and then, once the younger generation took over the story, other stuff started to become more interesting to me.
4) I have a weekend in Hamilton, ON, for a hockey tourney, and so I will reread it in its entirety and comment, probably on Saturday.
I'll be ready then for Shylock!
Bill
(I don't seem to be able to start my own post for some reason. Perhaps I'm just missing the right button to hit. Any thoughts or advice from anyone would be appreciated.)
ReplyDeleteMike, The Winter's Tale has become one of my favorite Shakespeare plays, mainly because it offers so much -- tragedy, comedy, a bear, a statue that comes to life, and so on. I recognize that it's one of the tougher plays to make work because of it's generally performed as two plays: the one about a husband's insane jealousy that brings down a kingdom and a romantic pastorale about love that transcends class. But the thing I really liked about Winterson's reading is that it really is about two friends and that it's really only one play with many incidental characters (and a bear).
At first I was a little annoyed about the homosexual affair between Xeno and Leo, not because I thought it was inappropriate, but because I thought it was too easy. I had been explaining to my students about homosociality and the space that men share and how Leontes's jealousy might be explained in the play not from a jealousy that his wife would be interested in Polixines, but rather that Polixines would do her bidding when his had failed. He was jealous that his lifelong friend would rather bend to his wife than to him (sort of like how I got accepted in the Zipay Inner Circle only after I married Becky -- maybe that's why I related so well to this reading). But as Winterson's story plays out, she really does manage to describe that complicated relationship. There is a jealousy when friends from one circle meet friends from another and have a better relationship than the guy in the middle has with either. I do think Winterson saw that and captured it well. The real reconciliation was not between Leontes and his child and wife, but rather with his old friend. Without their friendship, neither kingdom would ever be well-ruled.
It's been a few months since I read the book and perhaps I need to review the book. I had forgotten about the weird video game with the angels and collecting feathers and all that. It seems like they shared a distant presence with each other even after the banishment -- a little fragment they had of each other that they could see, but never really touch. As usual I associated it with the friendships we've all shared these last 30+ years -- not always together, but with a little distant piece of each other to sustain the friendships. I was struck at JUG night, when running into a bunch of our old classmates, how they seemed surprised that we were all still in touch one way or another. Gene Parr mentioned how he wasn't in touch at all with one of his closest friends from high school. It was an odd moment when he asked when the last time I'd seen several people in our gang. That is what Leontes throws away in his fury -- not the love of his life or his children, but the man he called a friend. I do think Winterson catches that a bit better than most of the productions I've seen of the play.
Friendships are weird, and they take on many forms, maybe even more now that we can communicate and yet not be in each other's company for a few years. I always remark how weird it is to follow someone on Facebook because you feel like you talk to them every day. You know what's going on, even when you haven't seen them in a long time, but it's not the same.
Okay -- so let me write a full essay for the blog, or tell me how to do it, or whatever, and I'll post something better thought through. I hope all is well with you all and that we can get together soon.
Rob
I think it's just the "New Post" link that appears in the top banner on the right. Do you see that?
ReplyDeleteNo, mine has something else there. Weird.
ReplyDelete