A C T A U N I V E R S I T A T I S L O D Z I E N S I S FO LIA L IT TE R A R IA A N G LIC A 6, 2003
Tom asz D obrogoszcz
O U T D E C O N STR U C T IN G D E C O N ST R U C T IO N IN JO H N FO W LES’S M A N T I S S A
A lthou gh Jo h n Fow les has asserted th a t M antissa was n o t m e a n t as a serious novel b u t as a kind o f literary je u d'esprit,' this disclaim er does n o t seem to sound absolutely convincing. T h e critics agree to a p o in t th a t th is w o rk is n o t “ typical F o w les,” m ainly in th e sense o f n a rra tiv e structure; nevertheless, m ost o f them a tta c h far-reaching significance to it. D avid L odge called the novel “ an intriguing m etafic tio n ,” an d for M artin Am is it “ seeks to explore the natu re o f reality and creativ ity .” Indeed, the reader will find M antissa h ardly as engrossing as The M agus o r The Collector; still, the novel em ploys literary m otifs (th o u g h at som e points utterly reversed) already present in French L ie u ten a n t’s W oman, for instance.
T h e hero o f the book, the novelist M iles G reen, is first in tro d u ced in a hospital, as he is recovering from am nesia under the care o f an au to cratic neuropsychologist D r Delfie. In spite o f G reen ’s protests, she im poses on him a kind o f sex-therapy - which soon tu rn s into a rap e on the p atien t. In the following chapters, as a result o f num erous m etam orphoses, D r Delfie takes on miscellaneous guises: from a doctor, through a nurse, a punk girl, a geisha, she develops into E rato, the m use. Concurrently, the abusive treatm en t ripens into an anim ating d ebate on literary theory. In the dispute, E ra to speaks fo r “ old style” traditional literary approaches, while G reen is show n as an advocate of self-conscious w riting from the era o f deconstruction.
F ro m the very beginning the reader is notified th a t the usual p re su p p o sitio n s fo r “ a novel by Jo h n F o w les” sho u ld , in th e case o f this n arrativ e, be p u t aside. T he setting o f the text - a sm all grey hospital room w ith quilted walls and padded dom ed ceiling - is overtly m etaphorical:
' Cf: M ichiko K akutani, “ Where John Fowles Ends and Characters o f His Novels Begin” . New York Times, O ctober 5, 1982. All quotations from Mantissa are from: John Fowles, Mantissa (London: Triad, 1982).
the reader is to deduce th a t the n arrativ e takes place in the novelist’s m ind. If we, like E ra to , fail to draw this conclusion, the in fo rm atio n is disclosed straig htforw ardly, in a slightly reproachful m anner:
‘I bet you haven’t even cottoned on to what these grey quilted walls really stand fo r— Grey walls, grey cells. G rey matter?’
’I t’s a ll ... talcing place inside your brain?’ ’Brilliant.’ (114)
In this way, am ong others, G reen places him self on an ontological level su perio r to the one o f E ra to and the events n arrated . T h u s, he seems to em ploy a ra th e r com m on postm odernist technique in which, using Brian M cH ale’s w ords, “ by breaking the fram e arou nd his w orld, th e a u th o r foregrounds his ow n superior reality.” 2 T h u s the te x t’s artificiality is laid b are in this way and there rem ains no sense o f any illusory reality o f the events recounted.
A fu rther way o f accentuating the ontological statu s o f M antissa as a book is the foregrounding o f its physicality by m eans o f sp atio tem p o ral references. A t the beginning o f the tre a tm e n t, D r D elfie explains to disoriented G reen th a t he has been in hospital for “ju s t a few pages” (19). E ven though this statem ent is later disguised as checking his “ basic sense o f reality” after the am nesia, the reader is acutely stirred w ith its frank genuineness - indeed, as a ch a rac te r in the bo o k th a t we are reading, M iles G reen has been w ith us for a few pages (nineteen in m y edition). L ater on, even D r Delfie - E ra to succum bs to the system o f m easu rin g passing tim e in pages, using phrases such as “ from the very first page o f m y existence” (97), o r “ I feel so terribly conscious I ’m only a few pages o ld ” (104). G reen shares her aw areness ab o u t the physicality o f th e book, as he rem ark s th a t the text which is being created is “ one hu nd red and eighty pages at least” (178) at the m om en t o f this declaration . Such allusions no t only set the axis o f tim e-flow against an opposing dim ension o f spatial units, they also indicate the fact th a t M antissa is a physical object, which, again typically o f postm odernism , “ has the effect o f foreg ro u n d in g the presence and m ateriality o f the b o o k .” 3
T h e “ o bject” th a t the reader is presented w ith consists o f fo u r p arts- chapters. T h e first o f them m arkedly stands o u t, being recounted in the past tense in opposition to the rem aining three present-tense p o rtio n s of the narrative. It is a t the end o f this ch ap ter th a t th e identity o f Miles G reen as the a u th o r becom es established. T h e n u rse assisting in th e controversial th erapy shows a bundle o f p apers to G reen, an d tells him
2 Brian M cHale, Postmodernist Fiction (London: Routlege, 1989), p. 197. 3 Ibid., p. 181.
“ I t’s a lovely little story. A nd you m ad e it all by yourself” (47); then she reads aloud a few sentences which ap p ear to be identical with the sentences th a t open the novel itself. In a m etafictional p arad o x the fictionality o f the text is foregrounded and the ch aracter o f G reen acquires auth o rial powers. O r, which m ay sound m ore convincing, he becom es a self-conscious a u th o r in the eyes o f the reader.
H aving validated this position, G reen can enjoy the freedom s which n atu rally spring from it. H e recognises him self no t only as a novelist, but as a p ostm odernist novelist, with all due rights. A ccording to M cH a le’s ob servation, postm o d ern ist writers are obsessed w ith the analogy between the au th o r and G o d , and G reen seems to exemplify the already quoted statem ent: “T he po stm odernist au th o r arrogates him self to the pow ers th a t gods have always claim ed.”4 P rovoked by E rato , he self-assuredly announces: “ I could always d rag in a deus e x m achina" (97), and ventures to practice the art o f a conjurer, creating an ashtray, a lighter and a box o f cigarettes with “ three quick snaps o f th u m b and forefinger” (98). In the course o f the narrative, G reen is able to bring various objects in and o u t o f existence, proving his divine, o r perhaps ju st au th o ria l, om nipotence.
G re en ’s asserted control over the w orld o f the text m anifests itself n o t only in his ability to create inanimate objects, bu t also in bringing to life characters appearing in the narrative. H e consistently claim s to have created his fem ale interlocutor in all her guises, from a n europsychologist to the m use. H e invokes the process o f creating a character labelling her im age an “ id ea” and a “ sketch” (53). M oreover, G reen flaunts the d em o n stratio n o f his creative abilities to the object o f his divine fertility: he inform s E rato th a t she is a “fictional re p resen ta tio n ” (63), referring to her and him self respectively as to “ the w ritten and the w riter” (64). Such an overt m anifes ta tio n o f godlike powers focuses the re a d e r’s atten tio n on E r a to ’s status as a ch aracter in a text produced by an o m nipo tent, and boastful, au th o r.
As for the m use, she frequently seems to reconcile herself to this p o sitio n in the n arrativ e, even if it requires ack no w led ging a hard ly reconcilable fact th a t “ the real ‘real m e’ is im ag in ary ” (159). Speaking from her neuropsy chologist’s knowledge, D r Delfie - E rato conceives th a t her physical presence results m erely from electro-chem ical reactions taking place in G re e n ’s right cerebral lobe (137). T his declaratio n, how ever, seems to c o n tain an internal co n trad ictio n , since in the light o f the fact th a t the whole story takes place in a m etaphorical, not literal, setting, the “ physicality” o f her presence appears ra th e r dubious. N evertheless, w hen G reen rath er provokingly rem arks: “ Y o u ’ve ju st shown y o u ’ve a will o f your o w n ," she subm issively sighs: “ H ardly a will, I ’m afraid. Ju st a w hisper o f an in stin ct”
(102). T h u s she attests to G re en ’s om nipotence and his ability to m an ip u late her, as a character from his text, in the m an n er o f a p up pet-m aster.
H ow ever, at som e points, E ra to ’s attitu d e is n o t at all th a t o f hum ble resignation. She can be bold enough as to rep ro ach her a u th o r th a t having been created by him is a “m isfo rtu n e” (89); fu rth er, her firm ness leads her to a darin g declaration: “ I ’m ju st one m ore m iserable fan tasy figure your diseased m ind is trying to conjure u p ” (85). T h e reader can clearly detect E ra to ’s dissatisfaction with G re en ’s m an n er o f stru ctu rin g the plot, as she expresses disapproving com m ents on his m eth od s (” I ’m sick to d ea th o f . .. having to pretend I exist in a way I never w ould, if I d id .” [88]), stressing, a t the sam e tim e, his superiority. W hen she com pares their pow ers and poten tials she turns ra th e r fem inist, declaring “ 1 have absolutely no rights. T he sexual ex p lo itatio n ’s nothing beside the ontological o n e ” (93). H . W. F aw kner notes th a t “E ra to is totally dissatisfied w ith her a u th o r-p a re n t Miles G reen, accusing him first o f m o d ern au th o rial indifference in allowing the text to w rite its im m oral self, and then . . . o f the old-fashioned m ale novelist’s M achiavellian to talita rian ism .” 5 In the op in io n o f th e critic, the m use blam es the w riter n o t only for the actions th a t he m ade her perform , b u t also for those th a t he let her perform according to her, o r the te x t’s itself, ow n whims. Finally, E rato even wishes G reen were a ch a racter in a story as well, so th a t she could take revenge on him for all her calam ities (55). In this explicit way she expresses her envy concerning his auth o rial pow ers and her vexation caused by the lack o f them ; h er asp ira tio n is to achieve a higher status, so th a t she could equal G reen o n the ontological level. W hen unable to fulfil her wishes, she directs her anger a t the whole genre, p o in tin g o u t its d iso rd erly state an d expressing h er p ity th a t, co n tra ry to the opinion o f m any, the novel is n o t dead (67). T his n o tio n , led to the extrem e, develops into a universal statem en t th a t literatu re is m en tal illness (140), which is supplem ented by the m u se’s m o d est longing for the m arvellous time in the p ast before the alp hab et and w riting were invented (75).
Surprisingly for the reader, at som e points o f th e text, Fow les provides the relation betw een G reen and E ra to with yet an o th er twist: the m use becom es herself equipped w ith au th o rial powers. Given the m etap h o rical setting o f the narrative, she is able to self-consciously disregard the laws o f n atu re (123), and at some points she approaches the issue o f om nipotence in a playful way: she can disap p ear physically from the surface-story, while controlling M iles at the sam e tim e (138), she can m ak e various elem ents o f the textual world em erge or vanish (52, 150), or, finally, she even
5 H. W. Fawkner, The Timescapes o f John Fowles (London: Associated University Presses, 1984), p. 136.
possesses the ability to change the w riter into a satyr (184-186). She tries to im pose her au th o rity on G reen, either by the aggressive, self-assured enforcem ent o f her role as a m aster o f cerem onies (56), o r by threaten in g to dem aterialise him (66). A ccording to F aw k n er, M iles G reen is being m anip u lated , hence the critic considers him “ a victim o f the conspiracy of the text led by the m use.” 6 C orrespondingly, the read er also feels som ew hat deceived when E ra to , recounting the story o f her sexual initiation vacillates in giving her age: she starts from fifteen (73), th ro u g h fou rteen (repeated twice 74-75), thirteen (78), twelve (79), to finally reach the figure o f eleven (80). H ow ever, som e o f E ra to ’s auth o rial powers are used to a different end th an m anipulation: prom pted by the w riter, she invents an altern ativ e story o f her life and narrates p a rt o f it in detail (101-105). T his dem onstrates her ability as a tale-spinner, which is adm ired even by G reen: “ I t ’s am azing how you open up a whole new world in a few b ro ad b ru sh stro k e s” (111).
In spite o f this, G reen ’s appreciation for E ra to ’s talen t at som e points develops into an aversion. A w are o f the fact th a t he is being m an ip u lated , the novelist discerns the deficiencies in his own alleged om nipotence. W hen he tries to bring back to existence the d o o r evaporated by the m use, he finds to his surprise th a t flicking his finger and thu m b does n o t w ork. T he textual reality of the narrative, which is supposed to be his own, will not yield to his wishes. F aw k n er asserts th a t “ the novelist unw rites him self,” 7 and th at, co n tra ry to French L ieutenant’s W oman, “ it is n o t a q uestion of a u th o r intruding into text, b u t o f text intru ding upo n a u th o r.” “ A sim ilar case is put forw ard by B urke, when the critic discusses th e inadequacy o f the a u th o r-G o d analogy. P o in tin g o u t th a t th e all-em b racin g infinite attrib u tes o f G od (such as om nipotence o r om nipresence) are n o t always valid for auth o rs, B urke declares th a t “ we can, w itho ut co n trad ictio n , conceive o f a u th o r s ... who d o n o t hold a univocal m astery over their tex t.” 9 M iles G reen seems to utterly exemplify such sort o f an au th o r.
F u rth erm o re, the conspicuous lack o f G reen ’s co n tro l over the world o f his text suggests an analogy which could vividly delineate the in terd ep en dence between tw o elements o f the narrative process: the a u th o r is given the characteristics o f a p reg n an t w om an, the text - th a t o f an u n b o rn child in h er w om b. F ow les evokes this icon to th e re a d e r in the passage preceding the already quoted m om en t w hen M iles G reen is presented with the papers contain ing the text and inform ed ab o u t his au th o rsh ip . P rio r to th a t, he is un dergoing a “ th e ra p y ” for his am nesia which takes form o f
6 Ibid., p. 154. 7 Ibid., p. 143. * Ibid., p. 116.
’ R. Burke, The Death o f the Author. Criticism and Subiectivity in Barthes, Foucault and Derrida (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 1998), p. 25.
a sexual intercourse with D r Delfie. T o his u tm ost aston ishm en t, he is told to keep “ a good steady rh y th m ” (44) o f m ovem ents, th o u g h n o t for m ere carn al pleasure, bu t for the sake o f his baby. F ro m this p o in t on, the scene o f a sexual act becom es am biguous: it can be alternatively read as th a t of lab our, d uring which D r D elfie acquires the statu s o f a m idw ife. T h e nurse assisting her shows the text to G reen in a m an n er th a t she w ould show an infant to the m other, “ using the finger to trace the w ords, as she m ight have touched a new -born nose or tiny wrinkled lips” (48). T h u s the w riter becom es acquainted with his w ork, and the read er is given to u n d erstan d th a t his responsibility for it is, after all, limited. As F aw k n e r has observed, “M iles G reen has no m ore conscious influence over the shap ing o f the text th an a p reg n an t w om an has over the form atio n o f features in the grow ing fo etu s.” 10 H e has even less influence since the text has already been born.
A t this p oint there is to be noticed a striking analogy w ith B arth es’s conception divulged in his “T h e D e ath o f the A u th o r.” A fter the a u th o r (m other) has w ritten (given b irth to ) the text (baby), he or she loses co ntro l over it. C u ttin g the tie with the au th o r is equivalent to cu ttin g the um bilical cord, from this p o in t on the text becomes free and self-responsible. In B arth es’s w ords “ A s soon as a fact is n arrated . . . this disconnection occurs, the voice loses its origin, the a u th o r enters in to his ow n d eath , w riting begins.” 11
H ow ever, to be m o re precise, in M antissa it is n o t the text itself th a t evades G re en ’s control, bu t ra th e r the ch aracter o f E ra to , incited by her au th o ria l inclinations. T h e dialogue betw een them , con stitu tin g the bulk of the novel, am o u n ts to an extended argum en t over the creative pow er, in which, as M cH ale puts it, “ b o th parties . . . claim to be the a u th o r o f the o th er p arty , G reen insisting th a t E ra to is a character in his w ritings, E ra to countering th a t all his inventions com e ultim ately from h e r.” 12 T h e critic then tries to speculate w hich o f them is ontologically superior, w hose fictional w orld is on a higher level; he postulates th a t the last ch ap ter reveals b o th o f them to be co-authors, w ho po ol th eir resources in an effort to produce the script. In p o in t o f fact, the read er can co n stru c t the im age o f co llaboration, given substan tial textual evidence to this hypothesis. T hey are b o th definitely seeking com prom ise when they uniform ly declare: “ I f we could only find som e absolutely im possible . . . text . . . we could b o th be o u r real selves at la st” (156-157). N onetheless, a detailed analysis o f the discourse m ay lead to the o bserv atio n th a t the balan ce between b o th p a rtie s is n o t p erfect - the scales are tip p ed in fa v o u r of
10 H. W. Faw kner, op. cit., p. 138.
11 Roland Barthes, “The D eath of the A uthor,” in: Image Music Text, trans. Stephen H eath (New York: Hill and Wang, 1977), p. 142.
G reen. It ap pears th a t he sets m ain routes for the story to follow, E ra to is only responsible for technical details. Alternatively, she m ay be perceived as an actor perform ing in G reen’s scenario. This hypothesis is feasibly co rro b o rated w ith the fact th a t a single female personality in the novel co rresp o n d s with several, utterly distinctive, characters. T h e w riter frequ ently com m ents on fluctuations o f her identity depending on which ego she is currently occupying - which m ay as well be read: which role she is playing. She herself confesses: “ I ’ve done m y best . . . to adapt myself to your ploddingly literal im agination” (142), in a m an n er o f a star unhappy with the p a rt she has had to play.
In the view o f the foregoing judgem ents, M antissa can be inferred to d em o n strate th at, depending on the discourse structure, the a u th o r figure - M iles G reen - need not necessarily co nstru ct the ch a rac te r - E ra to - but m ay as well be th e p ro d u ct o f her creative powers. O bviously, the tw o personalities m ay be created by yet an o th er party, external to the discourse. M cH ale suggests th a t the third p arty is Jo h n Fow les, “ ultim ately responsible for both o f them and everything they do, say, write.” 13 F o r Faw kner, “ Fowles conceives G reen and E ra to as a series o f m asks o r p ostures related to a conglom eration o f selves.” 14 T he m use seems to possess som e aw areness of this, which she even discloses to the w riter, hinting to him th a t he is also a ch a racter and som ebody is pulling his strings (87). T h u s, the con sid eratio n over the question whose ontological status is superior m ay as well be pointless, if we take into accou nt the observation o f E ra to “ W e’re tw o people w ho h appen to be locked in the sam e prison cell” (127), which sets b oth on a par with each other. Still, the third party, imagined to have created the w riter and the m use, rem ains concealed in the discourse; M antissa is n arrated covertly in the third person, w ith no outw ard signs o f the n a r ra to r’s identity.
In fact, E ra to ’s supposition that both o f them are characters in som ebody’s story app ears to be directly noticeable from the sim plest possible perspective o f reading: if we open the book by Jo h n Fow les, we find b o th nam es in the text, and the spontaneous n atu ra l reaction is to treat M iles G reen and D r Delfie - E ra to as characters. T h u s G reen has to suffer from the com m on p ostm odernist affliction experienced by all a u th o rs w ho resolve to short-circuit the ontological levels and app ear in their text. In her study on m etafictional w riting, P atricia W augh observes:
W hat happens . . . when [the writer] enters [the world o f the narrative] is th at his or her own reality is also called into question. T he ‘au th o r’ discovers th a t the language o f the text produces him or her as much as he or she produces the language o f the tex t.'s
13 Ibid., p. 215.
14 H. W. Faw kner, op. cit., p. 32.
15 Patricia W augh, Metafiction. The Theory and Practice o f Self-Conscious Fiction (London: Routledge, 1984), p. 133.
M cH ale considers this one o f the crucial aspects o f Jo h n F ow lcs’s novel: Mantissa . . . foregrounds a fact [that] the inscribed author is always a fiction, a “ paper- a u th o r” as Barthes says. . . . As soon as the author writes himself into the text, he fictionalises himself, creating a fictional character bearing [his] nam e . . . who is formally transw orld-identical with himself, while the author himself withdraws to a further remove from the world o f the text. . . . The ontological barrier between an author and the interior o f his fictional world is absolute, im penetrable.16
W augh has even tried to evaluate the extent o f au th o ria l presence in m etafictional texts, and her conclusion th a t “ [t]he m o re a u th o r app ears, the less he or she exists” 17 shows M iles G reen in a quite u n ch a ritab le light.
Indeed, since the m o m en t w hen the position o f G reen as the au th o r is established tow ards the end o f the first section o f the novel, his presence o n the ontological level o f the text becom es p erp etual, even despite the fact th a t this level is app aren tly alien to him. F aw k n e r notices th a t in M antissa the p ro p o rtio n s betw een narrativ e and in tru sio n are reversed, accen tu atin g the unconventionality o f the situation in w hich “ it is the polym orphic character w ho in terru p ts the novelist.” 18 In p o in t o f fact, only the first ch ap ter is organised according to a linear plot, the rest o f the novel consists o f a prolonged d ebate on w riting an d verbal struggle for au th o ria l pow ers betw een the two individuals. Fow les pushes to extrem es the stan d ard th a t “ [m ]etafictional novels which h and on to th e concept of a u th o r as inven tor o f the text . . . exaggerate au th o rial presence in relation to story o r in fo rm atio n ” 19: in M antissa there is hardly any story, and there are hardly any passages free from auth o rial presence. In this way, the stru ctu re o f the novel com es fo rth as an ad dition al facto r testifying to the ab su rd ity o f G re e n ’s, or E r a to ’s, p o sitio n as the a u th o r. S urprisingly enough, b o th the w riter an d the m use are also inclined to perceive th e lack o f balance o f p ro p o rtio n s w ithin the text. In their case, how ever, the em phasis is laid on a different aspect: their im pression is th a t the literary d eb a te is an intrusion, and core o f the narrativ e lies in experiencing various alternatives o f a sexual act: “T h ere were whole stretches to d ay w ith hardly a w hisper o f sex. I som etim es feel we’re losing all sense o f p rio rities” (162).
Likewise, for F aw kner “the infinite n um b er o f possible erotic positions com es to m irro r the infinite nu m b er o f n arrativ e alternatives, the terrifying freedom o f an endless am o u n t o f auth o rial postures. . . . F ow les focuses on the difficulty o f choosing a single p a th .”20 In tru th , M antissa does concentrate
16 B. McHale, op. cit., p. 215. 17 P. W augh, op. cit., p. 134. '* H. W. Faw kner, op. cit., p. 137. 19 P. W augh, op. cit., p. 131. 20 H. W. Faw kner, op. cit., p. 135.
on having various potentialities o f leading the story. T h e text ab o u n d s in references to the variations o f the plot which the read er is not given in the novel, but which are well rem em bered and discussed by G reen and E ra to (160, 182), and som e o f them are even given reference num bers. H ow ever, none o f the num erous op tions present in the surface story is fully accom plished, and the story rem ains recursive. 1 his qu ality o f M a n tissa brings to m ind the branching o f n arrativ e in B orges’s “ 1 he G ard en o f F o rk in g P a th s,” though in F ow les’s novel n one o f the p ath s is really taken.
As we can see, Fow les system atically deconstructs his n arrativ e, depriving the read er o f all cu stom ary footh olds expected in the w orld o f fiction. Unsafe and unsound, we are left to the whims o f tw o capricious su rrog ate au th o rs, whose aim is also to produce an “ unw ritable . . . unfinishable . . . unim aginable . . . endlessly revisable . . . text w itho ut w o rd s” (157). 1 he result o f th eir concerted efforts is “ an unw ritable n o n -tex t” (178), a hopeless precipice for the reader w ho tries to ap p ro ach the novel in a no n-ab su rd way. D eciding to reverse sta n d a rd m etafic tio n a l schem es, F o w les has m anaged to achieve a substantial result. As F aw k ner observes,
If the trend in the genre has been to write fiction about writing fiction and to write ^fiction about the difficulty of writing fiction, Mantissa would seem to carry this movem ent ; to its utterm ost extreme in being fiction about the impossibility o f writing fiction. Certainly failure is an im portant motif, for the narrative structure is th at o f an endlessly I. interrupted nontext.21
Fow les shapes the character o f M iles G reen as th a t o f an ti-a u th o r, exag g eratin g in his perso n ality the tra its o f a u th o rs , o r n o n -a u th o rs , im posed on them by the tenets of deconstruction. G reen p ro nou nces him self an advocate o f this theory, and tries to persuade E ra to o f its relevance; he m akes him self very explicit, instructing her alm ost in the form o f a quasi-lecture:
Serious m odern fiction has only one subject: the difficulty of writing serious m odern fiction. First, it has fully accepted th at it is only fiction, can only be fiction, will never be anything but fiction, and therefore has no business a t all tampering with real life or reality. . . . Second. The natural consequences o f this is th at writing about fiction has become a far more im portant m atter than writing fiction itself. I t ’s one of the best ways you can tell the true novelist nowadays. . . . Third, and m ost im portant. A t the creative level there is in any case no connection whatever between author and text. They are two entirely separate things. N othing, but nothing, is to be inferred or deduced from one to the other, and in either direction. The deconstructivists have proved th a t beyond the shadow of doubt. The author’s role is purely fortuitous and agential. (117)
H ow ever, follow ing the guidelines laid d ow n by decon stru ctio n ists does no t seem a very prom ising path for G reen. T rying to pursue these principles, he p ro duces an ab su rd and in co h eren t n o n -n a rra tiv e w hich d oes no t necessarily reflect the absurdity and incoherence o f h u m an existence, but merely its own infertility. F aw k n er in terp rets G re e n ’s efforts to overcom e his am nesia and recollect his identity as a m e ta p h o r for “ th e co n tem p o rary novelist’s attem p t to define and recover th a t creative au to n o m y which the d ec o n stru ctio n ists w ould seem to deny h im .” 22 N o neth eless, it can be postulated th a t, even w hen the w riter regains his original self, n o t quite th ro u g h his conscious exertion, he applies its creative pow ers to p roducing an unsubstantial non-text.
C onsequently, it becomes perceptible th a t Fow les is using a considerable supply o f irony against M iles G reen. H e takes up G re e n ’s line o f arg um en t and lets it develop freely, but only w ithin strictly set b ou n d aries o f logical reasoning. T he inevitable result is absurd: G reen is proved to be a barren a u th o r, the text com posed by him - an exam ple o f unproductiveness. C o n trary to the m odel “ serious m o d ern fiction” prescribed in G re e n ’s post-stru ctu ralist opinion, M antissa is a text ab o u t the absurdity o f writing about the impossibility o f writing fiction.
A ctually, F ow les’s literary oeuvre proves to his readers th a t creating fiction is a conceivable task. In his previous novels (as well as in The M aggot which follows M antissa), the w riter d em o n strates th a t the well- stru ctu red “ sto ry ” is a crucial aspect o f his writing. All his book s have rem ark ably elab o rate plots, ab oun d in g in unpredictab le turns; his characters are well-developed and convincing; the world o f the n arrativ e is always pleasingly m eticulous, overflow ing w ith richness o f detail. T he reviewers praise Fow les for being “ adm irable and immensely successful as a suspense- engineer,”23 and, w hat is also w o rth poin tin g o u t here, his novels are sold in m illions copies around the w orld, n o t necessarily by low brow audiences. F o r all those reasons, we are far from w rong if we assum e th a t when E ra to , co n tra ry to the widely-accepted opinio n, denies the d e a th o f the novel, she speaks for F ow les’s m ind.
In the light o f the foregoing argum ents, it can be postulated th a t Jo h n Fow les is an adversary o f a post-structuralist conviction th a t “ th e au th o r is d e a d ;” he stresses the im portance o f au th o rial presence in the text, as well as au th o rial reading o f it. F ow les’s view point on the d econstructive ap p ro ach to literature would ra th e r tend to com e closer to th a t o f G rah am
22 Ibid., p. 137.
23 Benjamin De M ott, “The Y am sm ith in Search of H im self’, New York Times, August 29, 1982.
M cC ann w ho defies the key role o f free critical reading in creating the text, noticing its excessive arbitrariness:
Dcconslruction is not incorrect in saying that the critic is creative; where it is disastrously wrong, however, is in its assum ption that creativity means freedom from constraints and from standards o f judgem ent operating on its results. . . . To be creative is not let one’s im agination run wild: it is to use one’s imagination productively.3*
It has to be observed, however, th at Fow les’s disparagem ent o f deconstructive theory in M antissa does no t tak e form o f a theoretical treatise, n o r even o f polem ic discussion. In trying to be as “ reader-friend ly ” as possible in this context, the novelist em ploys irony and sense o f h u m o u r in place of argum entativ e discourse. Fowles simply ridicules the n o tio n th a t the text can w rite itself, he m akes fun o f the co n c ep tio n th a t th e a u th o r is n o n -a u th o r. G iven the absurdity which results from the ap p e ara n ce o f such a self-writing, unw ritable non-text, together with the critical o pinions th a t em phasise the artificiality o f the a u th o r inscribed in the narrativ e, we can concur with F aw k n e r’s opinion th a t in M antissa “ the d econstructivists are o u td eco n stru c ted .” 25
D epartm ent o f English L iterature and Culture University o f Łódź
24 G raham M cC ann, “ D istant Voices, Real Lives: Authorship, Criticism, Responsibility,” in: What Is An Author?, eds. M aurice B iriotti, N icola M iller (M anchester: M anchester University Press, 1993), p. 65.
