Freud – RMST Blog Avery

If you read my last blog post you may remember that I found The Shrouded Women quite anxiety inducing, for this weeks story I read Agostino by Alberto Moravia but if I thought last weeks story was “bad” (in the sense of feeling, not content, I quite enjoyed The Shrouded Women!) then this weeks story was worse. There was a discomfort that engulfed me throughout this story from start to finish. When I read that a theme in this book was sexuality I certainly did not expect it to be portrayed in this way. Although I must say it was interesting to read of it from this young innocent boy perspective, I feel like it’s quite “taboo” in a way for society and therefore an untapped subtopic within sexuality. I hesitate to say I enjoyed it (it was an interesting read but I didn’t quite enjoy it) just because of the fact that its sexual acts and concept through the lens of a young boy (A MINOR AS WELL), so to me it just feels wrong.

I noticed that throughout the story a word was changed in relation to his mother. Throughout the first part of the book Agostino’s mother is referred to as “his mother”, but I noticed that on page 44 she’s referred to as “The mother”. I thought this was more interesting as it takes away Agostino’s personal relationship with his mother as he learns more about the world and her, just by using one word. This happens throughout the book whenever his is upset/disgusted with his mother, it changes to “the” mother.

Again I feel as though this story objectifies women, it puts women’s sexuality almost as a thing to be ashamed of, through the way Agostino is in such disgust with his mother. On the other hand a bunch of young boys are running around naked having fun while their old man leader watches! It’s hard to say because it is literally his mother and we are only getting Agostinos sexually confused perspective. However I feel like this book really put women’s sexuality to shame.

I don’t think that there was ever a mention of Agostino’s father and I can’t help but wonder the effect of having a loving father figure would have on this story. Maybe Agostino wouldn’t be so surprised or repulsed about intimacy and sexuality if he has seen his mother with his father being affectionate. Maybe he wouldn’t have this strange thoughts of interest in his mother sexuality or maybe he would want to kill his father and have his mother for himself (a very Freudian concept)…who knows! I do feel like having the father present would change the trajectory of this story quite a bit. I even wonder what would happen if roles were reverse and his father was the only one present with no mention of his mother. Would Agostino be so horrified if he saw his father naked and on boats with women?

Question: How do you think a father figure would have changed this story?

Combray, Proust

Combray by Marcel Proust overall gave me an overwhelming feeling of nostalgia. It reminded me very much of, from what I can remember, being a child. I felt connected with these scenarios of family situations, being a child at family gatherings. You know who everything is, you know kind of what’s going on, you know what feelings you are feeling but as a child, you don’t truly understand the gravity of things going on or being said and why you are feeling what you are feeling. I think this is described very well in the book, the boy knows he’s feeling anxious but can’t quite pinpoint why that truly is, all he knows is he wants his mom. I especially related to the scene where he wanted to see his mother even though he was not supposed to be out of bed and the anxiousness you feel as a kid wanting to talk to your parents when you should be sleeping. So in a sense the description of that scene was nostalgic for me.

Maybe it was just my reading into it however I found some bits of the novel and its trajectory hard to understand. I never quite knew where his thoughts were leading, like some thoughts spiralled into others which as a reader caused some confusion. But when I think about children and their sporadic train of thought this thinking process made sense to me. Often the child would see something that would remind him of something else, like seeing a book and remembering that his grandma bought and returned books for him which led to a thought about his grandma’s old spending and gifting habits. Often times I forgot about what the original thought or scene was until it was circled back to.

A recurring action throughout the novel is physical cues associated with memories, tastes, smells, actions, and feelings. There were a lot of combinations of scents that caused powerful and very lucid recollections. For example the smell of varnish that reminded him of a particular staircase, the smell and taste of the madaline and tea, the “dark cool smell of both forest and ancien regime” (pg.75) of a room he used to read in. This boy has a very acute sense of smell! I was amazed at the visual detail that was thoroughly described in some of the memories, not one detail was left out which made picturing scenes in my head very easy. – 50pg

I also thought his relationship/slight obsession (?) with his mother was very almost Freudian. Overall I picked up on the themes of memory, dreams, class and lucid visuals and enjoyed the vivid imagery of the settings in the novel. I found it quite ironic when he talked of places one has not been but heard stories and seen photos of, and how seeing it is almost disappointing all while the author creates this magical land of Combray.

Question: Do you have a childhood memory that is a very vivid memory for you?

RMST Blog Avery

Tag Archives: Freud

Agostino – Mommy AND Daddy Issues?

The Magical land of Combray – Marcel Proust