New Yorker Artical, Kristeva and Kissing Jessica Stein

     Kristeva puts it perfectly " [love is] the experience of having been able to exist for, through, with another in mind"  and at the same time  " love is solitary because incommunicable."  when in love the mind begins to open up to life in a way that it never has before, you begin to plan for not only yourself but for someone else; that persons morals and objection begin to matter above your own. one begins to meld into the person they think they  need to be, blurring the already  unclear image of the self. I think that is  why heartbreak is one of the greatest pains a person can know, you have to start over and  are now overcome by self doubt. but love is also held to such a high regard for the very same reason. you get the opportunity to test yourself, step outside of your comfort zone and be someone you never thought you could, like Jessica  Stein. She realized that she didn't know herself as much as she had previously thought, once she accepted this she was able to open up and become the artiest she has been meaning to be, and further more was able to inspire those around her. maybe this is the reason love is solitary, it leads to the experience of letting go and becoming more in tune with the self.
    There are are not nearly enough words to express the emotions of love, so words become inadequate, and physical expression becomes the language.one of the ways to make the solitude of love more like a union between  a couple is acting upon desire. desire can not always  breed love but can love is incomplete without desire.

Annie Enraux

" I behave in an artificial manner.The only actions involving willpower, desire,and what I it take as human intelligence, were all related to this man..." Enraux's perception of time revolved entirely around A. her life became when A was apart of it and an emptiness when he was gone. she no longer had a present, her time spent looking back at the memories of their time together, or dreaming about how they will spend time together once again.  she never knew when to expect him so she became obsessed with preparing. her constant longing and retracing the steps of the relationship was a bit extreme. she had no concept of the life she was currently living and refused to see past their relationship.she knew what they shared was temporary and that his feelings may not be all that strong for her, because what he was there for was sex. but I suppose  the reason she was so obsessed was because she knew at any moment it could end. in more traditional relationships the opposite occurs, you tend to image that the relationship will last long term and in some cases forever. the thought that every encounter with A could be her last caused her to dissect each moment shared, each moment moving forward was lack of time left.this all relates back to our ongoing conversation about desire. desire is an attempt to fill a lack of something, and her lack was time.

my love by sia

I had quite a bit of trouble picking one song for this assignment. There were so many songs that came to mind from various artiest from different genres and relaying different messages about love, courtship, and heartbreak.but this one makes me emotional every time so I picked one of my favorite songs My Love by Sia. 

Click Here for the Lyrics  

to me this song is about the moment that you give your heart to your lover and then the reciprocation. this song represents ideal love, where both people give and take equally and are able to become better people because of the ways that the lover is able to complement them. This song is also about the surrender of ones self for a lover. the song starts out and also ends with the same lyrics:

MY love

leave yourself behind

beat inside me 

leave you blind 

the line leave your self behind relates to the idea that, when in love you become one with your lover and are no longer are separate entity. When you leave yourself behind you are engulfed by love and are free from any other baggage, all that matter is the here and the now. beat inside me makes reference to the heart. the heart is an organ that is essential to life, so this lyric is meant to convey that this love is such that you cant live without , nor would you want to. leave you blind relates to the idea of rose colored glasses, remain blind to the reality of the other person and the reality of life outside of them.  this song is also about loss; Tonight you will sleep for good... Now I am strong , You gave all you had and now I am home. Throughout our discussion we talked about how death is predominant in love stories because once one obtains desire the only thing left to keep this alive ironically, is death. I think the same idea can be applied here.
But above all this song is beautiful musically, it touches my heart every time I hear it.

It’s easy to say the bad girl treated Ricardo poorly and he loved her so unconditionally so their relationship is one-sided. Maybe it’s the romantic in me, but I feel despite her denial, she felt something strong for Ricardo. The bad girl had the abilities of a chameleon and, she still always allowed Ricardo back in her life. She aspired for more and didn't want to settle down into anything in the fear that she may disappear, but with Ricardo she never had to worry about being less then important. She loved him in the only way that she knew how. It’s not conventional and she can easily be written off as a horrible deceitful woman but with every opportunity to be gone and stay gone she allowed their relationship to pick up where it left off without pause.  She feared that if she let their love run its course their desire would cease, she says on page 209 “you’ll never live quietly with me, I warn you. Because I don’t want you to get tired of me, to get used to me. And even if we marry to straighten out my papers, I’ll never be wife. I always want to be your lover… because I’ll always keep you crazy about me.”

This book reminded me of that obscure object of desire because no matter what Conchita did, Mathiue always went back. The fact that the bad girl like Conchita was always changing, is because it was never just about the women it was about the desire. In each stage of Ricardo’s life the bad girl fit into the Ricardo’s life styles, changing to stylish women of the time.  even at the end of the novel with her impending death, all he wanted from her all along , was to be settled and happy and in his old aged he got exactly that.  This book allowed me to see that desire is fleeting, always changing as you progress, but love is undying and  can stay In the heart dormant, ready to surface at any given moment, fully. Like they always  “distance makes the heart grow founder.” 

The Bad Girl

Lilly’s character is constantly undergoing  change, being the women she needs to be in order to further advance toward the women she wants to be . Even as a teenager she knew that best way to be accepted was to be something new and exciting , representing culture and knowledge. As time passed she matured and become the personification of sophistication, something she always envisioned herself to be.  Her successes are a result of the desire of the men she gets involved with, they offer her the world and in return she lets them THINK she is theirs.  Robert frost once said “love is the irresistible desire to be irresistible desired”.  All of the characters in the books we have read wanted to be desired by their love above all, and that was the fuel for them to continue their pursuit; if I make them love me all will be complete. Lilly is aware of this, she never really gives any of the men in her life the satisfaction of knowing that she desires them as fully as they desire her.  Lilly is called the bad girl, but isn't she just living her life to the fullest never letting the reality of it get to her? She does what she needs to do in order to make a life for herself, not complaining but just doing. I’m not applauding the way in which she does this, but I am applauding her incentive.

Lilly keeps Ricardo around because he loves her unconditionally.  Ricardo makes the same mistake Charles and Mathieu made, desiring too much and being blinded not allowing the reality of the situation create clarity. My question is why do we want to be desired so badly, yet when we are desired to much we feel suffocated and often times end up using that person when we need to make ourselves feel better? 

I am Love and Solaris response post

 This week we watched I am love and Solaris.

 Reha's character and relationship with Chris rings true to what we have been discussing in class thus far. she said in the movie "my voice sounds the way it does because that’s how you remember it to be and I want to commit suicide because that’s how you remember me" the audience has no idea what Reha was like- they couldn’t even tell if how she looks is truth, or if that too is part of the illusion. Chris cannot undo his perceptions, like what Lancan said in the mirror stage, we cannot go back to knowing what life was like before the illusion. Chris impression of Reha even after she committed suicide, is still positive he remains in love with her despite the fact she got an abortion without talking to him about it, and she was drifting from him.  in the additive model of impression formation in psychology there is a theory that our impressions are based on simple characteristics that we add together and that equals a impression. in this theory  you can add a negative character trait and it still leads to a  more positive impression because the positive traits weighed more heavily. why do we do this, why do we still maintain positive impressions of those we love even when they have hurt us, even when we know that our love is an illusion. We cling so desperately to something uncertain. Desire causes physical arousal, our hearts start beating faster, butterflies in your stomach (the blood in our stomach rushes to our heart in order to pump more blood and prepare for an adrenaline rush), sweating, heavier breathing. we begin to feel what it’s like to be alive. When the repetition of life gets to us all we desire is to feel alive, like there is something to live for, and at times to affirm that we still contain life. Chris was living his life day by day knowing exactly how it would begin and end, being a passive participant. Then he gets called to something extraordinary, it reawakens him. he loves the feeling so much he dies for desire. but on the other hand the physical arousal we feel is similar to the experience of fight or flight. When we're afraid we have a choice to run or to stay and fight. I find that ironic because in love and desire your presented with the same choice, you stay and surrender to desire or you run away, when you run the desire follows you and never really goes away, unlike predators in the wild desire doesn’t die. I think that’s why Chris at first rejects Reha but then he realizes it will follow him weather in a physical sense or in his dreams. When you stay you’re always fighting, trying to maintain the illusion.

I am Love is a beautiful movie, and found many ways to express desire and love in its many forms, but the part of the movie that  remains vivid in my mind is the section when Emma and Antonio make love in the garden. This is a recurrent theme in most of the films and book we have reviewed. Gardens symbolize nature and innocence- something untouched. In the film there are clips of insects ravaging the flowers much like Antonio was doing to emma. Emma was content in her life before never really questioning it. But after this garden scene she is reminded what it is to be primal. So there is a contrast between what the garden represents and what occurs in the garden. she later experiences tragedy and is left with the choice to stay in a life she now knows she cant stand to live in or flee with her lover and have a chance to experience desire with all her senses.   

After watching both of these movies I sit here and wonder who is worst off; those who run from desire or those who stay to fight. Personally I am the one who runs away, I recently come to the realization that running seems to cause just as much pain as staying. Those who run become even more trapped in an illusion because you never achieve that moment of reality that occurs after physically indulging in desire, you constantly wonder and desire what that will feel like. So in some ways I applauded these characters for taking the incentive and making that choice to do something kind of crazy.These characters knew a kind of truth that is often surpassed, desire isn't something you can not contain, and it knows your weakness and will exploit it. Sometimes it means rebelling against social norms in order to be happy.

Madame Bovary week 2

Rodolphe's box of "memories" is more like a storage place of his repugnant collection of  his mistresses trinkets  , a mere disposal of his past desires fulfilled. I find it ironic he put his collection in a an old used cookie tin. cookies are a snack one indulges in  when there is a craving for something sweet, its never something one could consume as a meal. cookies aren't  meant to be fulfilling. these women are like cookies to Rodolphe, something to quench his desires but never something that is made to last. instant gratification. the fact that his stores his "souvenirs"  in a used container  is just one more sign of disrespect in regards to these women. To him they have served their purpose and now they are labeled as used items to be disregarded. they are all the same to him, wanting and expecting to much, he's not in it all for the romance; he's in it for the sake of being in a game. He's the personification of  stereotypical "player", viewing woman as pawns, objects of desire- nothing more, and without any forms of true originality, other then the physical possibly unique attributes  they may posses that happen to turn him on. he expresses in part II " Emma was like all other mistresses: and the charm of novelty, slipping off gradually like a piece of clothing, revealed in its nakedness the eternal monotony of passion, which always assumes the same forms ans uses the same language." Rodolphe doesn't even think of Emma as her own person but as a part of a collection of all women; something to be had. he cant even be passionate for woman any more because he has surpassed authentic emotion  and is running on instant gratification and that alone. he leaves her because she starts to expect what he cant offer. Gustave Flaubert clearly uses Rodolphe to be an even less sympathetic character then Emma.

Madame Bovary Week one

    Emma, to me, represents the fickleness of youth; wanting everything a little to badly, to be part of something exciting and bigger then yourself, and some how expecting it all just to happen, never quite being satisfied and yearning to be completed. she is easily aroused by the "glitter" in life and not bothering to look into the deepth of it. she, like most girls, dreamed of a passionate love affair; like the ones she reads in novels. her desire is always passion and nothing more, she doesn't look to the person and desire to be with them she looks for the possibility that he can supply what she wants, naively thinking that her desire for him will follow. in the being of the novel she quickly realizes that Charles is not giving her what she wants "... acting upon theories that she believed to be sound, she kept trying to experience love."
    Charles in contrast knew what it was to be in a marriage without passion and wasn't overly sad to see his first wife die. this time around Charles is in love with Emma despite her constant pulling away. In some ways, i feel he likes it; to him it makes the moments that he can get just a little bit closer that much more exciting. but his desperation is the very thing that makes her retreat. this reminds me of one of my favorite songs by Grace Potter and the Nocturnal called "apologies"
"My love is like a blanket
That gets a little bit too warm sometimes
I wanna wrap somebody in it
Who can hold me in [her] arms
Cause when it got a little too hot in there
[she] was always stepping out for air and he froze
Oh [she] froze"
Emma wants to escape from the blanket Charles has her under, still youthful she wants to experience life, not wanting to settle. But  Charles loved her the very way she had always dreamed but is to busy looking at the surface of passion, Lust.

Second half Of Celestina

        In the second half of Celestina Melibea and Calisto consummate their love for each other. they meet up in  the garden in which they first meet at night. the repeat imagery of the garden  relates back to the garden of Eden, that love is paradise and can lead to eternal pleasure and happiness. the two meeting in Garden at  night represents the Garden of Eden, and its promise of eternal pleasure, is a part of an illusion or a  mere shadow of reality. At night we can not see  and need the help of artificial light in order to get clarity. in desire our ideas and morals are obscured and we have this idea that the light of the other person will lead us to something better. in desire we come to obsess and chase after someone in hopes to get tangible pleasure.  
        The fact that Melibea and Calisto meet at night also alludes to our societies ideas that mischief occurs at night, because we can hide with the darkness and don't have the light of day to show us all that is wrong with the picture.                                                                                                                                                                                    
        Melibea says to Calisto " my lord, for gods sake, now I'm all yours, now I'm your lover, you cant deny my love for you or deny me sight  of you. " The two lovers only meet at night for the rest of the novel after the death of Sempronio, Parmeno and Celestina because Calisto is in hiding. I think this is because  the lovers are only able to see each other through the artificial light that the other projects. In this quote Melibea is saying she can not go without seeing him because of her love, which is ironic because what she see him for is an illusion cast by the shadow of night and illuminated by her desire for love.

response to Celestina

         The epitome of desire reverts back to the story of Adam and eve in the Garden of Eden as told in the bible, and Celestina parallels many of its themes. in the very beginning of the story Melibea and Calisto meet in a garden and Calisto proclaims she is perfection and this is attributed to the glory of God, he sees Melibea as a gift from god to him. Eve was a gift to Adam someone he could relate to and later procreates with. Propelled by his desire Adam was willing to do anything that Eve wanted of him, much like Calisto who sought out Celestina even against the better judgment of his ,once loyal, servant Sempronio.
    Sempronio was representative of the conscience but later was swayed by Celestina to disreguard moral superiority and become a slave to his desire, is money and prosperity.

      Calisto wanted his desire to subside and the only cure that ,besides time, is to have the desire reciprocated. Celestina devized a plan that would change Melibea's feelings for Calisto and she too would sucombe to desire.Celestina is representative of the serpent, she knows exactly what the others characters want and how to get inside their heads and think the way she wants them too. Melibea was hesitant at first and knew that desire was the fire behind Calisto's words and all the bad that would become of letting desire the best of them. But celestina spoke to Melibea's virtue, and convinced her that buying her cord (which was cursed to make her desire Calisto) would help a poor unfortunate soul. Melibea succumbs to desire and it will end in their demise much like Adam and Eve.

Calisto says it perfectly " ... and so said Adam, Solomon, David, Aristotle and Virgil but they all gave in to a woman. who am I to be more strong minded than they." we all know this tale and how it ends but yet we find excuses for why we succumb to desire, it goes back to Lancan and the mirror stage we know we can never know ourselves without the image and it’s a constant battle that results in self destruction.

Troubadour Poetry, Slavoj Žižek, and Buñuel’s “That Obscure Object of Desire” reponse

 Troubadour's poetry brought to light the paradoxical complexity of love and desire. This quote in the poem summarizes the underlying theme in all three things we cover this week, “my pain is beautiful, this pain is worth more than any pleasure, and since I find this bad so good, how good the good will be when this suffering is done." in Zizec's essay he discusses masochism in one passage " The  Masochistic Theatre of Courtly Love" his views on this stuck with me. We all desire something knowing very well it is consuming us and inflicting emotional agony. Wanting it to stop but running  back for more. We tell our selves it’s all a part of the game and it will get better, if we endure it a little bit longer. The worst part about it is we like this pain; it makes people feel alive, like without this pain love couldn't be real. The pain is the only sign that love isn't just a dream. 

    At one point in the essay Zizec defines masochism “...violence is never carried out, brought to its conclusion it always remains suspended as the endless repeating of an interrupted gesture" this thought directly relates to Mathieu's tumultuous relationship with Conchita. The two actresses who played Conchita each represented different sides of this one character. She was innocent and thoughtful on one side, and a manipulative seductive vixen on the other. Her innocence drew him in and her seduction kept him at bay.  Mathieu desired Conchita so much,even when he had opportunities to leave but went back and was willing to endure his self inflicted pain. He allowed her to emotionally beat up his heart. Never allowing him to satisfy his thirst for her, Conchita had complete control of him; his desire took away his free will. Mathieu was suspended. He waited idly by for his suffering to end so he could feel how " good the good [would] be."

  

reponse to Song of Songs, Narcissus, and Lacan's "Mirror Stage"

In the “Song of Songs” the lovers each describe each other in way that implies that the other is a precious and luxurious commodity, something for the entire world to behold. Each time the lover describes the beloved they make references to fruit and gardens, which may be in relation to the bliss that is the Garden of Eden, precious metals which relates to their importance and worth, and animals like gazelle or a young stag, which suggests they possess a kind of grace. When describing the beloved the lover gives details that represent each of the senses for example, how they smell, what it feels like in there embrace, comparing the beloved to the taste and indulgence of wine. The lover sees the other in such a way that they are obsessed with every little detail that makes up the other person. The language used makes the reader imagine this perfect person. You begin to see the beloved in the rose colored glasses that lover sees them in; when in reality they are like everyone else, filled with imperfections. But the beloved then begins to feel they themselves have more worth, at least to this one other person, and that means the world to them, and why it wouldn’t. The idea that someone can love you even with your flows is endearing. But at the same time isn't your lover seeing an illusion of what they think you are?
This idea directly relates to Ovid's myth of Narcissus, Narcissus was in love with an illusion. He believed that his idea of his lover to be reality and that ended in his demise.
"…excited by the very illusion that deceived his eyes. Poor foolish boy, why vainly grasp at the fleeting image that eludes you." the lovers in the “Song of Songs” are guilty of the same thing so vainly involved with other not taking a moment to really consider reality. In “Mirror stage” Lancan discusses how a young child is able to identify its species in a way that it hadn’t before, this moment of awareness alludes to its first sighting of an illusion. What one sees in the mirror reflects something different from the realities of those around them. The same is to say about the relationship between a lover and the beloved; the lover sees something about the beloved that is not the reality to those outside of the relationship.