Mirrors of Narcissus (7 page)

In high school, after my initial dismay at encountering a girl’s body, I gradually forced myself to learn to like it, as I was resigned to the possibility that it would be all I could ever have. And perhaps a part of me was hoping that after enough times, I could “cure” myself of my more powerful homosexual desires. And still another factor was that I wanted to prove to the straight world—who would have crucified me for my true inclinations—that I was every bit as good as the straights, that I could compete with them at their game, even better them at it. If I couldn’t have what I really wanted, I might as well put up with what I could, and make the most of it. At any rate, I accepted the fact that I would have to at least be able to pretend heterosexuality. My first few times were clumsy, but I gradually learned the geography of a girl’s body.

My lack of true passion gave me a certain clinical detachment in my explorations, and this in turn allowed me the objectivity that most boys were denied. Most of them, no doubt, became so overwhelmed by the feel of her naked skin against theirs, the taste of her lips, that they couldn’t keep back the rising tide of orgasm, which erupted much too soon, just when she was becoming aroused. Unlike those boys, however, I was able to last much longer, my secret sobriety allowing me to concentrate on
her
pleasure. It usually takes women so much longer to achieve gratification—even after a long session of kissing and fondling—that I really can’t blame those men who are unable to hold out that long.

So I got a reputation among certain girls as the experienced one, the mature one. Little did they realize that I was only using the whole thing as a cover-up: going out with girl after girl and almost mechanically going through the motions, playing the numbers game, ranking the girls according to my own system of values, judging them by physical beauty, degree of sexual passion, the extent of their emotional involvement with me. Above all, I loved the irony of the fact that I, who had no true passion for girls, became famous in my school for my sexual expertise.

Boys would sometimes confide to me that they didn’t know if their girlfriends had orgasms or not. They were either afraid to ask or worried that they would be lied to if they did. For some reason I had much more open communication with my girls, and I’d learned that most of them really weren’t as concerned about orgasm as the boys thought. What they cared more about was being held by a boy they loved, and giving him pleasure.

Christine, always the eager explorer, had discovered orgasm when she was 16, through clitoral masturbation. She’d excitedly told her friends about this but most of them, to her surprise, were loath to try the experiment, either through prudery or fear. She herself found nothing wrong with masturbation; sometimes during our lovemaking, she would openly caress herself. Or I would caress her clitoris for her. I knew just the right touch she liked—it was different for every girl.

Tonight, though, she seemed happy with standard coitus. Her lips had drawn back and I could see her teeth clenched together hard. The muscles in her neck were corded and she was emitting short, powerful gasps. Usually, the sight of a girl’s sexual excitement left me cold, even blunted my own. Christine had been the first with whom I normally didn’t have to resort to mental substitutes for the final effort, but tonight my mind was too stimulated to do otherwise.

I pulled her legs up behind my hips, then pushed myself up off my knees, balancing all my weight upon my toes for a more steeply angled pivot. As her loosely crossed ankles came to rest on my buttocks, I began thrusting into her, harder, deeper, and faster. My motions caused her heels to rub rhythmically against my buttocks in a caressing manner.

I thought about Jonesy, and how he’d crept into other boys’ rooms and fondled their valuables. This vision was somehow linked with the boy I’d encountered in the restroom today, whose naked erection had been so brazenly exposed to my view. The two images merged in my mind, and I had a vivid picture of Jonesy mischievously pumping his dick at me. It was going to be good. It was going to be very good.

Christine had given up any attempt at suppressing her cries. I listened to them absently for a moment before giving myself up completely to the pictures in my mind.

The next morning I had to go back to my dorm to get my books for class. As I was about to unlock the door to my room and step inside, I heard sounds coming from within. It had to be Jonesy, packing his things to leave.

He seemed to be in the shower room taking out his toothbrush, soap, shaving gear.

I listened intently, dreading the prospect of meeting him. Would he say good-bye? Or should I? Didn’t I at least owe him that? Yet I was afraid of what the others would think. It would be like a betrayal, when he’d hurt so many of them. Leaving my post at the door, I quietly made my way down to the lounge. For about fifteen minutes I pretended to watch television, imagining I could hear the sounds of his packing. And then I heard a door opening, then shutting. Footsteps came down the hallway. I felt my eyeballs get hot.

But he didn’t come to the lounge.

After a decent interval had passed, I stepped out into the hallway and went down to Kruk’s room and knocked on his door. When he came to answer it, he looked drawn.

“What’s up?” I asked.

“Jonesy just left.”

“Yeah, I know. I heard him from out in the hall. But I didn’t say anything to him. Did you see him?”

“Yeah. I cracked open my door so I could get a look. And he saw me, too.”

“Was he alone?”

“Yeah. He was lugging a suitcase and a box. There was a taxi waiting for him outside.”

“Did he say anything? Any last words?”

“Nothing.”

“No contrition, no excuses, no anger? He just left?”

“That’s right. He couldn’t even look me in the face.”

I felt a sense of letdown, of having been cheated. Perhaps I had wanted drama—some indication of the impact he’d made on our lives. After all, he had been the virtual leader of the floor, the one who organized things, got things going, the life of every party. He’d been here since the beginning, was the first guy I’d met when I came here. And now he was gone from our lives. It was hard to believe, or accept.

I left Kruk and went to my own room. Except for Jonesy’s bed, the night table, and the study desk, everything had been cleared away. His side of the room still looked dirty. There were tiny holes in the wall, left by the thumbtacks where pin-ups had hung; beer rings had hardened on the window ledge. He’d left behind a huge stack of men’s magazines in the closet. I picked one up at random and idly flipped through it, then tossed it down.

I had to get to English class.

*

Part Two: Terra Incognita

1

I found out who “H. Golden” was, the mysterious person who liked to check out gay books. I was looking for courses to take in the coming winter term when I came across his name in the course catalog; he was a professor at the college.

Apparently Harold Golden taught Western Art History, among other subjects. I knew instinctively that he had to be the one, and felt a little let down. I had wanted to keep him in my imagination as a young, attractive athlete.

I checked the Underground Guide to find out what kind of instructor he was. Written by past students of the school, this mimeographed publication put out by the student union rated all the instructors on campus, telling how difficult they were, whether they were interesting lecturers, how tough they were at grading, and how to pass their classes.

Professor Golden was apparently well thought of by former students. As a lecturer he was rated “excellent,” and his courses were in high demand. His Western Art History class was especially popular among students majoring in non-art fields, such as Engineering, P-Chem, and pre-med. For them, the course was interesting and, at the same time, satisfied the art requirement they needed for graduation. Athletes also favored the course; for them, it was highly recommended.

I decided to drop in on one of his lectures to see how “H. Golden” looked.

My first sight of him was a disappointment. Perhaps I’d built him up too much in my imagination, but the middle-aged professor wearing old-fashioned glasses wasn’t quite what I’d come to expect. Unlike some of the younger instructors, whose hairstyles and clothes made them virtually indistinguishable from their students, Professor Golden was immaculately groomed and dressed. There was an air of old-world culture about him, even though apparently he was from someplace in Indiana. With his gold-rimmed glasses and goatee, he seemed quite cosmopolitan, a little out of place in this university.

In any case, the lecture hall was packed. Unlike most of my other courses, in which by the end of fall term half of the students had dropped out, his class showed no signs that attendance had diminished at all.

It was easy to see why: his lecture was fascinating. Quite apart from what he was discussing—in this case the art of the Weimar Period, with music from the era softly accompanying his slide presentation—his voice was mesmerizing. It was deep, soothing, and authoritative, somewhat like a doctor’s, and I wished it would go on and on. And his absorption in the topic was so infectious that I noticed students sitting on the edges of their chairs—students who probably normally wouldn’t have been interested in art at all. The hour that I spent listening to him was like a wonderful time trip into a glamorous past.

When the class was over, even after most of the students had left, there was still a small crowd around him, eager to ask more questions. He was apparently something like a sage for these hangers-on. Perhaps it was the distance they felt from him which gave him this special aura, and I could understand their feeling, for he seemed so different from anyone I’d ever met before.

I wondered how many of his students knew he was gay. This secret knowledge had colored some of the things he’d said; a brief mention he’d made of the beauty of Michelangelo’s David was for me tinged by the knowledge that he undoubtedly found the statue as sexually exciting as I did.

However, as I listened in on his talk with the students, I discovered that he made no secret of his gayness. I caught the word “homosexual” just as I joined the circle gathered around his lectern. One of the boys was asking him about a book called
Maurice
, by E.M. Forster.

“I’ve read some of his other books,” said the boy, “but they didn’t interest me at all. I thought they were kind of boring. Flatulent. I’ve never understood why the critics regard him so highly.”

Golden had been putting his notes into order, and now he put them aside and looked animatedly at the students around him. “A thing about literary criticism you have to understand is that there are certain academics who seem to feel that the more boring and obscure a book is, the deeper it is. Apart from Forster’s other books, with which I feel you’re being a little too harsh, what did you feel about
Maurice
?”

“It seemed a bit corny to me.”

“Well, you have to understand the times in which it was written. Remember, when Forster was a young man, homosexuality was actually a prisonable offence. So you can easily understand why he remained a closet homosexual all his life, and why he didn’t dare publish
Maurice
in his lifetime—which is a pity, because I think it’s quite a good novel. He did leave instructions for it to be published after his death, though. But by that time his treatment of the subject had become rather passé. When he first wrote it, it was no doubt a daringly straightforward and honest portrayal of a homosexual love affair, but by today’s standards, it’s almost quaint. After all, by the time of his death, in 1970, we had seen the publication of writers like Burroughs, Vidal, Rechy, and Genet, who are much more explicit in their depictions of sexuality.”

“Who’s Genet?” asked one boy.

“A French writer who’s still alive, though he hasn’t written anything for quite some time now. He wrote in the 1940s, and his work was translated into English in the 1960s.”

“What sort of stuff did he write?”

“He wrote five novels, dense with a rich, poetic prose, about his life in prison, about his—”

“He was in prison?”

“Yes. In fact, he wrote most of his books in prison. The rules of the prison forbade any form of creative writing, so he had to write his works on paper bags which he tore into page-sized sheets. Several times these works were discovered by prison officials and destroyed. But enough survived—and was published on the outside—to make his name well known among the reading public. Finally, thanks to the efforts of some of France’s leading literary figures—who rated his work quite highly—the government gave him a pardon.”

“What did he go to prison for?”

“Well, theft. Before he went to prison, though, he spent much of his youth in and out of homes for juvenile delinquents. As an orphan he never knew who his real parents were. He was raised in foster homes, but didn’t seem to be able to live the straight life. He grew up in the streets, learning to fight and steal in order to survive. As a young boy, he spent a lot of time in a succession of reform schools, and from them he just sort of graduated into adult prisons.”

“And he wrote about all this?”

“Yes. But not in straightforward prose. His novels are a mixture of dreams, fantasies, sexual longings, as well as hard reality. He describes some of his criminal activities in
Confessions of a Thief
. But it’s in his writing about his homosexuality that he reaches his greatest heights. He’d always been gay, but the special atmosphere of prison, which fosters ritualized homosexual relationships, appealed to his needs. His first book,
Our Lady of the Flowers
, gives wonderfully poetic, almost mystical descriptions of his sexual activities and fantasies. You can easily imagine how confinement in prison had enriched and deepened his fantasy life. It was his one method of escape from the grim realities around him.”

“But he’s out of prison now, right?”

“Yes. Maybe that’s the reason why he seems to have fallen silent. But though he has become a free man, Genet always seems to wear the aura of an outlaw, someone who lives outside all normal bounds. That is his special appeal. His being homosexual, and suffering society’s ostracism for it, only gave more impetus to the distrust and contempt he feels toward straight society. And by ‘straight,’ I mean straight in the jargon of both homosexuals and criminals.”

“Which book of his do you recommend?”

“They’re all good—
Our Lady of the Flowers,
Confessions of a Thief,
Miracle of the Rose,
Querelle of Brest
—but I like
Funeral Rites
best.”

I saw several students scribble these titles in their notebooks.

“Who were those other writers you mentioned?” asked a girl.

“Well, another interesting character is William S. Burroughs, who, though he never went to prison, was fascinated by the underworld. Perhaps as a result of his fascination, he began experimenting with drugs, almost willingly becoming a heroin addict in the process. Remember, as a young man, he lived in a time when drugs were almost exclusively linked with the shady underworld and jazz musicians. His experience as an addict gave him the materials for a series of books which form a searing indictment of American society. The world of Burroughs is the world of horror comics and bizarre science fiction—of paranoia, government conspiracies and erotic perversion. His style is a surrealistic blend of the most advanced literary experiments with popular genre fiction such as science fiction, hard-boiled detective novels, westerns, pornography. The result is a grotesque mirror world of our own society. His satire is keen and biting, though some of his descriptive passages are pure poetry. At one point, he was involved with literary experiments which he called cut-up. By actually cutting up a page of his writing and piecing it back together in random patterns designed to give insights into a deeper reality, he was trying to produce the equivalent of cubism in literature. But he failed, and those are his least readable works. I still think the homoerotic parts of his books are some of the most erotic writing I’ve ever read. He presents a tough, masculine homosexuality which I hadn’t come across until I’d read
Junky
,
Naked Lunch
, and other works by him.”

I felt a shiver go through me. He was echoing exactly my own feelings about the “good parts” in Burroughs’s books. How many of the others here had read those passages? By now, our number had dwindled until only five of us remained. His eyes had lingered on mine a number of times during his talk, and though he spoke to all of us, I felt that his words were directed at me alone. It was like listening to a private lesson arranged for my benefit. Yet the other four students seemed just as fascinated as I.

Golden’s student assistant had long ago put away the slide projector and tape recorder used for the lecture, and had left. But the professor himself seemed in no mood to halt his flow of talk. “Another interesting homosexual was the Japanese author Yukio Mishima.”

“Isn’t he the guy who committed hara-kiri? I didn’t know he was gay.”

“He wrote two books which deal with homosexuality:
Confessions of a Mask
and
Forbidden Colors
. Though I find Mishima’s prose rather too baroque and ornate for my taste, the straightforward way he deals with homosexual themes was rather refreshing when I first read him. He was more into the sadomasochistic aspects of sex, obsessed with pain, mutilation, and death.”

“Ugh.”

Golden grinned. He seemed to take a boyish delight in seeing the students’ shocked faces. Though they pretended to be mature and open-minded about his matter-of-fact acceptance of homosexuality, I knew most of them probably felt as I did, that we were flirting dangerously with the dark specters of our own demons.

“Well, he experienced his first orgasm while looking at a reproduction of Guido Reni’s painting of St. Sebastian, showing the young martyr’s death scene where he’s bound half-naked to a tree and shot full of arrows. In a sense, that picture became the motif of Mishima’s whole life: eroticism became bound up in a violent and beautiful death. Maybe because he was such a romantic, he never really outgrew his boyish dreams. He idealized manliness to an almost parodistic degree, and took up bodybuilding because he was ashamed of his weak, intellectual’s body. By the time he was in his thirties, he was so proud of his muscles that he posed for a series of nude and semi-nude photographs. In his forties he became an extreme Japanese nationalist, but I think what excited him about the Japanese past was its tough, samurai idealism, a manly, stoic philosophy which honors endurance of pain and discomfort. I don’t think he was deeply into the political aspects of Emperor worship. Be that as it may, he started a private paramilitary group, the Society of Shields, dedicated to the glory of the Emperor. He designed its uniforms himself, and was successful in recruiting a group of young men, mostly right-wing college students, to wear them. All of this was his preparation for the climax of his life—his own glorious death. And it had to be both violent and beautiful if it was to be the work of art he wanted it to be.”

“When was this?” asked a boy.

“In 1970, coincidentally, the same year E. M. Forster died. What a world of difference between two writers, though. The only thing linking them is their homosexuality and their dedication to literature.”

“How did Mishima die?” asked another boy impatiently.

Golden smiled. “He attempted to stage a coup d’etat at a Japanese Self-Defense Force base with a group of his followers. His idea was to incite the Self-Defense Forces into action on behalf of the Emperor. He probably knew it was doomed to failure. But it gave him the excuse he needed; he took responsibility for his failure in the age-old Japanese way—he committed ritual suicide, disemboweling himself with a short sword. Immediately after, one of his followers, said by some to be his lover, chopped off his head with a longer sword. Mishima had always said that he didn’t want to grow old—he wanted to die while still in the prime of his manhood, while he still had a beautiful body. He was forty-five years old when he staged his suicide. That morning, he had turned in to his publisher the last pages of the novel many consider his masterpiece. I think his suicide was, in the end, the culmination of his belief that death is the ultimate orgasm. With that dramatic climax, he’d turned his own life into his greatest novel. The moment of his death witnessed the apotheosis of his political, literary,
and
sexual philosophies.”