Longing

Passages

Every passage tagged with this emotion in the Vela corpus. Search the body text, narrow by source or register, click through to a book’s profile to see how the passage sits with the rest of the work.

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• From Becoming Myself: A Psychiatrist's Memoir (2017)

  From time to time I saw my beautiful train companion at a distance, but, of course, we could not speak, though I was often certain she was gazing deep into my eyes. Despite her warnings about future thoughts disrupting tranquility, I often imagined us meeting again on the train, without her sisters, after the retreat. I tried my hardest to dispel that luscious fantasy—surely such fantasies obstruct the path to equanimity. And, worst of all, no books! I rarely go a day without reading a chapter or two of a novel, but I had been required to part with all my reading material upon check-in. I felt squirrelly, like an addict in withdrawal. Spotting a wrinkled page of blank paper in my knapsack, I pounced on it, and with a nub of a pencil amused myself by sketching a story. I considered my train companion’s words: “Past remembrances and future longings produce only disquiet.” Now, with pencil in hand, I considered the catastrophic consequences of that thought. I imagined Shakespeare embracing that phrase and choosing not to write King Lear . Not only Lear, but all the great characters of literature would have been stillborn. Yes, the glorification of tranquility is wonderfully calming, but the cost, the cost! After the retreat I took the train back to Mumbai and never again saw the Indian sisters. Before leaving India I wanted to visit Varanasi, the spiritual capital of India, but the route led through Calcutta, which confronted me, as never before, with the depths of human misery. The taxi that drove me into the city from the airport passed endless wretched shacks of the poor, each with a charcoal stove spewing dark smoke and fumes into air that stung the throat and darkened the sun by two in the afternoon. Gaunt beggars, the blind, lepers, and staring, emaciated children awaited me every time I left the hotel. The lepers chased me for blocks, threatening to touch me with their sores unless I gave alms. I always went out with my pockets full of coins, but the poverty and the need were inexhaustible. I did my best to use the Vipassana techniques I had just learned, but I failed to achieve tranquility. My novice meditation practice seemed powerless against real agitation. After three days in Calcutta, I boarded the train and arrived at the holy city of Varanasi late at night, the only tourist at the empty train station. After an hour, a bicycle cart driver arrived at the station and agreed, after some spirited bargaining, to take me to Varanasi and help me find lodgings. But the city was so filled with Buddhist pilgrims that empty beds were scarce. Finally, after two hours of searching, I found a tiny room in a Tibetan monastery that was adequate but noisy. I slept very little that night because of the loud and joyful tantric chanting all night long.

• From Becoming Myself: A Psychiatrist's Memoir (2017)

  CHAPTER TEN MEETING MARILYN I always encourage student therapists to enter personal therapy. “Your own ‘self’ is your major instrument. Learn all you can about it. Don’t let your blind spots get in the way of understanding your patients or empathizing with them.” And, yet, I’ve been so closely bonded to one woman since I was fifteen years old and thereafter so wrapped in my large family that I often wonder whether I can truly enter the world of a person who goes through life alone. I often think of my years before Marilyn in harsh black and white: the color seeped in after she entered my life. I remember our first meeting with preternatural clarity. I was in the tenth grade of Roosevelt High School and had been living in my new neighborhood for about six months. One Saturday in the early evening after I had spent a couple of hours gambling at the bowling alley, Louie Rosenthal, one of my bowling chums, told me there was a party nearby at Marilyn Koenick’s house and suggested we go. I was shy and not very keen on parties, and I didn’t know Marilyn, who was in ninth grade, a half-semester behind me, but, as I had no other plans, I agreed to go. Her home was a modest brick row house, identical to every other house on Fourth Street between Farragut and Gallatin, with a few steps leading to a small front porch. As we approached it we saw a large bolus of kids our age gathered at the stairs and on the small porch, trying to get into the front door. I, socially avoidant as I was, immediately spun around and began to walk home, but my ever-resourceful chum, Louie, grabbed my arm, pointed to the front window facing the porch, and suggested we raise it and crawl in. I followed him through the window, and we made our way through the throng to the vestibule, where, at the absolute center of the milling crowd, stood a very petite, very cute, vivacious girl with long, light brown hair, holding court. “That’s her, the short one, that’s Marilyn Koenick,” Louie said as he moved into the next room to find himself a drink. Now, as I said, I was generally very shy, but that night I astounded myself and, instead of turning back and retreating through the window, I pushed through the crowd and made my way to the hostess. When I got to her I had no idea what to say and simply blurted out, “Hi, I’m Irv Yalom and I just crawled in through your window.” I don’t recall what else we said before her attention was diverted by others, but I do know I was a goner: I was drawn to her like a nail to a magnet and had an immediate feeling, no, more than a feeling, a conviction , that she was going to play a crucial role in my life.

• From Birthday Girl (2018)

  Se ríe entre dientes. Debe ser tan divertido. —Definitivamente eres triste —dice—. Las mujeres no son tan difíciles de hacer feliz si te interesa un poco. —No soy incapaz —espeto—. Pero ese no es el punto. Las chicas adolescentes deben estar con chicos adolescentes, y no lo olvides de una jodida vez la próxima vez que te cruces con una. Ella merece a alguien de su propia edad. Él asiente, pensando. Y luego me lanza una mirada. —Entonces, tu hijo es de su edad, ¿verdad? ¿La trató mejor que tú? Respiro pesadamente, pero permanezco en silencio. Me da una sonrisa medio complacida y se aparta, regresando a su casa. Eso no es el punto, imbécil. Sí, puedo decir con seguridad que sus relaciones con chicos de su misma edad tampoco son ganadoras, pero… ¿Pero qué? ¿No voy a ser capaz de darle todo lo que quiere? ¿No voy a crecer con ella? ¿No voy a comenzar de nuevo, y construir una familia a mi edad? Dos meses atrás, todos esos parecían argumentos válidos, pero con el tiempo se sintieron menos convincentes. Como que quizás, quién soy y dónde estoy en mi vida, no está grabado en piedra. Todavía puede cambiar. Sacudo la cabeza. No lo sé. No, hice lo correcto. Han pasado meses, y no he sabido de ella. Claramente siguió adelante. Pero Dios, la extraño. Es como si estuviera constantemente enfermo de hambre, pero la comida no me satisfará. Existe un vacío en mi interior que no puedo llenar por mi cuenta. Levanto la caja de herramientas y giró hacia la casa, pero cuando miro hacia arriba, veo a Cole de pie en la puerta trasera de la casa. Me detengo. Jesús. ¿Desde hace cuánto tiempo ha estado parado ahí? La caja cuelga de mis dedos mientras nos miramos, y estoy completamente sorprendido de verlo ahí. —Te vi en la graduación —dice, una mano en su bolsillo. Su graduación del campo de entrenamiento fue ayer, y había estado escribiéndole y acosando a su reclutador todo el verano para poder contactarlo. Aunque tenía que verlo. No podía perdérmelo. Es un logro impresionante. Lentamente, camino hacia él, incapaz de apartar la mirada. Se ve increíble. Más alto y grande, un largo verano en el campo de entrenamiento había bronceado su piel y aclarado su ahora cabello corto. Está usando su uniforme verde de camuflaje con su gorra en una mano mientras se recarga en el marco. —Solo quería verte —le digo—. No estaba seguro si me habías puesto en la lista o tu reclutador, pero no respondiste ninguna de mis cartas, así que no estaba seguro si me querías ahí. Después que la ceremonia terminó quise hablar con él, pero su mamá estaba ahí con su último novio, y con él estaban unos amigos que habían conducido para verlo. No quería arruinarlo, así que me fui. Él tendría de regreso su teléfono, así que podría ver las llamadas, mensajes, y correos de voz. Me haría saber cuando estuviera listo.

• From The Beautiful Room Is Empty (1988)

  Well, we were both musicians and junkies, except he was a real musician. We used to lie out by the pool and sun and doze, and I’d look at his powerful arms and shoulders ‘driving the music to sleep under silence, darker and more elegant than roses,’ that’s the end of a poem I wrote about him.” He laughed and sat up. “You know, Bunny, there’s nothing more romantic than a concert pianist, especially one who won’t play. He plays for me now, but only at home, he’s got a Steinway grand, and you should hear him tear through the Rachmaninoff Third, your hair would stand on end.” Suddenly my own life seemed shabbily devoid of incident. I longed for the courage to do something reckless and the years in which to regret it. The only light was coming from a horrible fluorescent tube in the bathroom, which made our bodies appear larval and brought out muddy circles under Lou’s eyes. If I leaned my head back on the pillow I was looking at the cityscape upside down. The revolving searchlight at the top of the Drake tower beamed through low, tumbling clouds, as though a circus trainer were gliding a whip under the plunging bodies of horses in a lather. Here and there, windows of distant apartments still burned. Lou left his curtains open and we awakened at noon, naked in a hemorrhage of sunlight under the gaze of office workers in the next building, so close we could see a typist take off her glasses and massage the bridge of her nose. In the afternoons we’d sometimes go to the beach, but Lou came up with so many problems and fears and objections that usually we didn’t get out

• From Another Country (1962)

  Eric looked very grave. He grunted, noncommittally, and sat down again. “You’ve wished you could—you say. And I wish I couldn’t.” “You say.” They looked at each other and smiled. Then, “I hope you get along with Ida better than I did with Rufus,” Eric said. Vivaldo felt chilled. He looked away from Eric, toward the window; the dark, lonely streets seemed to come flooding in on them. “How,” he asked, “did you get along with Rufus?” “It was terrible, it drove me crazy.” “I figured that.” He watched Eric. “Is that all over now? I mean—is Cass kind of the wave of your future?” “I don’t know. I thought I could make myself fall in love with Cass, but—but, no. I love her very much, we get on beautifully together. But she’s not all tangled up in my guts the way—the way I guess Ida is all tangled up in yours.” “Maybe you’re just not in love with her. You haven’t got to be in love every time you go to bed. You haven’t got to be in love to have a good affair.” Eric was silent. Then, “No. But once you have been—I” And he stared into his drink. “Yes,” Vivaldo said at last, “yes, I know.” “I think,” said Eric, “that I’ve really got to accept—or decide—some very strange things. Right away.” He walked into the dark kitchen, returned with ice, and spiked his drink, and Vivaldo’s. He sat down again in his straight chair. “I’ve spent years now, it seems to me, thinking that one fine day I’d wake up and all my torment would be over, and all my indecision would end —and that no man, no boy, no male—would ever have power over me again.” Vivaldo blushed and lit a cigarette. “I can’t be sure,” he said, “that one fine day, I won’t get all hung up on some boy—like that cat in Death In Venice. So you can’t be sure that there isn’t a woman waiting for you, just for you, somewhere up the road.” “Indeed,” said Eric, “I can’t be sure. And yet I must decide.” “What must you decide?” Eric lit a cigarette, drew one foot up, and hugged one knee. “I mean, I think you’ve got to be truthful about the life you have. Otherwise, there’s no possibility of achieving the life you want.” He paused. “Or think you want.” “Or,” said Vivaldo, after a moment, “the life you think you should want.” “The life you think you should want,” said Eric, “is always the life that looks safest.” He looked toward the window. The one light in the room, coming from behind Vivaldo, played on his face like firelight. “When I’m with Cass, it’s fun, you know, and sometimes it’s, well, really quite fantastic.

• From Another Country (1962)

  What in the world did these songs mean to her? For he knew that she often sang them in order to flaunt before him privacies which he could never hope to penetrate and to convey accusations which he could never hope to decipher, much less deny. And yet, if he could enter this secret place, he would, by that act, be released forever from the power of her accusations. His presence in this strangest and grimmest of sanctuaries would prove his right to be there; in the same way that the prince, having outwitted all the dangers and slaughtered the lion, is ushered into the presence of his bride, the princess. I loves you, Porgy, don’t let him take me. Don’t let him handle me with his hot hands. To whom, to whom, did she sing this song? The blues fell down this morning. The blues my baby gave to me. Water trickled past his ear, onto his wrist. He did not move and the slow tears rolled from the corners of his eyes. “You’re groovy, too,” he heard Belle say. “For real?” “For real.” “Let’s try to make it to Spain. Let’s really try.” “I’ll get dressed up Monday, uptown style”—she giggled—“and I’ll get a job as receptionist somewhere. I hate it, it’s such a drag, but, that way, we can get away from here.” “Do that, baby. And I’ll get a job, too, I promise.” “You don’t have to promise.” “But I do.” He heard their kiss, it seemed light and loving and dry, and he envied them their deadly and unshakable innocence. “Let’s ball.” “Not here. Let’s go downstairs.” He heard Lorenzo’s laugh. “What’s the matter, you shy?” “No.” He heard a giggle and a whisper. “Let’s go down.” “They’re stoned out of their heads, they don’t care.” She giggled again. “Look at them.” He closed his eyes. He felt another weight on his chest, a hand, and he looked into Harold’s face. Terribly weary and lined and pale, and his hair was damp and curled on his forehead. And yet, beneath this spectacular fatigue, it was the face of a very young boy which stared at him. “How’re you doing?” “Great. It was great charge.” “I knew you’d dig it. I like you, man.” He was surprised and yet not surprised by the intensity in Harold’s eyes. But he could not bear it; he turned his face away; then he put the weight of Harold’s head on his chest. “Please, man,” he told him after a moment, “don’t bother. It’s not worth it, nothing will happen. It’s been too long.” “What’s been too long?”

• From Lost Christianities: Christian Scriptures and the Battles over Authentication (2002)

  63 many of its themes (chs. 108–113). The story is of a lad who is sent by his royal family to retrieve a pearl from a great serpent in Egypt, but who, after arriving in Egypt, forgets who he is and why he has come. His royal parents send him a letter, reminding him of who he is and why he has gone, after which he ful¿ lls his mission and returns to great fanfare and reward. Of the many interpretations of this moving poem, probably the most sensible for its immediate context, is that humans, too, have a heavenly origin and need to recall who they really are and why they have come, rather than be caught up in the trappings of this world, its beauty, riches, and sensual pleasures. This is, in fact, the teaching of many of these Apocryphal Acts, that there is a greater world that cannot be seen, far superior to this one that can be, and that life in this world should be directed entirely toward that other one, lest we become entrapped in the bodily desires of this world and suffer dire consequences in the world to come. Ŷ Harold W. Attridge, “Thomas, Acts of,” Anchor Bible Dictionary, vol. VI, pp. 531–534. J. K. Elliott, Apocryphal New Testament, pp. 439–511. Edgar Hennecke and Wilhelm Schneemelcher, eds., New Testament Apocrypha, vol. 2, pp. 322–411. Bentley Layton, The Gnostic Scriptures, pp. 366–370 (on the “Hymn of the Pearl”). 1. In view of the values embraced by the Acts of Thomas, explain why Christianity may have been seen as socially dangerous in the ancient world. In what ways does a tale like this appear to work against “family values” in the modern context? Essential Reading Supplementary Reading Questions to Consider 64 Lecture 14: The Acts of Thomas 2. How could the Hymn of the Pearl be explained as a gnostic composition?

• From Lost Christianities: Christian Scriptures and the Battles over Authentication (2002)

  Third scene: Thrown to the wild beasts in Antioch. The main characters: Paul, Thecla, Alexander (an in(cid:192) uential citizen of Antioch), the governor of Antioch, and the Queen Tryphaena. The action: Paul and Thecla travel to Antioch, where she is accosted by Alexander, who desires her. She publicly humiliates him and, in response, he arranges to have her condemned to the wild beasts. Before her execution, the governor hands her over for safekeeping to an aristocratic woman, Tryphaena, relative of the emperor, who befriends her. When taken to the arena, Thecla is again miraculously protected from the wild beasts by God and eventually throws herself into a vat of wild, ravenous seals and baptizes herself there. When no beast will molest her, she is again set free. Final scene: Resolution and restoration. The main characters: Thecla and Paul. The action: Thecla longs for Paul, seeks after him and (cid:191) nds him, and receives his blessing to teach the word of God. She (cid:191) nds her mother, Theoclia, is restored to her, and moves to Seleucia, where she lives long and happy as a celibate preacher of the gospel. Some of the overarching themes of this fascinating account can be taken as representative of all the Apocryphal Acts. Passion and desire are not eliminated here but redirected; their proper objects are not sexual partners but God, Christ, and their earthly representatives. Those who reject this world and its pleasures and trappings are those who have found the truth of the world above and are in a right standing with God, both now and for eternity. Those who accept the gospel of Christ and renounce the pleasures of this world, including sexual love, will be socially disruptive and hated by the rest of the world. But God will protect them and miraculously vindicate the truthfulness of their message. No wonder that, looking at it from the outside, Christianity was seen to be such a dangerous religion by some pagans in the Roman Empire. It struck at the very heart of what most pagans held dear: social structure, family life, marital love, and the enjoyment of the simple pleasures of this life.Why were these accounts—and the idea of asceticism—so popular among Christian women? Scholars believe that the social structure in the Roman Empire, where women were forced to be subservient to men, played a role in leading 67

• From Amplified Holy Bible (2015)

  Evidently he never developed a tolerance for water, which was often contaminated and which, in the absence of wine, he would have to drink. e 5:24 VV 24 , 25 continue the advice given in v 22 regarding the selection of church leaders. 1 Timothy 6 a 6:11 An OT title referring to a man who officially spoke to God. In the NT this title is used only in reference to Timothy. The Second Letter of Paul to Timothy 2 Timothy 1 Timothy Charged to Guard His Trust 1 P aul, an apostle (special messenger, personally chosen representative) of Christ Jesus (the Messiah, the Anointed) by the will of God, according to the promise of life that is in Christ Jesus, 2 to Timothy, my beloved son: Grace, mercy, and peace [inner calm and spiritual well-being] from God the Father and Christ Jesus our Lord. 3 I thank God, whom I worship and serve with a clear conscience the way my forefathers did, as I constantly remember you in my prayers night and day, 4 and as I recall your tears, I long to see you so that I may be filled with joy. 5 I remember your sincere and unqualified faith [the surrendering of your entire self to God in Christ with confident trust in His power, wisdom and goodness, a faith] which first lived in [the heart of] your grandmother Lois and your mother Eunice, and I am confident that it is in you as well. 6 That is why I remind you to a fan into flame the gracious gift of God, [that inner fire—the special endowment] which is in you through the laying on of my hands [with those of the elders at your ordination]. 7 For God did not give us a spirit of timidity or cowardice or fear, but [He has given us a spirit] of power and of love and of sound judgment and personal discipline [abilities that result in a calm, well-balanced mind and self-control].

• From Becoming Myself: A Psychiatrist's Memoir (2017)

  Maybe he was uncomfortable with me, though he wasn’t at all shy or inhibited with his clan of men—I enjoyed seeing him laugh with them and tell jokes as they played pinochle. Perhaps we failed one another: he never inquired about my life or my work, and I never told him that I loved him. Our lunch discussion remains clear in my mind. We spoke together as adults for an hour and it was quite wonderful. I recall asking him if he believed in God, and he replied, “After the Shoah, how can anyone believe in God?” I know that it’s now time, past time, to forgive him for his silence, for being an immigrant, for his lack of education and his inattention to the trivial disappointments encountered by his only son. It’s time to put an end to my embarrassment at his ignorance and time to remember his handsome face, his gentleness, his graceful interactions with his friends, his melodious voice singing the Yiddish songs he learned as a child in the shtetl, his laughter as he played pinochle with his brother and friends, his graceful sidestroke as he swam at Bay Ridge beach, and his loving relationship with his sister Hannah, the aunt I most adored. T HE AUTHOR WITH HIS FATHER, 1936.

• From The Decameron (1353)

  There was, then, in Florence a noble youth, whose name was Tedaldo Elisei and who, being beyond measure enamoured of a lady called Madam Ermellina, the wife of one Aldobrandino Palermini, deserved for his praiseworthy fashions, to enjoy his desire. However, Fortune, the enemy of the happy, denied him this solace, for that, whatever might have been the cause, the lady, after complying awhile with Tedaldo's wishes, suddenly altogether withdrew her good graces from him and not only refused to hearken to any message of his, but would on no wise see him; wherefore he fell into a dire and cruel melancholy; but his love for her had been so hidden that none guessed it to be the cause of his chagrin. After he had in divers ways studied amain to recover the love himseemed he had lost without his fault and finding all his labour vain, he resolved to withdraw from the world, that he might not afford her who was the cause of his ill the pleasure of seeing him pine away; wherefore, without saying aught to friend or kinsman, save to a comrade of his, who knew all, he took such monies as he might avail to have and departing secretly, came to Ancona, where, under the name of Filippo di Sanlodeccio, he made acquaintance with a rich merchant and taking service with him, accompanied him to Cyprus on board a ship of his. His manners and behaviour so pleased the merchant that he not only assigned him a good wage, but made him in part his associate and put into his hands a great part of his affairs, which he ordered so well and so diligently that in a few years he himself became a rich and famous and considerable merchant; and albeit, in the midst of these his dealings, he oft remembered him of his cruel mistress and was grievously tormented of love and yearned sore to look on her again, such was his constancy that seven years long he got the better of the battle. But, chancing one day to hear sing in Cyprus a song that himself had made aforetime and wherein was recounted the love he bore his mistress and she him and the pleasure he had of her, and thinking it could not be she had forgotten him, he flamed up into such a passion of desire to see her again that, unable to endure longer, he resolved to return to Florence.

• From Lost Christianities: Christian Scriptures and the Battles over Authentication (2002)

  66 Lecture 15: The Acts of Paul and Thecla and Thecla, which may have originally circulated independently of the Acts of Paul. As with the other Apocryphal Acts, this book can be seen as a kind of Christianized version of the popular literature known as romances or novels. It shares many of the generic characteristics and concerns of ancient novels. These books are all about love, magic, danger, escape, and restoration. But the Christian versions of the novels stand against the pagan versions in central and striking ways. The pagan romances are all driven by a concern to set forth the sanctity of marriage and marital love in the context of religion and in relation to an overarching concern for the integrity of the social fabric (strong families and marital institutions work to preserve the good of society). The Apocryphal Acts are concerned to promote strict sexual renunciation and illustrate how the gospel of Christ destroys the social fabric of family and community, all for the sake of the greater truth of heaven and the world above. These similarities and differences can be neatly seen in the gripping tale of the Acts of Paul and Thecla. The narrative can be divided into four scenes of action. First scene: Thecla’s dramatic and socially disruptive conversion to Paul’s message of sexual renunciation. The main characters: a wealthy aristocratic young woman, Thecla; Thecla’s mother, Theoclia; Thecla’s ¿ ancé, Thamyris; and the apostle Paul. The action: Paul arrives in Thecla’s city of Iconium to preach his gospel that eternal life will come to those who abstain from sexual activity, even within marriage. Thecla listens to Paul for three days on end from the window of her home and converts to his message, to the severe consternation of her mother and ¿ ancé. Second scene: Trial by ¿ re in Iconium. The main characters: Thecla, Paul, Thamyris, the governor of Iconium. The action: Thamyris and other men of the city, outraged that Paul’s message has taken their wives and ¿ ancées from them, have him arrested. Thecla shows her absolute devotion to Paul by bribing the guards to let her in to see him. Out of frustration, Thamyris and Theoclia hand her over for punishment. The governor condemns her to death by burning. But God miraculously intervenes at the last moment, dousing the ¿ re with a thunderstorm, and Thecla is set free.

• From Memoirs of Fanny Hill (1749)

  It is peculiar to vice to tremble at the enquiries of justice; and Mrs. Brown, whose conscience was not entirely clear upon my account, as knowing as she was of the town as hackneyed as she was in bluffing through all the dangers of her vocation, could not help being alarmed at the questions, especially when he went on to talk of a Justice of peace, Newgate, the Old Bailey, indictments for keeping a disorderly house, pillory, carting, and the whole process of that nature. She, who, it is likely, imagined I had lodged an information against her house, looked extremely blank, and began to make a thousand protestations and excuses. However, to abridge, they brought away triumphantly my box of things, which, had she not ben under an awe, she might have disputed with them; and not only that, but a clearance and discharge of any demands on the house, at the expense of no more than a bowl of arrack-punch, the treat of which, together with the choice of the house conveniences, was offered and not accepted. Charles all the time acted the chance companion of the lawyer, who had brought him there, as he knew the house, and appeared in no wise interested in the issue; but he had the collateral pleasure of hearing all that I told him verified, as far as the bawd’s fears would give her leave to enter into my history, which, if one may guess by the composition she so readily came into, were not small. Phœbe, my kind tutoress Phœbe, was at the time gone out, perhaps in search of me, or their cooked-up story had not, it is probable, passed smoothly. This negociation had, however, taken up some time, which would have appeared much longer to me, left as I was, in a strange house, if the landlady, a motherly sort of a woman, to whom Charles had liberally recommended me, had not come up and borne me company. We drank tea, and her chat helped to pass away the time very agreeably, since he was our theme; but as the evening deepened, and the hour set for his return was elapsed, I could not dispel the gloom of impatience, and tender fears which gathered upon me, and which our timid sex are apt to feel in proportion to their love. Long, however, I did not suffer: the sight of him over-paid me; and the soft reproach I had prepared for him, expired before it reached my lips. I was still a-bed, yet unable to use my legs otherwise than awkwardly, and Charles flew to me, catches me in his arms, raised and extending mine to meet his dear embrace, and gives me an account, interrupted by many a sweet parenthesis of kisses, of the success of his measures.

• From Henry Miller on Writing (1964)

  There is a difference, do you see? And when I say shocked, I mean in a healthy, agreeable way. It is an aesthetic shock, if you like, but one which vibrates throughout their whole being. And here, all the young, and often the old too, are unanimous in writing of the therapeutic value of my work. They were altered. They thank me, bless me, bless me for “just being,” as they often say. But to come back to “intentions.” It is almost classic what I have to say on this score. I know it all by heart, and when you read again, if you read with this in mind, you too will see it very clearly. (Oh, yes, but before I forget—one important thing! Remember always that, with the exception of Cancer , I am writing counter-clockwise. My starting point will be my end point—the arrival in Paris—or, in another way of speaking, the breakthrough. So what I am telling about is the story of a man you never met, never knew; he is mostly of a definite period, from the time he met June (Mona-Mara) until he leaves for Paris. Naturally, some of what he is at the time of writing comes to the fore. Inevitable. But the attempt is—I am talking only of the auto-novels, of course—to be and act the man I was during this seven-year period. From this segment of time I am able to look backward and forward. Very much as our own time is described—the Janus period, the turning point, where both avenues become clear and recognizable—at least to those who see and think. Oof!) I wanted so much, so much, to be a writer (maybe not to write so much as to be a writer). And I doubt that I ever would have become one had it not been for the tragedy with June. Even then, even when I knew I would and could, my intention was to do nothing more than tell the story of those years with her, what it had done to me, to my soul, if you like. Because it was the damage to the soul, I must tell you, that was the all. (And I doubt if I have made that at all clear in my writing!) And so, on the fateful day, in the Park Department of Queens County, N.Y., I mapped out the whole autobiographical romance—in one sitting. And I have stuck to it amazingly well, considering the pressures this way and that.

• From Lost Christianities: Christian Scriptures and the Battles over Authentication (2002)

  63 many of its themes (chs. 108–113). The story is of a lad who is sent by his royal family to retrieve a pearl from a great serpent in Egypt, but who, after arriving in Egypt, forgets who he is and why he has come. His royal parents send him a letter, reminding him of who he is and why he has gone, after which he ful¿ lls his mission and returns to great fanfare and reward. Of the many interpretations of this moving poem, probably the most sensible for its immediate context, is that humans, too, have a heavenly origin and need to recall who they really are and why they have come, rather than be caught up in the trappings of this world, its beauty, riches, and sensual pleasures. This is, in fact, the teaching of many of these Apocryphal Acts, that there is a greater world that cannot be seen, far superior to this one that can be, and that life in this world should be directed entirely toward that other one, lest we become entrapped in the bodily desires of this world and suffer dire consequences in the world to come. Ŷ Harold W. Attridge, “Thomas, Acts of,” Anchor Bible Dictionary , vol. VI, pp. 531–534. J. K. Elliott, Apocryphal New Testament, pp. 439–511. Edgar Hennecke and Wilhelm Schneemelcher, eds., New Testament Apocrypha, vol. 2, pp. 322–411. Bentley Layton, The Gnostic Scriptures , pp. 366–370 (on the “Hymn of the Pearl”). 1. In view of the values embraced by the Acts of Thomas, explain why Christianity may have been seen as socially dangerous in the ancient world. In what ways does a tale like this appear to work against “family values” in the modern context? Essential Reading Supplementary Reading Questions to Consider 64 Lecture 14: The Acts of Thomas 2. How could the Hymn of the Pearl be explained as a gnostic composition?

• From Another Country (1962)

  He thought, “I’ve got to get some sleep.” I’ve got to get some sleep. But the people in his novel massed against him. They seemed to watch him with a kind of despairing, beseeching reproach. His typewriter, a dark shapeless presence, accused him, reminding him of the days and nights, the weeks, the months, the years by now, that he had spent without sleep, pursuing easier and less honorable seductions. Then he turned on his belly and his sex accused him, his sex immediately filled with blood. He turned on his back with a furious sigh. He thought, I’m twenty-eight years old. I’m too old for this bit. He closed his eyes and he groaned. He thought, I’ve got to finish that damn novel, and he thought, Oh, God, make her love me, oh God, let me love. “What a wonderful day!” cried Ida. He watched her face for a moment, looking extremely pleased himself, and then delicately increased his pressure on her elbow, more for the pleasure this gave him than to hurry them across the broad, impatient, startling Avenue. “Yes,” he said, “it’s a great day.” They had just come up from the subway and it was perhaps this ascent from darkness to day which made the streets so dazzling. They were on Broadway at Seventy-second Street, walking uptown—for Cass and Richard had moved, they were climbing that well-known ladder, Cass said. The light seemed to fall with an increased hardness, examining and inciting the city with an unsparing violence, like the violence of love, and striking from the city’s grays and blacks a splendor as of steel on steel. In the windows of tall buildings flame wavered, alive, in ice. There was a high, driving wind which brightened the eyes and the faces of the people and forced their lips slightly apart, so that they all seemed to be carrying, to some immense encounter, the bright, fragile bubble of a lifetime of expectation. Bright boys in windbreakers, some of them with girls whose hair, whose fingertips, caught the light, looked into polished delicatessen windows, the windows of shops, paused at the entrances of movie theatres to look at the gleaming stills; and their voices, which shared the harsh quality of the light which covered them, seemed breaking on the air like glass splinters. Children, in great gangs and clouds, erupted out of side streets with the sound of roller skates and came roaring down on their elders like vengeance long prepared, or the arrow released from the bow. “I’ve never seen such a day,” he said to Ida, and it was true. Everything seemed to be swollen, thrusting and shifting and changing, about to burst into music or into flame or revelation.

• From Another Country (1962)

  By and by, he was still. He rose, and went to the bathroom and washed his face, and then sat down at his work table. She put on a record by Mahalia Jackson, In the Upper Room, and sat at the window, her hands in her lap, looking out over the sparkling streets. Much, much later, while he was still working and she slept, she turned in her sleep, and she called his name. He paused, waiting, staring at her, but she did not move again, or speak again. He rose, and walked to the window. The rain had ceased, in the black-blue sky a few stars were scattered, and the wind roughly jostled the clouds along.

• From Becoming Myself: A Psychiatrist's Memoir (2017)

  Van den Enden, an ex-Jesuit classics teacher who operated a private academy, had wandered into Spinoza’s shop to buy some wine and raisins and had become astonished at the depth and breadth of Spinoza’s mind. He had urged Spinoza to enter his private academy so as to be introduced to the non-Jewish world of philosophy and literature. Though the novel is, of course, fiction, I attempted as much as possible to stay close to historical accuracy. But not in this passage: Baruch Spinoza never worked in his family store. There was no family store: his family had an export-import business but no retail outlet. I was the one who worked in the family grocery store. This fantasy of being recognized and rescued abides within me in many forms. Recently I attended a performance of the play Venus in Fur by David Ives. The curtain opens on a backstage scene showing us a weary director at the end of a long day of auditioning actresses for a lead role. Exhausted and highly dissatisfied with all the actresses he has seen, he is preparing to leave when a brash, highly flustered actress enters. She is an hour late. He tells her he is finished for the day, but she begs and wheedles for an audition. Aware that she is obviously unsophisticated, profane, uneducated, and entirely inappropriate for the role, he refuses. But she is an excellent wheedler; she is savvy and persistent and finally, to get rid of her, he gives in and grants her a brief audition in which they begin to read the script together. As she reads, she is transformed, her accent changes, her speech matures, she speaks like an angel. He is stunned; he is overwhelmed. She is what he has been looking for. She is more than he could have dreamed of. Could this be the bedraggled, vulgar woman he met only thirty minutes earlier? They continue to read the script. They do not stop until they have brilliantly performed the entire play. I loved everything about the performance, but that first few minutes, when he appreciates her true quality, resonated most deeply with me: my daydream of being recognized was enacted upon the stage and I could not contain the tears streaming down my face, as I rose, the first one in the theater, to applaud the actors.

• From Another Country (1962)

  “French logic is very simple. Whatever the French do is logical because the French are doing it. That’s the really unbeatable advantage French logic has over all others.” “I see,” she said, and laughed again. “I hope you read the play before your friend consulted the stars. Is it a good part?” “It’s the best part,” he said, after a moment, “that I’ve ever had.” Again, briefly, he heard the typewriter bell. Cass lit a cigarette, offered one to Eric, and lit it for him. “Are you going to settle here now, or are you planning to go back, or what?” “I don’t,” he said, quickly, “have any plans for going back, a lot—maybe everything—depends on what happens with this play.” She sensed his retreat, and took her tone from him. “Oh. I’d love to come and watch rehearsals. I’d run out and get coffee for you, and things like that. It would make me feel that I’d contributed to your triumph.” “Because you’re sure it’s going to be a triumph,” he said, smiling. “Wonderful Cass. I guess it’s a habit great men’s wives get into.” Weeping and crying, tears falling on the ground. The atmosphere between them stiffened a little, nevertheless, with their knowledge of why he had allowed his career in New York to lapse for so long. Then he allowed himself to think of opening night, and he thought, Yves will be here. This thought exalted him and made him feel safe. He did not feel safe now, sitting here alone with Cass; he had not felt safe since stepping off the boat. His ears ached for the sound of Yves’ footfalls beside him: until he heard this rhythm, all other sounds were meaningless. Weeping and crying, tears falling on the ground. All other faces were obliterated for him by the blinding glare of Yves’ absence. He looked over at Cass, longing to tell her about Yves, but not daring, not knowing how to begin. “Great men’s wives, indeed!” said Cass. “How I’d love to explode that literary myth.” She looked at him, gravely sipping her whiskey, without seeming to taste it. When I got to the end, I was so worried down. “You seem very sure of yourself,” she said. “I do?” He was profoundly astonished and pleased. “I don’t feel very sure of myself.” “I remember you before you went away. You were miserable then. We all wondered—I wondered—what would become of you. But you aren’t miserable now.” “No,” he said, and, under her scrutiny, blushed. “I’m not miserable any more. But I still don’t know what’s going to become of me.” “Growth,” she said, “is what will become of you. It’s what has become of you.” And she gave him again her oddly intimate, rueful smile. “It’s very nice to see, it’s very—enviable. I don’t envy many people. I haven’t found myself envying anyone for a long, long time.”

• From Another Country (1962)

  “Let’s have a drink,” he said, and took the bottle from her bag. “How much do I owe you?” She told him, and he paid her, shyly, with some crumpled bills which were lying on the mantelpiece, next to his keys. He moved into the kitchen, tearing the wrapper off the bottle. She watched him as he found glasses and ice. His kitchen was a mess and she longed to offer to clean it up for him, but she did not dare, not yet. She moved heavily to the bed and sat down on the edge of it and picked up the play. “I can’t tell if that play’s any good or not. I can’t tell any more, anyway.” Whenever he was unsure, his Southern accent became more noticeable. “Which character are you playing?” “Oh, I’m playing one of the bad cats, the one they call Malcolm.” She looked at the cast of characters and found that Malcolm was the son of Egan. The script was heavily underlined and there were long notes in the margin. One of these notes read, On this, maybe remember what you know of Yves, and she looked at the underlined sentence, No, I don’t want no damn aspirin. Man got a headache, why don’t you let him find out what kind of headache it is? Eric called, “Do you want water, or just ice?” “A little water, thanks.” He came back into the room and handed her her highball. “I play the last male member of a big, rich American family. They got rich by all kinds of swindles and by shooting down people, and all that jazz. But I can’t do that by the time I’m a man because it’s all been done and they’ve changed the laws. So I get to be a big labor leader instead, and my Dad tries to get me railroaded to jail as a Communist. It gives us a couple of nice scenes. The point is, there’s not a pin to choose between us.” He grinned. “It’ll probably be a big, fat flop.” “Well, just make sure we have tickets to opening night.” A brief silence fell, and her we resounded more insistently than the drums of Shostakovich. “Oh, I’m going to try to pack the house with my friends,” he said, “never fear.” Silence fell again. He sat down on the bed beside her, and looked at her. She looked down. “You make me feel very strange,” he said. “You make me feel things I didn’t think I’d ever feel again.” “What do I make you feel?” she asked. And then, “You do the same for me.” She sensed that he was taking the initiative for her sake. He leaned forward and put one hand on her hand; then rose, and walked away from her, leaving her alone on the bed. “What about Richard?”