project/panopticon-diaries
Helen Garner,
Eve Babitz,
Lauren Elkin,
Haley Mlotek,
Elizabeth Hardwick,
Alba de Céspedes,
Liv Ullmann,
Leslie Jamison,
Nona Willis Aronowitz
eve diary fragments
The change from the girlish, charming wife to the radical, courageous heroine setting out alone has always been a perturbation. Part of the trouble is that we do not think, and actresses and directors do not think, the Nora of the first acts, the bright woman — with her children, her presents, her nicknames, her extravagance, her pleasure in the thought of “heaps of money” — can be a suitable candidate for liberation. No, that role should by rights belong to the depressed, child-less, loveless Mrs. Linde and her lonely drudgery. The truth is that Nora has always been free; it is all there in her gaiety, her lack of self-pity, her impulsiveness, her expansive, generous nature. And Nora never for a moment trusted Helmer. If she had done so she would long ago have told him about her troubles.
The habit is to play Nora too lightly in the beginning and too heavily in the end. The person who has been charming in Acts 1 and 2 puts on a dowdy traveling suit in Act 3 and is suddenly standing before you as a spinster governess. If the play is to make sense, the woman who has decided to leave her husband must be the very same woman we have known before. We may well predict that she will soon be laughing and chattering again and eating her macaroons in peace, telling her friends — she is going back to her hometown — what a stick Helmer turned out to be. Otherwise her freedom is worth nothing. Nora’s liberation is not a transformation, but an acknowledgment of error, of having married the wrong man. Her real problem is money — at the beginning and at the end. What will she live on? What kind of work will she do? Will she get her children back? Who will be her next husband? When the curtain goes down it is only the end of Volume One.
In the year leading up to calling off my wedding, I often cried or yelled or reasoned or pleaded with my fiancé to tell me that he loved me. To be nice to me. To notice things about how I was living.
One particular time it was because I had put on a favorite red dress for a wedding. I exploded from the bathroom to show him. He stared at his phone. I wanted him to tell me I looked nice, so I shimmied and squeezed his shoulders and said: “You look nice! Tell me I look nice!” He said: “I told you that you looked nice when you wore that dress last summer. It’s reasonable to assume I still think you look nice in it now.”
Another time he gave me a birthday card with a sticky note inside that said BIRTHDAY. After giving it to me, he explained that because he hadn’t written in it, the card was still in good condition. He took off the sticky and put the unblemished card into our filing cabinet.
I need you to know: I hated that I needed more than this from him. There is nothing more humiliating to me than my own desires. Nothing that makes me hate myself more than being burdensome and less than self-sufficient. I did not want to feel like the kind of nagging woman who might exist in a sit-com.
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[...] 'My God!' he said to himself with a sharp feeling of anxiety. 'How ignorant we really are!' He read a great deal, but he had little real knowledge excepting in the field of literature. And even in literature ... Until now it hadn't bothered him — no need for any specialized knowledge to fight in the Resistance or to found a clandestine newspaper. He had believed that that was the way it would continue to be. Obviously he had been wrong. What is an opinion? What is an idea? What power do words have? On whom? And under what circumstances? If you publish a newspaper, you have to be able to answer those questions. And what with one thing leading to another, you eventually question everything. 'You have to decide in ignorance,' Henri said to himself. 'Even Dubreuilh often acts blindly — Dubreuilh, with all his learning.' Henri sighed; he was unable to resign himself to this defeat. There are degrees of ignorance, and the simple fact was that he was particularly ill-equipped for the political life. 'Well, I'll just have to start working at it,' he said to himself. But if he really wanted to extend his knowledge, it would require years of study. Economics, history, philosophy — he would never be done with it! What a job! And all that just to come to terms with Marxism!
Ever since I started keeping my diary of remorse, my remorse has evaporated. The answer to a personality problem or spiritual malaise is to keep a diary of it because then the quantity you are quantifying seems to disappear. Therefore I should go on to keep a diary of other troubling quantities. Such as Diary of Lassitude, Lack of Motivation, Failure to Act, etc.
cute
Well, I’m so broke I’m overdrawn at the bank and it makes me very nervous, especially since I don’t know when the check from the P. G. & E. [cover] is coming in, and I’m just really broke.
This weekend I gained 3 pounds. Friday was Daddy’s birthday so I ate Chinese chicken and cake. Joe Pailburn came to perk me up and, oh, and he kissed my feet. I nearly died.
I saw Neil on Thursday and fell for another of those 15-minute things, so I figured it would be best to get the fuck out of the house for a spell.
I am pretty tired from all the society and haven’t had a chance to read anything. This week I’m staying home and trying to figure out good ideas for collages.
fun
What else. Neil called last night and said that I put him uptight and he really wanted things to be natural and flow. I said why didn’t he come to dinner tomorrow? He said he had to go to San Francisco, and I said, how about Friday, and he said [he would] if he could. He said, what was I doing tonight? And I said I had an appt with Marshall Lumsden, but afterward I would be hungry, so why didn’t he take me out for dinner. And he said he’d call me back at 8 but that I really put him uptight. I said, “What do you expect from a 26-year-old Hollywood spinster?” (which is how I feel around him), and I said, “I’ll give you one more chance” (very flippant). He didn’t call back, so there you are.
Let’s see. What else? I’ve been practicing how to make the perfect omelet. They really taste fantastic with jack cheese surrounded by mandarin oranges. Oh, it’s so good.
I’m reading Julian by Vidal. I read Passage to India by E. M. Forster, which I loved, and Burmese Days by Orwell which I liked. I read Esprit de Corps by Lawrence Durrell and a strange book by Niccolò Tucci called Unfinished Funeral which was more depressing than Burmese Days. Also Snow White.
this is fun actually. good eve diary inspo [funny that they have the same name and age]
Well—I’m already 132 lbs, which is very encouraging since I practically starved and exercised all day yesterday and nearly drove myself nuts. However, it seems to be paying off as starving inevitably will.
lolll
This giving-up-smoking stuff is really fantastic. I can do everything except make a collage, go to the Troubadour, and lose weight. Although today I’ve decided not to eat anything outrageous, at least till I get back to 130 lbs. Trying to hold yourself together when you’re falling apart all over the place is extraordinarily weird, and most of the time, I feel like I’m about to topple over or faint. My mother says this feeling only lasts for 4 days. Since my mother, [my aunt] Tiby, and Carol gave up [smoking], I figure I can stop too. Before that, the only people I knew who stopped were men. All I’m going to smoke are joints and hash. I won’t have to lug a big purse with me—I can use my little beaded purses. At any rate—I have the feeling I’ll never smoke again. I hate the idea of going to a doctor and having him tell me I’ve got lung cancer. But my favorite thing is that it’s such a novelty to deny myself something. The discipline is really marvelous. Discipline is really great—I love it.
<3
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