Portrait of an Invisible Man - Essay Example

Essay #2 For Auster, anecdotes are the way that he has to understand his father. Mainly because that is all he really had of his father. His father was inscrutable, a shell, a cypher. There was no way to know his father, as his father never revealed himself. Auster had knowledge of his father, or forms of knowledge that built a history of his father, but never a knowing. Never a knowing, so different from knowledge. You can have knowledge about a person – this person likes flowers, that person likes pornography, another person likes tea. You can either know what a person is like, and this, too, is a form of knowledge – he is nice, she is gentle, he is funny, she is crass. You can know events that take part that involve a person – he was involved in a car accident yesterday, her daughter got married, his grandson was diagnosed with leukemia, she is having an affair. All of this is knowledge, but if this is all that you know about a person, what do you really know? It depends upon how much that person is willing to reveal of himself – his fears, hopes and dream – but, even if there is such a revelation, you still might never really know the person. With Auster, he did not really have any revelations of what his father really was. So, instead, he had to piece together his father from what he knew about his father, the kind of knowledge that builds a superficial accounting of a life but not the knowing of who the person was. For instance, Auster had knowledge of the state of his fathers house. He described the house was a kind of time capsule – nothing changed for fifteen years. No furniture was added, no walls were painted, the pots and pans were the same, his mothers dresses were present in the attic closet. (pp. 8-9). Auster saw the house as representative of his fathers state of mind, for he often described his father as rote, oblivious. That the house remained the same over so many years was a result of negligence, as opposed to clinging to the past. His father treated his house as he treated everything else in his life – he just did not want to be bothered. Auster also saw the house as proof that his father had an empty existence – he spent as little time at the house as possible, as he was always on the go, restless, going out to eat and socializing. He had a restlessness, a lack of center, a sense of being ungrounded. There was no central landing point for his father, as his inner world was empty. Auster also saw the house as a metaphor for his father, a manifestation of his fathers inner world. The house was tidy and preserved, yet was disintegrating due his fathers negligence. Everything was covered in dust, and the dishes, because they were only rinsed off, never washed with soap, was covered in grease. The shades, always drawn, had become threadbare. The cabinets were filled with bug-infested food. The furniture was stained by leaking water. Likewise, to the outside world, his father seemed to have it together, but his inner world was a void, neglected, his feelings put away and forgotten, like the house itself. (pp. 9-10). The house was also an “emblem of solitude.” Auster describes hair coloring products and shirts as evidence of his fathers solitude, for Auster imagined his father deciding, by himself, whether to wear this shirt of that, or whether to color his hair. The hair coloring products, and other items, such as condoms and razors, filled Auster with a kind of wonder, and they provided “remnants of thoughts, of consciousness” about his father. (P. 11). In this way, the house was anecdotal evidence of who his father was. Auster had a knowledge of the state of the house, how the house was kept, and this knowledge was a piece of the complex puzzle of who the owner of the house was. This was one of the pieces of evidence that led the author to the eventual truth of his father. The house was representative of his father – neglected, emotionally empty, unchanging, sad. The house could cease the exist, be carried away in a tornado or burned down, and his father probably would not even care. There would be no attempting to save priceless artifacts, for his father evidently had no connection to the house or any of its contents, just as the father did not have any connection to any person. This is a way to know his father on one level. At the same time, knowledge of the house cannot allow the author to know what his father was really feeling. One gets the sense that the father had some kind of depths, as every human does, but that these depths are buried. There was nothing in the house that would hint towards what really lies beneath. Perhaps it would have been comforting to find photo albums that were lying about, obviously being looked through, or maybe a record on the record player that means something to Auster or his father, because his father might have liked to dance to the record with his mother in their early days. Photos in frames, that were dusted and cared for also would have been comforting, particularly if these photos concerned the author. A coin collection kept pristine. Figurines kept behind glass. A collection of movies. It would have been comforting to have any kind of evidence that his father cared about something, for this would have given Auster a hint of his fathers depths. But there was nothing, so the state of the house could not provide Auster with any new knowledge about his father. Auster already knew that his father was sad, empty and alone, and the house could only confirm this, not provide any evidence to the contrary. Auster did find photos and a photo album, but this did not provide any more clues to what his father was thinking, and his fathers depths, because the album obviously was never looked through. (pp. 13-14). What these photos did give Auster, however, is the sense that his father actually had lived, and that his father was not merely a figment of Austers imagination. They also provided Auster with further knowledge about his father, knowledge that he perhaps never knew before. That his father had a seemingly happy bachelor life, that of a “prankster, man about town, good time Charlie.” (p. 15). Pictures of his father with girls. Of his father on a tennis court, by a swimming pool or log cabin, mountains in the background. These pictures filled in some gaps about Austers knowledge of his father, and they, like the house, became metaphor. His father was superficial, only staying on his selfs surface, and these pictures were representative of this. These pictures told of superficial good times, good times that are meaningful in the present, and perhaps also looking back into the past, but did not connote depth. This depth is what is always missing in the authors knowledge of his father, and these pictures did not aid in finding any depth to his father. Auster had knowledge of his fathers feelings towards his sister. (p. 24). Perhaps Austers fathers relationship with Austers sister provided the most clues to who his father really was. It seemed that, when it came to Austers sister, his father really cared. Perhaps the father did not do the right thing when it came to the sister, as he refused to accept that she had a mental illness and refused to get her help, but he did try. He tried by providing vitamin therapy to her. Auster seems to discount this, but I found it touching that he tried. Yes, the vitamin regimen was apparently quackery, and it was not proven, but it was an effort on the part of the father. Also, the father seemed to have his heart in the right place when he took the sister in after her hospitalizations. Auster saw that his father was finally moved - “but still, underneath it all, I know that he suffered. Sometimes, on the phone, when he and I were discussing my sister, I could hear his voice break ever so slightly, as if he were trying to muffle a sob. Unlike everything else he ever came up against, my sister illness finally moved him.” (p. 27). So, through his sisters illness, Auster finally glimpsed some depth to his father, a tiny peek at what lies beneath. He had knowledge about what his father was going through, and this knowledge translated into feeling, seemingly for the very first time. Through this knowledge, Auster also could understand why his father was so cold – he just did not want to feel, just did not want to face things. With the sister, his father had to face harsh reality, as this was his daughter, and she was suffering. The father could not turn his back on her. He also could not help her. Auster had knowledge that his father was frustrated and heartbroken, and through this, Auster discovered that his father was human after all. Perhaps most importantly, Auster gained knowledge as to what happened to his grandfather. His grandmother shot him in the kitchen of the house when Austers father was very young. (p. 35). This resulted in a sensational trial that ended in Austers grandmothers acquittal. After the grandmother was acquitted, she and her family, including Austers father, moved around all the time, just one step ahead of creditors and angry landlords. It was a hand-to-mouth existence that cemented the bond between the boys, and the bond between the boys and the mother. However, although Auster does not say as much, this incident might have provided the key to why Austers father was the way that he was. After all, he was only seven when this occurred. Perhaps this is when he learned to stuff his feelings. When he created the mask and the wall. As a little boy, this is a lot to deal with, especially when it was followed by constant instability. This kind of existence would probably cause anybody to have problems, and Austers father apparently dealt with this nomadic lifestyle and the trauma that preceded it by shutting himself off entirely. By gaining the knowledge of what his father went through, this probably enabled Auster to understand why his father was the way that he was, and perhaps gain some sort of acceptance. What did not come from this knowledge, however, was any further understanding of his fathers depths and his feelings. Understanding why there is a wall is different from understanding what is behind that wall, and the knowledge of his fathers tumultuous upbringing gave a glimpse of the former but not the latter. In the end, knowledge of events that surrounded his father, and knowledge of his fathers behavior was all Auster had. Auster never really gained a knowing of his father through this writing project, just knowledge. His father remained inscrutable and enigmatic, his true feelings forever unknown. As much as Auster tried, he could not reach the soul of his father, neither in life nor in death. I am sure that this portion of the book was written to try to gain an understanding of his father through translating the knowledge gained about his father, but this was unsuccessful. His father remained an unknown, and that is the real tragedy of the story. Read More