[.ca] Cosmos & Pornografia (ISBN 0802151590)

For example:
I'm joining the chorus of those asking for a direct translation. Let me quote the opening paragraph of the novel I translated from the original as a quick test: "But let me tell you another, even more curious adventure... Sweat, Fuks walks on, me behind him, trouser-legs, heels, sand, we plod on, plod on, earth, ruts, clod, glitter from glassy pebbles, glare, the heat buzzes, shimmering, everything black with sunlight, houses, fences, fields, woods, this road, this march, where from, how, it's a long story, to tell you the truth I was sick of my father and mother, my family in general, besides I wanted to do away with at least one exam, also to try a change, leave it all, live somewhere far away for a while. So I took off to Zakopane, I walk through Krupówki, think where the heck to get a cheap pension when I run into Fuks, his red-haired faded blond mug, protruding, his gaze pasted with apathy, but he was happy, and I was happy, how are you, what are you doing here, I'm looking for a room, so am I, I have an address - he said - of a small manor-house where it's cheaper as it's a long way out, almost bare countryside. So we walk, trouser-legs, heels in sand, the road and the heat, I look down, earth and sand, the pebbles sparkle, one, two, one, two, trouser-legs, heels, sweat, sleepiness in tired eyes from the train and nothing besides this pacing from down below. He stopped." If you have the book handy you'll notice how the published English version breaks up Gombrowicz's long meandering sentences and how it flattens certain phrases ("gaze pasted with apathy" becomes "fishlike eyes") not to mention misspelling one of the main character's names. Another example, a short one this time: "...how many times have I told her, Kata, don't be lazy, don't be afraid, go to the surgeon, get the operation done, get that appearance of yours regulated..." becomes: "...how many times have I told her not to put it off any longer but to go and see the surgeon and have it done...".

The Internal Cosmos:
These novels map internal states, tenors of mind, and they do so with courage, dramatising the internal by portraying fantastic events in the external world. 'Cosmos' focuses (obsessively) on a conjuction of paranoia and an irrational insistence for connections on the part of its young protagonist. 'Pornographia' shows elders living vicariously through the apetites of the young. * Both novels seem to satirise the basic premises of the bourgeois comedy of manners, being set in country households filled with characters respectful of middle-class ideals, only to unveil irrational psychological forces close by the surface. It is hard to imagine either novel being written without the author living through the horror of the Second World War - rationality itself and, more specifically, the veneration of tradition and culture are under attack - how can Gombrowicz have faith in such concepts when he has witnessed the unthinkable brutality initiated by so-called civilised, rational individuals, most notably by those inhabiting arguably the most civilised and rational of nations? Settings and presuppositions that functioned admirably in the work of Thomas Mann, or at least stumbled by in Chekov, now not only fail dismally, but engender a grotesque horror show. * Similar responses arose after the First World War, most persistently in the guise of surrealism. Their effects linger to this day - a suspicion of the merits of rationality still inhabits critical thinking, and few would subscribe to the idea that education and cultural refinement guarantee the moral and ethical worthiness of a person (thus we have the archetypal psychopath who listen to Beethoven as in 'A Clockwork Orange', and numerous other related examples inhabiting popular culture (the villains in James Bond movies, or even the Rickman character in 'Die Hard'). Gombrowicz lends his own unique voice to this chorus. * The literary style remains readable despite certain difficulties, possibly arising from translation. It is also very humorous, in the way that the Samuel Beckett of 'Watt' or 'Molloy' is humorous, and indeed Gombrowicz's assault on the mechanisms of rationality is reminiscent to that found in 'Watt'. * For me, these works appeal in the similar ways to those of Bruno Schulz, Stig Dagerman, Kafka, John Hawkes, Celine, and, as mentioned, Beckett, but beyond the similarities these novels are something special and inimitable. Hope this is something of a guide for what lies in store for you.

Test of a Mind:
'Cosmos', considered Gombrowicz's best novel, is an absurdist mystery in which the instinctive human search for order and meaning becomes the "culprit," just as it had in 'Pornografia'. Most of his writings, in fact, deal with the distorting power of Form over the human mind, the seductive allure of immaturity (formless yet imbued with the potential for form), and thus with the questions of identity and the possibility of relationship. His fiction hinges on moments in which the antithesis or incongruity of Form and reality becomes public and undeniable, and Gombrowicz is often as hilarious as he is revealing...this is worth the read!

Surrealism Without Parallel:
"Cosmos" cannot be compared to ordinary literature. Its closest companion might be Kafka's "The Castle." It brings out the potency and 'uniqueness of individual experience' by original and bizarre methods indicative of abnormal psychology. The narrator, of the same name as the author, is baffled by events which may not be events. He comes across a sparrow hung by wire on the branch of the tree. Later on he rents a boarding house whereupon he stumbles on a piece of wood, likewise hung by wire, in the backyard. Is there a connection between the sparrow and wood? This type of anxiety over something, which may be nothing at all, recurrs throughout. The mind of the narrator is mystified by objects, people, and senses of strangeness. The individual characters become unusual. There are instances of silence, mysticism, and suspense. The sentencing is done via fragments. My father once said that Gombrowicz had "the intensity of Kafa with the prose of Fitzgerald." "Pornographia," written later, is more poetically sound than "Cosmos." Very simply, "Pornographia" is about what I call "the vitality of youth." Old men in rural Poland are transfixed by two teens, a boy and girl, who may as well be having sex. But they may only be friends. A fascination envelops...then murder. Chances are I have not done Witold Gombrowicz justice. My attempted descriptions of his work are not competent enough. You see, his books have a life of their own: they are haunting. For this reason, Gombrowicz is among the best literary figures of the twentieth century.

Anybody ought to like this:
Occasionally a novel demonstrates a better approach to philosophy than anything modern professors study in the texts of philosophy. The idea that philosophy is merely a professional field in which rivals compete over who has a rationally systematic form of competence within a political system that bears little relevance to the world as it usually is, full of events that hardly maintain any notion of classical forms of reality, and often producing thoughts that stray far from rational systems, personal principles, or helpful advice, offers the novelist with some knowledge of this void a fertile field in which ideas can advance in unexpected directions. The novel COSMOS by Witold Gombrowicz was published in Polish in 1965, translated into French and German, and Eric Mosbacher managed to produce the English version from the other translations in 1967. It took me a long time to discover Witold Gombrowicz, and after reading that his modern viewpoint was much more comic than Sartre, I read PORNOGRAPHIA, which is a brilliant novel, originally published in Polish in 1960, first. I was impressed by its picture of individual wartime strategies set in Nazi-occupied Poland, but I was slow to appreciate how COSMOS might offer a better appreciation of how society makes personal demands on many levels. In the years that have passed since I finally read it, I have often thought that it could be a bitter lesson for young people who face the problem of shaping an individual personality to fit whatever job seems most appropriate for them in our society, which is becoming far too comic for this question to be answered seriously in a philosophical manner. The beginning of COSMOS, with its hanged bird, "Its little head was bent and its mouth wide open," (p. 10), was set in journalistic hyperbole. The world could hardly search for significance in a scene in which "the bad road, and the ruts and lumps of earth and heels, trouser-legs, stones, and all this vegetation, all culminating like a crowd genuflecting before this hanged sparrow--reigning triumphant and eccentric over this outlandish spot." (p. 10). Taking the title literally with such an opening scene suggests a work that will slog through a tremendous amount of irony on its way to some poetic justice. In a comic society, the last laugh has to be what works best, and ultimately COSMOS is a guide to the nature of the character most likely to have the last laugh. Though there are more people in this book than I can describe, I find that the comic elements can be traced with a few. "Fuchs tramped on ahead and I followed behind." (p. 9). Two men, described as "And so you two gentlemen are working for exams" (p. 15), looking for a good cheap place to stay, find a notice of rooms to let on a fence shortly after they saw the hanging sparrow. "Mr Wojtys, a retired bank manager, complete with signet ring and gold cuff-links" (p. 14). His daughter, "Lena was married. Her husband appeared after we had started dinner." (p. 22). They had been married two months and were living with her parents until their house was ready. Director Krysinski, described by Leo Wojtys as demanding "incongruence or contrariety which, he maintained, every candidate for high position must have at his fingertips." (p. 40). When Lena's husband Louis suggested "Rational organization of society and of the world," (p. 46), Leo "splayed his fingers like the claws of a beast of prey, advanced them across the tablecloth, and then opened his hand and blew on it. `One puff and it's gone, don't you see?' he said. `Gone, just like that.' " (p.46). The narrator admits to "feeling pleasure as well as dismay, pleasure at having brought off a coup" (p. 70) after one surprising episode. The entire household gathered to discuss what was going on. "What a kettle of fish. . . . He had no need to say any more to make us feel like a couple of pitiful beggars scratching about on a refuse heap." (p. 76). The key characters take an excursion to the mountains, joined by two other newlywed couples who were friends of Lena. Finally the fun starts: "Gradually things livened up in the carriage. The newlyweds, who were called Lolo and Lola, grew more animated, and after a bout of preliminary exchanges such as `Oh, Lolo, have I forgotten the thermos?' and `Lola, take this bag, it's in my way,' they gave themselves up completely to lolery." (p. 95). When they get to the mountains, the carriage picks up a priest who got lost on an excursion. "He climbs into your carriage and you are confronted with sin." (p. 103). A fine discussion of baths and washing on pages 110-111 is ended by a single comment which "cut right through the loloing of the Lolos," (p. 111). Lena's mother does not approve of Lena's friends. "Have you ever seen such a hussy? She can't even leave a priest alone." (p. 134). The pattern of the scattering of jokes was "the sticky honey of that triple honeymoon." (p. 136). "The Lolos were going for Fuchs, but of course Jadeczka was their real target, Fuchs was only the cushion off which the billiard balls bounced, and he knew it, but he was delighted at being bombarded with their jokes;" (p. 136). It is the comic nature of society that makes the reader most likely to sympathize with those who find a way to enjoy themselves, and eventually feel relieved that the more serious elements of the plot do not involve them at all. Something deeply disturbing is going on in this book, but social life takes place on another level, which seems to be difficult for the priest to enjoy. Events of a darker nature form a "series like a, b, c, d or 1, 2, 3, 4. What consistency, what subterranean logic. It leapt to the eye." (pp. 156-157).