How does reading (dis)locate space? Reading “The Call of the Woods” (“La voix du bois”) by Pierre Bergounioux

ABSTRACT

This multidisciplinary article shows how reading creates spaces, based on Pierre Bergounioux's short narrative ‘La voix du bois', where the narrator recalls his first reading as an ‘event' that dislocated his reality. First, a literary analysis of this text identifies three types of spatial configurations between fiction and reality: through ubiquity (Rosolato), contact points (Freud) and extimacy (Lacan). Second, multiple losses in the text are examined by a metapsychological analysis of reading based on a re-reading of Freud’s text on the Wunderblock (the periodical inexcitability of the perceptive system would not only contributes to form time representations but also space representations), and on a highlight of the drives at stake in reading, which rely on a quest of lost objects (gaze and voice). A third part of the article connects the three spatial configurations with three types of objects present in the act of reading: the read object necessitates a represented and stable geometrical space, the lost object holes representation and de-stablises space (Schilder), das Ding engages a beyond of representation, dislocating temporarily every representable space and causing an event.

Cet article pluridisciplinaire, qui est basé sur La voix du bois, un petit récit de Pierre Bergounioux, montre comment la lecture crée des espaces. Le narrateur de ce récit se remémore sa première lecture, un « événement » qui est venu désarticuler sa réalité. En premier lieu, une analyse littéraire de ce texte permet d'identifier trois types de configurations spatiales entre fiction et réalité : ubiquité (Rosolato), points de contact (Freud) et extimité (Lacan). Deuxièmement, la multiplicité des pertes au sein du texte est étudiée à travers une analyse métapsychologique de la lecture fondée sur une relecture du texte de Freud sur le Wunderblock (l'inexcitabilité périodique du système perceptif contribuerait non seulement à la formation de représentations temporelles mais également à celle de représentations spatiales), et une mise en exergue des pulsions à l'œuvre dans la lecture qui reposent sur la recherche d'objets perdus (regard et voix). Enfin, dans une troisième partie, l'article relie les trois configurations spatiales à trois types d'objets qui sont présent dans l'acte de lire : l'objet lu requiert un espace géométrique représenté et stable, l'objet perdu creuse un trou dans la représentation et dé-stabilise l'espace (Schilder), das Ding engage un au-delà de la représentation, désarticulant temporairement tout espace représentable et causant un événement.

Dieser multidisziplinäre Beitrag zeigt auf der Grundlage von Pierre Bergouniouxs kurzer Erzählung ‚La voix du bois‘, wie das Lesen Räume schafft. Der Erzähler erinnert sich an seine erste Leseerfahrung als ein ‚Ereignis‘, das seine Realität disloziert hat. Zunächst ermittelt eine literarische Analyse des Textes 3 Arten räumlicher Gestaltungen zwischen Fiktion und Realität: durch Ubiquität (Rosolato), Berührungspunkte (Freud) und Extimität (Lacan). Im zweiten Schritt werden vielfache Verluste im Text durch eine metapsychologische Analyse des Lesens anhand einer erneuten Lektüre von Freuds Notiz über den Wunderblock (die periodisch auftretende Nichterregbarkeit des Wahrnehmungssystems trüge nicht nur zur Bildung zeitlicher, sondern auch räumlicher Repräsentationen bei) und anhand der Hervorhebung jener Triebe untersucht, die beim Lesen auf dem Spiel stehen und die auf eine Suche nach verlorenen Objekten (Blick und Stimme) angewiesen sind. In einem dritten Teil dieses Beitrags werden die drei räumlichen Gestaltungen mit drei Arten von Objekten in Verbindung gebracht, die beim Leseakt gegenwärtig sind: das gelesene Objekt benötigt einen repräsentierten und beständigen geometrischen Raum; das verlorene Objekt durchlöchert die Repräsentation und destabilisiert den Raum (Schilder), das Ding belegt etwas außerhalb der Repräsentation, disloziert zeitweise jeglichen darstellbaren Raum und löst ein Ereignis aus.

Questo articolo multidisciplinare mostra come leggere crei degli spazi prendendo spunto dal racconto 'La voce del bosco' di Pierre Bergounioux, in cui il narratore ricorda la prima esperienza di lettura come un 'evento' che ha dislocato la sua realtà. Inizieremo dunque con l'individuare, attraverso l'analisi letteraria del testo, tre tipi di configurazioni spaziali tra finzione e realtà, caratterizzate rispettivamente da ubiquità (Rosolato), punti di contatto (Freud) ed estimità (Lacan). Procederemo quindi a esaminare le numerose perdite contenute nel testo attraverso un'analisi metapsicologica della lettura basata su una rilettura del testo freudiano sul Notes magico (la periodica non suscettibilità del sistema percettivo contribuirebbe a formare non solo rappresentazioni del tempo, ma anche dello spazio) e portando inoltre l'attenzione sulle pulsioni coinvolte nell'atto del leggere, rivolte alla ricerca di oggetti perduti (lo sguardo e la voce). La terza parte dell'articolo collega le tre configurazioni spaziali di cui si è detto con tre tipi di oggetti presenti nell'atto del leggere: l'oggetto che viene letto necessita di uno spazio geometrico rappresentato e stabile, l'oggetto perduto buca la rappresentazione e de-stabilizza lo spazio (Schilder), das Ding chiama in causa una dimensione al di là della rappresentazione, dislocando temporaneamente ogni spazio rappresentabile e producendo un evento.

A partir del relato “La voz del bosque”, donde el narrador recuerda su primera lectura como un “acontecimiento” que dislocó su realidad, este artículo multidisciplinario muestra cómo la lectura crea espacios. En primer lugar, el análisis literario de este texto identifica tres tipos de configuración espacial entre la realidad y la ficción: la ubicuidad (Rosolato), los puntos de contacto (Freud) y la extimidad (Lacan). En segundo lugar, se examinan las numerosas pérdidas en el relato mediante un análisis metapsicológico de la lectura. Este análisis se basa en la relectura del texto de Freud sobre la “pizarra mágica” (Wunderblock) (la inexcitabilidad periódica del sistema perceptivo no solo contribuiría a formar representaciones de tiempo sino también representaciones de espacio) y en la puesta de relieve de las pulsiones en juego en la lectura, que dependen de una búsqueda de objetos perdidos (la mirada y la voz). La tercera parte del artículo conecta los tres tipos de configuración espacial con tres tipos de objeto presentes en el acto de la lectura: el objeto leído requiere un espacio geométrico representado y estable; el objeto perdido agujerea la representación y desestabiliza el espacio (Schilder); la Cosa (das Ding) participa de un más allá de la representación, dislocando temporalmente todo espacio representable y produciendo un acontecimiento.

KEYWORDS:

• Metapsychology
• Freudian theory
• art
• literature
• representability/figurability

Correction Statement

This article has been republished with minor changes. These changes do not impact the academic content of the article.

Notes

1 Translator’s Note. La voix (voice) sounds of course like la voie (the way, the road to somewhere), thus la voix/voie also suggests a calling, even a vocation.

“Are we heading in the right direction? Oui, vous êtes sur la bonne voie!”

“Are we getting closer to our dream? Oui, vous êtes sur la bonne voie!”

2 “To interpret is first to summarize in order to work on the outlines of the fantasy organization – the key words of the sentence, if you will –, but it is then or at the same time to deal with the letter of the text, its literality, which cannot be insignificant: not only the adjectives, for example, but also the key words, the syntax, the scansion, up to the phonemes and graphemes by which is realized in each of us, at the heart of the encounter between psyche and soma, the inscriptions of language. The main thing for us is that, from the example of Freud reading Gradiva, one can consider reading a text instead of (at least before) pretending to psychoanalyse an author” (Bellemin-Noël 2002, 181).

3 “Sometimes it is in the depths of our planet, at the edges of the Primary, among the petrified trunks of calamites and the fossils of amphibians, that we must seek the explanation of our states of mind, when they are dejected and we claim to disregard them” (Bergounioux and Gribinski 2007, 73).

4 The rear cover mentions that “Pierre Bergounioux explains here his distance, even geographical, vis-à-vis psychoanalysis” (Bergounioux 2019), denoting the importance given by the author to the geographical and therefore spatial dimension.

5 Translator’s Note. The six-year-old boy in Bergounioux’s story (who is actually the author of the story, and hence the story is autobiographical) is in a tedious classroom on a dreary autumn day. He pulls out a book from his desk, which tells the story of a boy, living in a humble cottage with his hard-working mother. During a walk in the woods, a gnome calls the boy and gives him a bag of gold, which the boy takes back to his mother. He opens the bag in front of his mother, and dry autumn leaves fall out. He brings these back to the gnome in the woods, who tells him to look again and he now again discovers a bagful of gold. The parallel is thus drawn between the author’s dreary childhood school experience and his discovery in his desk of the wonderful world of books, and the boy-in-the-story’s dreary life and his discovery in the woods of a wonderful bagful of gold. Bergounioux’s story thus tells the story of his own childhood epiphany in discovering the wondrous world to be found in books … 

6 Anadiplosis is a style figure consisting, in this case, of repeating the last word of a phrase at the beginning of the next sentence (… A/A …). Etymologically, it is a repetition. “Anadiplosis can reflect a twist (of acts, objects, ideas), the repetition of a noise, the repetition of an argument, the echo” (Morier 1961, 25).

7 “I read and I daydream … So, my reading would be my impudent absence. Is reading an exercise in ubiquity?” (Rosolato 1969, 288).

8 The word “annex” (which can be used as well to name the building in which the child reads as the forest in which part of the story will take place) also literally makes a point of contact, although on a more explicit mode of analogy based on the use of “like”: “our body … is flanked like the old Renaissance hotel by an immaterial but not unreal annex” (Bergounioux 2001, 65–66).

9 This wealth is reminiscent of that of the “woods between the worlds” in The Magician’s Nephew by C.S. Lewis, an intermediate place of the multiverse where all the worlds are accessed by pools: “This wood was very much alive. When he tried to describe it afterwards Digory always said, ‘It was a rich place: as rich as plum-cake’.”

10 “The possible is ultrathin. … The possible implying becoming – the passage from one to the other takes place in the ultrathin” (Duchamp, 1999, 21).

11 “A real book affects to some degree what we were thinking and, therefore, what we are. It changes, to a certain extent, the world, which consists, in part, of the idea of what we think it is made of, whether it adorns and increases it, or completes its ruin. But this disaster, this loss, if we overcome them, can be turned to profit, turn into wealth and joy … I do not know of a book, which counted for something, which did not shatter the ground of existence, dislocate my prior poor and coarse views, before destabilizing it, in favour of reality” (Bergounioux 2001, 59).

12 In reference to one of Lacan’s definitions of sublimation: “sublimation elevates an object to the dignity of the Thing” (Lacan 1986, 133).

13 “The visual constituents of representation of the word, one can at first neglect them as secondary, acquired by reading … It is that the word is strictly speaking the rest of the word heard’s” (Freud 1923, 265).

14 Surprisingly, Derrida’s commentary is built on a spatial path similar to the one we follow in reading Bergounioux: a ubiquity quickly set aside (the scene of writing cannot belong to the classical and intelligible geometry of the res extensa), replaced by a vacillation of roles (between the author who reads and the first reader who dictates), to finish on a mise en abyme of Freud making the scene of writing (“Like all those who know how to write, [Freud] allowed the scene to split, repeat itself and denounce itself in the scene”; Derrida 1967, 338).

15 For a more complete theorization of reading at Freud, we refer to Assoun (1988).

16 Based on a study of the superego and verbal hallucinations, Lacan proposed the hypothesis of an invocation, allowing the subject’s report to be reported to different forms of non-sonorous voices, which can be manifested as the “little voice” of consciousness, “big voice” of the superego, or hallucinated voice (Lacan 2004).

17 “Space may be the projection of the extension of the psychical apparatus. No other derivation is probable. Instead of Kant’s a priori determinants of our psychical apparatus. Psyche is extended; knows nothing about it” (Freud 1938, 300).