Author: Danielle Schmidt

After a week that seemed like it took centuries to put behind me, I finally made it to Friday night, when I trekked to the Power Center to see Théâtre de la Ville’s production of Luigi Pirandello’s Six Characters in Search of an Author. The actors were superb, the set design was great, and the story itself had just the right amount of absurdism for the laywoman (me) to feel artistic, while still understand what was going on. What I really want to talk about today, though, is the use of subtitles in theatre.

First, to provide some context of the venue if you’ve never been there — the Power Center is large for a local or university theatre. According to the School of Music, Theatre, and Dance website, the proscenium (the area in front of the curtain) measures in at 55 feet, 3.75 inches by 28 feet. And this is where the subtitles were projected — at least 20 feet away from any of the actors’ faces.

If you look at this picture, the screens were hanging from the ceiling in the center and sitting on the stage on the left and right…

Although I was able to follow the French quite well last night, a couple of years ago, when I had considerably less education and work experience in the language, I went to see this same company perform Eugène Ionesco’s Rhinocéros. Throughout the production, I found myself staring at any one of these screens for about ninety percent of the two hour span. I walked out of the theatre really wanting to rave to the world about how much I loved the play and how it enlightened me, because I did love the writing, but I couldn’t. It took me a while to pinpoint why, but sooner or later, I realized that I was frustrated because I wasn’t seeing the movement on stage and the emotions on the faces of the actors. Of course, I could hear the notes of joy, pain, excitement, and terror in their voices; however, I didn’t feel immersed in the experience because I couldn’t rely on the sense upon which I depend most to read people in my everyday life — eyesight. The situation is different with film, I think, because the subtitles are right under the actors. If you read them quickly enough, you can usually switch your focus back to the images above and still catch the visual action unfolding. Twenty feet of distance to travel, though, was a bit too much for my eyes to handle.

After the play last night, the University Musical Society actually hosted a Question and Answer session with the director, Emmanuel Demarcy-Mota. Sitting in a folding chair on stage, this slight man embodied every positive stereotype of a Frenchman. Fitted navy blazer with black everything else. Chic. Check. Impeccable posture and only using his hands to accentuate the important details of his speech. Elegant. Check. His voice increasing to a vigorous tone whenever he really cared about something. Passionate. Check. And he really cared about those subtitles. He kept repeating that he loved how the author could be present through them, complementing the acting, how text can serve as a bridge between the literary and the theatrical worlds of a play. His argument was very fair, and he was very persuasive, but I was still not crazy about them in this venue.

At the same time, I have to admit that without subtitling, this show would have probably never come to the university. The people of the Ann Arbor community, bilingual or not, would not have had the opportunity to welcome a culture so beautifully unique to their own.

And that would have been a shame.

Sometimes, when I’m in Ann Arbor, I walk to Main Street, just so I can see people over the age of 25. Then I imagine I’m somewhere else.

I wish I could say that I love college. I really do. And my dislike of the environment isn’t that I haven’t learned so much about others and myself in my three years here. It isn’t that I haven’t been inspired by certain instructors. I think it’s mostly that I feel an overwhelming sense of exhaustion that comes with living in this bubble of a college town. I feel like the sleepless nights I’ve spent writing and studying have made me age at least 40 years. I feel like institutions of any variety naturally suppress creativity.

For instance, a few days ago, I handed in an essay about the pedestal in this poem.

Please let that sink in.

I spent hours upon hours of my life writing about a pedestal.

One of my greatest fears is that we each have a quota of creativity — a set number of words or ideas in our minds of which we can possibly run out. In fact, in a class this term, we learned about Joseph Mitchell, the reporter for The New Yorker who wrote Joe Gould’s Secret. We learned that that was the last significant work he produced. After its publication, he would go to his office, shut the door, and go home at the end of the day. His coworkers have stated that they barely heard typing and that he never yielded much else. I wonder if he was happy at the end of his life, because the way by which people have described him in his later years makes me terrified. They say he was detached. They note that he would nod at people in the hallways and keep walking and sigh and cut himself off from others. I am so scared of becoming a ghost that haunts the Earth while my heart is still beating.

And this semester has amplified my fear . . .

For a month, I had been researching and writing on the refugee shelter, Freedom House, in Detroit. Residents who were seeking asylum here in the U.S. trusted me with their stories in interviews and I viewed it as my responsibility to portray them accurately in my final piece. After pouring so much time and energy into this project, I moved on to my pedestal essay and simply could not bring myself to care about it. Like Mitchell, I was detached. I ignored phone calls and text messages and stared at my Word document, thinking that I just didn’t have it in me to string sentences together. I would walk to class and nod to acquaintances on the sidewalk and sigh and keep walking.

After spending so much time listening to both optimistic and heartbreaking stories from the residents at Freedom House, all of my other class work seemed so utterly meaningless. I wanted to print my pedestal essay and burn it out of rage. I often found myself wondering — what am I even doing here? In my walks down Main Street, I wanted to just keep going until I passed the city limits and left all of my problems behind me.

One day, after having one of these walking existential crises, I became particularly annoyed when a professor with the most uncaring attitude and a monotone voice to match literally called himself “an intellectual” in class. Now, he may very well be that, but to grant yourself such an title . . . God. I realized that I cannot stand professors who take their job name so literally — i.e. they feel that the only responsibility they have is to profess. It’s as if they are those people who shout that we’re all going to Hell on the Diag — thinking they’re helping the world by pointing out how wrong it is. To be a professor, you need to prove that what you’re professing matters. You need to teach. You need to inspire your students to give a damn. You need to realize that your Ph.D. does not make you invincible. I’ve spoken to so many refugees with advanced degrees in their home countries over the past year. They are struggling with the fact that they will need to essentially start their college education over in America. However, as I listen, what strikes me most in their voices is an unwavering sense of hope that gaining another degree will absolutely be possible. And after hours of staring at my horrible poem analysis, I started thinking of these people and truly understanding how inspiring they are. Because if they’re willing to spend years writing pedestal essays again, I shouldn’t be struggling to finish mine once.

I will graduate from this university eventually and I’m looking forward to it. I’m excited for the day when I can gaze at my elaborately scripted name on the diploma I’ve lost so much sleep and money for. But I don’t expect to feel some sort of magical transformation upon holding that paper in my hands. In my interview with Freedom House’s Case Manager and former resident, Lucy Neighbor, she explained how she helps asylum seekers when they are doubting their abilities to begin again in the U.S. “It’s not a degree that defines you,” she tells them. “It’s what’s in your heart.”

Brevity is always a quality of writing and film I’ve admired. To be honest, I sometimes close my eyes just so that I can internally roll them whenever a fellow student complains about not being able to fit all of their analysis/observations/feelings into only ten pages. As much as I do love to write, being concise has never really been a problem for me. I also find myself never being able to sit still for longer than about an hour and a half — so needless to say, I’m dreading the four hour documentary I have to watch for a class tomorrow.

Probably the master of the minimalist writing craft is the great Ernest Hemingway. In fact, he is often cited as writing the famous six-word story: “For sale: baby shoes. Never worn.”

And these two short sentences are a story. Yes, he is leaving it up to the reader to fill in the details — what happened? Was there actually a baby? Did s/he die? Or was a woman hoping to conceive, but unsuccessful in her attempts? There are many options, and ultimately, Hemingway is entrusting his audience to create their own prologues and epilogues for the scene to which he alludes. However, he does maintain overall control of his story because the six words are still able to evoke emotion within the reader, regardless of what explanation for the shoes they come up with. It is nearly impossible to consider a situation in which this anecdote is a joyful one. In their simplicity and gravity, the words carry so much weight.

And while creating a story in six words is impressive, I saw a similar distillation strategy employed in the National Gallery of Canada last spring. There was this exhibition of significant Canadian figures — be they activists, celebrities, politicians, etc. Next to their portraits on the walls, they had short bios, which began by giving the reader three words to describe the person. This one was my favorite:

“Goalie. Innovator. Knitter.

Goaltender Jacques Plante once said that playing goal was like being shot at. Plante, who led the Montreal Canadiens to six Stanley Cup wins, took action to protect himself. In 1959, he changed the face of professional hockey when he skated onto the ice wearing a fiberglass mask. Off ice, Plante spent much of his spare time knitting, which he claimed helped to calm his nerves.”

Now, although I may have normally seen the word “Goaltender” and walked right by, as sports of any type are not exactly my forte, I was immediately hooked into reading the paragraph below because I wanted to know what he innovated and why he knitted. I learned something about a person that I may have overlooked if it had not been for the short and carefully-chosen description that drew me in.

I’m not sure I will ever be able to adequately express my love for the poetry of e.e. cummings. The poet, himself, definitely has his personal flaws, but 99% of his work is incredible. Probably one of his most famous poems, “i carry your heart with me(i carry it in,” is, in my humble opinion, what love is. There is no further explanation necessary. He should have submitted it to Webster’s.

On the other hand, I do understand why someone would get frustrated with him, because I’ve been this person too. A little bit about myself: I thrive on structure, on organization, and all things linear. I appreciate logic and try find an explanation for everything. So, understandably, when I read my first cummings poem, I wanted to throw it out the window. To be honest, I felt a little deceived, like his signature insertion-of-parenthetical-statements/go-to-hell-punctuation style was a lot like subliminal messaging. I remember thinking: What does any of this mean? Through the years, though, I’ve come to understand that all poetry isn’t something to be read quickly or easily. Cummings forces you to slow down and pay attention to each word that he has taken the time to arrange. He makes you figure it out and that’s why I started enjoying his work. It was challenging art — like a puzzle or a mystery and I was Nancy Drew.

However, I would soon discover that there was danger in thinking that poetry was just waiting around — static, dormant, and ultimately, nonexistent — for me to decipher it . . .

At around this time last year, I was assigned to complete a poetry explication. Previously, I had heard that cummings had written a sonnet about legendary New York bohemian, Joe Gould, entitled, “little joe gould has lost his teeth and doesn’t know where,” and I decided that I absolutely had to use it as the subject of my paper. I had read Joe Gould’s Secret by Joseph Mitchell and loved it. So, I saw this as an opportunity to write about two of my favorite dead men together in a paper. What could go wrong?

A lot.

A lot went wrong when I came to the parenthetical statement, “(nude eel).”

I stopped. And read it about fifty more times, continuing to go no further.

“(nude eel)”

What the hell?

As an English major, I had been trained to look for phallic symbols in everything. So, that had to be it, right? Eels burrow into ocean floors, hiding themselves away, so this had to represent the emasculation of Gould as a starving, homeless man . . . without many clothes?

But it still didn’t make sense to me. Or feel right. Since when did eels wear clothes to begin with? Wouldn’t all of them be nude? And Joe Gould didn’t hide himself away. He was a personality.

So, I kept reading it. And I wrote my introduction and explicated the first three lines to death. After some procrastination, though, I realized I needed to comprehend those two words.

When I reached the point where I was totally out of ideas, I started saying the words out loud. “Nude eel, nuuudeel, nuuu deeeel.” Then, finally: “Oh my God . . . New Deal.” And I simultaneously felt elated and idiotic. How could I have possibly missed that? Or, at least, why did it take me so long?

The answers: Because I was trapped in my head. Because art is something that should be interpreted, but not overly so. It can be natural, even if in disguise. It can make sense.

So often in my undergraduate career here, I have heard English students (including myself) rely on the notion that every little thing in a book or poem must have an underlying meaning in spoken phrases like:

“Clearly the blue curtains are a symbol for the inner turmoil this character feels.”

“Obviously that broken clock in the attic is a metaphor for time coming to a screeching halt in her environment.”

“Evidently, the lines in her face indicate that she feels burdened by the pain of her world.”

When really, sometimes the curtains are just blue. Sometimes there is just a broken clock in the attic and time continues to pass, because, you know, physics. And sometimes, if they’re lucky, people get old.

There can be simplicity in everything that at first seems complex.

Image source: http://www.clivejames.com/pieces/metropolitan/cummings

Fate is a concept that has always seemed very real to me, along with pretty much every cliché that has to do with it — most significantly, that everyone comes into your life for a reason. Now, I’m not saying that this sentiment is as ultimate or profound as it sounds. For example, you could bump into someone on the sidewalk, and the most “reason” it might have is a small bruise the next day. And of course individuals have agency to change their lives. However, I do believe that external forces can be at work in this equation as well — that certain people can truly and positively affect you — whether that be through presenting you with the meaning of life or just catching your eyes and smiling when you need it most.

Because I am so enamored with this somewhat idealistic notion of destiny, I saw it as serendipitous when I came across this line in Truman Capote’s short story, “A Christmas Memory,” when the narrator is explaining to whom he and his elderly cousin give the fruitcakes that they bake during the holiday season: “Who are they for? Friends. Not necessarily neighbor friends: indeed, the larger share are intended for persons we’ve met maybe once, perhaps not at all. People who’ve struck our fancy.”

Before moving on, let’s just pause for a moment to reflect on the beauty of those last three words: “struck our fancy.” To me, this is less a British romantic thing (as in, someone ‘fancying’ someone else), but more a testament to how people can enter and exit our lives, striking a chord within us, so that we are forever altered by the experience of being in their presence.

I was very inspired by this story, as it helped me understand that I should probably be expressing more gratitude in my life. So I have compiled a very short list of people, some of whom I’ve never met, two of whom have passed away, one of whom is a fictional character, and most of whom I may never see again. But they all deserve my thanks, nonetheless, for shaking up, calming, and in some cases, awakening my mind and heart. They are some people who have “struck [my] fancy” . . .

To Arion: Thank you for playing music in ballet class that didn’t come from any standard book. Were they your own compositions? I may never know, but I cannot express how appreciative I am for your rescuing of us from the monotony of that same damn plié song in which all the other accompanists seemed to take comfort.

To e.e. cummings: Thank you for convincing me to believe in the power of poetry.

To little Sam and Abby, mes chéries: Thank you for being the smartest, most loving children and for not letting go of your hugs until I was safe from falling apart at the seams. I know that you will never let society corrupt you. Je vous adorerai toujours.

To the woman on the T that one time in the summer of 2010: Thank you for discussing how talented and gorgeous Robert from So You Think You Can Dance was on the orange-line commute with me after a long and lonely day.

To Dorothy Gale: Thank you for helping me redefine “home.”

To James: Thank you for being the first boy with whom I ever danced and for trying not to cry when I nearly broke your nose in a pirouette.

To the security guard outside the elevator in Centre Block: Thank you for understanding and sympathizing about how much wearing high heels all day sucks and that there was no way in hell I was walking home in those things, even if I looked ridiculous in tennis shoes and tights.

To the drummer of pots and pans at Faneuil Hall: Thank you for being so passionate about creating a rhythm that gives pedestrians a beat of hope. You are inspiring.

About a million more of these are awaiting structure in my head and I could make another (maybe longer?) list of instances where I have witnessed “ordinary” people positively influencing others in extraordinary ways.  There is something incredibly poetic about crossing paths, if only for a moment — something that is impossible to distill to words. In a brief attempt, though, it allows us to avoid becoming static. We move and grow, and through our encounters with others, we connect the world.

Confession: I like One Direction more than any adult is probably willing to admit. Even when I was a camp counselor the summer that they hit it big and crazed tweenagers were screaming the chansons into my ears, I held strong in my adoration of the British boy band.

There is one song of theirs, however, which has always irked me whenever it comes on the radio (or out of the mouth of a love-struck adolescent). It is, the ever-popular: “What Makes You Beautiful.”

In my opinion, the especially problematic lyrics are as follows:

1. “Don’t need make-up to cover up, being the way that you are is enough.”

2. “You don’t know you’re beautiful. That’s what makes you beautiful.”

With regards to this first line I’ve listed, it reminds me of a very passive aggressive roommate I had my freshman year of college. Almost every morning, I would wake up early to apply make-up and one time, she told me: “I don’t wear make-up, because I’m not trying to impress anyone.” My response: “Neither am I. I’m just trying to blend in.” No pun intended, but it’s true. In order to look the way I am expected to as a woman, I need to “cover up” the cystic acne that I have struggled with since I was eleven.

I do not have the appearance of what society deems as “natural beauty” in the morning. My hair looks like I was struck by lightning during the night and my skin’s “imperfections” do not consist of a few freckles. In fact, the year I was on hard-core medication that shut down all oil production in my skin (clearing my complexion, yet also giving me massive headaches and perpetually dry lips), the friends and family members I reconnected with after having not seen them since before swallowing that first intense pill would almost always say something along the lines of: “Oh my God! Your face looks so nice!” And I know they were trying to be kind, but I couldn’t help thinking — It’s great to know that you believe I looked hideous before. Now that the drugs didn’t completely work, I wear make-up, but not because I am vain or want to get laid. I wear it because I want to look “normal”. I wear it because I don’t want people averting their eyes when speaking with me or worse — staring pitifully into mine.

The issue that I find with the second lyric I’ve posted is similar, more general, and a well-discussed concern birthed from the feminist movement — why is a woman measured by her beauty in the first place? And why, in this instance, do a woman’s insecurities make her beautiful? It’s almost like my favorite five-member British boy band is trying to keep my confidence level fairly low if it’s saying that the type of beauty I should be striving for is derived from that special something with which femininity has always been associated: hyper-humility. Why am I not allowed to apply my foundation and lipstick, then look in the mirror and say: “damn, I look good today,” without being pegged as a fake, vain, bitch?

Why is it unacceptable for women to “know [they’re] beautiful” without being told so?