Part 22 (2/2)

It was enough to turn you into a great despairer-if you weren't one already.

To Book-of-the-Month Club members, City Life City Life was pitched as a wacky youth-culture statement. Nothing could have been further from Don's intentions. Most of his prepublication correspondence with Robbins concerned page layouts. ”I've asked for a new black square,” he said with regard to the beginning of ”The Explanation.” ”It solves the problem of having so little type on that page.” And he noted that on page 73, he'd ”killed a line to get a s.p.a.ce which should have been there. I need the s.p.a.ce more than the line.” In a certain section of ”Bone Bubbles,” Don wanted exactly ”33 lines. A nicety.” was pitched as a wacky youth-culture statement. Nothing could have been further from Don's intentions. Most of his prepublication correspondence with Robbins concerned page layouts. ”I've asked for a new black square,” he said with regard to the beginning of ”The Explanation.” ”It solves the problem of having so little type on that page.” And he noted that on page 73, he'd ”killed a line to get a s.p.a.ce which should have been there. I need the s.p.a.ce more than the line.” In a certain section of ”Bone Bubbles,” Don wanted exactly ”33 lines. A nicety.”

These layout problems are the obsessions of an artist worried about every word, every line, every blank. No other prose writer in America thought as much as Don did about the look look of a page, about the way typeface and s.p.a.cing would affect the way a reader absorbed the meaning of a sentence. Don's literary project, exacting, exceedingly careful, was hardly countercultural; rather, it was cultural in the highest sense, that of nudging the culture forward. Like all such projects, it was bound to be misunderstood. Despite newspaper profiles and growing critical attention, Don discovered-as he feared he would-little real change in the world resulting from his efforts. Younger writers were beginning to imitate him. Mainstream magazines were publis.h.i.+ng ”wilder” material than before. But these changes were superficial and left Don dissatisfied. of a page, about the way typeface and s.p.a.cing would affect the way a reader absorbed the meaning of a sentence. Don's literary project, exacting, exceedingly careful, was hardly countercultural; rather, it was cultural in the highest sense, that of nudging the culture forward. Like all such projects, it was bound to be misunderstood. Despite newspaper profiles and growing critical attention, Don discovered-as he feared he would-little real change in the world resulting from his efforts. Younger writers were beginning to imitate him. Mainstream magazines were publis.h.i.+ng ”wilder” material than before. But these changes were superficial and left Don dissatisfied.

City Life performed very well, particularly in paperback, but it hardly reached blockbuster status. Bantam printed 110,000 copies of the book; Pocket Books followed this up with 30,000 more. The initial hardcover sales had been modest. In 1972, two years after the book was first published, Farrar, Straus and Giroux notified Don that they needed to reduce their warehouse inventory. They offered him copies of performed very well, particularly in paperback, but it hardly reached blockbuster status. Bantam printed 110,000 copies of the book; Pocket Books followed this up with 30,000 more. The initial hardcover sales had been modest. In 1972, two years after the book was first published, Farrar, Straus and Giroux notified Don that they needed to reduce their warehouse inventory. They offered him copies of City Life City Life at fifty cents apiece. Don bought twenty copies, and sent a note: ”Why didn't we think of pricing it at 50 cents in the first place? We would have sold hundreds of thousands.” In later years, he joked that books should be sold like paintings: one of each, priced at millions of dollars. at fifty cents apiece. Don bought twenty copies, and sent a note: ”Why didn't we think of pricing it at 50 cents in the first place? We would have sold hundreds of thousands.” In later years, he joked that books should be sold like paintings: one of each, priced at millions of dollars.

If the machinery of celebrity and success, or the perception perception of success, dropped Don deeper into despair, his old habits of walking the city and of studying art kept him afloat. These pleasures are reflected everywhere in of success, dropped Don deeper into despair, his old habits of walking the city and of studying art kept him afloat. These pleasures are reflected everywhere in City Life. City Life. Don had his Don had his own own cultural heroes, who gave him strength: Harold Rosenberg, Thomas Hess-and Willem de Kooning, still for Don the king of romance and artistic dedication. However, by 1970 the art world's publicity machine tended to ignore de Kooning in favor of Clement Greenberg's favorite painters, Morris Louis and Kenneth Noland-and it was harder for Don and his friends, who found Greenberg's enthusiasms soulless, to attain comfort from galleries and musuems. cultural heroes, who gave him strength: Harold Rosenberg, Thomas Hess-and Willem de Kooning, still for Don the king of romance and artistic dedication. However, by 1970 the art world's publicity machine tended to ignore de Kooning in favor of Clement Greenberg's favorite painters, Morris Louis and Kenneth Noland-and it was harder for Don and his friends, who found Greenberg's enthusiasms soulless, to attain comfort from galleries and musuems.

Still, Don tried to engage the key issues driving contemporary art. Herbert Marcuse, formerly of the Frankfurt School, had recently said that art was dominated by the administrative structures of machinery. For this reason, the protests of May 1968 had failed, Marcuse said: Technological systems systems control everything, including social behavior and thought. control everything, including social behavior and thought.

Marcuse's remarks reflected the fact that many artists, including Robert Rauschenberg and Andy Warhol, were working with engineers and scientists; John Chamberlain had accepted a commission from the RAND Corporation. Was art complicit in the horrors of Vietnam?

In this context, ”The Explanation” and ”Kierkegaard” are of a piece with Don's earlier stories, ”Report” and Game,” about military gadgetry. ”Paraguay,” with its futuristic vision of ”sheet art,” which is ”run through heavy steel rollers,” controlled by ”flip-flop switches” and ”dried in smoke,” comes straight out of 1960s art-world conversations. ”Each citizen is given as much art as his system can tolerate,” Don wrote.

Of intense interest to artists and writers was the degree to which individuals were trapped by systems. Words like variable, feedback, variable, feedback, and and looping looping were entering everyday speech as a result of computer research, the s.p.a.ce program, and military research and development. Naturally, art absorbed these concepts. In asking, ”Why is were entering everyday speech as a result of computer research, the s.p.a.ce program, and military research and development. Naturally, art absorbed these concepts. In asking, ”Why is this this thing art?” conceptual and minimalist work tried to implicate viewers in the thing art?” conceptual and minimalist work tried to implicate viewers in the system system of structuring and authenticating aesthetic experience. In ”The Explanation” and in ”Kierkegaard,” when Q or A gets stuck in a linguistic loop-”How is my car? How is my nail? How is the taste of my potato? How is the cook of my potato?”-language reveals itself as part of a system, self-testing, self-correcting, self-perpetuating. of structuring and authenticating aesthetic experience. In ”The Explanation” and in ”Kierkegaard,” when Q or A gets stuck in a linguistic loop-”How is my car? How is my nail? How is the taste of my potato? How is the cook of my potato?”-language reveals itself as part of a system, self-testing, self-correcting, self-perpetuating.

At stake in these art-world debates are two sobering questions, one social, the other metaphysical: 1. To what degree can art humanize humanize an increasingly high-tech society, which is more and more efficient at war? 2. To what degree can an individual in a speeded-up culture live in the moment-and what does it an increasingly high-tech society, which is more and more efficient at war? 2. To what degree can an individual in a speeded-up culture live in the moment-and what does it mean mean to ”live in the moment”? If nothing else, when confronted by a series of identical black squares, or an eight-hour film of the Empire State Building, you become aware, perhaps excruciatingly so, of each pa.s.sing second. If nothing else, when confronted by a hard metallic shape where you don't expect to find it, you may begin to question the beneficence, and the purpose, of machines. to ”live in the moment”? If nothing else, when confronted by a series of identical black squares, or an eight-hour film of the Empire State Building, you become aware, perhaps excruciatingly so, of each pa.s.sing second. If nothing else, when confronted by a hard metallic shape where you don't expect to find it, you may begin to question the beneficence, and the purpose, of machines.

In mid-April 1971, Don entered St. Vincent's Hospital so the latest medical technology could be used to remove a basal-cell malignancy from his upper lip.

His hospital stay lasted four days. ”In my mind, the basal-cell malignancy resembled a tiny truffle,” he wrote in ”Departures.” ” 'Most often occurs in sailors and farmers,' the doctor had told me. 'The sun.' But I, I sit under General Electric light, mostly.” In fact, the cancer had been caused by his heavy smoking.

The doctor told Don that most people could lose up to a third of their upper lip ”without a bad result.” In an autobiographical section of ”Departures,” Don recounted his exchange with a Franciscan priest employed by St. Vincent's. The priest wanted to know why Don had marked ”None” on his medical forms in the s.p.a.ce reserved for ”Religion.” ”I rehea.r.s.ed for him my religious history,” Don wrote. ”We discussed the distinguis.h.i.+ng characteristics of the various religious orders-the Basilians, the Capuchins. Recent outbreaks of enthusiasm among the Dutch Catholics were touched upon.”

He was given a local anesthetic and was aware, throughout the procedure, of ”[s]omething...going on there,” above his teeth. ”I opened my eyes,” he wrote. ”The bright light. 'Give me a No. 10 blade,' the doctor said.”

His ”truffle” was taken to a pathologist for examination. The next day, he was wheeled into surgery, where the ”doctors were preparing themselves for the improvement of my face,” he said. ”I felt the morphine making me happy. I thought: What a beautiful hospital.”

He emerged from St. Vincent's without the delicate, full mouth he had inherited from his mother. His upper lip was almost totally gone, leaving a large white s.p.a.ce below his nose and a tiny triangle of flesh near the center of the absent lip. His grin was more elfin than ever. In the 1980s, when Phillip Lopate met Don, he thought Don was cultivating an ”avant-garde” look by growing a beard without the mustache. Don told him he couldn't grow a mustache because of his cancer surgery. Lopate was abashed.

Don left the hospital with st.i.tches in his face and a lingering morphine high. ”I had my pants on and was feeling very dancy,” he wrote. ” 'Udbye!' I said [to the nurses]. 'Hank you!' ”

A piece Don wrote about his surgery was ”handsomely done,” Roger Angell said, ”but somehow it still sounds like someone talking about his operation.” The magazine turned it down (until it appeared later as part of ”Departures”). Medical, grocery, and other bills piled up, and The New Yorker The New Yorker's accountants continued their arcane practices with all the glee of medieval alchemists. By the beginning of June 1971, Don had once more reached the magazine's ”debt ceiling of two thousand dollars.” ”[W]e are not allowed to exceed” this, Angell told him. Though Don's first-refusal renewal was imminent, The New Yorker The New Yorker did not make advance payments against the renewals, nor did it allow ”our writers to repay a debt to us out of that particular source of income.” Angell added, ”I'm sorry to let you down, especially for such complicated reasons.” did not make advance payments against the renewals, nor did it allow ”our writers to repay a debt to us out of that particular source of income.” Angell added, ”I'm sorry to let you down, especially for such complicated reasons.”

With the st.i.tches out, Don was free to smile again, but he didn't much feel like smiling. He stuck his new face into the wind and walked.

He pa.s.sed the Museum of Modern Art. He recalled an exhibition there, a few years before, ent.i.tled ”The Machine as Seen at the End of the Mechanical Age.” It featured work by Jean Tinguely, Nam June Paik, and Kurt Schwitters. Soon, Don would draft a story called ”At the End of the Mechanical Age.” ”It was a good age,” he would write. ”I was comfortable in it, relatively. Probably I will not enjoy the age to come quite so much. I don't like its look.”

These days, it was hard to like the look of the city's West Side; for years, it had endured the nation's largest urban-renewal experiment, overseen by the all-powerful developer Robert Moses. As Don walked to Lincoln Center for music and film festivals, he pa.s.sed newly dead-ended streets, torn-up avenues reminiscent of Paris under Baron Haussmann. Eventually, Don would write a story about a struggling family called ”110 West Sixty-First Street.” The setting played no part in the story except as the unspoken context in which it unfolds. But the context said it all. West Sixty-first Street was chopped off right where Don placed his beleaguered couple.

City life.

As he walked, Don felt ”freaked out” about many things...and harbored a persistent suspicion that he'd missed something important.

”I have reached an age where I am ready to indulge myself in the luxury of not understanding everything, of not having to understand every last motherf.u.c.king nuance,” he had written in an early draft of ”City Life.” Eventually, he cut the lines. He didn't mean it. He took a long, ragged breath and kept walking.

38.

SLIGHTLY IRREGULAR.

One day, Birgit asked Don if she could initiate an affair with a professor she had met at the New School. Don didn't answer, a.s.suming her whim would pa.s.s and that she was trying to provoke him. He worried about his drinking. Sometimes he blacked out in the evenings after several scotches. The following morning, he'd have no memory of the night before. Birgit's scowl told him they had argued.

Eventually, Don forced a separation. His innate restlessness and the increasing difficulties of living with Birgit's disease led him to want ”more freedom,” Harrison Starr believes. ”He didn't want the restraints and the kind of narrowness they had. He got Birgit settled around the corner on Seventh Avenue, where Waverly Place comes across, in an apartment that was kind of triangular because the Waverly intersection was oblique. Birgit began to unravel. I would go to pick Anne up, or I was taking her somewhere, and it'd be thirty degrees out and she'd have a T-s.h.i.+rt on. Birgit became increasingly depressed and had a couple of very self-destructive affairs...with Anne in the apartment.”

The apartment was ”dark, and it had a feeling of transience to it, as if [Birgit] was just pa.s.sing through...which of course she was,” says Sandra Leonard, an art historian and gallery director who fell in love with Starr in 1971, after Starr's separation from Sally Kempton. Don introduced Starr to her and the couple spent many evenings with Don and Birgit. Leonard recalls the Eleventh Street apartment as ”immaculate,” but after Birgit moved out, it slipped into ”complete disarray.”

One afternoon, Starr, who had bought a carriage house on Charles Lane, and who had, he said, ”always been the practical one for Donald,” got a call from Don. He said, ” 'Birgit.' I said, 'What is it?' And he said, 'I think she's dead.' And I said, 'I'll be right there.' I could see that she had overdosed about ten or twelve hours earlier, and I could see that she was alive. She wasn't going to die. Now whether she was brain-damaged or not, I couldn't tell. We picked her up...and carried her to St. Vincent's, cradling her.”

When Birgit recovered, she and Anne returned to the Eleventh Street apartment with Don. Soon thereafter, he took a studio apartment down the block, close to the Hudson River. Anne thought of it as her father's ”writing studio.” ”It wasn't a writing studio,” Starr says. ”It's where he moved.”

Finally, early in 1972, Birgit insisted on returning to Denmark. ”I think Dad knew that if he didn't let her go back to Copenhagen, she'd try to kill herself,” Anne says. She and her mother flew to Denmark and stayed with one of her mother's friends in a beautiful apartment in the center of Copenhagen. Don moved back to his old place on West Eleventh. Six months later, Birgit and Anne returned to New York, but they did not move in with Don. They took a place on Perry Street. Don and Birgit tried to work things out, but the marriage was damaged beyond repair. Birgit went back to Copenhagen for good. ”Anne was locked in to Donald and did not want to go,” Starr says. ”He and I had a fight about it because [by now] I was kind of a G.o.dfather to Anne. She did not want to go, and I told him, 'Absolutely not.' Then there was some psychiatrist who said, 'The daughter must stay with the mother, blah blah blah.' It was bulls.h.i.+t.”

”Living with my mother was...well, you know...you're a kid. I didn't know any different,” Anne says. ”But I wanted to be with my father. He was more grounded.”

Around the time Birgit left with Anne, Don met the Swiss novelist and poet Max Frisch, whose work he greatly admired. Frisch had come to the States with his new young wife, Marianne, for an extended series of lectures and readings. Marianne was translating City Life City Life into German, for an edition to be published by Suhrkamp Verlag. Don was charmed by her intelligence, humor, and openness. While Frisch-at sixty, nearly thirty years older than his wife-relished his literary celebrity, and indulged in an affair with a publisher's a.s.sistant, Don and Marianne began to spend time together. into German, for an edition to be published by Suhrkamp Verlag. Don was charmed by her intelligence, humor, and openness. While Frisch-at sixty, nearly thirty years older than his wife-relished his literary celebrity, and indulged in an affair with a publisher's a.s.sistant, Don and Marianne began to spend time together.

”Of the women I knew that [were around] Donald, she was quite different,” Sandra Leonard says. ”Physically different, first of all. She was really really a woman. And she was just a delight to be around.” a woman. And she was just a delight to be around.”

Starr concurs that Marianne was ”physically powerful.” In the past, Don had tended to be drawn to pet.i.te women with rather boyish figures. For him, this new pa.s.sion was tinged with desperation: He was shaken by his separation from Birgit, though it had long been coming, and by the fear that he might lose his daughter. He had come to feel he couldn't survive without his little girl.

Marianne was drawn to Don's ”tense” attentiveness, his ”sparkling, cunning, laughing eyes,” and his rueful humor. In a remembrance written shortly after his death, she recalled the day she told him she was translating his book. She was standing at a traffic light, waiting to cross the street at Sixth Avenue and Tenth, when she spotted Don. She asked him what he was doing there. In her remembrance piece, Marianne wrote of Don's reply and the conversation that ensued: ”Intersections interest me. Sometimes cute girls cross.... Time for coffee?”Three meters from the light there was a brightly lit, sad-looking coffee shop.”Do you always cry on Sat.u.r.day afternoons?” ”Often.” ”Are you crying today because I don't write as well as Samuel Beckett?”...”I'm crying, first, because I'm nervous, second, because it's Sat.u.r.day, and, third, because I have something difficult I should tell you.””Something criminal?” ”Possibly...I signed a contract some weeks ago.” ”You're too young for contracts, much too young.” ”But I've signed to translate City Life. City Life.” ”That's no reason for a grown-up girl to cry.” ”I'm worried that Donald Barthelme's prose is too difficult for me-untranslatable.””I will translate him from English into English for you. No problem. That's my specialty. I have translated Tolstoy, Balzac, Kafka, Borges, and many, many others from English into English. I can help you even though my German is non-existent.”

As she worked with him, he was a ”dinosaur of patience,” she recalled, ”a true master.” He ”spoke of music, the music of words that was the most important thing, the rhythm of the sentences.”

”Pretty funny, isn't it? Is it crazy enough?” he would ask her about a particular line.

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