२२ नोव्हेंबर, २०२०

"Morris lived for many years with her gravestone standing in the corner of her library, the ne plus ultra of memento moris."

"She was an inveterate traveler but also prized her house in the Welsh village of Llanystumdwy; she wrote often about its snuggly, hyggelig qualities. Death for her may be something akin to merely being in, to borrow the words of the novelist Joshua Cohen, a bed with a lid. 'I am attracted to decline, to the melancholy spectacle of things that get old and die,' Morris told Leo Lerman in a Paris Review interview. She also joked that when she departed, the headlines would read, 'Sex Change Author Dies.' Jan Morris was born James Humphrey Morris on Oct. 2, 1926, in Somerset, England. From 1964, when she began taking hormone pills, to 1972, when she had the surgery, she transitioned to female from male, a process documented in 'Conundrum' (1974), her critically and commercially successful memoir. She wrote more than 40 books, the bylines nearly evenly divided between James and Jan.... She wrote a fair amount of doddle later in her life; not all of her stuff is worth the investment. (If you can make it through her books on Lincoln and Canada, you are a hardier person than I am.)"

From the obituary by Dwight Garner in the NYT, which distinguishes itself with a headline — "Jan Morris, a Distinctive Guide Who Took Readers Around the World" — that does not say the thing that Morris joked would be the one distinction in the headlines for her obituary. In place of the distinction "transgender," the Times gives Morris the distinction "distinctive." 

I was intrigued by Garner's phrase "the ne plus ultra of memento moris." One's own gravestone is indeed the ne plus ultra of memento moris.

I mulled over whether "ne plus ultra" and "memento moris" should be italicized as foreign language words and looked them up in the OED. 

"Ne plus ultra" — the furthest attainable point or peak of perfection — has been in use in English since the 1600s. A restoration era play has the line "Now Madam, you have seen the ne plus ultra of Art."

"Memento mori" has the distinction of appearing first in a work of William Shakespeare: 
Bardolph: Why, Sir John, my face does you no harm.  
Falstaff: No, I’ll be sworn; I make as good use of it as many a man doth of a death’s head, or a memento mori. I never see thy face but I think upon hell-fire and Dives that lived in purple – for there he is in his robes, burning, burning’. (Henry IV, Part 1 3.3. 24 – 28)

Falstaff makes good use of Bardolph's face. It looks like the face of a man burning in Hell and thus serves as a memento mori, a sobering reminder of death.

ADDED: I was fascinated by this quote from Morris: "What I can’t stand is being patronized by men.... Treated as a second-class citizen. Just because I’m a woman, there are people now who think I haven’t got a mind any more. Sometimes even those who’ve known me before." Presumably, "before" refers to the various treatments she received, including hormone therapy. Did the hormones change how she wrote? "She wrote a fair amount of doddle later in her life," the author of the obituary opines, and I imagine that sounded okay to write because the decline seems to have to do with age and not the hormone therapy. It's politically incorrect even to ask the question whether the female hormones had a negative effect on the writing. 

२४ टिप्पण्या:

Lucien म्हणाले...

Never saw “hyggelig” in print before, but can guess.

Michael P म्हणाले...

Shouldn't the phrase be "mementos mori"? In Latin, both are verb forms, so forming the Latin plural would not be precisely right; but we have adopted "memento" into English as a noun.

Ann Althouse म्हणाले...

"Never saw “hyggelig” in print before, but can guess."

It's the adjective for "hygge" (which has been a trendy topic in recent years).

And he uses redundancy to tell you what it means by having "snuggly" there too. That's the kind of rhetorical move that can be regarded as patronizing.

Fernandinande म्हणाले...

hyggelig

Gesundheit!

Fernandinande म्हणाले...

Shouldn't the phrase be "mementos mori"?

I used one of those internets to discover that "memento mori" is singular and plural.

dbp म्हणाले...

I had read someplace, or maybe it was on an episode of This American Life of a woman transitioning into a man. She was taking hormones like testosterone and reported sheepishly, that she was suddenly very much better at math and physics than before.

Obviously there are plenty of women who are good at math and physics, but maybe it it a missing ingredient in those who aren't good at these subjects. It is entirely plausible that a man who transitioned into a woman would become better at some things and worse at others.

gspencer म्हणाले...

I'd prefer reading about the other Morris.

Morris the Cat.

Hey Skipper म्हणाले...

“ I had read someplace, or maybe it was on an episode of This American Life of a woman transitioning into a man.”

TAL episode entitled “Testosterone.” It’s a good one, describing things that are obvious to anyone who thinks evolution didn’t stop at the neck.

Lurker21 म्हणाले...
ही टिप्पणी लेखकाना हलविली आहे.
Lurker21 म्हणाले...

No, probably just a reaction to seeing your pal turning into a gal. It can be disorienting (or disorientating as Brits say). People don't know how to react and wonder if the old Jim is still there or if they took him when they took his willie.

Whit Stillman worked a politically incorrect jibe about homosexuality declining from a vice of aristocrats to what sweaty, hairy guys who meet in gyms do into one of his movies. Maybe it's the same way with transsexuality. Say what you will about her, Morris was unique in her own day. Not something you can say about today's trans people. She was a curiosity a rarity, in a way that scared people or repelled them, but also in a way that intrigued them. Today the big snip and twist has become normalized and routinized and trans people are less of a conundrum.

But of course, the Greeks managed to be both aristocrats and hairy, sweaty guys who hung out in gyms ...

Kate म्हणाले...

Our gravestone is in the family plot, a place we visit every other month or so. I had no idea we were so ne plus ultra in the memento mori sweepstakes.

William म्हणाले...

Some ne plus ultras are more ne plus ultras than others. There were medieval monks who used to sleep in their coffins in order to remind themselves of the transience of this life. Next to that a tombstone is kind of candy ass. And I bet there were some monks who wore hairshirts when they reposed upon the bare wooden planks. There's always something beyond the beyond.

WhoKnew म्हणाले...

I read one of her books years ago. "Trieste and the Meaning of Nowhere". I seem to remember it not living up to it's intriguing title. And I don't recall any mention of his attempt to change sex. If he'd waited until now to publish it, that fact alone would make the book a best seller and all right-thinking people would be forced to buy it and display it prominently on their bookshelf.

John henry म्हणाले...

I was wondering if I could buy a coffin via the portal. You can, but:

Most are unavailable and they must be shipped to a funeral home. If you want one for personal use you're out of luck.

One of the caskets shown is described as

Overnight Caskets Mother Pink Finish With Light Pink Interior 18 Gauge Metal Casket - Coffin

It looks and costs the same as others but according to one review does not have a USB port.

So why would I need an overnight casket? I believe in the resurrection but it will be a while.

John Henry



BarrySanders20 म्हणाले...

There once was an author named Jim
All his life he felt like a Kim,
So he chopped off his bits,
And grew him some tits,
Now goes by her and not him.

Openidname म्हणाले...

Ave atque vale.

I read her "Pax Britannica"; she was an excellent, readable historian. You know how it helps to have at least one black friend, or one gay friend, to stop you from stereotyping people? She did that for me for trans people. Speaking as a woman, I felt she was genuinely a woman. And she was a very accomplished woman. A credit to our sex.

Of course, that was before it was cool to be trans, and way before trans became a political movement. I liked her precisely because she did it when it wasn't cool, and she wasn't all political about it. It was personal, and I respected that.

I didn't know this before, but I see in Wikipedia that, as a male journalist, she accompanied Sir Edmund Hillary on his Everest expedition and was the first to break the news that the expedition had succeeded.

So quite a life.

Ignorance is Bliss म्हणाले...

When it's politically incorrect to even ask, you already know the answer.

JAORE म्हणाले...

Gettin' hygge wid it.

n.n म्हणाले...

Medical corruption to smooth the cognitive dissonance of trans/homosexual couplets, especially when there is disparate gender (i.e. masculine, feminine) bias, with progressive effect and collateral damage.

Joe Smith म्हणाले...

Let's all celebrate mental illness...

Yay mental illness!

You will be made to care.

Roger Sweeny म्हणाले...

I remember at the time reading in some respectable periodical that the author thought her writing had changed to be stereotypical female, and he thought she was a victim of male chauvinist society's expectations.

Narr म्हणाले...

I never glommed on to Morris, before or after, despite an interest in travel writing (see my profile for details). I did see her a few times on CSPAN and she seemed nice enough, but not all that interesting.

There's also Dierdre (ne Donald) McCloskey, prominent economist and historian, also known to me mostly via CSPAN.

During the latter phases of the War of the Spanish Succession (1701-1714) the French built a fortified line called Ne Plus Ultra about 100 miles long from the Channel south of Calais to Namur. It worked about as well as such things do against skilled and aggressive foes.

Narr
That is, not very

wildswan म्हणाले...

John Donne, the peoet, had himself painted in his winding sheet and set the painting up by his bedside. Izak Walton tells the story
"Dr Donne sent for a Carver to make for him in wood the figure of an Urn, giving him directions for the compass and height of it; and, to bring with it a board of the height of his body. These being got, then without delay a choice Painter was to be in a readiness to draw his picture, which was taken as followeth. Several Charcole-fires being first made in his large Study, he brought with him into that place his winding-sheet in his hand; and, having put off all his cloaths, had this sheet put on him, and so tyed with knots at his head and feet, and his hands so placed, as dead bodies are usually fitted to be shrowded and put into the grave. Upon this Urn he thus stood with his eyes shut, and with so much of the sheet turned aside as might shew his lean, pale, and death-like face; which was purposely turned toward the East, from whence he expected the second coming of his and our Saviour. Thus he was drawn at his just height; and when the picture was fully finished, he caused it to be set by his bed-side, where it continued, and became his hourly object till his death."

And there's a picture here.
http://quigleyscabinet.blogspot.com/2010/03/john-donne-shrouded.html

And he wrote this poem

Death, be not proud, though some have called thee
Mighty and dreadful, for thou art not so;
For those whom thou think’st thou dost overthrow
Die not, poor death, nor yet canst thou kill me.
From rest and sleep, which but thy pictures be,
Much pleasure; then from thee much more must flow,
And soonest our best men with thee do go,
Rest of their bones, and soul’s delivery.
Thou art slave to fate, chance, kings, and desperate men,
And dost with poison, war, and sickness dwell,
And poppy or charms can make us sleep as well
And better than thy stroke; why swell’st thou then?
One short sleep past, we wake eternally,
And death shall be no more, death, thou shalt die.

Bob म्हणाले...

Travel writer Paul Theroux met Morris on the journey around Great Britain that he wrote about in The Kingdom By the Sea, and Morris even then had the gravestone in the corner. Theroux noted that Morris had been proceeded in death by her wife, and that the gravestone read Beloved Friends. Theroux also noted that she looked like Tootsie (the Dustin Hoffman movie) and that when he kissed Morris good-bye, "it gave me a strange thrill."