Professional Documents
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Narrate or Describe
Narrate or Describe
&
I'
CIRJlilC
GEORG LUKACS
by
Page
r-:Pr-1_., \) Preface 7
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c'T
'..,#'.
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r) Healthy or Sick Art? 103
(.) Narrate or Describe? 110
1) The Intellectual Physiognomy in Characterization 149
\)The Writer and the Critic 189
\.q)Pushkin's Place in World Literature 227
I,)
NARRATE OR DESCRIBE? 111
• 'f drama. Vronsky's fall means an overturning in Anna's life.
Just before the race she had realized that she was pregnant
i'
~-"
I.,(.
i and, after painful hesitation, had informed Vronsky of her
A PRELIMINARY DISCUSSION OF NATURALISM AND FORMALISM scenes which provide a turning point in the plot.
The absolute divergence of intentions in the scenes in the
To be radical is to grasp things by the roots. The two novels is further reflected in the creative approaches. In !
root of humanity, however, is man himself. Zola the race is described from the standpoint of an observer; '"
-Marx. [ in Tolstoy it is narrated from the standpoint of a participant...
~
Vronsky's ride is thoroughly integrated into the total action
LET'S start in medias res! In two famous modern novels, of the novel. Indeed, Tolstoy emphasizes that it is no mere
Zola's Nana and Tolstoy's Anna Karenina, horse races are incidental episode but an event of essential significance in
depicted. How do the two writers approach their task? Vronsky's life. The ambitious officer has been frustrated in
The description of the race is a brilliant example of Zola's advancing his military career by a set of circumstances, not
virtuosity. Every possible detail at a race is described precisely, the least of which is his relationship with Anna. For him a
colourfully and with sensuous vitality. Zola provides a small, victory in the race in the presence of the court and of the
monograph on the modern turf; every phase from the saddling aristocracy offers one of the few remaining opportunities for
of the horses to the finish is investigated meticulously. The furthering his career. All the preparations for the race and all
Parisian public is depicted in all the brilliance of a Second the events of the race itself are therefore integral to an impor- .
Empire fashion show. The manreuvring behind the scenes, too, tant action, and they are recounted in all their dramatic
is presented in detail. The race ends in an upset, and Zola significance, Vronsky's fall is the culmination of a phase in his
describes not only the surprise outcome but also the betting personal mama. With it Tolstoy breaks off the description of
fraud responsible for it. However, for all its virtuosity the: the rape. The fact that Vronsky's rival subsequently overtook
description is mere filler U;:-'ihe novel. The events are loosely him can be noted in passing later.
~related to the plot and could easily be eliminated; the sole But the analysis of the epic concentration in this scene is not
connection arises from the fact that one of Nana'smanyfleeting yet exhausted by any means. Tolstoy is not describing a
lovers is ruined in the swindle. "thing", a horse-race. He is recounting the vicissitudes of
Another link to the main plot is even more tenuous, hardly
human beings. That is why the action is narrated twice, in
an integral element in the action of the novel at all-and is
true epic fashion, and not simply picturesquely described. In
thus even more representative of Zola's creative method: the
the first account, in which Vronsky was the central figure as
victorious horse is named Nana. Surprisingly, Zola actually
a participant in the race, the author had to relate with pre
underlines this tenuous chance association. The victory of the
cision and sophistication everything of significance in the
coquette's namesake is symbolic of her own triumph in
preparations and in the race itself. But in the second account
Parisian high society and demi-monde.
Anna and Karenin are the protagonists. Displaying his con
In Anna Karenina the race represents the crisis in a great summate epic artistry, Tolstoy does not introduce this account
110
112 WRITER AND CRITIC NARRATE OR DESCRIBE? 113
of the race immediately after the first. Instead he first recounts ; of the two approaches to inevitability and accident in the
earlier events in Karenin's day and explores Karenin's attitude , representation of fictional subject matter.
towards Anna. Thus he is able to present the race as the climax Compare the description of the theatre in the same Zola
of the entire day. The race itself develops into an inner drama. novel with that in Balzac's Lost Illusions. Superficially there is
Anna watches VroI1.'1ky alone, oblivious to all other events in much similarity. The opening night, with which Zola's novel
the race and to the success and failure of all other participants. begins, decides Nana's career. The premiere in Balzac signifies
Karenin watches no one but Anna, following her reactions to a turning point in Lucien de Rubempre's life, his transition
what happens to Vronsky. This scene, almost devoid of from unrecognized poet to successful but unscrupulous
dialogue, prepares for Anna's outburst on the way home, when journalist.
she confesses her relations with Vronsky to Karenin. In this chapter Zola, with characteristic and deliberate
Here the reader or writer educated in the "modern" school ~\thoroughness, (describes the theatre only from the poil1t of view:
may protest: "Granted that these do represent two different ,>'of the audience.', Whatever happens in the auditorium, in the.
fictional approaches, does not the very linkil)g of the race foyer or in the loges, as well as the appearance of the stage as
with the destinies of the protagonists make the race itself a seen from the hall, is described with impressive artistry. ~ut
chance event, simply an opportunity for the dramatic cata Zola's obsession with monographic detail is not satisfied(!!~e,.
strophe? And does not Zola's comprehensive, monographic, _.<!<::votes another chapter to the description of the theatre as"
effective description provide an accurate picture of a social seen from the stage.\ With no less descriptive power he depicts
phenomenon ?" -'the scene changes, ~the dressing-rooms, etc., both during the
The key question is: what is meant by "chance" in fiction? . performance and the intermissions. And to complete this
Without chance all narration is dead and abstract. No writer picture, he describes in yet a third chapter a rehearsal, again
can portray life if he eliminates the fortuitous. On the other with equal conscientiousness and virtuosity. ,..
'hand, in his representation of life he must go beyond crass This meticulous detail is lacking in Balzac. (!or him the·
accident and elevate chance to the inevitable. theatre and the performance serve as the setting for an inner
Is it thoroughness of description that renders something drama of his characters: Lucien's success, Coralie's theatrical
artistically "inevitable"? Or does inevitability arise out of the . . career, the passionate love between Lucien and Coralie,
relationship of characters to objects and events, a dynamic Lucien's subsequent conflict with his former friends in the
interaction in which the characters act and suffer? Linking D'Arthez circle and his current protector Lousteau, and the
Vronsky's ambition to his participation in the race provides beginning of his campaign of revenge against Mme. de
quite another mode of artistic necessity than is possible with Bargeton, etc.
Zola's exhaustive description. Objectively, attendance at or But what is represented in these battles and conflicts-all
" participation in a race is only' an incident in life. Tolstoy directly or indirectly related to the theatre? the state of the
'integrated such an incident into a critical dramatic context theatre under capitalism: the absolute dependence of the
as tightly as it was possible to do. The race is, on the one theatre upon capital and upon the press (itself dependent upon
hand, merely an occasion for the explosion of a conflict, capital); the relationship of the theatre to literature and of
but, on the other hand, through its relationship to Vronsky's journalism to literature; the capitalistic basis for the connection
social ambitions-an important factor in the subsequent between the life of an actress and open and covert prostitution~
tragedy-it is far more than a mere incident. These social problems are posed by Zola, too. But they are;
There are examples in literature of more obvious contrasts simply described as social facts, as results, as caput mortuum
114 WRITER AND CRlTIC NARRATE OR DESCRlBE? 115
of a social process. Zola's theatre director continually repeats: of prizes to the farmers in Flaubert's Madame Bovary is among!
"Don't say theatre, say bordello." Balzac, however, depicts how . the most celebrated achievements of description in modern '
the theatre becomes prostituted under capitalism. The drama realism. But Flaubert presents only a "setting". For him the ",
of his protagonists is simultaneously the drama of the institu fair is merely background for the decisive love scene between./
tion in which they work, of the things with which they live, of Rudolf and Emma Bovary. The setting is incidental, merely
the setting in which they fight their battles, of the objects "setting". Flaubert underscores its incidental character; by
through which they express themselves and through which interweaving and counterposing official speeches with frag
their interrelationships are determined. ments of love dialogue, he offers an ironic juxtaposition of the
r This is admittedly an extreme case. The objective factors in public and private banality of the petty bourgeoisie, accom-j,_
, a man's environment are not always and inevitably so inti plishing this parallel with consistency and artistry.
mately linked to his fate. They can provide instruments for his But there remains an unresolved contradiction: this inci
activity and for his career and even, as in Balzac, turning dental setting, this accidental occasion for a love scene, is
points in his fortunes. But they may also sinwly provide the simultaneously an important event in the world of the novel;
setting for his activity and for his career. the minute description of this setting is absolutely essential to \
Does the contrast in approach we have just noted ~ise where Flaubert's purpose, that is, to the comprehensive exposition of •
(there is, a simple literary representation of a setting? )
~ ".~ ~
the social milieu. The ironic juxt~position does not exhaust
In the introductory chapter to his novel Old Mortality, the significance of the description. (The "setting" has an inde
Walter Scott depicts a marksmanship contest during some pendent exist~nce as an element In the representation of the
national holiday in Scotland after the Restoration, organized environment. \ The characters, however, are nothing but
as part of a campaign to revive feudal institutions, as a review observers of this setting. To the reader they seem undifferen
of the military power of the Stuart supporters and as a provo tiated, additional elements of the environment Flaubert is
cation for unmasking disaffection. The parade takes place on the describing. They become dabs of colour in a painting which
eve of the revolt of the oppressed Puritans. With extraordinary rises above a lifeless level only insofar as it is elevated to an
epic artistry Walter Scott assembles on the parade ground all ironic symbol of philistinism. The painting assumes an impor
the opposing elements about to explode in bloody conflict. In tanoe which does not arise out of the subjective importance of
. a series of grotesque scenes during the military review, he the events, to which it is scarcely related, but from the artifice
; exposes the hopeless anachroni.'lm of the feudal institutions in the formal stylization: "
and the stubborn resistance of the population to their revival. Flaubert achieves his symbolic content through irony and
In the subsequent contest he exposes the contradictions within consequently on a considerable level of artistry and to some
each of the two hostile parties; only the moderates on both extent with genuine artistic means. But when, as in the case
sides take part in the sport. In the inn we see the brutal out of Zola, the symbol is supposed to embody social monumen
rages of the royal mercenaries and encounter Burley, later to tality and is supposed to imbue episodes otherwise meaningless,
become the leader of the Puritan uprising, in all his gloomy with great social significance, true art is abandoned. The
magnificence. In effect, in narrating the events of this military metaphor is over-inflated in the attempt to encompass reality.
review and describing the entire setting, Walter Scott intro An arbitrary detail, a chance similarity, a fortuitous attitude,
duces the factions and protagonists of a great historical drama. an accidental meeting-all are supposed to provide direct
In a single stroke he sets us in the midst of a decisive action. expression of important social relationships. There are innum
The description of the agricultural fair and of the awarding erable possible examples in Zola's work, like the comparison of
116 WRITER AND CRITIC NARRATE OR DESCRIBE? 117
Nana with the golden fleece, which is supposed to symbolize subordinate mode), became the principal mode. In this develop
her disastrous effect on the Paris of before 1870. Zola himself ment the character and function of description underwent a
confessed to such intentions, declaring: "In my work there fundamental transformation from what it had been in the epic.
is a hypertrophy of real detail. From the springboard of exact In his critique of Stendhal's Charterhouse of Parma, Balzac
observation it leaps to the stars. With a single beat of the wings, had emphasized the importance of description as a mode of
the truth is exalted to the symbol." modern fiction. In the novel of the eighteenth century (Le
! In Scott, Balzac or Tolstoy we experience events which are Sage, Voltaire, etc.) there had scarcely been any description, or
\ inherently significant because of the direct involvement of the at most it had played a minimal, scarcely even a subordinate,
, ) ; characters in the events and because of the general social
! significance emerging in the unfolding of the characters' lives.
role. Only with romanticism did the situation change. Balzac
pointed out that the literary direction he followed, of which
Weare the audience to events in which the characters take he considered Walter Scott the founder, assigned great impor
active part. We ourselves Qrperimce these events. tance to description.
In Flaubert and Zola the characters are I?erely spectators, But after emphasizing the contrast with the "aridity" of the
more or less interested in the events. As a result, the events seventeenth and eighteenth centuries and associating hiITISelf
theIllSeives become only a tableau for the reader, or, at best, with the modem method, he adduced a whole series of stylistic
a series of tableaux. We are merely ~ers. criteria for defining the new literary direction. According to
Balzac, description was only one stylistic mode among several.
He particularly emphasized the new significance of the
II
dramatic element in fiction.
The opposition between experiencing and observing is not The new style developed out of the need to adapt fiction
,accidental. It arises out of divergent basic positions about life to provide an adequate representation of new social pheno.
I and about the major problems of society and not just out of mena. The relationship of the individual to his class had
divergent artistic methods of handling content or one specific become more complicated than it had been in the seventeenth
aspect of content. and eighteenth centuries. Formerly a summary indication of
Only after making this assertion can we attempt a concrete the background, external appearance and personal habits of an
investigation of our problem. As in other areas of life, in individual (as in Le Sage) had sufficed for a clear and compre
literature there are no "pure" phenomena. Engels once noted hensive social characterization. Individualization was accom
ironically thai "pure" feudalism had existed only in the plished almost exclusively through action, through the reactions
constitution of the ephemeral Kingdom of Jerusalem. Yet of characters to events.
feudalism obviously was an historical reality and as such is a Balzac recognized that this method could no longer suffice.
valid subject for scientific investigation. There are no writers Rastignac is an adventurer of quite another sort to Gil BIas.
who renounce description absolutely. Nor, on the other hand, The precise description of the filth, smells, meals and service
can one claim that the outstanding representatives of realism in the Vauquier pension is essential to render Rastignac's
after 1848, Flaubert and Zola, renounced narration absolutely. particular kind of adventurism comprehensible and real.
What is important here are philosophies of composition, not Similarly, Grandet's house and Gobseck's apartment must be
any illusory "pure" phenomenon of narration or description. described accurately and in precise detail in order to.represent
What is important is knowing how and why description, origi two contrasting usurers, differing as individuals and as social
nally one of the many modes of epic art (undoubtedly a types.
118 WRITER AND CRITIC NARRATE OR DESCRIBE? 119
But apart from the fact that the description of the environ above all a manifestation of their opposition, an expression of
ment is never "pure" description but is almost always trans their hate, revulsion and contempt for the political and social
formed into action (as when old Grandet repairs his decayed order of their time. People who made peace with the order
_ staircase himself), description for Balzac provides nothing more turned into soulless, lying apologists for capitalism. But
than a base for the new, decisive element in the composition Flaubert and Zola had too much integrity. For them the only 1
of the novel: the dramatic element. Balzac's extraordinarily solution to the tr,agic contradiction in their situation was to )'
multifaceted, complicated characterizations could not possibly stand aloof as o~ervers and cri~ics of capitalist society. At the
emerge with such impressive dramatic effectiveness if the same time they became specialists in the craft of writing,
environmental conditions in their lives were not depicted in . writers in the sense of the capitalist division of labour. The
such breadth. In Flaubert and Zola description has an entirely book had become merchandise, the writer, a salesman of this
different function. merchandise-unless he had been born a coupon clipper. In
Balzac, Stendhal, Dickens and Tolstoy depict a bourgeois Balzac we still see the gloomy magnificence of primary
society consolidating itself after severe crises, the complicated accumulation in the realm of culture. Goethe and Tolstoy can
laws of development operating in its fo~tion, and the still exhibit the aristocratic disdain of those who do not live
tortuous transitions from the old society in decay to the new exclusively from writing. But Flaubert becomes a voluntary
society in birth. They themselves actively experienced the ascetic, and Zola is constrained by material pressures to be a
crises i!! this development, though in different ways. Goethe, writer in the sense of the capitalist division of labour.
Stenqihl and Tolstoy took part in the wars which were the New styles, new ways of representing reality, though always
midwives of the revolutions; Balzac was a participant in and linked to old forms and styles, never arise from any immanent
victim of the feverish speculations of emerging French capita dialectic within artistic forms. Every new style is socially and}
lism; Goethe and Stendhal served as government officials; and historically determined and is the product of a social develop
Tolstoy, as landowner and as participant in various social ment. But to recognize the determining factors in the formation
organizations (the census and famine commissions, for ex
ample) directly experienced important events of the transitional
upheaval.
1
of artistic styles is not to assign equal artistic value or rank to
these styles. Necessity can also be necessity for the artistically
false, distorted and corrupt. The alternatives, experiendng ,
In their public activity as well as in their private lives, they and observing, correspond to what was socially determined for
followed the tradition of the writers, artists and scientists of the writers of two different periods of capitalism. Narration and I
Renaissance and of the Enlightenment, men who participated description represent the principal modes of fiction appropriate)
variously and actively in the great social struggles of their to these periods.
times, men whose writing was the fruit of such rich, diverse To distinguish the two modes effectively, we can counter
activity. They were not "specialists" in the sense of the pose statements by Goethe and Zola regarding the relationstllp
capitalist division of labour. of observation to creation. "I have never," said -Goethe, "con
With Flaubert and Zola it was otherwise. They started their templated 'nature' witIr poetic purpose in mind. But my early
creative work after the June uprising in a firmly established landscape sketching and later investigations in natural science
bourgeois society. They did not participate actively in the life trained me to a constant, precise observation of nature. Little
of this society; indeed they refused to do so. In this refusal by little I became so well acquainted with nature in its smallest
lay the tragedy of the important generation of artists of the details that when I need something as a poet, I find it at hand
transitional period. This renunciation of social activity was and do not easily err against truth." Zola also expressed him
120 WRITER AND CRITIC
NARRATE OR DESCRIBE? 121
self clearly about his method of approaching a subject: "A
is not in understanding that Greek art and epic are related to
naturalistic novelist wants to write a novel about the world of
certain stages of social development. The difficulty is in under
the theatre. He starts out with this general idea without possess
standing why they still provide us with artistic pleasure and
ing a single fact or character. His first task will be to take notes
still serve in certain measure as the norm and unattainable
on what he can learn about the world he wants to describe.
example."
He has known this actor, attended that performance.... Then
Naturally Marx's observation applies equally in cases of
he will speak with the people who are best informed about this
negative aesthetic jUdgment. In neither case may aesthetic
material, he will collect opinions, anecdotes, character portraits.
evaluation be mechanically separated from the question of
That is not all. He will then read documents. Finally he will
historical origin. That the Homeric epics are true epics, while
visit the locale itself and spend some days in a theatre to
those of Camoens, Milton and Voltaire are not, is simul
become familiar with the minutest details; he will spend his
taneously a social, an historical and an aesthetic question. No
evenings in the dressing room of an actress and will absorb
"artistry" can exist independently of and in isolation from
the atmosphere as much as possible. And once this documenta- ~
social, historical and subjective conditions which are unpro
tion is complete, the novel will write itself. The novelist must )
pitious to a rich, comprehensive, many-sided and dynamic
only arrange the facts logically.... Interest is no longer con
artistic reflection of objective reality. Social presuppositions and
centrated on originality of plotif~()Tt~he contrary, the more
objective conditions adverse to artistic creation inevitably lead
banal and general it is, the more typical "it becomes." [Emphasis
"
battle against the preconceptions themselves and even accepted mode in composition in a period in which, for social reasons, 11~"("1 j
them as incontestable objective facts, his battle was tragic and the sense of what is primary in epic construction has been lost. 1,,~ wei
hopeless. He complained unceasingly and passionately of the Description is the writer's substitute for the epic significance
boredom, pettiness and repugnance of the bourgeois subject that has been lost.
matter he was forced to depict. During his work on each But in the genesis of new ideological forms, an interaction
bourgeois novel he swore never again to occupy himself with always takes place. The predominance of description is not
such filth. The only escape he could find was in a flight to the only a result but also and simultaneously a cause, the cause of
exotic. His preconceptions barred him from discovering the a further divorce of literature from epic significance. The
inner poetry of life. , domination of capitalist prose over the inner poetry of human
The inner poetry of life is the poetry of men in struggle, the experience, the continuous dehumanization of social life, the
poetry of the turbulent, active interaction of men. Without general debasement of humanity-all these are objective facts
this inner poetry to intensify and maintain its vitality, no real of the development of capitalism. The descriptive method is
epic is possible and no epic composition can be elaborated that the inevitable product of this development. Once established
will rouse and hold people's interest. Epic art-and, of course, this method is taken up by leading writers dedicated in their
the art of the novel--consists in discovering the significant and own way, and then it in turn affects the literary representation
vital aspects of social practice. From epic poetry men expect of reality. The poetic level of life decays-and literature in
a clearer, sharper mirror of themselves and of their social tensifies the decay.
activity. The art of the epic poet consists in a proper distribu
tion of emphasis and in a just accentuation of what is essential.
IV
A work becomes impressive and universal according to how
much it presents the essential element-man and his social Narration establishes proportions, description merely levels.
practice-not as an artificial product of the artist's virtuosity Goethe demands that epic poetry treat all events as past in
but as something that emerges and grows naturally, as some contrast to the drama, which contemporizes all action. Thus
thing not invented, but simply discovered. Goethe perceptively defines the stylistic distinction between
Thus the German novelist and dramatist Otto Ludwig, epic and drama. Drama in principle stands on a much higher
whose own literary practice is very dubious indeed, arrived at level of abstraction than the epic. A drama is concentrated
a very correct insight from studying Walter Scott and Dickens. about a single conflict; whatever does not pertain directly or
He declared: "... the characters seem the decisive elements, indirectly to the conflict must be excluded as a disturbing,
and the wheel of events serves only to impel the characters superfluous element. The opulence of a dramatist like Shakes
into a game in which they are naturally involved; hence they peare results from a varied and rich conception of the conflict
are not included to help turn the wheel. The fact is that the itself. In the exclusion of all details not pertaining to the con
author makes interesting what requires interest and simply flict, there is no fundamental difference between Shakespeare
gives free play to that which is interesting in itself.... The and the Greeks.
characters are what is important. And actually an event, no Goethe insisted that the action of the epic be set in the past
128 WRITER AND CRITIC NARRATE OR DESCruBE? 129
because he understood that only thus could there be an effec since he introduces only details that contribute to his goals.
tive poetic selection of the essential elements within the varied The reader takes confidence from the author's omniscience and
richness of life and only thus could there be a representation feels at home in the fictional world. If he cannot foretell the
of the essential elements that would promote the illusion of events, he feels confident about the direction which the events
life in its full breadth. The criteria for determining whether a will take because of their inner logic and because of the inner
detail is pertinent, whether it is essential, must be more necessity in the characters. Perhaps he does not know every
generous in the epic than in the drama and must encompass thing about the future progress of the action and the future
more complex and indirect relationships. Within this broader evolution of the characters, but in general he knows more than
and fuller conception of the essential, however, selection is still the characters themselves.
as rigorous as for the drama. What does not pertain to the Indeed, with the gradual exposition of their significance, the
subject here too is ballast, no less an impediment than in the details are seen in a new light. When, for example, in his short
drama. story "After the Ball", Tolstoy describes with subtle touches the
The involved complexity of patterns of lif; is clarified only self-sacrifice of the father of the hero's fiancee for his daughter,
at the conclusion. Only in activity are particular personal the reader accepts the information without grasping its signifi
qualities in the totality of a character revealed as important cance. Only after the account of the running of the gauntlet,
and decisive. Only in practical activity, only in the complicated where the same tender father acts as the brutal commander at
intercatenation of varied acts and passions is it possible to an execution, is the suspense resolved. Tolstoy demonstrates his
determine what objects, what institutions, etc., significantly epic artistry in maintaining the unity within this suspense by
influence men's lives and how and when this influence is avoiding depicting the old officer as a dehumanized "product"
effected. Only at the conclusion can these questions be resolved of czarism and by showing instead how the czarist regime
and reviewed. Life itself sorts out the essential elements in the transforms people, decent and self-sacrificing in their private
subjective as well as in the objective world. The epic poet who lives, into passive and even eager instruments of its brutality.
narrates a single life or an assemblage of lives retrospectively I t is clear that all the nuances of the events at the ball could
makes the essential aspects selected by life clear and under be revealed only in retrospect from the gauntlet scene. The
standable. But the observer, necessarily a contem!orary to ~ "contemporary" observer, who could not view the ball from
what he observes, loses him,self in a whirlwind ofLdetails of I this perspective or retrospectively at all, would have had to
apparently equal significance~for life has not done its selecting I see and describe other, insignificant and superficial details.
through the test of practice. the use of the past tense in the J The necessary distance in narration, which permits the selec
epic is thus a basic technique prescribed by reality for achiev tion of the essential after the action, is not lost when true epic
ing artistic order and organ,i?:ation. poets use the first-person point of view, where a character is
Of course, the reader does not know the conclusion in himself the narrator, as in this Tolstoy short story. Even in a
advance. He possesses an abundance of details of which he novel in diary form like Goethe's Werther, individual passages
cannot always and immediately determine the importance. are set back in time, if only a short period of time, to provide
Certain expectations are awakened which the later course of the perspective necessary for the selection of details essential
the narrative will confirm or refute. But the reader is involved for revealing the effeet of events and people upon Werther.
in a rich web of variegated motivations; the author in his Only in this perspective can characters assume definite out
omniscience knows the special significance of each petty detail line without at the same time losing their capacity to change.
for the final solution and for the final revelation of character As a matter of fact, with this approach their transformation
130 WRITER AND CRITIC NARRATE OR DESCRIBE? 131
can proceed as an enriclunent, as a fulfilment of the outline either reject any principle of selection, undertake an inex
with ever more intense vitality. Tension in the novel results haustible labour of Sisyphus or simply emphasize the pictur
from this evolution; it is a suspense regarding the success or esque and superficial aspects best adapted to description.
failure of characters with whom we have become acquainted. In any case, the loss of the narrative interrelationship
That is why in masterworks of epic art the conclusion can between objects and their function in concrete human experi
be anticipated from the very beginning. In the opening lines ences means a loss of artistic significance. Objects can then
of the Homeric epics the content and conClusion are even acquire significance only through direct association with some
summarized. abstract concept which the author considers essential to his
How then does suspense arise? Indubitably it does not arise view of the world. But an object does not thereby achieve
out of an aesthetic interest in how the poet goes about arriving poetic significa.. nce; significance is assigned to it. The object is \
at his goal. It arises rather from the natural human curiosity made a symbol. As this process demonstrates, the aesthetic
regarding the capacities Odysseus will yet disclose and the approach of naturalism inevitably engenders formalist methods
obstacles he has still to overcome to achieve,his goal. In the of fiction.
Tolstoy story we know from the outset that the love of the hero But the loss of inner significance and hence of any epic
narrator will not result in marriage. The suspense therefore is order and hierarchy among objects and events does not stop at
not in what will happen to his love but in how the hero mere levelling and transformation of an imitation of life into
developed his present maturity and sense of irony. The tension a still life. Bringing characters to life and representing objects
in genuine epic always develops out of concern for the destinies on the basis of immediate, empirical observation is a process
of the characters. with its own logic and its own mode of accentuation. Some
Description contemporizes everything. Narration }:~count~ thing much worse than mere levelling results-a reversed order
the past. One describes what one sees, and the spatial:'present'" of significance, a consequence implicit in the descriptive
confers a temporal "present" on men and objects. BufirIS an method since both the important and the unimportant are
illusory present, not the present of immediate action of the described with equal attention. For many writers this process
drama. The best modern narrative has been able to infuse the leads to genre description deprived of all human significance.
dramatic element into the novel by transferring events into With devastating irony Friedrich Hebbel dissected a typical
the past. But the contemporaneity of the observer making a exponent of this genre-like description, Adalbert Stifter, who,
description is. the antithesis of the contemporaneity of the thanks to Nietzsche, has been elevated to a classic of German
drama. Static situations are described, states or attitudes of reaction. Hebbel demonstrates how the pressing problems of
mind of human beings or conditions of things---stilllives. mankind vanish in Stifter; all basic aspects of life are smothered
Representation declines into genre, and the natural principle \ under a blanket of delicatdy delineated minutiae. "Because
of epic selection is lost. One state of mind at any moment and moss shows up more impressively if the painter ignores the
of itself without relation to men's activity is as important or as tree, and the tree stands out better if the forest disappears,
irrelevant as another. And this equivalence is even more blatant there is a general cry of exultation, and artists whose powers
when it comes to objects. In a narrative it is reasonable to scarcely suffice to render the pettiest aspects of nature and who
mention only those aspects of a thing which are important to instinctively do not attempt loftier tasks are exalted above
its function in a specific action. In and of itself everything has others who do not depict the dance of the gnats because it is
innumerable qualities. When a writer attempts as an observer scarcely visible next to the dance of the planets. The
and describer to achieve a comprehensive description, he must 'peripheral' begins to bloom everywhere: the mud on
132 WRITER AND CRITIC NARRATE OR DESCRmE? 133
Napoleon's boot at the moment of the hero's abdication is as world-the harsher the disharmony. The dialogue sinks into
painstakingly portrayed as the spiritual conflict in his face.... the arid, flat prose of everyday bourgeois life: the description
In short, the comma puts on coat-tails and in its lofty com declines into the strained artificiality of a synthetic art. The
placency smiles haughtily at the sentence to which it owes its characters have no connection at all with the objects described.
existence." But if the relationship is established on the basis of descrip
Hebbel astutely defines the other basic danger latent in tion, the situation becomes even worse. Then the author
description: the danger of details becoming important in them describes everything from the point of view of the psychology
selves. With the loss of the art of narration, details cease to be of his characters. Not only is a consequent representation of
transmitters of concrete aspects of the action and attain reality impossible in such an approach (except in an extremely
significance independent of the action and of the lives of the subjective first-person novel), but, in addition, there is no
characters. Any artistic relationship to the composition as a possibility of artistic composition. The author's point of view
whole is lost. The false contemporaneity in description brings,_ jumps from here to there, and the novel reels from one per
_ i a disintegration of the composition into discoIlJilected and auto spective to another. The author loses the comprehensive vision
1
1 nomous details. Nietzsche, observing with an acute eye and omniscience of the old epic narrators. He sinks consciously
< symptoms of decadence in art and life, defined the stylistic to the level of his characters and sometimes knows only as
impact of this process on the individual sentence. "The indi much about situations as they do. The false contemporaneity
vidual word," he declared, "becomes sovereign and leaps out of description transforms the novel into a kaleidoscopic chaos.! '/
of the sentence, the sentence bursts its bounds to obscure the Thus every epic relationship disappears the descriptive
sense of the page; the page acquires life at the expense of the style. Lifeless, fetishized objects are whisked about in an
whole-the whole is no longer a whole. But this is the picture amorphous atmosphere. Epic relationships are not simply suc
of every decadent style ... the vitality, vibrance and exuber cessive; and when in description individual pictures or sketches
ance of life withdraws into the minute image; whatever is left are arranged chronologically, epic relationship is not thereby
over lacks life .... The whole is no longer alive; it is a syn established. In genuine narration an author can render a
thetic, contrived artifact." chronological series of events lifelike and meaningful only by
The autonomy of the details has varied effects, all utilizing approaches of considerable complexity. In narration
deleterious, on the representation of men's lives. On the one the writer must move with the greatest deftness between past
hand, writers strive to describe details as completely, plasticly and present so that the reader may grasp the real causality of
and picturesquely as possible; in this attempt they achieve an the epic events. And only the experience of this causality can
extraordinary artistic competence. But the description ofthings communicate the sense of a real chronological, concrete,
no longer has anything to do with the lives of characters. Not historical sequence, as in the double narration of the race in
only are things described out of any context with the lives of Tolstoy'S Anna Karenina. Similarly, with what art does Tolstoy
the characters, attaining an independent significance that is in Resurrection expose bit by bit the background to the rela
not their due within the totality of the novel, but the very tionship between Nechlyudov and Maslova, introducing an
manner in which they are described sets them in an entirely additional detail whenever the illumination of a moment in
different sphere from that in which the characters move. The the past is needed to advance the action another step!
more naturalistic writers become, the more they seek to portray Description debases characters to the level of inanimate
only common characters of the everyday world and to provide objects; as a result a basic principle of epic composition is
them only with thoughts, emotions and speech of the everyday abandoned. The writer using the descriptive method starts out
134 WRITER AND CRITIC NARRATE OR DESCRIBE? 135
with things. (We have seen how Zola conceives the writer's most natural fashion" implies that the characters either fall
confrontation of a subject. The actual core of his novels is a into no relationships at all or at best into transient and super
complex of facts: money, the mine, etc.) The consequence of ficial relationships, that they appear suddenly and just as
this approach is that the varied manifestations of a complex suddenly disappear, and that their personal lives-since we
of objects determine the organization of the novel, as in N ana, scarcely know them--do not interest us in the least, and that
where the theatre is described in one chapter from the view they take no active part in a plot but merely promenade with
point of the audience and in another from backstage. The varying attitudes through the externalized objective world
characters' lives, the careers of the protagonists, merely consti described in the novel. That is certainly "natural" enough. The
tute a loose thread for attaching and grouping a series of question is: what is the result for the art of narration?
pictures of objects, pictures which are ends in themselves. Dos Passos is no common talent and Sinclair Lewis is an
Matching this spurious objectivity is an equally spurious outstanding writer. Thus what Sinclrur Lewis says in the same
subjectivity. For from the standpoint of epic interrelationships essay about Dickens' and Dos Passos' characterization is
not much is gained when a simple successi911 of events pro significant: "Of course Dos Passos created no such enduring
vides the motive principle of the composition or when a novel characters as Pickwick, Micawber, Oliver, Nancy, David and
is based on the lyrical, self-orientated subjectivity of an isolated his aunt, Nicholas, Smike, and at least forty others, and he
individual; a succession of subjective impressions no more will never succeed in doing so." An invaluable admission and
suffices to establish an epic interrelationship than a succession quite honest. But if Sinclair Lewis is right, and undoubtedly he
of fetishized objects, even when these are inflated into symbols. is, what then is the artistic value of the "most natural fashion"
From an artistic point of view, the individual pictures in both of relating characters to the action?
cases are as isolated and unrelated to each other as pictures in
a museum.
Without the interaction of struggle among people, without
v
testing in action, everything in composition becomes arbitrary But what about the intensive existence of objects? The
and incidental. No psychology, no matter how refined, and poetry of things? The poetic truth of description? These are
no sociology, no matter how pseudo-scientific, can establish the objections of the admirers of the naturalistic method.
epic relationships within this chaos. In reply one must return to the basic principles of epic art.
The levellipg inherent in the descriptive method makes How are things rendered poetic in epic poetry? Is it true that
everything episodic. Many modern writers look contemptuously a description accomplished with ~irtuosity and perfection of
at the old-fashioned, complicated methods by which the old technical detail of a setting like a theatre, a market or a stock
novelists set their plots into motion and elaborated an epic exchange will really transmit the poetry in the theatre or the
composition with all its involved interaction and conflict. Thus stockmarket? It is certainly doubtful. Boxes and orchestra,
Sinclair Lewis contrasts Dickens' method of composition with stage and parterre, backstage and dressing-room are in them
Dos Passos' to the latter's advantage: "And the classical selves inanimate, absolutely unpoetic and void of interest. And
method--oh yes, was painstakingly spun out. Through an ill they remain so even when thronged with characters in whose
fated coincidence Mr. Jones and Mr. Smith are sent out in the lives we have been involved. Q!!l.y-_when..~ Jh~a.~I'.e.gL~ ..s!9ck
same coach so that something pathetic and entertaining may ex~l:1.~!lge .P!gyide. .tlle.~e!!<lJ~.r~~_~~.~_~!p'~~!io!lS, _. ~_~!~g~ or
occur. In Manhattan Transfer people do not run into each '!. battlefield forIIlen)strugg!e.sw.ith each other, d2 they be
other on the road but meet in the most natural fashion." "The -.cQme~'PQetic. ·~~()IlJY.'Yll~n... t.hey.i~rIiISii~~ihe ind~p'~nsable
136 WRITER AND CRITIC NARRATE OR DESCRIBE? 137
s_ellicle for transmitting human relationships d() they, acquire expressed this tendency most clearly and paradoxically,
-p()~T~vaJ..l!~ or b~£2!!!~E~eti~-~~~lves."· -,,-- -- writing: ". . . every artistic production comes to grief when
<A:._"PQ~try_QL!hings" indepeI)dent of peoplt?_~.9~le's only artists can appreciate its beauty. . . . This is one of the
...
Jb:,~ c:l~es I!Q!~~~_~.1 in literature .. It is more than questionable greatest stupidities ever expressed. It is d'Alembert's." To
whether totality of description, so highly praised, and accuracy combat the profound truths of the Enlightenment, the fore
of technical detail even result in an effective representation of runners of naturalism embraced without reservation the theory
the objects being described. Anything which plays a meaning of art for art's sake.
ful role in the activity of a man about whom we are concerned Objects come to life poetically only to the extent they are
becomes poetically significant (given a certain literary compe related to men's life, that is why the real epic poet does not
tence) precisely because of its relationship to the character's describe objects but exposes their function in the mesh of
activity. One has only to recall the profound poetic effect of human destinies, introducing things only as they play a part
the tools rescued from the shipwreck in Robinson Crusoe. in the destinies, actions and passions of men.~.Qg under- ~-:.\\ ,\\
On the other hand, consider any descriptiop at all in Zola. stood this principle of poetic composition. '~Lfind t~r "
Take, for example, backstage in N ana. "A painted curtain _cl~l?ictsnothing .but ;tction."he._wr9t~, '.'thathe ckpictS-..all \,'
was lowered, the set for the third act: the grotto on Mt. Aetna. indiy_ic:l.':l~!_9~je.~t~aIlg people onlythX()IJKhJ;t.~..P~L~<::jpation \'" \'
Stagehands planted poles in slots in the floor, others fetched the jE~~n". In the Laocoon Lessing provides an example ,< ~" ..
flats, pierced them and tied them with strong rope to the poles. of this observation so striking that it is worth quoting in
In the background a lightman set a spot with flames behind entirety.
red panes to simulate the blaze of Vulcan's forge. The entire He is discussing the description of the two sceptres, Aga
stage was a mad rush, a hustle and bustle in which, however, memnon's and Achilles': " ... if, I say, we needed a more
the tiniest movement was purposeful and calculated. In the complete, a more precise image of this important sceptre, what
midst of this hurly-burly the prompter strolled with tiny steps, would Homer do? Would he picture the wood and the carved
stretching his legs." head in addition to the gold nails ? Yes, if the description were
What purpose does such a description serve? Anyone to serve later as an heraldic emblem 1 that someone might
ignorant of the theatre obtains no real insight; for the sophisti subsequently reproduce in every detail. And yet I am certain
cated such a description presents nothing new. Artistically it that many modern poets would give a description of such an
is superfluous. And this striving after maximum objective heraldic emblem in the sincere conviction that they had
"accuracy" harbours a serious danger for the novel. One does achieved a true picture if a painter would be able to reproduce
not need to understand anything about horses to appreciate it. What does Homer care about how much he leaves for the
the drama in Vronsky's race. But the naturalists aspire to ever painter to do ?,_ I~~~(LQt a d,etailed picture he gives u~J~e
greater technical "precision" in terminology; in increasing 1!!s!QX:Y..Qf. the sceptre~ First' its ~carvrng-by'Vulcan; ihen"how it
measure they employ the jargon of the field with which they shines in Jupiter's hands; now as a symbol of Mercury's
are dealing. Thus just as he speaks professionally of "flats", dignity, then as the staff of command of the warlike Pelops,
Zola would, whenever possible, describe a studio in the terms next as the shepherd's crook of the peaceful Atreus .... When
of the painter and a metal shop in the terms of the metal Achilles swears by his sceptre to avenge himself for the con~
worker. What results is a literature for specialists, for literateurs tempt shown him by Agamemnon, Homer relates the history
who have a connoisseur's appreciation of the painstaking assim 1 Here, in effect, Lessing is criticizing the "precision" of the Glncourts
ilation of such technical knowledge and jargon. The Goncourts and of Zola.-GL.