20

8 9 , 13/5/2010
(7- Human Stain -8
)

Oscar winning Director Robert Benton 2003

Kramer vs. Kramer
Pieces in the Heart
Nobodys Fool

1st part of the book

Pay attention to the structure
The human stain (book)
The book has 5 chapters
Thats what comes of his life with people like us. The human stain
We leave a stain, we leave our imprint, impurity abuse,
errorimplication of human stain
We are in 1998: Lewinski and Viagra
Historical novel (1998) summer of Clinton scandal and when the Viagra
kicks off the market place. The history of desire; not only sexual. But
desire to perform your life.
Historical markers are mundane and debased but the novel evokes transhistorical truths such as the history of desire. Element of History in
postmodernism: A tendency to rewrite history irony.

(Why does Roth start the story giving the parallel story of Monica-Clinton?)
Puritan ethic how Americans should be
At the beginning Roth states that he wants to criticize this ecstasy of
sanctimony.
Why Clinton-Monica is important?
How the novel is extended to a larger critique of the 20 th century
culture?
Roth builds up a plot as a microcosmic case the individual case of the
hero/Silk to tell us something for 20th century culture in general
The desire to impeach the president is out of proportion to the crime the
hypocrisy of people.
It is possible that congressmen railing against Clinton were covering up
their own offenses or inner desires
The underlying message zealots of the left and right are tainted by the
same disease: smugness and self-righteousness.
Roths fury at American Puritanism and his vehement contempt for all
forms of moral scapegoating
The cultural implication of political correctness
Political correctness is a historical element that spread in the cultural
community with focus on the language.

Novel belongs in the identity plot genre. The construction of identity is it

racial? Biological? Essence? Performance?
Tension with individuals in a group tension between the I and the We.
Plot twists in this classical theme.
Page 106 the protagonist decides not to conform to the group. He hated
Howard.
Coleman reference to his race (middle name Brutus reference to
betrayal)

The novel is also about class limits/transgressions not only about race.
I VS WE (page 108)
Pioneers! Book The pioneers

The great of the greatest pioneers of the I They create their own self
(Emerson, Whitman, Gatsby etc)
p. 144 Coleman decides to get rid of the ancestors worship. The hell with
that imprisonment - Radical un-freedom: he wants to be different than
the usual we. He wants to be himself.

Identity as fluidity

He could play his skin however he wanted, color himself as he chose

(p.109)

Although his father gave them middle names from Sh and tried to
show them the grandeur of the English language he gains his power
from the act of performing his identity

(p.109)
He wants to transgress every group he is in (all sorts of border), to create
his own life.
Character..became personality. Became identity (fluid etc)
Novels point of view (Nathan Zuckerman)
Judith Butler: sex/race is a social construction

Steenas dance (more than foreplay)

Full of connotations novel; sth that does not come up in the movie
(p.115)

In the dance scene with Nathan the description of his body is

revealing (p.21-22).

Body as revelation its transparency

Coleman is still the maker of himself in the world

Jazz music hybrid music (black and Jewish!?!) +Steenas pure whiteness
It evokes an identity of absolute fluidity..

Irony
Who are you? emphasis on identity..
(Identity as secrecy)
p.93 They learned the power of naming precisely It is exactly what
Coleman does not do. He uses his father lessons in a subversive manner!
Decision not to be classified!
The materiality of the body
(The dance with Nathan) revealing some elements of Colemans identity
(p.21)
Importance of physique but also mind! Boxing emphasis on being smart
for Coleman. Not an overpowered opponent but a cunning one!
Like the Human Stain is the sequel of Ellisons The Invisible Man that
he never got to write!
Boxing as metaphor (boxing in American literature) individualism!
Tattoo as a symbol of the decision of his passing / permanency/ human
stain
Physical markers reveal sth about ones identity. But the book is contrary
to that; to those markers. The details are the ciphers that make us
different. Million little symbols
People identities are not transparent!
THE BODY AS CIPHER
The blue tattoo as a sign of difference
Coleman is not decipherable
Tuesday the 25th makeup class at 9am

LILY-WHITE face
Language as a demonstration of identity (p.182) revealing and concealing
Coleman uses it to Nelson when he is enraged with him. It slips from his
mouth.
He is angry and he reveals sth about himself.
Delphine Roux (Delphine mysteries) but she lacks complexity
(P.38-39)

Secrecy at the heart of identity

(p.99 100) He did love secrets

Counter-confessional! (Connotation: The confessional poets)
Power and pleasure in concealing and being counter-confessional!
Roth biography! Roth keeps being confessional in the 5 decades of his
writing history.
His heroes approach Roths age and have his own problems.
Nathan is Roths mouthpiece writing secluded etc (similarities but do
you know him?)
Secrecy is his credo and not revelation.
Immerse yourself in competition