Incidents by Roland Barthes; Richard Howard; Bringing Out Roland Barthes by D.A.

Miller Review by: Michael du Plessis Discourse, Vol. 16, No. 1, Improbable Dialogues: Encounters in Cultural Studies (Fall 1993), pp. 174-179 Published by: Wayne State University Press Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/41389306 . Accessed: 13/08/2013 23:37
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Book

Reviews

Incidents Roland Barthes Trans.Richard Howard U ofCalifornia P, 1992.73 pp. Berkeley: OutRolandBarthes Bringing DA. Miller U ofCalifornia P, 1992.55 pp. Berkeley:

Michaeldu Plessis not Barthesat his best. Yet the dustjacket of Incidents is certainly Richard Howard's translationwould have prospective readers believe thatthisposthumoustext,now available in English,marks an event , the anonymousblurb declares,Barthes Why?In Inddents directnotationto hisgay of,finally, giving "gavewayto thenecessity desire in itsvariousstatesof excitation, panic, and despair." Queer at lastteUs a/// French theorist Perhapsthistabloidgambit hopes to gain for Barthes and Incidents the same succsde scandale thatJames ofFoucaulthas enjoyed, withitshighbrow homoMiller'sbiography leathersex,wills-to-power, phobia and lurid tales of death-wishes, in Death Valley, sex.(Can Foucault: and itsrumors of unsafe acid trips TheMiniseries be farbehind?) is nothingquite as eventful, and at leastitspublication Inddents Out Roland Barthesis intended antiwith DA. Miller's Bringing Inddents itself consists offourshortpieces, twoof homophobically. "The LightoftheSud-Ouest"and "AtLe Palace Tonight . . which, were publishedduringBarthes'slife (1977 and 1978 respectively); is about Barthes'sbucolic attachment to the French counthe first the while second shows Barthes at Le Palace , a disco inferno tryside,

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in whichhe recallsProust,not theProustiancitiesof the plain,but morecoyly, Proustian duchessesat theOpra (48) . The other rather, twopieces, the eponymous"Incidents"and "Soires de Paris," do, inscribeBarthesas a gayman - more specifically a white, however, in middle-class man first the Morocco of the late sixties and gay thenin theParisof the late seventies. inwhichBarthes's The ways raceand classinflect his "gaydesire" are made more than legible: in Morocco, his erotic encounters, and presentedin equallybrieffragments, are chiefly with fleeting, and unfortunately youngMoroccan men (repeatedly designatedas "boys,"forexample, 14, 23, 24, 31); in Paris,hustlers providethe text'ssexual traffic (forexample,59, 62-63,65, 68). And whileboth "Incidents" and "Soires de Paris" have the alibi of the diaristic itis difficult not to notice,in thesetexts at least,Barthes's fragment, unconcernwiththesocial contexts of his desires. The lastsign-incident of "Incidents,"forexample,is thesightof a djellaba: "The peace ofa djellaba (from the behind) on a donkey, sign regularly repeated in the countryside"(41). The apparendy of the djellaba thatconstitutes, in thistext,the pastoraliterability of "Morocco-ness" (see also 14, 18, 20, 35, and 39), verysignifier drainsthe"countryside" oftheconflicts ofhistory (colonialism,the of decolonialization) and leaves it open to a whitemale struggles gaze thatsees precious litde except "local color." With 4 shocking detachment, too, Barthescan remark:"A girlbegging: Myfather's dead. It's to buya notebook,' etc.," and he complains,"The nasty is the tediumof the stereotypes" (37). partof mendicancy in "Soires de Paris,"Barthes'spowersofdeducTen yearslater, tion once again bespeak a class-basedsemiologyratherthan the semiologicalprojectwhichis one ofBarthes'slegacies:he politicized is able to "deduce" the "husderdom" of a man from"his coarse hands" (59) . Still, thereis thereduction ofan "Arab" toa stereotype: Barthesnotices an "Arab" who " without , touches asking formoney each one's cock" in a bathhouse (67; myemphasis); to drivehome his point,Barthesgeneralizes:"Pure paradox: an Arab forwhom someone else's cock existsand not onlyhis own (whichis his ego)" here are highly that (67). The twinpresuppositions suspect:firsdy, it is unusual foran "Arab" notto ask formoney(byimplication, all thatitis equallyout of the "Arabs" mustbe hustlers) , and secondly, in anotherman's dick foran "Arab" to showanyinterest ordinary the (the parenthesis confidendy glosses penis of the "Arab" as his a which whatFrantzFanon critigloss replicatesprecisely "ego" in whiteracistfantasies, of the black man to cizes as the reduction, fetishized or disregarded: one hispenis [120] ) . Blackmen are either of the ostensiblereasonswhya visitto a leatherbar is cut shortis because "the place is filledwithblacks" (Incidents 64).

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Discourse 16.1

In Incidents , then, Barthes's "gay desire" appears as a white middle-class thatmaysometimes note gaymale subjectivity ruefully its limits,but consistently ignores the termsof its construction. thereis nevera mentionof anything like homophobia, Moreover, on the "abusively hetero" characalthoughBarthesonce comments terof a film byPialat.Even here his primary objectionseems rather to be towhathe too lightly calls "a sortof 'youth* racism"in thefilm (72). Bartheswas, indeed, could not butbe, a gay man at and of a certaintimeand place - all queer subjectsare situatedhistorically, to be sure- but Incidents does thegayBarthesa disservice. Because it does not addressthe situations of race and class and colonialism in which Barthes's "gay desire" occurs, Incidents retrospectively distorts the otherwise characterof Barthes's politically progressive oftheimperialism atwork (Rememberhistimely semiology. critique in an image ofa blacksoldierwitha Frenchflagin Mythologies 116.) makes "gaydesire" seem to appear onlyat the expense of Incidents otherkindsof politics, ratherthanin conjunctionor coalitionwith them. In such a context-without-context, theend of "Soires de Paris" resonates witha lastnote ofhomophobia:after an unsuccessful date witha younger Barthestinkles at man,who,forone, is not a hustler, thepiano and sighswithresignation: I sawthatI would "How clearly have to give up boys,because I was either too scrupulous or too to imposemydesireon them" (73) . A bleakfuture is in store: clumsy forme but hustlers Whatwillthespectacle "Nothingwillbe left ofmyworldcome to be?" (73) . And thisfrom thesame Bartheswho in hisRolandBarthes trans. could write thatperversions, (1975, 1977) "make [one]happy"(63-64)? specifically "homosexuality," The editorialdecision to marketthistextas Barthes'scoming ofIncidents and nowin itsEnglish out,bothin theFrenchpublication locates Barthes's queerness all too neatlywithinthe translation, coversofa singlebook, a book hatis too slight to bear such weight. This one book muststand in for all of Barthes's "gay desire," as thoughBartheswerea closetcase who could onlycome out posthuIncidents offers no "positive"image ofBarthesas mously. Evidently, a gay man; unfortunately, the image is not especiallycompelling either. As if to compensate, the English Incidents has been released withMiller's companionvolume,Bringing OutRolandBarthes. While Miller does notaddress Incidents as such,he searches Barthes's through for the ubiquitous, if indirect,inscriptions of Barthes's writings sexual identity: Miller's project is thus a reading in of Barthes's gaynessin order to bringit out: "If Barthes'sreticence [about his "has successfully shieldedanyone,itis his ", writes Miller, sexuality] critics" (25). In an almost allegoricizingmanner, homophobic

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Miller ranges throughwhat one mightcall key "Barthesemes"the neuter,the grainof thevoice, the letter, artifice, pleasure - to kindof gaymale subjecwithone particular showup theirintertext Miller'ssupplementing of Barthes's"reticence," however, is tivity. of itsown. not without predicaments "But isn'tittimehe stood on hisown twofeet?":Millerimagines thisone homophobic response to Roland, the mother'sboy,in a son (32). photographin which his mothercarriesher overgrown OutRolandBarthes withBringing The pairingof Incidents , however still Barthes short of intended, stops standing anti-homophobically on his own,as ifBarthesneeds a littlehelp out of the closet.Miller designateshis projecta "bringingout," a genteelversionforhigh cultureof the low practicenamed by thatother,potentially ruder, on a middle as he wryly observes, gerund,"outing."This putsMiller, ground between Eve Sedgwick and Michelangelo Signorile (6). isn'ttheEpistemologa OutRolandBarthes Milleris quite right: Bringing it isn't Outweek either. the but Closety of of thepolice, Milleris awareof theoretician Evertheargus-eyed out" almostunavoidably has with thebonds thatanyactof"bringing "there is hardlya procedure for the policing of sexual identities: look or feel out [homosexualmeaning] thatdoesn't itself bringing to ofthose . But he does out like (18) try slip police entrapment" just deuxbonds when he muses: "Unless such,perhaps,were a folie - thatwould of community where'two'standsin forthepossibility in a fashion out as subtle and it as, say,the color of flattering bring a garmentis said to bringout a complexion" (18). Miller'sfolie Barthes'sfrequent deuxborrows analogyof textto textileto dream he weavesfrom oftheoutfit ofdrapingRoland in thebecomingtints Barthes'sloose ends. fleshthemout,as Millerwould also givebodyto such garments, itwere:Leo Bersani (creditedas theauthorof theblurbforMiller's in one of those gyms book) says,"Like a good trainer surelynever Miller'develops' Barthes'sgay Barthes, bytheProustian frequented . But out" makesBarthesa clone Miller's"bringing muscle."In short, who here is whose clone? The two texts(would-behandsome volumes) are conjoined by a band that reproduces a closeup of Barthes'seyes on one side and a closeup of Miller'son the other; Millerand Bartheswould thussee eye to eye,man to man. Millerwrites: On thesubjectof "gaycommunity" Any knowledgeI was able to produce of a "gay" Roland between us and ofus couldn'thelp beinga knowledge Barthes real and fashionedwithinthe practicesand relations, bothy inflecand acrossthevarious ofgaycommunity, phantasmatic nation and for tions,givento such community by, example, (6) generation.

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ofsuch "nation" and "generation," whileconceded The inflections remain"gay" and in thelastinstance, nevertheless as phantasmatic, ofMiller'stext, itis clear thathe much thesame. Fromthestart very or more simply, "the ... of male gay sexuality," envisages practice in thesingular(6) . "gaymale sexuality" There are manywaysof being queer, as a Queer Nation sticker lesbiansexactivist, forexample,writes about pointsout.SusieBright, her experiences as a bisexual woman and, like Miller, invokes ends: "I pick up myBible, Roland Barthes,but to verydifferent Barthes'sA Lover's Discourse or 'Lovers Disco,' as I call it" (155). thereare queerer waysof dancing to Barthes'sbeat than Evidently, Miller's.It is the verynotion of "gay community" thathas been at issue in the proliferation of queer politicalpractices, fromQueer in San Francisco, Nation (more recently, also Transgender Nation) A Taste to queerzineslike Bimbox, and , ofLatex,Quirn, Thing Logomotive , which fracturethe monolith of "gay community"by their - theirXeroxly - impudence.When Millerdoes invoke writerly ACT UP,forexample,almostat theend ofhis text(54) , he indicates thathe stillassumesACT UP to be essentially a gaymale group- a contentious He theAIDS crisis highly assumption. evokes, obliquely, via Barthes'smourningforhis mother, when Millerwrites of "the devastations of [theclone's] once flourishing culture"(33). Yeteven in thisinstance- and I do notwishto minimize thelossesto which Milleralludes at variouspointsin his text- his notion thata single "clone culture"existedin thefirst place seemsopen to question.His roundaboutevocationofthecrisis somewhat mayalso leaveone with the sense that for Miller,the crisishas happened, continues to stanceis takenby, for happen,for"clones" alone. (Averydifferent and contributors to Women, AIDS and Activism example,the writers fromtheACT UP/NY Womenand AIDS Book Group.) Millersinglesout Barthes'spracticeof the "novelesque" as an effective forholdingtheclampdowns ofnarrative, thefamily strategy of at The heterosexism, plots bay (43-51). "novelesque" offers, a wayof inscribing the personalas the political accordingto Miller, of autobiography; (50), without havingrecourseto the constraints die "novelesque" providesat once a "radical askesis" (48) and "an erotics"(50) . Insteadofradicalaskesis, whatone getsin Bringing Out is a text- and an author- fullof themselves. RolandBarthes The details of the novelesque in Miller's writing work more towardsestablishing a "gay" reality a "gay" verisimilitude: effect, the Castro,the Marlboroman - a limited, out-of-date gyms, "gay" to the least. And such of the image-repertory, say putativeeffects resistance rather thansolidarity or "community" "gay"real provoke in this particularqueer reader. I, for one, find myself unable to withMiller'shavingto lingerover the dumbbellsat his sympathize touch his lover'shands (14). If gymso thathe can surreptitiously

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Miller has to go to the gym,whydoesn't he comeout and show thereon theNautilus? and lustforhis boyfriend affection right Miller's of a difference betweengaymen elaboration Similarly, men on the basis of boxersas opposed to briefs(guess and straight howpersuasively who's supposed towearwhich ) , no matter pursued, queers wear all kindsof underwearor again produces incredulity: no underwearat all. (Miller,I assume,would not considermen in black lace pantieseithergayor attractive.) And what of the coincidence that both Miller,like Barthes, consultedthe Spartacus guide beforevisiting Japan?IsaacJulienand in Kobena Mercer, theircritiqueofwhitegaymale racismsingleout the Spartacus guide which"commentsthatboyscan be boughtfora in the Philippines" (169). Millerclaims thatgay pack of cigarettes in a waythat is neitherthe white racial differences men fetishize racistfixationon physical liberaldisregardof race nor the overtly markersof race (39-42), but does his argumenthere effectively respond to the potentialforracismin "Incidents"? Once embarrassedby the sound of his voice - in so faras it " sounded "gay" - Miller now cannot get enough of "a gayvoice machineoverto listen (25) and playsthemessageson his answering for thatvoice. All "gay voices" are not the same. " But don'ttakeit ," Millerimagineshimself sayingto Barthesat one point personally " in return, one might (51). To Miller, say speak for yourself."

WorksCited AIDS andActivACT UP/NY Womenand AIDS Book Group. Women, . Boston:SouthEnd, 1990. ism Trans.Annette Lavers.London: Paladin, Roland.Mythologies. Barthes, 1973. Barthes . Trans.RichardHoward.NewYork:Hill, 1977. . Roland A Virtual Reader. SexWorld Susie.Sexual Cleis, Pittsburgh: Reality: Bright, 1992. . London: Paladin,1970. White Masks Black Fanon,Frantz. Skin, A DiscourseOn "True Confessions: Isaac, and Kobena Mercer. Julien, ToBrother: NewWritings Brother ImagesOf BlackMale Sexuality." 1991. Men.Ed. EssexHemphill.Boston:Alyson, BlackGay by NewYork:Simon,1993. Foucault. Miller, ofMichel James.ThePassion

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