Rajat Kumar Maurya
Research Scholar, Department of English, Central University of Karnataka, Karnataka, India This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
Dr. Rinu
Asstt. Professor, Dept. of English & Foreign Languages, Central University of Haryana, India This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
Abstract: This research paper focuses on human mental activity and its requirement for living in various situations. It embraces the area of psychological fiction which underlines the depiction of the inner self and encourages the character to explore a life consisting of spiritual and mental terrain. In literary studies, memory narratives have been taken into use by writers from the west long before. Earlier, the writers like Samuel Richardson, Henry James, William Faulkner, Virginia Wolf, Samuel Beckett etc. wrote many psychological novels. Novels on imaginations, dreams and memories have been introduced later by the experiment of these writers. Psychological fiction includes thoughts, feelings and motivations of the characters exercised immensely with greater interest than the external action of the narratives. John Banville (1945- ) is an Irish novelist and he favours writing about the past. He says that his exploration of the past through writing may deeply touch the readers’ yearnings. His novels such as The Newton Letters (1982), The Book of Evidence (1989), Untouchable (1997), Eclipse (2000), The Sea (2005), and Ancient Light (2012) discuss memory, reminiscence and share a good amount of nostalgias of the protagonists’ life. This paper will be an attempt to focus on memories of the life of Banville’s protagonist under different circumstances and how he moves along the reality of life in The Sea. The protagonist has employed memory as a powerful tool to face various adverse situations of life after being approached at old age. Memory helps him to find out mysterious things about life which were once strange to him and also helped him to solve them through rummaging. Memory also assists to ensure the identity of the protagonist through recalling his interaction with other community people as well as through remembering his day-to-day activities.
Keywords: Memory, Reminiscence, Identity, Nostalgia
Introduction:
Reminiscence and memory are considered constituents of psychology. In literature, reminiscence or memory helps the writer to escape from the discontent or desperation of the present. When a writer is not satisfied with his life and surroundings, he shifts back to the past and seeks consolation from grief. The terms, ‘memory’ and ‘reminiscence’ are concerned with the human mind and depict the life of a person by fetching numerous events of life-related to one’s life. The term ‘reminiscence’ is used first by psychologist Ballard in 1913. He defines reminiscence as the act or process of recalling past experiences or events, or memories. The psychologist Gillian Cohen in his book Memory in the Real World (1989) asserts areas of everyday memory and brings together studies on many different topics such as memory for plans and actions, names and faces, routes and maps, life experiences and flashbulb memory, and eyewitness memory. He puts emphasis on the role of memory in consciousness and meta-cognition. W. Allen’s The Timeless Moment (1931) and U. Neisser’s Memory Observed Reminiscing in Natural Context (1982) discuss that reminiscence is a unique phenomenon, a process in which the ego is cognizant of an experience in which the individual is for the moment especially interested that is enfolded in his or her memory. The light of the reminiscence is the awareness focused on the point where a new experience is passing in through the senses from the outer world to mess inextricably with enfolded memory.
Memory, Reminiscence and Identity
Memories and reminiscences are part of human life. A human being anticipates escaping if he presupposes anything unsuitable. He seeks a comfortable place out of the unfavourable. He expects a better world which would allow him to subside his anxiety and stress. Existential philosophers support the freedom of the human mind from all restraints. They advocate that a person looks for a better place where he can put his other self. He may prefer to flee from the resistance of the real world. He can experience a pleasant moment or search for self-identity. Existential philosophers like Søren Kierkegaard, Jean-Paul Sartre and Albert Camus contend about human existence and emphasize his importance in society. They utter that human being has the right to stay in despair or discontent or may come out to explore and find freedom from tension. He prefers the world according to his choice, whether it is suitable for him or not. He may choose the world of dreams or memories which generally do not cause a problem if selected from childhood. Kierkegaard’s The Concept of Dread (1844) and Sickness Unto Death (1848) has elaborated that human being has a strong belief in gods, however, he seeks solace in them. He tries to find freedom and peace of mind from the tensions or adversities. Jean-Paul Sartre asserts his philosophy in his seminal work L’Existenialismeest un Humanisme (1946). He contends a man can adopt life what he wants. There are multiple options for him; he can choose any of these. He expresses that the life of man is not still instead it is dynamic. His philosophical viewpoints show that humans may ascribe to two states of life. In the first state, he may live a life which is unproductive and cheerless because of being surrounded by stresses and agonies, or in the second state, he may be active by exercising the power of his own choice so that he can give the meaning to his life. He can exercise the power which is provided to him by nature. He can apply his mind to furnish happiness for himself seeking a proper place in the real world or a world of his own where he can transfer a portion of him to spend time in memory and reminiscence. The memory of own life eases the life of such people who do not find another way to console themselves. Existential philosophy leads humanity to recognize the importance of existence. Memory and reminiscence are applied with the help of mental faculty for the rest of life.
Identity corresponds with the expression of an individual’s personality or a group in society. There are various ways to put an individual into different categories to be identified by the people in society. A man can ensure his identity by giving evidence, either from currently existing life or from the memories of early days recollected in his mind. It is often thought that each person has his own personal identity and personal memory which gives him a unique identity. The importance of memory for identity can be understood considering its pivotal importance in human life. Thus, memories are one of the important factors for self-identity. Memory and identity accompany together when a person oscillates in search for ‘self’ with help of memory. Memory plays a vital role to ascertain the identity of the person. It ameliorates to recall his social interactions and communal negotiation. Reminiscence compels the person to experience the same circumstance that he ever endured. It instigates him to move around and search for the people who were close to him.
Journey to the Past
In Irish Literature, John Banville has invented a new scope in his narration based on the expression of the real-life incidents through the exploration of the past by recalling and by visiting. He perceives the human mind and overwhelming desire that seeks a perfect place for comfort. He bestows the conceit of the human mind which renders at the time of difficulty in life. He depicts the psychics of his protagonists who are suffering a lot from mental stress. His narration involves the complications of the protagonists and their attempts to handle the unfavourable conditions. The protagonists are characterized and categorized on the basis of their goals and tasks which they perform to release themselves from the stress. He expresses the mental conditions of his protagonists through his mastery over words.
In The Sea, John Banville has depicted the life journey of a restless protagonist (Max Morden) who wants to move away from his surroundings in search of tranquillity. It depicts sufferings as well as promotes awareness of the complexity of real-life which contains pains and distress. Max Morden who suffers from mental agonies, executes numerous plans to get away from these. He adherently decides to return to his home, especially to the rented lodge named, the Cedar. The house carries nostalgia and experience of his early life which seems like an important event ever. He prefers to visit those places which have the nostalgia of his childhood days. He wants to smell, touch and observe again the vanishing images that had a drastic impact on his life. Banville puts his protagonist in the perplexity of life and then finds ways to get him out of this. The bewilderments of life echo throughout the novel in terms of the death of the dearest and the desertion of a family member. It functions as a reminder and assists him to remember vividly all the events of his life. He observes the movement of the sea: rising and falling waves raise multiple notes in his heart. He grows up in the salty air of the sea from childhood to adulthood until he moves to the city. He wants to return again the coastal village where he used to come with his parents during the holidays. He travels to a seaside village where he spent summers in his youth. He gets reminded of everything related to his early life when he observes old buildings contemporary to his boyhood and the house where he used to live. The sounds produced by the swelling of the sea, he hears, rejuvenate the incidents of life. He suspends himself while watching the sea and sitting on the dunes of the coast. He always refers to the past moment as he hears the noises coming out of the sea. The past seems an integral body organ which strikes intermittently. He considers the past as his heartbeat. The novel opens with the protagonist looking at the sea from a house near the coast. He observes the swelling of the waves and turning pebbles at the sea which reminds him of the scuffles of life. He has come back to this place in search of relief from the distress that he acknowledges after the death of his wife. He remembers his childhood days at this place when he was living here with his parents and with the Grace family that was dear to him after his parents. He spends most of his time with the Grace family, especially with Chloe who was his first girlfriend.
Childhood Memories as an Escape
Banville argues that whatever dreams and images we have about our future in childhood, they generally discrete in adulthood. Max also dreams about his future in his childhood which is subtly different from the present he saw. He states: “When I consider the matter closely, I see that the version of the future that I pictured as a boy had an oddly antique cast to it. The world in which I live now would have been, in my imagining of it then, for all my perspicacity, different from what it is in fact.” (95) Like other boys, Max foresaw his future to be flourished. However, the pictures of the future foreseen in childhood are not corresponding exactly when he grows up. The pictures of the childhood about the future now have become fantasies. Those days of the past, especially the childhood when dreams usually struck in the mind, are now solely the truth of life. The already gone past days concerning his childhood are now furnishing a bunch of nostalgia for those days. The glimpse of the future seen in childhood appears distinct as a dreadful present when his wife deserts him on the way of life. He wonders why people have dreams in their childhood to be what they would become when they grow up. Most children live their childhood picturing an ideal world of their own. Max too draws solid pictures of his future in childhood. Max in his childhood was very precise and definite in his expectations. He says that he never wanted to become an engine driver or a famous explorer. Now, after serving as an architect, he is retired from the exhaustive race of life and is detached from the social restraints. Curious to know everything in the outset life has been resolved and the difficult questions of early-stage answered when he comes at the age of adulthood. The puzzles and mysteries of life that ever troubled him a lot in childhood because of the least awareness got gradually settled. He further says that old age is extremely calm and uncurious in terms of having a lot of experiences in life. Problems that a person ever faced in childhood and adulthood get ultimately terminated.
Conclusion
Banville’s quest for a known place instigates him to look through the memories of the past days. Although he does not want his protagonist to live solely in the past, he insists to make an analogy between the two arenas of life. He allows his protagonist to have experience of two different worlds. He then distinguishes good one among them. He says that we have our past which is our own; the present is mere abstract; the future contains potentiality. He reinforces the idea of moving back which is, according to him, a better place for anyone. He also accentuates the places of childhood days over the places of city life. He acclaims the experience of childhood retaining good or bad memories and having the capacity to release stresses. He corroborates his idea in his novels in which the protagonists move from place to place, but in the end, they find their birthplace more pleasing. According to Banville, incidents of childhood are more important. They create trauma in the human mind and prolong it for the rest of life. He discusses trauma as part of human life relating to the human mind which assists to keep in touch with the incidents of life and remains longer as the form of memory. Memory helps an individual to investigate his life thoroughly with the help of stored data of incidents of life and reminiscing.
Works Cited:
Banville, John. The Sea, Picador, London, 2013
Gray, Jason. “The Sea (Review)”, The Missouri Review, vol. 29, no. 1, Spring, 2006, pp. 162-163
Radstone, Susannah, and Hodgkin, Katharine, editors, Regimes of Memory, Routledge, London, 2003
Radstone, Susannah, editor. Memory and Methodology, Bloomsbury Pub., London, 2000
Reynolds, Jack. Understanding Existentialism, Acumen, Chesham, 2006
(The paper was received on April 24th, 2022. It was sent for blind peer review on 30th April and after review it was received back from the reviewer/s on 18th May 2022.)
