Every time he speaks of himself you sense something missing, something not quite true. It's not that you doubt his sincerity - on the contrary, you know he's making every effort to be entirely forthright - it's just that you recognize that the self looks different viewed from inside. It's as though by putting himself in the spotlight he had blinded himself to his own shadow, to the audience of alternate personae watching from the wings. He tells you, honestly and in great detail, what he sees, but all the while what you really want to know is what's lurking there, behind his mind.
It's like the difference between the image of yourself you carry with you and your face in a photograph.
7 comments:
mm
last line is lovely... and so true!
Hadn't thought of it this way. I'll be thinking about this for a while now..
~N.
Reg. photographs - Have you read Rushdie's piece called "On Being Photographed"?
It is about Avedon's photo-portrait of him. Funny story and interesting picture.
Can't recall the details, but something to the effect being happy that though he did not see himself that way, the picture conveyed the resistance and endurance the world would expect etc.
I thought he looked rather Satanic in that picture.
No one has ever seen their own face with their eyes. All one has ever looked at is their face in a mirror.
"It's like the difference between the image of yourself you carry with you and your face in a photograph."
Megan McArdle had an interesting post on same subject. http://meganmcardle.theatlantic.com/archives/2007/08/youre_not_as_hot_as_you_think.php
Are you hiding something?
:-D
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