Isak Dinesen

[mido505]

David Punter's study of Gothic fiction, THE LITERATURE OF TERROR, contains a marvelous and informative section on Isak Dinesen, one of Welles' favorite writers. I have not yet read Dinesen, and so have never been able to understand, based on what others have written, and what Welles has said in interviews, what the attraction was, until I read this: "Dinesen's claims to inclusion here stem from the unique way in which her work continued in the twentieth century to foreground the connexions between Gothic and the problems of the aristocracy. There is an irony in the very use of the term 'Gothic' for her, because she is concerned not with terror but with the gentle and debilitating nostalgia which has replaced it as the aristocrat - and the artist - has become increasingly rootless and homeless, no longer sustained by a relevant system of social relations and unable to form others without sacrificing those residual notions of honour and privilege which are all that remain of the feudal idyll. For many of her characters, displaced in class, in nationality or in even more fundamental ways, the emotion of fear is, like the other emotions, only now a distant memory from a time when feeling was possible in the world. Although the stories are various in time and place, their locale is rigorously consistent in one way: in its early eighteenth-century rejection and exclusion of the world of trade and commerce."

Sounds very Wellesian to me!

Renoir once said this about Welles: "Actually, most directors---even the greatest ones---are bourgeois directors. Orson Welles is one of a handful of aristocrats. And his films are aristocratic works. It is probably for that reason that they often are not financially successful."

In his life, and his art, Welles was a man out of time, as he himself has stated repeatedly. And his entire body of work is distinctly Gothic in look and in tone, which is why more than a few of us would love to have seen a full-blooded Welles Gothic horror picture. For any interested scholars out there, a monograph attempting to situate Welles within the Gothic tradition might be an enlightening project.

I have just checked out SEVEN GOTHIC TALES from the library and will read it this week to see if Punter is on the money or out of his gourd. If anyone reading this has read Dinesen, I would love to read your comments.

[tonyw]

I've read some Dineson. She is a very demanding, but rearding, author but the Gothic connections mentioned in this posting appear very relevant to both her fiction and Welles's cinema, especially the Gothic elements in THE MAGNIFICENT AMBERSONS associated with the decline of an aristocratic family during changing times that they have no comprehension of.

The late fiilm critic Andrew Britton (whose collection of writings will soon be published by Wayne State University Press) once remarked something to the effect that "At it's best, the Gothic can register a hesitation.." He meant that the supernatural aspects actually denote important social and cultural meanings rather than being merely formal elements. In a similar light, I'm currently reading Eleanor Salotto's GOTHIC RETURNS IN COLLINS, DICKENS, ZOLA AND HITCHCOCK (Palgrave, 2006) with deals with the repressed aspect of the female voice in (19th fiction..

Robert Aldrich also employed some Welles visual techniques in his films and I'm reminded of Townes's comment to Dell in TWILIGHT'S LAST GLEAMING (1977) when he says "They (the people) don't want to know." This can equally apply to artistic achievement as well as history which many of my students rejected in their evaluations as future ones may do when I teach Welles again in the context of the 1930s. However, some do "want to know" and this is very important.

[Glenn Anders]

You make a very keen point, mido505.

In her fables, Dinesen is very much a writer who is referring to one thing while describing another, as was Welles. And both, as you suggest, admired the virtues of the past which keep slipping away from us, and chose to critique the interloper while recognizing the failings of the old order.

You can see that in Welles' implied criticism of the nouveau riche in CITIZEN KANE; then, repeated in his cold-eyed examination of Modernism amid the nostalgia of THE MAGNIFICENT AMBERSONS;in his warning against escaped Nazis coming to an older America in THE STRANGER; in stirring up the corrupt stew of native born fascists Michael O'Hara finds in THE LADY FROM SHANGHAI; in his attraction to the themes of a soul-mate, Shakespeare, when adapting MACBETH, OTHELLO, and CHIMES AT MIDNIGHT; in the young villainy of Van Stratten contrasted with that of the older Gregori Arkadin in MR. ARKADIN; in the labyrinth of the modern state in THE TRIAL; and of course, in the voyeurism of the central character in (Dinesen's) THE IMMORTAL STORY.

I should imagine a loss of power would be the central theme of THE OTHER SIDE OF THE WIND.

These are all stories of men attempting hold, grasp or regain the power of an enticing past, of youth and its passage into old age. All are villains presented with enough sympathy to make them universal.

If I had to pick a film (in its best edition) which most illustrates Welles' affinity for Isak Dinesen, it would be MR. ARKADIN.

Glenn

[Tony]

Glen: Please explain this statement:

"Dinesen is very much a writer who is referring to one thing while describing another, as was Welles."

And secondly: "All are villains..."

Are you sure you would call them 'villains"?

[Glenn Anders]

Sorry, Tony, I was away with my clan in Reno.

Perhaps, I'm being obtuse.

As you may know, one of the definitions of high art is that the creator presents an object, a theme, a story, which may be extrapolated as referential to many other matters. All I'm saying is that Dinesen's seemingly obscure fables drawn from yester-year were very much about her personal experience and her observations of the world in her own time.

Welles often does something similar, though seldom, except in his Shakesperian adaptations, going back into the far past.

Yes, again, speaking more simply, I think that Orson Welles was in the business of creating "tragic heroes," which is another way of saying that he tended toward villains we might find some sympathy for, or empathy with.

Glenn

[mido505]

I was rewatching the ONE MAN BAND documentary this evening and was struck by the following quotation from Orson during the segment on Isak Dinesen: "Isak Dinesen was a Dane, who wrote under that name, and I've been in love with her, since I opened her first book. In life, she was the Baroness Blixen, and to her close friends, she was Tanya."

How appropriate, touching, and revelatory, that when Welles created his great Mother/lover/goddess figure for Marlene Dietrich in TOUCH OF EVIL, he gave her that name, Tanya.

[Glenn Anders]

What a lovely observation.

As they used to wire in the old days: "Colonial papers, please copy"!

Glenn

[mido505]

That is a lovely comment, Glenn.

[ToddBaesen]

Quite an interesting observation about Tanya, as I never connected the name of Dietrich's character to Welles love of Isak Dinesen.

Along the same lines, I just realized that Harry Shannon, who played Police Chief Gould in TOUCH OF EVIL, was - along with Ray Collins and Joe Cotten - one of three actors in TOE who also appeared in CITIZEN KANE, playing Kane's father. Shannon also appeared in THE LADY FROM SHANGHAI, so he was clearly a Welles favorite.

[The Night Man]

Prompted by this discussion I too embarked on Dinesen's Seven Gothic Tales and came upon this passage, which certainly must have resonated with Welles:

A [looking] glass tells you the truth about yourself. With a shudder of disgust he remembered how he had been taken, as a child, to see the mirror-room of the Panoptikon, in Copenhagen, where you see yourself reflected, to the right and the left, in the ceiling and even on the floor, in a hundred glasses each of which distorts and perverts your face and figure in a different way - shortening, lengthening, broadening, compressing their shape, and still keeping some sort of likeness - and thought how much this was like real life. So your own self, your personality and existence are reflected within the mind of each of the people whom you meet and live with, into a likeness, a caricature of yourself, which still lives on and pretends to be, in some way, the truth about you. Even a flattering picture is a caricature and a lie.

[NoFake]

What a great find! And as the "Tales" were selected by the Book-of-the-Month Club in 1934, this telling characterization must have inspired, in whole or in part, the mirror sequences in KANE, LADY...

[The Night Man]

The last two sentences of the Dinesen quote also suggest the approach to Citizen Kane. And surely Welles would have recalled them when contemplating how he himself would be remembered.

[Roger Ryan]

Along the same lines, I just realized that Harry Shannon, who played Police Chief Gould in TOUCH OF EVIL, was - along with Ray Collins and Joe Cotten - one of three actors in TOE who also appeared in CITIZEN KANE, playing Kane's father. Shannon also appeared in THE LADY FROM SHANGHAI, so he was clearly a Welles favorite.

Going a bit off-topic here, but don't forget Gus Schilling: head waiter in KANE and Eddie Farnham in TOE. In fact, apart from Cotten, I think Schilling is only bested by Erskine Sanford for the number of appearances in Welles film productions (both actors appear in KANE, AMBERSONS, LADY and MACBETH; Schilling adds TOE and Sanford adds JANE EYRE and THE STRANGER).

[Skylark]

An interview with Karen Blixen:

http://theparisreview.org/media/4911_DINESEN.pdf

[Glenn Anders]

Thank you, skylark:

There are clues, perhaps, in this interview to the fascination Welles seemed to have with Isak Dinesen.

First of all, of course, is the masks she wore, the ironic laughter in the face of melancholy, the secret (or secrets) she kept, the "romantic" places she grew up in, and the freedom of her eclectic education. Beyond that, there is her dedication to story telling, to the gothic, and to the past.

For me, her most telling remark about story telling [and a certain kind of classic film making] is this one:

"In a painting the frame is important. Where does the picture end? What details should one include? Or omit! Where does the line go that cuts off the picture?"

What could be more Wellsian?

Not to mention Hemingway and the Monkey (or, maybe, the cockatoo)?

Glenn