An Escape Into The Reality Of Dreams English Literature Essay

The following passage is an additional ending of the story Secret Weapons written by Julio Cortazar. Michele, just like generations of women before and after her, carries the problem of starting a relationship with the wrong person at the wrong time. By starting an affair with a German soldier, she gets caught in the tangled web of love, fear and betrayal. In Secret Weapons, Cortazar uses the figure of a woman to portray the evocation of an affair, which is counterbalanced by an image of rape. In my passage, I am trying to exploit the subconscious behavior of Michele, revealed in a dream sequence which foreshadows her future.

Michele endures her life in the times of war when the French were fighting the Germans, when she is meeting a German soldier which whom she is starting an affair. Secret Weapons might indicate that she was raped by the German and then haunted by him when she encounters a new relationship. However, my passage is meant to emphasize that she actually willingly had an affair with him, and when they get caught she is betraying him.

By continuing Schumann’s song in my short story, I emphasize that the intention of the German really was not meant to rape her, but that he loved Michele deeply. This song (or poem) often appears in the short story of Cortazar, however only the two first verses are mentioned. When we go further in this song, it talks about love and longing and indeed not quite about the terrible act suggested by Cortazar.

I have tried to capture Cortazar’s use of change in perspectives and magic as well as the themes of the Quest of Identity and the hidden reality behind the everyday lives of common people to bring alive the often confusing but magical situations in his short stories. In my passage I take the changes in the perspectives to ultimate limits. By shifting points of views, Cortazar creates bridges between different realities. I try to stress that by changing the viewpoints from first to second and even third narrative to confuse the reader of who the narrator is and to change the voices of the text, as well as blurring the line between reality and dreams.

Similar to the short story Night Face Up, my passage emphasizes the importance of dream sequences. It begins with a dream projected to the future, with which I am trying to establish a bridge of continuity between the past and the present. The underlying thesis in both stories, Secret Weapons and Night Face Up seem to be that every life is paved with repetitions. It also suggests that links between human are not always visible but often hidden and mystical. I try to let the dreams fuse with wakefulness to highlight illogical scenes of life which often influence the life of a person by a great extent.

Michele is haunted by the German soldier whose curse is embodied by Pierre. The unsettling presence of Pierre is a constant reminder of her betrayal she did almost seven years ago. Michele recognizes the presence of the German in Pierre, by recurring situations of the times she lived in Enghien.

The short story Secret Weapons creates suspicion of other dimensions of realities which are not communicable and which cannot be explained by using scientific or non-scientific thinking. Cortazar blurs the line between reality and dreams in many of his short stories by creating works at the border of insanity. Therefore, in my passage I try to emphasize that art of style by including insane scenes, especially the ending, in which it is required for the reader to accept the unknown to understand the last sequence.

My passage is divided into five short scenes, portraying the flow of incidents, beginning with the dream sequence of the future and Michele waking up back in the time of War between France and Germany. It goes on with the change of perspective in which the German soldier is describing the scene and emphasizes that he has seen Michele through the eyes of Pierre, suggesting that the dream of Michele must carry truth. It has then a short part of the scene when the German is killed, replicating it the way Cortazar suggested it in Secret Weapons. After that, the reader will follow the insane flow of thoughts of Michele who is feeling horrible after having betrayed her boyfriend, who then is falling into the magic realism of the story by changing the perspectives and sceneries several times. The final scene will again be in the forest of Enghien, a last encounter with Pierre, the German and Michele, before I suggest her suicide.

Through careful reading of the stories of Cortazar I have tried to capture the magic writing of him to use the same kind of techniques as well as tone and images to emphasize the complexity of his stories, and the many different interpretations he allows readers to have.

Pierre only asked for one last Gauloises, the ceremony seemed almost familiar to him (dry leaves, green leaves, leaves, leaves come up and smack him in the face).

It was an unusual dream for the reason that it felt so significant to me and it seemed so real, and dreams never seem real to me. In a single jump I was out of my bed, my face in great pain, the nightmare is bothering me. The view outside the window shows the giant greens of Enghien losing their leaves, gunshots are sometimes heard in the distance, and my German man is humming a song while reading Michaux, because Michaux is a better reading than Graham Greene. He looks at me, in my pale blue nightgown. He strokes my hair, kisses me. My lips hurt.

First there was confusion, then a moment of sensations before you began to realize that your dream was to become reality, Im wunderschönen Monat Mai… Her scared eyes meet min (through Pierre’s eyes she looked so much older). The door opens, silence then yelling, cries and screams, they drag me outside. Da ist in meinem Herzen die Liebe aufgegangen…

There was a time when I thought that this bloody battle would end. I met Franz by chance one morning two weeks ago (it must have been the month of May) when I took a walk through the green forest (the green forest where you get lost so easily). Never before had I gone into the green, and the dark of my soul and my heart, but I instantly knew that Franz and I were linked. And I was afraid of it. There cannot be anything that hurts more, than keeping love a secret. The fondness of two, which is forced to be left unknown. It is painful, since this love will never have a chance to fade away. I think that had it not been for his blue eyes… I am French and he is German and I know that there would be no understanding, ever. I know that I have to keep my mouth shut and put the pain aside.

“What did he do to you!” Babette yelled and dragged Michele down the stairs, they pass the glass ball, outside into the green. Eyes, big black eyes staring at her. She starts crying – and they take me away. I dig my hands into her shoulders, my nails bite into her flesh. She pushes me off, Roland stares at me in disgust, I stare back…at Michele.

A car stops, a man gets pulled out in the middle of the woods, one last cigarette, a short talk. Silence. A shot (almost like an angry outburst). A face blasted to bits among the dry leaves.

It feels like an incurable disease, and I feel invisible (they are all around me). The air is warm, but it is giving me shivers. Pierre, I spot his sleeping pills. I take one (two, three, and four…).

How do I leave the past behind, if it keeps finding its way back into my dreams, my heart, back to Enghien? It was my only chance at that moment, it was right! No it wasn’t, it was my fatality, and how will I ever forget him if his eyes are haunting me. Als alle Vögel sangen… I can feel him everywhere, I can see him. I can’t hide from something that will never go away. I open my eyes, and the light is green.

It is green all around her. She sees Pierre standing next to the dead body of Franz, and she sees Franz standing next to the dead body of Pierre (the leaves fall, they fall, they fall until they are dry on the faces of the dead bodies). All the trees around her become a single one, Michele becomes one of them. She can’t move, she can’t scream. Is it really a lie, if she believes it? Was it a mistake if it is always repeated? When she realized what she had lost, she was lost (in the forest so green). Pierre and Franz look at her, and Michele looks at the shotgun.