Liberation (22 page)

The visit to Laguna Beach was a success. Gavin was very pleased with Jack Fontan's reading, thought him much the best of the astrologers he had met. And I got through a lot of nuisance-letter-answering. Jack and Ray's new octagonal house is really attractive. But oh how they do talk, in their carefully quiet sweet calming voices!

 

August 23.
Today I finished in rough the extra part (Kathleen's later life) which I'm adding on to chapter 17; so now I have covered the whole book, more or less. What remains to be done is rewrite from chapter 11 on. This means actually that chapters 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 18 and the second half of 17 will have to be pretty thoroughly rewritten, but that 16 and the first half of 17 don't need to be touched, except for a couple of inserts, because they are over ninety-nine percent direct quotation from diaries and letters. So I can still hope to finish this fall, barring serious interruptions.

On the 19th, I went to see Dorothy Miller. She looked far better than I expected and although the doctor has given her a crutch she wasn't using it. As usual we talked a lot about Elsa. Dorothy said, “If you talk to her a lot she
bores
you.” She is very happy about a Unity church in the neighborhood which she has just joined. The pastor is white and so are most of the congregation and it seemed that what Dorothy really appreciates is that she feels completely accepted by them.

When I told Swami that my meditation isn't any better he said he would write me out some instructions. I'm to get them when I see him next.

The day before yesterday, a goodbye dinner for Peter Schlesinger, who returns to England today. We are both fond of him and rather concerned about his future, maybe without cause. He looks like “a flower of the field” but is probably a very tough little evergreen. Gavin's friend, the one who dances (or maybe
has
danced, for now it's banned) naked at the Honey Bucket, came with Gavin. His name is Mark Andrews.
³²
He is an overwhelming talker and flirt—he flirted with
everybody
, Jack, Jim, Camilla, Linda [Crawford], Peter, Truman Brewster,
³³
Ralph Williams, Don, me; but there's something amusing and quite delightful about him; he made our party go.

 

August 27.
A happy busy birthday yesterday. Did some quite good work on chapter 11, I have to be careful and slow about this, and went on the beach with Don and in the ocean and then on to the gym (where damn it my weight has gone up again—I was down just a shade below 150, now I'm just a shade above) then we went up to have supper with Jennifer. This was quite delightful though sad because it'll be for the last time at the Tower Grove Drive house; she's selling it in two weeks. Such memories of that place, it really is the only “Great House” I have ever known throughout my life in Hollywood. And last night the living room was as beautiful as ever—all the more so for being empty—lit by a beige-gold radiance from the lamps. Don's two great drawings, the one of David with the blank lens on one side of his glasses and the tip of his little finger appearing through the other, and the one of me, so cruelly and exquisitely exact. The dining porch with all its reflections of trembling candle flames amongst the dark bushes outside. The “hashish room” which Tony Duquette designed. And the chairs and table out on the porch all set with lighted candles and quite empty, as if it were a shrine. One had a sense that Jennifer is living here alone amidst her ghosts. Dinner was served by a maid, but you felt the house was
vacant
.

Jennifer has a new deadline (October 15) on which her lover
³⁴
has to decide between her and his wife—which of course is the very last thing he wants to do. It's curious how absolutely convinced she is that,
if
he does finally come to her, they will be happy for the rest of their lives! But she really is adorable and so delightful to be with. We stayed on until late.

Don has now heard that the
Esquire
office is mailing his release on his photo back to him. (I still don't trust them one inch.)
³⁵

Also, which really
is
good news, Billy Al Bengston is holding a group show at his studio of the work of his friends and he is exhibiting three of Don's drawings—this after only asking for one to begin with. So Don's morale is considerably boosted.

I want to discuss with myself the problem which immediately faces me in chapter 11; exactly what was the private mythology I created out of
Wuthering Heights
?

Well, first of all,
Wuthering Heights
showed me how to see the Disley landscape dramatically; that much is obvious. It did this by showing me an approximately similar landscape which was related to a drama, a love drama. At the time when I first read
Wuthering Heights
I was (it seems to me) in love with Johnny Monkhouse, “Mr Honeypot,” with his blond hair and his grin and his beautiful long legs and his hockey stick.

Johnny was a “hopeless” love; actually I didn't even seriously want to make him and fear absolutely prohibited me from ever trying to. I enjoyed suffering and mooning around and watching the house to see if he'd come out. Yes, and talking about my feelings, of course, to Paddy [Monkhouse].

Heathcliff doesn't (apparently) make Cathy. Not because he's shy but because she won't cooperate, she's married, she's fatally sick and, finally, she's his sister, so to speak. Their relationship is presented as being infinitely deeper, more violent, more binding, more everything than the mere sexual relationships which both he and Cathy enter into, quite irresponsibly, almost casually. Of course there are suggestions here of Emily's relationship to her own brother; not to mention Byron's relationship to his half sister. So there's the incest thing as a barrier.

When I took on the fantasy role of Heathcliff, the “hopeless” love wasn't incest but homosexuality; which was all very well while I was very young and inhibited. Later, when the love turned out to be not in the very least hopeless, I had to drop that part of the Heathcliff role.

But Heathcliff has another aspect. Like Byron, he is a mysterious traveller; he has been away somewhere, “in foreign lands,” but he won't say where. And then he
returns
. That part of the role was what really appealed to me—the returning traveller from romantic journeys and that part I still play whenever I go up to Disley on visits.

Heathcliff wasn't visiting, however. He came back to stay. And this stay was tragic and ended in death. This suggests that what I have latterly made out of the role is a Heathcliff who refuses to stick around and get involved in the tragedy. After enjoying the emotions of the returned native son, he leaves again while he still can, and returns again and leaves again, over and over.

 

August 31.
On the 27th, Swami gave me new meditation instructions; he had written them out for me. They are (abridged):

 

Cover the whole universe with the presence of Brahman as Light, and repeat mentally: “I meditate on the glories of that Being who has produced this universe. In Him we live and move and have our being. May he enlighten my mind.”

Feel the presence of Ramakrishna with you, and talk to him: “Oh Lord may I serve Thee in every way, whatever I do, whatever I give, may I do and give as an offering unto Thee. May I be truly an instrument in Thy hands. Thou art my only refuge. Enlighten me for I am Thine.”

Feel that you are free through His grace and rest for a while thinking that you have His peace and bliss.

Send love and goodwill to every being.

Think of your guru, feel his presence. Then of his guru, Maharaj. Now again feel the protection and guidance of Ramakrishna, Holy Mother, Swamiji and Maharaj. “May they inspire me with love, truth and purity. May I feel their grace.” Then think of the mind as pure and perfect and that no evil can enter your mind.

Now hold the mind in the lotus of the heart and think of your Chosen Ideal for a few moments. Then let the mind run as it wills for about ten minutes and you stand as a witness and watch. Do not seek to control it even if the thoughts are bad.

Then take a firm hold of the mind, concentrate on your Chosen Ideal, seem to see him as bright and luminous and hear his voice. Repeat the mantram as you meditate. Perform mental worship, offer flowers at his feet, place a garland around his neck, wave the light before him, burn incense, wash his feet and wipe them.

 

(I meant to write a lot about my problems in connection with this, but must wait till tomorrow because I have been interrupted so much by people coming in.)

 

September 1.
I find the above desperately frustrating, almost meaningless. All my old resistance to things Indian comes back upon me and I keep remembering Aldous's objections to formal meditation (which actually made me rather angry when he used to speak of them) and even someone at La Verne (it was Harold Stone Hull, I've just looked this up in my journal) saying sarcastically, “When do we stop the motion pictures and start meditating?”
³⁶

The only part which is relatively easy and seems helpful is mentally doing the acts of ritual worship. The hardest part is thinking of the universe covered by Brahman as Light. And when I try to assemble the two Ramakrishnas, Maharaj, and Swamiji in the room I get a feeling,
where are they all going to sit?

Well, I really do want to watch my reactions to this problem so I'll write down something about it every day. I know that will be helpful.

Hunt Stromberg called up out of the blue at the end of last week and asked would I be interested in doing a T.V. series, “the definitive ‘Frankenstein'”?! So he's coming round this afternoon.

Don much upset yesterday, said I am never frank with him, jolly him along, why don't I tell the truth—that his paintings are faggy. I said, even if they are, why the hell shouldn't they be if that's your myth? He said, I'm ashamed of my myth. . . . I write down these lines and they sound funny, but there is a terrific deep problem here which I only partly grasp. (“Because of a basic inattention”? Yes, there's that, and there's my desire to get on with my work undisturbed and not have the boat rocked. True. But it is also true that I'm not nearly so perceptive about Don's problems as Don thinks I ought to be and secretly am and won't let on to being, lest I have to get involved with them. Of course you can say my stupidity is self-protective and so we go round in a circle.) All is love again now for the moment. But I must pursue this problem. I must pursue it particularly at the times when Don is
not
disturbed about it—though usually when I try to do this he isn't inclined to talk about it.

 

September 2.
Saw Swami last night. I complained about my difficulty with the meditation on Brahman and he said, then just say Om three times and feel that it resounds throughout the universe and that Brahman is Om. I complained about the “crowding” when I try to see Ramakrishna and the others all together. He said, I should try to see them one after the other in succession. (This certainly is easier.) He also said that, when mentally doing the ritual worship, I should sometimes do the offering up of the physical body, the subtle body etc. etc., until Brahman alone remains.

Hunt Stromberg came by yesterday with a boy from Florida [. . .]. Hunt talked about the “Frankenstein” T.V. special (it isn't a series) and made it sound as if it was a
fairly
firm offer. He has broken up with Dick Shasta,
³⁷
whom we liked; said Dick was impossible to live with and talked vaguely about a car being blown up—he didn't actually say Dick did this. As a result, Hunt hired a bodyguard, a seemingly very square ex-marine. Now, he claims, the bodyguard is so fascinated by the “fag scene” that he is showing signs of “coming out” himself. Hunt described how [the boy from Florida] was sunbathing by the pool and the bodyguard came out and didn't see Hunt and started lustfully looking [the boy] over. Then he saw Hunt and immediately began shooting all over the place with a BB gun to cover his embarrassment!

This morning in the mail came the announcement of the group show at Billy Al's studio: Moses, Bengston, Bachardy, Bell, Goode, Berlant, Davis, Ruscha, Price, Alexander.
³⁸
(In that order.) This is really a very distinguished gathering and Don is pleased. Irving Blum was very nice about it when Don phoned him in New York to ask if he objected to Don's exhibiting at another gallery; and Irving thought it was good for Don's prestige too.

 

September 6.
Such an effort to write anything in this book! Because whenever I'm at the desk I have this blind urge to get on and on and on with
Kathleen and Frank
. And rightly. There's still a tremendous lot of work to be done on it. Am slowly coming to the end of chapter 11.

On the 2nd, we had supper with Gavin, Mark Andrews and Rita Hayworth at Trader Vic's (which I hate, it's so depressing). Mark made rather an ass of himself; we had been expecting him to be marvellous with Rita and charm her. But he really is very much more naive than we'd supposed. He made corny advances and asked tactless questions, such as, “Where are you from?” This got under Rita's skin—I hadn't realized how sensitive she still is about being Mexican—and she told him loud and clear, “I'm from
here
, I'm North American!”

Felt sort of protective towards her but not sorry for her; she can so obviously look after herself. Anyhow we are far too easily sentimental about the beautiful who have ceased to be beautiful—and Rita still looks very good, in a different way.

On the 4th I went with Swami and Krishna to have supper with Len, Peter Schneider's father. His girlfriend, a nice middle-aged woman, cooked, and Peter and his little brother Danny and Jim Gates (who is now working at the West Hollywood Goodwill and back living in the shack with Peter) were also there. Peter had just bought a
chadar
. He camped around in it, calling as much attention to himself as possible, and then Danny put it on. Swami took the whole thing in his stride as usual and I think made a good impression on Dr. Schneider, for whose benefit our get-together was really being staged; Peter is determined to “convert” him. Jim has just cut his hand severely, on the shower faucet. I can't help seeing him more and more through Don's eyes, that is, seeing his prim mischief-making side. Later, and this was the second objective of our meeting, the boys got Swami to come back for a moment to visit their shack, and thus bless it and the meditation shed behind.