So Vile

Hospital Journal

Most of the time, I feel my body is rebelling against me. These past six months have been an amazing experience. Six months ago, I didn’t have a penis. I haven’t the foggiest idea where it went, and perhaps this goes with the aging male. I didn’t know. But now, six months later, I have my penis back.

My friend Kimley recommended a book to me, Vile Bodies, by Evelyn Waugh, written in 1930. It is based on the youth group of that era, the Bright Young Things—people who were rich or pretended to be wealthy and held wild parties at their parents’ estates. Too young to have fought in the battles of World War I, they were nevertheless a reaction to the trauma of the war and the death of the previous generation. Their non-political stance, or lack of morals, can be seen as a direct reaction to the war, but Waugh saw them as empty figures floating in a culture that was either changing or dying.

It took me two days to read Vile Bodies, and it is still a struggle for me to connect with the present moment because of the radical difference between being at home and being in the hospital. The book served as a background to my feelings of misplacement.

What works for me is that the novel is basically all dialogue. There are only a few descriptions of interiors and exteriors, and a sense of theatrical staging pervades these settings.

Vile Bodies is very much an absurd book, which reminds me of Boris Vian’s Foam of the Daze (L’Écume des jours), as both deal with the nature of youth. Vian is more in love with youth and its jazz culture. Waugh, on the other hand, is more distanced from the action and really doesn’t approve of the world of the Bright Young Things. A born conservative, Waugh is the flip side of the coin, as if Vian were on the other side.

The duality of looking at youth in play is very much enjoyed in Vian’s work, but Waugh casts a shade of darkness over the characters in his book. Often silly, I can sense Waugh’s disdain for them.

Both novels expose the height of activity, but the darkness will come around the corner. Being sick, I am always waiting for the other shoe to drop. I have a firm hold on the ground, doing what I can to make sure the shoe doesn’t fall off.

My feet are often swollen, so it takes time to put my shoes on.

Bodies are vile. Mine is physical, but there are touches of the mental state projecting images, and I feel like Dennis Wilson surfing on whatever wave happens to come.