A Gouldian Defense Variation

[Birgitte Jorgensen <bj@kemmunet.net.mt>]

As a newcomer to the list, I send out greetings to all fellow Gouldians
and thanks to Mary Jo Watts for setting up this forum, which Glenn Gould
no doubt would have been delighted to participate in.

I must concur with Kate Clunies-Ross on her impatience with the
discussions of Asperger's disease as a way of "explaining" Gould and her
wish (apparently shared by many on the list) that the issue would simply
be dismissed for lack of relevance. (Not to mention Peter Ostwald?s
quite outrageous assertion that Gould?s reclusiveness may have been a
subconscious means of suppressing a homicidal impulse.) There have been
numerous attempts to portray Gould as a "crazy genius" but I think all
such attempts miss the point that genius is by definition distinct.
Although I feel somewhat ambivalent about discussing his personality
(fascinating as it is, I take it as far as it goes in helping us
understand his work), I think this issue of analyzing public figures by
a process of opportune editing should be addressed. At some level, many
psycho-biographies really amount to invasion of privacy of a
particularly insidious and sophistic sort, although I am sure that this
was not Ostwald?s intention in an otherwise illuminating study.

Aside from the obvious fact that it seems unprofessional, irresponsible,
and rather unfair to diagnose a mental condition from a distance (both
historical and tangible), it also seems that psychiatry fares much
better at labeling and categorizing apprehensible conditions and
symptoms than it does in actually understanding them or arriving at any
practical insights. The companion field of neurobiology, with its
electro-chemical concept of the brain goes much further in answering our
questions about behavior and perception, but, still, it doesn?t tell us
nearly enough about how the "mind" works, and in my opinion this is
where Ostwald?s sensitive but misguided presumptions about Gould fall
short.

I simply don?t think it possible to select and isolate just one or
another facet of a person?s life or behavior and hold it up to intense
scrutiny and judgement, and claim thereby to comprehend another?s mind
in any kind of objective sense. There can be no way to arrive at the
"meaning" of a mind unless it be comprehended in the context of an
entire life, including many thoughts and feelings and actions to which
we are not and never will be privy. This is not to imply that reliable
diagnoses of mental illness, under certain conditions, cannot be made at
all, only that many observable behavioral traits do not necessarily
correlate with a mental aberration. In other words, some people with
Aspberger?s syndrome (assuming this is a genuine physiological state and
not merely a handy label for a set of behavioral symptoms) may be
reclusive, but not everyone who is reclusive is necessarily in need of
psychiatric therapy.

I?m sure most of you on the list have read Gould?s selected letters and
read the many published testimonials by his friends, family and
colleagues in which he is invariably described as possessing a friendly
and sunny personality of exceptional warmth, good humor, and
approachability. John McGreevy?s book brims with anecdotes of first
meetings with Gould-the-legend (hence, he was usually approached with
some trepidation) which typically consisted of memorable all-nighter
marathons of talk and intellectual camaraderie of the rarest sort. None
of these stories describe a person remotely resembling a misanthrope. It
is simply not possible to reconcile this and much other evidence, such
as a prodigious body of work requiring immense concentration and focus,
with an image of Gould the artist or Gould the man as a deeply troubled
and tragic figure. If, indeed, he concealed a much darker interior --
and there is no reason to suspect that he was ever anything but
emphatically himself ?- and if he tried to suppress his inner anguish
(and who isn?t haunted by life?s big questions?), there can be no doubt
that he found ways, through solitude and self-awareness, to transcend
any such turmoil and transform it into music (and other works) of
exceptional clarity and power in which we might all share.

If anyone doubts the power of Gould?s extraordinary ability to
communicate, which is hardly a characteristic of Aspberger?s, read the
customer comments and reviews of his CDs and videos on Amazon.com,
especially those for Vol. XIII (the 1981 Goldberg Variations film) of
Sony?s video collection. He literally has changed people?s lives.

And this just in! From the latest issue of The Gould Standard, which
arrived in my mailbox as I typed this out, a telling quote from Bruno
Monsaingeon, the man who made the above-mentioned film: "He was the most
secure pianist I have ever known. He could play exactly what he wanted,
when he wanted." Such a statement does nothing to support the idea of
Gould as a man crippled by psychological illness and contradicts any
notion of him as a man at the mercy of his so-called eccentricities.

What we are left with is this: In the context of his superlative
achievements, it is well-nigh impossible to see Gould as being in any
sense disturbed or as the victim of a psychologically debilitating
syndrome. (Another quote from the current issue of The Gould Standard
from a Friends of GG member who attended a recent presentation of
Monsaingeon?s films at the University of Oregon, bears witness to the
effect Gould?s psychology stirs in those who encounter him through the
medium of video: "This is art as Beethoven described it ?- from my heart
to yours ?- nothing is concealed, everything is revealed."

That Gould may have been tormented by some inner demons, that he may
have suffered some emotional and mental distress does not in any way set
him apart from most human beings. That through his searing intelligence
he was able to triumph over his adversities with such "glinting
brilliance" (as he was recently described in the NYT by Edward
Rothstein) and to communicate to each listener such a deeply moving
sense of his humanity, that is what truly sets him apart.

Birgitte Jorgensen