Growing Up James: A playlist of haphazard education and no backyard barbeques

Growing Up James: A Playlist for Haphazard Education and No Backyard Barbeques

During the semester, we read books, diaries, a play, and essays. We even looked at a poem that was supposed to be about Henry and William James. One media that never came up in class is music. My papers have primarily explored contemporary links to the James family, including Catch-22 and Buffy the Vampire Slayer. I struggled to open the literature of each sibling and construct a dialogue with the present. However, for this paper I’m going to focus on the actual individual James sibling. What happens if I use music as a way to represent the James family? Music is open to interpretation; there is no single meaning. The siblings James are complex individuals and to understand them is seemingly impossible. The genre of music is an area in which none of the James children dabbled. Perhaps the unfamiliar ground can help expose the inner workings of these three amazing individuals.

1. “There is a Light That Never Goes Out”- The Smiths (William)

I thought Oh God, my chance has come at last
but then a strange fear gripped me
and I just couldn't ask…
There is a light that never goes out.

 I think that an integral part of understanding William James is an awareness of his vulnerability. His fragmented education and constant relocation forced him to develop an intense self-awareness, distancing him from the shared history of childhood the rest of his generation experienced. While William James knew when he was being ridiculous, indecisive, and generally frustrating, he did his best to channel that energy into articulating a way to manage it. James felt “that every gush of feeling should be followed by adequate action… that they sometimes conflicted with one another did not, in his view, lessen his obligation to respect each one” (Menand 77). Coordinating those impulses with everyday life must have been difficult; yet his struggles birthed Pragmatism.

2. “Logical Song”- Supertramp (William)

There are times when all the world's asleep
The questions run too deep for such a simple man
Won't you please, please tell me what we've learned
I know it sounds absurd but please tell me who I am

William James spent his life creating a philosophy that would reconcile emotion with science. His own life wrought with uncertainty and indecision, James used pragmatism as a means of choosing the best outcome. In discovering the “cash-value” (“What Pragmatism Means” 380) of an option, James articulated a way of living life that combined two opposing spheres: reason and emotion. James states, “An attitude of orientation is what the pragmatic method means” (380).

This song reflects the openness of William James’s life and chosen profession. Pragmatism does not lead to a concrete conclusion, nor does it provide clear-cut rules for life. The pragmatic method declares, “That an idea is ‘true’ so long as to believe it is profitable to our lives” (388). While William James appreciates and encourages individuality, that quality also makes locating oneself in relation to the world difficult. Hearing Supertramp croon “please tell me who I am” reminds me that William James did not have all the answers, nor did he want them, he was simply trying to find a way to discover them.

3. “Psychotherapy”- Melanie Safka (William)

Oh mine eyes have seen the glory of the theories of Freud,
He has taught me all the evils that my ego must avoid.
Repression of the impulses resulting paranoid
As the id goes marching on.
Glory glory psychotherapy, glory glory sexuality,
Glory glory now we can be free as the id goes marching on

This song parodies the psychology of Freud and mocks the way society has incorporated theories into everyday life. Freud hunted out the beginnings of habits and personal problems. You were having relationship issues? You were probably pining for your mother/father. William James put no faith in that. No generalization applied to society, because “no two of us have identical difficulties, nor should we be expected to work out identical solutions” (“Conclusions” 760). I think that this song points to William James’s hidden snarkiness. I bet he wishes he wrote an awesome essay mocking a theorist, but he was too classy for such behavior.

James believed in free will and the unique experience, “to look for laws at all in the chaos seems absurdly presumptuous” (Menand 142). Philosophy and psychology should not explain everything about the world; rather it should affect our perception of the world around us. What use is a philosophy that spells out everything? A life like that has no spontaneity or purpose.

4. “Red Right Ankle”- The Decemberists (Henry)

This is the story of your red right ankle
And how it came to meet your leg
And how the muscle, bone, and sinews tangled
And how the skin was softly shed

And how it whispered “Oh, adhere to me
For we are bound by symmetry
And whatever differences our lives have been
We together make a limb.”
This is the story of your red right ankle.

This song has so much Henry James in it that I had trouble deciding which bit to focus on. The image of the anatomy of the leg reminds me of the metaphor of the house in Portrait of a Lady. You cannot see the inside house from the outside, there is always something lurking just out of sight. Skin hides the intricacies of the human body, leaving much to the imagination. Henry James did not believe in making his text easy for the reader, the complex connections between characters and events were always just under the surface.

Henry James, with his love of commas and labyrinthine sentences, has a way of lighting a match in a darkened room and taunting the reader with what they cannot see. His stories frustrate and intrigue, but they never tell the whole story. Much as “Red Right Ankle” does not connect the limb to the rest of the body, Henry James forces the reader to make leaps in the dark and forge connections.

5. “Love Love Love”- The Mountain Goats (Henry)

Raskolnikov felt sick
But he couldn't say why
When he saw his face reflected
In his victim's twinkling eye
Some things you do for money
And some you'll do for fun
But the things you do for love
Are gonna come back to you one by one

Henry James loves the gut instinct, the unexplainable (“The Beast in the Jungle” and Portrait of a Lady, anyone?). Much like William, Henry understands there are some things that we just know. We do not know exactly how we fall in love, or precisely why we hate cilantro, we simply know that we do. There are emotions and situations that we cannot explain, but rationalize to ourselves later. When Isabel Archer catches a glimpse of Madame Merle and Osmond sitting together, she comes to a realization (James 417). No logic leads Isabel to this conclusion, rather there is a gut feeling that she trusts.

The act of expressing the inexpressible is courageous. Henry James is a master at skirting around the subject, at providing the background while leaving out the important features. The reader fills in the blank spaces with his or her own interpretation. Literature does not lay everything out on the table, where would be the fun in that?

6. “The Bones of You”- Elbow (Henry)

So I'm there, charging around with a juggernaut brow
Over draft speeches and deadlines to make
Cramming commitments like cats in a sack
Telephone burning, purposeful gait

When out of a doorway the tentacles stretch
of a song that I know,
and the world moves in slow - mo
Straight to my head like the first cigarette of the day
And it’s you, and it’s me, and we're sleeping through the day
And I’m five years ago and three thousand miles away

The works of Henry James draw the reader out of the everyday hustle and bustle. You cannot skim a text by Henry James, you have to parse the sentences and immerse yourself in his world if you want to follow his story line. The song also reminds me of the slow build of a novel, the way nothing comes easily for the reader. Henry James makes you work for every piece of information, every characteristic. You do not realize how much Isabel Archer values her ability to make her own decisions until she decides to remain with Osmond.

7. “See Me Fall”- Lady & Bird (Alice)

Right here coming to life
Nothing to blame
I've been up and about under the rain
But I thought there was something in life to live for
Yes I thought you were something in life to live for

And if you hear me fall
If you hear me fall
If you see me walk upon a bridge
You've seen it all

Alice James took to her bed, but she did not lounge around uselessly. Reading her diary, a contemporary reader gets the feeling that Alice was not an easy person to live with, but more importantly, Alice was vibrant and very much an individual. She teased and tormented her poor brothers, Henry and William, but she did so with love. Concerning a surprise visit of William, organized by Henry, Alice states, “with the assistance of 200 grains of Bromides I think I behaved with extreme propriety” (51).

Alice may have been a hysteric, she may have been neurotic, but she was also strong and determined. She did her best with her lot in life, and as a result, some days were better than others were. Nevertheless, Alice did not succumb to pressure from society to be quiet and demure; she found something in life for which to live.

8. “Strange Reunions”- Yeasayer (Alice)

Don't ask me for any favors
And I won't ask how you're doing.
Leave me alone
'Cause after all,
Dealing with you is a nuisance.

Ever since I was young I've been wondering this,
Why we walk on eggshells around the wholly dimwitted
And if your tongue slips we might have to take to task with all of our hallowed institutions.

Oh, Alice, my dearest acerbic Alice, I think we could be friends. I once made a post in which I claimed Alice was bitter. I retracted that opinion, and here I wish to refine it. Alice, while not bitter, was certainly sharp-tongued and suffered no fools. I’m sure that made life lamentable for Henry and William, who only wished for her calmness and acceptance. Her brothers could not relate to her, they could only make overtures from a far-off vantage point. Alice remarks, “Poor dear William with his exaggerated sympathy for suffering isn’t to know anything about it until it is all over” (208).

9. “Little Lion Man”- Mumford and Sons (Alice)

weep for yourself, my man,
you'll never be what is in your heart
weep little lion man,
you're not as brave as you were at the start
rate yourself and break yourself,
take all the courage you have left
waste it fixing all the problems that you made in your own head

My favorite thing about Alice James is that she never blamed people for her own problems, at least not in her diary. She never cursed her father for moving the family from place to place; she never wished to take the place of her brothers. After receiving a diagnosis of breast cancer, Alice does not sink into a depression; rather, she is overjoyed that there is finally a label for what she has always been aware. Alice does not want sympathy for her plight because “[she] feels as if [she] hadn’t yet given [her] message” (218). “Little Lion Man” brings to mind an image of Alice scoffing at the people mourning her downward spiral. She has lived her life the way she wanted, and she has no fear.

10. “History of Britain”- Emmy the Great (Alice)

You say: My Girl, My Girl, You should be sure
These things you dream of are not yours
Wake up and see the planet that you live in.
And I say what’s the point in getting on
The earth will turn, we'll both be gone
We're just another moment on the timeline of the History of Britain.

I hear this song as a conversation between Henry and Alice. Although Henry supports Alice’s chosen lifestyle, he still worries about the disconnection between her and society. I think that Henry worries too much. Susan Sontag’s play “Alice in Bed” has a revealing moment between Alice and Henry, in which Henry explains that Alice has an “extraordinary intensity of will and personality. That would create enormous practical problems of life, if you chose to live in what is called, in a permanent fit of overvaluation, the real world” (29). While Henry understands that Alice is in some way beyond the reach of society, he cannot reach the same level as her.

The fleeting nature of life allows Alice to live in an unconventional manner. Much as the song states, “We’ll both be gone.” Life is not meant to last, and Alice is well aware of this. Near the end of her life, Alice comments on the value of one’s lifetime: “The success or failure of a life, as far as posterity goes, seems to lie in the more or less luck of seizing the right moment of eclipse” (229). Life is a game of chance, and Alice might have been a card-shark. Alice did not spend her life alone and she was more aware of reality than I originally gave her credit.

In the wee hours of the morning as I scoured my iTunes for suitable songs, I feel as though I engaged in bizarre dialogue with the James family. I had the most fun with Alice, because she was the sibling I felt that I did not understand. William and Henry are confusing, yes, but Alice is a mystery wrapped in an enigma. She hangs out in bed with Katharine Loring, dismisses William’s sympathies, and shocks Henry by transcribing all of his gossip. Her motives were the bits of her that eluded me. Creating this playlist has led me to a conclusion, or at least a resting point: Alice did not dwell in her present. She cast her mind forward into the years to come, the years in which women did not have to be submissive to men. I like to think that Alice thought in possibilities rather than realities.

 Works Cited

James, Henry. Portrait of a Lady. New York: Signet Classics, 2007. Print.
James, Alice. The Diary of Alice James. Ed. Leon Edel. Boston: Northeastern University Press, 1999. Print.
James, William. "Conclusions [to "The Varieties of Religious Experience"]." The Writings of William James: A

Comprehensive Edition. Ed. John McDermott. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1977. 758-782. Print
"What Pragmatism Means." 376-390. Print.

Menand, Louis. The Metaphysical Club. New York: Farrar, Straus, and Giroux: 2001. Print.

Sontag, Susan. "Alice in Bed." New York: Farrar, Straus, and Giroux, 1993. Print.
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