Weekly Insónia: Loneliness (Translation)
(This article is a translation of the original Insónia Semanal: Solidão published on April 3rd, 2021)
In an increasingly connected world, is loneliness decreasing or increasing? Some say that we are all born and inevitably die alone. Others advocate that it is in solitude that we can find wisdom.
QUOTE
Lonely people tend, rather, to be lonely because they decline to bear the psychic costs of being around other humans.
David Foster Wallace in E Unibus Pluram Television and U.S. Fiction
BOOK
The Stranger — Albert Camus (1942)
This is the story of a man condemned by society for not being moved by his mother’s death. It is Albert Camus’ greatest work, exploring the existentialist themes that were dear to him.
MOVIE
Lars and the Real Girl — Craig Gillespie (2007)
The main character who gives the film its title is a ‘geek’. His family begins to realise that his antisocial behaviour has reached the point of becoming a mental illness when he buys a life-size silicone doll, a replica of a woman. Lars begins to behave as if the doll were a real woman, his girlfriend.
What’s ingenious about the plot is the way it portrays the small-town backdrop. Everyone loves Lars and doesn’t want to hurt his feelings, so everyone behaves as if his hallucination is real.
Despite its comedic tone, the film manages to give the viewer an uncomfortable feeling of embarrassment. The dialogues explore the comedy of the absurd, sometimes in a touching way, but never asking the viewer to feel sorry for the protagonist despite all his weaknesses.
Lars can’t tolerate being touched; intimacy seems an impossibility to him. Despite this, he has so much love to give that he finds a place for it in the doll.
In the end, the film conveys an optimistic view of humanity; it’s hard to believe that in an individualistic, fast-paced society like ours, Lars would be greeted with anything other than pity or contempt.
RECORD
Flower Boy — Tyler the Creator (2017)
American rapper Tyler the Creator’s songs have always focused on the darkest corners of the mind. The gratuitous violence of albums like Bastard or Goblin was justified by the artist as being the thoughts we all harbour when we’re alone.
On Flower Boy, however, the references to loneliness and boredom take on a more direct but less violent form, in themes buried in unorthodox hip-hop string melodies.
ARTICLE
The Unfinished — The New Yorker
An article on the life and work of David Foster Wallace. We began this article with a quote from the American writer about loneliness. In D.T. Max’s article, we follow the author’s troubled relationship with his own psyche, which resulted in his suicide, and how the themes of loneliness, depression, sadness, and the search for meaning marked his work.
Jaime Monteiro
