Paper, Little overdue

“Easy, you know, does it, son.”

“But the future has no such reality (as the pictured past and the perceived present possess); the future is but a figure of speech, a specter of thought.” (Nabokov 489)

A person notices a rock lying at the bottom of a creek bed; its glassy surface bounces the sun’s light through the water’s surface. They wonder how much time has elapsed for the creek’s flow to smooth the rock enough for such a refraction to occur. The person wonders if it may have fallen from a mountain during a landslide or after an aggressive flood or heavy rainfall. They wonder what carried the rock so many miles to its current location. This person does not wonder, however, what the future holds for the rock; they are stuck in the present, admiring its beauty, pondering what may have happened in the past, and are caught in its current appearance. In Vladimir Nabokov’s Transparent Things, Hugh Person confronts two major themes: the three tenses and the three forms of consciousness. Similar to the rock laying beneath the water, these themes enable Hugh to have a pictured past, bring him to his perceived present being, and shape the inevitable future that at present times is merely a specter of thought.
The premise that creates synthesis amongst the themes is the three tenses: past, present and future. These tenses go along with the stages of life as well as the conscious and un-conscious; for the many stages of life and ones cognizance throughout it determines how someone reflects on their past, behaves in the present, and views their upcoming future. “Perhaps if the future existed, concretely and individually, as something that could be discerned by a better brain, the past would not be so seductive: its demands would be balanced by those of the future. Persons might then straddle the middle stretch of the seesaw when considering this or that object. It might be fun.” (Nabokov 489) Because people can not directly see what their future holds, they look to their past and think about things they should have done differently, or of issues that continue to haunt them in their present. A person holds a multitude of memories from their past, and the choices they made effect how they act in their present state of being. This inevitably influences the choices they will someday make that directly affect their future. If a person knew what was going to happen in the future, they could better balance their lives by not dwelling so much on the past, but instead live in, and enjoy the present.
Hugh constantly deals with issues from his past, issues that compromise his livelihood and are afflicted by irrational fears. Hugh is not able to look at the rock below the surface of the water and see its present state and function. Instead, Hugh looks at an object and notices its color, shape and imperfections: qualities that enable Hugh to lose himself in the object’s past rather than its current form. “When we concentrate on a material object, whatever its situation, the very act of attention may lead to our involuntarily sinking into the history of that object. Novices must learn to skim over matter if they want matter to stay at the exact level of the moment. Transparent things, though which the past shines!” (Nabokov 489) Hugh feels awkward when he is in an unfamiliar place in life, making him constantly revert back to how things used to be. When he visits a hotel he has not been to in years, Hugh feels upset when the receptionist is not the same person, the familiar hotel room 313 is occupied, and the hallway is unrecognizable. Hugh continues to dwell on the grief that engrained one fifth of his life; the same time period he last visited the Ascot Hotel. Because Hugh focuses strongly on memories from the past, he makes the Ascot Hotel seem like a dreadful building rather than appreciating it for its purpose and function in the present. Hugh continually breaks through this tension film, and “will find himself no longer walking on water but descending upright among staring fish.” (Nabokov 489)
The rock that lies below the surface of the water, depending on where you stand, may not deliver the same degree of refracted light that a person might see from a different angle. Without the same level of reflection from the sun, the person may not notice the rock’s shiny coat, or worse, the beautiful rock could go completely unnoticed. Past is not the only factor that affects a person’s present being. Society, as well as different viewpoints and interiority, can strongly alter a person’s perception of reality and present time. Hugh Person does not have an optimistic view of the world, giving him tendencies to find faults and imperfections in everything that surrounds him. Some objects Hugh finds many problems with include dingy lilacs, shade-less lamps, broken umbrellas, cheap pine and faceless old pencils. (Nabokov 492) Because of his interpretation and perception of how the world is, Hugh is conditioned to see the worst in both people and his surroundings.
The people in Hugh Person’s life seem to have the same tainted pasts and flawed exteriors as the objects that surround him. Hugh is unable to view people as they exist in present time, which means he always sees their extra baggage as well as their dirty laundry. The only time that Hugh is able to live in the present, rather than thinking about the past, occurs when his father dies. Hugh does not want to be troubled with sending his fathers body home, and suggests to “get rid of the dreadful object practically at once.” (Nabokov 498) In this instance, Hugh does not sink into the history of his father’s body, but instead sees it as merely a carcass that must be disposed of. Bodies have scars, wrinkles and evidence of existence, all of which allows the past to shine though their outer appearances. However, Hugh chooses to view the body from a different angle: not as his father, but as a carcass that needs to be disposed of. Rather than dwelling on the past as he usually does, Hugh finds himself standing in the present moment, letting go of memories attached to the body of “Henry Emery Person, our Person’s father,” who “might be described as a well-meaning, earnest, dear little man, or as a wretched fraud, depending on the angle of light and the position of the observer.” (Nabokov 498)
Out of the three tenses, future is the least discussed in Transparent Things. For Hugh, the future is only a “figure of speech” or a “specter of thought.” He is able to grasp the past because of the pictures he has created inside his memory palace, and is able to perceive what is happening in the present moments; however, Hugh does not look too far into the future for he has no image or recollection of what it will be like. One of the only statements Hugh says regarding future throughout the entire story is that “every task in life should be brought to an end, like completing that road above Witt, where they had a house, a chalet de luxe, but had to trudge up to the Drakonita cableway until the new road had been finished.” (Nabokov 505) Because Hugh knows that every task in life must come to an end, he is aware that changes will be made in the future. For example: Hugh knows he will always finish a book, he knows he wants to climb the mountain that caused him such embarrassment, and he knows that eventually, like everyone else in his life, he too will die. However, even though Hugh understands that everything will eventually come to an end, he is unaware of where the end will lie.
Hugh harnesses dark fears that consist of both the future and the past. During the days, Hugh projects his feelings of fear and low self-esteem onto the objects and people surrounding him. But each day will come to an end, bringing Hugh to face the fact that everything, including daytime, always comes to an end. The end of daytime means the beginning of nighttime, and the beginning of nighttime forces a person to leave the world of the conscious and surrender their thoughts and feelings to the bodies subconscious. The “low sun’s funeral,” (Nabokov 506) does not only refer to the death and end of a day, but the birth of darkness that would soon blanket the entire earth, causing Hugh once again to battle his fears of sleep, and the black world that surrounds it. Like the past, future and present, Hugh is also shaped by his mental patterns, bringing him closer then further away from reality and present time, with each setting or rising of the sun.
Sleeping, dreaming and being awake are three forms of consciousness, or the un-conscious, found throughout Transparent Things. While daytime and consciousness are generally seen as positive and symbolize the present, the idea of darkness and sleeping brings forth Hugh’s problematic nocturnal fears, which makes sleep become a habitual problem. “Ever since childhood…the problem was twofold. He was obliged, sometimes for hours, to woo the black automation with an automatic repetition of some active image-that was one trouble. The other referred to the quasi-insane state into which sleep put him, once it did come. He could not believe that decent people had the sort of obscene and absurd nightmares which shattered his night and continued to tingle throughout the day.” (Nabokov 527) The problems Hugh harnesses with going to sleep are a direct correlation with not being able to control his own thoughts. Once his brain slips away into the abyss of his subconscious, Hugh opens himself up to seeing the unending awfulness of his deepest thoughts; thoughts he is usually able to suppress while awake and in control. Knowing what his brain is capable of conjuring during sleep, Hugh dreads what the dark symbolizes and instead is restless until the first sliver of sunlight enters his room.
The abyss, which is also known as Hugh’s subconscious, is a scary place for him to visit, for he has learned that he has “destructive urges” in his dreams. These destructive tensions and urges are those that have been stored up since infancy, making his past, present and future desires the main storyline for the dreams Hugh will fade into once night falls. “Hugh need not be ashamed of them. In fact, at puberty sexual desire arises as a substitute for the desire to kill, which one normally fulfills in one’s dreams; and insomnia is merely the fear of becoming aware in sleep of one’s unconscious desires for slaughter and sex.” (Nabokov 531) Hugh is already aware enough of his not-so-happy past, and making himself aware of what his present subconscious feels and desires for himself and the future, will only make him more unhappy. Also, knowing that his friends and acquaintances do not have similar dreams makes Hugh feel even more like an outcast. “He could not believe that decent people had the sort of obscene and absurd nightmares which shattered his night and continued to tingle throughout the day. Neither the incidental accounts of bad dreams reported by friends nor the case histories elucidations, presented anything like the complicated vileness of his almost nightly experience.” (Nabokov 527)
Everything must come to an end, death is inevitable, and sleeping without an active subconscious creates an illusion of what death and the future holds. In the end, Hugh determines his own fate. If only Hugh had looked at his life and society from a different point of view, he may have been able to enjoy the present, and appreciate the beauty that surrounded him rather than notice the scars and evidence from histories past.
“Person hated the sight and the feel of his feet. They were uncommonly graceless and sensitive. Even as a grown man he avoided looking at them when undressing.” (Nabokov 548) Every time Hugh glances down at his own feet he becomes aware of all the steps he has taken, the places he is currently standing, and the places his feet will take him in the future. They are reminders of where he has been, and where he will go. If Hugh had only walked a different path, then he may have been able to escape his fears, noticing the rock reflecting brightly from below the tension surface of the small creek.
A person notices a strange figure lying at the bottom of a creek bed; its coarse, uneven surfaces consisting of fabric, hair and decomposing skin make strange shapes and colors reflect through the water’s surface. They wonder how much time has elapsed for the creek’s flow to slowly deteriorate the body and the clothes attached to it. The person wonders if the body was put there by a criminal or carried by a strong flood or if the body had simply drowned on the spot. They wonder what carried the body so many miles to its current location. This person does not wonder, however, what the future holds for the body; they are stuck in the present, knowing a life has ended, pondering what may have happened in the past to cause the bodies current appearance and demise. Hugh Person would never notice the beautiful rock that lies next to the decaying body. Nor does he find beauty in objects where the exterior suggests a rough past. Instead, Hugh Person confronts the themes of tenses and forms of consciousness by exposing fears and pessimisms that have a direct correlation to his past, present and where his future will take him. In Vladimir Nabokov’s Transparent Things, Hugh is shaped strongly by his pictured past, which brings him to his perceived present being, and shapes the inevitable future to come. If only Hugh had glanced at the riverbed from a different view, he may have seen the beauty of a polished rock, and appreciated the small refraction of sunlight twinkling from beneath the surface.