The Confusions Of Young Törless (2001) - Plot & Excerpts
the place is an exclusive all-boys boarding school in Austria. the time is the turn of the 19th century. three boys: Törless, Beineberg, and Reiting. Reiting is an amiable, energetic sort; his aggressive nature is balanced by his charm and ease in the world. Beineberg is an anti-intellectual intellectual; much like his father, he yearns to be a mystic. in Törless, still waters run deep and much of the material world holds little interest for him; contemplation and melancholy are his hallmarks. what are three such precocious lads to do with themselves? there is the village whore to spend time with, but these boys' interests go further. what to do, what to do? how about find a fellow schoolchum, learn about his weaknesses, and then grind him into nothing; torment and humiliate, beat, sexually abuse. and so there is a fourth boy: Basini. the three boys play with him. The Confusions of Young Törless was published in 1906 by Robert Musil. apparently it is autobiographical in nature. it is a philosophical treatise and a classic coming of age novel. although the novel's narrative is centered around the endless debasement of the passive Basini, that degradation is not at all the novel's primary concern. it is there in the title: the book is about confused young Törless: his quest for logic in an illogical world and his need to quantify the ineffable and his barely-understood desire for transcendence, for an escape from small minds and fixed roles and murky morality. a boy will fight against his surroundings, he will struggle with authority figures, he will be cynical without experiencing enough of the outside world to earn that cynicism. a boy will rationalize or a boy will simply choose not to think about things that disturb him. a boy will strive, a boy will yearn, a boy will barely understand himself. but a boy will try. and he may force others to do the same. there are worms. a worm is a symbol of decay. or rebirth? a cord dangling from drapes looks like a writhing worm in the moonlight. there is a red worm of blood that trickles down Basini's face.there is an eye; Törless sees it in the boys' secret hideaway. it is an eye made of dust motes and shadows and dim shafts of light. he sees it in the midst of one of Basini's beatings. he contemplates it. what does this eye behold? what is the story of this eye?there are windows. windows are a window to the unknown; Törless stares through many windows. windows are a window to memory; Törless recalls sounds he once heard through windows. the sky is a window; Törless stares at the sky and is filled with awe, wonder, and fear. Törless is a thinker, Törless is a dreamer. Törless has disturbing feelings: some about his mother, some about the local whore, some about Basini. Törless has hallucinatory dreams with meanings he can only slightly grasp. he tries to share these feelings, these dreams, but no one ever understands.Törless, Törless, Törless. oh, Törless! you and your yearning, your dreams. fuck you, Törless. of the three boys, I think you are the worst. Reiting likes Basini to read him stories about conquering heroes; then he fucks and beats him. Beineberg likes to use Basini as a footrest, make him bark like a dog, beat him; sometimes he fucks him. Törless asks Basini searching questions about how he feels, what is going on inside of him while all of this is happening; he makes Basini speak when Basini would rather cry; sometimes he fucks him. guess who Basini falls in love with? Reiting and Beineberg's motivations are banal (despite Beineberg's laughably pretentious attempt to intellectualize his predations): they are cruel boys who enjoy brutalizing someone under their thumb. Törless is not like them, he's a sensitive lad. he wants to understand many things, imaginary numbers and order vs. chaos and the logic of dreams. unlike his friends, he is not a malevolent sort and his sexual arousal at Basini's tortures confuse him. poor, confused Törless! Basini means nothing to him, he considers him to be "meaningless" - except as one of many puzzles he is desperate to figure out. fuck you, Törless. your confusions are nothing compared to what you and your buddies dole out. the problem with this thoughtful, absorbing, boring, poetic, mechanistic, frustrating, compelling, often brilliant novel is that it is exactly like its title character. it is not about the debasement and Törless' key role there. it is all about our protagonist's struggle, his inner life. well, it was a bit hard for this reader to focus on such things when throughout all of the philosophical musings are brief descriptions of the boys' predations. the intellectualization of such acts, their use as metaphor, all the world's a play and we are merely actors on a stage, what goes on behind the curtain and within a mind... honestly I don't give a flying fuckeroo about all that when some weak kid is getting destroyed by stronger kids. you used the wrong metaphor, Musil. all the philosophical musings - I would say 90% of the novel - were rendered obnoxious and uninteresting after it became clear that Musil himself is disinterested in what is happening to Basini. like the novel's protagonist, the author also views Basini as meaningless. Musil, you are like Törless. you make that crystal clear. and that is not a good look.
The blurb on the back of my Picador copy says that 'Törless is drawn into the vicious brutalities of his fellow cadets in the secret attic that provides a torture chamber for sadistic homosexual ritual.' Given that the book was first published in 1906 I wasn't sure what to expect; I thought most of the 'horrors' would be implied rather than related explicitly; and it is to a certain extent but it still packs a punch, so be warned - this is not Tom Brown's School Days.The book begins with Törless arriving at the academy with his parents after a break. The academy is somewhere on the eastern border of the Austro-Hungarian empire. Törless makes friends with Beineberg and Reiting and it is this trio that form a sort of bullies' club and the main subject of the book is the bullies' characters and actions. Basini is their victim.Reiting is the main bully, he's come out the winner in a power struggle between himself and Beineberg. He's the more practical bully as he has a natural affinity for power, violence and torture. He also instigates the sadistic sexual practices within the group. Whereas Reiting outwardly enjoys the punishing of Basini, Beineberg claims that he doesn't enjoy it but does it as a spiritual test for himself - he's interested in Eastern mysticism which influences all his views on life. Törless has more of an intellectually detached view and doesn't really feel that he's the same as the other two. He gets drawn into the others' actions and seems to be interested in how Basini feels when he is experiencing his punishments. Törless is aware that there are moral arguments against what they're doing but does not feel the need to stop the others. Even when Törless does step away from the others and informs the headmaster he doesn't feel any remorse for what he's done but just relief that it's over with.Basini is the victim who falls into the bullies' clutches when it's discovered that he's stolen some money. Reiting and Beineberg view Basini as little better than an animal. Basini is a weaselly, effeminate boy who, to some extent, enjoys the punishments. Basini virtually seduces Törless when they're left alone during a vacation, possibly because Törless does not appear to be a true bully. When Basini climbs into bed with Törless he exclaims 'We're both younger than the others. You don't boast and bully the way they do...You're gentle...I love you...'But things escalate; Reiting gets bored and wants to make Basini 'knuckle under completely.' and he wants 'to see how far it can go.' The reader gets the feeling that Reiting would stop at nothing and would happily torture Basini to death. In the end Törless puts a stop to it without the others suspecting him. But for me the truly horrific thing about the story is that it's Basini that gets the blame for leading the others astray whereupon he is expelled. The authorities are eager to believe that it was mostly Basini's own fault and that the upstanding Reiting, Beineberg and Törless can be considered blameless.The book was a bit dull at first but it builds to a compelling climax. None of the characters are appealing or likeable; they're either vicious, sadistic, amoral, weak or depraved. Readers who want likeable characters should avoid this book.My copy was called, Young Törless and was translated by Eithne Wilkins and Ernst Kaiser in 1955. The book was originally published in 1906 as Die Verwirrungen des Zöglings Törleß. I read this as part of the German Literature Month 2013
What do You think about The Confusions Of Young Törless (2001)?
Quando li As perturbações do pupilo Törless, de Robert Musil, ainda o título era O Jovem Törless. Também a tradução era outra, de 1987, da Editora Livros do Brasil, feita por João Filipe Ferreira. Depois publicaram-se as obras completas de Robert Musil, nas Publicações Dom Quixote, com traduções da responsabilidade de João Barrento. O título As perturbações do pupilo Törless é mais fiel ao título original e ao conteúdo da obra; contudo prefiro o título O Jovem Törless. Preferiria até que o título fosse somente Törless. Penso que estaria mais de acordo com o livro que eu li. Houve alguém que disse - eu ouvi-o, ou li-o, já não sei, ao José Saramago - que ler era reescrever. É por isso que digo que o título devia ser simplesmente Törless. Um título só e desamparado. Porque foi assim que eu li, ou melhor, foi assim que na minha leitura reescrevi Törless.Törless é um daqueles livros que li tarde demais. Há livros que lemos antes do tempo (li muitos livros antes do tempo, Os Possessos de Fiódor Dostoiévski, que referi aqui, foi um deles), outros que lemos na altura certa, outros que devíamos ter lido muito antes. Quando abrimos o livro, e depois de passarmos a epígrafe de Maeterkinck, que soa como um último aviso, chegamos a «uma pequena estação de caminho-de-ferro». Törless despede-se da mãe, ou a mãe de Törless despede-se dele, ou um despede-se do outro, nunca saberemos bem. E no momento seguinte já Törless está no internato fundado por uma ordem religiosa.
—André Benjamim
hmmmmm...Okay, that could be all but I'm just very talkative...Thing is, first, that despite me knowing that Musil's some kind of famous and stuff, I didn't know, well, anything upon starting this book. I am kinda glad that it was that way, though, to be honest, with my only starting years of broader reading of high literature I am not sure if I can adequately say anything about this.At one glance, this seems like a story about bullying in a boarding school or a story about puberty and it's homo-tendencies in some. I partly agree - but I think this is more about the way in which teens think and try to see the world and make it understandable for their minds.For example, the three main boys: Törleß himself and his friends Reiting and Beineberg. Beineberg tries to have the world make sense through (Indian) religion and philosophy. Törleß tries to have the world make sense through emotions but also logic. Reiting doesn't seem to care about any of this, he tries to have the world make sense by not making sense of it.Of course, since this is mostly from Törleß' point of view, his developing worldview is present the most, and his, let's call it, distrust of Beineberg's position is apparent whenever it comes up.But the three boys are bound by one other: Basini, a classmate who stole money, and who is punished, mostly by Beineberg and Reiting, for this - while, actually, they are just bullies who exercise power over him by making him feel as guilty as possible.Törleß doesn't really take much part in it, but he feels... attracted, somehow? to Basini and one way or the other gets to know what exactly his friends are doing. Basini, in turn, seeks the help of Törleß...And this is where I thing it gets tricky. I could easily fall into seeing this all as puberty-gay-times, but somehow I have the feeling that it is much more about the workings of the minds of adolescents and the things they have to deal with. Because Basini especially doesn't seem that much like someone who genuinely enjoys the gay stuff, maybe a bit, but more like a child with a difficult life having his life made even more difficult. His Dad's dead and his Mum's not well off, which almost naturally makes for grounds for his classmates to pick on, plus loading him with some deeply emotional crap.Along come his classmates and take advantage of his problems. This is not only something which, sadly, frequently happens - it is also a fear of the young, that everyone else in their world(As in: Classmates and teachers) will know what they are dealing with and loading their crap on top of it.No, actually that's a typical human fear. But I guess at one point you just start to stop caring.At times, Musil came off a bit preachy - but as I have not yet a deeper knowledge of his person and works I will refrain from judging that completely. I may just be mistaken, or he may just have been too good in melting with his protagonist. I hope I'll know rather soon - The Man Without Qualities rests in my room just as this point.Four stars for deep human stuff and pretty convincing teens.
—Lina
*Traduzione Andrea Landonfi*Allora ditelo che questo tomo, questo tomino, è di letteratura Austriaca. Mica roba tedesca di germania.Il giovane Törless è in un collegio di pregio dell'impero austroungarico. Senza dubbio è uno di quei caposaldi.Forse anche perché è stato uno dei primi ad affrontare il tema un po' scottante sul discorso ragazzini in collegio che si inchiappettano.Sarà che siamo in quota psicanalisi, ma il discorso procede discretamente a suon di pipponi. Il regazzino di sedici anni fa discorsi un po' troppo maturi e cogitabondi per la sua età.Le vicende sessuali sono accennate in punta di forchetta, il lettore moderno vuole sapere cosa diavolo combinano. Probabilmente al tempo non c'era bisogno di esplicitarlo, che tanto la gente era pratica di collegi. C'è anche da dire che il non detto, il pippone proto-psicologico, eccetera... sono quelle cose che rendono il libro a suo modo eterno. Di diarietti più espliciti ne vengono scritti oggi come piovesse, e finiranno tutti fra il macero e il dimenticatoio. Interessante come in contesto sociale vagamente omofobo, i giudizi non sono delicati sul povero Basini - l'efebo italiano che dà i basini - comunque l'esperienza omosex è cassata come una normale evenienza nella vita. È anche interessante notare come l'europa di inizio 900 era molto più libertina di come si creda. È stato poi quel ventennio fra guerre mondiali e fascismi... e poi il dopoguerra. Periodi neri in cui si è tornati indietro di molti decenni sul discorso libertà sessuale. Che dopo le guerre la società vuole figli per la patria per sostituire i defunti e giocoforza tutto ciò che non è missionario viene eliminato dai radar. Per arrivare al librino. A dirla tutta per quanto abbia il suo valore intrinseco, letterario e sociale... denota abbastanza la propria vecchiezza. Soprattutto nelle riflessioni filosofiche pedanti e pesanti del giovane Torless. Non so se a inizio 900 i regazzini fossero dei pensatori, sicuramente un adolescente si fa un sacco di pippe anche mentali, e sicuramente Musil era abbastanza fresco di adolescenza all'epoca. Ma è evidente che ha trasfigurato se stesso e la propria cogitabonda adolescenza in collegio, e magari anche delle esperienze omofile vere, in un pippone poetico e filosofico di un adolescente dalla profondità emotiva incredibilmente sviluppata (per quanto faccia di merda). Che oggi suona un po' fesso.
—Coni
