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- From: lowry.charles AT gmail.com
- To: percy-l AT lists.ibiblio.org
- Subject: Re: [percy-l] Synesthesia in The Moviegoer
- Date: Thu, 10 Apr 2025 17:57:04 -0400
I was delighted to see Henry’s thoughts on synesthesia. I had a momentary
flash that all those years of Greek (many years of Greek, though several
fewer than of Latin) were about to be put to the test. I did fine, though to
reassure myself, in spiritu humilitatis, I searched for a standard
definition: “a concomitant sensation, especially a subjective sensation or
image of a sense (as of color) other than the one (as of sound) being
stimulated.”
[“Synesthesia.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster,
https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/synesthesia. Accessed 10 Apr.
2025.]
The same reference work gives an example: “That’s probably what gives you
synesthesia, the ability to see a flavor or feel a sound.”
I can quote one example of what might be considered a form of synesthesia in
The Moviegoer, near the beginning. The novel opens with Binx taking the bus
to his aunt’s and uncle’s house for lunch. Binx gets off the bus at
Esplanade, and the multi-sensory assault begins at once: “I alight at
Esplanade in a smell of roasting coffee and creosote and walk up Royal
Street. The lower Quarter is the best part. The ironwork on the balconies
sags like rotten lace. The French cottages hide behind high walls. Through
deep sweating carriageways one catches glimpses of courtyards gone to
jungle.” I know that this example may not satisfy synesthesia purists, but I
suspect that the passage shows an almost unbreakable link, reinforced by
unvarying regularity frequently experienced, between the two sensations of
smelling and seeing.
I wonder if New Orleans offers fewer opportunities for synesthesia just
because it is such a richly sensuous milieu: the clouds, the sun, the
architecture, the smells (e.g. coffee and creosote), the sazeracs and gin
fizzes, the food and music that feed the dreamer, the sirens and streetcars
and Spanish moss, a feast for the senses, and maybe in New Orleans these
attacks upon our senses are so strong and frequent that synesthesia doesn’t
have time to take root.
Just a thought or two.
Chuck Lowry
Brooklyn, New York
> On Apr 9, 2025, at 9:14 AM, H Mills <wppdirector AT gmail.com> wrote:
>
> Dear Percy friends,
>
> I came across this luscious quote from the MG this morning that
> demonstrates Percy as a master craftsman of synesthesia. Any other similar
> Percy passages of the sort in any of his novels come to mind to others?
> Please post.
>
> Also, as advance notice, I am pleased to share we will be having another
> Slow Reading Group of a Percy novel this summer. Stay tuned for more
> information in May.
>
> Best wishes for a wonderful Spring,
> Henry Mills
>
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>
> —
> Henry P. Mills III
> Director, The Walker Percy Project
> www.ibiblio.org/wpercy
-
[percy-l] Synesthesia in The Moviegoer,
H Mills, 04/09/2025
- <Possible follow-up(s)>
- Re: [percy-l] Synesthesia in The Moviegoer, lowry . charles, 04/10/2025
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