Travels in Hyperreality
or
Diary of a Rock'n'Roll Star
by
Per Stam
In this article I will try to compare two texts and two ways of
interpreting culture. The reasons for choosing these texts are
the following: they are totally different in language, aims and
scope, but they share the same topic &endash; a European (white
male) travelling in and interpreting the USA &endash;, and they
are both from the first half of the seventies. I believe, that
by reading these two texts, and by placing them side by side, we
could learn something about our own trade. The comparison could
be the start of a discussion of subjectivity/objectivity, participation/voyeurism,
empathy/aversion in cultural studies.
First I'll give a short outline of the two texts, their authors
and their arguments, then I'll measure the differences between
them.
The long essay "Travels in Hyperreality" is written by Umberto
Eco in 1975 (later published in the book, Faith in Fakes 1986/1995).
Eco is the internationally well-known Italian semiotician, whose
theories of semiotics and of open text has gained much influence
in different disciplines all over the world. Eco has also written
two famous novels, The Name of the Rose and Foucault's Pendulum.
The essay "Travels in Hyperreality" is not a scholarly work, Eco
points out in the preface to the whole book, but it's not entirely
different from his scholarly work.
I don't believe there is any gap between what I write in my "academic" books
and what I write in the papers. I cannot say precisely whether,
for the papers, I try to translate into language accessible to
all and apply to the events under consideration the ideas I later
develop in my academic books, or whether it is the opposite that
happens. Probably many of the theories expounded in my academic
books grew gradually, on the basis of the observations I wrote
down as I followed current events. ([viii, no pagination])
Although Eco says that "this is not a book of semiotics" (ix),
it is still the gospel of a semiotician he brings to the reader.
In the preface he also writes:
In these pages I try to interpret and to help others interpret
some "signs". These signs are not only words, or images; they can
also be forms of social behavior, political acts, artificial landscapes.
[- - -] I believe it is my job as a scholar and a citizen
to show how we are surrounded by "messages," products of political
power, of economic power, of the entertainment industry and the
revolution industry, and to say that we must know how to analyze
and criticize them. (ix)
Eco is the 'decoder', the one who sees the hidden patterns and
explains them to us ordinary citizens. In "Travels in Hyperreality" Eco
takes the reader on an American journey through what he calls hyperreality;
in short, copies of cultural artefacts made more real than the
real ones, because the Americans always want 'more'. Quote: "To
speak of things that one wants to connote as real, these things
must seem real. The 'completely real' becomes identified with 'the
completely fake.' Absolute unreality is offered as real presence." (7)
The reader is taken by the hand and educated on the double logic
of the American hyperreal: wax museums, fortresses of solitude,
artificial jungles, Disneyland and other toy cities (cities that
imitate cities). There is also the question of the short American
history. Eco writes:
[…] the frantic desire for the Almost Real arises
only as a neurotic reaction to the vacuum of memories; the Absolute
Fake is offspring of the unhappy awareness of a presence without
depth. (30-31)
In summary I could say that the main themes in Eco's essay are
travel, hyperrealism, lack of history, the last resort.
Diary of a Rock'n'Roll Star is written by Ian Hunter, leader of
the English rock band Mott the Hoople, whose song "All the Young
Dudes" (written and produced by David Bowie) in the end of 1972
(when the diary starts) climbs the charts. Hunter takes the reader
on an American tour through a rock-star-on-the-road-reality, or
unreality as he calls it. (35, 40) The book is written for "the
kids", that is the fans and young musicians back home who want
to know how it really is. Hunter writes in the "Preface":
This is a documentary about the band I'm in: Mott the Hoople.
It covers the duration of a five-week American tour in November
and December of 1972. It was written as it happened, on planes,
buses, in cars, hotels, dressing rooms &endash; anywhere I could
put pen to paper. Sometimes I was tired, sometimes drunk, sometimes
corny high and sometimes very down. [Hunter also says that
he won't reveal secrets about groupies etc., then goes on:]
I'll begin in the beginning and I will write as simply as I can
because I want the people to read it as it happens. It's not meant
to have literary merit, nor to be a journalist's delight. No, it's
more like a letter to a fan in the front row at the Rainbow, a
diary to keep in touch. It's meant to be a buzz for the people
who dig us and will never be able to go to the places we travel.
I hope the kids we play to will read it and that it will give them
some pleasure. ([5, no pagination])
This is obviously written to keep the expectations low, but from
his point of view Hunter can give quite a few descriptions of what
Eco calls hyperreality. He describes a wax museum (40); a 'historical'
building in Dallas: "The first house ever built here is still on
display, but it's been 'restored' and is called the Restored John
Neely Bryan Cabin and was originally built in November of 1841,
and that's about it." (112-113); the American fascination over
'toys': "The Americans have an uncanny knack of making all adult
things extensions of children's toys. Everything is attractive
on the eye as everyone was once a child." (94); the fine line between
the real and the fake, this is one example from the Whiskey A-Go-Go
in Los Angeles, and it has to do with groupies &endash; and with
gender: "Jill comes over &endash; she might be genuine, but who
knows." (18) Hunter can never go to Disneyland &endash; the group
would not be let in, their hair is too long. (21, 70) Still, the
journey includes a pilgrimage to the house of Elvis Presley. I
stop there, summing up Hunter's main themes: travel, on the road,
music business, unreality.
Now, if we compare these texts, it's easy to see that they describe
the same America, but that they differ a lot in their ways of describing.
Both texts claim to be popular works, written for ordinary people.
The difference lies in the narrator's position, and how he talks
to his narratees.
Umberto Eco wants to educate (and maybe entertain) his fellow
citizen, "to help others interpret some 'signs'". (ix) He is the
detached observer, who with modestly hidden disgust analyses the
hyperbolic 'true original copies'. He becomes almost sick when
facing Venus de Milo in The Palace of Living Arts in Buena Park,
Los Angeles. Venus de Milo is
[…] leaning on an Ionic column against the background
of a wall with figures painted in red. I say "leaning," and in
fact this polychrome unfortunate has arms. The legend explains: "Venus
de Milo brought to life as she was in the days when she posed for
the unknown Greek sculptor, in approximately 200 B.C." (20)
He usually behaves like a semiotic scholar, not taking any big
place in the discourse. Although he tries to make faces sometimes,
as above, and when he writes about William Randolph Hearst's castle:
It's like making love in a confessional with a prostitute dressed
in a prelate's liturgical robes reciting Baudelaire while ten electronic
organs reproduce the Well Tempered Clavier played by Skriabin.
(23-24)
I think this tells something about Eco's desires. (To get closer
to Eco, we have to look behind what he is saying, search for hidden,
involuntary revelations, like this one.) Still &endash; Eco's discourse
is well put, well mannered, and a bit boring. But why should we
believe him? Is he telling us the truth? Is he objective, and does
he show us something new? I'll come back to this, but we mustn't
forget the other text.
Ian Hunter's book is maybe not better, but it treats the reader
like a friend and someone who also knows: "P.S. Batman's on the
telly." (54) It is also livelier, and in many ways more interesting.
Why? I think it works this way because Hunter participates in the
hyperreality, he doesn't just look at it, he is tempted by and
desires some of the fake originals, the things over-the-top. To
symbolically enter hyperreality Hunter and the band, before leaving
London, buy stage costumes that look flashy, but are worth nothing:
Now we've got to look groovy so our manager, Tony DeFries, gave
us £100 each to buy clothes. That's O.K., but the clothes
are all shit &endash; Carnaby Street, Ken Market, Kings Road &endash;
ridiculous prices for rubbish that doesn't last five minutes […].
(7)
Remember that this is 1972, and by their association with Bowie,
they have become part of the glam rock movement, and have to dress
accordingly. The American tour is a tour in hyperreality, but a
hyperreality that you have to meet, smell, fight with and desire.
This is exemplified best with the story about the guitar shaped
like a Maltese Cross, that Hunter finds in a pawn shop and has
to buy, although it could be &endash; and is &endash; a bad guitar.
MICK: 'Look at that fuckin' guitar.'
ME: 'What is it?'
MICK: 'I don't know, but it's amazing.'
ME: 'I've got to have it.'
MICK: 'You've got to have it.'
ME: 'How much do you reckon?'
MICK: 'Could be anything between $100 and $250.'
ME: 'I'll go to 300. I've got to have it.'
MICK: 'Yeah.'
ME: 'Eh, excuse me, can I have a look at the white cross guitar?'
MAN: 'No.'
ME: 'Er, why not?'
MAN: 'Cos I'm busy.'
ME: 'But is it for sale?''
MAN: 'Yeah.'
ME: 'Well, can I have a look at that cross guitar?'
MAN: [He's on the phone.] 'Look you get that fuckin' stuff
through the fuckin' customs or I'll bust your fuckin' head, I don't
care....You get it....Look you sly son of a bitch...you get your
ass down here with that fuckin' stuff....'
ME: 'Ahem &endash; cough.'
MAN: 'Look, will you come back some other time, I'm busy.'
ME: 'But I want to have a look.'
MAN: 'Have you got any fuckin' money?'
ME: 'Enough.'
MAN: 'You wanna pay $100 and I'll get it off the wall?'
ME: 'Yes.'
MAN: 'O.K. then.'
He waddled round the thin corridor between counters and hanging
merchandise, pulled the cross down and laid it on the counter.
I couldn't believe it. It was well made, the neck being the only
problem. It needed ironing, there just wasn't enough holding it
on.
MAN: 'You wannit?'
ME: 'Does it work?'
MAN: 'Of course it fuckin' works, whaddaya think I got here, a
junk shop?'
ME: 'Got an amp to try it on?'
MAN: 'No, trust me; it's O.K. Look, you wanna guitar right? I
give you the thing for nothin.'
ME: 'Give it to me for nothing?'
MAN: '$75, that's fuckin' nothin'. Look, I though you were bums.
O.K., I feel bad, got trouble with the Canadian customs. Give me
the money. I'll give you a case, you won't believe it, it shouldn't
be allowed this case it's so good. C'mon, 75 cash 3 tax. You're
pros, you know, it's a good deal.'
Mick and me think, well the shape of it is good and it looks good
and he's a conning bastard but we'll take a chance &endash; I've
got to have it.
ME: 'O.K.'
[Etc.] (115-116)
(Some of you might suspect that the makers of the movie Spinal
Tap read this book. I'm sure they did.) The Maltese Cross guitar
is the metaphor I'll use to propose that you have to invest something
in your travel report, your analyses, your papers and your discourse.
You have to risk being silly, come out without armour. The guitar
is also the object of other people's desires, but that's not important
here.
Umberto Eco's travel is unproblematic and 'false', he is an objective
voyeur. In the beginning of the essay he describes a hologram with
two naked girls. I think this opening scene is symptomatic:
Two very beautiful naked girls are crouched facing each other.
They touch each other sensually, they kiss each other's breasts
lightly, with the tip of the tongue. They are enclosed in a kind
of cylinder of transparent plastic. Even someone who isn't a professional
voyeur is tempted to circle the cylinder in order to see the girls
from behind, in profile, from the other side. (3)
"Look at that!" Eco seems to say, "look at them strange Americans." Hunter
says the same thing, but he does participate, he does meet them.
His book consequently is more fun, more accurate, and &endash;
believe it or not &endash; harder to read!
Umberto Eco knows how to write, his essay starts with the quotation
above, to make the reader interested. He then imitates a 'real'
traveller; and we are invited to the journey: "And so we set out
on a journey […]." (7) 'We', that is Eco and the reader.
The 'we' is a rhetoric strategy. He later writes 'I', but that
'I' is not a personal pronoun, it's the 'I' of the semiotic discourse
aimed at a wider audience. The 'I' tells nothing about Umberto,
unless we analyze his choices of examples and jokes.
Ian Hunter is writing from a here-I-am-now position, firmly situated
in time and space. This sometimes makes the stories he is telling
dull, clumsy, or boring. But the reader can expect anything to
happen, anytime &endash; but not always. And that's the way that
it is: everything that happens to you does not have a hidden meaning.
The world of Eco is full of meaning, or is structured to appear
that way. The world described by Hunter is (presumably) also structured,
but not to fit a pattern or a world view.
I do not want to deride Eco's essay or Eco, only what I feel is
an unfortunate trait in it. What's disturbing me is the arrogance
in Eco's writing, and in his declarations in the beginning of the
book. And I have a growing feeling that what semiotics, as structuralism,
and as some of what is called post structuralism are saying is
that there is a real way of looking at things. "This is how it
really is, although you can't see it &endash; yet." The question
is: how to escape this hidden assumption? Eco tells us what he
has seen, but he does not ask himself what he has to do with what
he sees, and how he describes it. Umberto Eco as a subject with
feelings and knowledge does not exist in his text. There is no
reflexion over his own participation, subjectivity (history, memories,
education, etc.), and his aversion towards some of the described
phenomena. In his description of the semiotic structure Eco has
not noticed himself.
And what about me? Am I someone who just happened to read these
texts and then objectively compared them. Of course not. I'm an
academic with a taste for rock music. I have one foot in the fan's
graveyard, and one foot in Eco's echo chamber. I could have framed
this essay with a story about how I found the Swedish translation
of Eco's book at an overnight visit at a friend's house. I started
to read, and then bought the book myself. I now &endash; afterwards &endash;
suspect that my association of Eco with Hunter started here, because
of my friend's (implicit) presence: we had shared the enthusiasm
for Mott the Hoople and Ian Hunter. The story of how I got to know
Hunter's book is also firmly associated with my friend. When we
in our late teens read in a Swedish novel that the protagonist
was reading Hunter's Diary of a Rock'n'Roll Star, a book we never
had heard about earlier, we both got really interested. And since
we had been swept away by the rumours of insanity and nervous breakdowns
surrounding Hunter, and knew all the lyrics by heart, we both thought: "This
is the book we need to get to know more about it." We wrote, during
a history class, to the Swedish author, asking if he had Hunter's
book, if it was any good, and if we could borrow it. I got the
answer, to my friend's envy. It said: "I've got the book, it's
interesting, but I don't know where it is now." We had been very
precise in our letter, we did not write about his book, or about
anything else associated with him. We just wanted that Diary of
a Rock'n'Roll Star.
It took me years to find the book, I don't remember how or when.
The important thing is the firm association between person, place
and books. Is this the very reason why I have made the comparison?
Not really, and I must admit that it was when I reread Hunter's
book, after having read Eco's, that I made this comparison. So,
although Hunter does describe a lot of interesting phenomena, I
would not have interpreted them in this way without Eco.
Summing up: Situating myself between or in both cultures, academic/rock'n'roll,
I think that it is more correct to call Umberto Eco's essay Diary
of a Rock'n'roll Star and Ian Hunter's book Travels in Hyperreality.
Eco flies over the country, gives the occasional interview, but
is detached, he sees things but he doesn't participate. Hunter
lives in Hyperreality for some weeks and tells us about it, how
it tastes, how it smells, and how to endure it.
So, what can we learn from these texts? How shall we write? How
shall we evaluate things? For whom do we write? And what are our
texts worth? I'm not proposing that we should all embark on extensive
diary writing, but shouldn't we show our Maltese Cross guitar dreams,
and shouldn't we shy away from the voyeuristic tactics of the Ecos
of the world? We might want to teach (like Eco), but shouldn't
we also write to give pleasure (like Hunter)? I might be more Umberto
than Ian, but I'll end with a quote from the latter:
[…] life's to be lived, not avoided. Get yourself
out on the street, mate! (122)
This article was originally written as a paper for The Interpretation
of Culture and The Culture of Interpretation. The First Conference
of The Graduate Program in Literature, April 20-21, 1996, Uppsala,
Sweden. © Per Stam 1996. Comments should be sent to per.stam@littvet.uu.se
- I'm using the 1995 edition, Umberto Eco, "Travels in Hyperreality" [1975],
Faith in Fakes. Travels in Hyperreality, Translated from the Italian
by William Weaver, London-Auckland-Melbourne-Singapore-Toronto
1995, p 1&endash;58; and the "Preface", in the same book, p vii&endash;x.
- Selected bibliography: Semiotics &endash; A Theory of Semiotics,
London 1977; The Role of the Reader: Explorations in the Semiotics
of Texts, London 1981; The Open Work, Cambridge 1989 (revised.);
Interpretation and overinterpretation, (Eco with Richard Rorty,
Jonathan Culler, Christiane Brooke-Rose) Edited by Stefan Collini,
Cambridge-New York-Port Chester-Melbourne-Sydney 1992; Novels &endash;
The Name of the Rose, London 1983, Foucault's Pendulum, London
1988.
- I'm not trying to criticize Eco's use of the term hyperreality,
nor to give a history of its origin. I'm primarily concerned with
the way Eco and Hunter address their readers. The two texts should
consequently be seen as examples of discourses. &endash; About
the concept of hyperreality, see for instance Peter Brooker, "Introduction:
Reconstructions", in Modernism/Postmodernism. Edited and Introduced
by Peter Brooker, London-New York 1992, p 1-33; Jean Beaudrillard, "From
'Simulacra and Simulations'", in Brooker (ed.) 1992, p 151-162.
(The full text in Jean Baudrillard: Selected Writings, Edited by
Mark Poster, Cambridge 1988, p 166-184.)
- Ian Hunter, Diary of a Rock'n'Roll Star, Frogmore, St Albans,
Herts 1974, (159 pages). &endash; Selected discography: Mott the
Hoople &endash; "Mott the Hoople" 1969, "Mad Shadows" 1970, "Wildlife" 1971, "Brain
Capers" 1971, "All the Young Dudes" 1972, "Mott" 1973, "The Hoople" 1974;
Ian Hunter &endash; "Ian Hunter" 1975, "All American Alien Boy" 1976, "You're
Never Alone with a Schizophrenic" 1979, "Short Back'n'Sides" 1981.
- Narratee [narrataire] = the adressee of the story. (Narrator>narration>narratee.)
See Gérard Genette, Narrative Discourse. An Essay in Method,
Translated by Jane E Lewin. Foreword by Jonathan Culler [1980],
Ithaca, New York 1995 ["Discours du récit", Figures
III, Paris 1972], and Narrative Discourse Revisited, Translated
by Jane E Lewin, Ithaca, New York 1988, p 130-154 [Nouveau
discours de récit, Paris 1983]; see also Gerald Prince,
Narratology. The Form and Functioning of Narrative, Berlin-New
York-Amsterdam 1982, p 16-26.
- Note that this is a story told from a previous visit to the
USA, and maybe therefore dramatized. This is how it is introduced: "Speaking
of pawn shops. Did I ever tell you about the time in San Fransisco
I bought the Maltese Cross, since immortalized in Disc, Melody
Maker, Sounds, NME, etc. Trouble was they didn't bother to take
photos of me &endash; just the cross. It was funny that day in
the pawn shop." (115)
- In analyzing this short inserted story we find a lot of repetition
at work, leit motif are 'you've /I've got to have it'. I think
that this comes from the (probable) fact that the story has been
told several times before (an oral feature), but also that it is
here told in its entirety, therefore organized different from the
rest of the book, where the narrator does not know the ending of
the story (a literary, or textual feature).
"Albert King was intrigued [by the guitar]:
'Where d'ya git that son of a bitch?'
'In a pawn shop.'
'That's a mean guitar man, that's a mean son of a bitch &endash;
how much did ya pay for it?'
'$75.'
'How much do ya want for it?'
'Got to keep it Albert.'
'Yeah, that's a mean evil son of a bitch.'" (117)
- A good critique of this can be found in Michael Gustavsson,
Textens väsen. En kritik av essentialistiska förutsättningar
i modern litteraturteori. Exemplen Cleanth Brooks, Roman Jakobson,
Paul de Man, [The Nature of the Text: A Critique of Essentialist
Presuppositions in Modern Literary Theory &endash; Cleanth Brooks,
Roman Jakobson, Paul de Man] (dissertation), Uppsala 1996.
Gustavsson shows that even the one who claims that you can never
find the essence of language, behaves as if only he knew its true
essence. Substitute language for structure, culture, world: "de
Man, like Jakobson, seems to think that language hides a 'secret'
essence from ordinary folk using language, and that this secret
essence is something very different from what language is for us
in concrete, everyday practice. [- - -] One views language
as something distinct from reality and our lives rather than something
integrated with them. One is forced to see language as being simpler
than it is. In a word, the question of the nature of language assumes
that language has a nature." (From the summary in English, p 200.)
- This is one of the great differences between Eco and another
semiotic writer, Roland Barthes, whose approach to these matters
I sympathize with. See S/Z. Essais, Paris 1970; La chambre claire:
note sur la photographie, Paris 1980 (both are available in English
translation).
- Umberto Eco, Vad kostar ett mästerverk?, Translated by
Barbro Andersson, Stockholm 1989. The essay discussed here is opening
the book, but shortened; the last chapter of the essay is not included
(which gives the text a strange ending).
- The author was Ulf Lundell, the book probably Sömnen. Roman,
Stockholm 1977.
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Rock 'n' Roll Star page
The views in this paper are not necessarily those of Half Moon
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