Upon reading Felix Krull I
Upon reading Felix Krull I have determined that I do not know as much about nothing as I thought I did. Clearly Thomas Mann has much more of a grasp than I. After reading the last lines of the novel I was left with the distinct feeling of just having lost something valuable but not knowing quite what. I think that my lost feeling might be attributed to the fact that the writing of Thomas Mann is confounding, and at least in the case of Felix Krull is dumbfounding. I think that the book was a comment of the arbitrary nature of our identity’s superficial reliance upon language, or more accurately perhaps that our identity IS language. While not immediately convincing I must admit that the novel has stuck in me a new feeling of inadequacy, or perhaps that is not entirely accurate, it has at least reaffirmed my previously held suspicion that I am nothing more than what I say I am, or at least that I would be if I were to deny that I have existed. *
SO this is what I ended up saying to my teacher in reponse to the book.
Identity
After reading Felix Krull I have decided that the novel is primarily about the arbitrariness of identity. Felix is the best example of this idea. He is a person who does not feel the constraint of being bound to a particular identity. He manifests this freedom through his constant defining and redefining of his character. His ability to do this is bound to the language that he chooses to use in the definition of his being, as well as the superficial manipulation of his physical appearance.
In the early portion of of the novel he defines himself as a school boy named Felix Krull, later he takes on the form of Armand a life operator, and concurrently maintains the identity of a young socialite, and still later he takes on the identity of Louis, the Marquis de Venosta. The only change that actually takes place as he switches from identity to identify is the way in which he uses language to define himself as well as the clothing that he chooses to wear.
What I think this indicates is that identity is not something innately bound to a person and their station in life, if that were so, it would be impossible for Felix to redefine himself as he moved from role to role. The consequences of this proposition are profound, because it means that there is no real security in a person supposed .being., as it is actually subject to the whims of human freedom.
Having not read the book, I am wondering if by “language”, you mean Felix’s speech patterns or choice of spoken or written words change throughout the novel, or does he switch between German and French and English…? Or is his identity perhaps more caught up in a particular subset of culture and language, that being one’s given or taken name…
Felix? Thomas? Phshaw. Why don’t you write about Quine and Wittgenstein like everyone else?
Felix Krull has many facets to his persona: confidence man, swindler, thief, hustler… These are a few of the larger sized ones. His character plays out the possibility of a complex mixture of personalities none of which is the least bit constant. Felix is superficial, self-centred, overly assured, anti-social…and strangely adaptable. His attachments through early life were limited; this determines his direction as an adult. I am only half way through the novel and curiously wondering how he will “end up”. Just as interesting will be who he ends up as. A lesson for everyone is that maybe our persona (our identity, our uniqueness) is not such a deep, lasting or meaningful concept. Our beliefs otherwise may just be delusions.
After all am I — are you? — much like the person you were five days ago or five years ago??? Do we ever think we know much about who we are and how long and how deeply we are that “person”?
Limited as we are by language can we do much other than define everyone and everything be a generalisation. Our communication with others on this matter is intrinsically limited. Mann may be telling us that language limits the scope of our knowledge and understanding of everything and shows this by in our limited capacity to bestow on Felix Krull an indentity.
Right now, I stop to wonder who I may be??? I may be the only one who has a definition of that that is more than just words!
Imagine you know me — or any one else — only as well as the use of words allows…!!!