The Letters of Abélard and Héloïse
Compelling and touching…notwithstanding that, the tragedy and torture did not exhilarate me
This is acclaimed as one of the most passionate and admirable love stories
I was impressed as would be expected.
But there is a naughtiness, cynicism and outré habit of questioning aspects, characters that are universally applauded
It is commendable that Abelard confesses in his first letters that he had lived a life of sin, if not debauchery before meeting Heloise.
So there’s one, the first against him.
Once he saw her, he is enraptured, enthralled.
But, with that doubtful perspective, I am wondering –and indeed, Abelard himself makes hints in this direction- how much was pure admiration and what was the role of lust.
Somehow- looking for faults in a near perfect relationship-I felt like Abelard should have kept the distance.
Platonic love would have been better…this is what crossed my mind when hearing about the evolution of the affair.
Abelard becomes the tutor of the young, virgin girl and if you want my opinion, he abuses that status, in what today would be statutory rape.
After all, they still try to extradite, prosecute and jail a present day Abelard- for all the major differences- in the person of Roman Polanski.
And I sort of think that for all the Chinatown, Pianist, Knife in the Water and more, he still should face prosecution.
As for the love that inflamed the young philosopher and tutor, if we think in near absolute, pure terms, I would say that he should have protected the girl he loved.
By holding her hand, kissing her and abstaining from going further, in the knowledge that more means disaster.
And yet, that is probably the measure, the depth of that “divine, sublime” feeling that they just could not refrain from “making love”.
- I don’t know
An example from Thomas Mann comes to mind- an author that I have just learned, to my shock that was actually homosexual, from one point on, or a bisexual- who states in a short story that, in these approximate words:
- People keep saying- I love you, our friendship cannot be expressed in words
- But that is so untrue
- Real love and true friendship exist only in novels
- In the real world, if we look at the meaning, lovers do not keep the same feeling for long and friends tend to be absent when the going gets tough
Indeed, psychology tests have determined that there is a period of about two years, during each a phenomenon called the honeymoon effect takes place, meaning that for that period the novelty keeps couples interested, but then the attraction diminishes in most cases.
Abelard and Heloise probably come as close as humanly possible to the perfect love, where they keep their strong feelings under duress and the most adversarial circumstances, away from each other.
But in the aforementioned spirit of dissecting this glorious, heavenly, rather pure- in spite of the sin committed in the eyes of the church- relationship I still say
- Perhaps we could think of what Marcel Proust repeats in his Remembrance of Things Past: we want very much what we don’t have and once we have it, we tend to lose interest
- This is called in psychology “hedonic adaptation”
To end with this mischievous, evil manner:
- If the two stayed together, they could have suffered from the honeymoon effect
- With Heloise available without any impediment, Abelard may have returned to his philandering
But then perhaps not.
Impressive love story, that made me frown when the poor man is tortured and he becomes and eunuch.
To my surprise he adds insult to that injury saying that the bible mentions that these poor people are rejected by God
- I wonder why?
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