Perversion the Social Relation

Fatal West 2,9tiginous sensation of being sucked into a vast empty space where wordsdo not exist" (128). In projecting himself backwards to that originatingmoment, he finds that his mind seems empty of words. However, thatmoment is always a nachtràglich construction, an illusion of wordlessnessconstructed out of the limitations we experience within language,an illusion of freedom made from the constraints of subjectivity. The"dying feeling" Dink describes is a momentary lapse of subjectivity, afeeling many long for (and pursue in drugs, alcohol, sex, and religion)and one they misconstrue as death.Dink's control of orgasm is based on Zen traditions of bodily controland tantric sexuality, practices that, despite the regular supply of sexmanuals they inspire, remain exotic for Americans. However, Americaninstitutions employ recitations little more complex than the ABCs tobring crowds of people to this extremity of deathly, linguistic oblivion,a circumstance DeLillo dwells on in The Names. We see such practicesin religion and political assembly, in action on the stock exchange floor,and in other events that are socially useful yet inspire a sublime thrill.But when someone stages such enjoyment for himself, we know him tobe perverse rather than admirable.The difference between the pervert and a futures trader sweating andscreaming like any Pentecostal is that the pervert knows what he wantswhile the other comes to it inadvertently in the course of his duties.This power of the word to produce ecstasy finds expression in one ofBurroughs's dream images: the dreamer sees a body spattered with "ashower of red sparks" that create "burning erogenous zones that twistand writhe into diseased lips whispering the sweet rotten fever words"(277). In Burroughs's imagination, every part of the body can be eroticizedby a tongue of flame, but the forms those parts take are likely to beabject. The vampire's kiss may look like love, but its aim is blood. Thevampire, the ad man, and the evangelical fundraiser on television will,if they know their jobs as well as Poe's diddler, drain you and leave youwanting to give more. The most reasonable language carries somethingancient within it that can give speech an elemental power.The One God Universe ConDolan points out that Burroughs's valuing of space over time, of an escapefrom time's compulsion, allies him with a romantic strain, a gnosti-