Regarding Susan Sontag Page #4

I know it does--it seems

like gallantry to you,

but it doesn't

feel right to us.

It's a little better to

be called a woman writer.

I don't know why, but,

you know, words count.

We're all writers,

we know that.

[Audience member

shouts]

Well, how about a woman

doctor, a woman lawyer?

Yeah, I mean, if you were

introducing James Baldwin,

you wouldn't say our

foremost Negro writer.

AUDIENCE MEMBER:

Man writer!

And we certainly

wouldn't say a man writer.

And so a lot of it,

a lot of it--

WOMAN:
A gentleman writer!

[Laughter and applause]

MAILER:
Susan. Susan--

No, I really ask you

this not in an

argumentative spir--

I will never use the word

"lady" again in public.

[Applause]

Don't allow yourself to be

patronized, condescended to,

which, if you are a woman

happens, and will continue to

happen all the time,

all your lives.

Don't take sh*t.

Tell the bastards off.

[Cheering and applause]

WOMAN:
When she had just

become a Farrar, Straus,

and Giroux author,

Roger and Dorothea

Straus were giving one

of their parties.

The custom was that after

dinner, the men would go off to

one room to smoke their cigars

and have their conversation,

and the women would go

off to another room.

When Susan saw this, she

just went to join the men.

And that was it.

Susan broke the tradition, and

after that, we never split up

after dinner again.

WOMAN:
I don't think feminism

gave Susan anything.

Susan had already taken out

the license to be a great woman

before there was

any feminism; any talk

of feminism.

In fact, I think feminism

must've curtailed her sphere

of activity because she had

suddenly to identify with all

these women--all these

dopey women! Ha ha!

SONTAG:
I'm a militant

feminist, but I'm not

a feminist militant.

The main activity that

I have as a writer

I have as a writer

and not as a woman writer.

WOMAN, AS SONTAG:

To be a woman is to

be an actress.

Being feminine is a

kind of theater,

with its appropriate costumes,

decor, lighting,

and stylized gestures.

The feminism is there.

But she was such an

individual; you know, she

so hated to be pigeon-holed,

that, "I am not going to stamp

my little feet and

say 'Naughty, naughty,

'Susan Sontag.

Why weren't you marching

with your NOW button?'"

But she was a feminist who

found most women wanting.

"Why do they waste so much

time worrying about what they

looked like instead of

what they thought?"

SONTAG:
I don't know

what it means to be

trapped in domesticity.

I was married. I had a child

whom I raised mostly myself

because I was divorced when

my son was 7 years old.

And I have had

a domestic life.

I just don't

think it's a trap.

KOLLISCH:

My son was 7 when I first

met Susan, and David I think

was about 11 or 12.

It was the first time that a

woman courted me and won me.

I might actually have

met Susan via Irene.

I don't think I ever

knew the whole truth.

I don't think she told me

really how deeply she was

still involved with Irene and

how much she was still in love

with her...I didn't know.

I mean I never considered

myself main lover...

lover number 1, main wife,

or whatever--no.

I was sort of the interlude.

We tried to have a life where

we could do our mothering

and pursue our work and have a

little extra time for fun or

walking around the Village

or talking or making love.

I was a much more

traditional mother.

I wanted my son to have

a regular bedtime.

I wanted him to

eat normal food. Ha ha!

And I think that Susan treated

David like a peer I think long

before she should

have done that.

WOMAN, AS SONTAG:

Yesterday, David announced as

he was being prepared for bed,

"You know what I see

when I shut my eyes?

I see Jesus on the cross."

It's time for Homer, I think.

Paganize his tender spirit.

KOLLISCH:

I think she came to me for the

part that was the old Susan--

the one who was hungry and

took off her shoes and raided

the 'fridgerator and started

to gossip and be

very comfortable.

I knew that she had really

another life among

very famous people.

On one or two occasions

when I was in some lecture

or some social event,

Susan treated me quite shabbily.

She didn't introduce me,

or if she did then she left me

standing there, and that

offended me and hurt me a lot.

She was never able to

know what goes on

in another person.

I mean the sensitivity that we

exercise in everyday life all

the time, you know, like,

"What are you thinking?

"What are you feeling?

Where are you in this?"

Susan was not sensitive,

was not a sensitive person.

WOMAN, AS SONTAG:

My image of myself since age

3 or 4:
the

Genius-Schmuck.

I develop relationships to

satisfy one or the other.

Irene, obviously, was for the

schmuck, Philip for the genius.

Yet both are always

there, like Siamese twins.

It came to me last night

that I have lost Irene.

Like a bulletin coming

into view in Times Square.

Her eyes are blank.

She has let go.

KOCH:
She was briefly involved

with Jasper Johns.

In Jasper, Susan's ego

met its match.

She didn't think that there

were many people around who

were her equal, so she sought

out people who were her equal

though in very

different areas.

She slept with whomever she

felt like sleeping with.

She was very

resistant to categories.

NUNEZ:
She had relationships

with women and she had

relationships with men,

and she fell in love

with women and she

fell in love with men.

LEVINE:
After Irene and

Eva--oh, and then there

was Lily Engler

and Carlotta.

Things were very elaborate.

I mean this was after all,

you know, this was

the sixties in the Village.

Doctor!

Will you tell these fools

I'm not crazy?

Make them listen to me

before it's too late!

[Car horn honks]

They're here already!

You're next!

[Zapping]

Aah!

Aaaaaah!

She writes about

science fiction--

like, trashy science fiction

B films, you know--

"The Invasion of the

Body Snatchers."

You cannot imagine any other

New York intellectuals

writing about this.

It's just preposterous.

[Gunfire]

WOMAN, AS SONTAG:

We live under continual

threat of two equally fearful

but seemingly

opposed destinies--

unremitting banality and

inconceivable terror.

[Explosions]

It is fantasy which allows

most people to cope with these

twin spectres.

[Explosions]

It was from a weekly visit to

the cinema that you learned

how to strut, how to kiss,

to fight, to grieve.

[Tires squeal]

MAN:
In the days of the

New Wave, the latest Godard

or Fassbinder--this was a big,

big deal, and Susan was there

before anybody.

WOMAN, AS SONTAG:

Cinema was poetic and

mysterious and erotic

and moral--

all at the same time.

You wanted to be

kidnapped by the movie.

KOCH:
She says to me blandly

over dinner in a Chinese

restaurant, "Oh, by the way,

I'm going to Sweden

to make a movie."

She'd got a letter

saying, "Dear Ms. Sontag.

We would like you

to make a movie".

This is like fantasy land.

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