Because I am such a stranger to insomnia, I feel its strangeness acutely: the lucidity, everything so pin-prick sharp that it becomes eerie; the efforts to lure back sleep - reading, closing one’s eyes - and the certainty that none of them will work; the futility of looking out of the window.
My thoughts at such a time are unusually clear, as if all the light that would normally be outside has turned inside. Sometimes this can lead to unflattering discoveries.
For some time, I have known that I have been lonely in Chengdu. However, by not really delving into the roots of this feeling, I had managed to convince myself in some vague way that it was the city that was at fault. The vagueness was crucial to this self-deception - if I had ever seriously given the matter any thought, my scenario would quickly have fallen apart.
Before going any further, however, I want to be clear that I am not somehow saying that there are no elements in my life in Chengdu that cause discomfort. On the contrary, there are, and they inescapably play a role in how lonely (or not) I feel. The most obvious example is that my place in society here is curiously difficult to define. Clearly, I am not Chinese, because I am not of Chinese heritage, was not born here, did not grow up here, and am unfamiliar with many common cultural touchstones. Yet, after nine years, the archetypal foreigner (“laowai” in Chinese) is equally not a category that I can easily fit into, since laowai are expected to know nothing about China, be generally gauche and naive, and above all, not to speak the language.
The social etiquette around dealing with laowai is unequivocal. As a laowai, Chinese people will treat you with great hospitality, will try to explain China to you (assuming that your understanding is practically nil), and will, of course, speak to you in English. Because most foreigners who visit China really do know quite little about China and cannot speak the language, this model generally works to the satisfaction of both parties. And clearly, the existence of such a well-defined social category (“laowai”) greatly simplifies dealings with foreigners. Essentially, it is the default setting for Chinese-Western interactions in China.
My problem, then, is that there is not an equally well-defined social category, with its own set of etiquette and mutually acceptable rules, for people like me. The lack of such a category causes unease - to both sides. Some examples might help to illustrate:
(1) Occasionally I encounter Chinese people in Chengdu who can’t speak English, or speak very limited English, yet insist on speaking to me in English. Our conversations usually reach a stalemate, whereby I persist in speaking in Chinese, while my interlocutor equally doggedly replies in English. This farce can go on over repeated interactions, as is the case with the guy who runs the shop in my building.
(2) More often, I get into pleasant conversations with people in Chinese, yet the conversation is repeatedly broken up by remarks (or sometimes even quiz-type interludes) concerning what I do or don’t know about China. While these interactions are much more rewarding, they still remind me that the core assumption that foreigners are only meant to know certain things has deep roots.
(3) Or, with certain students and colleagues, whose English is decent, but not excellent, I encounter disappointment (sometimes expressed, sometimes merely sensed) that I am not monolingual, since if I were, they could practise their English all the time.
The sociologist, Erving Goffman, used the metaphor of theatre to describe human social interactions. In each social interaction, we enact social roles, but the interaction will only be smooth and successful as long as all the players have reached a basic consensus on whom they are supposed to be playing. This is a very apt metaphor for my situation. I sometimes feel as if I have studied for years to play Hamlet, but when I turn up to the theatre I am instead told that I will be playing Gertrude. However, once on the stage, rather than dutifully playing Gertrude, as the others expect me to, I stubbornly speak Hamlet’s lines. General discomfort and disorder ensue, and in the end, no one is entirely happy with the result.
This is one very concrete example of a social difficulty that I have here, and which contributes to loneliness. But what my insomnia reminded me, quite ruthlessly, is that there are specific social difficulties anywhere. Last time I was in London, for example, I noticed how little everyday warmth there is. Two or three colleagues can be in a tiny kitchen together at the university where I work, each making a cup of tea, and no one would dream of breaking the silence with a friendly remark. On the bus in London, I observed sadly how scrupulously people avoided sitting near one another. These facets of life in London may be no less isolating than the struggle I face to carve out a foreign-yet-not-laowai identity for myself here.
But more than that, loneliness is a kind of weather that one carries around. Why have I been lonely here, when I was not lonely in Beijing? The two cities are not so very different - the awkward theatrical jostling that I described above occurs in Beijing as much as it does here. The truth is that I have connived in my own loneliness by staying indoors, by taking offence easily, by weighing certain experiences more heavily in the balance than others. It’s a sadness of my own making, I realised in the middle of the night.
——————
The same sleepless night, I thought back on the year I spent in Hereford before coming to Chengdu. It could have been a lonely year, because Hereford is not lively, and I had few friends there. That it was not was at least partly due to my discovery of a local branch of the Society of Friends (or Quakers, as they are also known).
It was somehow an anthropological experience more than anything else. I did not formally join the Quakers, nor did the idea ever really cross my mind, but through taking part in their meetings over the course of six months or so, I felt like I came to understand what Quakerism is. This was, in its own way, as enriching and enduring an encounter as any I had experienced during my early curious years in China.
What is Quakerism? I cannot describe it easily, because it does not have a formal creed or manifesto. Historically, it was a Christian movement that originated in the seventeenth century in the UK, and which emphasised the importance of personal spiritual experience, rather than scriptural doctrine. And really, it’s through experience that I relate to Quakerism, and continue to feel connected to it even now.
The main practice is silence. People come together and sit together in silence, and reflect, and if they feel moved all of a sudden, they are free to share what it is that has moved them. It is not histrionic - probably because silence is more conducive to sober contemplation than ecstatic pantomime. What people share tends to be small, modest, poignant, with the accent firmly on personal experience. But most of all people sit together in silence; indeed, entire meetings can go by without a word being said.
It may seem odd to want to sit in silence with strangers, but I found it curiously natural. During the meetings, I did not have particularly lofty or spiritual thoughts, but then, there is no particular pressure to think anything at all, since there is not a specific creed or set of prayers that you are supposed to be following. For me, it satisfied a need to be with other people, while giving me the space to develop my own perspective.
However, the form of the meetings is just the outward expression of an underlying ethical system, which although not formally codified, nevertheless binds people together. Indeed, it was my limited knowledge of what the Quakers stood for that first drew me to them: from their beginning, Quakers have espoused non-violence, simplicity in daily life, and equality, and these principles have informed the movement’s development, as well as individual Quaker lives. There are many examples of how these values have been realised in practice: in the seventeenth century, the early Quakers wasted no time in recognising women as their equals; meanwhile, in the twentieth century, Quakers were among the most strident conscientious objectors during the First World War. Consistently, Quakers have been at the forefront of social movements on behalf of disadvantaged minorities, including prisoners, homosexuals and the poor.
However, what I didn’t expect at all when I first started attending meetings - what I had no way of knowing before - is that beneath the outward forms of worship, beneath even the ethical principles (or “testimonies” as they are referred to), there is something even deeper and stranger. Quakerism is a promise of a different social order, a seed of revolution, an imagined community. This is most obvious in the way that Quakers make decisions: they eschew the winner-takes-all ethos of a voting system, which inevitably produces disappointment in some and gloating in others, in favour of a process that mirrors the structure of meetings for worship. Although I have never taken part in one of these decision-making meetings, as I understand it, people sit together and reflect in silence on the topic at hand (for example, what their view on gay marriage is). Participants are free to stand up and share their thoughts on the topic if they are moved to do so, but no one is obliged to talk, and the aim is not to hold a conventional adversarial debate, rather, it is to reflect together as a group and try to listen for (God’s) guidance in order to reach a corporate position.
And it is this bizarre, mystical system which has both kept the faith together as a unified body, and allowed it to evolve to face new issues in society. I still wonder at its subversive potential - in its power structures, in its approach to individual and group identity, in its answer to the prevailing Western, liberal, democratic society in which it exists - the Quaker system is so clearly an anomaly. And yet still it continues, neither extinct nor resurgent, ploughing its own furrow.
The collectivist yet disparate Quaker spirit also animates the production of “Quaker Faith and Practice”, the major Quaker text. This book, which is revised every few years, compiles short passages written by Quakers on issues from family life to social justice to sexuality to grief. There is no official Quaker doctrine on what a good family life is, or what healthy sexuality looks like, or what grief should consist of, but through the personal experiences conveyed in each passage, one gets a sense of what Quakerism is about, and to me it is beautiful.
Reading the book, I do feel connected with this strange, mystical, revolutionary group. Even though I am not fully a Quaker, and do not want to be, I feel that on some deep level I understand what Quakerism is, and why it is, and that the Society of Friends has enriched me, or perhaps rather discovered something latent in myself that I could not have known otherwise. In some way, this is similar to how I feel about China.
——————
During the same night (it was a very long night), my mind joined imaginary dots between Quakerism and the world portrayed in a science-fiction book that I had just finished called “The Dispossessed”, by Ursula Le Guin.
Let me start by saying that this is one of the most perfect novels I have read. I have not read much science fiction, out of pure snobbism, and I realise now how great my loss has been. For boldness, for depth, for sparkle, this book has few peers.
What strikes me as the author’s most unique achievement is the rigour with which she imagines different social systems. The book describes in detail two rival worlds: one, Urras, which is vibrant and lush and rich in resources, yet capitalist and therefore extremely unequal; and the other, Anarres, which is poor and infertile, yet anarchist and therefore egalitarian. Both societies are so confidently conceived and described that it staggers the mind - the closest equivalent I can think of for sheer force of imagination would be the Harry Potter books, however Le Guin’s creation is richer by far in terms of politics and sexuality. For example, here is how the author describes sleeping arrangements on the anarchist planet, Anarres:
“As a child, if you slept alone in a single it meant you had bothered the others in the dormitory until they wouldn’t tolerate you; you had egoised. Solitude equated with disgrace. In adult terms, the principle referent for single rooms was a sexual one. Every domicile had a number of singles, and a couple that wanted to copulate used one of these free singles for a night, or a decad, or as long as they liked. A couple undertaking partnership took a double room; in a small town where no double was available they often built one on to the end of a domicile, and long, low straggling buildings might thus be created room by room called ‘partners’ truck-trains’. Aside from sexual pairing there was no reason for not sleeping in a dormitory. You could choose a small one or a large one, and if you didn’t like your room-mates you could move to another dormitory. Everybody had the workshop, laboratory, studio, barn or office that he needed for his work; one could be as private or as public as one chose in the baths; sexual privacy was freely available and socially expected; and beyond that privacy was not functional. It was excess, waste. The economy of Anarres would not support the building, maintenance, heating, lighting of individual houses and apartments. A person whose nature was genuinely unsociable had to get away from society and look after himself. He was completely free to do so. He could build himself a house wherever he liked (though if it spoiled a good view or a fertile bit of land he might find himself under heavy pressure from his neighbours to move elsewhere). There were a good many solitaries and hermits on the fringes of the older Anarresti communities, pretending that they were not members of a social species. But for those who accepted the privilege and obligation of human solidarity, privacy had a value only where it served a function.”
The author’s imaginative gifts do not end here, with interesting, but essentially dry descriptions of social customs. She is brilliant in exploring the intersection between place and personality, in other words, how the society we grow up in develops us as people, shaping the expression of something innate that we might call “character”. For example, this is how she describes the somewhat aloof central character’s experiences growin up on Anarres, a planet where community is the norm:
“Since he was very young he had known that in certain ways he was unlike anyone else he knew. For a child the consciousness of such difference is very painful, since, having done nothing yet, and being incapable of doing anything, he cannot justify it. The reliable and affectionate presence of adults, who are also, in their own way, different, is the only reassurance such a child can have; and Shevek had not had it. His father had indeed been utterly reliable and affectionate. Whatever Shevek was and whatever he did, Palat approved and was loyal. But Palat had not had this curse of difference. He was like the others, like all the others to whom community came so easy. He loved Shevek, but he could not show him what freedom is, that recognition of each person’s solitude which alone transcends it.”
And one of the things she does with the novel, bringing all these gifts together, is to offer a critique of different social systems, analysing the ways that they inflict suffering and limit the human spirit. Although her sympathies are firmly with the anarchist planet of Anarres and the characters who live there, she is much too shrewd to give it a free pass. She is alert to the dangers posed by a society where community is everything, and approval has the force of law, noting how this can give rise to bland conformity and fear of change. Even more shrewdly, she notes how power structures and power-seeking personalities exist even in the most egalitarian systems, and how it is only possible to challenge them, not to root them out.
Can it be a coincidence that she is the daughter of a famous anthropologist?
Why did I think of this book in connection with Quakerism, besides the fact that I was suffering from insomnia and therefore prone to idle fancies? The answer is that both Anarres and Quakerism represent imagined anarchic communities, where behaviour is governed by individual conscience, and there is no formal hierarchy. Both are appealing to me somehow, not least because they offer an intelligent alternative to the established order, and thus show that society is not bound to be as it is…rather, it is as limitless and plastic as our imaginations. And yet, as Le Guin implies in her novel, there is no ideal community in reality… or rather, the only ideal community is one that is continuously asking questions of itself, continuously ready to reform itself, continuously open to fresh ideas…and by definition, any system that has entrenched, vested interests is reluctant to do this.
Incidentally, and as final proof of the genius of Le Guin, I offer one character’s almost casually thrown-in description of Terra, a thinly disguised version of Earth. Bear in mind this was written in the early 1970s, long before climate change was regularly in the news:
“‘My world, my Earth, is a ruin. A planet spoiled by the human species. We multiplied and gobbled and fought until there was nothing left, and then we died. We controlled neither appetite nor violence; we did not adapt. We destroyed ourselves. But we destroyed the world first. There are no forests left on my Earth. The air is grey, the sky is grey, it is always hot. It is habitable - it is still habitable - but not as this world is.’”
——————
Actually, no, I can’t leave Le Guin alone. Her take on homosexuality is so cool and unabashed that it is actually shocking. At a time when the western medical establishment still regarded homosexuality as a diagnosable mental disorder, she was writing passages such as the following:
“They met again the next evening, and discussed whether or not they should pair for a while, as they had when they were adolescent. It had to be discussed, because Shevek was pretty definitely heterosexual and Bedap pretty definitely homosexual; the pleasure of it would be mostly for Bedap. Shevek was perfectly willing, however, to reconfirm the old friendship; and when he saw that the sexual element of it meant a great deal to Bedap, was, to him, a true consummation, then he took the lead, and with considerable tenderness and obstinacy made sure that Bedap spent the night with him again. They took a free single in a domicile downtown, and both lived there for about a decad [i.e. 10 days]; then they separated again, Bedap to his dormitory and Shevek to Room 46. There was no strong sexual desire on either side to make the connection last. They had simply reasserted trust.”
Where to begin with this passage? The notion that sex needn’t be more than a way of expressing affection and reasserting trust between friends? The notion that a “pretty definitely heterosexual” man might encourage a homosexual relationship as a way of demonstrating that friendship, out of concern for a friend? The notion that sexuality should be thought of as situated within interpersonal relationships, rather than as an intrinsic, individual quality that somehow exists outside those relationships? The notion that there are no absolutes in sexuality - no one is “heterosexual” or “homosexual”, and the closest we can get is only “pretty definitely”?
Even forty years on, we remain wedded to the idea that sexuality is something fixed, intrinsic and usually binary (i.e. gay or straight). This is true for the gay community, as much as it is for mainstream society. That the author could so casually challenge this (homosexuality is not even a major theme in her novel) in such a radical manner is, to me, mind-blowing. The world has yet to catch up with her.
——————
Community is central to the novel, and also to Quakerism, and I have been thinking about this in the light of the shooting in Orlando, as well as the recent EU referendum - when I first started writing this piece, the first had happened, but not the second.
Commentators have noted that, at the beginning, the reports on the shooting in Orlando did not mention that it took place at a gay club. Even later on, some media outlets refused to describe it as a hate crime that specifically targeted gay people, arguing instead that it was a crime that affected all people, equally. While it is true that some of the patrons at the club may not have been gay, it does not change the fact that the shooter chose a place that was associated with homosexuality.
I find this reticence to call things by their true name (when is a deliberate, violent attack on a gay venue not a hate crime?) troubling and disappointing, but strictly speaking, this is not the angle that I wish to explore. I am more interested in what gay venues mean to gay people, and therefore the nature of the pain that this attack causes.
If we lived on Anarres, there would not be a need for gay bars, since there would not be an historical separation between gay and straight people. On Earth, things are rather different. Even now, I find it awkward to express same sex affection in public - even of the chaste, hand-holding variety, let alone anything as daring as kissing. This shame (and, I think, fear of possible reprisals from homophobic strangers) is so deeply embedded that the impulse to express affection spontaneously doesn’t even take hold of me. I only know the shame is there because of how I react when men try to express affection towards me: awkward glances to see if anyone is looking; tense body language; a racing, anxious state of mind. I generally do not find such moments agreeable, although I cannot deny that there is also a rebellious thrill in there somewhere.
Another example of this shame: the excruciating, red-faced, sweaty-palmed feeling I had when I checked into a hotel with my then boyfriend in Xiamen, and the hotel staff queried whether we realised we had booked a room with a double bed. Their tone was quite polite and indifferent, but in my mind they were judging me, and I could not even find the words to answer them. In the end, it was my boyfriend, older and more assured, who spoke, and told them that, yes, this was what we wanted.
Although shame is a universal emotion, I suspect that this particular shame, the one of not feeling able to reveal a romantic or sexual relationship with people that you care deeply about, is difficult for heterosexual people to grasp. Certainly, I feel as if I am sometimes met with a “get over it” attitude, as if surely everyone ought to be past that by now…don’t we live in an era of equal marriage rights, after all?
I can only say that for me the work is still incomplete, and that I still wouldn’t feel completely at ease with kissing a man in a “straight” club, whereas I would do in a “gay” club. I suspect this is true for many gay people, especially for those who are less sure of themselves, or who live in areas where homophobia is more commonplace. And this does not even begin to address the non-sexual friendships that exist within the gay community, and that often take root and flourish within gay bars. We still need gay spaces, in other words, and the fact that the gunman attacked at the very heart of where the gay community feels most at home is key to understanding why this was a hate crime.
I think of this in connection with “The Dispossessed”, because there is a passage in the book where the main character talks about suffering, arguing that it is more true somehow than comfort and happiness. He says the following: “I’m trying to say what I think brotherhood really is. It begins - it begins in shared pain.” I think this is so, and believe that if people do want to stand with the gay community, then it is not enough to be open-minded about homosexuality, or to have homosexual friends, or to be willing to go to a gay bar every once in a while. One needs to try to empathise with the particular forms of suffering that the gay community experiences.
And, of course, gay people also need to realise that theirs is not the only kind of suffering. This responsibility cuts both ways.
With the EU referendum, multiple communities were at stake, most obviously, the EU community, but also the United Kingdom, and UK society itself. All of them seem to have been irrevocably fractured by the referendum result, and at the moment it is doubtful whether Humpty Dumpty will ever be put back together again.
I suspect that in order to heal the gaping divisions that the referendum has revealed, especially in UK society - between old and young, between educated and less-educated, between London and the rest of England and Wales - a similar attempt to understand the suffering that provoked this negative result will be needed. For I believe that it was provoked by suffering, or at least a feeling of suffering, which amounts to the same thing. Unfortunately, I do not think anyone is in the mood for this right now…the air is instead thick with recrimination, and the sound of high walls being constructed.
