Gender Debates between Rainer Maria Rilke and Lou Andreas-Salom Author(s): Dorothee Ostmeier Source: The German

Quarterly, Vol. 73, No. 3 (Summer, 2000), pp. 237-252 Published by: Wiley on behalf of the American Association of Teachers of German Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/3072860 . Accessed: 04/03/2014 21:01
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DOROTHEE OSTMEIER Universityof Washington

Gender Debates between Rainer Maria Rilke and Lou Andreas-Salome

RilkeandAndreas-Salom6 met in 1897, studied and traveled together in Russia in 1899-1900 and participated in the Psychoanalytical Congress of 1913. AndreasSalom6 studied with Freud in Vienna in 1912-13 and became a lay analyst. At this time the friendship between Rilke and Andreas-Salom6 cooledbut was carriedon a through lively exchange of letters' and texts which, amongother topics,rethought and revised Freud's concept of sexuality as developed in Drei Abhandlungen zur Sexualmoral.2Whereas Freud focuses on the development of infantile sexuality in order to define the origins of neurosis, Rilke and Andreas-Salom6refer to different phases of this developmentin orderto define sexual partnership. Examining the relevanceof the individual'ssexual experience for the partner Rilke and AndreasSalom6investigate the potentials of intercourse to conquer and/or to transgress individual differences. Both authors are drivenby the question of whether and how sexuality leads to the constructionof a harmonious "we."For Rilke, these questions are intimately linked to linguistic questions about the functions of the personal pronouns "ich,""du"and "wir."Does the pronoun "wir"mediate between first and second person or does it establish an entirely new identity? Andreas-Salom6focuses on the differentiatingand harmonizing capacities of physiologicaland psychological processes stimulated by sex. These approachesof both authors-as they are presented in Rilke's poetic texts, in "Liebeslied"from Neue Gedichte,DuiThe GermanQuarterly73.3 (Summer2000) 237

neser Elegien and their poetic and biographicalcontexts, and Andreas-Salom6's essays "Drei Briefe an einen Knaben," "Zum Typus Weib," "Anal und Sexual," and "Psychosexualittit"3-contribute to the destabilizationof sexual categoriesinitiated by the extensive pathologicalstudies of physicians in the nineteenth century, and further explored by the late nineteenth- and early twentieth-century writers, as for example Havelock Ellis and Sigmund Freud.4Freud workedtowards a liberationof sex frompathologyandmoralistic concerns by outlining the dynamic process of the individualunconscious,but he never clearly worked out the relationship amongbiologicalcharacteristics,individual psychicformationsand social interpersonalrelations.5This openeda spacefor further investigation as reflected in the exchanges between Rilke and AndreasSalom6. The letters between the authors unveil their personal friendship as stimulus for this debate, although Rilke's poetic and Andreas-Salom6's essayistic work present diverse approachesto sexuality. In her autobiographicalretrospective Lebensriickblick,6Andreas-Salom6 cites her friendshipwith Rilkeas one of the most important motivations for her encounter with Freud'spsychoanalysis.She describes it as "Miterlebender AuBerordentlichkeit und Seltenheit des Seelenschicksals eines Einzelnen" (Lr 151). As Ursula Welsch, MichaelaWiesnerand BiddyMartinargue, the close friendshipwith Rilkeand the intimate experience of his physical and emotional tensions stimulate Andreas-Salo-

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m6's study of medicine and psychoanalysis.7WhereasWelschandWiesnertracethe developmentof Rilke's and Andreas-Salom6's discussion about a possible psychoanalyticaltreatment for Rilke,Martingoes a step furtherand arguesthat the relationship to Rilke was one of the drivingforces forSalom6'sresearchon genderdifference. Martin writes: to his sexualambiguiSalome wasdrawn andfemiboth masculine Rilke seemed ty; forherthebasis nineat once,exemplifying and in a primary narcissism of creativity Rilke's wasprimarily Salome washislover, friend, anchor, analyst.8 Martin describes Andreas-Salom6'sperception of Rilke's "bisexuality"and does not address Rilke's critical investigations of his own genderedidentity.Both studies fail to note that Rilke and Andreas-Salom6 rarelytookissue with eachothers'theoretical positionsregardinggenderidentityand thatAndreas-Salom6's essayisticproseand Rilke'spoetrydonot reflectthe genderconThe authors' cepts of their correspondence. individual fantasies interpret the prelinguistic or prediscursiveexperiencesof sex differently.This leads to distinct constructions of genderidentities and their inscriptions into what Freud refers to as biological and/orpsychoanalyticfacts. Fantasyas the fabricating agency of sex and gender categories undermines the differentiation between sex as nature and gender as culture, as Judith Butler recently argued.9 This essay will trace such fantasies at work and will identify a split between the theoretical positions of the authors and their personal perceptions of each other. Lou Andreas-Salom6writes about her quicklydevelopingfriendshipwith Rainer Maria Rilke in Lebensriickblick:"Nun withrte es gar nicht mehr lange, bis Ren6 Maria Rilke zum Rainer geworden war"
(Lr 113). Her renaming of Rilke calls attention to a shift in Rilke's signature. He signs his tenth letter to her, dated September 5, fundamentalbisexuality [...]. Thoughshe

1897, no longer as Rend but.as Rainer, changinghis full name fromRen6Wilhelm Josef Maria Rilke to Rainer Maria Rilke. This clear construct of a gender duality, which marks most of the letters to his friends, is missing in letters to AndreasSalom6; they are signed with his male He frees his first name of name "Rainer." the exotic feminine connotations1oand distances himself from the Catholic and literary connotations of his middle name "Maria." This biographical fact corresponds to issues raised in Rilke's poetic texts which view the erotic tensions between "I"and "you,""he"and "she"as obstacles to individual identity formations. The exploration of these tensions in his and Malte novel, in the poem "Liebeslied," in the first and second elegy culminate in the most explicit poetic distinction between male and female sexuality in the third elegy.
II

Andreas-Salom6's actual renaming precedesRilke'snovelDieAufzeichnungen des Malte Laurids Brigge, in which Rilke worksthroughthe memoryof his mother's manipulative play with his gender idenIn the novel the mother calls her son tity.11 Malte "Sophie"and teaches him to play a feminine role. Malte wears dresses and fashions his voice as female. When his mother later suggests that "Sophie"has probablydied, Malte insists on the continIn this conuation of his femininerole-play. text the name "Sophie"invokes numerous literary and biographical associations: it recalls the name of Novalis's deceased bride "Sophie,"whom Novalis cherished and poeticizedespeciallyin the third of his Hymnenan die Nacht. Rilke's mother was
baptized as "Sophie"12 and his deceased sister went by the same name (Simenauer 639). Similar to Novalis,l3 Malte explores the potentials of his imagination and fantasy in regard to his sister's death; his

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Rilke and Andreas-Salom6 OSTMEIER: mother mourns the loss of her youth. Malte's association and impersonation of these absent female figures--sister and youth--establish secret dialogueswith his mother.Malte identifies these intimate encounters as experiences of the "Wunderbare" and thus links this romantic concept to the enacted fantasies of gender transgression. By encouraging Malte's role play the mother actively designs Malte's physical and imaginary presence according to models of nineteenth-century femininity. She blurs the distinctions between feminine and masculine gender identity and obscures Malte's literal and imaginary, non-figurative and figurative self-perceptions.14 Rilke reflects on these issues of "gender trouble" by designing Malte's fiction of the mother. But although he initiates these multiple layers of biographical reflectivity in this novel, they do not master the tensions Rilke personally experiences between these realities. On December 28, 1911, he expresses in a letter to Andreas-Salom6 his worries about the fusion of him and his Malte figure: Niemand als Du, liebe Lou, kann unterscheiden und nachweisen, ob und wie weit er [Malte]mir ihnlich ist. Ob er, der ja zum Theil aus meinen Gefahren gemacht ist, darin untergeht, gewissermaBen, um mir den Untergang zu ersparen, oderob ich erst recht mit diesen Aufzeichnungen in die Stromung geraten bin, die mich wegreiBtund hiniibertreibt.15 Rilke asks Andreas-Salom6 to evaluate the similarity between himself and his Malte figure. Wondering about the influence of his fictional character on his own biography, Rilke also traces the conflict between his fictional and literal realities in his everyday social relations: Wie oft geschieht es mir nicht, daBich gewissermal3en als ein Chaos aus meiner Stube trete, drauBen,von jemandem aufgefalSt,eine Fassung finde, die eigentlich die seine ist und im niichsten Moment,zu meinem Staunen, gut geformte Dinge

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ausspreche, wiihrend doch eben noch alles in meinem ganzen BewuBtsein vollig amorphwar [...] und in diesem Sinn werden die Menschen immer das Falsche flir mich sein.16 Rilke recognizes that he easily adjusts to the expectations of others. In order not to be consumed by these social interactions he plans to withdraw from society and to confront the chaos of his amorphous consciousness.17 Thus Rilke's identity crisis of 1911 is based on a vicious circle: once he escapes from the control of social interactions, he is controlled by his own imaginary figures, and vice versa. Due to this chaos he moves into the seclusion of the Duino castle, ceases to write novellas, and focuses on the new genre of elegies, starting in 1912.18 Here he considers psychoanalytical treatment and asks AndreasSalom6 for advice. However, in the end he rejects therapy, for fear of losing the capacity to write: Was mich nun betrifft, so schrieb ich Dir dieses Aufschon, daBich, gefU"hlsmiiig, geriumtwerden eher scheue und mir,bei meiner Natur, kaum etwas Gutes davon erwarten k6nnte. Etwas wie eine desinfizierte Seele kommt dabei raus, ein Unding, ein Lebendiges,roth [sic] korrigiert, wie die Seite in einem Schulheft [...] Ich weiBjetzt, daB die Analyse fur mich nur Sinn hitte, wenn der merkwiirdigeHintergedanke,nicht mehr zu schreib e n, [...] mir wirklich ernst wire. [...] Oder ist auch das wieder nur ein Stiick verschlagener Produktivitiit, sich gewissermaBlen, einen anderen Menschen, statt innerhalb einer Arbeit, in der eigeHaut vorzustelnen schiibig-gewordenen len von morgen an.19 Psychoanalytic treatment would interfere with Rilke's personal and literary productivity. Although he does not give up his theoretical interest in Freud, his literary practice makes a commitment to therapy impossible. Rilke confronts the problems of negoti-

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ating one's gender and social identity in various texts. The poem "Liebeslied" from 1907, published in Neue Gedichte,scrutinizes the tensions between the "I" and "you"of lovers and investigates the implications of the social reality of a "we." It questions whether the autonomyof an individualsubjectis riskedby his/herlove encounter.Here the problemsare not yet cast in gendered terms, but they are modified and addressed later in terms of sexuality and gender in the first Duineser Elegien. "Liebeslied" is framedby questions. A lover addressesthe belovedand asks: "Wie soll ich meine Seele halten, daB/ sie nicht an deine riihrt?Wie soll ich sie / hinheben tiber dich zu anderen Dingen?"And the poem ends: "Aufwelches Instrument sind wir gespannt? / Und welcher Geiger hat uns in der Hand?"(12-13)20Whereas the first questions ask how to establish a distance between "I"and "you," the last questions acceptthe loss of distanceand ask for the controlling agent of the love relationship. They focus on the "we"instead of the "I"and "you," and the speakeracceptsthat s/he does not have any control over the relation to the "you."The desire for independence, for isolation, and for otherness (likethe desireof the prodigalson inMalte) is silencedby the realityof the "uns,"an experience of a relationshipwhich cannot be controlled. This relationship is not described through literal language. Its control is vaguely called "alles"and is imaged as "Bogenstrich," "Instrument," "Geiger." The "I" and "you" are subjected to it: "Doch alles, was uns anriihrt, dich und mich, / nimmt uns zusammen wie ein Bogenstrich"(9-10). The "uns"can be experienced, but the conditions for its presence are not known. "Aufwelches Instrument sind wir gespannt? / Und welcher Geigerhat uns in der Hand?"(12-13). The poem ends by addressing itself as "Oh
Lied." The theme of love in the title siMBes "Liebes-Lied" is redirected to the emphatic realization of the song's own sensuality, of its sound and melody. The poem moves

from the thematization of love to its own perception as song. Love itself can be grasped neither philosophically nor linguistically. As Lawrence Ryan recently argued about these "Dinggedichte,""the 'thing' itself"-in this case love--"transcends our perceptionand is thereforeunknowable."21In this case it can only be experienced as aesthetic enchantment. The song's queries call semantic fixations into question. "I" and "you" as independent agents in the constructionof the "uns"are revoked. Literal and metaphoric languages do not offer any possibilityto escape fromthe experience of the "uns." Instead, they stress the musicalpathos of the questions: "Wiesoil ich meine Seele halten, daB/ sie nicht an deine rfihrt? Wie soll ich sie / hinheben iuberdich zu anderen Dingen?" (1-3) This aesthetic concept of the "uns" ignores gender difference.The later texts, which will be discussed, erase this aesthetic enchantment from love poetry as soon as issues of sexual difference are stressed. The pronoun "uns"is emptied of its sublime connotations. In the first of the "Duineser Elegien" (WerkeI: 685-88), the harmonious image of the "uns" as the sound of the violin is gone.22 The problem of the "I" is not smoothed over by aesthetic enchantment. But the idea of a string is kept in the more aggressive image of bow and arrow: wirliebend Ist es nichtZeit,daB uns vomGeliebten befrein undes bebend bestehen: wie der Pfeil die Sehne besteht, um imAbsprung gesammelt mehrzuseinalserselbst.DennBleiben ist nirgends. (50-51) In this reversalof the image of the violinist,
the harmony of the two strings is turned into the powerful tension between the bow's arrow and string. The text focuses exclusively on the challenge lovers face in gaining independence from each other.23

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OSTMEIER: Rilke and Andreas-Salom6 Traditionally,the bow and arrowis associated with Cupid,as his means of causing erotic attraction. In this poem, it is turned into a metaphor for the liberation from such attractions. In fact, the image is condensed:it focuses on the arrowand its capacities to withstand the force of the bow's string. The arrowcan overcomethe limits of its own gravity only by facing the resistance of the string. This metaphorabstracts the love relationshipfrompersonal, emotional, psychological or philosophical tensions and describesthe processof liberation as a mechanical technique of transgressing one's own limits by utilizing the resistance of the other.24 The bondposedby the experiencesof "wir"and "uns"is seen as a threat to individualidentity formation and it evokes the desire for differentiation and separation.25 The second elegy (Werke I: 689-92) detects the basis for this crisis among lovers in their perceptionof their erotic and sensual encounter.Here the lover does not address the beloved,but an interrogating"I" asks for evidence of the existence of the "uns," and slowly subverts the evidences througha series ofcounterarguments.The "I" asks for the connotations and references of the personal pronoun "uns": "Liebende,euch, ihr einander Genfigten, frag ich nach uns"(44).26After asking "Habt ihr Beweise"(45) it puts forwarda counterargumentcomparingthe touching of oneself with the gestures of love, with "Liebkosungen,"and "Umarmungen"of the lovers. Here, Rilkemodifiessome of his studies on gestural language in Rodin's sculptures. His meditations on Rodin's sculpture "The Kiss" underlie his argument: Eine Hand, die sich auf eines anderen Schulter oderSchenkel legt,geh6rtnicht mehrganz zu dem Kbrper, von dem sie
kam: aus ihr und dem Gegenstand, den sie beriihrt oder packt, entsteht ein neues Ding, ein Ding mehr, das keinen Namen hat und niemandem gehort. (WerkeV: 165)

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Throughgestural contacts individualbodies lose their separateness and are unified. The gesture is not emotionalized or psychologized as narcissistic or altruistic pleasure. As a "newthing," it is nameless, and exists in an extra-linguistic sphere, which "Liebeslied"calls "uns"and "wir," and to which it refers only aesthetically by privileging the poem's musical elements over its semantics. Gestural language also revokes "I" and "you" as independent agents in the construction of the "uns." The elegy refers to the individual's selfencounter and asks if an individual existence can be deducedat all from a gestural or sensual contact. Seht, mir geschiehts,daBmeine Hiinde einander innewerden oderdabmeingebrauchtes Gesicht in ihnensichschont. Dasgiebtmir einwenig Doch werwagte darum schon Empfindung.
zu sein?

(46-49) The "I"compares such self-centered gestures with the caresses and embraces of lovers, the "sichinne werden"of its hands with the "sich greifen" of the lovers and asks in both cases if the subject identifies itself with its sensual experiences.The "I" asks: "Ihr greift euch. Habt ihr Beweise?"(45) It questions the referend of the linguistic signifier "euch" and examines the relevance of the sensual experience to its linguistic expression. Through establishing a referential context for the use of reflexive pronouns,the "I"asks about the status of "Empfindung."It addresses the lovers and contrasts their linguistic selfperceptionwith the experienceon which it is based.As in the Rodinessay,the elegy focuses on the kiss: "Wenn ihr einer dem andern / euch an den Mund hebt und ansetzt-: Getraink an Getrink: / o wie
entgeht dann der Trinkende seltsam der Handlung" (63-65). This metaphoric description identifies four different moments in the kiss: as each partner offers

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and accepts a drink, both partners lose control over the action. And in these moments one cannot tell whether the experienced pleasure is related to a narcissistic self-encounter of each partner or to the process of sharing:27"o wie entgeht dann der Trinkende seltsam der Handlung" (65). The metaphor for the kiss is complicated:the personal pronoun "euch"is imbut it functions also as aged as "Getriink," reflexive pronoun. This metaphorization empowers the pronoun. As a controlling force,it frees the partners of their individual boundaries.But this action is only described negatively and vaguely. The individual is consumed by his/her pleasure. Positive references of this action are obscured.28 The second elegy disqualifies sensual eroticism from giving evidence of the "euch."The question about the references of the pronounleads to the loss of the object of the question, of the "euch"and the "uns" in the sentence: "euch, ihr aneinander Geniigten, frag ich nach uns." These pronouns are emptied of their semantic references. Their aesthetic connotations evoked in "Liebes-Lied"are now radicallycalled into question. As "empty" signs they are non-referentialwith respect and they disillusion all conto "reality,"29 ventional associationsand fantasies about social unity in sexual partnership. Rilke's mistrust in the conventional references of the pronouns is further explored in the third elegy which Otto Friedrich Bollnow calls "ein psychoanaIt was written lytisches Lehrgedicht."30 around 1912-13 in Duino and Paris during and after the time of Rilke's rejection of psychoanalytic treatment. This elegy I: 693-96) deconstructsall idealis(Werke tic concepts of partnerships.And whereas the discussion of "I," "you"and "we" in andin the earlierelegiesis not "Liebeslied"
sexualized, the third elegy sets up a split between male and female sexuality and examines the intersection of gender with sexuality. Mother and girl are stereotypically

called "ffihlend," "leicht," "heimlich," and "freundlich," "menschlich," "zdirtlich," in their relation to son or lover they are identified as naive. The mother's nurturing distractsthe son from the threatening "Finsternis" and "Chaos" of his unconscious. Nicht in die Finsternis,nein, in dein Dasein nnheres hast du das Nachtlichtgestellt, und es schien wieausFreundschaft. Nirgends ein Knistern, das du nicht lichelnderklirtest, so als wii3testdu lingst, wann sich die Dielebenimmt... (34-37) As a figure of enlightenment the mother conceals the son's access to the unknown. Rationalizing the child's fear she is estranged from the fear's origin and restricted to her own subjective desire to nurture. Scenes which were consoling for Malte, such as the mother's visit at night VI: 797-98), are now considered a (Werke distraction. And while the girl imagines herself the source for the lover's attraction, she functions for him only as catalyst for his homoeroticdesires. Meinstduwirklich, ihn hitte deinleichter Auftritt also erschiittert,du, die wandelt wie Frdihwind? Zwardu erschrakst ihm das Herz;doch iltereSchrecken stiirzten in ihn bei dem beriihrenden Anstol3. (18-22) Rilke plays with the connotations of the word "erschiittern:" that what appears superficially as attraction is revealed as shock and fright. The male lover is characterized as "fiQrchterlich," "verstrickt,"
"wiirgend," and "tierhaft." Mythologized as "schuldiger FluB-Gott des Blutes" or as "des Blutes Neptun" the "Jiingling" is driven by forces which are unknown to himself.

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Rilke and Andreas-Salom6 OSTMEIER:

er wasweiB selbst von dem Herrnder Lust, der aus demEinsamen oft, oftauchals nochlinderte, ehedasMiidchen wiaesie nicht, Unkenntlichen triefend, ach,vonwelchem dasGotthaupt die Nacht zu unendaufhob,aufrufend Aufruhr. lichem Ohdes BlutesNeptun,o sein furchtbarer Dreizack. (3-9) The narcissistic entanglement with his own unconscious disqualifies the "Jiingling" from any self-analysis. The elegy locates the sources for the mythological threat of the male chaos in the processesof procreation and links the mythological to a physiological vocabulary. Rilke avoids Freudian terminology,but he is perhaps more biologicallyconcise here than in any other text.
[...] Liebend

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Blut, in die stieg er hinabin das Ailtere Schluchten, wo dasFurchtbare lag,nochsatt von den Vitern. Undjedes warwie kannte Schreckliche ihn,blinzelte, verstandigt.
Ja, das Entsetzlicheliichelte... Selten

Wie hast du so ziArtlich gelichelt,Mutter. sollte er es nichtlieben,da es ihm lichelte.Vor dir hat ers geliebt,denn, da du ihn trugst schon, wares im Wasser gel-st,dasdenKeimendenleichtmacht. (57-66)

The mythologized gender conflict is inserted into physiological relations. Male lovers foster a desire for their prenatal existence, and especiallyto the physicalpresence of the father in the process of procreation. The bodies of mother and beloved mediate between son and father. When the male body liquifies in the moment of procreation31 each male is driven by the

desire to re-connect homoeroticallyto his male heritage.32Rilke turns to these prenatal processes in order to determine sexual differences and he distinguishes men from women through the different relationship to their prenatal existence. Ignoring female sexual desires, the elegy addresses the beloved as animator and as catalyst for the male to re-establish his male heritage. Thus, the elegy introduces the belovedgirl to her partner's alienation from her and opens up the abyss between their sexes. Men exploit heterosexual partnerships in order to gain access to their paternal roots. In each of the texts discussed thus far, Rilketurns the search for male and female identity to the various aspects of love relationships, the relationships between son and mother and between lovers in general. These searches examine the semantic references of the unifying pronoun "wir"/ "euch"and they ask if a sharedidentity between individualscan exist. "Liebes-Lied" confirms the empirical "wir"and demonstrates how it vigorouslysubjugatesthe individual.The "wir"cannot be conceptualized, and turns into an aesthetic concept. The elegies link linguistic and sexual categories.Whereasthe first and the secondelegy dismiss the conventionalreferences of "euch,"the third elegy explores the reasons for these charges. It emphasizes the tensions between sensual experiencesand their linguistic expressions. It warns mother and beloved of their delusions aboutson andlover."Siehewir lieben nicht wie die Blumen, aus einem / einzigen Jahr, uns steigt, wo wir lieben,/ unvordenklicher Saft in die Arme" (65-67). For the male lover,erotic relationshipsarouse a baffling memory of the past which seems to be engrained in his body. Since it cannot be grasped theoretically,it must be erotically
activated. The vigor of this memory distracts from interpersonal relationships and leads men to bond with their male heritage. The woman, however, remains naive about this physical deception: "Und du

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selber,was weiBlt du-, du locktest / Vorzeit empor in dem Liebenden"(76-77). As in "Liebeslied," the linguistic concepts of suggest a unity between the "wir"/"euch" sexes which the elegies reveal as flawed. The third elegy realizes that sexual relationships are exploitative:men exploit female eroticism in order to establish their own identity as a male "wir." They live up to their fantasies about women but destabilize them at the same time. These fantasies of the female other as "reines Gesicht," "fithlendes Midchen," "Friihwind," and "freundlicheWelt" recall the romanticizedgender constructs of Malte's mother. But this concept of femininity is clearlyunderminedby male sexual ecstasy which directsits devotionto fatherfigures. The fathers are portrayedas "das zahllos and as Brauende,"as "Triimmer Gebirgs," "lautlose Landschaftunter dem wolkigen oder reinen Verhiingnis." They precedeall and as representatives of a figurations, or pre- postlinguisticspherethey are privileged over all culturally constructed gender identities, especially the female identity.33The feminine role is perceived as culturally stabile. The civilizing mother frustrates the desires of her son and only the female lover grants him the possibility to overcome the mother's oppressive cultural constraints. Men liberate themselves from the oppressivefemale culture through regressionto patriarchalpotency. With this inscription of homoerotic into heterosexualdesires Rilke offers a very eccentricversion of Freud'sapproachto sexuality in his Abhandlungen. Through abstractionfromthe femalesexualdesireand his stress on male sexualityhe establishesa gender-sex dichotomy.Only men gain access to their preoedipaland prediscursive heritage. Rilke deviates from Freud's distinctions of the preoedipalas the oral, and
anal phases by focussing only on the phallic. Here he anticipates the primacy of the phallus which Freud introduces much later in his 1923 revision of the Drei Abhandlungen zur Sexualtheorie in Die

infantile Genitalorganisation. III In contrast to Rilke, Lou AndreasSalom6 does not ignore female sexuality. She arguesthat also the female perception of the sexual partner is controlled by a memoryof the preoedipalphase,but in this case it is the memory of the harmonious oral phase which precedes the subjectformation. In fact, women have a much more intimate relationship to this period of infantile developmentthan men. Throughouther work-in texts which she wrote before and during her studies of psychoanalysis-she interprets the psychologicaland spiritualimplicationsof ova and spermatozoa."Criticizingthe simple dichotomy of female sexuality as passive and male sexuality as aggressive and active, she interprets the ova as simultaneously active and passive. And wherever Freud focuses on male sexuality AndreasSalom6 stresses female sexuality. For the purpose of my argument I will first highlightthe most radicalparagraphs in which she argues against Freud'sjudgments of women's sexuality as less "konsequent," as "zuginglich," and as "Riickbilor as "Pervertierung."36 Whereas dung,"35 the male psyche is always torn between ego- and object- libido, women integrate these two drives and experience "Gliick," which is reserved solely for them. "Nun liegt es mir eigentlich ferner, von Tugenden und Leistungenzu reden, als von dem, worin ich mich kompetenter ftihle: vom Glick" ("ZTW" 94). Andreas-Salom6 points towards an experience which is missing in Freud's analysis. Freud admits that "das [Liebesleben] des Weibes zum Teil infolge der Kulturverkiimmerung,
zum anderen Teil durch die konventionelle Verschwiegenheit und Unaufrichtigkeit der Frauen in ein nochundurchdringliches Dunkel gehiillt ist."37 Andreas-Salom6 calls this "obscurity" "Gliick." She appro-

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OSTMEIER: Rilke and Andreas-Salom6 priates Freud's analytical results but reverses their logic:women integrate sexuality and spirituality whereas men separate them; women solve inner paradoxes, whereas men are exposed to contradictions: IndemdieKraftderMannheit als sexuell
und geistig in Gegensitzen auseinanderstiebt, oder aber sich selbst Konkurrenz macht, gibt sie ihre unmittelbare Gliicksgemeinschaft in sich auf; in dem der Mann als Leistender sich nachjagt, verliert er sich als Selbstbesitzender-wie er schon im Dienst der Fortpflanzungverliert was er besitzt. ("ZTW" 95) Men either strive for sexual satisfaction or they project their "Ich Ideal" on to the establishment of their own social status. Ego libido and object libido exclude each other and are directed towards external objects. Here Andreas-Salom6 identifies the identity crises-which Rilke had addressed in his letter to her in 1912--clearly as a male predicament. Women's sexuality is more complex because women activate objectand ego libido simultaneously, and these are not in competition with each other: "der passiv gerichtete Sexualtrieb kann sich dem hinhalten, was dem Ichtrieb das f6rdernd H*chste erscheint" ("ZTW" 95). Women incorporate the processes of sublimation38 into their sexual relationships and unite energies which are irreconcilable for Freud. Andreas-Salom6 reintroduces idealistic concepts of spirituality, meaning, and self into the debate about sexuality: so steckt dahinter doch nicht mehr oder weniger als folgende Leistung:den geistigen Sinn des Erlebten dort am geistigsten zu fassen, wo er am korperhaftestenzugedeckt, am psychisch undeutbarsten bleibt, und so der eigenen Grundeinheit am gewissesten zu werdendort,wo sie am 99) abgriindigstenschwankt. ("ZTW" In regard to men, the term "Leistung" re-

245

fers to social establishment; in regard to women, it refers to the construction of spiritual identity. While sex agitates individual physical and psychological confinements, women are able to decipher the basis for this experience. They gain access to a meaning of intercourse inaccessible to men.39 But this meaning is hidden and tied to past experiences of an original totality. Only sexual ecstasy can open up this memory: Dieses Vergeistigen und Idealisieren in seiner Unwillkiirlichkeitlli3t sich veranlasst denken dadurch, daB, dem weiblich-einheitlichen Wesen nach, in den Ubertragungen der Liebe lebenslang deren urspriinglicher Ausdruck fiihlbarer gegenwirtig bleibt als dem Mann-jene uranfainglicheVerschmelzung mit dem Ganzen darin wir ruhten, ehe wir selber uns gegeben waren und die Welt in Einzelgestaltungen vor uns aufging. ("ZTW" 99) Lovemaking evokes the involuntary memory of a total unity which precedes the splits, abysses and dualities of subject formation. This unity has very different connotations in the course of Andreas-Salom6's various texts. The early text "Der Mensch als Weib"40 from 1899 idealizes woman in contrast to men as a unity per se, as "pers6nlich gewordenes Sprachrohr des Allebens" ("DMaW" 36), as "grol3e Stille und Sammlung," and as "in sich friedvollere, intaktere, selbstherrlichere Welt" ("DMaW" 41). On a metaphoric level the female body is perceived as fabulous castle with "Gemaecher(n)" "Schaetze(n)," ("DMaW"28), "goldene(n) Tore(n)," "festliche(n) Wege(n)"("DMaW" 18) deviating sharply from the mechanisms of male sexuality ("DMaW" 17). Although men are dependent on women, the women remain independent of them. As Biddy Martin demonstrates, Andreas-Salom6 attempts in this essay "to avoid both the conservative bourgeois feminist negation of women's

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sexuality and 'equality arguments' at the same time."'41 narThe text "ZumTypusWeib"(1913) rows the broad concept of gender difference. It focuses on intercourseas a special stimulus for female perception. The woman understands what unifies the sexual partnersbeyondtheir personalboundaries: "daBsie in ihm erkennt, was sie mit ihm gewissermaBenfiber die Person hinaus eint" ("ZTW"100). Here it is not the woman per se who has access to the interpersonalharmony.Onlyin the moments of sexual ecstasy are women able to transgress sexual differences.In the later text, "Analund Sexual," Andreas-Salom6calls this process of sublimation "Umsetzung menschlicher Blutwairme in GeistesShe no longergendersthis issue. gestalt."42 She describesthe ecstasy of intercourseas "ritselhafte Geheimchiffreder Einheit"43 (an enigmatic and concealed puzzle of unity), and addresses the sexual centralization of all partialdrivesas "Hoheliedder and as celebration of all senses. Liebe"44 These metaphorichyperbolesexposea perspective which Andreas-Salom6had described earlier as female perception. She imposes this feminine perspective on to sexual experiencein generalanddefinesall other sexual interactions, solely based on objectcathexis, as undeveloped,dull, cripThese interactions ignore pled and anal.45 individual the partner and are reducedto partial arousals. The earlier text "Zum Typus Weib"characterizes such interactions solely as male, and in her novel Feniareactsto it with "inde"Fenitschka," scribabledisgust and scorn."'46 With these characterizationsof intercourse, Andreas-Salom6attempts to reconcile at least two issues: in the traditionof Freud, she views sexual ecstasy as revival of the original harmony between mother
and child and/or of the harmony in the child's autoeroticism. But she also focuses on the interaction between the partners and on their experience of togetherness, an experience which she calls "ritselhafte

This threefoldhyperbolic Geheimchiffre." encoding fuses two concepts of harmony and brings together what Rilke and Freud separate when they ignore female sexualthe constitutionof ity.ForAndreas-Salom6 the social subject of the "we" does not threaten the individual identity. In "Anal und Sexual"she writes:47 Denn auf dem sexuellen H6hepunkt spielt fiir unser bewu.Btseinsbetdiubtes nichtsmehreine Rolleals die Verlangen Illusiongegenmoglichstunbehinderte die MomenseitigerDurchdrungenheit; tekstasedes Geschlechtsaktes hebt den anderngewissermaBen auf, und indem Liebende wieder"zusich"kommen, wird ihnen der Partner-alsein wiederklein -deutlichals Jemand wenigdistanzierter fiur sichundvon selbstAndiger Lebendigkeit.48 Andreas-Salom6is aware of and committed to the illusionary effects of sexual ecstasy. Whereas Rilke calls such experiences into question and replaces them by male fictions of fusion with the paternal heritage,Andreas-Salom6acceptsthe fantasies of the interpersonal "wir" as concrete experiences. Her perception of sexual ecstasy integrates fictional and literal realities, while Rilke differentiates between them in orderto objectto the experience of a heterosexually shared identity of the "we."When he later poses the homoerotic unity with the paternal heritage he ironicallyignoresits fictionalstatus. By introducingfantasyas the fabricatingagency anticiof gender identity,Andreas-Salom6 of contemwhich branches pates concepts poraryfeministtheoryexplorefurther.Different individual interpretations of the extra-linguistic bodily encounter signify the fluidity of the gender categories which thereforecan be appropriated by arbitrary individual interests, desires, or ideals. As argued earlier, between 1899 and 1914 Andreas-Salom6 changes her approach to sexuality: with the early essay "Der Mensch als Weib" she develops a

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Rilke and Andreas-Salom6 OSTMEIER: "radicalmodel of the feminine to counter the dominant hierarchicalpriviledgingof the male pervasive duality of 'femininity' and 'masculinity'."49 In the later essays she perceivessexuality as a means to overcome this duality.Rilke,in contrast, starts out to examine criticallythe conditionsof a unity and later in the third elegy arguesfor a cutting gender duality.Weface an interesting reversal: whereas Andreas-Salom6in her later texts views sexuality as the undoing of sexual difference, Rilke insists on this difference. He questions the references of the conventional signifier "uns,"and does not trust languageto representthe human experience. Andreas-Salom6is not troubled by the limits of language and accepts the incomprehensibilityof the "we:" Anstattder gleichsam wiitendenIdentitaitmitihm,dieallesin sichkomprimiert, Geheim16stsich danndiese riitselhafte chiffreder Einheit,in die einzelnenausfiihrlicheren Liebesbezogenheiten,in denen sie zwar nur noch indirekt beartiaberdaftir verstindlicher schrieben, kommt.50 kuliert,zu Worte The extralinguistic exprience cannot be directly captured by language, and it dissolves as soon as it is articulated.

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IV
In orderto construct a gender identity, Rilke and Andreas-Salom6interpret the experienceof sexual ecstasy and relate it to processes of involuntary memories. Both authors are aware that the sexual experience is not directly representable. Anredreas-Salom6'sterm "Geheimschiffre" fers to its doubleclosure.Rilkerefersto the memory of a prenatal gendered identity and Andreas-Salom6 to a pre-oedipal
transgendered harmony. Her approach shifts. She presents the memories of childhood as links to a transsexual and transgendered identity of the "wir" and "Euch" and she ties the process of remembering to

the constitution of a new social entity, an entity whichFreudas well as Rilkecallinto question. Thus sexual difference leads to the erasure of two sexualities, to an androgynous union of sexual energies and to the life-affirming social reality of the Rilke is much more critical of the "wir."51 referentialcapacitiesof language.Forhim, the male partneruses the ecstasy of intercourse to reconnect homoerotically with his male heritage. Intercourse does not overcomesexual differences.The comparison of these two approachesindicate that the individual concepts of gender depend on the interpretationof prenatal or infantile experienceson one hand and on the experiences of intercourse on the other. These interpretations link two extra-linguistic events by inserting the authors' arbitraryfantasies. In our context these fantasies also reflect the biographicalencounter of both authors. writAndreas-Salom6's Lebensriickblick, in and ten 1931-32 published posthumously in 1951, projectsher concept of interpersonalunity on to the time with Rilke before 1901, which she describesas "zweisames Ineinanderleben,"as "raunen des UnfaBbaren in beiden gemeinsam" (Lr 139). She points to "jeneStille und Selbstversta.ndlichkeit, die uns aneinander schloBwie etwas, das immerdargewesen" (Lr 138). During this time she calls herself his wife. The sharedexperiencescannotbe described: "Man hitte das uns Gemeinsame daran niemandem schildern kinnen" (Lr 141-42). Languagedoes not have access to this unconscious or preconscious relationshipand she regrets not being able to comprehendRilke'spoetry (see Lr 140). Interestingly, she makes a point of mentioning her excitement when Rilke once sent her a postcardwithout text. This harmonywas disruptedby Rilke's
emerging commitment to his poetic production during their trips to Russia. Ohne Zweifel steckt ja, zutiefst gesehen, in allem Kunstvorgangein Stiick solcher

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Gefahr, solcher Nebenbuhlerschaft zum Leben: fiir Rainer noch unberechenbar gefihrlicher, weil seine Veranlagungdaraufgerichtet war,lyrischdas fast Unaussprechbarezu bewiiltigen. (Lr 115) As a rival of life his writing competes with the shared experiences of the "Unfaf3bare," "Stille," and "Unaussprechbare." Recalling definitions of maleness from "Zum Typus Weib" Andreas-Salom6 writes: Mir war das ohne Leistung in den SchoB gefallen, was Dich um Deiner Leistung willen in allen Tiefen aufgerissen [...] die Wucht Deiner inneren Problematik riB mich zu Dir hin [...] Und doch-und doch: riB es mich nicht zugleich von Dir fort? ausjener WirklichkeitDeinerAnffinge,in der wir wie von einer Gestalt gewesen waren. Wer ergriindet das Dunkel der letzten Ferne und Nihe voneinander!In jenem sorgend inbriinstigen Nahesein bei Dir stand ich dennoch auBerhalbdessen, was Mann und Weib ineinanderschlieBt, und nie mehr wurde das fiir mich anders. (Lr 146) The interpersonal conflict is based on the male tension between object- and ego-libido. This later text applies her theoretical model of gender difference from 1914 to her relationship to Rilke. There she argues: "in dem der Mann als Leistender sich nachjagt, verliert er sich als Selbstbesitzender" ("ZTW" 95). The literal correspondences between the texts from 1914 and 1931-32 demonstrate that Rilke is inscribed into Andreas-Salom6's debates about gender and that he functions as a model for her concept of maleness in the earlier text. Later, as we have seen, she rejects this kind of male narcissism in "Anal und Sexual." Rilke and Andreas-Salom6 decided in 1901 to break off their relationship not only by ceasing to live together but also by disrupting their habit of "Allesmiteinanderteilens," and to their correspondence "es sei denn in der Stunde h6chster Not" (Lr 147). In 1903 with his first letter to

Andreas-Salom6, Rilke refers to this agree-

ment. After they meet again in 1905

Andreas-Salom6 writes: Von unserm Pfingsten an las ich, was Du schufst, nicht nur mit Dir, ich empfing es und bejahtees wie eine Aussage ilber Deine Zukunft, die nicht aufzuhalten war. Und hieran wurde ich noch einmal Dein, auf eine zweite Weise-in einem zweiten Magdtum.(Lr 148) Physical closeness is exchanged for literary closeness which letters call "Zuriickund Her-denken" (Briefwechsel 307), "in Gedanken begleiten" (Briefwechsel 326), "so ganz bei Deinen Worten und mit ihnen ganz allein [sein]" (Briefwechsel 332). The letters indicate that Andreas-Salom6 always argues from the perspective of hope for a unity, perhaps most expressively, in a letter from 24 June 1914: Und ich mochte immer weiter und weiter schreiben, und sagen und sagen,-nicht weil ich viel wiiite, nur weil ich (wenn auch ganz anders als Du, und nur weil man als Weibdort irgendwie angesiedelt ist) Deine Herzt6ne, diese tiefen, neuen, durch mein ganzes Wesen h6re. (Briefwechsel 333)

Andreas-Salom6projects her concept of a

transgendered and transpersonal harmony on to her relationship to Rilke and thus anticipates her theories of 1916. In his response Rilke acknowledges Andreas-Salom6's view but rejects it: Liebe Lou, Du weift und begreifst;kbnnt ich's nur von dir aus sehen eine Sekunde, so, wie ich Dir's glaube, der einsehende Andere sein, ich kaimegestirkt in meine Verstrickungen zuriick, die unabsehbaren, so weiter vorbereiteten. (Briefwechsel 336) He points to the clash between his psychological reality and her harmonizing fictionalization of it, realizing his alienation from her perspective. Consistent with his

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Rilke and Andreas-Salom6 OSTMEIER: earlier poetic elaborations he calls Andreas-Salom6's constructs of a transpersonaland transgenderedidentity-of a "wir" and "euch"-into question, insisting on the difference between AndreasSalom6's and his own constructions of male and female identities and interpersonal dialogue. This leads to a paradoxical relationship: Rilke and Andreas-Salom6 explore and project their individual theoretical views on each other but each rejects them. This process of projectionand rejection becomes the attraction of their ongoing dialogue in letters.

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an excellent collection of Andreas-Salom6's texts about psychoanalysis. Inge Weber and Brigitte Rempp, eds., Lou Andreas-Salomd: Das zweideutigeLdchelnder Erotik: Textezur Psychoanalyse (Freiburg: Kore, 1990). This edition includes the following texts: "Drei Briefe an einen Knaben"(1913); "ZumTypus Weib" (1913) (all further references will appear as "ZTW");"Analund Sexual" (1914); "Psychosexualitait"(1915); "NarziBmus als Doppelrichtung"(1921). 4See, e.g., Klaus Miiller, Aber in meinem Herzen sprach eine Stimme so laut: Homosexuelle Autobiographien und medizinische Pathographien im 19. Jahrhundert (Berlin: Winkel, 1991); Jeffrey Weeks, Sex, Politics & Society: The Regulation of Sexuality since 1800, 2nded. (London:Longman, 1989). Notes 5Weeks152-56. 6Ernst Pfeiffer, ed., Lou Andreas-Salomd (Frankfurt a.M: Insel, 1977) 1Ernst Pfeiffer, ed., Rilke Andreas-Salomed Lebensriickblick All further will appear as Lr. 113. references a.M.: 1979). (Frankfurt Insel, Briefwechsel Most of Lou Andreas-Salom6'sletters to Rilke 7UrsulaWelschand MichaelaWiesner,Lou are lost. All further referencesto this workwill Andreas-Salome. Vom "Lebensgrund" zur "Psychoanalyse" (Miinchen: Verlag Interappear as Briefwechsel. 2Rilkewas probablyfamiliar with most of nationale Psychoanalyse,1988). BiddyMartin, and Modernity:The (Life)StylesofLou Freud's texts since he lived with Freud's pub- Woman lisher Hugo Heller in Vienna 1907. (See Erich Andreas-Salomed (Ithaca: CornellUP, 1991). 8Martin40-41. Simenauer,Rainer Maria Rilke. Legende und 9JudithButler, "GenderTrouble,Feminist Mythos[Bern:Haupt, 1953] 133.) He discusses psychoanalyticalissues with Dr.von Gebsattel, Theory,and PsychoanalyticDiscourse,"Femithe psychiatrist of his wife, in the winter of nism/Postmodernism,ed. Linda J. Nicholson 1907-08 in Paris (Simenauer 134). And he (New York:Routledge, 1990) 324-40. considers in letters to Lou Andreas-Salom6 10In spoken French there are no differwhether he should commit to psychoanalytic ences between "Rene"and "Renee." 11Fora thorough study of the relationship therapy himself. Lou Andreas-Salomestudied Freud's texts intensely before she became a between "Sehenlernen,Erinnernund Versuch student of his in Vienna in 1911 and before des Erziihlens" see Judith Ryan, "'Hypotheworkingherself as a therapist. In her texts she tisches Erzahlen': Zur Funktion von Phanredesigns some of Freud's theories focussing tasie und Einbildung,in Rilke'sMalte Laurids especiallyon the role of the woman.Simenauer Brigge," Jahrbuch der deutschen Schillerarguedalreadyin 1953 that the context of psy- gesellschaft 15 (1971): 202-230. 12Stefan Schank, Kindheitserinnerungen choanalysishas to be taken into accountforthe discussion of Rilke's texts. Simenauernot only im WerkRainer Maria Rilkes: Eine biograpoints to thematic parallels,but also views the phisch-literaturwissenschaftliche Studie, ed. associative structure of the elegies in the con- Karl Richter, Gerhard Sauder and Gerhard text of Freud's metapsychologicalstudies. In Schmidt-Henkel (St. Ingbert: Rihrig, 1995) the elegies the "I"gains again its voice which 15. was mostly removed from Neue Gedichtebevon Braun,"ZurBedeutungder 13Christina cause of their concern about the "Ding." Sexualbilder im rassistischen AntisemitisSimenauercalls the monologicstructureof the mus,"Jiidische Kultur und Weiblichkeit in der elegies "die der psychoanalytischenSituation Moderne,ed. Inge Stephan, Sabine Schilling, and SigridWeigel(K6ln:Bohlau, 1994) 35. gemifBeAusdrucksform"(136). 14Thatwhich inspires the child's sense for 3IngeWeberand Brigitte Rempppublished

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wonder causes confusion for the adult. Malte has to write about the mother's fantasies of him as a daughterand aboutall of her stories in order to establish himself as son. Michael F Davis does not addressthis liberatingaspect of the writingwhen he arguesthat the main character's crisis with modernistculture leads him to gain access to his mother's language, which replaces his own capacities to write and to speak. Michael F Davis, "Writingthe Mother in TheNotebooks ofMalte Laurids Brigge:The Rhetoric of Abjection,"The GermanicReview LXVIII.4(1993): 156-66. 238. 15Briefwechsel 244. 16Briefwechsel 17This identity crisis is addressed in all variations throughout his correspondence with Andreas-Salome. On June 26, 1914 he writes: Ich bin auch so heillos nach auBen gekehrt, darum auch zerstreut von allem, nichts ablehnend, meine Sinne gehn, ohne mich zu fragen, zu allem Storenden fiber,ist da ein Geriusch, so geb ich mich auf und bin dieses Geriusch, und da alles einmal auf Reiz eingestellte, auch gereizt sein will, so will ich im Grunde gest*rt
sein und bins ohne Ende. [...] drauBen ist

immer die gleiche Preisgegebenheit." (Briefwechsel337) 18This relationship between identity and language crisis recalls the crises of Hofmannsthal's Chandos letter. See Egon Schwarz, "Hugo von Hofmannsthal und Rainer Maria Rilke Recondidered, Rilke,"Rilke-Rezeptionen ed. Sigrid Bauschinger and Susan L. Cocalis Francke, 1995) 15-26. (Thibingen: 250 and 252, 253. 19Briefwechsel 20RilkeWerke,ed. Rilke-Archivin Verbindung mit Ruth Sieber-Rilke (Frankfurt a.M.: Insel, 1955) 482. All further references to this edition will appearin the text as Werke. 21LawrenceRyan, "Rilke's Dinggedichte: The 'Thing' as 'Poem in Itself'," Bauschinger and Cocalis31. 22Mydiscussion of the elegies focuses on the tensions between sexual differences. I do not address their more abstract topics, for example their philosophyof figuration. See Paul de Man, "Tropes," Allegoriesof Reading (New Haven:YaleUP 1979) 49. 23Jacob Steiner,who interprets the Elegies most extensively,does not analyze the implications of this imagery. Jacob Steiner, Rilkes

Duineser Elegien (Miinchen:Francke, 1962). 24Thegender implications of the imagery suggests also the following reading: This love is not only conceptualized as liberation from the beloved but also as liberation from gendered relationships. The first part of the sentence suggests the liberation of a female lover from the male beloved ("vom Geliebten"), and the simile of the second part suggests the liberationof a male ("derPfeil")from a female lover ("dieSehne"). Both lovers need to be freed from conventional roles in heterosexual relationshipsin orderto gain their independence. 25These poetic elaborations are closely linked to biographical experiences. A few weeks after finishing the first elegy,Rilke, in a letter to Lou Andreas-Salome, portrays his wife Claraas the lover who lost her identity in her relationship with him. Clara had asked him for a divorce.He writes: Es ist nichts B ses zwischen uns, aber sie geht doch gewissermaBenals meine Frau mit falscher Aufschrift herum, ist nicht mit mir und kommt doch uiber mir zu nichts anderem. Das ist seltsam: unser Verhiltnis bestand darin, daB sie mich unendlich restlos bejahte, acceptierte, und dann wieder, wenn sie merkte, wie viel absolut Fremdes, ja Feindsdiliges sie da mit unterschrieben hatte, in Ablehnung verfiel. Sucht man dahinter nach ihr, nach dem, was sie seit der Midchenzeit geworden ist, so findet sich, [...] nichts Greifbares, nichts als diese abwechselnde Funktion des Mich-einnehmens und Mich-ausscheidens ..." (Fe-

bruary 7, 1912). (Briefwechsel259) 26Jacob Steiner also addressesthe question of the "uns,"but does not considerthe possibility that "uns" refers solely to the two lovers when he writes: "Dann wiederholt sich die Frage nach uns, nach unserem Sein und dem Dauern nach ihm" (Steiner 49-50). 27Inhis interpretation of these lines Jacob Steiner concentrates on the relevance of this exchange for the individual and not for the shared experience when he says: Und eben darin verliert er das MaB des Abstands (IV 77) und die Beherrschung seiner selbst; denn als Getrink ist er ins Passive verlegt, wird aus dem Becher seiner selbst geleert und hat nicht mehr die Kraft der Riickkehrin sich selbst wie die

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OSTMEIER: Rilke and Andreas-Salom6

Engel. (Steiner 51) 28Accessto a harmonizedhumanity which Rilke genders as neutral and calls "ein reines, verhaltenes, schmales Menschliches,"(Werke I: 692) remains a utopian desire. In the ninth elegy the ideal is only present as the demand: "Menschlichesmiissen" (Werke I: 717). 29Cf. Emile Benveniste, "The Nature of Pronouns," Problems in General Linguistics (CoralGables:U of Miami P, 1971) 219. 300tto FriedrichBollnow,Rilke (Stuttgart: Kohlhammer,1951) 65. For a critique of this approach,see Steiner 55. 31Thisrelationship of the male to his body can serve as a counterexampleto the conventions of stereotypingfemale bodies as "floods," "oceans,""morass,""slime"as Klaus Theweleit demonstrates in Male Fanatasies, tr. Stephen Conway, (Minneapolis: Minnesota UP, 1987). 32JacobSteiner interprets "Wasser"only as "Fruchtwasser"and not as sperm (Steiner 66). 33In a note to Lou Andreas-Salomedated June 8, 1914 Rilkeis moreradical,and disqualifies not only the girl's but any lover's support of him. Expressions-as for example "unmittelbar,""rein,""unbeirrt,""Liebesstrahl," which are associated with the beloved in the third elegy-are no longer gendered.Rilke admits his male sadism towards any such lover: [S]o bleib ich nun, nach diesen Monaten Leidens, ganz anders gerichtet zuriick: einsehn miissend diesmal, daBkeiner mir helfen kann, keiner;und kiimeer mit dem berechtigsten, unmittelbarsten Herzen und wiese sich aus bis an die Sterne hinan und ertriige mich, wo ich mich noch so schwer und steif mache, und behielte die reine, die unbeirrteRichtungzu mir,auch wenn ich ihm zehnmal den Liebesstrahl breche mit der Trilbe und Dichte meiner Unterwasser-Welt-:ichwiirde doch (das weiBich nun) ein Mittel finden, ihn in der ganzen Fiille seiner immer neu nachwachsenden Hiilfe bloBzustellen, ihn in den Bereich luftleerer Lieblosigkeit einzuschlieBen, sodal3sein Beistand, unanwendbar,an ihm selber iiberreifwirdund welk und schrecklichabgestorben.(Briefwechsel 322) 34Andreas-Salom6 wrote a review of Wilhelm B6lsche's Das Liebeslebenin der Natur: Eine Entwicklungsgeschichteder Liebe (Leip-

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zig: Friedrichs, 1898-1903) and took issue with Haeckel'sDarwinismand his reductionof woman to her reproductivefunction and maternity, in her essay "Der Mensch als Weib." Biddy Martin discusses this essay and puts it into its historical and critical context, arguing that Andreas-Salome works in these texts "withinand against the terms of biologicaland evolutionarythought" (Martin 141). 35SigmundFreud, Drei Abhandlungenzur Sexualitdit, Studienausgabe V (Frankfurt: Fischer, 1972) 112. 98. 36SeeAndreas-Salome,"ZTW" 37Freud 61. Andreas-Salome avoids the latinization of the term libido and talks about "Ichideal,"and "Sexualtrieb." 38Inge Weber and Brigitte Rempp, commentators on Andreas-Salome's essay "Anal und Sexual," point to the larger discussion of the term "sublimation"in Freud's Viennese circle around 1912. Weber and Rempp 343. Andreas-Salometakes this term up again in her essay "Narzismul3 als Doppelrichtung." 39Andreas-Salom6 uses the same vocabulary as Freud when she discusses the meaning of the sexual experienceas "physicallycovered up" (k~rperhaft zugedeckt).But in Freud it is the individual process of cathexis and not the experience of sexual togetherness which "covers up." Freud relates the reexperience of an originalunity solely to the ego libidoin his Drei Abhandlungen: Die narzistische oder Ichlibido erscheint uns als das groBeReservoir,aus welchem die Objektbesetzungenausgeschickt und in welches sie wieder einbezogen werden, die narziBtischeLibidobesetzungdes Ichs als der in der ersten Kindheit realisierte Urzustand, welcher durch die spiiteren Aussendungen der Libido nur verdeckt wird, im Grunde hinter denselben erhalten geblieben ist. (122) Freud refers to the "original state of things"as the autoeroticism of the infant who has not learnedthe processof objectcathexis.Thushe focuses solelyon the individualactionof the partners,andpaysno attentionto the processof sharing which Andreas-Salome identifies as the enigmaof sexual ecstasy. 40Whereas Gisela Brinker-Gabler published this essay under the title "Die in sich ruhende Frau" in Zur Psychologie der Frau, ed. Gisela Brinker-Gabler (Frankfurt a.M.: Fischer, 1978), Ernst Pfeiffer published a

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THE GERMAN QUARTERLY

Summer 2000

slightly shorter version of it under the quoted title "Der Mensch als Weib"in Lou AndreasSalome. Die Erotik. Vier Aufsditze (Frankfurt/M:Ullstein, 1992) 7-44. (Allfurtherreferences will appearin the text as "DMaW.") 41Martin155. "Analund Sexual" 124. 42Andreas-Salom6, In this text Andreas-Salomeadjusts more to Freudian vocabulary,but subverts it at the same time. The discussion of Freud's concept offers a new link to the develof "Analerotik" opment of a conscious "Ich."In controllingthe the infant developsa sense for the "Analdrang" own personal power which separates between the I and its physicalexcrement,between the I and its radicalotherness. Thus the infant is involved in two processes of objectcathexis: the loving unity/identity between mother's breast of the and sucking child and the objectification self in its physical excrement. Since these processes are not directly linked to gender issues, Andreas-Salome initially avoids addressing gender difference. "Anal und Sexual"121. 43Andreas-Salom6, "Anal und Sexual"122. 44Andreas-Salom6, der Sexualtrieb seinerseits 45"Wohingegen ein Zuwenig hievon [sic] merken liilt, sich auf eine sehr spezielle Sondererregung beschrainkt,die Person des Partners persbnlich kaum mitmeint, da wiederholt er im Grunde nur ein Analogon zum analen Vorgang.Insofern die geschlechtliche Vermihlung wiedereinsetzt beim Einfachsten und Anfainglichsten, dem ZusammenschluBvon Ei und Samen, und hinter diesem Geschehnis sich persinlich undurchsichtig vollzieht, sagt sie dariiber Deutliches nur gleichnisweise aus oder durch das Drum und Dran der Partialbetfitigungenum sie. Fehlt es, dann kann man mit lihnlichemRecht von einer riickstaindigen, bruchstiickhaftenSexualerledigungreden wie und Sexual"122-23) beim Neurotiker." ("Anal Fenitschkaand De46Lou Andreas-Salome, viations, tr. Dorothee Einstein Krahn (Lanham: UP of America, 1990) 11. 47Thispassage couldbe read as a commenof the kiss. description taryto Rilke'smetaphoric und Sexual" "Anal 120, 48Andreas-Salom6, 121. 49DianaBehler, "Nietzsche and The Feminine," Nietzsche Studien 26, ed. Giinter Abel, Ernst Behler,Jorg Salarquarda,and Josef Simon (Berlin:de Gruyter 1997) 501. und Sexual"121. "Anal 50Andreas-Salom6,

51There are phrases and images in Andreas-Salom6 texts which caused debates about her conservatism which Biddy Martin reviews in her book Womanand Modernity. Gisela Brinker-Gabler calls Andreas-Salom6's work regressive because it ignores the historical and social manipulationsof the perception of gender differences. (See Gisela BrinkerGabler,ed., Zur Psychologieder Frau [Frankfurt a.M.: Fischer, 1978] 20.) Some of Andreas-Salome'simages of women remindreaders also of Theweleit's characterizations of fascist male fantasies in his analysis of the texts and psyche of "Freikorp"soldiers who mostly fought during WWI, then triumphed over the revolutionaryGerman working class in the years immediately after WWIand later becamethe coreof Hitler's SA. In the earlytext "DerMensch als Weib,"Andreas-Salomepresents women with the symbolic gesture of kneeling instead of standing and as "Heimat," or "Schinheit" (29), and at the end of the text she associates the ecstasy of male ego-libido with Nietzche's Zarathustra who descends from the mountain with a renewed perception of femininity:"[A]lssahe er die Ewigkeit selbst in Gestalt eines jungen knieenden Weibes,von dem man nicht weiB,ob es kniet, um der Erde ndher oder dem Himmel williger zu sein" (Pfeiffer,Erotik 44). Here woman turns into a symbol for the process of transcending and transgressing the boundaries of everydaylife. In "Der Mensch als Weib" Andreas-Salome characterizeswoman as the complexstructure of virgin, mother, and the sexually active woman. In "ZumTypus Weib"she calls women without children "sozial minderes Material," and the borders between sexuality as conception and as pleasure are still blurred. Such und Sexevaluationscannot be found in "Anal ual."This leads me to the followingconclusion: in confrontingFreud's and Rilke's genderbias frees her rhetoricsfromidealAndreas-Salom6 istic stereotypes. But she does not give up her specialfocuson the problemof definingtogetherness. As a philosophically and psychologically interested thinker she does not attempt to write a social and politicalhistory.Her shifting rhetorics indicate that she accommodated various-mainly male-scientific biological, philosophicaland psychoanalyticaldiscourses while pursuingher main interest in equalizing female sexuality.

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