Harlot Masquerade: Part Four: Marc Gafni

posted by Marc Gafni assistant

Remember one of the last scenes in Thornton Wilder’s Our Town? Emily, who has died in childbirth, asks the ghosts if she can go back to visit her life. They say — you can, but no one ever does. Emily cannot understand why until she goes back to visit her 12th birthday. She watches it unfold and realizes that she can’t get anyone’s attention. Mum, Dad, her friends — no one sees her. She understands why no one ever goes back to visit their lives. The pain of realizing you were invisible to people you thought loved you so is too much to bear.

So Hiyya’s wife gets dressed up as Heruta. Note that this is the first time she has a name. Until now she was Hiyya’s wife. She puts on a mask in order to take off her mask. Her husband, by contrast, has been wearing a mask although it is invisible: the mask of the pious ascetic. From behind a mask we can never see our loved ones clearly. Whenever those who rely on us do not feel seen by us, we force them to dress up in all sorts of costumes to attract our attention again.

To be loved is to be seen. Love is a perception. When the perceptive faculty of love has broken down, Hiyya’s wife reverts to the sexual seeing upon which love’s perception is modeled. She tries to use the strength of sexual perception in order to help him get his true sight back. Sex models Eros; but it is not Eros.

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