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SUSAN SONTAG
known. Genet, in his writings, seems to be asking us to approve of
cruelty, treacherousness, licentiousness and murder. But so far as
he is making a work of art, Genet is not advocating anything at all.
He is recording, devouring, transfiguring his experience. In Genet's
books, as it happens, this very process itself is his explicit subject;
his
books are not only works of art but about art. However, even when
(as is usually the case) this process is not in the foreground of the
artist's demonstration, it is still this, the processing of experience, to
which we owe our attention. It is immaterial that Genet's characters
might repel us in real life. So would most of the characters in
King
Lear.
The interest of Genet lies in the manner whereby his "subject"
is annihilated by the serenity and intelligence of his imagination.
Approving or disapproving morally of what a work of art "says"
is just as extraneous as becoming sexually excited by a work of art.
(Both are, of course, very common.) And the reasons urged against
the propriety and relevance of one apply as well to the other. Indeed,
in this notion of the annihilation of the subject we have perhaps the
only serious criterion for distinguishing between erotic literature or
films or paintings which are art, and those which (for want of a better
word) one has to call pornography. Pornography has a "content," and
is designed to make us connect (with disgust, desire) with that con–
tent. It is a substitute for life. But art does not excite; or, if it does,
the excitation is appeased, within the terms of the esthetic experience.
All great art induces contemplation, a dynamic contemplation. How–
ever much the reader or listener or spectator is aroused by a provi–
sional identification of what is in the work of art with real life, his
ultimate reaction-insofar as he is reacting to the work as a work of
art-must be detached, restful, contemplative, emotionally free, be–
yond indignation and approval. It is interesting that Genet has recently
said that he now thinks that if his books arouse readers sexually,
"they're badly written, because the poetic emotion should be so strong
that no reader is moved sexually. Insofar as my books are porno–
graphic, I don't reject them. I simply say that I lacked grace."
The objection that this approach reduces art to mere "formalism"
must not be allowed to stand. (That word should be reserved for
those works of art which mechanically perpetuate outmoded or
depleted esthetic formulas.) The sense in which a work of art has no
content is no different from the sense in which the world has no con-
