538
PARTISAN REVIEW
rejected society through his alcoholism is buried under the weight of his fear.
He clings dearly to that same societal structure, as if to a rope over an abyss.
Though he openly admits his condemnation of his social stratosphere, Berenger
isn't strong enough to allow his own release. He holds on to the life he hated to
avoid, the wave that would wash him into the life he does not understand.
Curiosity and tension were rising in the class. The true surprise was not
so much the reversal of an accepted interpretation as the rigor, the para–
doxically reversed common sense and the logic of the demonstration.
Berenger maintains that his friend Jean "must have made a mistake" because he
(Berenger) is unable to find a more valid reason to choose, and because he cannot
comprehend his old friend's desire for a "new life." Whether or not the "mindless"
life of the Rhinoceros is a more satisfying one or a (better) more stimulating one is
irrelevant. Berenger choosing not to sacrifice his identity is unfounded because he
makes it on the basis of fear. As he finds himself the last remaining human being,
he retains his obstinate skepticism. "I'm the last man left, I'm staying that way to
the end. I'm not capitulating." Berenger's refusal to "capitulate" is hardly an hon–
orary one. Fear of change constrains our progression. To choose a life of bondage
to certain misery-a life of constriction (as Berenger's was: "I just can't get used to
life," is a coward's choice. Berenger cannot be credited with "maintaining his
integrity or identity." He maintains nothing but the pathetic life he so detests that
for him is safe, and turns his back on an opportunity for revival.
THE PROFESSOR HAD HURRIED over the last few sentences in embar–
rassment. He already knew the text and was terrified that he would sink
into his thoughts again, as when he first read it.
"I can't get used to
life."
All too often he had whimpered such words back home as well as
here, in the New World, and in the new life which he did not feel pre–
pared for.
Preserving his identity? Out of fear? Really?
Yes, he hurried over the last sentences as if he hoped to shut out the
dilemma, the thought that had been left behind, in the words that he
had dragged after him from the other end of the world and that contin–
ued
to
crawl after him, with him, in him, endlessly.
How "European" the traditional interpretation of the play seemed all
at once!
The reader had admitted his duplicity, his postponed aspirations,
gradually perverted by the sinuous twists of prudence, but he knew how
