Letter to the Editor: Part of the solution

To the Editor,

Many-a-time I have been accused of performative reading. Occasionally, I carry a novel in my back pocket. This seems to provoke particularly vehement allegations of performativity…but isn’t that the point of a paperback? One day stands out in particular— the day I had Jane Austen’s Emma nestled beside my bottom.

Yes. I read feminist literature. Lots of it.

At this point, I ought to mention that I study English. Emma, along with Austen’s Persuasion and Northanger Abbey were on my reading list. As I sallied on a summer day towards a group of friends sat on the lawn, I was fraught with anxieties. My hearing with the tribune I knew would not be favourable; I would be a Mersault in court, Frankenstein’s creature entering the village.

Verbal batteries assailed me every which way: sardonic remarks denigrating my engagement with women’s writing. How did I escape? Feigning outrage at the conduct of my fellow men in the group, I cried: ‘at least I’m part of the solution!’

This was all hilarious of course.

It’s incredibly odd too, however. My friends and I engaged in an ironic dance, arbitrarily claiming aesthetic and political positions to reconcile my carrying a copy of Emma for my degree.

The other side to the coin is that it’s just a laugh, they’re taking the mick. But why? The whole gag only works because it references this internet phenomenon of performative reading. Another time I sparked incredulity by sending my friend a picture of a beer I was drinking and book I was reading while waiting for her at the pub. She responded: ‘if I didn’t know you…’ The thing is, she does know me, all of my friends do, yet performativity hangs about like the elephant in the room that must be acknowledged before we can move on. It’s an absurdly self-referential joke that is sustained by its contrived presence in social media discourse.

The paradox peaked at San Francisco’s ‘performative male contest.’ Gladiators dressed in knit jumpers and baggy jeans, armed with tote bags and Labubus, competed to be crowned the Ultimate Performative Male. No actually performative men attended; the chimera remains. Instead, a profoundly odd group of people apportioned clout to people who best performed the elusive ‘performative male.’ Evidently this is an inane and hypocritical exercise, yet it speaks to our strange relationship today with performance and authenticity. It’s hard not to suspect this is the expression of a crisis of authenticity.

Today, the paparazzi are ubiquitous. We see the smallest, most authentic parts of our life reflected in the black mirror. At all times. we are actors, whether we’ve asked for the stage or not. And all the time we are watching performances of real life. In these conditions the very notions of authenticity and performance are redundant. I think we all know it.

Yet here we are, trying to assert the relevance of these ideas. It’s strange that reading (particularly men reading) has been chosen as the premier site for this. ‘Performative’ appears to have become a substitute for a type of nonconformity; few people today read in public, especially actual, physical books. Allegations of performativity are also far more probable when someone is reading an entry-level or popular book: an Austen, a bell hooks, The Communist Manifesto. More niche books are safe; someone reading Fanny Burney or Frederic Jameson might actually be more knowledgeable than you.

Calling something ‘performative’ has thereby become an effective method of gatekeeping. It comes from the belief that people should already have a certain bank of cultural capital. Anyone reading this stuff in public is showing off what is ‘commonplace.’ In this way it is an impressively elitist construction that creates a hostile atmosphere to those who dare to introduce themselves to new ideas.

 

When ‘identifying’ a performative reader, you are performing your authenticity whilst fostering an anti-intellectual culture. It was probably funny though. You’ve been a great audience.

 

Sincerely,

 

Niccolo Albarosa

 

Read Kalina Hagen’s original piece, ‘Fellas, is it gay to read?’ here.

 

Words by Niccolo Albarosa. Image via Niccolo Albarosa.