DJ’s Post on H.D.

I think HERmione was an interesting but challenging book to read and discuss, and for the most part, the content and the style of writing made it more unique. I may be wrong in my analysis of H.D.’s book, but the book’s contents gave me a particular impression as I read it. Seeing how it was written and how the story progressed through Hermione Gart’s perspective made me view the book as a journal or diary that gave an inside look at H.D.’s life and how she saw situations throughout it. The writing style also gave the idea that it was done with the intention of making it sound mildly poetic. I believe that the entire book is a poetic journal written by H.D. and transformed into a story of her search for self-identification and acceptance.

I call it a journal because it really focused on several situations in which H.D., while being portrayed by Hermione, found herself. The style in which the book is written somewhat gives the idea that the character was the one telling the story instead of H.D. herself when, in reality, the two women were the same being. This book is indeed an autobiography, but the people who actually took part in the events that unfolded had their names changed. Readers can gather the idea that HERmione is autobiographical by noticing times when the writing shifts from first-person to third-person. As a class, we have already established the characters George Lowndes and Fayne Rabb as Ezra Pound and Frances Josepha Gregg, respectively. Still, given how those characters they’re portrayed when interacting with Hermione in the book, we can also see how the real counterparts behaved in the eyes of H.D.

Another sign of the book’s nature as a journal is the personalized style of writing. Right at the beginning, we are met with Hermione repeating, “I am Her, Her, Her” (H.D. 3). It is a concept that continuously comes back that reestablishes how she feels about herself. If this were written by hand, I think it would be easy to understand that she might have written it in haste or rather messily since she may have been distraught at the time. This repetition might have been her way of consoling herself when she starts having troublesome thoughts and worries about herself and her self-worth and identity. This idea is further supported by the fact that the book describes her own opinion of herself. “She only felt that she was a disappointment to her father, an odd duckling to her mother, an importunate overgrown, unincarnated entity that had no place here” (H.D. 10). As I said before, although this is mainly speaking about Hermione, H.D. most likely had the same thoughts in her mind about herself as she wrote this and gave the most fitting description she could give to demonstrate how people including her own family viewed her. It fits the idea of it being a personal journal entry because it is likely that it is the most unfiltered area for anyone to write their thoughts.

The seemingly inconsistent pattern of writing could also add to the idea that H.D. did these retellings in several bursts of writing. It may explain why chapters are split up into smaller sections as well. Those smaller sections could be seen as entries for particular days and or moments throughout a single day that Hermione or H.D. wrote about at some point. How much time she has when she writes it and how much she wants to include in the entry might also justify the reasons behind why some of the sections are barely a page in length. Her emotional state may also factor into this idea. She potentially stops at a few points to end a specific scene at a particularly drastic point that leaves her wanting to search for more answers or ruminate on what took place and attempt to make sense of all that she just went through. In some instances throughout the book, the scene abruptly ends and continues with Hermione’s thoughts on the matter rather than continue with the full event and see her true thoughts after the moment passed.
H.D. and Hermione’s mental state comes into focus again later in the book when Hermione appears to suffer a mental breakdown. As discussed in class, there are ample amounts of verbal spouting from H.D. through Hermione for a few pages that almost make it seem like she’s just continuing to talk about basically nothing. It appears to be very prevalent in pages 209-211 when the nurse who was treating her attempted to give Hermione some medication to calm her mind down and make her relax. Every time the nurse tries, Hermione begins going on a monologue with some mentioning of Fayne and George. It could be seen as a way of processing the influence they both had on her mind, which is why throughout all of the supposedly mad rants, their names kept coming up. H.D. could be venting her thoughts through this kind of writing, similar to how someone vents their frustrations about something that devastates them emotionally.

Since there are several moments where the writing style of H.D. and the emotions that Hermione demonstrates appear to coincide for a more significant impact, the idea that this book could be seen as a journal seems all the more plausible. HERmione may have been a book that H.D. very much wanted to be as personal as possible.