# Une réminiscence qui se fit noire



## Randisi

Hello all,

This sentence is puzzling me. I can't even begin to interpret it adequately until I understand what 'noire' means in this context. The author is describing how we return to and become conscious of the state of our ancestral four handed primates when we climb and use our hands to move.

"Si noire se fit, en moi, cette réminiscence foudroyante que je ne redoute plus de parler de la bête: je me souviens de qui nous fûmes."

My feeble attempt: This sudden recollection has become so faded in me that I am no longer afraid to speak of the beast: I remember from whom we came.

Does a recollection fade when a memory turns 'noire' in French? But how can he remember from whom he came, when the memory has faded so much? There is surely some distinction implied here between 'se souvenir' and 'réminiscence,' but I can't begin to decipher it until I understand the 'noire.'

Thanks,
Randisi


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## Vikta

Wow, deep stuff. The *"noire"* in this context could be symbolic for many things.
Ex.: Vague, illusive, not clear, darkened as to not remember it well.

Maybe someone can add to this, but I think that's what the author means.


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## Francis Nugent Dixon

....... Brings back bad memories ?


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## Randisi

Interesting as it is, I'm not sure 'bringing back bad memories applies here. Vitka, all the possibilities you give support or are some variation on the 'faded' interpretation, so I'm going with that. Thanks

Spelunking a little deeper into the better dictionaries of the French language, I've discovered that 'réminiscence' can refer to a primal, collective memory. So this helps remove the paradox of having a faded 'réminiscence' and remembering it. 'Réminiscence' also refers to memories with a primarily affective element. So I think the sentence means that the primal and affective memory has become so faded, the issue can be now be approached without aversion (there is, I'm sure, a play on 'bête noire' in this phrase), and remembered with cool and conscious theoretical memory (se souvenir). There is probably some Bergson, Plato, and maybe even Proust rumbling around in the background…


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## edwingill

It made me very gloomy


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## Randisi

Is 'it made me gloomy' really an idiomatic sense for 'se faire noir'? It won't work as the primary translation though, since how would 'being made gloomy' remove the fear of 'speaking of the beast'? Even so, it is interesting as overtone for the passage. Thanks.


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## pieanne

Randisi said:
			
		

> Hello all,
> 
> This sentence is puzzling me. I can't even begin to interpret it adequately until I understand what 'noire' means in this context. The author is describing how we return to and become conscious of the state of our ancestral four handed primates when we climb and use our hands to move.
> 
> "Si noire se fit, en moi, cette réminiscence foudroyante que je ne redoute plus de parler de la bête: je me souviens de qui nous fûmes."
> 
> My feeble attempt: This sudden recollection has become so faded in me that I am no longer afraid to speak of the beast: I remember from whom we came.
> 
> Does a recollection fade when a memory turns 'noire' in French? But how can he remember from whom he came, when the memory has faded so much? There is surely some distinction implied here between 'se souvenir' and 'réminiscence,' but I can't begin to decipher it until I understand the 'noire.'
> 
> Thanks,
> Randisi


 
A mere attempt...

This blazing recollection turned to such a darkness inside of me that I no longer fear talking about the beast. I remember from whom we came."

I don't think "noire" is "faded"...


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## Randisi

Thanks pieanne. I am not all that satisfied myself with my interpretation. Even though the passage is written by a philosopher who loves word play and giving meanings at several different levels at once, this seems far too complex for what is the sixth sentence in the book. It would greatly simplify things, if we could give 'se fit noire' a POSITIVE meaning, one that would explain why the author can now speak of the beast without fear. Your translation seems to move in that direction. But we still have the paradox: how do you remember a something 'turned black'? 

Unless…

Are you suggesting that the blazing bright nature of the recollection has faded, so that the author can now look at it without fear and hence, examine and remember it?

If so, you are a genius.

Thanks so very much.


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## pieanne

What is that "sudden recollection"? What does it refer to?
Could you tell me? It might help understand the "dark"...


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## Randisi

Still, upon further reflection, the author began the passage in the present tense, describing how he is now putting his hands to the rock and beginning to climb the steepening terrain. Then he writes:

'Homo erectus, l'homme debout, récent, retourne à celui dont il descend, l'archaïque quadrumane. Si noire se fit, en moi…'

Again, the 'quadrumane' here is our 'four-handed' pre-hominid ancestor.

Would the use of the passé simple be appropriate here? I may very well be. What do you think?


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## pieanne

Is he referring to the Sysyphus myth? (The steepening terrain & the rock)?


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## Randisi

He is described how when we start using our hands for locomotion as we do when rock-climbing, we revert in some way to our ancestral primordial quadrumane state. This is the sudden or perhaps blazing recollection. A kind of body or species memory, I presume. This is why I believe 'réminiscence' here is being used as primal memory.

So on our current interpretation, the lightning flash of this primal memory has faded, so he can see it. But if we interpret it this way, is the use of the passé simple appropriate? Especially as 'foudroyant' is not a constant light.


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## pieanne

Funny you used the word "flash" when I was just thinking it!

And who/what is "the beast"?

(I'll give you my opinion when you've answered this one)


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## Randisi

I presume the beast [bête] is the pre-hominid human ancestor. So the primal recollection is of this very animal. 

I also believe some word play on 'bête noire' is in play here: no longer fear/no longer have an aversion (to the recognition of our lowly origins in the quadrumane, perhaps?)


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## pieanne

I'll tell you what I think, but these are no words from the Gospels...

At some moment he had a flash, a recollection of that pre-hominid state. That recollection was so intense - he describes it as "noire", so maybe horrible (negative sense), or so pervading, all-encompassing (like those calamars that send ink shrouds towards their ennemies - that now, having gone through that experience, he no longer fears to talk about the beast.
What he's been through is "worse"/"stronger" than talking about it.

I'm not sure I'm very clear... And I must have made spelling mistakes too... I don't use "calamar" every day.
Sorry!


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## polaire

A sudden recollection that _plunged me into the black/dark_ . . .?

Your discussion makes this primal memory sound almost like "a recovered memory."


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## Randisi

An interesting interpretation, pieanne. I'll have to mull it over some more. I may have to email the author about this.

I've never used the word 'calamar' either. It's not in my dictionary. Calamary is, but these are small squid. A cuttlefish is a well-known squid-like creature that squirts ink to flee predators.

Again thanks for all the input.

Polaire, one of the problems here is: how can the recollection of something be plunged in the dark and still remembered?
I suspect the author is playing off the multiple meanings of 'réminiscence:' a primal memory, a primarily affective memory, and a vague memory, one difficult in fact to recover, opposing these three meanings to the more conscious cold memory of 'se souvenir.' The primal memory, since it only arises when the body is physically active, would not be clearly accessible to consciousness, strictly understood as the seat of theoretic knowledge. Though it would not be totally unaware of it. But this is an awful lot to chew on for the sixth sentence of the book.

This may be a case for just giving the most plausible translation and juxtaposing in brackets the original for all to see.

Again, thanks for the input.


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## pieanne

how can the recollection of something be plunged in the dark and still remembered

Hey, I don't understand it like you! The recollection is not *plunged* in the dark! it *brings* dark or *is* dark.
To be plunged in the dark, you need a third party. I don't think there's more than you/him & the recollection?


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## Randisi

Let's cite the entire passage, the opening of the book:

'Je marche sur un sol dont la pente se relève doucement. À un moment, je m'arrête et <<mets les mains>>; la vraie montagne commence, j'escalade. Dès lor que mon dos s'incline, reviens-je à l'état de quadrupède? Presque: mon corps se transforme, les pieds deviennent des mains et les deux prises manuelles des assurances d'équilibre. Homo erectus, récent, retourne à celui dont il descend, l'archaïque quadrumane. Si noire se fit, en moi, cette réminiscence foudroyante que je ne redoute plus de parler de la bête: je me souviens de qui nous fûmes.'

So you think the recollection brings darkness or is dark? I'm not sure what you mean? How does this result in the reduction of fear? Are we going back to the idea that the memory flashed in the historical past but is now dark enough to speak of and remember? The only problem we had with that was explaining the use of the passé simple:

I'm wondering right now, whether 'réminiscence' doesn't refer to the story told in the first sentences? So that the sudden flash of primal recollection that occurred, then, has since gone dark (but in the historic past), so that the author in the present, no longer fears it and remembers it.

What do you think?


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## polaire

Randisi said:
			
		

> An interesting interpretation, pieanne. I'll have to mull it over some more. I may have to email the author about this.
> 
> I've never used the word 'calamar' either. It's not in my dictionary. Calamary is, but these are small squid. A cuttlefish is a well-known squid-like creature that squirts ink to flee predators.
> 
> Again thanks for all the input.
> 
> Polaire, one of the problems here is: how can the recollection of something be plunged in the dark and still remembered?
> *
> It was just a throwaway suggestion, but imagine a terrifying experience that is suddenly recollected; one can imagine recalling it and at the same time feeling so disturbed by it that one feels plunged into terrible emotional darkness.  I'm just talking here . . . .
> 
> Assuming that people actually have recovered memories, maybe that's what it would be like.
> *
> 
> 
> I suspect the author is playing off the multiple meanings of 'réminiscence:' a primal memory, a primarily affective memory, and a vague memory, one difficult in fact to recover, opposing these three meanings to the more conscious cold memory of 'se souvenir.' The primal memory, since it only arises when the body is physically active, would not be clearly accessible to consciousness, strictly understood as the seat of theoretic knowledge. Though it would not be totally unaware of it. But this is an awful lot to chew on for the sixth sentence of the book.
> 
> This may be a case for just giving the most plausible translation and juxtaposing in brackets the original for all to see.
> 
> Again, thanks for the input.


You're welcome.  It was just a stab in the dark, so to speak.


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## Randisi

Pieanne, I think what you've been trying to say has just penetrated my thick skull. 'Se fit noire' here means something like 'wrecking havoc.' I wasn't able come up with a good idiom that incorporates 'blackness.' Perhaps 'caused so much darkness,' but that's a little weak.

'That sudden and intense recollection wrecked so much havoc within me, back then, that I am now no longer afraid to speak about the beast: I remember from whom we came.'

In order to express the passé simple, I've had to resort to adding 'back then' and a 'now.'

What do you think?


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## polaire

Randisi said:
			
		

> Let's cite the entire passage, the opening of the book:
> 
> 'Je marche sur un sol dont la pente se relève doucement. À un moment, je m'arrête et <<mets les mains>>; la vraie montagne commence, j'escalade. Dès lor que mon dos s'incline, reviens-je à l'état de quadrupède? Presque: mon corps se transforme, les pieds deviennent des mains et les deux prises manuelles des assurances d'équilibre. Homo erectus, récent, retourne à celui dont il descend, l'archaïque quadrumane. Si noire se fit, en moi, cette réminiscence foudroyante que je ne redoute plus de parler de la bête: je me souviens de qui nous fûmes.'
> *
> Again, and I'm just talking off the top of my head, but if one suddenly started regressing it might feel like a dark experience, and it strikes me that the writer is breaking from the linear description of ascending the slope and plunging directly into the experience.  He's so struck by this memory/revelation that he can no longer distance himself; he can't speak of the animal in a distanced, objective way because he recalls now, and realizes he is the animal.  He remembers whence we came.
> 
> Of course, I could be completely full of s____.  Just trying something out. *
> 
> So you think the recollection brings darkness or is dark? I'm not sure what you mean? How does this result in the reduction of fear? Are we going back to the idea that the memory flashed in the historical past but is now dark enough to speak of and remember? The only problem we had with that was explaining the use of the passé simple:
> 
> I'm wondering right now, whether 'réminiscence' doesn't refer to the story told in the first sentences? So that the sudden flash of primal recollection that occurred, then, has since gone dark (but in the historic past), so that the author in the present, no longer fears it and remembers it.
> 
> What do you think?


 
*Unfortunately, I have to sign off soon and get some work done.  Bonne chance! *


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## Randisi

Interesting Polaire, so you're saying the 'se fit noire'…  Scratch that.

Eureka! Just now, while looking over your response, thinking about what to say - I appreciate your input by the way and wouldn't have had this thought, if it weren't for what you and pieanne wrote, which I thought about for quite a while - I think I figured it out. Lightning!

"So black did this thundering recollection scorch me inside, that I no longer fear to speak of the beast: I remember whence we came."

Does this work? Can 'se fit si noire' legitimately be translated with way?


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## viera

Randisi:
Just a little correction:  the expression is "wreak havoc".


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## polaire

viera said:
			
		

> Randisi:
> Just a little correction:  the expression is "wreak havoc".



Just so you know, you can also "play" or "create" havoc.  "Wreak" would be my first choice, however.


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## pieanne

Sounds OK to me, Viera, though "noire" doesn't evoke "scorching" to me...


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## Randisi

'Wreak havoc,' quite right.

Pieanne, the image that struck me (sorry, couldn't help the pun) was of the black scorch mark left by a lightning strike. 'Foudroyante:' the recollection struck like lightning and left such a black scorch there, the author is still aware of it, gotten quite used to it, so it's ability to frighten has abated.

When this idea came to me, it was like finding the jigsaw piece that finally fits. The author often makes use of the literal meanings of figurative terms.
But if this stretches the French terms beyond their ability to convey meaning, please let me know. If so, it can't be right.


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## pieanne

No, no, it's quite all right... I understand what you mean, don't change a thing!

Cheers,
P.


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## Randisi

Excellent!
Man, that was a lot of work for a single sentence. I couldn't have done it without you. Especially your insistence that the recollection was black or somehow blackened the consciousness of the author.

Merci beaucoup!


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## pieanne

Philosophers' single sentences might each fill a book...
I'm glad I could be of some help!


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## Randisi

Does some version of 'lightning never strikes the same place twice' exist in French?

If so, besides the aptness of the lightning metaphor for an alpinist/philosopher on a mountain, this old saw may partly explain the resulting lack of fear. He has already been struck once. (Though any good alpinist - and surely Serres does too - knows that lightning mostly strikes in the same places!)


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