Participation aux activités de recherche

MAHELELAINE ANIS
LLCER ANGLAIS

I have always been fond of the writings of the American realist novelists in the second
half of the 20th century and that is why I have chosen conferences linked to one of my
favorite writers Saul Bellow and his famous novel “Seize the Day”. Saul Bellow was a
Canadian-American writer, playwright and a Novelist from Jewish origins. His writings in
literature were appreciated through novels that investigate isolation, spiritual dissociation and
the possibilities of human awakening. Usually, Bellow’s protagonists are men of feelings,
burdened with mind and often at a point of deep crisis in their lives. “Seize the day” is a
Novel that tells the story of Tommy Wilhelm, the “failed” son of a successful father, who is
suffering from the loss of his job, separation of his wife and the relationship with his father.
Dr.Tamkin is a “psychologist” who successfully persuades Wilhelm to partner with him in a
large investment. A character that will play an important role in Tommy’s “Reckoning day”
and leads him to an understanding of his true self.
So what is the meaning behind “seize the day” in this Novel, and how can we interpret that it
was an advice given to the protagonist by Tamkin putting into consideration that he was a
crook?
To do so we have to analyze Tommy’s character, his internal thoughts and state, his
relationship with his father and most importantly with Tamkin leading to the final event in the
novel.

Tommy was associated with the water symbolism throughout the entire Novel from the
first scene when the elevator was descending, this water imagery points to the fact that
Tommy is a drowning man, burdened with stress and duress. His father always believed in
materialism and that people are power driven “Adlerism’, he and Tommy could not
understand each other as they were raised in a different world with different way of
communicating. Furthermore, Bellow masters the juxtaposition, which is the appropriate term
to portray Tamkin’s behaviour; he is definitely a crook although his story may be ambiguous.
He is a dreamer, shares the same language as Tommy and aware of Tommy’s feelings which
made him different from the other characters. Tamkin can be seen as a paradoxical character;
he provides Tommy with both truths and lies, which somehow will eventually help him break
free from his drowning state. Tommy is both attracted and repelled by Tamkin, he trusts and
doubts him at the same time.

“Seize the day” means “snatch the day” and enjoy yourself while you can; it comes from
the shortness of life and the inevitability of death. It also might be assessed as the motto of
Epicureanism. That’s why Tamkin’s is preaching a “here and now” philosophy to Tommy
while reading to him his poem “The past is no good to us. The future is full of anxiety. Only
the present is real-the here-and-now...” Yet, it seems that Tommy’s healing is coming from
his past and memory and ironically he recalls with nostalgia a moment of illness with a wife
who did not feel like reading to him poetry and stories, as a struggle of “Mechanism vs.
Functionalism.” Tommy thinks to himself he was wrong to gamble with Tamkin and that he
should have listened to his father. This can mean that either Tommy eventually needs to break
away from Tamkin to reach a kind of rebirth or he has to come in terms with his past and take
responsibility of his mistakes to do so. Figuratively speaking he needs to learn how to swim
as the water fluctuates he needs to embrace it in order to succeed "You can't march in a
straight line to the victory…You fluctuate toward it... The modern age analyzes the wavers."

Tamkin has become Tommy’s guide, whether corrupt, fraudulent or not, he helps him to
be more connected to the external world that he has been isolated within, as his soul begins to
unite and emerge (internal/external; real/pretender; natural/material) he was first reaching
some kind of redemption which was shown and interpreted in memory of the way he felt in
Times Square and also how Margaret was nursing him while reading to him “unintentionally”
love poems. Tommy lost all his money to Tamkin along with his trust, however, this
backward movement can be a positive one because now he needs to get on without Tamkin,
free in a sense. Tommy can be compared to Mr.Rappaport; he was “blind” and couldn’t
appreciate the important things in life and live the moment in a material driven society. In the
end of the novel, through the language we understand that Tommy is stuck in an ocean of
problems, again a water metaphor. Calls himself a “Hippopotamus” although heavy but it is
made to live in water, to dive and reappear without danger of sinking which indicates an
optimistic ending. Tamkin have to abandon him and his father needs to refuse if he’s going to
reach any kind of understanding. Finally, it seems to me that the final scene of the novel,
where Tommy Wilhelm, begins to cry at the funeral of an unknown man catches much of
what has been transpiring within the main character. His crying is the penultimate realizations
of the title “seize the day”, it took a death of a stranger for Tommy to come to a complete
rebirth and awakening and this understanding came in the form of tears “water”. It is the first
time in the novel where Tommy simply drops his rationalizations, calculations, and
deductions and simply surrenders in to the moment and his emotions. He stopped using his
father’s language and ended up with the discovery of his own: feelings, tears and love. He
understood that simply one needs to make the most of the present rather than dwelling on the
future or the past “Carpe diem”.

To conclude, the title “seize the day” is an American concept referring to the American
Dream where one needs to take every opportunity and live the moment to the fullest. Tommy
has been like a drowning man throughout the novel, and whether Tamkin was a fraud or not,
we cannot know for sure. Yet, he surely played an important role in Tommy’s “Day of
reckoning” where he understood that it is not about money, appearance or success but about
seizing the day and to make the best out of it while you’re still alive.