“The Readers,” by Ben Lerner

Illustration by Jack Smyth Save this story Save this story Save this story Save this story Early in my treatment, we decided that you wouldn’t read my work. If you had an intense reaction to my writing of whatever sort, I’d worry it might influence how you related to me, but if you were more or less indifferent to it, I would feel devalued, misunderstood, rejected. Your response, from my perspective, could only be too much or too little, and I’d always suspect your feelings about my writing, no matter how effectively you concealed them, had bled into your questions, your silences, your advice. And all these problems are heightened by the fact that my books involve biographical material, altered versions of my formative experiences, traumas, fears, contradictory desires (I always want too much and too little). It would be one thing if I wrote fiction about Cromwell or aliens, but, given that my protagonists resemble me, how could I know you weren’t mixing us up?

You’ve always maintained that you don’t believe that reading my work would actually influence how you relate to me, but that I’d always wonder if it did, which would have its own effects. And besides, you’ve said more than once, what’s important is that I bring the “raw material,” the complex of emotions and desires and inhibitions behind my writing, into our sessions; that’s better than your reading my edited attempts at mastery. (Is that what this is?)

It didn’t take long for us to agree that this structure of feeling—the sense that everything is too much or too little, that the only options are overwhelming intimacy or abandonment, that you can only merge with a person or be rejected by them—characterized many of my relationships, especially with women. We’ve traced this to childhood experiences, particularly, of course, with my mother. “Have you read my mother?” I remember blurting out, as I scanned your shelves, during our initial consultation, one of three we’d scheduled to determine if we were a “good fit.” (Hearing myself ask this question, I thought of that classic children’s book my kids loved where the baby bird goes around asking other animals—and various inanimate objects—“Are you my mother?” I hate that book.) What would it mean for you, you responded, if I have or haven’t read her work?