After completing our reading of the memoir Girl, Interrupted, Mr. Lewenstein asked us in groups to contribute a song to a class soundtrack. Our goal was to find a song or an artist that best represented the pain and suffering we just read about.
The
original version of the the song “Hurt” was written by Trent Reznor of The
Nine-Inch Nails. At the time he wrote
the song, Trent was messed up from top to bottom. Most of his fans must have already known he
was a heroin addict, but in the dark lyrics of this song they learn of his
issues with self-harm: “I hurt myself
today /To see
if I still feel /I focus on the
pain
/The only thing that's real..”
/The only thing that's real..”
In 2002 Johnny Cash covered this song
shortly before he died. Like
Trent Reznor, Johnny knew something about depression. He was life-long drug addict. To keep up with the rigors of his profession,
he mixed amphetamine pills and alcohol.
He needed the speed to keep it going on the road. He needed the booze to sleep. At a certain point, the drugs were killing
him. He couldn’t even sing anymore. What could be more depressing for a man like
Cash?
Country
singer Kris Kristofferson once wrote a song about Cash with these lyrics: "He's
a walking contradiction, partly truth and partly fiction." The song tries to explain how someone with so
much going for him could throw it all away.
Kristofferson could have easily been writing about Susanna Kaysen in Girl, Interrupted. From her writing, Susanna seems very aware of
who she is, but whether she is telling the truth is anyone’s guess. Throughout the memoir, she seems to unravel.
She becomes more frightened and confused of her condition. In the chapter “Bare
Bones,” she bangs her wrists and bites her hands. She believes she’s lost her bones. She tells everyone she has no problem, but
that’s before we learn she washed down a bottle of aspirin with vodka in an
effort to kill herself.
The song“Hurt” matches up well to Girl, Interrupted. Both works
speak to fear, abandonment, and self-damaging impulses.
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“Hurt” by Johnny Cash
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Girl, Interrupted by Susanna Kaysen
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I hurt myself today
To see if I still feel I focus on the pain The only thing that's real The needle tears a hole The old familiar sting Try to kill it all away But I remember everything |
I began scratching at the back of my hand.
My plan was to get hold of a flap of skin
and peel it away, just to have a look.
I wanted to
see that my hand was a normal human hand with bones….
…I put my hand in my mouth and chomped. Success! A
bubble of blood came out near my last knuckle, where my incisor had pierced
the skin.
( Susanna, 102)
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What have I become
My sweetest friend Everyone I know goes away In the end And you could have it all My empire of dirt I will let you down I will make you hurt |
Lisa always knew what she needed.
She’d say, “I need a vacation from this place,” and
then she’s run away. When she got
back, we’d ask her how it was out there.
“It’s a mean world,” she’d say. She was usually glad enough to be
back. “There’s nobody to take care of
you out there.”
( Lisa, 22)
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Beneath the stains of time
The feelings disappear You are someone else I am still right here |
Now I would I say to myself, you are feeling
alienated from people and unlike other people….
…When you look at a face, you see a blob of rubber
because you are worried that your face is a blob of rubber.
( Susanna, 41)
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