Wednesday 22 October 2014

...of machination

From their barely opened lips it issued... a murmur, a hardly perceptible whisper... - His chin is growing longer, yes, I'm afraid, he'll have an undershot jaw... - Ah, like Uncle Francois... and they grew silent... A look, a sign exchanged between them must have put them on their guard, incited them to be prudent... Once more they have enveloped him in silence, once more they have put on the magic cap that gives him the feeling of not being seen, as though in place of his body, of his face, there were an empty space that their glances pass through, in which nothing hinders them... nothing that comes from him reaches, or disturbs the calm, opaque surface of their eyes.

"His"... They look, they observe, situated at a good distance, a form that he can't see, in which he is imprisoned, enclosed, circumscribed, demarcated, separated, designated by that word that they apply to him: his.

["Fools Say", Sarraute, N.]

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