Friday 31 July 2015

...of an idyll

"Don't ask for my opinion on this subject. I'm an overseer. I don't know anything except what I see."
"Precisely. Tell me what you've seen." Silence from the guard. "Well," said Akim, "you're afraid to talk. I'll find out everything myself."
"No, Alexander Akim, don't try to find out: what good will it do? I'm going to speak to you with an open heart. I would tell this to anyone. When they were married, I already had my job at the Home. I had a wife, too. For the first few days, they didn't leave their room. There was a strange silence in the house, a feeling of idleness. In spite of all the work, you didn't know what to do with yourself. After a week, some strangers came, and I had to go tell them. In the first room, I didn't find anyone. There was dust on the furniture, as if no one had lived there for several years. I was afraid, I called out. Then I went into the little office. But no one was there either. Everything was in order, and yet I already knew that something dreadful had happened. I stood there for several moments waiting. I wanted to run away. I thought they were both dead. But finally I opened a door a crack and lifted the curtain. They were sitting apart, not looking at each other, not looking at anything at all. I couldn't read anything in their faces. The only thing was that air of emptiness, and it made me turn away. Yes, an air that explained this bleak, heavy silence that was indifferent to misery, without bitterness towards anyone. I felt that I couldn't stay there. I moved, and he looked at me and said: "Yes, yes, I'm coming."
"Is that all?" asked Akim. "But what you're describing is tranquil happiness, something extraordinary - the feeling that's at the heart of every idyll, a true happiness without words.
"Really?" said the overseer. "Really? Is that what you would call it?"

[Vicious Circles: The Idyll, Blanchot, M.]

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