303. THE BONFIRE OF
THE PROFANITIES
(inauguration day connections)
I love watching
people leave, on
their way out.
It's a great thing
to see. As if, in
summation, all of
a sudden, everything
can be made to make
sense, and to have
been done with
purpose and
meaningfulness.
people leave, on
their way out.
It's a great thing
to see. As if, in
summation, all of
a sudden, everything
can be made to make
sense, and to have
been done with
purpose and
meaningfulness.
There's a term, in
writing, for this
'narrative technique
of jumping forward
in time,' and I guess
I've just done it. It's
called 'prolepsis' -
it sounds more to
me like one of
the peculiar and
annoying new
'syndromes' or
something, a
medical farce
by which they
try to drag you
in, and then give
you a medication
for it - dependence
of course - which
they, then again,
cover for risk by
saying 'if you suffer
from prolepsis, be
aware that taking
Gubertol may cause
vomiting, sweat,
chills, dizziness,
unease, diarrhea,
loss of appetite,
diminishment of
sexual urges,
lack of attention,
suicidal urges,
unexplainable
nightmares,
ache, ague, and
hallucinations
aligned with
moodiness
and tremors.'
Oh, really? That's
OK, I'll just keep
the prolepsis.
Jumping ahead
in time, narrative-wise,
is one thing, but
doing it bodily, and
in front of others in,
say, a supermarket
check-out line...I
don't think so.
There's also
another item they
continually bring
up in writing seminars
and all that - don't
use current names
and/or personalities
who will turn stale
as a reference in
a few years and by
which reference, in
the future, your
writing may
seem dated, trite,
or without merit.
Oh, OK again.
(Talk about being
prideful. Like
anyone's going
to be reading this
or anything in fifty
years). There's a
certain sort of
self-identified ego
and pride involved
in any of this, or
why write, I suppose;
so I can understand
their point, but I
don't necessarily
accept it. Admittedly,
to read John Updike
today, or even Saul
Bellow does sometimes
seem to be a
time-machine
backwards, with
the names and all.
Not much different
than using outdated
character names :
'Caleb turned to
Annhilda and
said, 'forsooth,
milady, you are
driving this GTO
much too swiftly,
as Orion nodded
his agreement
from the rear
passenger seat.'
-
I was lost in
the present,
which was the
past, and I had
no future. Anyhow,
that's how it always
looked to me.
There's a book
called 'Zama', by
Antonio DiBenedetto;
it's an older work
now, from like 1956
or something.
Argentinian, both
this writer and the
book - but an
Argentinian fiction
or writing that can,
as well, cover all
the Americas and
certainly encompass
the USA almost as
if it had been written
today, instead of
just now being
rightfully translated,
in an easy, colloquial
tongue for the
present-day reader.
There are a lot of
things in it that
catch, that are
quite absorbable
and bring the reader
well into a current vibe.
Today's thought.
American or not.
'Ready to go and
not going...' In
the book this fellow
is engrossed in
bouts of obsession,
delusion, and wild
aggression, but
the writing remains
clear-headed and
not overwrought.
Strangely lethal.
The character, Don
Diego de Zama, is
a 'pacifier of Indians',
an administrator of
the Spanish crown
posted in some
far-off (for Argentina,
where most thing
only happen in
Buenos Aires - or
as he, for some
reason, calls it
'Buenos Ayres'),
which he's posted
to in some faraway,
almost horrendously
boring, outpost called
the 'Vice-royalty of
the Rio de la Plata',
among the locals,
in a vast area of
what now
encompasses
Argentina, Bolivia,
Paraguay and
Uruguay. Americans,
certainly in 1956,
had no clue on the
what or where of any
of these places : long,
strange, and exotic,
as they were, and
only when 'conquered'
by gringos at the end
end of a gun did any of
these places ring true.
I remember Kennedy,
and his inaugural, with
all that 'bear any burden,
pay any price, maim
and kill any people
and destroy any
land and village,
in the name of
Freedom and
Liberty.' But,
whatever. I
understood.
"It was early. I
had little to do."
His job there mostly
entails receiving
occasional visitors,
distinguished or
not, overseeing
prisoner transfers,
contemplating petitions
for requisitioning
work-gangs of
enslaved Indians
for one or another
requested task.
Finding ways NOT
to prosecute local
murderers who
are well-connected,
and other such
morally-dubious
administrative tasks.
Boredom, I suppose,
is always the essential
figleaf beneath even
the most expensive
of clothing. He
seems to have
an 'impassioned
disposition' and a
perfectly fine aloofness
from others as he
goes about these
tasks anyway,
and I love the
way this is put,
all this doing of
rote tasks, as he
warns, or tells,
himself that he
need only: 'keep
diligently in my
mind my stability,
my post, and
the duties attendant
upon it, to succeed
in disencumbering
myself of it - of
the post, that is.'
Existentialist fiction,
the havoc within
being kept
concealed while
the pace and
the action of
a life are
determined,
each by a choice
and a step along
the way. It all - I
have to be honest
hear - sounds
just like NOW (yes,
oh ye of the long
future, I mean
NOW), with one
President leaving
out the side door
making sure his
behind is clean,
and another rousting
in through the front
door, salivating at
the mess-to-be,
and forget the ass-end;
well, for now). OK,
so, I suffer from
prolepsis; yet I'm
not shaking, nor
puking. And I
retain a sexual
peak!
-
I always wondered
if there was a
drug that would
make one curse,
blurt things out,
swear and profane
every fucking thing
one saw. There
probably is. They
really ought to
use it. 'My fellow
Americans...you
freaking lousy
asshole robots,
this is the shits -
greatest place to
be, for me Hell,
yeah. Anywhere.
Very best. Podium,
all you faces. Fucking
great. Huge.' Man,
that was a great -
and short - inaugural
speech. Forget about
the other guy's exit
speech; who cares.
-
Here's Don Diego
(this is great stuff,
wish I'd written it),
contemplating a
'wrtihing patch of
water' : "A dead
monkey, still whole,
still undecomposed,
drifted back and
forth with a certain
precision upon
those ripples and
eddies without exit.
All his life the water
at the forest's edge
had beckoned him
to a journey, a
journey he did
not take until he
was no longer a
monkey but only
a monkey's corpse.
The water that bore
him up tried to bear
him away, but he
was caught among
the posts of the
decrepit wharf
and there he was,
ready to go and
not going. And
there we were.
There we were:
Ready to go
and not going."
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