Avoir du caractère,
c’est accepter sa propre apparence
et s’en faire une arme.
*
[Character is accepting
and making use of who you are.]
*
Only in the going on do we see
What it is we are.
Courage, is all,
And the courage to love
What we see and don’t see,
The courage to love life
And everything.
Two quotes from Alain.
*
Nous ne pensons que nos perceptions.
[We only think our perceptions. — We only think what we perceive.]
*
J’ai souvent pensé que
la peur,
qui est la passion nue,
et la plus pénible,
n’est autre chose que
le sentiment
d’une irrésolution,
si je puis dire,
musculaire.
On se sent
sommé d’agir
et incapable.
[I’ve often thought that
fear,
which is pure passion,
and the most painful,
is nothing other than
the feeling
of irresolution,
if I can say,
in the body,
a muscular irresolution.
You feel called on to act
and incapable.]
What a time to be alive.
What choices.
*
At one point today I imagined myself
—my deepest self, my soul, as you like—
inwardly descending en enfer,
—silently, privately, invisibly—,
as around me the whole show played out as usual.
I imagined it for a moment.
‘The weather’s bad’, I said in myself some time later.
The internal weather I carry in me.
Interior climate.
The thoughts were bad,
and came and struck as they do.
Flick—flick—knock—crack.
Tempt, would have you.
At some points I thought:
you’ve got to do something.
Go and do something that scares you,
go start a conversation,
approach someone and small talk,
something.
(Once today I did.
Certain good.
But the difficulties persist—
and I as I can,
I do too.)
‘We must work and affirm,
but we have no guess
of the value
of what we say or do.’
[—Emerson, ‘Illusions’]
*
Life as it’s lived,
A dense tunnel, high wind—
A nod and a smile,
A small question
Lived.
I never know – we never know – what’s going to come and find us.
Trifles along the way. You have to joke, and fart, and trip. Forget what to say, mess up.
(And then move on, indifferent, content, if possible.)
Feeling well recently has put me on edge a little. I noticed it in the car, coming home. You start to – you catch yourself smiling, and there’s a catch, you feel: there must be a catch; impending grief.
(O poor wretch, come on.)
Anyway.
(A quote from Giorgio Gaber. — If you read French or Italian I highly recommend the bilingual book Gaber–Brel Dialogo by Micaela Bonavia. It is exceptional, and what Brel and Gaber say, and repeat, how they think and thought out their lives, how they lived and reflected on their lives: it does a lot of good to read and reflect with them, such voices are rare, because bold and honest and serious and nonconformist, recent artists whose aim was higher than conventional success, wealth and popularity, intellectual (in the good sense; the ideas lived by, applied—and refined and reapplied), artists concerned with what’s essential, what matters, not in terms of brief political and social fashions, or enthusiasms, but in terms of what lasts.)
*
E pensare
che basterebbe pochissimo.
Basterebbe spostare a stacco
la nostra angolazione visiva.
Guardare le cose
come fosse la prima volta.
Lasciare fuori campo
tutto il conformismo di cui
è permeata
la nostra esistenza.
Dubitare delle risposte
già pronte.
Dubitare dei nostri
pensieri fermi,
sicuri,
inamovibili.
Dubitare delle nostre convinzioni
presuntuose e saccenti.
Basterebbe smettere
di sentirsi sempre
delle brave persone.
Smettere di sentirsi vittime
delle madri,
dei padri,
dei figli.
Smascherare,
smascherare tutto:
smascherare l’amore,
il riso,
il pianto,
il cuore,
il cervello.
Smascherare la nostra
falsa coscienza individuale.
Subito.
Qui e ora.
*
[And to think
that it would take very little.
It would be enough
to change our point of view.
To look at things
as if it were the first time.
To leave out
all the conformism
that impregnates
our existence.
To doubt
ready responses.
To doubt
our firm,
secure,
immovable
thoughts.
To doubt
our pretentious
and pedantic
conventions.
It would be enough
to stop thinking of ourselves always
as ‘good people’.
To stop thinking of ourselves
as victims
of mothers,
fathers,
children.
To unmask,
to unmask everything:
to unmask
love,
laughter,
tears,
the heart,
the mind.
To unmask
our false individual conscience.
Soon.
Here and now.]
A perfect government
and a perfect society
assume a perfect people.
That is,
a perfect government
and a perfect society
would require
a perfect people:
a people without vices;
a people of perfect virtue;
that is, angels;
not men and women
who actually exist
(or have existed,
or will exist).
If the government was perfect,
would we be happy?
If every demand
of every activist
and concerned citizen
was granted,
fulfilled
(and perfectly so),
would we be happy?
Change the word ‘happy’
if you will:
content,
satisfied
(with ourselves,
with others,
how things are,
our life,
the world,
etc.)
I’m reminded of a quote
from Giorgo Gaber.
(I’ve reminded myself here.)
« Io mi appassiono alla realtà,
non ai rapporti di forza.
La politica è un mestiere preciso
che passa attraverso
l’illusorio uso di parole
e concetti volgarizzati
perché deve trovare
più consensi possibili.
Questo non è il mio gioco:
il mio gioco è la parola precisa,
non il concetto ambiguo. »
[I’m passionate about reality,
not about systems of force.
Politics is a particular profession
which happens through
the illusive use of words
and simplified concepts
because it has to find
the most consenus possible.
That’s not my thing;
my thing is the exact word,
not the ambiguous concept.]
I think also of a quote
from Montagine,
something I wrote down
in my journal a while back:
« Nous empêtrons
nos pensées
avec les questions générales
es les causes universelles
et les façons
dont est conduit l’univers,
qui se conduit
très bien sans nous,
et nous laissons de côté
notre cas
et Michel [ou Gray, ou toi, ou qui que ce soit]
qui nous concerne
encore de plus près
que l’homme en général. »
[We mix up
our thoughts
with general questions
and universal causes
and the ways
in which the world behaves,
which carries on
very well without us,
and we leave to the side
our case
and Michel [or Gray, or you, or whoever it is],
which concern us
still much more
than mankind in general.]
I think the problem
for most of us
(the immense majority of us)
is that we are flooded
(sure, we mostly allow it,
and we usually want it,
because desperate,
because absolutely
hooked,
addicted,
and suffering) –
is that we are flooded
with ‘mankind in general’
(or ‘culture’,
or ‘humanity’,
or ‘the world’,
as you like):
the news,
social media,
streaming shows
and movies, etc.
Give yourself long enough
to such abstract concepts
(‘mankind in general’,
‘millenials’,
‘Zoomers’,
‘Americans’,
‘white people’,
‘conservatives’,
‘liberals’,
whatever)
and you start to believe
that these ideas
exist.
You can’t touch
any of these;
they are what any individual
thinks to call them,
and that’s subject to change
according to the hour,
the mood,
etc.
We don’t think
(or know)
the same things
in the morning
and in the evening,
or have the same opinions
(not really).
We are
all of us
process
(individually,
alone).
(And because
of our choices,
every one.)
Not as ‘people’
(insert whatever
color
or race),
not as whatever
opinions
we pick up
and point at
(we’re not
what we like,
or do
or say).
The problem
is spiritual
(define ‘spritual’
as you like).
It is one of
feeling.
If when you see your father
or aunt
or brother
or grandmother
and more than the
temporary guest
of this world
(like you,
like me
fragile,
uncertain,
brief),
you see
an idea,
or an opinion
(or a set
of opinions,
vague,
unwieldy),
you’re going to
suffer
stupidly.
Because no one
(not you,
not me)
is
their
opinions
(how many times
have yours changed?
do you feel them
the same
as you did
last week?)
Anyway.
You have to resist the little things that pain you
or worry you,
that tempt, and say,
You know you want to stress about this,
that there’s fear to be played out,
imagined,
(that is, to let your fear imagine what happens,
not you).
My stomach tightens at the thought of going out tonight (or any night). Even determining the time:
do you have a time you want to go?
6, I say.
How about 5:45?
That’s good.
Leave at 5:45? D breaks in.
Uh.
And then T:
Could we do 6:15?
Easier for M.
Well,
that’s that.
Little things. Stress. Choosing to go with it,
to try to find a place in me
perfectly willing to accept what’s settled,
even to be not only fine with it,
but good with it,
(on good terms,
ready,
content).
And so on.
« Non mais
ce que vous appelez
la douceur,
qui est un mot
qui revient souvent
de mes proches
ou même des gens
qui me lisent
et parfois des journalistes
et des critiques,
c’est que
je pense que
les plus grands drames
sont dans les silences,
dans les attentes,
mais aussi
la résolution
des plus grands drames
est dans les silences
et les attentes. »
*
[No but
what you call
sweetness,
which is a word
that comes up often
with my friends and family
or even from people
who read me
and sometimes journalists
and critics,
it’s that
I think that
the greatest dramas
are in the silences,
in the waiting,
but also
the resolution
of the greatest dramas
are in the silences
and in the waiting.]
*
Voici un autre extrait de la épisode récente sur Les Lueurs avec Éric-Emmanuel Schmitt.
[Here is another extract from the recent episode on Les Lueurs with Éric-Emmanuel Schmitt.]
I had to start writing it, the first novel.
It’s strange. It isn’t what I – how to put this? – wanted, or would have wanted, or expected, but it’s started, it isn’t nothing, and that is enough now for me. I intend to finish it and publish it.
Of course (I suppose) I’ll edit it. This seems to me unimportant now.
The point is, I’m beginning my novel.
I’m thinking of something Gaber says in this book I got recently.
He says something along the lines of:
If you would know yourself, and really, write a novel, or paint a picture, create an album. Take up the work, and see it through, difficulties and all, imperfections and all. Carry it all the way to the end.
It won’t be perfect. It won’t be what you thought it would be, what you wanted or expected: it’ll be something else. But you’ll only know what it is after you’ve done it.
That’s what I mean.
*
Bisognerebbe mettersi lì
a fare qualcosa,
scrivere una canzone,
un libro,
dipingere un quadro,
e solo dopo
chiedersi:
« Come sono?»,
non prima.
Magari vien fuori
che sei fascista.
Peccato,
però almeno
lo sai.
Altrimenti
non sai in fondo
chi sei
e non ti puoi cambiare.
E poi
c’è il momento
della verifica. [Giorgo Gaber]
*
[It would be necessary to put yourself there
where you can do something,
write a song,
a book,
paint a picture,
and only after
to ask yourself:
“What am I?”,
not before.
Perhaps you find out
that you’re a fascist.
A shame,
but at least
you know.
Otherwise
you don’t know at bottom
who you are
and you can’t change.
And then
there’s the moment
that confirms.]
*
You have to make your life exciting,
even if it’s not,
especially if it’s not,
if only in yourself,
as you imagine it.
*
How succesful are you
in imagining your life,
in giving it fullness,
in feeling it full?
*
Quand on écrit
on fait ce qu’on peut,
n’est-ce pas.
On ne sait les choses
qu’après.
On ne sait tout
qu’après.
On ne sait rien
pendant.
On ne sait rien. [Brel]
*
[When you write
you do what you can,
isn’t it.
You don’t what it is
till after.
You don’t know everything
till after.
You know nothing
during.
You know nothing.]
From his journal:
Nov. 8, 1838
Let me never fall into
the vulgar mistake
of dreaming that I am persecuted
whenever I am contradicted.
[I, what do I do? I contradict everyone in my head. And then I contradict myself. ‘Existential solitude’?! Ha. I know no intellectuals (in the flesh), or, at least, no one (as far as I know) reading what I’m reading, thinking with the authors I’m thinking with. This is no excuse. But I… I trust myself very little. My thoughts are agitated, sensitive; if anything is sure, it’s a few feelings, the words for which I typically lack.]
No man, I think,
had ever a greater well being
with a less desert
than I.
[I cannot say the same. But I admire E’s confidence here.]
I can very well afford
to be accounted
bad or foolish
by a few dozen or a few hundred persons—
I who see myself greeted
by the good expectation
of so many friends
far beyond any power of thought
or communication of thought
residing in me.
[We sense, but we don’t know. We know, but we don’t know. There is a feeling, and the essential thing is how we serve it, how responsible we are to it, in our everday lives, in our smallest acts. And, importantly, how willing we are to suffer for it, — will we remain loyal when we are most tempted to renounce, on the days and in the hours when we feel its weight the most; in our darkest moments, when it costs us the most, how do we respond to it?]
Besides, I own,
I am often inclined
to take part with those
who say I am bad or foolish,
for I fear I am both.
[I’ll say in French: tout le monde l’est. Et ce qui importe, c’est de le savoir, et de faire des efforts pour ne pas l’être, ou plutôt de l’être moins, parce qu’on est humain.] [‘Everyone is. And what matters is knowing it, and to make efforts to not be, or rather to be so less, because we’re human.]
I believe and know
there must be
a perfect compensation.
[‘Nothing is got for nothing.’]
I know too well
my own dark spots.
Not having
myself attained,
not satisfied myself,
far from a holy obedience—
how can I expect to satisfy others,
to command their love?
[‘But how can he expect that others should… for who himself will take no heed at all?’]
A few sour faces,
a few biting paragraphs—
is but a cheap expiation
for all these shortcomings of mine.
[To ‘know how to estimate a sour face’, ça vaut la peine. How many I offer up every day, and there’s nothing but a stupid haste or anxiety behind – we’re not so deep (or mean) as that!
*
Nov. 9, 1838
I find no good lives.
I would live well.
I seem to be free to do so,
yet I think with very little respect
of my way of living;
it is weak,
partial,
not full
and not progressive.
But I do not see any other
that suits me better.
The scholars are shiftless
and the merchants are dull.
[As loyal as we are to our best thoughts,
the feelings that stir and move us the most,
the image of our heart,
the hints and nods of the soul,
how we treat ourselves when we’re suffering the most,
how we find our balance again,
our willingness to accept ourselves,
fumbling and grasping as we are,
awkward imperfect near-animals;
how we resist our worst thoughts,
the shallowness and evasions that come and pile on,
suffocate and overwhelm;
how we resist our inherent barbarism,
the meanness that not one of us is free from;
how we get up and go on.]
Gray Haskins 