To Lola it was still an adventure, coming to see me in that prison, as you might have called it. We two didn't cry. Where would we get our tears from?
"Is is true that you've gone mad, Ferdinand?" she asked me one Thursay.
"It's true," I admittted.
"But they'll treat you here?"
"There is no treatment for fear, Lola."
"Is it as bad as all that?"
"It's worse Lola. My fear is so bad that if I die a natural death later on, I especialy don't want to be cremated. I want them to leave me in the ground, quietly rotting in the graeyard ready to come back to life... Maybe...how do we know? But if they burned me to ashes, Lola, don't you see, it would be over, really over... A skeleton, afer all, is still something like a man...It's more likely to come backto life than ashes....Reduced to ashes, you're finished!...what do you think?...Naturally the war..."
"Oh Ferdinand! Then you're an absolute coward! You're as loathsome as a rat..."
"Yes, an absolute coward, Lola, I reject the war and everything in it.,, I don't deplore it... I don't resign myself to it... I don't weep about it... I just plain reject it and all its fighting men. I don't want to have anything to do with them or it. Even if there were nine hundred and ninety-five million of them and I were all alone, they'd still be wrong and I'd be right. Because I'm the one who knows what I want: I don't want to die."
"But it's not possible to reject the war, Ferdinand! Only crazy people and cowards reject the war when their county is in danger..."
"If that's the case, hurrah for the crazy people! Look, Lola, do you remember a single name, for instance, of any of the soldiers killed in the Hundred Years War?...Did you ever try to find out who any of them were?... No! ...You see? You never tried...As far as you're concerned they're as anonymous, as indifferent, as the last atom of that paperweight,as your morning bowel movement...Get it into your head, Lola, that they died for nothing! For absolutely nothing, the idiots! I say it and I'll say it again! I've proved it! The one thing that counts is life! In ten thousand years, I'll bet you, this war, remarkable as it may seem to us at present, will be utterly forgotten...Maybe here and there in the world a handful of scholars will argue about its causes or the dates of the principle hecatombs that made it famous...Up until now those are the only things about men that other men have thought worth remembering after a few centuries, a few years, or even a few hours...I don't believe in the future, Lola..."
When she heard me flaunting my shameful state like that, she lost all sympathy for me...Once and for all she put me down as contemtible, and decided to leave me without further ado. It was too much. When I left her that evening at the hospital gate, she didn't kiss me.
Evidently the thought that a condemed man might have no vocation for death was too much for her. When I asked her how her pancakes were doing, she did not reply.
-Lois-Ferdinand Celine
Journey to the End of the Night.
It has been awhile since I have been so excited about reading something. The language he uses is beautiful and the imagery is striking. It is amazing how his idea still pertain to today's events. Expect me to quote him a lot more. (Most pages in my book already have underlined passages.
I don't necessarily agree with the entire passage I have just quoted but the overall meaning is ,for the most part, how I feel. What an amazing book. (so far)
Everything else has been the same. I'm still on my new habit of going out doing stuff. My girlfriend and I have just gone to out first Opera together (Tristan and Isolde) and it was really interesting. She and I are in a really good spot lately. We are coming up on our 7 year anniversay and we still are as madly in love as when we first started dating. She's probably the best person I have ever known.
Had a little scare at the beginning of the week. My father had a minor heartattack.. He just turned 70 in April. He's okay now. It actually turned out to be a good thing. Apparently, he has a lot of blockage in his arteries. His heart attack brought this to the attention of his doctor and they were able to take care of it before something major happened. Still, it is scary to see someone you have idolized your whole life in such a weakened condition.
I think I've written enough for now. I've gotta stop procrastinating and start doing the stuff I was suppoed to have finished today.
"Is is true that you've gone mad, Ferdinand?" she asked me one Thursay.
"It's true," I admittted.
"But they'll treat you here?"
"There is no treatment for fear, Lola."
"Is it as bad as all that?"
"It's worse Lola. My fear is so bad that if I die a natural death later on, I especialy don't want to be cremated. I want them to leave me in the ground, quietly rotting in the graeyard ready to come back to life... Maybe...how do we know? But if they burned me to ashes, Lola, don't you see, it would be over, really over... A skeleton, afer all, is still something like a man...It's more likely to come backto life than ashes....Reduced to ashes, you're finished!...what do you think?...Naturally the war..."
"Oh Ferdinand! Then you're an absolute coward! You're as loathsome as a rat..."
"Yes, an absolute coward, Lola, I reject the war and everything in it.,, I don't deplore it... I don't resign myself to it... I don't weep about it... I just plain reject it and all its fighting men. I don't want to have anything to do with them or it. Even if there were nine hundred and ninety-five million of them and I were all alone, they'd still be wrong and I'd be right. Because I'm the one who knows what I want: I don't want to die."
"But it's not possible to reject the war, Ferdinand! Only crazy people and cowards reject the war when their county is in danger..."
"If that's the case, hurrah for the crazy people! Look, Lola, do you remember a single name, for instance, of any of the soldiers killed in the Hundred Years War?...Did you ever try to find out who any of them were?... No! ...You see? You never tried...As far as you're concerned they're as anonymous, as indifferent, as the last atom of that paperweight,as your morning bowel movement...Get it into your head, Lola, that they died for nothing! For absolutely nothing, the idiots! I say it and I'll say it again! I've proved it! The one thing that counts is life! In ten thousand years, I'll bet you, this war, remarkable as it may seem to us at present, will be utterly forgotten...Maybe here and there in the world a handful of scholars will argue about its causes or the dates of the principle hecatombs that made it famous...Up until now those are the only things about men that other men have thought worth remembering after a few centuries, a few years, or even a few hours...I don't believe in the future, Lola..."
When she heard me flaunting my shameful state like that, she lost all sympathy for me...Once and for all she put me down as contemtible, and decided to leave me without further ado. It was too much. When I left her that evening at the hospital gate, she didn't kiss me.
Evidently the thought that a condemed man might have no vocation for death was too much for her. When I asked her how her pancakes were doing, she did not reply.
-Lois-Ferdinand Celine
Journey to the End of the Night.
It has been awhile since I have been so excited about reading something. The language he uses is beautiful and the imagery is striking. It is amazing how his idea still pertain to today's events. Expect me to quote him a lot more. (Most pages in my book already have underlined passages.
I don't necessarily agree with the entire passage I have just quoted but the overall meaning is ,for the most part, how I feel. What an amazing book. (so far)
Everything else has been the same. I'm still on my new habit of going out doing stuff. My girlfriend and I have just gone to out first Opera together (Tristan and Isolde) and it was really interesting. She and I are in a really good spot lately. We are coming up on our 7 year anniversay and we still are as madly in love as when we first started dating. She's probably the best person I have ever known.
Had a little scare at the beginning of the week. My father had a minor heartattack.. He just turned 70 in April. He's okay now. It actually turned out to be a good thing. Apparently, he has a lot of blockage in his arteries. His heart attack brought this to the attention of his doctor and they were able to take care of it before something major happened. Still, it is scary to see someone you have idolized your whole life in such a weakened condition.
I think I've written enough for now. I've gotta stop procrastinating and start doing the stuff I was suppoed to have finished today.
p.s. glad you liked my set.
xoxo Onie