The Elegance Of The Hedgehog Part 3

"Wouldn't you at least like to sit down?" I suggested.

"Sit down?" he echoed, astonished. "Uh, uh no, what for?"

"To rest a bit."

"Ah, I seeee. Well, uh, uh no."

I left him to the company of the camellias and kept an eye on him from the window. After a very long time he roused himself from his floral contemplation and headed at a snail's pace for my loge. I opened before he foundered in his endeavor to ring the bell.

"I'll be on my way," he said, without seeing me, his silky unkempt locks flopping down over his eyes. Then, with what seemed an enormous effort: "Those flowers ... what are they called?"

"The camellias?" I asked, surprised.

"Camellias ... " he echoed slowly, "camellias ... Well thank you, Madame Michel," he said eventually, his voice astonis.h.i.+ngly firm.

And he turned on his heels. I did not see him again for weeks, until one morning in November when, as he was pa.s.sing by outside my loge, I scarcely recognized him, so great was his fall. Yes, a fall ... We are all headed for one. But for a young man to reach that point before his time, the point where he cannot get to his feet again ... such a fall is so visible and so brutal that your heart is seized with pity. Jean Arthens was no more than a tortured body staggering through life on a razor's edge. Horrified, I was wondering how he would even manage to make the simple gestures required to operate the elevator when Bernard Grelier suddenly appeared, took hold of him and lifted him up as if he were a feather, and I was spared having to intervene. I had a brief glimpse of a frail, mature man carrying a ravaged child in his arms, then they disappeared into the dark stairway.

"But Clemence will be coming," said Manuela who, uncannily, always picks up the thread of my unspoken thoughts.

"Chabrot told me to ask her to leave," I said, thoughtful. "He won't see anyone but Paul."

"The baroness was so upset she was blowing her nose into a dishcloth," added Manuela, referring to Violette Grelier.

I am not surprised. Truth will out, when the end is near ... Violette Grelier is to dishcloths what Pierre Arthens is to silk; we are all prisoners of our own destiny, must confront it with the knowledge that there is no way out and, in our epilogue, must be the person we have always been deep inside, regardless of any illusions we may have nurtured in our lifetime. Just because you have been around fine linen does not mean you are ent.i.tled to it-no more than a sick person is to health.

I pour the tea and we sip in silence. We have never had our tea together in the morning, and this break with our usual protocol imbues the ritual with a strange flavor.

Yes, this sudden trans.m.u.tation in the order of things seems to enhance our pleasure, as if consecrating the unchanging nature of a ritual established over our afternoons together, a ritual that has ripened into a solid and meaningful reality. Today, because it has been transgressed, our ritual suddenly acquires all its power; we are tasting the splendid gift of this unexpected morning as if it were some precious nectar; ordinary gestures have an extraordinary resonance, as we breathe in the fragrance of the tea, savor it, lower our cups, serve more, and sip again: every gesture has the bright aura of rebirth. At moments like this the web of life is revealed by the power of ritual, and each time we renew our ceremony, the pleasure will be all the greater for our having violated one of its principles. Moments like this act as magical interludes, placing our hearts at the edge of our souls: fleetingly, yet intensely, a fragment of eternity has come to enrich time. Elsewhere the world may be bl.u.s.tering or sleeping, wars are fought, people live and die, some nations disintegrate, while others are born, soon to be swallowed up in turn-and in all this sound and fury, amidst eruptions and undertows, while the world goes its merry way, bursts into flames, tears itself apart and is reborn: human life continues to throb.

So, let us drink a cup of tea.

Kakuzo Okakura, the author of the Book of Tea Book of Tea, laments the rebellion of the Mongolian tribes in the thirteenth century not because it brought death and desolation but because it destroyed one of the creations of the Song dynasty, the most precious among them, the art of tea. Like Okakura, I know that tea is no minor beverage. When tea becomes ritual, it takes its place at the heart of our ability to see greatness in small things. Where is beauty to be found? In great things that, like everything else, are doomed to die, or in small things that aspire to nothing, yet know how to set a jewel of infinity in a single moment?

The tea ritual: such a precise repet.i.tion of the same gestures and the same tastes; accesion to simple, authentic and refined sensations, a license given to all, at little cost, to become aristocrats of taste, because tea is the beverage of the wealthy and of the poor; the tea ritual, therefore, has the extraordinary virtue of introducing into the absurdity of our lives an aperture of serene harmony. Yes, the world may aspire to vacuousness, lost souls mourn beauty, insignificance surrounds us. Then let us drink a cup of tea. Silence descends, one hears the wind outside, autumn leaves rustle and take flight, the cat sleeps in a warm pool of light. And, with each swallow, time is sublimed.

Profound Thought No. 6.

What do you drink What do you read At breakfast And I know who You are.

Every morning at breakfast Papa drinks a coffee and reads the newspaper. Several newspapers, in fact: Le Monde Le Monde, Le Figaro Le Figaro, Liberation Liberation and, once a week, and, once a week, L'Express L'Express, Les echos Les echos, Time Time and and Courrier International Courrier International. But I can tell that the most satisfying thing for him is his first cup of coffee with Le Monde Le Monde. He is absorbed by his reading for at least half an hour. In order to enjoy this half-hour, he has to get up very early, because his days are full. But every morning, even if there's been a nighttime session and he has only slept two hours, he gets up at six and reads his paper while he drinks a strong cup of coffee. In this way Papa constructs himself, every day. I say "constructs himself" because I think that each time it's a new construction, as if everything has been reduced to ashes during the night, and he has to start from scratch. In our world, that's the way you live your grown-up life: you must constantly rebuild your ident.i.ty as an adult, the way it's been put together it is wobbly, ephemeral, and fragile, it cloaks despair and, when you're alone in front of the mirror, it tells you the lies you need to believe. For Papa, the newspaper and the coffee are magic wands that transform him into an important man. Like a pumpkin into a coach. Of course he finds this very satisfying: I never see him as calm and relaxed as when he's sitting drinking his six o'clock coffee. But at such a price! You pay such a price when you lead a false life! When the mask is taken away, when there's a crisis-and there's always a crisis at some point among mortals-the truth is terrible! Look at Monsieur Arthens, the food critic on the sixth floor, who is dying. At noon, Maman whirled in from her shopping like a tornado and the moment she was in the hallway she shouted for everybody to hear: "Pierre Arthens is dying!" By everybody, of course I mean Const.i.tution and me. Needless to say, her effort at drama was a flop. Maman, who was a bit disheveled, looked disappointed. When Papa came home this evening she jumped on him to tell him the news. Papa seemed surprised: "His heart? What, already?" he asked.

I have to admit that Monsieur Arthens is a truly nasty man. Papa is just a kid who's playing the dead serious grown-up. But Monsieur Arthens ... a first cla.s.s truly nasty man. When I say nasty, I don't mean unkind or cruel or tyrannical, though there is a bit of that too. No, when I say, "he's a truly nasty man," I mean he has so thoroughly renounced everything good that he might have inside him that he's already like a corpse even though he's still alive. Because truly nasty people hate everyone, to be sure, but most of all themselves. Can't you tell when a person hates himself? He becomes a living cadaver, it numbs all his negative emotions but also all the good ones so that he won't feel nauseated by who he is.

Pierre Arthens for sure was truly nasty. They say he was the pope of food critics and a worldwide champion of French cuisine. Well, that doesn't surprise me. If you want my opinion, French cuisine is pitiful. So much genius and wherewithal and so many resources for such a heavy end result ... And so many sauces and stuffings and pastries, enough to make you burst! It's in such bad taste ... And when it isn't heavy, it's as fussy as can be: you're dying of hunger and before you are three stylized radishes and two scallops in a seaweed gelee served on pseudo-Zen plates by waiters who look as joyful as undertakers. On Sat.u.r.day we went to a very fancy restaurant that was just like that: Napoleon's Bar. This was a family outing, to celebrate Colombe's birthday. And she chose her dishes with all her usual grace: pretentious thingummies with chestnuts, lamb prepared with some herbs with unp.r.o.nounceable names, and a Grand Marnier sabayon (how horrible can you get). Sabayon is the emblem of French cuisine: it pretends to be light but would asphyxiate any common Christian. I didn't have a starter (and I'll spare you Colombe's remarks about my "irritating-little-sister anorexia") and then, for the price of sixty-three euros, I had some filets of mullet in curry (with diced al dente zucchini and carrot tucked under the fish) and then, for thirty-four euros, the least evil thing I could find on the menu: a bitter chocolate fondant. Let me tell you: at that price, I would have preferred a year's subscription to McDonald's. At least it's in bad taste without being pretentious. And I won't even get started on the decor in the dining room and on the table. When the French want to get away from the traditional "Empire" style with burgundy drapes and gilt galore, they go for the hospital style. You sit on these Le Corbusier chairs ("By Corbu," says Maman) and you eat out of these white plates with very Soviet-bureaucracy geometrical shapes, and you dry your hands in the restrooms on towels so thin that they don't absorb a thing.

Clean lines, simplicity; no, that's not it. "But what would you rather have?" asked Colombe, exasperated, because I didn't manage to finish my first mullet. I didn't answer. Because I don't know. I'm still only a little girl, after all. But in my mangas, people seem to eat differently. It looks simple, refined, moderate, delicious. You eat the way you look at a beautiful picture or sing in a beautiful choir. Neither too much nor too little: moderate, in the good sense of the word. Maybe I'm completely mistaken; but French cuisine seems old and pretentious to me, whereas j.a.panese cuisine seems ... well, neither young nor old. Eternal, divine.

Anyway, Monsieur Arthens is dying. I wonder what he used to do in the morning to prepare for his role as a truly nasty man. Maybe a strong little coffee while he read the compet.i.tion, or an American breakfast with sausages and home fries. What do we do in the morning? Papa reads his paper while he drinks his coffee, Maman drinks her coffee while she leafs through catalogues, Colombe drinks her coffee while she listens to France Inter and I drink hot chocolate while reading mangas. Just now I'm reading Taniguchi mangas; he's a genius, and he's teaching me a lot about people.

But yesterday I asked Maman if I could drink some tea. My grandmother drinks black tea at breakfast, flavored with bergamot. Even though I don't find it particularly good, it seems less aggressive than coffee, which is a nasty person's drink. But at the restaurant last night Maman ordered some jasmine tea and she let me taste it. I thought it was so good, so "me," that this morning I said that from now on I want to have tea at breakfast. Maman shot me a strange look (her "poorly-purged-sleeping-tablet" look) then she said yes yes sweetheart you're old enough now.

Tea and mangas instead of coffee and newspapers: something elegant and enchanting, instead of adult power struggles and their sad aggressiveness.

12. Phantom Comedy.

After Manuela has left, I attend to all manner of captivating activities: I do the housework, use the mop in the hallway, take the garbage cans out into the street, pick up the leaflets, water the flowers, prepare the cat's repast (including a slice of ham with a fat edge of rind), make my own meal-cold Chinese noodles with tomato, basil and parmesan-read the newspaper, take a moment's retreat in my den to read a very fine Danish novel, and handle the crisis in the foyer where Lotte, the Arthens's granddaughter, Clemence's eldest, is crying outside my loge because Granpy doesn't want to see her.

At nine in the evening at last I have finished with everything and I suddenly feel old and very depressed. Death does not frighten me, least of all that of Pierre Arthens, but it is the waiting that is unbearable, this suspension of time when something has not yet happened and where we feel how very useless it is to struggle. I sit on in the kitchen, in silence, in the half-light, a bitter taste of absurdity in my mouth. My mind drifts slowly. Pierre Arthens ... A brutal despot, hungry for glory and accolades and yet, torn to the very end between an aspiration for art and a thirst for power, he endeavored to use language in pursuit of an illusion. Which way lies truth, in the end? In power, or in Art? Is it not the power of well-crafted discourse which enables us not only to sing the praises of mankind's creations but also to denounce as a crime of illusory vanity the urge to dominate, which moves us all all-yes, all, even a wretched concierge in her cramped loge who, although she may have renounced any visible power, nevertheless pursues those dreams of power in her mind?

Indeed, what const.i.tutes life? Day after day, we put up the brave struggle to play our role in this phantom comedy. We are good primates, so we spend most of our time maintaining and defending our territory, so that it will protect and gratify us; climbing-or trying not to slide down-the tribe's hierarchical ladder, and fornicating in every manner imaginable-even mere phantasms-as much for the pleasure of it as for the promised offspring. Thus we use up a considerable amount of our energy in intimidation and seduction, and these two strategies alone ensure the quest for territory, hierarchy and s.e.x that gives life to our conatus. But none of this touches our consciousness. We talk about love, about good and evil, philosophy and civilization, and we cling to these respectable icons the way a tick clings to its nice big warm dog.

There are times, however, when life becomes a phantom comedy. As if aroused from a dream, we watch ourselves in action and, shocked to realize how much vitality is required simply to support our primitive requirements, we wonder, bewildered, where Art fits in. All our frenzied nudging and posturing suddenly becomes utterly insignificant; our cozy little nest is reduced to some futile barbarian custom, and our position in society, hard-won and eternally precarious, is but a crude vanity. As for our progeny, we view them now with new eyes, and we are horrified, because without the cloak of altruism, the reproductive act seems extraordinarily out of place. All that is left is s.e.xual pleasure, but if it is relegated to a mere manifestation of primal abjection, it will fail in proportion, because a loveless session of gymnastics is not what we have struggled so hard to master.

Eternity eludes us.

At times like this, all the romantic, political, intellectual, metaphysical and moral beliefs that years of instruction and education have tried to inculcate in us seem to be foundering on the altar of our true nature, and society, a territorial field mined with the powerful charges of hierarchy, is sinking into the nothingness of Meaning. Exeunt rich and poor, thinkers, researchers, decision-makers, slaves, the good and the evil, the creative and the conscientious, trade unionists and individualists, progressives and conservatives; all have become primitive hominoids whose nudging and posturing, mannerisms and finery, language and codes are all located on the genetic map of an average primate, and all add up to no more than this: hold your rank, or die.

At times like this you desperately need Art. You seek to reconnect with your spiritual illusions, and you wish fervently that something might rescue you from your biological destiny, so that all poetry and grandeur will not be cast out from the world.

Thus, to withdraw as far as you can from the jousting and combat that are the appanages of our warrior species, you drink a cup of tea, or perhaps you watch a film by Ozu, and place upon this sorry theater the seal of Art and its greatest treasures.

13. Eternity.

At nine in the evening, I put a ca.s.sette into the video player, a film by Ozu, The Munekata Sisters The Munekata Sisters. This is my tenth Ozu film this month. Why? Because Ozu is a genius who can rescue me from biological destiny.

It all started one day when I told Angele, our little librarian, that I was very fond of the early Wim Wenders films, and she said, Oh, have you seen Tokyo-Ga Tokyo-Ga? And when you've seen Tokyo-Ga Tokyo-Ga, which is an extraordinary doc.u.mentary devoted to Ozu, then obviously you want to find out more about Ozu. So I found out more about Ozu and, for the first time in my life, the Art of the cinema made me laugh and cry as real entertainment should.

I press the start b.u.t.ton, sip my jasmine tea. From time to time I rewind, thanks to this secular rosary known as the remote control.

And here is an extraordinary scene.

The father, played by Chishu Ryu, one of Ozu's preferred actors and a vital lead through all his work, an extraordinary man who radiates warmth and humility-this father, therefore, is about to die, and is conversing with his daughter Setsuko about the stroll they have just taken through Kyoto. They are drinking sake.

THE FATHER.

And the Moss Temple! The light made the moss even more splendid.

SETSUKO.

And the camellia on the moss, too.

THE FATHER.

Oh, did you notice? How beautiful it was! (Pause.) There are beautiful things in old j.a.pan. (Pause.) Insisting that it's all bad ... I find that outrageous.

The film continues and right at the end comes this last scene, in a park, where Setsuko, the eldest, is talking with Mariko, her capricious younger sister.

SETSUKO, her face radiant her face radiant Tell me, Mariko, why are the mountains of Kyoto violet?

MARIKO, mischievously mischievously It's true. They look like azuki bean paste.

SETSUKO, smiling smiling It's such a lovely color.

The film is about disappointed love, arranged marriages, parents and children, brotherhood, the death of the father, the old and new faces of j.a.pan, as well as alcohol and the violence of men.

But above all it is about something that is unattainable to Western sensibilities, and that only j.a.panese culture can elucidate. Why do these two short, unexplained scenes, not driven by anything in the plot, arouse in us such a powerful emotion, containing the entire film between their ineffable parentheses?

Here is the key to the film.

SETSUKO.

True novelty is that which does not grow old, despite the pa.s.sage of time.

The camellia against the moss of the temple, the violet hues of the Kyoto mountains, a blue porcelain cup-this sudden flowering of pure beauty at the heart of ephemeral pa.s.sion: is this not something we all aspire to? And something that, in our Western civilization, we do not know how to attain?

The contemplation of eternity within the very movement of life.

Journal of the Movement of the World No. 3.

Go on, catch up with her!

When I think there are people who don't have television! How do they manage? I could spend hours watching. I turn the sound off and watch. I feel as if I'm watching things with an X-ray. If you turn the sound off, in fact, you're removing the wrapping paper, the pretty tissue paper enveloping some two-bit piece of rubbish. If you watch the television news reports in this way, you'll see: the images have no connection to each other, the only thing that does link them is the commentary, which wants you to take a chronological succession of images for a real succession of events.

Anyway, I love television. And this afternoon I saw an interesting movement of the world: a diving contest. Several contests, in fact. It was a retrospective of all the world champions.h.i.+ps in this particular sport. There were individual dives, with compulsory figures and freestyle, men and women, but above all, what caught my interest was the synchronized diving. In addition to their individual prowess with all these twists, somersaults and flips, the two divers have to be synchronized. Not just more or less together, no: perfectly together, to the very thousandth of a second.

The funniest thing is when the divers have very different builds: a stocky little person with a long slim one. You tell yourself, this will never work; from a physical point of view, they cannot take off and arrive at the same time, but they do, go figure. Object lesson: in the world, everything is compensation. When you can't go as fast, you push harder. But here's where I found subject matter for my journal: two young Chinese women got up on the springboard. Two long slim G.o.ddesses with s.h.i.+ning black braids, who could have been twins, they looked so alike, but the commentator made a point of saying they weren't even sisters. In short, they went out on the springboard and at that point I think we must have all been doing the same thing: holding our breath.

Following a few graceful bounces, they jumped. The first microseconds were perfect. I felt that perfection in my body; it would seem it's a question of "mirror neurons": when you watch someone doing something, the same neurons that they activate in order to do something become active in your brain, without you doing a thing. An acrobatic dive without budging from the sofa and while eating potato chips: that's why we like watching sports on television. Anyway, the two graces jump and, right at the beginning, it's ecstasy. And then, catastrophe! All at once you get the impression that they are very very slightly out of synch. You stare at the screen, a knot in your stomach: no doubt about it, they are out of synch. I know it seems crazy to describe it like this when the jump itself cannot last more than maybe three seconds in all but, precisely because it doesn't last more than three seconds, you look at every phase as if it lasted a century. And now it has become clear, you can no longer hide from the truth: they are out of synch! One of them is going to reach the water before the other! It's horrible!

I sat there shouting at the television: go on, catch up with her, go on! I felt incredibly angry with the one who had dawdled. I sunk deeper into the sofa, disgusted. What is this? Is that the movement of the world? An infinitesimal lapse that has just succeeded in ruining the possibility of perfection forever? I spent at least half an hour in a foul mood. And then suddenly I wondered: but why did I want so desperately for her to catch up? Why does it feel so rotten when the movement is not in synch? It's not very hard to come up with an answer: all those things that pa.s.s before us, which we miss by a hair and which are botched for eternity ... All the words we should have said, gestures we should have made, the fleeting moments of kairos kairos that were there one day and that we did not know how to grasp and that were buried forever in the void ... Failure, by a hair's breadth ... But then another idea surfaced thanks to these mirror neurons. A disturbing idea, moreover, and vaguely Proustian, no doubt (which annoys me). What if literature were a television we gaze into in order to activate our mirror neurons and give ourselves some action-packed cheap thrills? And even worse: what if literature were a television showing us all the things we have missed? that were there one day and that we did not know how to grasp and that were buried forever in the void ... Failure, by a hair's breadth ... But then another idea surfaced thanks to these mirror neurons. A disturbing idea, moreover, and vaguely Proustian, no doubt (which annoys me). What if literature were a television we gaze into in order to activate our mirror neurons and give ourselves some action-packed cheap thrills? And even worse: what if literature were a television showing us all the things we have missed?

So much for the movement of the world! It could have been perfection and it was a disaster. It should be experienced in reality and it is pleasure by proxy, like always.

And so I ask you: why stay in such a world?

14. When of a Sudden, Old j.a.pan.

The next morning, Chabrot rings at my loge. He seems to have mastered his emotions, his voice no longer trembles, his nose is dry and suntanned. But he makes me think of a ghost.

"Pierre has died," he says, in a flat voice.

"I am sorry."

I truly am sorry for him, for even if Pierre Arthens is no longer in pain, Chabrot will have to learn to live, however dead he may feel. "The undertakers will be arriving," adds Chabrot in his spectral voice. "I'd be very grateful if you'd show them up to the apartment."

"Of course."

"I'll be back in two hours, to take care of Anna."

He looks at me for a moment in silence.

"Thank you," he says, for the second time in twenty years.

I am tempted to reply in keeping with the ancestral traditions of concierges but, I scarcely know why, the words will not come out. Perhaps it is because Chabrot will not be coming here anymore, because the strongest barriers break down in the presence of death, because I am thinking about Lucien, and because decency, after all, precludes any sort of wariness that might offend the deceased.

So I do not say, Don't mention it, but rather: "You know ... everything comes at its appointed time."

That might sound like a plat.i.tude, although it is also something similar to what Marshal Kutuzov says to Prince Andrei in War and Peace: I have been much blamed, both for war, and for peace ... But everything comes at its appointed time War and Peace: I have been much blamed, both for war, and for peace ... But everything comes at its appointed time ... Tout vient a son heure pour qui sait attendre. ... Tout vient a son heure pour qui sait attendre.

I would give anything to be able to read it in Russian. What I have always liked about this pa.s.sage are the pauses, the balance between war and peace war and peace, the ebb and flow of his thoughts, like the tide on the sh.o.r.e carrying the riches of the ocean, in, and out. Was this merely a whim on the part of the translator, embroidering something that might have been very simple in the original-I have been much blamed, both for war, and for peace-thus consigning my maritime ruminations to the chapter of unfounded extravagance, or is this the very essence of a superb text which, even today, still moves me, however I resist, to tears of joy?

Chabrot nods his head slowly, then departs.

The rest of the morning is dreary. I have no posthumous affection for Pierre Arthens, but I find myself wandering about like a lost soul, unable even to read. The camellia and the moss had offered me a brief but happy interlude from the coa.r.s.eness of the world: now that is over, leaving no hope, and my heart is bitter, tormented by the darkness of all these unhappy events.

When of a sudden Old j.a.pan intervenes: from one of the apartments wafts a melody, clearly, joyfully distinct. Someone is playing a cla.s.sical piece on the piano. Ah, sweet, impromptu moment, lifting the veil of melancholy ... In a split second of eternity, everything is changed, transfigured. A few bars of music, rising from an unfamiliar piece, a touch of perfection in the flow of human dealings-I lean my head slowly to one side, reflect on the camellia on the moss of the temple, reflect on a cup of tea, while outside the wind is rustling the foliage, the forward rush of life is crystallized in a brilliant jewel of a moment that knows neither projects nor future, human destiny is rescued from the pale succession of days, glows with light at last and, surpa.s.sing time, warms my tranquil heart.

15. The Rich Man's Burden.

Civilization is the mastery of violence, the triumph, constantly challenged, over the aggressive nature of the primate. For primates we have been and primates we shall remain, however often we learn to find joy in a camellia on moss. This is the very purpose of education. What does education imply? One must offer camellias on moss, tirelessly, in order to escape the natural impulses of our species, because those impulses do not change, and continually threaten the fragile equilibrium of survival.

I am a very camellia-on-moss sort of person. If I really think about it, there is nothing else that can quite explain my withdrawal into this bleak loge of mine. As I was convinced very early on of the pointlessness of my existence, I could have chosen to rebel, and taking G.o.d as my witness that I had been cruelly used by fate, I could have resorted to the violence inherent in our condition. But school made of me a soul whose unpromising destiny led only to abnegation and confinement. The wonder of my second birth had shown me the way to master my impulses: since it was school that had given birth to me, I had to show my allegiance, and thus I complied with my instructors' intentions by tamely becoming a most civilized human being. In fact, when the struggle to dominate our primate aggressiveness takes up arms as powerful as books and words, the undertaking is an easy one, and that is how I became an educated person, finding in written symbols the strength to resist my own nature.