everyone is permitted to copy and distribute verbatim copies of this license document but changing it is not allowed preamble the licenses for most software are designed to take away your freedom to share and change it by contrast the gnu general public license is intended to guarantee your freedom to share and change free software to make sure the software is free for all its users this general public license applies to most of the free software foundation s software and to any other program whose authors commit to using it some other free software foundation software is covered by the gnu lesser general public license instead you can apply it to your programs too when we speak of free software we are referring to freedom not price our general public licenses are designed to make sure that you have the freedom to distribute copies of free software and charge for this service if you wish that you receive source code or can get it if you want it that you can change the software or use pieces of it in new free programs and that you know you can do these things to protect your rights we need to make restrictions that forbid anyone to deny you these rights or to ask you to surrender the rights these restrictions translate to certain responsibilities for you if you distribute copies of the software or if you modify it for example if you distribute copies of such a program whether gratis or for a fee you must give the recipients all the rights that you have you must make sure that they too receive or can get the source code and you must show them these terms so they know their rights we protect your rights with two steps copyright the software and offer you this license which gives you legal permission to copy distribute and or modify the software also for each author s protection and ours we want to make certain that everyone understands that there is no warranty for this free software if the software is modified by someone else and passed on we want its recipients to know that what they have is not the original so that any problems introduced by others will not reflect on the original authors reputations finally any free program is threatened constantly by software patents we wish to avoid the danger that redistributors of a free program will individually obtain patent licenses in effect making the program proprietary to prevent this we have made it clear that any patent must be licensed for everyone s free use or not licensed at all the precise terms and conditions for copying distribution and modification follow terms and conditions for copying distribution and modification this license applies to any program or other work which contains a notice placed by the copyright holder saying it may be distributed under the terms of this general public license the program below refers to any such program or work and a work based on the program means either the program or any derivative work under copyright law that is to say a work containing the program or a portion of it either verbatim or with modifications and or translated into another language hereinafter translation is included without limitation in the term modification each licensee is addressed as you activities other than copying distribution and modification are not covered by this license they are outside its scope the act of running the program is not restricted and the output from the program is covered only if its contents constitute a work based on the program independent of having been made by running the program whether that is true depends on what the program does you may copy and distribute verbatim copies of the program s source code as you receive it in any medium provided that you conspicuously and appropriately publish on each copy an appropriate copyright notice and disclaimer of warranty keep intact all the notices that refer to this license and to the absence of any warranty and give any other recipients of the program a copy of this license along with the program you may charge a fee for the physical act of transferring a copy and you may at your option offer warranty protection in exchange for a fee you may modify your copy or copies of the program or any portion of it thus forming a work based on the program and copy and distribute such modifications or work under the terms of section above provided that you also meet all of these conditions a you must cause the modified files to carry prominent notices stating that you changed the files and the date of any change b you must cause any work that you distribute or publish that in whole or in part contains or is derived from the program or any part thereof to be licensed as a whole at no charge to all third parties under the terms of this license c if the modified program normally reads commands interactively when run you must cause it when started running for such interactive use in the most ordinary way to print or display an announcement including an appropriate copyright notice and a notice that there is no warranty or else saying that you provide a warranty and that users may redistribute the program under these conditions and telling the user how to view a copy of this license exception if the program itself is interactive but does not normally print such an announcement your work based on the program is not required to print an announcement these requirements apply to the modified work as a whole if identifiable sections of that work are not derived from the program and can be reasonably considered independent and separate works in themselves then this license and its terms do not apply to those sections when you distribute them as separate works but when you distribute the same sections as part of a whole which is a work based on the program the distribution of the whole must be on the terms of this license whose permissions for other licensees extend to the entire whole and thus to each and every part regardless of who wrote it thus it is not the intent of this section to claim rights or contest your rights to work written entirely by you rather the intent is to exercise the right to control the distribution of derivative or collective works based on the program in addition mere aggregation of another work not based on the program with the program or with a work based on the program on a volume of a storage or distribution medium does not bring the other work under the scope of this license you may copy and distribute the program or a work based on it under section in object code or executable form under the terms of sections and above provided that you also do one of the following a accompany it with the complete corresponding machine readable source code which must be distributed under the terms of sections and above on a medium customarily used for software interchange or b accompany it with a written offer valid for at least three years to give any third party for a charge no more than your cost of physically performing source distribution a complete machine readable copy of the corresponding source code to be distributed under the terms of sections and above on a medium customarily used for software interchange or c accompany it with the information you received as to the offer to distribute corresponding source code this alternative is allowed only for noncommercial distribution and only if you received the program in object code or executable form with such an offer in accord with subsection b above the source code for a work means the preferred form of the work for making modifications to it for an executable work complete source code means all the source code for all modules it contains plus any associated interface definition files plus the scripts used to control compilation and installation of the executable however as a special exception the source code distributed need not include anything that is normally distributed in either source or binary form with the major components compiler kernel and so on of the operating system on which the executable runs unless that component itself accompanies the executable if distribution of executable or object code is made by offering access to copy from a designated place then offering equivalent access to copy the source code from the same place counts as distribution of the source code even though third parties are not compelled to copy the source along with the object code you may not copy modify sublicense or distribute the program except as expressly provided under this license any attempt otherwise to copy modify sublicense or distribute the program is void and will automatically terminate your rights under this license however parties who have received copies or rights from you under this license will not have their licenses terminated so long as such parties remain in full compliance you are not required to accept this license since you have not signed it however nothing else grants you permission to modify or distribute the program or its derivative works these actions are prohibited by law if you do not accept this license therefore by modifying or distributing the program or any work based on the program you indicate your acceptance of this license to do so and all its terms and conditions for copying distributing or modifying the program or works based on it each time you redistribute the program or any work based on the program the recipient automatically receives a license from the original licensor to copy distribute or modify the program subject to these terms and conditions you may not impose any further restrictions on the recipients exercise of the rights granted herein you are not responsible for enforcing compliance by third parties to this license if as a consequence of a court judgment or allegation of patent infringement or for any other reason not limited to patent issues conditions are imposed on you whether by court order agreement or otherwise that contradict the conditions of this license they do not excuse you from the conditions of this license if you cannot distribute so as to satisfy simultaneously your obligations under this license and any other pertinent obligations then as a consequence you may not distribute the program at all for example if a patent license would not permit royalty free redistribution of the program by all those who receive copies directly or indirectly through you then the only way you could satisfy both it and this license would be to refrain entirely from distribution of the program if any portion of this section is held invalid or unenforceable under any particular circumstance the balance of the section is intended to apply and the section as a whole is intended to apply in other circumstances it is not the purpose of this section to induce you to infringe any patents or other property right claims or to contest validity of any such claims this section has the sole purpose of protecting the integrity of the free software distribution system which is implemented by public license practices many people have made generous contributions to the wide range of software distributed through that system in reliance on consistent application of that system it is up to the author donor to decide if he or she is willing to distribute software through any other system and a licensee cannot impose that choice this section is intended to make thoroughly clear what is believed to be a consequence of the rest of this license if the distribution and or use of the program is restricted in certain countries either by patents or by copyrighted interfaces the original copyright holder who places the program under this license may add an explicit geographical distribution limitation excluding those countries so that distribution is permitted only in or among countries not thus excluded in such case this license incorporates the limitation as if written in the body of this license the free software foundation may publish revised and or new versions of the general public license from time to time such new versions will be similar in spirit to the present version but may differ in detail to address new problems or concerns each version is given a distinguishing version number if the program specifies a version number of this license which applies to it and any later version you have the option of following the terms and conditions either of that version or of any later version published by the free software foundation if the program does not specify a version number of this license you may choose any version ever published by the free software foundation if you wish to incorporate parts of the program into other free programs whose distribution conditions are different write to the author to ask for permission for software which is copyrighted by the free software foundation write to the free software foundation we sometimes make exceptions for this our decision will be guided by the two goals of preserving the free status of all derivatives of our free software and of promoting the sharing and reuse of software generally no warranty because the program is licensed free of charge there is no warranty for the program to the extent permitted by applicable law except when otherwise stated in writing the copyright holders and or other parties provide the program as is without warranty of any kind either expressed or implied including but not limited to the implied warranties of merchantability and fitness for a particular purpose the entire risk as to the quality and performance of the program is with you should the program prove defective you assume the cost of all necessary servicing repair or correction in no event unless required by applicable law or agreed to in writing will any copyright holder or any other party who may modify and or redistribute the program as permitted above be liable to you for damages including any general special incidental or consequential damages arising out of the use or inability to use the program including but not limited to loss of data or data being rendered inaccurate or losses sustained by you or third parties or a failure of the program to operate with any other programs even if such holder or other party has been advised of the possibility of such damages end of terms and conditions how to apply these terms to your new programs if you develop a new program and you want it to be of the greatest possible use to the public the best way to achieve this is to make it free software which everyone can redistribute and change under these terms to do so attach the following notices to the program it is safest to attach them to the start of each source file to most effectively convey the exclusion of warranty and each file should have at least the copyright line and a pointer to where the full notice is found one line to give the program s name and an idea of what it does copyright c yyyy name of author this program is free software you can redistribute it and or modify it under the terms of the gnu general public license as published by the free software foundation either version of the license or at your option any later version this program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful but without any warranty without even the implied warranty of merchantability or fitness for a particular purpose see the gnu general public license for more details you should have received a copy of the gnu general public license along with this program if not see also add information on how to contact you by electronic and paper mail if the program is interactive make it output a short notice like this when it starts in an interactive mode gnomovision version copyright c year name of author gnomovision comes with absolutely no warranty for details type show w this is free software and you are welcome to redistribute it under certain conditions type show c for details the hypothetical commands show w and show c should show the appropriate parts of the general public license of course the commands you use may be called something other than show w and show c they could even be mouse clicks or menu items whatever suits your program you should also get your employer if you work as a programmer or your school if any to sign a copyright disclaimer for the program if necessary here is a sample alter the names everyone is permitted to copy and distribute verbatim copies of this license document but changing it is not allowed preamble the gnu general public license is a free copyleft license for software and other kinds of works the licenses for most software and other practical works are designed to take away your freedom to share and change the works by contrast the gnu general public license is intended to guarantee your freedom to share and change all versions of a program to make sure it remains free software for all its users we the free software foundation use the gnu general public license for most of our software it applies also to any other work released this way by its authors you can apply it to your programs too when we speak of free software we are referring to freedom not price our general public licenses are designed to make sure that you have the freedom to distribute copies of free software and charge for them if you wish that you receive source code or can get it if you want it that you can change the software or use pieces of it in new free programs and that you know you can do these things to protect your rights we need to prevent others from denying you these rights or asking you to surrender the rights therefore you have certain responsibilities if you distribute copies of the software or if you modify it responsibilities to respect the freedom of others for example if you distribute copies of such a program whether gratis or for a fee you must pass on to the recipients the same freedoms that you received you must make sure that they too receive or can get the source code and you must show them these terms so they know their rights developers that use the gnu gpl protect your rights with two steps assert copyright on the software and offer you this license giving you legal permission to copy distribute and or modify it for the developers and authors protection the gpl clearly explains that there is no warranty for this free software for both users and authors sake the gpl requires that modified versions be marked as changed so that their problems will not be attributed erroneously to authors of previous versions some devices are designed to deny users access to install or run modified versions of the software inside them although the manufacturer can do so this is fundamentally incompatible with the aim of protecting users freedom to change the software the systematic pattern of such abuse occurs in the area of products for individuals to use which is precisely where it is most unacceptable therefore we have designed this version of the gpl to prohibit the practice for those products if such problems arise substantially in other domains we stand ready to extend this provision to those domains in future versions of the gpl as needed to protect the freedom of users finally every program is threatened constantly by software patents states should not allow patents to restrict development and use of software on general purpose computers but in those that do we wish to avoid the special danger that patents applied to a free program could make it effectively proprietary to prevent this the gpl assures that patents cannot be used to render the program non free the precise terms and conditions for copying distribution and modification follow terms and conditions definitions this license refers to version of the gnu general public license copyright also means copyright like laws that apply to other kinds of works such as semiconductor masks the program refers to any copyrightable work licensed under this license each licensee is addressed as you licensees and recipients may be individuals or organizations to modify a work means to copy from or adapt all or part of the work in a fashion requiring copyright permission other than the making of an exact copy the resulting work is called a modified version of the earlier work or a work based on the earlier work a covered work means either the unmodified program or a work based on the program to propagate a work means to do anything with it that without permission would make you directly or secondarily liable for infringement under applicable copyright law except executing it on a computer or modifying a private copy propagation includes copying distribution with or without modification making available to the public and in some countries other activities as well to convey a work means any kind of propagation that enables other parties to make or receive copies mere interaction with a user through a computer network with no transfer of a copy is not conveying an interactive user interface displays appropriate legal notices to the extent that it includes a convenient and prominently visible feature that displays an appropriate copyright notice and tells the user that there is no warranty for the work except to the extent that warranties are provided that licensees may convey the work under this license and how to view a copy of this license if the interface presents a list of user commands or options such as a menu a prominent item in the list meets this criterion source code the source code for a work means the preferred form of the work for making modifications to it object code means any non source form of a work a standard interface means an interface that either is an official standard defined by a recognized standards body or in the case of interfaces specified for a particular programming language one that is widely used among developers working in that language the system libraries of an executable work include anything other than the work as a whole that a is included in the normal form of packaging a major component but which is not part of that major component and b serves only to enable use of the work with that major component or to implement a standard interface for which an implementation is available to the public in source code form a major component in this context means a major essential component kernel window system and so on of the specific operating system if any on which the executable work runs or a compiler used to produce the work or an object code interpreter used to run it the corresponding source for a work in object code form means all the source code needed to generate install and for an executable work run the object code and to modify the work including scripts to control those activities however it does not include the work s system libraries or general purpose tools or generally available free programs which are used unmodified in performing those activities but which are not part of the work for example corresponding source includes interface definition files associated with source files for the work and the source code for shared libraries and dynamically linked subprograms that the work is specifically designed to require such as by intimate data communication or control flow between those subprograms and other parts of the work the corresponding source need not include anything that users can regenerate automatically from other parts of the corresponding source the corresponding source for a work in source code form is that same work basic permissions all rights granted under this license are granted for the term of copyright on the program and are irrevocable provided the stated conditions are met this license explicitly affirms your unlimited permission to run the unmodified program the output from running a covered work is covered by this license only if the output given its content constitutes a covered work this license acknowledges your rights of fair use or other equivalent as provided by copyright law you may make run and propagate covered works that you do not convey without conditions so long as your license otherwise remains in force you may convey covered works to others for the sole purpose of having them make modifications exclusively for you or provide you with facilities for running those works provided that you comply with the terms of this license in conveying all material for which you do not control copyright those thus making or running the covered works for you must do so exclusively on your behalf under your direction and control on terms that prohibit them from making any copies of your copyrighted material outside their relationship with you conveying under any other circumstances is permitted solely under the conditions stated below sublicensing is not allowed section makes it unnecessary protecting users legal rights from anti circumvention law no covered work shall be deemed part of an effective technological measure under any applicable law fulfilling obligations under article of the wipo copyright treaty adopted on december or similar laws prohibiting or restricting circumvention of such measures when you convey a covered work you waive any legal power to forbid circumvention of technological measures to the extent such circumvention is effected by exercising rights under this license with respect to the covered work and you disclaim any intention to limit operation or modification of the work as a means of enforcing against the work s users your or third parties legal rights to forbid circumvention of technological measures conveying verbatim copies you may convey verbatim copies of the program s source code as you receive it in any medium provided that you conspicuously and appropriately publish on each copy an appropriate copyright notice keep intact all notices stating that this license and any non permissive terms added in accord with section apply to the code keep intact all notices of the absence of any warranty and give all recipients a copy of this license along with the program you may charge any price or no price for each copy that you convey and you may offer support or warranty protection for a fee conveying modified source versions you may convey a work based on the program or the modifications to produce it from the program in the form of source code under the terms of section provided that you also meet all of these conditions a the work must carry prominent notices stating that you modified it and giving a relevant date b the work must carry prominent notices stating that it is released under this license and any conditions added under section this requirement modifies the requirement in section to keep intact all notices c you must license the entire work as a whole under this license to anyone who comes into possession of a copy this license will therefore apply along with any applicable section additional terms to the whole of the work and all its parts regardless of how they are packaged this license gives no permission to license the work in any other way but it does not invalidate such permission if you have separately received it d if the work has interactive user interfaces each must display appropriate legal notices however if the program has interactive interfaces that do not display appropriate legal notices your work need not make them do so a compilation of a covered work with other separate and independent works which are not by their nature extensions of the covered work and which are not combined with it such as to form a larger program in or on a volume of a storage or distribution medium is called an aggregate if the compilation and its resulting copyright are not used to limit the access or legal rights of the compilation s users beyond what the individual works permit inclusion of a covered work in an aggregate does not cause this license to apply to the other parts of the aggregate conveying non source forms you may convey a covered work in object code form under the terms of sections and provided that you also convey the machine readable corresponding source under the terms of this license in one of these ways a convey the object code in or embodied in a physical product including a physical distribution medium accompanied by the corresponding source fixed on a durable physical medium customarily used for software interchange b convey the object code in or embodied in a physical product including a physical distribution medium accompanied by a written offer valid for at least three years and valid for as long as you offer spare parts or customer support for that product model to give anyone who possesses the object code either a copy of the corresponding source for all the software in the product that is covered by this license on a durable physical medium customarily used for software interchange for a price no more than your reasonable cost of physically performing this conveying of source or access to copy the corresponding source from a network server at no charge c convey individual copies of the object code with a copy of the written offer to provide the corresponding source this alternative is allowed only occasionally and noncommercially and only if you received the object code with such an offer in accord with subsection b d convey the object code by offering access from a designated place gratis or for a charge and offer equivalent access to the corresponding source in the same way through the same place at no further charge you need not require recipients to copy the corresponding source along with the object code if the place to copy the object code is a network server the corresponding source may be on a different server operated by you or a third party that supports equivalent copying facilities provided you maintain clear directions next to the object code saying where to find the corresponding source regardless of what server hosts the corresponding source you remain obligated to ensure that it is available for as long as needed to satisfy these requirements e convey the object code using peer to peer transmission provided you inform other peers where the object code and corresponding source of the work are being offered to the general public at no charge under subsection d a separable portion of the object code whose source code is excluded from the corresponding source as a system library need not be included in conveying the object code work a user product is either a consumer product which means any tangible personal property which is normally used for personal family or household purposes or anything designed or sold for incorporation into a dwelling in determining whether a product is a consumer product doubtful cases shall be resolved in favor of coverage for a particular product received by a particular user normally used refers to a typical or common use of that class of product regardless of the status of the particular user or of the way in which the particular user actually uses or expects or is expected to use the product a product is a consumer product regardless of whether the product has substantial commercial industrial or non consumer uses unless such uses represent the only significant mode of use of the product installation information for a user product means any methods procedures authorization keys or other information required to install and execute modified versions of a covered work in that user product from a modified version of its corresponding source the information must suffice to ensure that the continued functioning of the modified object code is in no case prevented or interfered with solely because modification has been made if you convey an object code work under this section in or with or specifically for use in a user product and the conveying occurs as part of a transaction in which the right of possession and use of the user product is transferred to the recipient in perpetuity or for a fixed term regardless of how the transaction is characterized the corresponding source conveyed under this section must be accompanied by the installation information but this requirement does not apply if neither you nor any third party retains the ability to install modified object code on the user product for example the work has been installed in rom the requirement to provide installation information does not include a requirement to continue to provide support service warranty or updates for a work that has been modified or installed by the recipient or for the user product in which it has been modified or installed access to a network may be denied when the modification itself materially and adversely affects the operation of the network or violates the rules and protocols for communication across the network corresponding source conveyed and installation information provided in accord with this section must be in a format that is publicly documented and with an implementation available to the public in source code form and must require no special password or key for unpacking reading or copying additional terms additional permissions are terms that supplement the terms of this license by making exceptions from one or more of its conditions additional permissions that are applicable to the entire program shall be treated as though they were included in this license to the extent that they are valid under applicable law if additional permissions apply only to part of the program that part may be used separately under those permissions but the entire program remains governed by this license without regard to the additional permissions when you convey a copy of a covered work you may at your option remove any additional permissions from that copy or from any part of it additional permissions may be written to require their own removal in certain cases when you modify the work you may place additional permissions on material added by you to a covered work for which you have or can give appropriate copyright permission notwithstanding any other provision of this license for material you add to a covered work you may if authorized by the copyright holders of that material supplement the terms of this license with terms a disclaiming warranty or limiting liability differently from the terms of sections and of this license or b requiring preservation of specified reasonable legal notices or author attributions in that material or in the appropriate legal notices displayed by works containing it or c prohibiting misrepresentation of the origin of that material or requiring that modified versions of such material be marked in reasonable ways as different from the original version or d limiting the use for publicity purposes of names of licensors or authors of the material or e declining to grant rights under trademark law for use of some trade names trademarks or service marks or f requiring indemnification of licensors and authors of that material by anyone who conveys the material or modified versions of it with contractual assumptions of liability to the recipient for any liability that these contractual assumptions directly impose on those licensors and authors all other non permissive additional terms are considered further restrictions within the meaning of section if the program as you received it or any part of it contains a notice stating that it is governed by this license along with a term that is a further restriction you may remove that term if a license document contains a further restriction but permits relicensing or conveying under this license you may add to a covered work material governed by the terms of that license document provided that the further restriction does not survive such relicensing or conveying if you add terms to a covered work in accord with this section you must place in the relevant source files a statement of the additional terms that apply to those files or a notice indicating where to find the applicable terms additional terms permissive or non permissive may be stated in the form of a separately written license or stated as exceptions the above requirements apply either way termination you may not propagate or modify a covered work except as expressly provided under this license any attempt otherwise to propagate or modify it is void and will automatically terminate your rights under this license including any patent licenses granted under the third paragraph of section however if you cease all violation of this license then your license from a particular copyright holder is reinstated a provisionally unless and until the copyright holder explicitly and finally terminates your license and b permanently if the copyright holder fails to notify you of the violation by some reasonable means prior to days after the cessation moreover your license from a particular copyright holder is reinstated permanently if the copyright holder notifies you of the violation by some reasonable means this is the first time you have received notice of violation of this license for any work from that copyright holder and you cure the violation prior to days after your receipt of the notice termination of your rights under this section does not terminate the licenses of parties who have received copies or rights from you under this license if your rights have been terminated and not permanently reinstated you do not qualify to receive new licenses for the same material under section acceptance not required for having copies you are not required to accept this license in order to receive or run a copy of the program ancillary propagation of a covered work occurring solely as a consequence of using peer to peer transmission to receive a copy likewise does not require acceptance however nothing other than this license grants you permission to propagate or modify any covered work these actions infringe copyright if you do not accept this license therefore by modifying or propagating a covered work you indicate your acceptance of this license to do so automatic licensing of downstream recipients each time you convey a covered work the recipient automatically receives a license from the original licensors to run modify and propagate that work subject to this license you are not responsible for enforcing compliance by third parties with this license an entity transaction is a transaction transferring control of an organization or substantially all assets of one or subdividing an organization or merging organizations if propagation of a covered work results from an entity transaction each party to that transaction who receives a copy of the work also receives whatever licenses to the work the party s predecessor in interest had or could give under the previous paragraph plus a right to possession of the corresponding source of the work from the predecessor in interest if the predecessor has it or can get it with reasonable efforts you may not impose any further restrictions on the exercise of the rights granted or affirmed under this license for example you may not impose a license fee royalty or other charge for exercise of rights granted under this license and you may not initiate litigation including a cross claim or counterclaim in a lawsuit alleging that any patent claim is infringed by making using selling offering for sale or importing the program or any portion of it patents a contributor is a copyright holder who authorizes use under this license of the program or a work on which the program is based the work thus licensed is called the contributor s contributor version a contributor s essential patent claims are all patent claims owned or controlled by the contributor whether already acquired or hereafter acquired that would be infringed by some manner permitted by this license of making using or selling its contributor version but do not include claims that would be infringed only as a consequence of further modification of the contributor version for purposes of this definition control includes the right to grant patent sublicenses in a manner consistent with the requirements of this license each contributor grants you a non exclusive worldwide royalty free patent license under the contributor s essential patent claims to make use sell offer for sale import and otherwise run modify and propagate the contents of its contributor version in the following three paragraphs a patent license is any express agreement or commitment however denominated not to enforce a patent such as an express permission to practice a patent or covenant not to sue for patent infringement to grant such a patent license to a party means to make such an agreement or commitment not to enforce a patent against the party if you convey a covered work knowingly relying on a patent license and the corresponding source of the work is not available for anyone to copy free of charge and under the terms of this license through a publicly available network server or other readily accessible means then you must either cause the corresponding source to be so available or arrange to deprive yourself of the benefit of the patent license for this particular work or arrange in a manner consistent with the requirements of this license to extend the patent license to downstream recipients knowingly relying means you have actual knowledge that but for the patent license your conveying the covered work in a country or your recipient s use of the covered work in a country would infringe one or more identifiable patents in that country that you have reason to believe are valid if pursuant to or in connection with a single transaction or arrangement you convey or propagate by procuring conveyance of a covered work and grant a patent license to some of the parties receiving the covered work authorizing them to use propagate modify or convey a specific copy of the covered work then the patent license you grant is automatically extended to all recipients of the covered work and works based on it a patent license is discriminatory if it does not include within the scope of its coverage prohibits the exercise of or is conditioned on the non exercise of one or more of the rights that are specifically granted under this license you may not convey a covered work if you are a party to an arrangement with a third party that is in the business of distributing software under which you make payment to the third party based on the extent of your activity of conveying the work and under which the third party grants to any of the parties who would receive the covered work from you a discriminatory patent license a in connection with copies of the covered work conveyed by you or copies made from those copies or b primarily for and in connection with specific products or compilations that contain the covered work unless you entered into that arrangement or that patent license was granted prior to march nothing in this license shall be construed as excluding or limiting any implied license or other defenses to infringement that may otherwise be available to you under applicable patent law no surrender of others freedom if conditions are imposed on you whether by court order agreement or otherwise that contradict the conditions of this license they do not excuse you from the conditions of this license if you cannot convey a covered work so as to satisfy simultaneously your obligations under this license and any other pertinent obligations then as a consequence you may not convey it at all for example if you agree to terms that obligate you to collect a royalty for further conveying from those to whom you convey the program the only way you could satisfy both those terms and this license would be to refrain entirely from conveying the program use with the gnu affero general public license notwithstanding any other provision of this license you have permission to link or combine any covered work with a work licensed under version of the gnu affero general public license into a single combined work and to convey the resulting work the terms of this license will continue to apply to the part which is the covered work but the special requirements of the gnu affero general public license section concerning interaction through a network will apply to the combination as such revised versions of this license the free software foundation may publish revised and or new versions of the gnu general public license from time to time such new versions will be similar in spirit to the present version but may differ in detail to address new problems or concerns each version is given a distinguishing version number if the program specifies that a certain numbered version of the gnu general public license or any later version applies to it you have the option of following the terms and conditions either of that numbered version or of any later version published by the free software foundation if the program does not specify a version number of the gnu general public license you may choose any version ever published by the free software foundation if the program specifies that a proxy can decide which future versions of the gnu general public license can be used that proxy s public statement of acceptance of a version permanently authorizes you to choose that version for the program later license versions may give you additional or different permissions however no additional obligations are imposed on any author or copyright holder as a result of your choosing to follow a later version disclaimer of warranty there is no warranty for the program to the extent permitted by applicable law except when otherwise stated in writing the copyright holders and or other parties provide the program as is without warranty of any kind either expressed or implied including but not limited to the implied warranties of merchantability and fitness for a particular purpose the entire risk as to the quality and performance of the program is with you should the program prove defective you assume the cost of all necessary servicing repair or correction limitation of liability in no event unless required by applicable law or agreed to in writing will any copyright holder or any other party who modifies and or conveys the program as permitted above be liable to you for damages including any general special incidental or consequential damages arising out of the use or inability to use the program including but not limited to loss of data or data being rendered inaccurate or losses sustained by you or third parties or a failure of the program to operate with any other programs even if such holder or other party has been advised of the possibility of such damages interpretation of sections and if the disclaimer of warranty and limitation of liability provided above cannot be given local legal effect according to their terms reviewing courts shall apply local law that most closely approximates an absolute waiver of all civil liability in connection with the program unless a warranty or assumption of liability accompanies a copy of the program in return for a fee end of terms and conditions how to apply these terms to your new programs if you develop a new program and you want it to be of the greatest possible use to the public the best way to achieve this is to make it free software which everyone can redistribute and change under these terms to do so attach the following notices to the program it is safest to attach them to the start of each source file to most effectively state the exclusion of warranty and each file should have at least the copyright line and a pointer to where the full notice is found one line to give the program s name and a brief idea of what it does copyright c year name of author this program is free software you can redistribute it and or modify it under the terms of the gnu general public license as published by the free software foundation either version of the license or at your option any later version this program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful but without any warranty without even the implied warranty of merchantability or fitness for a particular purpose see the gnu general public license for more details you should have received a copy of the gnu general public license along with this program if not see also add information on how to contact you by electronic and paper mail if the program does terminal interaction make it output a short notice like this when it starts in an interactive mode program copyright c year name of author this program comes with absolutely no warranty for details type show w this is free software and you are welcome to redistribute it under certain conditions type show c for details the hypothetical commands show w and show c should show the appropriate parts of the general public license of course your program s commands might be different for a gui interface you would use an about box conor mcgregor will run for the irish presidency in elections later this year the controversial former fighter said on thursday as he announced his candidacy for the largely ceremonial role on an anti immigration stance mcgregor who in recent years has emerged as a figurehead for the far right in ireland said on social media that he would run for president to oppose a long awaited new european union migration pact aimed at sharing the burden of processing asylum claims more evenly across the bloc who else will stand up to government and oppose this bill he said in an instagram post to his more than million followers any other presidential candidate they attempt to put forward will be of no resistance to them i will the post comes just days after mcgregor appeared at the white house with donald trump on st patrick day where he became the latest european ally of the us president to promote anti immigrant sentiment drawing controversy and censure back home ireland is at the cusp of potentially losing its irishness mcgregor said monday claiming the government had abandoned the voices of irish people and that rural towns were being overrun by immigrants irish leader micheál martin said mcgregor comments did not reflect the spirit of st patrick day or the views of the people of ireland once the face of the ultimate fighting championship dublin born mcgregor was the first fighter to hold two ufc belts simultaneously and according to forbes was the world highest paid sports star in despite several rumored comebacks he hasn t fought in the ufc since back to back defeats four years ago and has become a hugely controversial figure in ireland dogged by accusations of sexual assault which he has denied in a january civil lawsuit a woman accused mcgregor of sexual battery during the nba finals in miami the incident was investigated by police at the time and the miami dade state attorney declined to press charges against him mcgregor said the allegations were false last fall a civil jury in dublin awarded nearly euros in damages to a woman who claimed mcgregor had brutally raped and battered her in a hotel in dublin in mcgregor testified that the two had consensual sex and vowed to appeal the verdict in recent years mcgregor has also turned his attention to sparring with people on social media political analysts and far right experts have told cnn that mcgregor unique brand of irish patriotism that won him supporters as a fighter has mutated into a strand of far right irish nationalism as far back as mcgregor had expressed support for people protesting against immigration some irish politicians have accused him of fanning the flames of discontent online voicing his anger at ireland immigration policy a particularly sensitive issue given the country long history of emigration ireland a country of just over million people saw immigrants arrive in the year leading up to april the highest figure in years with some attracted by its strong economic performance according to the central statistics office ireland but for many ordinary workers the benefits are failing to reach their pockets and they are struggling to afford high housing prices and rents ireland next presidential election must take place by november in his instagram post thursday mcgregor said he would put the eu migration bill to a referendum if elected although i oppose greatly this pact it is neither mine nor government choice to make it is the people of ireland choice always he wrote this is the future of ireland with me as president but mcgregor faces an uphill task to get his name on the ballot as few irish lawmakers share his vehement anti immigrant views and many publicly criticized him after the civil case last november presidential candidates must be nominated by at least of the members of the lower and upper houses of parliament or by four of ireland local councils according to the country electoral commission the government of israel s prime minister benjamin netanyahu has voted to dismiss ronen bar the chief of israel s shin bet internal security service the vote in the early hours of friday local time could still be subject to appeals by israel s supreme court the government has now unanimously approved prime minister benjamin netanyahu s proposal to terminate the term of shin bet head ronen bar the prime minister s office said in a statement friday ronen bar will end his role as shin bet head on april or when a permanent shin bet head is appointed whichever comes first it added it came after netanyahu met with bar last week and informed him that he would propose his removal in a video statement released on sunday netanyahu said his ongoing distrust of bar had led to the move at all times but especially in such an existential war the prime minister must have full confidence in the head of the shin bet netanyahu said netanyahu added that removing bar would be necessary for achieving israel s war goals in gaza and preventing the next disaster the prime minister has frequently criticized the agency placing blame on its leaders for the security lapses that led to the hamas october attacks that killed more than people shin bet which is in charge of monitoring domestic threats to israel conducted an internal investigation that determined that the agency had failed in its mission to prevent the attacks but it also blamed policies enacted by netanyahu s government as contributing factors such as politicians visits to the al aqsa compound in jerusalem the treatment of prisoners and the perception that israeli society has been weakened due to the damage to social cohesion an israeli official told cnn on thursday that the government had lost all confidence in ronen bar who continues to cling to his seat while cynically using the families of the hostages and politically improperly using his position to fabricate futile unfounded investigations shin bet is reported to have recently opened an investigation into allegations that members of netanyahu s office inappropriately lobbied on behalf of qatar something his office denies on wednesday the office of attorney general gali baharav miara sent a letter to netanyahu saying that the government could not fire bar without the approval of a special committee netanyahu responded with a letter on thursday saying baharav miara was exceeding her authority and giving legal opinions and instructions to the government in violation of supreme court rulings bar released a statement just hours before his dismissal saying the vote by netanyahu s cabinet was hastily convened contrary to every basic legal rule dealing with the right to be heard and contrary to the position of the legal adviser to the government netanyahu has previously removed both bar and the head of the mossad intelligence service david barnea from the negotiating team engaging in indirect talks with hamas regarding the gaza ceasefire and hostage deal opposition politicians have criticized netanyahu s targeting of bar claiming it is politically motivated the dismissal of the head of the service at this time at the initiative of the prime minister sends a message to all those involved a message that may jeopardize the optimal outcome of the investigation this is a direct danger to the security of the state of israel bar said in his statement thursday significance our understanding of life on exoplanets and exomoons must be based on what we know about life on earth liquid water is the common ecological requirement for earth life temperature on an exoplanet is the first parameter to consider both because of its influence on liquid water and because it can be directly estimated from orbital and climate models of exoplanetary systems life needs some water but deserts show that even a little can be enough only a small amount of light from the central star is required to provide for photosynthesis some nitrogen must be present for life and the presence of oxygen would be a good indicator of photosynthesis and possibly complex life abstract the requirements for life on earth its elemental composition and its environmental limits provide a way to assess the habitability of exoplanets temperature is key both because of its influence on liquid water and because it can be directly estimated from orbital and climate models of exoplanetary systems life can grow and reproduce at temperatures as low as c and as high as c studies of life in extreme deserts show that on a dry world even a small amount of rain fog snow and even atmospheric humidity can be adequate for photosynthetic production producing a small but detectable microbial community life is able to use light at levels less than of the solar flux at earth uv or ionizing radiation can be tolerated by many microorganisms at very high levels and is unlikely to be life limiting on an exoplanet biologically available nitrogen may limit habitability levels of o over a few percent on an exoplanet would be consistent with the presence of multicellular organisms and high levels of o on earth like worlds indicate oxygenic photosynthesis other factors such as ph and salinity are likely to vary and not limit life over an entire planet or moon the list of exoplanets is increasing rapidly with a diversity of masses orbital distances and star types the long list motivates us to consider which of these worlds could support life and what type of life could live there the only approach to answering these questions is based on observations of life on earth compared with astronomical targets life on earth is easily studied and our knowledge of it is extensive but it is not complete the most important area in which we lack knowledge about life on earth is its origin we have no consensus theory for the origin of life nor do we know the timing or location what we do know about life on earth is what it is made of and we know its ecological requirements and limits thus it is not surprising that most of the discussions related to life on exoplanets focus on the requirements for life rather than its origin in this paper we follow this same approach but later return briefly to the question of the origin of life limits to life there are two somewhat different approaches to the question of the limits of life the first approach is to determine the requirements for life the second approach is to determine the extreme environments in which adapted organisms often referred to as extremophiles can survive both perspectives are relevant to the question of life on exoplanets it is useful to categorize the requirements for life on earth as four items energy carbon liquid water and various other elements these are listed in table along with the occurrence of these factors in the solar system in our solar system it is the occurrence of liquid water that appears to limit the occurrence of habitable environments and this appears to be the case for exoplanetary systems as well from basic thermodynamic considerations it is clear that life requires a source of energy to power metabolism and growth life on earth uses only one energy source that associated with the transfer of electrons by chemical reactions of reduction and oxidation for example methane producing microbes use the reaction of co with h to produce ch photosynthetic organisms use a light absorbing protein such as chlorophyll bacteriochlorophylls and bacteriorhodopsin to convert photon energy to the energy of an electron which then completes a redox reaction the electrons from the redox reaction are used to create an electrochemical gradient across cell membranes this occurs in the mitochondria in of most eukaryotes and in the cell membrane of prokaryotic cells it has recently been shown that electrons provided directly as electrical current can also drive microbial metabolism although life can detect and generate other energy sources including magnetic kinetic gravitational thermal gradient and electrostatic none of these is used for metabolic energy carbon has the dominant role as the backbone molecule of biochemistry for earth life and is widespread in the solar system however the abundance of carbon may not be a useful indication of the habitability of an exoplanet this is illustrated in fig which shows that the earth is significantly depleted in carbon compared with the outer solar system the vast majority of the carbon on earth is stored in sedimentary rocks within the crust however because light carbon containing molecules are volatile co co and ch adequate carbon is present at the surface of the earth as well as mars and venus leading candidates for the status of required elements table adapted from davies and koch lists the distribution of elements in the cosmos and on the earth and compares these with the common elements in life represented by humans and the bacterium escherichia coli if liquid water and biologically available nitrogen are present then phosphorous potassium sodium sulfur and calcium might come next on a requirements list as these are the next most abundant elements in bacteria however there is no definitive list and any list would depend on the organism considered for example habitability for methanogens requires high nickel levels in a strict sense habitability can only be confirmed by showing inhabitation no list is conclusive of these secondary elements n is probably the one most likely to be in question on an exoplanet as is discussed below sulfur and phosphorous and virtually all of the rest of the elements listed by davies and koch as used in life have major refractory phases at the temperatures of liquid water and should be available if water and rock interact the second approach to the requirements for life is that based on the abilities of extremophiles in a range of environmental factors table lists the limits of life under extreme conditions our understanding of the requirements for life listed in table has not changed for many years in contrast the limits of life listed in table have changed in several significant ways over the past few decades if one compares a list of the limits of life from a few decades ago with table the most notable change is in the high temperature limit this has been raised from c to c there has been considerable discussion on the limits of life and their application to the search for life on other worlds and it has been realized that the limits vary when organisms face multiple extreme conditions at the same time whereas the limits of life have changed in some ways over the past few decades there has been a more radical change in our appreciation of where microbial ecosystems can be found notable examples of the discovery of unexpected microbial ecosystems include endolithic microorganisms in the antarctic cold desert hot deep sea vents cool deep sea vents deep in basalt deep below the subsurface and in an ice covered antarctic lake that has been sealed for thousands of years several aspects of these recently discovered ecosystems are worth comment first the organisms found are not alien and map in expected areas of the tree of life second with the exception of the high temperature vents the organisms do not greatly extend the limits of life derived from more mundane and accessible ecosystems third the organisms themselves do not find these unusual environments extreme and typically are well adapted to the conditions under which they live and fourth the organisms in these environments do not in general control the physical environment temperature and pressure with their own metabolic activity but rather live in locations where the local physical conditions are suitable even when these environments are nestled within larger inhospitable areas the lesson to be learned from these discoveries is that microbial life is extremely adept at locating places to live and we have not been adept at anticipating how small environments can be habitable in otherwise barren locations microbial life is more clever than we are this is a factor that should inform our consideration of habitability of exoplanets strategy for exoplanets given the general requirements for life table the elemental composition of life table and the environmental limits for life table we can consider how to assess the habitability of the environment on an exoplanet it may seem logical to focus on primary production because without that there cannot be an ecosystem however it is possible that photochemical processes in an exoplanet atmosphere play the role of primary production as has been suggested for titan many of the limits to life in table such as ph and salinity are unlikely to be extreme over an entire world as on earth they would shape the distribution of life on a world but not its possible occurrence and are therefore not considered further the key parameters that could be extreme over an entire world and the order in which they may limit any life on an exoplanet are listed in he most important parameter for earth like life is the presence of liquid water which directly depends on pressure and temperature temperature is key both because of its influence on liquid water and because it can be directly estimated from orbital and climate models of exoplanetary systems we can consider the cold and hot limits temperature cold limit many organisms can grow and reproduce at temperatures well below the freezing point of pure water because their intracellular material contains salts and other solutes that lower the freezing point of the solution recently mykytczuk et al reported an isolate from arctic permafrost that grows and divides at c the lowest temperature demonstrated to date and is metabolically active at c in frozen soils thin films of water at the interface between ice and soil grains augmented by any solutes provide adequate water for life at these low temperatures the snow algae chlamydomonas nivalis thrives in liquid water associated with snow coloring it red but the algae are the beneficiaries of external processes that melt the snow microbial activity can generate sufficient heat in permafrost soils and landfills and composts such that it is a major contributor to melting but there is no known occurrence of an organism using metabolic energy coupled directly e g through enzymes to overcome the latent heat of fusion of ice thereby liquefying it temperature hot limit many of the exoplanets discovered to date have high surface temperatures and hence the high temperature limit of life is of particular interest takai et al showed growth survival and methane production by a methanogen at c where the high pressure mpa atmospheres stabilized the liquid water at higher pressure water can be liquid at even higher temperatures however as water is heated and maintained as a liquid under pressure the dielectric constant and the polarity of the liquid decreases sharply thus significantly changing its characteristics as a solvent and its interaction with dissolved biomolecules in particular lipids but also proteins and nucleic acids at c the dielectric constant is about half of the room temperature value it is likely that the destabilization of lipid bilayers as they become soluble in the lower dielectric constant water is what sets the high temperature limit on life it is therefore perhaps not surprising that the organisms that can survive the highest temperatures are archaea as their membrane lipids are held together with ether bonds which are chemically more resistant than ester bonds which are used in the membranes of nonarchaea denaturing of proteins with temperature appears also to play a role hot water in contact with rocks can be efficient in generating or recycling redox couples this has been suggested for the interior of enceladus such ecosystems provide a compelling example of possible life below the ocean of an exoplanet or exomoon and can even be productive enough to support multicellular life in the presence of an o rich environment fig shows a crab at the lost city hydrothermal vent water dry limit on worlds where the temperature is within the range discussed above life may be limited by the availability of water mars is an example of this thus the dry limit of life is of interest in dry environments phototrophs seek shelter and water retained in and below rocks fig shows photosynthetic cyanobacteria and lichens from several dry deserts fig a shows endolithic cyanobacteria which live just below the surface of halite rocks in the dry core of the atacama desert the water to support their growth comes from absorption of atmospheric moisture by the deliquescence of the salt fig b shows the green biofilm of cyanobacteria that live beneath translucent rocks in many deserts surviving on as little as a few days of rain or fog each year the example shown is from an unusual carbonate rock from the mojave desert that is clear inside but covered with a red coating fig c shows lichen forming a green and black layer inside sandstone from the dry valleys of antarctica which obtain water from melting of occasional snow these examples show that a small amount of rain fog or snow and even atmospheric humidity can be adequate for photosynthetic production producing a small but detectable microbial community photosynthesis in dry environments in the driest environments on earth photosynthesis occurs inside and under rocks a green layer of cyanobacteria living just below the surface of halite rocks in the dry core of the atacama desert b inverted samples of red coated carbonate translucent rocks from the mojave desert showing green biofilm of cyanobacteria that live beneath the rock c lichen forming a green and black layer inside sandstone from the dry valleys of antarctica scale bar in all images cm images a b and c are courtesy of j wierzchos c mckay and e i friedmann respectively energy energy for life can come from chemical redox couples generated by geothermal processes or light from the central star geothermal flux can arise from i the planet cooling off from its gravitational heat of formation ii decay of long lived radioactive elements or iii tidal heating for a close orbiting world or moon note that on earth only a tiny fraction of the geothermal heat is converted into chemical energy whereas about half the solar flux occurs at wavelengths that are usable for photosynthesis this is expected as the free energy available in heat flow is much less than that available in low entropy photons the example of earth indicates that a biosphere can have effects on a global scale and hence be detectable over interstellar distances only when it is powered by light life based on geothermally derived chemical energy would by dint of energy restrictions always remain small and globally insignificant life is able to use light at very low levels littler et al reported on growth of red macroalgae on deep seamounts at light levels of μmol m s raven et al have reviewed the minimum light levels for photosynthesis and also concluded that μmol m s is needed or of the direct solar flux at earth μmol m s even at the orbit of pluto light levels exceed this value by a factor of it has been suggested that exoplanets around m stars a common star type which radiates more in the infrared compared with the sun could support photosynthesis using a three or four photon mechanism photon instead of the two photon system used in plants on earth uv and radiation complex life forms such as humans are sensitive to radiation but the dose that can be tolerated by many microorganisms is astonishingly high given natural levels of radiation in the environment table lists the tolerances and acute dose survival for deinococcus radiodurans a well studied soil heterotroph with high radiation tolerance it has been suggested that the high radiation tolerance of d radiodurans is due to adaptation to dehydration stress desert cyanobacteria of the genus chroococcidiopsis shown in their characteristic hypolithic growth form in fig b are extremely resistant to desiccation ionizing radiation and uv an exoplanet would not require a magnetic field to be habitable any plausible field would not deflect galactic cosmic rays because these particles are much too energetic these particles are primarily stopped by the mass of the atmosphere or surface materials the column mass earth s atmosphere is equivalent to kg cm the earth s magnetic field does deflect solar protons channeling these particles to the polar regions creating the aurora however even without the magnetic field these particles would not penetrate the earth s atmosphere and would not reach the surface earth occasionally loses its strong dipole field during field reversals these events are not correlated with extinctions in the fossil record nitrogen life requires a source of nitrogen after carbon nitrogen is arguably the most important element needed for life experiments have shown that aerobic microorganisms require a minimum of atmospheres n for fixation a variety of energetic processes such as aurorae lightning and volcanoes can convert n to nitrate even in co atmospheres in the reducing conditions of the outer solar system n is present as ammonia which is also biologically usable the biological availability of nitrogen in an important factor in the assignment of habitability for mars o multicellular life on earth generally relies on oxygen metabolism and the rise of multicellular life over earth history tracked the rise of oxygen there are interesting exceptions to the connection between oxygen and multicellular life and the link to o may be in need of further scrutiny nonetheless levels of o over a few percent on an exoplanet would be consistent with and possibly indicative of the presence of multicellular organisms owen suggested that o and o would be suitable targets for spectroscopy in the search for evidence of life on exoplanets and exomoons it is generally agreed that high levels of o on earth like worlds indicate photosynthesis origin of life discussions of life on an exoplanet should logically begin with a consideration of the possible origin of life on that world however our understanding of the origin of life is speculative and so we can only assume that planets that have a diversity of habitable environments are also generative of life as shown in fig it is useful to divide theories for the origin of life on earth into two main categories depending on whether life originated independently on a world or was carried to that world from somewhere else the latter category is usually called panspermia and versions that involve both natural and directed panspermia have been considered there are possible panspermia schemes that are relevant to exoplanets napier has proposed that life could be carried on dust between stars see also ref and others have suggested rocks could travel between star systems if such dust grains or rocks were incorporated into the preplanetary nebula then every planet and moon that formed would be infected with life theories for the origin of life that propose that life on earth began on earth are labeled as terrestrial in fig and could apply to suitable exoplanets as well a key question for life on exoplanets is how long the habitable conditions liquid water must persist for life to begin the fossil record on earth provides only broad constraints on how long it took for life to start on this planet simulations of the formation of earth suggest that habitable conditions were present no sooner than billion y ago the earliest indication of possible life is present in the carbon isotope record at billion y ago and convincing evidence of life is present at billion y ago thus the origin of life occurred within million y after the formation of earth this is only an upper limit however and the process may have been much faster in a review of this question lazcano and miller suggested that in spite of the many uncertainties involved in the estimates of time for life to arise and evolve to cyanobacteria we see no compelling reason to assume that this process from the beginning of the primitive soup to cyanobacteria took more than million years however orgel criticized this conclusion and stated that we do not understand the steps that lead to life consequently we cannot estimate the time required attempts to circumvent this essential difficulty are based on misunderstandings of the nature of the problem thus until new data are obtained the problem of origin of life remains unsolvable titan life in the previous sections the considerations of life on exoplanets have centered on earth like life requiring liquid water this is certainly a reasonable starting point in the search for life however it may be that liquids other than water are also suitable media for carbon based life forms benner et al first suggested that the liquid hydrocarbons on titan could be the basis for life playing the role that water does for life on earth those researchers concluded that in many senses hydrocarbon solvents are better than water for managing complex organic chemical reactivity there is also suitable redox energy available for life organic molecules on the surface of titan such as acetylene ethane and solid organics would release energy if they reacted with hydrogen present in the atmosphere forming methane acetylene yields the most energy however all these reactions are kinetically inhibited and thus could be used by biology if suitable catalysts were evolved based on this mckay and smith predicted that a sign of life on a titan like world would be a depletion of hydrogen acetylene and ethane lunine suggested that titan like worlds and moons might be more common in the galaxy than earth like worlds gilliam and mckay showed how titan like worlds orbiting m type stars could maintain liquid methane and ethane surface reservoirs titan is an example moon that is of interest with respect to astrobiology in our solar system europa and enceladus are similarly of interest indeed enceladus seems to have all of the requirements for habitability it has long been recognized that moons of giant planets may be warmed by tidal heating from the primary planet and receive sufficient light from a central star to power photosynthesis this provides a model for possible habitable moons orbiting giant exoplanets conclusion as the number of known exoplanets and exomoons expands we will certainly find worlds that resemble the earth to varying extent based on our understanding of life on earth we can present a checklist for speculating on the possibilities of life on these distant worlds i is the temperature between c and c and a total pressure high enough to keep water liquid water stable p atmospheres ii if the world is arid are there at last a few days per year of rain fog snow or rh iii are there adequate light or geothermal energy sources light determined by distance from the star geothermal energy estimated by bulk density iv are the uv and ionizing radiation below the very high limits of microbial tolerance v is there a biologically available source of nitrogen vi if o is present at over atmospheres there could be complex life and the presence of o is convincing indicator of photosynthetic life on earth like worlds significance the composition of the biosphere is a fundamental question in biology yet a global quantitative account of the biomass of each taxon is still lacking we assemble a census of the biomass of all kingdoms of life this analysis provides a holistic view of the composition of the biosphere and allows us to observe broad patterns over taxonomic categories geographic locations and trophic modes abstract a census of the biomass on earth is key for understanding the structure and dynamics of the biosphere however a global quantitative view of how the biomass of different taxa compare with one another is still lacking here we assemble the overall biomass composition of the biosphere establishing a census of the gigatons of carbon gt c of biomass distributed among all of the kingdoms of life we find that the kingdoms of life concentrate at different locations on the planet plants gt c the dominant kingdom are primarily terrestrial whereas animals gt c are mainly marine and bacteria gt c and archaea gt c are predominantly located in deep subsurface environments we show that terrestrial biomass is about two orders of magnitude higher than marine biomass and estimate a total of gt c of marine biota doubling the previous estimated quantity our analysis reveals that the global marine biomass pyramid contains more consumers than producers thus increasing the scope of previous observations on inverse food pyramids finally we highlight that the mass of humans is an order of magnitude higher than that of all wild mammals combined and report the historical impact of humanity on the global biomass of prominent taxa including mammals fish and plants sign up for pnas alerts get alerts for new articles or get an alert when an article is cited one of the most fundamental efforts in biology is to describe the composition of the living world centuries of research have yielded an increasingly detailed picture of the species that inhabit our planet and their respective roles in global ecosystems in describing a complex system like the biosphere it is critical to quantify the abundance of individual components of the system i e species broader taxonomic groups a quantitative description of the distribution of biomass is essential for taking stock of biosequestered carbon and modeling global biogeochemical cycles as well as for understanding the historical effects and future impacts of human activities earlier efforts to estimate global biomass have mostly focused on plants in parallel a dominant role for prokaryotic biomass has been advocated in a landmark paper by whitman et al entitled prokaryotes the unseen majority new sampling and detection techniques make it possible to revisit this claim likewise for other taxa such as fish recent global sampling campaigns have resulted in updated estimates often differing by an order of magnitude or more from previous estimates for groups such as arthropods global estimates are still lacking all of the above efforts are each focused on a single taxon we are aware of only two attempts at a comprehensive accounting of all biomass components on earth whittaker and likens made a remarkable effort in the early s noting even then that their study was intended for early obsolescence it did not include for example bacterial or fungal biomass the other attempt by smil was included as a subsection of a book intended for a broad readership his work details characteristic values for the biomass of various taxa in many environments finally wikipedia serves as a highly effective platform for making accessible a range of estimates on various taxa https en wikipedia org wiki biomass ecology global biomass but currently falls short of a comprehensive or integrated view in the past decade several major technological and scientific advances have facilitated an improved quantitative account of the biomass on earth next generation sequencing has enabled a more detailed and cultivation independent view of the composition of natural communities based on the relative abundance of genomes better remote sensing tools enable us to probe the environment on a global scale with unprecedented resolution and specificity the tara oceans expedition is among recent efforts at global sampling that are expanding our view and coverage continental counterpart efforts such as the national ecological observatory network in north america add more finely resolved continent specific details affording us more robust descriptions of natural habitats here we either assemble or generate estimates of the biomass for each of the major taxonomic groups that contribute to the global biomass distribution our analysis described in detail in si appendix is based on hundreds of studies including recent studies that have overturned earlier estimates for many taxa e g fish subsurface prokaryotes marine eukaryotes soil fauna results the biomass distribution of the biosphere by kingdom in fig and table we report our best estimates for the biomass of each taxon analyzed we use biomass as a measure of abundance which allows us to compare taxa whose members are of very different sizes biomass is also a useful metric for quantifying stocks of elements sequestered in living organisms we report biomass using the mass of carbon as this measure is independent of water content and has been used extensively in the literature alternative measures for biomass such as dry weight are discussed in materials and methods for ease of discussion we report biomass in gigatons of carbon with gt c g of carbon we supply additional estimates for the number of individuals of different taxa in whereas groups like insects dominate in terms of species richness with about million described species their relative biomass fraction is miniscule some species contribute much more than entire families or even classes for example the antarctic krill species euphausia superba contributes gt c to global biomass similar to other prominent species such as humans or cows this value is comparable to the contribution from termites which contain many species and far surpasses the biomass of entire vertebrate classes such as birds in this way the picture that arises from taking a biomass perspective of the biosphere complements the focus on species richness that is commonly held si appendix fig s the uncertainty associated with global biomass estimates the specific methods used for each taxon are highly diverse and are given in detail in the si appendix along with data sources global biomass estimates vary in the amount of information they are based on and consequently in their uncertainty an estimate of relatively high certainty is that of plants which is based on several independent sources one of these is the forest resource assessment a survey on the state of world forests conducted by the international food and agriculture organization fao the assessment is based on a collection of country reports that detail the area and biomass density of forests in each country using a standardized format and methodology the fao also keeps a record of nonforest ecosystems such as savannas and shrublands in each country alternatively remote sensing data give high coverage of measurements that indicate plant biomass remote sensing is used to measure for example the height of trees or the number of tree stems per unit area biomass is inferred by field measurements establishing a connection between tree plant biomass and satellite based remote sensing measurements combining data from independent sources such as these enables a robust assessment of the total plant biomass a more characteristic case with larger uncertainties is exemplified by marine prokaryotes where cell concentrations are measured in various locations and binned based on depth for each depth range the average cell concentration is calculated and the total number of marine prokaryotes is estimated through multiplication by the water volume in each depth range the total number of cells is converted to biomass by using the characteristic carbon content per marine prokaryote in cases where there are fewer measurements e g terrestrial arthropods terrestrial protists the possibility of systematic biases in the estimate is greater and the uncertainty larger to test the robustness of our estimates we used independent approaches and analyzed the agreement between such independent estimates details on the specific methodologies used for each taxon are provided in the si appendix because most datasets used to estimate global biomass rely on fragmentary sampling we project large uncertainties that will be reduced as additional data become available the impact of humanity on the biosphere over the relatively short span of human history major innovations such as the domestication of livestock adoption of an agricultural lifestyle and the industrial revolution have increased the human population dramatically and have had radical ecological effects today the biomass of humans gt c si appendix table s and the biomass of livestock gt c dominated by cattle and pigs si appendix table s far surpass that of wild mammals which has a mass of gt c si appendix table s this is also true for wild and domesticated birds for which the biomass of domesticated poultry gt c dominated by chickens is about threefold higher than that of wild birds gt c si appendix table s in fact humans and livestock outweigh all vertebrates combined with the exception of fish even though humans and livestock dominate mammalian biomass they are a small fraction of the gt c of animal biomass which primarily comprises arthropods gt c si appendix tables s and s followed by fish gt c si appendix table s comparison of current global biomass with prehuman values which are very difficult to estimate accurately demonstrates the impact of humans on the biosphere human activity contributed to the quaternary megafauna extinction between and y ago which claimed around half of the large kg land mammal species the biomass of wild land mammals before this period of extinction was estimated by barnosky at gt c the present day biomass of wild land mammals is approximately sevenfold lower at gt c si appendix pre human biomass and chordates and table s intense whaling and exploitation of other marine mammals have resulted in an approximately fivefold decrease in marine mammal global biomass from gt c to gt c while the total biomass of wild mammals both marine and terrestrial decreased by a factor of the total mass of mammals increased approximately fourfold from gt c to gt c due to the vast increase of the biomass of humanity and its associated livestock human activity has also impacted global vertebrate stocks with a decrease of gt c in total fish biomass an amount similar to the remaining total biomass in fisheries and to the gain in the total mammalian biomass due to livestock husbandry si appendix pre human biomass the impact of human civilization on global biomass has not been limited to mammals but has also profoundly reshaped the total quantity of carbon sequestered by plants a worldwide census of the total number of trees as well as a comparison of actual and potential plant biomass has suggested that the total plant biomass and by proxy the total biomass on earth has declined approximately twofold relative to its value before the start of human civilization the total biomass of crops cultivated by humans is estimated at gt c which accounts for only of the extant total plant biomass the distribution of biomass across environments and trophic modes examining global biomass in different environments exposes stark differences between terrestrial and marine environments the ocean covers of the earth s surface and occupies a much larger volume than the terrestrial environment yet land biomass at gt c is about two orders of magnitude higher than the gt c in marine biomass as shown in fig a even though there is a large difference in the biomass content of the terrestrial and marine environments the primary productivity of the two environments is roughly equal for plants we find that most biomass is concentrated in terrestrial environments plants have only a small fraction of marine biomass gt c in the form of green algae and seagrass fig b for animals most biomass is concentrated in the marine environment and for bacteria and archaea most biomass is concentrated in deep subsurface environments we note that several of the results in fig b should be interpreted with caution due to the large uncertainty associated with some of the estimates mostly those of total terrestrial protists marine fungi and contributions from deep subsurface environments when analyzing trophic levels the biomass of primary producers on land is much larger than that of primary and secondary consumers in stark contrast in the oceans gt c of primary producers supports gt c of consumer biomass resulting in an inverted standing biomass distribution as shown in fig c such inverted biomass distributions can occur when primary producers have a rapid turnover of biomass on the order of days while consumer biomass turns over much more slowly a few years in the case of mesopelagic fish thus the standing stock of consumers is larger even though the productivity of producers is necessarily higher previous reports have observed inverted biomass pyramids in local marine environments an additional study noted an inverted consumer producer ratio for the global plankton biomass our analysis suggests that these observations hold true when looking at the global biomass of all producers and consumers in the marine environment discussion our census of the distribution of biomass on earth provides an integrated global picture of the relative and absolute abundances of all kingdoms of life we find that the biomass of plants dominates the biomass of the biosphere and is mostly located on land the marine environment is primarily occupied by microbes mainly bacteria and protists which account for of the total marine biomass the remaining is mainly composed of arthropods and fish the deep subsurface holds of the total biomass in the biosphere it is chiefly composed of bacteria and archaea which are mostly surface attached and turn over their biomass every several months to thousands of years in addition to summarizing current knowledge of the global biomass distribution our work highlights gaps in the current understanding of the biosphere our knowledge of the biomass composition of different taxa is mainly determined by our ability to sample their biomass in the wild for groups such as plants the use of multiple sources to estimate global biomass increases our confidence in the validity of current estimates however for other groups such as terrestrial arthropods and protists quantitative sampling of biomass is limited by technical constraints and comprehensive data are thus lacking beyond specific taxa there are entire environments for which our knowledge is very limited namely the deep subsurface environments such as deep aquifers and the ocean s crust which might hold the world largest aquifer studies in these environments are scarce meaning that our estimates have particularly high uncertainty ranges and unknown systematic biases main gaps in our knowledge of these environments pertain to the distribution of biomass between the aquifer fluids and the surrounding rocks and the distribution of biomass between different microbial taxa such as bacteria archaea protists and fungi scientists have closely monitored the impact of humans on global biodiversity but less attention has been given to total biomass resulting in high uncertainty regarding the impact of humanity on the biomass of vertebrates our estimates for the current and prehuman biomasses of vertebrates are only a crude first step in calculating these values si appendix prehuman biomass the biomass of amphibians which are experiencing a dramatic population decline remains poorly characterized future research could reduce the uncertainty of current estimates by sampling more environments which will better represent the diverse biosphere on earth in the case of prokaryotes some major improvements were recently realized with global estimates of marine deep subsurface prokaryote biomass reduced by about two orders of magnitude due to an increased diversity of sampling locations identifying gaps in our knowledge could indicate areas for which further scientific exploration could have the biggest impact on our understanding of the biosphere as a concrete example we identify the ratio between attached to unattached cells in the deep aquifers as a major contributor to the uncertainties associated with our estimate of the biomass of bacteria archaea and viruses improving our understanding of this specific parameter could help us better constrain the global biomasses of entire domains of life in addition to improving our reported estimates future studies can achieve a finer categorization of taxa for example the biomass of parasites which is not resolved from their hosts in this study might be larger than the biomass of top predators in some environments by providing a unified updated and accessible global view of the biomass of different taxa we also aim to disseminate knowledge of the biosphere composition to a wide range of students and researchers our survey puts into perspective claims regarding the overarching dominance of groups such as termites and ants nematodes and prokaryotes for example the biomass of termites gt c is on par with that of humans but is still around an order of magnitude smaller than that of other taxa such as fish gt c si appendix table s other groups such as nematodes surpass any other animal species in terms of number of individuals si appendix fig s but constitute only about of the total animal biomass the census of biomass distribution on earth presented here is comprehensive in scope and based on synthesis of data from the recent scientific literature the integrated dataset enables us to draw basic conclusions concerning kingdoms that dominate the biomass of the biosphere the distribution of biomass of each kingdom across different environments and the opposite structures of the global marine and terrestrial biomass pyramids we identify areas in which current knowledge is lacking and further research is most required ideally future research will include both temporal and geographic resolution we believe that the results described in this study will provide students and researchers with a holistic quantitative context for studying our biosphere materials and methods taxon specific detailed description of data sources and procedures for estimating biomass the complete account of the data sources used for estimating the biomass of each taxon procedures for estimating biomass and projections for the uncertainty associated with the estimate for the biomass of each taxon are provided in the si appendix to make the steps for estimating the biomass of each taxon more accessible we provide supplementary tables that summarize the procedure as well as online notebooks for the calculation of the biomass of each taxon see data flow scheme in si appendix overview in table we detail the relevant supplementary table that summarizes the steps for arriving at each estimate all of the data used to generate our estimates as well as the code used for analysis are open sourced and available at https github com milo lab biomass distribution choice of units for measuring biomass biomass is reported in gigatons of carbon alternative options to represent biomass include among others biovolume wet mass or dry weight we chose to use carbon mass as the measure of biomass because it is independent of water content and is used extensively in the literature dry mass also has these features but is used less frequently all of our reported values can be transformed to dry weight to a good approximation by multiplying by the characteristic conversion factor between carbon and total dry mass we report the significant digits for our values throughout the paper using the following scheme for values with an uncertainty projection that is higher than twofold we report a single significant digit for values with an uncertainty projection of less than twofold we report two significant digits in cases when we report one significant digit we do not consider a leading as a significant digit general framework for estimating global biomass in achieving global estimates there is a constant challenge of how to move from a limited set of local samples to a representative global value how does one estimate global biomass based on a limited set of local samples for a crude estimate the average of all local values of biomass per unit area is multiplied by the total global area a more effective estimate can be made by correlating measured values to environmental parameters that are known at a global scale e g temperature depth distance from shore primary productivity biome type as shown in fig this correlation is used to extrapolate the biomass of a taxon at a specific location based on the known distribution of the environmental parameter e g the temperature at each location on the globe by integrating across the total surface of the world a global estimate is derived we detail the specific extrapolation procedure used for each taxon in both the si appendix and supplementary tables si appendix tables s s for most taxa our best estimates are based on a geometric mean of several independent estimates using different methodologies the geometric mean estimates the median value if the independent estimates are log normally distributed or more generally the distribution of estimates is symmetrical in log space uncertainty estimation and reporting global estimates such as those we use in the present work are largely based on sampling from the distribution of biomass worldwide and then extrapolating for areas in which samples are missing the sampling of biomass in each location can be based on direct biomass measurements or conversion to biomass from other types of measurement such as number of individuals and their characteristic weight some of the main sources of uncertainty for the estimates we present are the result of using such geographical extrapolations and conversion from number of individuals to overall biomass the certainty of the estimate is linked to the amount of sampling on which the estimate is based notable locations in which sampling is scarce are the deep ocean usually deeper than m and deep layers of soil usually deeper than m for some organisms such as annelids and marine protists and arthropods most estimates neglect these environments thus underestimating the actual biomass sampling can be biased toward places that have high abundance and diversity of wildlife relying on data with such sampling bias can cause overestimation of the actual biomass of a taxon another source of uncertainty comes from conversion to biomass conversion from counts of individuals to biomass is based on either known average weights per individual e g kg of wet weight for a human which averages over adults and children or mg of dry weight for a characteristic earthworm or empirical allometric equations that are organism specific such as conversion from animal length to biomass when using such conversion methods there is a risk of introducing biases and noise into the final estimate nevertheless there is often no way around using such conversions as such we must be aware that the data may contain such biases in addition to describing the procedures leading to the estimate of each taxon we quantitatively survey the main sources of uncertainty associated with each estimate and calculate an uncertainty range for each of our biomass estimates we choose to report uncertainties as representing to the best of our ability given the many constraints what is equivalent to a confidence interval for the estimate of the mean uncertainties reported in our analysis are multiplicative fold change from the mean and not additive change of the estimate we chose to use multiplicative uncertainty as it is more robust to large fluctuations in estimates and because it is in accord with the way we generate our best estimates which is usually by using a geometric mean of different independent estimates our uncertainty projections are focused on the main kingdoms of life plants bacteria archaea fungi protists and animals the general framework for constructing our uncertainties described in detail for each taxon in the si appendix and in the online notebooks takes into account both intrastudy uncertainty and interstudy uncertainty intrastudy uncertainty refers to uncertainty estimates reported within a specific study whereas interstudy uncertainty refers to variation in estimates of a certain quantity between different papers in many cases we use several independent methodologies to estimate the same quantity in these cases we can also use the variation between estimates from each methodology as a measure of the uncertainty of our final estimate we refer to this type of uncertainty as intermethod uncertainty the way we usually calculate uncertainties is by taking the logarithm of the values reported either within studies or from different studies taking the logarithm moves the values to log space where the se is calculated by dividing the sd by the square root of the number of values we then multiply the se by a factor of which would give the confidence interval if the transformed data were normally distributed finally we exponentiate the result to get the multiplicative factor in linear space that represents the confidence interval akin to a confidence interval if the data were log normally distributed most of our estimates are constructed by combining several different estimates e g combining total number of individuals and characteristic carbon content of a single organism in these cases we use intrastudy interstudy or intermethod variation associated with each parameter that is used to derive the final estimate and propagate these uncertainties to the final estimate of biomass the uncertainty analysis for each specific biomass estimate incorporates different components of this general scheme depending on the amount of information that is available as detailed on a case by case basis in the si appendix in cases where information is ample the procedure described above yields several different uncertainty estimates for each parameter that we use to derive the final estimate e g intrastudy uncertainty interstudy uncertainty we integrate these different uncertainties usually by taking the highest value as the best projection of uncertainty in some cases for example when information is scarce or some sources of uncertainty are hard to quantify we base our estimates on the uncertainty in analogous taxa and consultation with relevant experts we tend to round up our uncertainty projections when data are especially limited taxonomic levels used our census gives estimates for the global biomass at various taxonomic levels our main results relate to the kingdom level animals archaea bacteria fungi plants and protists although the division into kingdoms is not the most contemporary taxonomic grouping that exists we chose to use it for the current analysis as most of the data we rely upon does not provide finer taxonomic details e g the division of terrestrial protists is mainly based on morphology and not on taxonomy we supplement these kingdoms of living organisms with an estimate for the global biomass of viruses which are not included in the current tree of life but play a key role in global biogeochemical cycles for all kingdoms except animals all taxa making up the kingdom are considered together for estimating the biomass of animals we use a bottom up approach which estimates the biomass of key phyla constituting the animal kingdom the sum of the biomass of these phyla represents our estimate of the total biomass of animals we give estimates for most phyla and estimate bounds for the possible biomass contribution for the remaining phyla si appendix other animal phyla within chordates we provide estimates for key classes such as fish mammals and birds we estimate that the contribution of reptiles and amphibians to the total chordate biomass is negligible as we discuss in the si appendix we divide the class of mammals into wild mammals and humans plus livestock without a contribution from poultry which is negligible compared with cattle and pigs even though livestock is not a valid taxonomic division we use it to consider the impact of humans on the total biomass of mammals data availability acknowledgments we thank shai meiri for help with estimating the biomass of wild mammals birds and reptiles and arren bar even oded beja jorg bernhardt tristan biard chris bowler nuno carvalhais otto coredero gidon eshel ofer feinerman noah fierer daniel fisher avi flamholtz assaf gal josé grünzweig marcel van der heijden dina hochhauser julie huber qusheng jin bo barker jørgensen jens kallmeyer tamir klein christian koerner daniel madar fabrice not katherine o donnell gal ofir victoria orphan noam prywes john raven dave savage einat segev maya shamir izak smit rotem sorek ofer steinitz miri tsalyuk assaf vardi colomban de vargas joshua weitz yossi yovel yonatan zegman and two anonymous reviewers for productive feedback on this manuscript this research was supported by the european research council project novcarbfix the israel science foundation grant the isf nrf singapore joint research program grant the beck canadian center for alternative energy research dana and yossie hollander the ullmann family foundation the helmsley charitable foundation the larson charitable foundation the wolfson family charitable trust charles rothschild and selmo nussenbaum this study was also supported by the nih through grant r gm mira r m is the charles and louise gartner professional chair a car or an automobile is a motor vehicle with wheels most definitions of cars state that they run primarily on roads seat one to eight people have four wheels and mainly transport people rather than cargo there are around one billion cars in use worldwide the french inventor nicolas joseph cugnot built the first steam powered road vehicle in while the swiss inventor françois isaac de rivaz designed and constructed the first internal combustion powered automobile in the modern car a practical marketable automobile for everyday use was invented in when the german inventor carl benz patented his benz patent motorwagen commercial cars became widely available during the th century the oldsmobile curved dash and the ford model t both american cars are widely considered the first mass produced and mass affordable cars respectively cars were rapidly adopted in the us where they replaced horse drawn carriages in europe and other parts of the world demand for automobiles did not increase until after world war ii in the st century car usage is still increasing rapidly especially in china india and other newly industrialised countries cars have controls for driving parking passenger comfort and a variety of lamps over the decades additional features and controls have been added to vehicles making them progressively more complex these include rear reversing cameras air conditioning navigation systems and in car entertainment most cars in use in the early s are propelled by an internal combustion engine fueled by the combustion of fossil fuels electric cars which were invented early in the history of the car became commercially available in the s and are predicted to cost less to buy than petrol driven cars before the transition from fossil fuel powered cars to electric cars features prominently in most climate change mitigation scenarios such as project drawdown s actionable solutions for climate change there are costs and benefits to car use the costs to the individual include acquiring the vehicle interest payments if the car is financed repairs and maintenance fuel depreciation driving time parking fees taxes and insurance the costs to society include maintaining roads land use road congestion air pollution noise pollution public health and disposing of the vehicle at the end of its life traffic collisions are the largest cause of injury related deaths worldwide personal benefits include on demand transportation mobility independence and convenience societal benefits include economic benefits such as job and wealth creation from the automotive industry transportation provision societal well being from leisure and travel opportunities people s ability to move flexibly from place to place has far reaching implications for the nature of societies the english word car is believed to originate from latin carrus carrum wheeled vehicle or via old north french middle english carre two wheeled cart both of which in turn derive from gaulish karros chariot it originally referred to any wheeled horse drawn vehicle such as a cart carriage or wagon the word also occurs in other celtic languages motor car attested from is the usual formal term in british english autocar a variant likewise attested from and literally meaning self propelled car is now considered archaic horseless carriage is attested from automobile a classical compound derived from ancient greek autós αὐτός self and latin mobilis movable entered english from french and was first adopted by the automobile club of great britain in it fell out of favour in britain and is now used chiefly in north america where the abbreviated form auto commonly appears as an adjective in compound formations like auto industry and auto mechanic in hans hautsch of nuremberg built a clockwork driven carriage the first steam powered vehicle was designed by ferdinand verbiest a flemish member of a jesuit mission in china around it was a centimetre long in scale model toy for the kangxi emperor that was unable to carry a driver or a passenger it is not known with certainty if verbiest s model was successfully built or run nicolas joseph cugnot is widely credited with building the first full scale self propelled mechanical vehicle in about he created a steam powered tricycle he also constructed two steam tractors for the french army one of which is preserved in the french national conservatory of arts and crafts his inventions were limited by problems with water supply and maintaining steam pressure in richard trevithick built and demonstrated his puffing devil road locomotive believed by many to be the first demonstration of a steam powered road vehicle it was unable to maintain sufficient steam pressure for long periods and was of little practical use the development of external combustion steam engines is detailed as part of the history of the car but often treated separately from the development of true cars a variety of steam powered road vehicles were used during the first part of the th century including steam cars steam buses phaetons and steam rollers in the united kingdom sentiment against them led to the locomotive acts of in nicéphore niépce and his brother claude created what was probably the world s first internal combustion engine which they called a pyréolophore but installed it in a boat on the river saone in france coincidentally in the swiss inventor françois isaac de rivaz designed his own de rivaz internal combustion engine and used it to develop the world s first vehicle to be powered by such an engine the niépces pyréolophore was fuelled by a mixture of lycopodium powder dried spores of the lycopodium plant finely crushed coal dust and resin that were mixed with oil whereas de rivaz used a mixture of hydrogen and oxygen neither design was successful as was the case with others such as samuel brown samuel morey and etienne lenoir who each built vehicles usually adapted carriages or carts powered by internal combustion engines in november french inventor gustave trouvé demonstrated a three wheeled car powered by electricity at the international exposition of electricity although several other german engineers including gottlieb daimler wilhelm maybach and siegfried marcus were working on cars at about the same time the year is regarded as the birth year of the modern car a practical marketable automobile for everyday use when the german carl benz patented his benz patent motorwagen he is generally acknowledged as the inventor of the car in benz was granted a patent for his first engine which had been designed in many of his other inventions made the use of the internal combustion engine feasible for powering a vehicle his first motorwagen was built in in mannheim germany he was awarded the patent for its invention as of his application on january under the auspices of his major company benz cie which was founded in benz began promotion of the vehicle on july and about benz vehicles were sold between and when his first four wheeler was introduced along with a cheaper model they also were powered with four stroke engines of his own design emile roger of france already producing benz engines under license now added the benz car to his line of products because france was more open to the early cars initially more were built and sold in france through roger than benz sold in germany in august bertha benz the wife and business partner of carl benz undertook the first road trip by car to prove the road worthiness of her husband s invention in benz designed and patented the first internal combustion flat engine called boxermotor during the last years of the th century benz was the largest car company in the world with units produced in and because of its size benz cie became a joint stock company the first motor car in central europe and one of the first factory made cars in the world was produced by czech company nesselsdorfer wagenbau later renamed to tatra in the präsident automobil daimler and maybach founded daimler motoren gesellschaft dmg in cannstatt in and sold their first car in under the brand name daimler it was a horse drawn stagecoach built by another manufacturer which they retrofitted with an engine of their design by about vehicles had been built by daimler and maybach either at the daimler works or in the hotel hermann where they set up shop after disputes with their backers benz maybach and the daimler team seem to have been unaware of each other s early work they never worked together by the time of the merger of the two companies daimler and maybach were no longer part of dmg daimler died in and later that year maybach designed an engine named daimler mercedes that was placed in a specially ordered model built to specifications set by emil jellinek this was a production of a small number of vehicles for jellinek to race and market in his country two years later in a new model dmg car was produced and the model was named mercedes after the maybach engine which generated hp maybach quit dmg shortly thereafter and opened a business of his own rights to the daimler brand name were sold to other manufacturers in Émile levassor and armand peugeot of france began producing vehicles with daimler engines and so laid the foundation of the automotive industry in france in auguste doriot and his peugeot colleague louis rigoulot completed the longest trip by a petrol driven vehicle when their self designed and built daimler powered peugeot type completed kilometres mi from valentigney to paris and brest and back again they were attached to the first paris brest paris bicycle race but finished six days after the winning cyclist charles terront the first design for an american car with a petrol internal combustion engine was made in by george selden of rochester new york selden applied for a patent for a car in but the patent application expired because the vehicle was never built after a delay of years and a series of attachments to his application on november selden was granted a us patent u s patent for a two stroke car engine which hindered more than encouraged development of cars in the united states his patent was challenged by henry ford and others and overturned in in the first running petrol driven american car was built and road tested by the duryea brothers of springfield massachusetts the first public run of the duryea motor wagon took place on september on taylor street in metro center springfield studebaker subsidiary of a long established wagon and coach manufacturer started to build cars in and commenced sales of electric vehicles in and petrol vehicles in in britain there had been several attempts to build steam cars with varying degrees of success with thomas rickett even attempting a production run in santler from malvern is recognised by the veteran car club of great britain as having made the first petrol driven car in the country in followed by frederick william lanchester in but these were both one offs the first production vehicles in great britain came from the daimler company a company founded by harry j lawson in after purchasing the right to use the name of the engines lawson s company made its first car in and they bore the name daimler in german engineer rudolf diesel was granted a patent for a new rational combustion engine in he built the first diesel engine steam electric and petrol driven vehicles competed for a few decades with petrol internal combustion engines achieving dominance in the s although various pistonless rotary engine designs have attempted to compete with the conventional piston and crankshaft design only mazda s version of the wankel engine has had more than very limited success all in all it is estimated that over patents created the modern automobile and motorcycle large scale production line manufacturing of affordable cars was started by ransom olds in at his oldsmobile factory in lansing michigan and based upon stationary assembly line techniques pioneered by marc isambard brunel at the portsmouth block mills england in the assembly line style of mass production and interchangeable parts had been pioneered in the us by thomas blanchard in at the springfield armory in springfield massachusetts this concept was greatly expanded by henry ford beginning in with the world s first moving assembly line for cars at the highland park ford plant as a result ford s cars came off the line in minute intervals much faster than previous methods increasing productivity eightfold while using less manpower from manhours to hour minutes it was so successful paint became a bottleneck only japan black would dry fast enough forcing the company to drop the variety of colours available before until fast drying duco lacquer was developed in this is the source of ford s apocryphal remark any color as long as it s black in an assembly line worker could buy a model t with four months pay ford s complex safety procedures especially assigning each worker to a specific location instead of allowing them to roam about dramatically reduced the rate of injury the combination of high wages and high efficiency is called fordism and was copied by most major industries the efficiency gains from the assembly line also coincided with the economic rise of the us the assembly line forced workers to work at a certain pace with very repetitive motions which led to more output per worker while other countries were using less productive methods in the automotive industry its success was dominating and quickly spread worldwide seeing the founding of ford france and ford britain in ford denmark ford germany in citroën was the first native european manufacturer to adopt the production method soon companies had to have assembly lines or risk going bankrupt by companies which did not had disappeared development of automotive technology was rapid due in part to the hundreds of small manufacturers competing to gain the world s attention key developments included electric ignition and the electric self starter both by charles kettering for the cadillac motor company in independent suspension and four wheel brakes since the s nearly all cars have been mass produced to meet market needs so marketing plans often have heavily influenced car design it was alfred p sloan who established the idea of different makes of cars produced by one company called the general motors companion make program so that buyers could move up as their fortunes improved reflecting the rapid pace of change makes shared parts with one another so larger production volume resulted in lower costs for each price range for example in the s lasalles sold by cadillac used cheaper mechanical parts made by oldsmobile in the s chevrolet shared bonnet doors roof and windows with pontiac by the s corporate powertrains and shared platforms with interchangeable brakes suspension and other parts were common even so only major makers could afford high costs and even companies with decades of production such as apperson cole dorris haynes or premier could not manage of some two hundred american car makers in existence in only survived in and with the great depression by only of those were left in europe much the same would happen morris set up its production line at cowley in and soon outsold ford while beginning in to follow ford s practice of vertical integration buying hotchkiss british subsidiary engines wrigley gearboxes and osberton radiators for instance as well as competitors such as wolseley in morris had per cent of total british car production most british small car assemblers from abbey to xtra had gone under citroën did the same in france coming to cars in between them and other cheap cars in reply such as renault s cv and peugeot s cv they produced cars in and mors hurtu and others could not compete germany s first mass manufactured car the opel ps laubfrosch tree frog came off the line at rüsselsheim in soon making opel the top car builder in germany with per cent of the market in japan car production was very limited before world war ii only a handful of companies were producing vehicles in limited numbers and these were small three wheeled for commercial uses like daihatsu or were the result of partnering with european companies like isuzu building the wolseley a in mitsubishi was also partnered with fiat and built the mitsubishi model a based on a fiat vehicle toyota nissan suzuki mazda and honda began as companies producing non automotive products before the war switching to car production during the s kiichiro toyoda s decision to take toyoda loom works into automobile manufacturing would create what would eventually become toyota motor corporation the largest automobile manufacturer in the world subaru meanwhile was formed from a conglomerate of six companies who banded together as fuji heavy industries as a result of having been broken up under keiretsu legislation fossil fuels most cars in use in the early s run on petrol burnt in an internal combustion engine ice some cities ban older more polluting petrol driven cars and some countries plan to ban sales in future however some environmental groups say this phase out of fossil fuel vehicles must be brought forwards to limit climate change production of petrol fuelled cars peaked in other hydrocarbon fossil fuels also burnt by deflagration rather than detonation in ice cars include diesel autogas and cng removal of fossil fuel subsidies concerns about oil dependence tightening environmental laws and restrictions on greenhouse gas emissions are propelling work on alternative power systems for cars this includes hybrid vehicles plug in electric vehicles and hydrogen vehicles out of all cars sold in nine per cent were electric and by the end of that year there were more than million electric cars on the world s roads despite rapid growth less than two per cent of cars on the world s roads were fully electric and plug in hybrid cars by the end of cars for racing or speed records have sometimes employed jet or rocket engines but these are impractical for common use oil consumption has increased rapidly in the th and st centuries because there are more cars the s oil glut even fuelled the sales of low economy vehicles in oecd countries the bric countries are adding to this consumption batteries main article electric vehicle battery see also electric car batteries and automotive battery in almost all hybrid even mild hybrid and pure electric cars regenerative braking recovers and returns to a battery some energy which would otherwise be wasted by friction brakes getting hot although all cars must have friction brakes front disc brakes and either disc or drum rear brakes for emergency stops regenerative braking improves efficiency particularly in city driving cars are equipped with controls used for driving passenger comfort and safety normally operated by a combination of the use of feet and hands and occasionally by voice on st century cars these controls include a steering wheel pedals for operating the brakes and controlling the car s speed and in a manual transmission car a clutch pedal a shift lever or stick for changing gears and a number of buttons and dials for turning on lights ventilation and other functions modern cars controls are now standardised such as the location for the accelerator and brake but this was not always the case controls are evolving in response to new technologies for example the electric car and the integration of mobile communications some of the original controls are no longer required for example all cars once had controls for the choke valve clutch ignition timing and a crank instead of an electric starter however new controls have also been added to vehicles making them more complex these include air conditioning navigation systems and in car entertainment another trend is the replacement of physical knobs and switches by secondary controls with touchscreen controls such as bmw s idrive and ford s myford touch another change is that while early cars pedals were physically linked to the brake mechanism and throttle in the early s cars have increasingly replaced these physical linkages with electronic controls cars are typically equipped with interior lighting which can be toggled manually or be set to light up automatically with doors open an entertainment system which originated from car radios sideways windows which can be lowered or raised electrically manually on earlier cars and one or multiple auxiliary power outlets for supplying portable appliances such as mobile phones portable fridges power inverters and electrical air pumps from the on board electrical system a more costly upper class and luxury cars are equipped with features earlier such as massage seats and collision avoidance systems cars are typically fitted with multiple types of lights these include headlights which are used to illuminate the way ahead and make the car visible to other users so that the vehicle can be used at night in some jurisdictions daytime running lights red brake lights to indicate when the brakes are applied amber turn signal lights to indicate the turn intentions of the driver white coloured reverse lights to illuminate the area behind the car and indicate that the driver will be or is reversing and on some vehicles additional lights e g side marker lights to increase the visibility of the car interior lights on the ceiling of the car are usually fitted for the driver and passengers some vehicles also have a boot light and more rarely an engine compartment light during the late th and early st century cars increased in weight due to batteries modern steel safety cages anti lock brakes airbags and more powerful if more efficient engines and as of typically weigh between and tonnes and short tons and long tons heavier cars are safer for the driver from a crash perspective but more dangerous for other vehicles and road users the weight of a car influences fuel consumption and performance with more weight resulting in increased fuel consumption and decreased performance the wuling hongguang mini ev a typical city car weighs about kilograms lb heavier cars include suvs and extended length suvs like the suburban cars have also become wider some places tax heavier cars more as well as improving pedestrian safety this can encourage manufacturers to use materials such as recycled aluminium instead of steel it has been suggested that one benefit of subsidising charging infrastructure is that cars can use lighter batteries most cars are designed to carry multiple occupants often with four or five seats cars with five seats typically seat two passengers in the front and three in the rear full size cars and large sport utility vehicles can often carry six seven or more occupants depending on the arrangement of the seats on the other hand sports cars are most often designed with only two seats utility vehicles like pickup trucks combine seating with extra cargo or utility functionality the differing needs for passenger capacity and their luggage or cargo space has resulted in the availability of a large variety of body styles to meet individual consumer requirements that include among others the sedan saloon hatchback station wagon estate coupe and minivan traffic collisions are the largest cause of injury related deaths worldwide mary ward became one of the first documented car fatalities in in parsonstown ireland and henry bliss one of the us s first pedestrian car casualties in in new york city there are now standard tests for safety in new cars such as the euro and us ncap tests and insurance industry backed tests by the insurance institute for highway safety iihs however not all such tests consider the safety of people outside the car such as drivers of other cars pedestrians and cyclists the costs of car usage which may include the cost of acquiring the vehicle repairs and auto maintenance fuel depreciation driving time parking fees taxes and insurance are weighed against the cost of the alternatives and the value of the benefits perceived and real of vehicle usage the benefits may include on demand transportation mobility independence and convenience and emergency power during the s cars had another benefit c ouples finally had a way to head off on unchaperoned dates plus they had a private space to snuggle up close at the end of the night similarly the costs to society of car use may include maintaining roads land use air pollution noise pollution road congestion public health health care and of disposing of the vehicle at the end of its life and can be balanced against the value of the benefits to society that car use generates societal benefits may include economy benefits such as job and wealth creation of car production and maintenance transportation provision society wellbeing derived from leisure and travel opportunities and revenue generation from the tax opportunities the ability of humans to move flexibly from place to place has far reaching implications for the nature of societies car production and use has a large number of environmental impacts it causes local air pollution plastic pollution and contributes to greenhouse gas emissions and climate change cars and vans caused of energy related carbon dioxide emissions in as of electric cars produce about half the emissions over their lifetime as diesel and petrol cars this is set to improve as countries produce more of their electricity from low carbon sources cars consume almost a quarter of world oil production as of cities planned around cars are often less dense which leads to further emissions as they are less walkable for instance a growing demand for large suvs is driving up emissions from cars cars are a major cause of air pollution which stems from exhaust gas in diesel and petrol cars and from dust from brakes tyres and road wear electric cars do not produce tailpipe emissions but are generally heavier and therefore produce slightly more particulate matter heavy metals and microplastics from tyres are also released into the environment during production use and at the end of life mining related to car manufacturing and oil spills both cause water pollution animals and plants are often negatively affected by cars via habitat destruction and fragmentation from the road network and pollution animals are also killed every year on roads by cars referred to as roadkill more recent road developments are including significant environmental mitigation in their designs such as green bridges designed to allow wildlife crossings and creating wildlife corridors governments use fiscal policies such as road tax to discourage the purchase and use of more polluting cars vehicle emission standards ban the sale of new highly pollution cars many countries plan to stop selling fossil cars altogether between and various cities have implemented low emission zones banning old fossil fuel and amsterdam is planning to ban fossil fuel cars completely some cities make it easier for people to choose other forms of transport such as cycling many chinese cities limit licensing of fossil fuel cars mass production of personal motor vehicles in the united states and other developed countries with extensive territories such as australia argentina and france vastly increased individual and group mobility and greatly increased and expanded economic development in urban suburban exurban and rural areas citation needed growth in the popularity of cars and commuting has led to traffic congestion moscow istanbul bogotá mexico city and são paulo were the world s most congested cities in according to inrix a data analytics company access to cars in the united states the transport divide and car dependency resulting from domination of car based transport systems presents barriers to employment in low income neighbourhoods with many low income individuals and families forced to run cars they cannot afford in order to maintain their income dependency on automobiles by african americans may result in exposure to the hazards of driving while black and other types of racial discrimination related to buying financing and insuring them health impact further information motor vehicle pollution and pregnancy air pollution from cars increases the risk of lung cancer and heart disease it can also harm pregnancies more children are born too early or with lower birth weight children are extra vulnerable to air pollution as their bodies are still developing and air pollution in children is linked to the development of asthma childhood cancer and neurocognitive issues such as autism the growth in popularity of the car allowed cities to sprawl therefore encouraging more travel by car resulting in inactivity and obesity which in turn can lead to increased risk of a variety of diseases when places are designed around cars children have fewer opportunities to go places by themselves and lose opportunities to become more independent emerging car technologies although intensive development of conventional battery electric vehicles is continuing into the s other car propulsion technologies that are under development include wireless charging hydrogen cars and hydrogen electric hybrids research into alternative forms of power includes using ammonia instead of hydrogen in fuel cells new materials which may replace steel car bodies include aluminium fiberglass carbon fiber biocomposites and carbon nanotubes telematics technology is allowing more and more people to share cars on a pay as you go basis through car share and carpool schemes communication is also evolving due to connected car systems open source cars are not widespread fully autonomous vehicles also known as driverless cars already exist as robotaxis but have a long way to go before they are in general use car share arrangements and carpooling are also increasingly popular in the us and europe for example in the us some car sharing services have experienced double digit growth in revenue and membership growth between and services like car sharing offer residents to share a vehicle rather than own a car in already congested neighbourhoods the automotive industry designs develops manufactures markets and sells the world s motor vehicles more than three quarters of which are cars in there were million cars manufactured worldwide down from million the previous year the automotive industry in china produces by far the most million in followed by japan seven million then germany south korea and india the largest market is china followed by the us around the world there are about a billion cars on the road they burn over a trillion litres us gal imp gal of petrol and diesel fuel yearly consuming about exajoules twh of energy the numbers of cars are increasing rapidly in china and india in the opinion of some urban transport systems based around the car have proved unsustainable consuming excessive energy affecting the health of populations and delivering a declining level of service despite increasing investment many of these negative effects fall disproportionately on those social groups who are also least likely to own and drive cars the sustainable transport movement focuses on solutions to these problems the car industry is also facing increasing competition from the public transport sector as some people re evaluate their private vehicle usage in july the european commission introduced the fit for legislation package outlining crucial directives for the automotive sector s future according to this package by all newly sold cars in the european market must be zero emissions vehicles established alternatives for some aspects of car use include public transport such as busses trolleybusses trains subways tramways light rail cycling and walking bicycle sharing systems have been established in china and many european cities including copenhagen and amsterdam similar programmes have been developed in large us cities additional individual modes of transport such as personal rapid transit could serve as an alternative to cars if they prove to be socially accepted a study which checked the costs and the benefits of introducing low traffic neighbourhood in london found the benefits overpass the costs approximately by times in the first years and the difference is growing over time dogs are mammals usually to be kept as pets for work on farms or for the police some dogs are trained to be rescue dogs and join teams such as mountain rescue they have been bred by humans from ancestral wolves they were the first animal to live with humans there was a lot of different types among wolves in the late pleistocene the dingo is also a dog but many dingos have become wild animals again and live in the wild away from humans parts of australia today some dogs are used as pets and others are used to help humans do their work they are popular pets because they are usually playful friendly loyal and listen to humans thirty million dogs in the united states have been registered as pets dogs eat both meat and vegetables often mixed together and sold in stores as dog food dogs often have jobs including police dogs army dogs assistance dogs fire dogs messenger dogs hunting dogs herding dogs or rescue dogs they are sometimes called canines from the latin word for dog canis wolves are also canines a baby dog is called a pup or puppy a dog is called a puppy until it is about one year old dogs are sometimes known as human s best friend because they are kept as pets are usually loyal and like being around humans dogs like to be petted but only when they can first see the petter s hand before petting one should never pet a dog from behind august is national dog day worldwide while march is national puppy day in the united states appearance and behaviour dogs can smell and hear better than humans but cannot see well in color because they are color blind due to the structure of the eye dogs can see better in low light than humans they also have a larger field of vision like wolves wild dogs travel in groups called packs packs of dogs are listed by rank and dogs with low rank will submit to other dogs with a higher rank the highest ranked dog is called the alpha male a dog in a group helps and cares for others pet dogs often view their owner as the alpha male different dog breeds have different lifespans in general smaller dogs live longer than bigger ones the size and the breed of the dog change how long the dog lives on average breeds such as the dachshund usually live for fifteen years chihuahuas can reach age of twenty on the other hand the great dane has an average lifespan of six to eight years some great danes have lived for as long as ten years an american bulldog lives for around years bigger dogs will have smaller lives than smaller dogs because of the pressure on its heart to move around dogs are often called man s best friend because they fit in with human life dogs can serve people in many ways for example there are guard dogs hunting dogs herding dogs guide dogs for blind people and police dogs there are also dogs that are trained to smell for diseases in the human body or to find bombs or illegal drugs these dogs sometimes help police in airports or other areas sniffer dogs usually beagles are sometimes trained for this job dogs have even been sent by russians into outer space a few years before any human being the first dog sent up was named laika but she died within a few hours there is much more variety in dogs than in cats that is mainly because of the way humans have selected and bred dogs for specific jobs and functions it may also have something to do with the fact that dogs are pack animals whereas cats are not one morning when gregor samsa woke from troubled dreams he found himself transformed in his bed into a horrible vermin he lay on his armour like back and if he lifted his head a little he could see his brown belly slightly domed and divided by arches into stiff sections the bedding was hardly able to cover it and seemed ready to slide off any moment his many legs pitifully thin compared with the size of the rest of him waved about helplessly as he looked what s happened to me he thought it wasn t a dream his room a proper human room although a little too small lay peacefully between its four familiar walls a collection of textile samples lay spread out on the table samsa was a travelling salesman and above it there hung a picture that he had recently cut out of an illustrated magazine and housed in a nice gilded frame it showed a lady fitted out with a fur hat and fur boa who sat upright raising a heavy fur muff that covered the whole of her lower arm towards the viewer gregor then turned to look out the window at the dull weather drops of rain could be heard hitting the pane which made him feel quite sad how about if i sleep a little bit longer and forget all this nonsense he thought but that was something he was unable to do because he was used to sleeping on his right and in his present state couldn t get into that position however hard he threw himself onto his right he always rolled back to where he was he must have tried it a hundred times shut his eyes so that he wouldn t have to look at the floundering legs and only stopped when he began to feel a mild dull pain there that he had never felt before oh god he thought what a strenuous career it is that i ve chosen travelling day in and day out doing business like this takes much more effort than doing your own business at home and on top of that there s the curse of travelling worries about making train connections bad and irregular food contact with different people all the time so that you can never get to know anyone or become friendly with them it can all go to hell he felt a slight itch up on his belly pushed himself slowly up on his back towards the headboard so that he could lift his head better found where the itch was and saw that it was covered with lots of little white spots which he didn t know what to make of and when he tried to feel the place with one of his legs he drew it quickly back because as soon as he touched it he was overcome by a cold shudder he slid back into his former position getting up early all the time he thought it makes you stupid you ve got to get enough sleep other travelling salesmen live a life of luxury for instance whenever i go back to the guest house during the morning to copy out the contract these gentlemen are always still sitting there eating their breakfasts i ought to just try that with my boss i d get kicked out on the spot but who knows maybe that would be the best thing for me if i didn t have my parents to think about i d have given in my notice a long time ago i d have gone up to the boss and told him just what i think tell him everything i would let him know just what i feel he d fall right off his desk and it s a funny sort of business to be sitting up there at your desk talking down at your subordinates from up there especially when you have to go right up close because the boss is hard of hearing well there s still some hope once i ve got the money together to pay off my parents debt to him another five or six years i suppose that s definitely what i ll do that s when i ll make the big change first of all though i ve got to get up my train leaves at five and he looked over at the alarm clock ticking on the chest of drawers god in heaven he thought it was half past six and the hands were quietly moving forwards it was even later than half past more like quarter to seven had the alarm clock not rung he could see from the bed that it had been set for four o clock as it should have been it certainly must have rung yes but was it possible to quietly sleep through that furniture rattling noise true he had not slept peacefully but probably all the more deeply because of that what should he do now the next train went at seven if he were to catch that he would have to rush like mad and the collection of samples was still not packed and he did not at all feel particularly fresh and lively and even if he did catch the train he would not avoid his boss s anger as the office assistant would have been there to see the five o clock train go he would have put in his report about gregor s not being there a long time ago the office assistant was the boss s man spineless and with no understanding what about if he reported sick but that would be extremely strained and suspicious as in fifteen years of service gregor had never once yet been ill his boss would certainly come round with the doctor from the medical insurance company accuse his parents of having a lazy son and accept the doctor s recommendation not to make any claim as the doctor believed that no one was ever ill but that many were workshy and what s more would he have been entirely wrong in this case gregor did in fact apart from excessive sleepiness after sleeping for so long feel completely well and even felt much hungrier than usual he was still hurriedly thinking all this through unable to decide to get out of the bed when the clock struck quarter to seven there was a cautious knock at the door near his head gregor somebody called it was his mother it s quarter to seven didn t you want to go somewhere that gentle voice gregor was shocked when he heard his own voice answering it could hardly be recognised as the voice he had had before as if from deep inside him there was a painful and uncontrollable squeaking mixed in with it the words could be made out at first but then there was a sort of echo which made them unclear leaving the hearer unsure whether he had heard properly or not gregor had wanted to give a full answer and explain everything but in the circumstances contented himself with saying yes mother yes thank you i m getting up now the change in gregor s voice probably could not be noticed outside through the wooden door as his mother was satisfied with this explanation and shuffled away but this short conversation made the other members of the family aware that gregor against their expectations was still at home and soon his father came knocking at one of the side doors gently but with his fist gregor gregor he called what s wrong and after a short while he called again with a warning deepness in his voice gregor gregor at the other side door his sister came plaintively gregor aren t you well do you need anything gregor answered to both sides i m ready now making an effort to remove all the strangeness from his voice by enunciating very carefully and putting long pauses between each individual word his father went back to his breakfast but his sister whispered gregor open the door i beg of you gregor however had no thought of opening the door and instead congratulated himself for his cautious habit acquired from his travelling of locking all doors at night even when he was at home the first thing he wanted to do was to get up in peace without being disturbed to get dressed and most of all to have his breakfast only then would he consider what to do next as he was well aware that he would not bring his thoughts to any sensible conclusions by lying in bed he remembered that he had often felt a slight pain in bed perhaps caused by lying awkwardly but that had always turned out to be pure imagination and he wondered how his imaginings would slowly resolve themselves today he did not have the slightest doubt that the change in his voice was nothing more than the first sign of a serious cold which was an occupational hazard for travelling salesmen it was a simple matter to throw off the covers he only had to blow himself up a little and they fell off by themselves but it became difficult after that especially as he was so exceptionally broad he would have used his arms and his hands to push himself up but instead of them he only had all those little legs continuously moving in different directions and which he was moreover unable to control if he wanted to bend one of them then that was the first one that would stretch itself out and if he finally managed to do what he wanted with that leg all the others seemed to be set free and would move about painfully this is something that can t be done in bed gregor said to himself so don t keep trying to do it the first thing he wanted to do was get the lower part of his body out of the bed but he had never seen this lower part and could not imagine what it looked like it turned out to be too hard to move it went so slowly and finally almost in a frenzy when he carelessly shoved himself forwards with all the force he could gather he chose the wrong direction hit hard against the lower bedpost and learned from the burning pain he felt that the lower part of his body might well at present be the most sensitive so then he tried to get the top part of his body out of the bed first carefully turning his head to the side this he managed quite easily and despite its breadth and its weight the bulk of his body eventually followed slowly in the direction of the head but when he had at last got his head out of the bed and into the fresh air it occurred to him that if he let himself fall it would be a miracle if his head were not injured so he became afraid to carry on pushing himself forward the same way and he could not knock himself out now at any price better to stay in bed than lose consciousness it took just as much effort to get back to where he had been earlier but when he lay there sighing and was once more watching his legs as they struggled against each other even harder than before if that was possible he could think of no way of bringing peace and order to this chaos he told himself once more that it was not possible for him to stay in bed and that the most sensible thing to do would be to get free of it in whatever way he could at whatever sacrifice at the same time though he did not forget to remind himself that calm consideration was much better than rushing to desperate conclusions at times like this he would direct his eyes to the window and look out as clearly as he could but unfortunately even the other side of the narrow street was enveloped in morning fog and the view had little confidence or cheer to offer him seven o clock already he said to himself when the clock struck again seven o clock and there s still a fog like this and he lay there quietly a while longer breathing lightly as if he perhaps expected the total stillness to bring things back to their real and natural state but then he said to himself before it strikes quarter past seven i ll definitely have to have got properly out of bed and by then somebody will have come round from work to ask what s happened to me as well as they open up at work before seven o clock and so he set himself to the task of swinging the entire length of his body out of the bed all at the same time if he succeeded in falling out of bed in this way and kept his head raised as he did so he could probably avoid injuring it his back seemed to be quite hard and probably nothing would happen to it falling onto the carpet his main concern was for the loud noise he was bound to make and which even through all the doors would probably raise concern if not alarm but it was something that had to be risked when gregor was already sticking half way out of the bed the new method was more of a game than an effort all he had to do was rock back and forth it occurred to him how simple everything would be if somebody came to help him two strong people he had his father and the maid in mind would have been more than enough they would only have to push their arms under the dome of his back peel him away from the bed bend down with the load and then be patient and careful as he swang over onto the floor where hopefully the little legs would find a use should he really call for help though even apart from the fact that all the doors were locked despite all the difficulty he was in he could not suppress a smile at this thought after a while he had already moved so far across that it would have been hard for him to keep his balance if he rocked too hard the time was now ten past seven and he would have to make a final decision very soon then there was a ring at the door of the flat that ll be someone from work he said to himself and froze very still although his little legs only became all the more lively as they danced around for a moment everything remained quiet they re not opening the door gregor said to himself caught in some nonsensical hope but then of course the maid s firm steps went to the door as ever and opened it gregor only needed to hear the visitor s first words of greeting and he knew who it was the chief clerk himself why did gregor have to be the only one condemned to work for a company where they immediately became highly suspicious at the slightest shortcoming were all employees every one of them louts was there not one of them who was faithful and devoted who would go so mad with pangs of conscience that he couldn t get out of bed if he didn t spend at least a couple of hours in the morning on company business was it really not enough to let one of the trainees make enquiries assuming enquiries were even necessary did the chief clerk have to come himself and did they have to show the whole innocent family that this was so suspicious that only the chief clerk could be trusted to have the wisdom to investigate it and more because these thoughts had made him upset than through any proper decision he swang himself with all his force out of the bed there was a loud thump but it wasn t really a loud noise his fall was softened a little by the carpet and gregor s back was also more elastic than he had thought which made the sound muffled and not too noticeable he had not held his head carefully enough though and hit it as he fell annoyed and in pain he turned it and rubbed it against the carpet something s fallen down in there said the chief clerk in the room on the left gregor tried to imagine whether something of the sort that had happened to him today could ever happen to the chief clerk too you had to concede that it was possible but as if in gruff reply to this question the chief clerk s firm footsteps in his highly polished boots could now be heard in the adjoining room from the room on his right gregor s sister whispered to him to let him know gregor the chief clerk is here yes i know said gregor to himself but without daring to raise his voice loud enough for his sister to hear him gregor said his father now from the room to his left the chief clerk has come round and wants to know why you didn t leave on the early train we don t know what to say to him and anyway he wants to speak to you personally so please open up this door i m sure he ll be good enough to forgive the untidiness of your room then the chief clerk called good morning mr samsa he isn t well said his mother to the chief clerk while his father continued to speak through the door he isn t well please believe me why else would gregor have missed a train the lad only ever thinks about the business it nearly makes me cross the way he never goes out in the evenings he s been in town for a week now but stayed home every evening he sits with us in the kitchen and just reads the paper or studies train timetables his idea of relaxation is working with his fretsaw he s made a little frame for instance it only took him two or three evenings you ll be amazed how nice it is it s hanging up in his room you ll see it as soon as gregor opens the door anyway i m glad you re here we wouldn t have been able to get gregor to open the door by ourselves he s so stubborn and i m sure he isn t well he said this morning that he is but he isn t i ll be there in a moment said gregor slowly and thoughtfully but without moving so that he would not miss any word of the conversation well i can t think of any other way of explaining it mrs samsa said the chief clerk i hope it s nothing serious but on the other hand i must say that if we people in commerce ever become slightly unwell then fortunately or unfortunately as you like we simply have to overcome it because of business considerations can the chief clerk come in to see you now then asked his father impatiently knocking at the door again no said gregor in the room on his right there followed a painful silence in the room on his left his sister began to cry so why did his sister not go and join the others she had probably only just got up and had not even begun to get dressed and why was she crying was it because he had not got up and had not let the chief clerk in because he was in danger of losing his job and if that happened his boss would once more pursue their parents with the same demands as before there was no need to worry about things like that yet gregor was still there and had not the slightest intention of abandoning his family for the time being he just lay there on the carpet and no one who knew the condition he was in would seriously have expected him to let the chief clerk in it was only a minor discourtesy and a suitable excuse could easily be found for it later on it was not something for which gregor could be sacked on the spot and it seemed to gregor much more sensible to leave him now in peace instead of disturbing him with talking at him and crying but the others didn t know what was happening they were worried that would excuse their behaviour the chief clerk now raised his voice mr samsa he called to him what is wrong you barricade yourself in your room give us no more than yes or no for an answer you are causing serious and unnecessary concern to your parents and you fail and i mention this just by the way you fail to carry out your business duties in a way that is quite unheard of i m speaking here on behalf of your parents and of your employer and really must request a clear and immediate explanation i am astonished quite astonished i thought i knew you as a calm and sensible person and now you suddenly seem to be showing off with peculiar whims this morning your employer did suggest a possible reason for your failure to appear it s true it had to do with the money that was recently entrusted to you but i came near to giving him my word of honour that that could not be the right explanation but now that i see your incomprehensible stubbornness i no longer feel any wish whatsoever to intercede on your behalf and nor is your position all that secure i had originally intended to say all this to you in private but since you cause me to waste my time here for no good reason i don t see why your parents should not also learn of it your turnover has been very unsatisfactory of late i grant you that it s not the time of year to do especially good business we recognise that but there simply is no time of year to do no business at all mr samsa we cannot allow there to be but sir called gregor beside himself and forgetting all else in the excitement i ll open up immediately just a moment i m slightly unwell an attack of dizziness i haven t been able to get up i m still in bed now i m quite fresh again now though i m just getting out of bed just a moment be patient it s not quite as easy as i d thought i m quite alright now though it s shocking what can suddenly happen to a person i was quite alright last night my parents know about it perhaps better than me i had a small symptom of it last night already they must have noticed it i don t know why i didn t let you know at work but you always think you can get over an illness without staying at home please don t make my parents suffer there s no basis for any of the accusations you re making nobody s ever said a word to me about any of these things maybe you haven t read the latest contracts i sent in i ll set off with the eight o clock train as well these few hours of rest have given me strength you don t need to wait sir i ll be in the office soon after you and please be so good as to tell that to the boss and recommend me to him and while gregor gushed out these words hardly knowing what he was saying he made his way over to the chest of drawers this was easily done probably because of the practise he had already had in bed where he now tried to get himself upright he really did want to open the door really did want to let them see him and to speak with the chief clerk the others were being so insistent and he was curious to learn what they would say when they caught sight of him if they were shocked then it would no longer be gregor s responsibility and he could rest if however they took everything calmly he would still have no reason to be upset and if he hurried he really could be at the station for eight o clock the first few times he tried to climb up on the smooth chest of drawers he just slid down again but he finally gave himself one last swing and stood there upright the lower part of his body was in serious pain but he no longer gave any attention to it now he let himself fall against the back of a nearby chair and held tightly to the edges of it with his little legs by now he had also calmed down and kept quiet so that he could listen to what the chief clerk was saying did you understand a word of all that the chief clerk asked his parents surely he s not trying to make fools of us oh god called his mother who was already in tears he could be seriously ill and we re making him suffer grete grete she then cried mother his sister called from the other side they communicated across gregor s room you ll have to go for the doctor straight away gregor is ill quick get the doctor did you hear the way gregor spoke just now that was the voice of an animal said the chief clerk with a calmness that was in contrast with his mother s screams anna anna his father called into the kitchen through the entrance hall clapping his hands get a locksmith here now and the two girls their skirts swishing immediately ran out through the hall wrenching open the front door of the flat as they went how had his sister managed to get dressed so quickly there was no sound of the door banging shut again they must have left it open people often do in homes where something awful has happened gregor in contrast had become much calmer so they couldn t understand his words any more although they seemed clear enough to him clearer than before perhaps his ears had become used to the sound they had realised though that there was something wrong with him and were ready to help the first response to his situation had been confident and wise and that made him feel better he felt that he had been drawn back in among people and from the doctor and the locksmith he expected great and surprising achievements although he did not really distinguish one from the other whatever was said next would be crucial so in order to make his voice as clear as possible he coughed a little but taking care to do this not too loudly as even this might well sound different from the way that a human coughs and he was no longer sure he could judge this for himself meanwhile it had become very quiet in the next room perhaps his parents were sat at the table whispering with the chief clerk or perhaps they were all pressed against the door and listening gregor slowly pushed his way over to the door with the chair once there he let go of it and threw himself onto the door holding himself upright against it using the adhesive on the tips of his legs he rested there a little while to recover from the effort involved and then set himself to the task of turning the key in the lock with his mouth he seemed unfortunately to have no proper teeth how was he then to grasp the key but the lack of teeth was of course made up for with a very strong jaw using the jaw he really was able to start the key turning ignoring the fact that he must have been causing some kind of damage as a brown fluid came from his mouth flowed over the key and dripped onto the floor listen said the chief clerk in the next room he s turning the key gregor was greatly encouraged by this but they all should have been calling to him his father and his mother too well done gregor they should have cried keep at it keep hold of the lock and with the idea that they were all excitedly following his efforts he bit on the key with all his strength paying no attention to the pain he was causing himself as the key turned round he turned around the lock with it only holding himself upright with his mouth and hung onto the key or pushed it down again with the whole weight of his body as needed the clear sound of the lock as it snapped back was gregor s sign that he could break his concentration and as he regained his breath he said to himself so i didn t need the locksmith after all then he lay his head on the handle of the door to open it completely because he had to open the door in this way it was already wide open before he could be seen he had first to slowly turn himself around one of the double doors and he had to do it very carefully if he did not want to fall flat on his back before entering the room he was still occupied with this difficult movement unable to pay attention to anything else when he heard the chief clerk exclaim a loud oh which sounded like the soughing of the wind now he also saw him he was the nearest to the door his hand pressed against his open mouth and slowly retreating as if driven by a steady and invisible force gregor s mother her hair still dishevelled from bed despite the chief clerk s being there looked at his father then she unfolded her arms took two steps forward towards gregor and sank down onto the floor into her skirts that spread themselves out around her as her head disappeared down onto her breast his father looked hostile and clenched his fists as if wanting to knock gregor back into his room then he looked uncertainly round the living room covered his eyes with his hands and wept so that his powerful chest shook so gregor did not go into the room but leant against the inside of the other door which was still held bolted in place in this way only half of his body could be seen along with his head above it which he leant over to one side as he peered out at the others meanwhile the day had become much lighter part of the endless grey black building on the other side of the street which was a hospital could be seen quite clearly with the austere and regular line of windows piercing its facade the rain was still falling now throwing down large individual droplets which hit the ground one at a time the washing up from breakfast lay on the table there was so much of it because for gregor s father breakfast was the most important meal of the day and he would stretch it out for several hours as he sat reading a number of different newspapers on the wall exactly opposite there was photograph of gregor when he was a lieutenant in the army his sword in his hand and a carefree smile on his face as he called forth respect for his uniform and bearing the door to the entrance hall was open and as the front door of the flat was also open he could see onto the landing and the stairs where they began their way down below now then said gregor well aware that he was the only one to have kept calm i ll get dressed straight away now pack up my samples and set off will you please just let me leave you can see he said to the chief clerk that i m not stubborn and like i like to do my job being a commercial traveller is arduous but without travelling i couldn t earn my living so where are you going in to the office yes will you report everything accurately then it s quite possible for someone to be temporarily unable to work but that s just the right time to remember what s been achieved in the past and consider that later on once the difficulty has been removed he will certainly work with all the more diligence and concentration you re well aware that i m seriously in debt to our employer as well as having to look after my parents and my sister so that i m trapped in a difficult situation but i will work my way out of it again please don t make things any harder for me than they are already and don t take sides against me at the office i know that nobody likes the travellers they think we earn an enormous wage as well as having a soft time of it that s just prejudice but they have no particular reason to think better it but you sir you have a better overview than the rest of the staff in fact if i can say this in confidence a better overview than the boss himself it s very easy for a businessman like him to make mistakes about his employees and judge them more harshly than he should and you re also well aware that we travellers spend almost the whole year away from the office so that we can very easily fall victim to gossip and chance and groundless complaints and it s almost impossible to defend yourself from that sort of thing we don t usually even hear about them or if at all it s when we arrive back home exhausted from a trip and that s when we feel the harmful effects of what s been going on without even knowing what caused them please don t go away at least first say something to show that you grant that i m at least partly right but the chief clerk had turned away as soon as gregor had started to speak and with protruding lips only stared back at him over his trembling shoulders as he left he did not keep still for a moment while gregor was speaking but moved steadily towards the door without taking his eyes off him he moved very gradually as if there had been some secret prohibition on leaving the room it was only when he had reached the entrance hall that he made a sudden movement drew his foot from the living room and rushed forward in a panic in the hall he stretched his right hand far out towards the stairway as if out there there were some supernatural force waiting to save him gregor realised that it was out of the question to let the chief clerk go away in this mood if his position in the firm was not to be put into extreme danger that was something his parents did not understand very well over the years they had become convinced that this job would provide for gregor for his entire life and besides they had so much to worry about at present that they had lost sight of any thought for the future gregor though did think about the future the chief clerk had to be held back calmed down convinced and finally won over the future of gregor and his family depended on it if only his sister were here she was clever she was already in tears while gregor was still lying peacefully on his back and the chief clerk was a lover of women surely she could persuade him she would close the front door in the entrance hall and talk him out of his shocked state but his sister was not there gregor would have to do the job himself and without considering that he still was not familiar with how well he could move about in his present state or that his speech still might not or probably would not be understood he let go of the door pushed himself through the opening tried to reach the chief clerk on the landing who ridiculously was holding on to the banister with both hands but gregor fell immediately over and with a little scream as he sought something to hold onto landed on his numerous little legs hardly had that happened than for the first time that day he began to feel alright with his body the little legs had the solid ground under them to his pleasure they did exactly as he told them they were even making the effort to carry him where he wanted to go and he was soon believing that all his sorrows would soon be finally at an end he held back the urge to move but swayed from side to side as he crouched there on the floor his mother was not far away in front of him and seemed at first quite engrossed in herself but then she suddenly jumped up with her arms outstretched and her fingers spread shouting help for pity s sake help the way she held her head suggested she wanted to see gregor better but the unthinking way she was hurrying backwards showed that she did not she had forgotten that the table was behind her with all the breakfast things on it when she reached the table she sat quickly down on it without knowing what she was doing without even seeming to notice that the coffee pot had been knocked over and a gush of coffee was pouring down onto the carpet mother mother said gregor gently looking up at her he had completely forgotten the chief clerk for the moment but could not help himself snapping in the air with his jaws at the sight of the flow of coffee that set his mother screaming anew she fled from the table and into the arms of his father as he rushed towards her gregor though had no time to spare for his parents now the chief clerk had already reached the stairs with his chin on the banister he looked back for the last time gregor made a run for him he wanted to be sure of reaching him the chief clerk must have expected something as he leapt down several steps at once and disappeared his shouts resounding all around the staircase the flight of the chief clerk seemed unfortunately to put gregor s father into a panic as well until then he had been relatively self controlled but now instead of running after the chief clerk himself or at least not impeding gregor as he ran after him gregor s father seized the chief clerk s stick in his right hand the chief clerk had left it behind on a chair along with his hat and overcoat picked up a large newspaper from the table with his left and used them to drive gregor back into his room stamping his foot at him as he went gregor s appeals to his father were of no help his appeals were simply not understood however much he humbly turned his head his father merely stamped his foot all the harder across the room despite the chilly weather gregor s mother had pulled open a window leant far out of it and pressed her hands to her face a strong draught of air flew in from the street towards the stairway the curtains flew up the newspapers on the table fluttered and some of them were blown onto the floor nothing would stop gregor s father as he drove him back making hissing noises at him like a wild man gregor had never had any practice in moving backwards and was only able to go very slowly if gregor had only been allowed to turn round he would have been back in his room straight away but he was afraid that if he took the time to do that his father would become impatient and there was the threat of a lethal blow to his back or head from the stick in his father s hand any moment eventually though gregor realised that he had no choice as he saw to his disgust that he was quite incapable of going backwards in a straight line so he began as quickly as possible and with frequent anxious glances at his father to turn himself round it went very slowly but perhaps his father was able to see his good intentions as he did nothing to hinder him in fact now and then he used the tip of his stick to give directions from a distance as to which way to turn if only his father would stop that unbearable hissing it was making gregor quite confused when he had nearly finished turning round still listening to that hissing he made a mistake and turned himself back a little the way he had just come he was pleased when he finally had his head in front of the doorway but then saw that it was too narrow and his body was too broad to get through it without further difficulty in his present mood it obviously did not occur to his father to open the other of the double doors so that gregor would have enough space to get through he was merely fixed on the idea that gregor should be got back into his room as quickly as possible nor would he ever have allowed gregor the time to get himself upright as preparation for getting through the doorway what he did making more noise than ever was to drive gregor forwards all the harder as if there had been nothing in the way it sounded to gregor as if there was now more than one father behind him it was not a pleasant experience and gregor pushed himself into the doorway without regard for what might happen one side of his body lifted itself he lay at an angle in the doorway one flank scraped on the white door and was painfully injured leaving vile brown flecks on it soon he was stuck fast and would not have been able to move at all by himself the little legs along one side hung quivering in the air while those on the other side were pressed painfully against the ground then his father gave him a hefty shove from behind which released him from where he was held and sent him flying and heavily bleeding deep into his room the door was slammed shut with the stick then finally all was quiet ii it was not until it was getting dark that evening that gregor awoke from his deep and coma like sleep he would have woken soon afterwards anyway even if he hadn t been disturbed as he had had enough sleep and felt fully rested but he had the impression that some hurried steps and the sound of the door leading into the front room being carefully shut had woken him the light from the electric street lamps shone palely here and there onto the ceiling and tops of the furniture but down below where gregor was it was dark he pushed himself over to the door feeling his way clumsily with his antennae of which he was now beginning to learn the value in order to see what had been happening there the whole of his left side seemed like one painfully stretched scar and he limped badly on his two rows of legs one of the legs had been badly injured in the events of that morning it was nearly a miracle that only one of them had been and dragged along lifelessly it was only when he had reached the door that he realised what it actually was that had drawn him over to it it was the smell of something to eat by the door there was a dish filled with sweetened milk with little pieces of white bread floating in it he was so pleased he almost laughed as he was even hungrier than he had been that morning and immediately dipped his head into the milk nearly covering his eyes with it but he soon drew his head back again in disappointment not only did the pain in his tender left side make it difficult to eat the food he was only able to eat if his whole body worked together as a snuffling whole but the milk did not taste at all nice milk like this was normally his favourite drink and his sister had certainly left it there for him because of that but he turned almost against his own will away from the dish and crawled back into the centre of the room through the crack in the door gregor could see that the gas had been lit in the living room his father at this time would normally be sat with his evening paper reading it out in a loud voice to gregor s mother and sometimes to his sister but there was now not a sound to be heard gregor s sister would often write and tell him about this reading but maybe his father had lost the habit in recent times it was so quiet all around too even though there must have been somebody in the flat what a quiet life it is the family lead said gregor to himself and gazing into the darkness felt a great pride that he was able to provide a life like that in such a nice home for his sister and parents but what now if all this peace and wealth and comfort should come to a horrible and frightening end that was something that gregor did not want to think about too much so he started to move about crawling up and down the room once during that long evening the door on one side of the room was opened very slightly and hurriedly closed again later on the door on the other side did the same it seemed that someone needed to enter the room but thought better of it gregor went and waited immediately by the door resolved either to bring the timorous visitor into the room in some way or at least to find out who it was but the door was opened no more that night and gregor waited in vain the previous morning while the doors were locked everyone had wanted to get in there to him but now now that he had opened up one of the doors and the other had clearly been unlocked some time during the day no one came and the keys were in the other sides it was not until late at night that the gaslight in the living room was put out and now it was easy to see that parents and sister had stayed awake all that time as they all could be distinctly heard as they went away together on tip toe it was clear that no one would come into gregor s room any more until morning that gave him plenty of time to think undisturbed about how he would have to re arrange his life for some reason the tall empty room where he was forced to remain made him feel uneasy as he lay there flat on the floor even though he had been living in it for five years hardly aware of what he was doing other than a slight feeling of shame he hurried under the couch it pressed down on his back a little and he was no longer able to lift his head but he nonetheless felt immediately at ease and his only regret was that his body was too broad to get it all underneath he spent the whole night there some of the time he passed in a light sleep although he frequently woke from it in alarm because of his hunger and some of the time was spent in worries and vague hopes which however always led to the same conclusion for the time being he must remain calm he must show patience and the greatest consideration so that his family could bear the unpleasantness that he in his present condition was forced to impose on them gregor soon had the opportunity to test the strength of his decisions as early the next morning almost before the night had ended his sister nearly fully dressed opened the door from the front room and looked anxiously in she did not see him straight away but when she did notice him under the couch he had to be somewhere for god s sake he couldn t have flown away she was so shocked that she lost control of herself and slammed the door shut again from outside but she seemed to regret her behaviour as she opened the door again straight away and came in on tip toe as if entering the room of someone seriously ill or even of a stranger gregor had pushed his head forward right to the edge of the couch and watched her would she notice that he had left the milk as it was realise that it was not from any lack of hunger and bring him in some other food that was more suitable if she didn t do it herself he would rather go hungry than draw her attention to it although he did feel a terrible urge to rush forward from under the couch throw himself at his sister s feet and beg her for something good to eat however his sister noticed the full dish immediately and looked at it and the few drops of milk splashed around it with some surprise she immediately picked it up using a rag not her bare hands and carried it out gregor was extremely curious as to what she would bring in its place imagining the wildest possibilities but he never could have guessed what his sister in her goodness actually did bring in order to test his taste she brought him a whole selection of things all spread out on an old newspaper there were old half rotten vegetables bones from the evening meal covered in white sauce that had gone hard a few raisins and almonds some cheese that gregor had declared inedible two days before a dry roll and some bread spread with butter and salt as well as all that she had poured some water into the dish which had probably been permanently set aside for gregor s use and placed it beside them then out of consideration for gregor s feelings as she knew that he would not eat in front of her she hurried out again and even turned the key in the lock so that gregor would know he could make things as comfortable for himself as he liked gregor s little legs whirred at last he could eat what s more his injuries must already have completely healed as he found no difficulty in moving this amazed him as more than a month earlier he had cut his finger slightly with a knife he thought of how his finger had still hurt the day before yesterday am i less sensitive than i used to be then he thought and was already sucking greedily at the cheese which had immediately almost compellingly attracted him much more than the other foods on the newspaper quickly one after another his eyes watering with pleasure he consumed the cheese the vegetables and the sauce the fresh foods on the other hand he didn t like at all and even dragged the things he did want to eat a little way away from them because he couldn t stand the smell long after he had finished eating and lay lethargic in the same place his sister slowly turned the key in the lock as a sign to him that he should withdraw he was immediately startled although he had been half asleep and he hurried back under the couch but he needed great self control to stay there even for the short time that his sister was in the room as eating so much food had rounded out his body a little and he could hardly breathe in that narrow space half suffocating he watched with bulging eyes as his sister unselfconsciously took a broom and swept up the left overs mixing them in with the food he had not even touched at all as if it could not be used any more she quickly dropped it all into a bin closed it with its wooden lid and carried everything out she had hardly turned her back before gregor came out again from under the couch and stretched himself this was how gregor received his food each day now once in the morning while his parents and the maid were still asleep and the second time after everyone had eaten their meal at midday as his parents would sleep for a little while then as well and gregor s sister would send the maid away on some errand gregor s father and mother certainly did not want him to starve either but perhaps it would have been more than they could stand to have any more experience of his feeding than being told about it and perhaps his sister wanted to spare them what distress she could as they were indeed suffering enough it was impossible for gregor to find out what they had told the doctor and the locksmith that first morning to get them out of the flat as nobody could understand him nobody not even his sister thought that he could understand them so he had to be content to hear his sister s sighs and appeals to the saints as she moved about his room it was only later when she had become a little more used to everything there was of course no question of her ever becoming fully used to the situation that gregor would sometimes catch a friendly comment or at least a comment that could be construed as friendly he s enjoyed his dinner today she might say when he had diligently cleared away all the food left for him or if he left most of it which slowly became more and more frequent she would often say sadly now everything s just been left there again although gregor wasn t able to hear any news directly he did listen to much of what was said in the next rooms and whenever he heard anyone speaking he would scurry straight to the appropriate door and press his whole body against it there was seldom any conversation especially at first that was not about him in some way even if only in secret for two whole days all the talk at every mealtime was about what they should do now but even between meals they spoke about the same subject as there were always at least two members of the family at home nobody wanted to be at home by themselves and it was out of the question to leave the flat entirely empty and on the very first day the maid had fallen to her knees and begged gregor s mother to let her go without delay it was not very clear how much she knew of what had happened but she left within a quarter of an hour tearfully thanking gregor s mother for her dismissal as if she had done her an enormous service she even swore emphatically not to tell anyone the slightest about what had happened even though no one had asked that of her now gregor s sister also had to help his mother with the cooking although that was not so much bother as no one ate very much gregor often heard how one of them would unsuccessfully urge another to eat and receive no more answer than no thanks i ve had enough or something similar no one drank very much either his sister would sometimes ask his father whether he would like a beer hoping for the chance to go and fetch it herself when his father then said nothing she would add so that he would not feel selfish that she could send the housekeeper for it but then his father would close the matter with a big loud no and no more would be said even before the first day had come to an end his father had explained to gregor s mother and sister what their finances and prospects were now and then he stood up from the table and took some receipt or document from the little cash box he had saved from his business when it had collapsed five years earlier gregor heard how he opened the complicated lock and then closed it again after he had taken the item he wanted what he heard his father say was some of the first good news that gregor heard since he had first been incarcerated in his room he had thought that nothing at all remained from his father s business at least he had never told him anything different and gregor had never asked him about it anyway their business misfortune had reduced the family to a state of total despair and gregor s only concern at that time had been to arrange things so that they could all forget about it as quickly as possible so then he started working especially hard with a fiery vigour that raised him from a junior salesman to a travelling representative almost overnight bringing with it the chance to earn money in quite different ways gregor converted his success at work straight into cash that he could lay on the table at home for the benefit of his astonished and delighted family they had been good times and they had never come again at least not with the same splendour even though gregor had later earned so much that he was in a position to bear the costs of the whole family and did bear them they had even got used to it both gregor and the family they took the money with gratitude and he was glad to provide it although there was no longer much warm affection given in return gregor only remained close to his sister now unlike him she was very fond of music and a gifted and expressive violinist it was his secret plan to send her to the conservatory next year even though it would cause great expense that would have to be made up for in some other way during gregor s short periods in town conversation with his sister would often turn to the conservatory but it was only ever mentioned as a lovely dream that could never be realised their parents did not like to hear this innocent talk but gregor thought about it quite hard and decided he would let them know what he planned with a grand announcement of it on christmas day that was the sort of totally pointless thing that went through his mind in his present state pressed upright against the door and listening there were times when he simply became too tired to continue listening when his head would fall wearily against the door and he would pull it up again with a start as even the slightest noise he caused would be heard next door and they would all go silent what s that he s doing now his father would say after a while clearly having gone over to the door and only then would the interrupted conversation slowly be taken up again when explaining things his father repeated himself several times partly because it was a long time since he had been occupied with these matters himself and partly because gregor s mother did not understand everything first time from these repeated explanations gregor learned to his pleasure that despite all their misfortunes there was still some money available from the old days it was not a lot but it had not been touched in the meantime and some interest had accumulated besides that they had not been using up all the money that gregor had been bringing home every month keeping only a little for himself so that that too had been accumulating behind the door gregor nodded with enthusiasm in his pleasure at this unexpected thrift and caution he could actually have used this surplus money to reduce his father s debt to his boss and the day when he could have freed himself from that job would have come much closer but now it was certainly better the way his father had done things this money however was certainly not enough to enable the family to live off the interest it was enough to maintain them for perhaps one or two years no more that s to say it was money that should not really be touched but set aside for emergencies money to live on had to be earned his father was healthy but old and lacking in self confidence during the five years that he had not been working the first holiday in a life that had been full of strain and no success he had put on a lot of weight and become very slow and clumsy would gregor s elderly mother now have to go and earn money she suffered from asthma and it was a strain for her just to move about the home every other day would be spent struggling for breath on the sofa by the open window would his sister have to go and earn money she was still a child of seventeen her life up till then had been very enviable consisting of wearing nice clothes sleeping late helping out in the business joining in with a few modest pleasures and most of all playing the violin whenever they began to talk of the need to earn money gregor would always first let go of the door and then throw himself onto the cool leather sofa next to it as he became quite hot with shame and regret he would often lie there the whole night through not sleeping a wink but scratching at the leather for hours on end or he might go to all the effort of pushing a chair to the window climbing up onto the sill and propped up in the chair leaning on the window to stare out of it he had used to feel a great sense of freedom from doing this but doing it now was obviously something more remembered than experienced as what he actually saw in this way was becoming less distinct every day even things that were quite near he had used to curse the ever present view of the hospital across the street but now he could not see it at all and if he had not known that he lived in charlottenstrasse which was a quiet street despite being in the middle of the city he could have thought that he was looking out the window at a barren waste where the grey sky and the grey earth mingled inseparably his observant sister only needed to notice the chair twice before she would always push it back to its exact position by the window after she had tidied up the room and even left the inner pane of the window open from then on if gregor had only been able to speak to his sister and thank her for all that she had to do for him it would have been easier for him to bear it but as it was it caused him pain his sister naturally tried as far as possible to pretend there was nothing burdensome about it and the longer it went on of course the better she was able to do so but as time went by gregor was also able to see through it all so much better it had even become very unpleasant for him now whenever she entered the room no sooner had she come in than she would quickly close the door as a precaution so that no one would have to suffer the view into gregor s room then she would go straight to the window and pull it hurriedly open almost as if she were suffocating even if it was cold she would stay at the window breathing deeply for a little while she would alarm gregor twice a day with this running about and noise making he would stay under the couch shivering the whole while knowing full well that she would certainly have liked to spare him this ordeal but it was impossible for her to be in the same room with him with the windows closed one day about a month after gregor s transformation when his sister no longer had any particular reason to be shocked at his appearance she came into the room a little earlier than usual and found him still staring out the window motionless and just where he would be most horrible in itself his sister s not coming into the room would have been no surprise for gregor as it would have been difficult for her to immediately open the window while he was still there but not only did she not come in she went straight back and closed the door behind her a stranger would have thought he had threatened her and tried to bite her gregor went straight to hide himself under the couch of course but he had to wait until midday before his sister came back and she seemed much more uneasy than usual it made him realise that she still found his appearance unbearable and would continue to do so she probably even had to overcome the urge to flee when she saw the little bit of him that protruded from under the couch one day in order to spare her even this sight he spent four hours carrying the bedsheet over to the couch on his back and arranged it so that he was completely covered and his sister would not be able to see him even if she bent down if she did not think this sheet was necessary then all she had to do was take it off again as it was clear enough that it was no pleasure for gregor to cut himself off so completely she left the sheet where it was gregor even thought he glimpsed a look of gratitude one time when he carefully looked out from under the sheet to see how his sister liked the new arrangement for the first fourteen days gregor s parents could not bring themselves to come into the room to see him he would often hear them say how they appreciated all the new work his sister was doing even though before they had seen her as a girl who was somewhat useless and frequently been annoyed with her but now the two of them father and mother would often both wait outside the door of gregor s room while his sister tidied up in there and as soon as she went out again she would have to tell them exactly how everything looked what gregor had eaten how he had behaved this time and whether perhaps any slight improvement could be seen his mother also wanted to go in and visit gregor relatively soon but his father and sister at first persuaded her against it gregor listened very closely to all this and approved fully later though she had to be held back by force which made her call out let me go and see gregor he is my unfortunate son can t you understand i have to see him and gregor would think to himself that maybe it would be better if his mother came in not every day of course but one day a week perhaps she could understand everything much better than his sister who for all her courage was still just a child after all and really might not have had an adult s appreciation of the burdensome job she had taken on gregor s wish to see his mother was soon realised out of consideration for his parents gregor wanted to avoid being seen at the window during the day the few square meters of the floor did not give him much room to crawl about it was hard to just lie quietly through the night his food soon stopped giving him any pleasure at all and so to entertain himself he got into the habit of crawling up and down the walls and ceiling he was especially fond of hanging from the ceiling it was quite different from lying on the floor he could breathe more freely his body had a light swing to it and up there relaxed and almost happy it might happen that he would surprise even himself by letting go of the ceiling and landing on the floor with a crash but now of course he had far better control of his body than before and even with a fall as great as that caused himself no damage very soon his sister noticed gregor s new way of entertaining himself he had after all left traces of the adhesive from his feet as he crawled about and got it into her head to make it as easy as possible for him by removing the furniture that got in his way especially the chest of drawers and the desk now this was not something that she would be able to do by herself she did not dare to ask for help from her father the sixteen year old maid had carried on bravely since the cook had left but she certainly would not have helped in this she had even asked to be allowed to keep the kitchen locked at all times and never to have to open the door unless it was especially important so his sister had no choice but to choose some time when gregor s father was not there and fetch his mother to help her as she approached the room gregor could hear his mother express her joy but once at the door she went silent first of course his sister came in and looked round to see that everything in the room was alright and only then did she let her mother enter gregor had hurriedly pulled the sheet down lower over the couch and put more folds into it so that everything really looked as if it had just been thrown down by chance gregor also refrained this time from spying out from under the sheet he gave up the chance to see his mother until later and was simply glad that she had come you can come in he can t be seen said his sister obviously leading her in by the hand the old chest of drawers was too heavy for a pair of feeble women to be heaving about but gregor listened as they pushed it from its place his sister always taking on the heaviest part of the work for herself and ignoring her mother s warnings that she would strain herself this lasted a very long time after labouring at it for fifteen minutes or more his mother said it would be better to leave the chest where it was for one thing it was too heavy for them to get the job finished before gregor s father got home and leaving it in the middle of the room it would be in his way even more and for another thing it wasn t even sure that taking the furniture away would really be any help to him she thought just the opposite the sight of the bare walls saddened her right to her heart and why wouldn t gregor feel the same way about it he d been used to this furniture in his room for a long time and it would make him feel abandoned to be in an empty room like that then quietly almost whispering as if wanting gregor whose whereabouts she did not know to hear not even the tone of her voice as she was convinced that he did not understand her words she added and by taking the furniture away won t it seem like we re showing that we ve given up all hope of improvement and we re abandoning him to cope for himself i think it d be best to leave the room exactly the way it was before so that when gregor comes back to us again he ll find everything unchanged and he ll be able to forget the time in between all the easier hearing these words from his mother made gregor realise that the lack of any direct human communication along with the monotonous life led by the family during these two months must have made him confused he could think of no other way of explaining to himself why he had seriously wanted his room emptied out had he really wanted to transform his room into a cave a warm room fitted out with the nice furniture he had inherited that would have let him crawl around unimpeded in any direction but it would also have let him quickly forget his past when he had still been human he had come very close to forgetting and it had only been the voice of his mother unheard for so long that had shaken him out of it nothing should be removed everything had to stay he could not do without the good influence the furniture had on his condition and if the furniture made it difficult for him to crawl about mindlessly that was not a loss but a great advantage his sister unfortunately did not agree she had become used to the idea not without reason that she was gregor s spokesman to his parents about the things that concerned him this meant that his mother s advice now was sufficient reason for her to insist on removing not only the chest of drawers and the desk as she had thought at first but all the furniture apart from the all important couch it was more than childish perversity of course or the unexpected confidence she had recently acquired that made her insist she had indeed noticed that gregor needed a lot of room to crawl about in whereas the furniture as far as anyone could see was of no use to him at all girls of that age though do become enthusiastic about things and feel they must get their way whenever they can perhaps this was what tempted grete to make gregor s situation seem even more shocking than it was so that she could do even more for him grete would probably be the only one who would dare enter a room dominated by gregor crawling about the bare walls by himself so she refused to let her mother dissuade her gregor s mother already looked uneasy in his room she soon stopped speaking and helped gregor s sister to get the chest of drawers out with what strength she had the chest of drawers was something that gregor could do without if he had to but the writing desk had to stay hardly had the two women pushed the chest of drawers groaning out of the room than gregor poked his head out from under the couch to see what he could do about it he meant to be as careful and considerate as he could but unfortunately it was his mother who came back first while grete in the next room had her arms round the chest pushing and pulling at it from side to side by herself without of course moving it an inch his mother was not used to the sight of gregor he might have made her ill so gregor hurried backwards to the far end of the couch in his startlement though he was not able to prevent the sheet at its front from moving a little it was enough to attract his mother s attention she stood very still remained there a moment and then went back out to grete gregor kept trying to assure himself that nothing unusual was happening it was just a few pieces of furniture being moved after all but he soon had to admit that the women going to and fro their little calls to each other the scraping of the furniture on the floor all these things made him feel as if he were being assailed from all sides with his head and legs pulled in against him and his body pressed to the floor he was forced to admit to himself that he could not stand all of this much longer they were emptying his room out taking away everything that was dear to him they had already taken out the chest containing his fretsaw and other tools now they threatened to remove the writing desk with its place clearly worn into the floor the desk where he had done his homework as a business trainee at high school even while he had been at infant school he really could not wait any longer to see whether the two women s intentions were good he had nearly forgotten they were there anyway as they were now too tired to say anything while they worked and he could only hear their feet as they stepped heavily on the floor so while the women were leant against the desk in the other room catching their breath he sallied out changed direction four times not knowing what he should save first before his attention was suddenly caught by the picture on the wall which was already denuded of everything else that had been on it of the lady dressed in copious fur he hurried up onto the picture and pressed himself against its glass it held him firmly and felt good on his hot belly this picture at least now totally covered by gregor would certainly be taken away by no one he turned his head to face the door into the living room so that he could watch the women when they came back they had not allowed themselves a long rest and came back quite soon grete had put her arm around her mother and was nearly carrying her what shall we take now then said grete and looked around her eyes met those of gregor on the wall perhaps only because her mother was there she remained calm bent her face to her so that she would not look round and said albeit hurriedly and with a tremor in her voice come on let s go back in the living room for a while gregor could see what grete had in mind she wanted to take her mother somewhere safe and then chase him down from the wall well she could certainly try it he sat unyielding on his picture he would rather jump at grete s face but grete s words had made her mother quite worried she stepped to one side saw the enormous brown patch against the flowers of the wallpaper and before she even realised it was gregor that she saw screamed oh god oh god arms outstretched she fell onto the couch as if she had given up everything and stayed there immobile gregor shouted his sister glowering at him and shaking her fist that was the first word she had spoken to him directly since his transformation she ran into the other room to fetch some kind of smelling salts to bring her mother out of her faint gregor wanted to help too he could save his picture later although he stuck fast to the glass and had to pull himself off by force then he too ran into the next room as if he could advise his sister like in the old days but he had to just stand behind her doing nothing she was looking into various bottles he startled her when she turned round a bottle fell to the ground and broke a splinter cut gregor s face some kind of caustic medicine splashed all over him now without delaying any longer grete took hold of all the bottles she could and ran with them in to her mother she slammed the door shut with her foot so now gregor was shut out from his mother who because of him might be near to death he could not open the door if he did not want to chase his sister away and she had to stay with his mother there was nothing for him to do but wait and oppressed with anxiety and self reproach he began to crawl about he crawled over everything walls furniture ceiling and finally in his confusion as the whole room began to spin around him he fell down into the middle of the dinner table he lay there for a while numb and immobile all around him it was quiet maybe that was a good sign then there was someone at the door the maid of course had locked herself in her kitchen so that grete would have to go and answer it his father had arrived home what s happened were his first words grete s appearance must have made everything clear to him she answered him with subdued voice and openly pressed her face into his chest mother s fainted but she s better now gregor got out just as i expected said his father just as i always said but you women wouldn t listen would you it was clear to gregor that grete had not said enough and that his father took it to mean that something bad had happened that he was responsible for some act of violence that meant gregor would now have to try to calm his father as he did not have the time to explain things to him even if that had been possible so he fled to the door of his room and pressed himself against it so that his father when he came in from the hall could see straight away that gregor had the best intentions and would go back into his room without delay that it would not be necessary to drive him back but that they had only to open the door and he would disappear his father though was not in the mood to notice subtleties like that ah he shouted as he came in sounding as if he were both angry and glad at the same time gregor drew his head back from the door and lifted it towards his father he really had not imagined his father the way he stood there now of late with his new habit of crawling about he had neglected to pay attention to what was going on the rest of the flat the way he had done before he really ought to have expected things to have changed but still still was that really his father the same tired man as used to be laying there entombed in his bed when gregor came back from his business trips who would receive him sitting in the armchair in his nightgown when he came back in the evenings who was hardly even able to stand up but as a sign of his pleasure would just raise his arms and who on the couple of times a year when they went for a walk together on a sunday or public holiday wrapped up tightly in his overcoat between gregor and his mother would always labour his way forward a little more slowly than them who were already walking slowly for his sake who would place his stick down carefully and if he wanted to say something would invariably stop and gather his companions around him he was standing up straight enough now dressed in a smart blue uniform with gold buttons the sort worn by the employees at the banking institute above the high stiff collar of the coat his strong double chin emerged under the bushy eyebrows his piercing dark eyes looked out fresh and alert his normally unkempt white hair was combed down painfully close to his scalp he took his cap with its gold monogram from probably some bank and threw it in an arc right across the room onto the sofa put his hands in his trouser pockets pushing back the bottom of his long uniform coat and with look of determination walked towards gregor he probably did not even know himself what he had in mind but nonetheless lifted his feet unusually high gregor was amazed at the enormous size of the soles of his boots but wasted no time with that he knew full well right from the first day of his new life that his father thought it necessary to always be extremely strict with him and so he ran up to his father stopped when his father stopped scurried forwards again when he moved even slightly in this way they went round the room several times without anything decisive happening without even giving the impression of a chase as everything went so slowly gregor remained all this time on the floor largely because he feared his father might see it as especially provoking if he fled onto the wall or ceiling whatever he did gregor had to admit that he certainly would not be able to keep up this running about for long as for each step his father took he had to carry out countless movements he became noticeably short of breath even in his earlier life his lungs had not been very reliable now as he lurched about in his efforts to muster all the strength he could for running he could hardly keep his eyes open his thoughts became too slow for him to think of any other way of saving himself than running he almost forgot that the walls were there for him to use although here they were concealed behind carefully carved furniture full of notches and protrusions then right beside him lightly tossed something flew down and rolled in front of him it was an apple then another one immediately flew at him gregor froze in shock there was no longer any point in running as his father had decided to bombard him he had filled his pockets with fruit from the bowl on the sideboard and now without even taking the time for careful aim threw one apple after another these little red apples rolled about on the floor knocking into each other as if they had electric motors an apple thrown without much force glanced against gregor s back and slid off without doing any harm another one however immediately following it hit squarely and lodged in his back gregor wanted to drag himself away as if he could remove the surprising the incredible pain by changing his position but he felt as if nailed to the spot and spread himself out all his senses in confusion the last thing he saw was the door of his room being pulled open his sister was screaming his mother ran out in front of her in her blouse as his sister had taken off some of her clothes after she had fainted to make it easier for her to breathe she ran to his father her skirts unfastened and sliding one after another to the ground stumbling over the skirts she pushed herself to his father her arms around him uniting herself with him totally now gregor lost his ability to see anything her hands behind his father s head begging him to spare gregor s life iii no one dared to remove the apple lodged in gregor s flesh so it remained there as a visible reminder of his injury he had suffered it there for more than a month and his condition seemed serious enough to remind even his father that gregor despite his current sad and revolting form was a family member who could not be treated as an enemy on the contrary as a family there was a duty to swallow any revulsion for him and to be patient just to be patient because of his injuries gregor had lost much of his mobility probably permanently he had been reduced to the condition of an ancient invalid and it took him long long minutes to crawl across his room crawling over the ceiling was out of the question but this deterioration in his condition was fully in his opinion made up for by the door to the living room being left open every evening he got into the habit of closely watching it for one or two hours before it was opened and then lying in the darkness of his room where he could not be seen from the living room he could watch the family in the light of the dinner table and listen to their conversation with everyone s permission in a way and thus quite differently from before they no longer held the lively conversations of earlier times of course the ones that gregor always thought about with longing when he was tired and getting into the damp bed in some small hotel room all of them were usually very quiet nowadays soon after dinner his father would go to sleep in his chair his mother and sister would urge each other to be quiet his mother bent deeply under the lamp would sew fancy underwear for a fashion shop his sister who had taken a sales job learned shorthand and french in the evenings so that she might be able to get a better position later on sometimes his father would wake up and say to gregor s mother you re doing so much sewing again today as if he did not know that he had been dozing and then he would go back to sleep again while mother and sister would exchange a tired grin with a kind of stubbornness gregor s father refused to take his uniform off even at home while his nightgown hung unused on its peg gregor s father would slumber where he was fully dressed as if always ready to serve and expecting to hear the voice of his superior even here the uniform had not been new to start with but as a result of this it slowly became even shabbier despite the efforts of gregor s mother and sister to look after it gregor would often spend the whole evening looking at all the stains on this coat with its gold buttons always kept polished and shiny while the old man in it would sleep highly uncomfortable but peaceful as soon as it struck ten gregor s mother would speak gently to his father to wake him and try to persuade him to go to bed as he couldn t sleep properly where he was and he really had to get his sleep if he was to be up at six to get to work but since he had been in work he had become more obstinate and would always insist on staying longer at the table even though he regularly fell asleep and it was then harder than ever to persuade him to exchange the chair for his bed then however much mother and sister would importune him with little reproaches and warnings he would keep slowly shaking his head for a quarter of an hour with his eyes closed and refusing to get up gregor s mother would tug at his sleeve whisper endearments into his ear gregor s sister would leave her work to help her mother but nothing would have any effect on him he would just sink deeper into his chair only when the two women took him under the arms he would abruptly open his eyes look at them one after the other and say what a life this is what peace i get in my old age and supported by the two women he would lift himself up carefully as if he were carrying the greatest load himself let the women take him to the door send them off and carry on by himself while gregor s mother would throw down her needle and his sister her pen so that they could run after his father and continue being of help to him who in this tired and overworked family would have had time to give more attention to gregor than was absolutely necessary the household budget became even smaller so now the maid was dismissed an enormous thick boned charwoman with white hair that flapped around her head came every morning and evening to do the heaviest work everything else was looked after by gregor s mother on top of the large amount of sewing work she did gregor even learned listening to the evening conversation about what price they had hoped for that several items of jewellery belonging to the family had been sold even though both mother and sister had been very fond of wearing them at functions and celebrations but the loudest complaint was that although the flat was much too big for their present circumstances they could not move out of it there was no imaginable way of transferring gregor to the new address he could see quite well though that there were more reasons than consideration for him that made it difficult for them to move it would have been quite easy to transport him in any suitable crate with a few air holes in it the main thing holding the family back from their decision to move was much more to do with their total despair and the thought that they had been struck with a misfortune unlike anything experienced by anyone else they knew or were related to they carried out absolutely everything that the world expects from poor people gregor s father brought bank employees their breakfast his mother sacrificed herself by washing clothes for strangers his sister ran back and forth behind her desk at the behest of the customers but they just did not have the strength to do any more and the injury in gregor s back began to hurt as much as when it was new after they had come back from taking his father to bed gregor s mother and sister would now leave their work where it was and sit close together cheek to cheek his mother would point to gregor s room and say close that door grete and then when he was in the dark again they would sit in the next room and their tears would mingle or they would simply sit there staring dry eyed at the table gregor hardly slept at all either night or day sometimes he would think of taking over the family s affairs just like before the next time the door was opened he had long forgotten about his boss and the chief clerk but they would appear again in his thoughts the salesmen and the apprentices that stupid teaboy two or three friends from other businesses one of the chambermaids from a provincial hotel a tender memory that appeared and disappeared again a cashier from a hat shop for whom his attention had been serious but too slow all of them appeared to him mixed together with strangers and others he had forgotten but instead of helping him and his family they were all of them inaccessible and he was glad when they disappeared other times he was not at all in the mood to look after his family he was filled with simple rage about the lack of attention he was shown and although he could think of nothing he would have wanted he made plans of how he could get into the pantry where he could take all the things he was entitled to even if he was not hungry gregor s sister no longer thought about how she could please him but would hurriedly push some food or other into his room with her foot before she rushed out to work in the morning and at midday and in the evening she would sweep it away again with the broom indifferent as to whether it had been eaten or more often than not had been left totally untouched she still cleared up the room in the evening but now she could not have been any quicker about it smears of dirt were left on the walls here and there were little balls of dust and filth at first gregor went into one of the worst of these places when his sister arrived as a reproach to her but he could have stayed there for weeks without his sister doing anything about it she could see the dirt as well as he could but she had simply decided to leave him to it at the same time she became touchy in a way that was quite new for her and which everyone in the family understood cleaning up gregor s room was for her and her alone gregor s mother did once thoroughly clean his room and needed to use several bucketfuls of water to do it although that much dampness also made gregor ill and he lay flat on the couch bitter and immobile but his mother was to be punished still more for what she had done as hardly had his sister arrived home in the evening than she noticed the change in gregor s room and highly aggrieved ran back into the living room where despite her mothers raised and imploring hands she broke into convulsive tears her father of course was startled out of his chair and the two parents looked on astonished and helpless then they too became agitated gregor s father standing to the right of his mother accused her of not leaving the cleaning of gregor s room to his sister from her left gregor s sister screamed at her that she was never to clean gregor s room again while his mother tried to draw his father who was beside himself with anger into the bedroom his sister quaking with tears thumped on the table with her small fists and gregor hissed in anger that no one had even thought of closing the door to save him the sight of this and all its noise gregor s sister was exhausted from going out to work and looking after gregor as she had done before was even more work for her but even so his mother ought certainly not to have taken her place gregor on the other hand ought not to be neglected now though the charwoman was here this elderly widow with a robust bone structure that made her able to withstand the hardest of things in her long life wasn t really repelled by gregor just by chance one day rather than any real curiosity she opened the door to gregor s room and found herself face to face with him he was taken totally by surprise no one was chasing him but he began to rush to and fro while she just stood there in amazement with her hands crossed in front of her from then on she never failed to open the door slightly every evening and morning and look briefly in on him at first she would call to him as she did so with words that she probably considered friendly such as come on then you old dung beetle or look at the old dung beetle there gregor never responded to being spoken to in that way but just remained where he was without moving as if the door had never even been opened if only they had told this charwoman to clean up his room every day instead of letting her disturb him for no reason whenever she felt like it one day early in the morning while a heavy rain struck the windowpanes perhaps indicating that spring was coming she began to speak to him in that way once again gregor was so resentful of it that he started to move toward her he was slow and infirm but it was like a kind of attack instead of being afraid the charwoman just lifted up one of the chairs from near the door and stood there with her mouth open clearly intending not to close her mouth until the chair in her hand had been slammed down into gregor s back aren t you coming any closer then she asked when gregor turned round again and she calmly put the chair back in the corner gregor had almost entirely stopped eating only if he happened to find himself next to the food that had been prepared for him he might take some of it into his mouth to play with it leave it there a few hours and then more often than not spit it out again at first he thought it was distress at the state of his room that stopped him eating but he had soon got used to the changes made there they had got into the habit of putting things into this room that they had no room for anywhere else and there were now many such things as one of the rooms in the flat had been rented out to three gentlemen these earnest gentlemen all three of them had full beards as gregor learned peering through the crack in the door one day were painfully insistent on things being tidy this meant not only in their own room but since they had taken a room in this establishment in the entire flat and especially in the kitchen unnecessary clutter was something they could not tolerate especially if it was dirty they had moreover brought most of their own furnishings and equipment with them for this reason many things had become superfluous which although they could not be sold the family did not wish to discard all these things found their way into gregor s room the dustbins from the kitchen found their way in there too the charwoman was always in a hurry and anything she couldn t use for the time being she would just chuck in there he fortunately would usually see no more than the object and the hand that held it the woman most likely meant to fetch the things back out again when she had time and the opportunity or to throw everything out in one go but what actually happened was that they were left where they landed when they had first been thrown unless gregor made his way through the junk and moved it somewhere else at first he moved it because with no other room free where he could crawl about he was forced to but later on he came to enjoy it although moving about in the way left him sad and tired to death and he would remain immobile for hours afterwards the gentlemen who rented the room would sometimes take their evening meal at home in the living room that was used by everyone and so the door to this room was often kept closed in the evening but gregor found it easy to give up having the door open he had after all often failed to make use of it when it was open and without the family having noticed it lain in his room in its darkest corner one time though the charwoman left the door to the living room slightly open and it remained open when the gentlemen who rented the room came in in the evening and the light was put on they sat up at the table where formerly gregor had taken his meals with his father and mother they unfolded the serviettes and picked up their knives and forks gregor s mother immediately appeared in the doorway with a dish of meat and soon behind her came his sister with a dish piled high with potatoes the food was steaming and filled the room with its smell the gentlemen bent over the dishes set in front of them as if they wanted to test the food before eating it and the gentleman in the middle who seemed to count as an authority for the other two did indeed cut off a piece of meat while it was still in its dish clearly wishing to establish whether it was sufficiently cooked or whether it should be sent back to the kitchen it was to his satisfaction and gregor s mother and sister who had been looking on anxiously began to breathe again and smiled the family themselves ate in the kitchen nonetheless gregor s father came into the living room before he went into the kitchen bowed once with his cap in his hand and did his round of the table the gentlemen stood as one and mumbled something into their beards then once they were alone they ate in near perfect silence it seemed remarkable to gregor that above all the various noises of eating their chewing teeth could still be heard as if they had wanted to show gregor that you need teeth in order to eat and it was not possible to perform anything with jaws that are toothless however nice they might be i d like to eat something said gregor anxiously but not anything like they re eating they do feed themselves and here i am dying throughout all this time gregor could not remember having heard the violin being played but this evening it began to be heard from the kitchen the three gentlemen had already finished their meal the one in the middle had produced a newspaper given a page to each of the others and now they leant back in their chairs reading them and smoking when the violin began playing they became attentive stood up and went on tip toe over to the door of the hallway where they stood pressed against each other someone must have heard them in the kitchen as gregor s father called out is the playing perhaps unpleasant for the gentlemen we can stop it straight away on the contrary said the middle gentleman would the young lady not like to come in and play for us here in the room where it is after all much more cosy and comfortable oh yes we d love to called back gregor s father as if he had been the violin player himself the gentlemen stepped back into the room and waited gregor s father soon appeared with the music stand his mother with the music and his sister with the violin she calmly prepared everything for her to begin playing his parents who had never rented a room out before and therefore showed an exaggerated courtesy towards the three gentlemen did not even dare to sit on their own chairs his father leant against the door with his right hand pushed in between two buttons on his uniform coat his mother though was offered a seat by one of the gentlemen and sat leaving the chair where the gentleman happened to have placed it out of the way in a corner his sister began to play father and mother paid close attention one on each side to the movements of her hands drawn in by the playing gregor had dared to come forward a little and already had his head in the living room before he had taken great pride in how considerate he was but now it hardly occurred to him that he had become so thoughtless about the others what s more there was now all the more reason to keep himself hidden as he was covered in the dust that lay everywhere in his room and flew up at the slightest movement he carried threads hairs and remains of food about on his back and sides he was much too indifferent to everything now to lay on his back and wipe himself on the carpet like he had used to do several times a day and despite this condition he was not too shy to move forward a little onto the immaculate floor of the living room no one noticed him though the family was totally preoccupied with the violin playing at first the three gentlemen had put their hands in their pockets and come up far too close behind the music stand to look at all the notes being played and they must have disturbed gregor s sister but soon in contrast with the family they withdrew back to the window with their heads sunk and talking to each other at half volume and they stayed by the window while gregor s father observed them anxiously it really now seemed very obvious that they had expected to hear some beautiful or entertaining violin playing but had been disappointed that they had had enough of the whole performance and it was only now out of politeness that they allowed their peace to be disturbed it was especially unnerving the way they all blew the smoke from their cigarettes upwards from their mouth and noses yet gregor s sister was playing so beautifully her face was leant to one side following the lines of music with a careful and melancholy expression gregor crawled a little further forward keeping his head close to the ground so that he could meet her eyes if the chance came was he an animal if music could captivate him so it seemed to him that he was being shown the way to the unknown nourishment he had been yearning for he was determined to make his way forward to his sister and tug at her skirt to show her she might come into his room with her violin as no one appreciated her playing here as much as he would he never wanted to let her out of his room not while he lived anyway his shocking appearance should for once be of some use to him he wanted to be at every door of his room at once to hiss and spit at the attackers his sister should not be forced to stay with him though but stay of her own free will she would sit beside him on the couch with her ear bent down to him while he told her how he had always intended to send her to the conservatory how he would have told everyone about it last christmas had christmas really come and gone already if this misfortune hadn t got in the way and refuse to let anyone dissuade him from it on hearing all this his sister would break out in tears of emotion and gregor would climb up to her shoulder and kiss her neck which since she had been going out to work she had kept free without any necklace or collar mr samsa shouted the middle gentleman to gregor s father pointing without wasting any more words with his forefinger at gregor as he slowly moved forward the violin went silent the middle of the three gentlemen first smiled at his two friends shaking his head and then looked back at gregor his father seemed to think it more important to calm the three gentlemen before driving gregor out even though they were not at all upset and seemed to think gregor was more entertaining that the violin playing had been he rushed up to them with his arms spread out and attempted to drive them back into their room at the same time as trying to block their view of gregor with his body now they did become a little annoyed and it was not clear whether it was his father s behaviour that annoyed them or the dawning realisation that they had had a neighbour like gregor in the next room without knowing it they asked gregor s father for explanations raised their arms like he had tugged excitedly at their beards and moved back towards their room only very slowly meanwhile gregor s sister had overcome the despair she had fallen into when her playing was suddenly interrupted she had let her hands drop and let violin and bow hang limply for a while but continued to look at the music as if still playing but then she suddenly pulled herself together lay the instrument on her mother s lap who still sat laboriously struggling for breath where she was and ran into the next room which under pressure from her father the three gentlemen were more quickly moving toward under his sister s experienced hand the pillows and covers on the beds flew up and were put into order and she had already finished making the beds and slipped out again before the three gentlemen had reached the room gregor s father seemed so obsessed with what he was doing that he forgot all the respect he owed to his tenants he urged them and pressed them until when he was already at the door of the room the middle of the three gentlemen shouted like thunder and stamped his foot and thereby brought gregor s father to a halt i declare here and now he said raising his hand and glancing at gregor s mother and sister to gain their attention too that with regard to the repugnant conditions that prevail in this flat and with this family here he looked briefly but decisively at the floor i give immediate notice on my room for the days that i have been living here i will of course pay nothing at all on the contrary i will consider whether to proceed with some kind of action for damages from you and believe me it would be very easy to set out the grounds for such an action he was silent and looked straight ahead as if waiting for something and indeed his two friends joined in with the words and we also give immediate notice with that he took hold of the door handle and slammed the door gregor s father staggered back to his seat feeling his way with his hands and fell into it it looked as if he was stretching himself out for his usual evening nap but from the uncontrolled way his head kept nodding it could be seen that he was not sleeping at all throughout all this gregor had lain still where the three gentlemen had first seen him his disappointment at the failure of his plan and perhaps also because he was weak from hunger made it impossible for him to move he was sure that everyone would turn on him any moment and he waited he was not even startled out of this state when the violin on his mother s lap fell from her trembling fingers and landed loudly on the floor father mother said his sister hitting the table with her hand as introduction we can t carry on like this maybe you can t see it but i can i don t want to call this monster my brother all i can say is we have to try and get rid of it we ve done all that s humanly possible to look after it and be patient i don t think anyone could accuse us of doing anything wrong she s absolutely right said gregor s father to himself his mother who still had not had time to catch her breath began to cough dully her hand held out in front of her and a deranged expression in her eyes gregor s sister rushed to his mother and put her hand on her forehead her words seemed to give gregor s father some more definite ideas he sat upright played with his uniform cap between the plates left by the three gentlemen after their meal and occasionally looked down at gregor as he lay there immobile we have to try and get rid of it said gregor s sister now speaking only to her father as her mother was too occupied with coughing to listen it ll be the death of both of you i can see it coming we can t all work as hard as we have to and then come home to be tortured like this we can t endure it i can t endure it any more and she broke out so heavily in tears that they flowed down the face of her mother and she wiped them away with mechanical hand movements my child said her father with sympathy and obvious understanding what are we to do his sister just shrugged her shoulders as a sign of the helplessness and tears that had taken hold of her displacing her earlier certainty if he could just understand us said his father almost as a question his sister shook her hand vigorously through her tears as a sign that of that there was no question if he could just understand us repeated gregor s father closing his eyes in acceptance of his sister s certainty that that was quite impossible then perhaps we could come to some kind of arrangement with him but as it is it s got to go shouted his sister that s the only way father you ve got to get rid of the idea that that s gregor we ve only harmed ourselves by believing it for so long how can that be gregor if it were gregor he would have seen long ago that it s not possible for human beings to live with an animal like that and he would have gone of his own free will we wouldn t have a brother any more then but we could carry on with our lives and remember him with respect as it is this animal is persecuting us it s driven out our tenants it obviously wants to take over the whole flat and force us to sleep on the streets father look just look she suddenly screamed he s starting again in her alarm which was totally beyond gregor s comprehension his sister even abandoned his mother as she pushed herself vigorously out of her chair as if more willing to sacrifice her own mother than stay anywhere near gregor she rushed over to behind her father who had become excited merely because she was and stood up half raising his hands in front of gregor s sister as if to protect her but gregor had had no intention of frightening anyone least of all his sister all he had done was begin to turn round so that he could go back into his room although that was in itself quite startling as his pain wracked condition meant that turning round required a great deal of effort and he was using his head to help himself do it repeatedly raising it and striking it against the floor he stopped and looked round they seemed to have realised his good intention and had only been alarmed briefly now they all looked at him in unhappy silence his mother lay in her chair with her legs stretched out and pressed against each other her eyes nearly closed with exhaustion his sister sat next to his father with her arms around his neck maybe now they ll let me turn round thought gregor and went back to work he could not help panting loudly with the effort and had sometimes to stop and take a rest no one was making him rush any more everything was left up to him as soon as he had finally finished turning round he began to move straight ahead he was amazed at the great distance that separated him from his room and could not understand how he had covered that distance in his weak state a little while before and almost without noticing it he concentrated on crawling as fast as he could and hardly noticed that there was not a word not any cry from his family to distract him he did not turn his head until he had reached the doorway he did not turn it all the way round as he felt his neck becoming stiff but it was nonetheless enough to see that nothing behind him had changed only his sister had stood up with his last glance he saw that his mother had now fallen completely asleep he was hardly inside his room before the door was hurriedly shut bolted and locked the sudden noise behind gregor so startled him that his little legs collapsed under him it was his sister who had been in so much of a rush she had been standing there waiting and sprung forward lightly gregor had not heard her coming at all and as she turned the key in the lock she said loudly to her parents at last what now then gregor asked himself as he looked round in the darkness he soon made the discovery that he could no longer move at all this was no surprise to him it seemed rather that being able to actually move around on those spindly little legs until then was unnatural he also felt relatively comfortable it is true that his entire body was aching but the pain seemed to be slowly getting weaker and weaker and would finally disappear altogether he could already hardly feel the decayed apple in his back or the inflamed area around it which was entirely covered in white dust he thought back of his family with emotion and love if it was possible he felt that he must go away even more strongly than his sister he remained in this state of empty and peaceful rumination until he heard the clock tower strike three in the morning he watched as it slowly began to get light everywhere outside the window too then without his willing it his head sank down completely and his last breath flowed weakly from his nostrils when the cleaner came in early in the morning they d often asked her not to keep slamming the doors but with her strength and in her hurry she still did so that everyone in the flat knew when she d arrived and from then on it was impossible to sleep in peace she made her usual brief look in on gregor and at first found nothing special she thought he was laying there so still on purpose playing the martyr she attributed all possible understanding to him she happened to be holding the long broom in her hand so she tried to tickle gregor with it from the doorway when she had no success with that she tried to make a nuisance of herself and poked at him a little and only when she found she could shove him across the floor with no resistance at all did she start to pay attention she soon realised what had really happened opened her eyes wide whistled to herself but did not waste time to yank open the bedroom doors and shout loudly into the darkness of the bedrooms come and ave a look at this it s dead just lying there stone dead mr and mrs samsa sat upright there in their marriage bed and had to make an effort to get over the shock caused by the cleaner before they could grasp what she was saying but then each from his own side they hurried out of bed mr samsa threw the blanket over his shoulders mrs samsa just came out in her nightdress and that is how they went into gregor s room on the way they opened the door to the living room where grete had been sleeping since the three gentlemen had moved in she was fully dressed as if she had never been asleep and the paleness of her face seemed to confirm this dead asked mrs samsa looking at the charwoman enquiringly even though she could have checked for herself and could have known it even without checking that s what i said replied the cleaner and to prove it she gave gregor s body another shove with the broom sending it sideways across the floor mrs samsa made a movement as if she wanted to hold back the broom but did not complete it now then said mr samsa let s give thanks to god for that he crossed himself and the three women followed his example grete who had not taken her eyes from the corpse said just look how thin he was he didn t eat anything for so long the food came out again just the same as when it went in gregor s body was indeed completely dried up and flat they had not seen it until then but now he was not lifted up on his little legs nor did he do anything to make them look away grete come with us in here for a little while said mrs samsa with a pained smile and grete followed her parents into the bedroom but not without looking back at the body the cleaner shut the door and opened the window wide although it was still early in the morning the fresh air had something of warmth mixed in with it it was already the end of march after all the three gentlemen stepped out of their room and looked round in amazement for their breakfasts they had been forgotten about where is our breakfast the middle gentleman asked the cleaner irritably she just put her finger on her lips and made a quick and silent sign to the men that they might like to come into gregor s room they did so and stood around gregor s corpse with their hands in the pockets of their well worn coats it was now quite light in the room then the door of the bedroom opened and mr samsa appeared in his uniform with his wife on one arm and his daughter on the other all of them had been crying a little grete now and then pressed her face against her father s arm leave my home now said mr samsa indicating the door and without letting the women from him what do you mean asked the middle of the three gentlemen somewhat disconcerted and he smiled sweetly the other two held their hands behind their backs and continually rubbed them together in gleeful anticipation of a loud quarrel which could only end in their favour i mean just what i said answered mr samsa and with his two companions went in a straight line towards the man at first he stood there still looking at the ground as if the contents of his head were rearranging themselves into new positions alright we ll go then he said and looked up at mr samsa as if he had been suddenly overcome with humility and wanted permission again from mr samsa for his decision mr samsa merely opened his eyes wide and briefly nodded to him several times at that and without delay the man actually did take long strides into the front hallway his two friends had stopped rubbing their hands some time before and had been listening to what was being said now they jumped off after their friend as if taken with a sudden fear that mr samsa might go into the hallway in front of them and break the connection with their leader once there all three took their hats from the stand took their sticks from the holder bowed without a word and left the premises mr samsa and the two women followed them out onto the landing but they had had no reason to mistrust the men intentions and as they leaned over the landing they saw how the three gentlemen made slow but steady progress down the many steps as they turned the corner on each floor they disappeared and would reappear a few moments later the further down they went the more that the samsa family lost interest in them when a butcher s boy proud of posture with his tray on his head passed them on his way up and came nearer than they were mr samsa and the women came away from the landing and went as if relieved back into the flat they decided the best way to make use of that day was for relaxation and to go for a walk not only had they earned a break from work but they were in serious need of it so they sat at the table and wrote three letters of excusal mr samsa to his employers mrs samsa to her contractor and grete to her principal the cleaner came in while they were writing to tell them she was going she d finished her work for that morning the three of them at first just nodded without looking up from what they were writing and it was only when the cleaner still did not seem to want to leave that they looked up in irritation well asked mr samsa the charwoman stood in the doorway with a smile on her face as if she had some tremendous good news to report but would only do it if she was clearly asked to the almost vertical little ostrich feather on her hat which had been source of irritation to mr samsa all the time she had been working for them swayed gently in all directions what is it you want then asked mrs samsa whom the cleaner had the most respect for yes she answered and broke into a friendly laugh that made her unable to speak straight away well then that thing in there you needn t worry about how you re going to get rid of it that s all been sorted out mrs samsa and grete bent down over their letters as if intent on continuing with what they were writing mr samsa saw that the cleaner wanted to start describing everything in detail but with outstretched hand he made it quite clear that she was not to so as she was prevented from telling them all about it she suddenly remembered what a hurry she was in and clearly peeved called out cheerio then everyone turned round sharply and left slamming the door terribly as she went tonight she gets sacked said mr samsa but he received no reply from either his wife or his daughter as the charwoman seemed to have destroyed the peace they had only just gained they got up and went over to the window where they remained with their arms around each other mr samsa twisted round in his chair to look at them and sat there watching for a while then he called out come here then let s forget about all that old stuff shall we come and give me a bit of attention the two women immediately did as he said hurrying over to him where they kissed him and hugged him and then they quickly finished their letters after that the three of them left the flat together which was something they had not done for months and took the tram out to the open country outside the town they had the tram filled with warm sunshine all to themselves leant back comfortably on their seats they discussed their prospects and found that on closer examination they were not at all bad until then they had never asked each other about their work but all three had jobs which were very good and held particularly good promise for the future the greatest improvement for the time being of course would be achieved quite easily by moving house what they needed now was a flat that was smaller and cheaper than the current one which had been chosen by gregor one that was in a better location and most of all more practical all the time grete was becoming livelier with all the worry they had been having of late her cheeks had become pale but while they were talking mr and mrs samsa were struck almost simultaneously with the thought of how their daughter was blossoming into a well built and beautiful young lady they became quieter just from each other s glance and almost without knowing it they agreed that it would soon be time to find a good man for her and as if in confirmation of their new dreams and good intentions as soon as they reached their destination grete was the first to get up and stretch out her young body once when i was six years old i saw a magnificent picture in a book called true stories from nature about the primeval forest it was a picture of a boa constrictor in the act of swallowing an animal here is a copy of the drawing in the book it said boa constrictors swallow their prey whole without chewing it after that they are not able to move and they sleep through the six months that they need for digestion i pondered deeply then over the adventures of the jungle and after some work with a colored pencil i succeeded in making my first drawing my drawing number one it looked like this i showed my masterpiece to the grown ups and asked them whether the drawing frightened them but they answered frighten why should any one be frightened by a hat my drawing was not a picture of a hat it was a picture of a boa constrictor digesting an elephant but since the grown ups were not able to understand it i made another drawing i drew the inside of the boa constrictor so that the grown ups could see it clearly they always need to have things explained my drawing number two looked like this the grown ups response this time was to advise me to lay aside my drawings of boa constrictors whether from the inside or the outside and devote myself instead to geography history arithmetic and grammar that is why at the age of six i gave up what might have been a magnificent career as a painter i had been disheartened by the failure of my drawing number one and my drawing number two grown ups never understand anything by themselves and it is tiresome for children to be always and forever explaining things to them so then i chose another profession and learned to pilot airplanes i have flown a little over all parts of the world and it is true that geography has been very useful to me at a glance i can distinguish china from arizona if one gets lost in the night such knowledge is valuable in the course of this life i have had a great many encounters with a great many people who have been concerned with matters of consequence i have lived a great deal among grown ups i have seen them intimately close at hand and that hasn t much improved my opinion of them whenever i met one of them who seemed to me at all clear sighted i tried the experiment of showing him my drawing number one which i have always kept i would try to find out so if this was a person of true understanding but whoever it was he or she would always say that is a hat then i would never talk to that person about boa constrictors or primeval forests or stars i would bring myself down to his level i would talk to him about bridge and golf and politics and neckties and the grown up would be greatly pleased to have met such a sensible man chapter the narrator crashes in the desert and makes the acquaintance of the little prince so i lived my life alone without anyone that i could really talk to until i had an accident with my plane in the desert of sahara six years ago something was broken in my engine and as i had with me neither a mechanic nor any passengers i set myself to attempt the difficult repairs all alone it was a question of life or death for me i had scarcely enough drinking water to last a week the first night then i went to sleep on the sand a thousand miles from any human habitation i was more isolated than a shipwrecked sailor on a raft in the middle of the ocean thus you can imagine my amazement at sunrise when i was awakened by an odd little voice it said if you please draw me a sheep what draw me a sheep i jumped to my feet completely thunderstruck i blinked my eyes hard i looked carefully all around me and i saw a most extraordinary small person who stood there examining me with great seriousness here you may see the best potrait that later i was able to make of him but my drawing is certainly very much less charming than its model that however is not my fault the grown ups discouraged me in my painter s career when i was six years old and i never learned to draw anything except boas from the outside and boas from the inside now i stared at this sudden apparition with my eyes fairly starting out of my head in astonishment remember i had crashed in the desert a thousand miles from any inhabited region and yet my little man seemed neither to be straying uncertainly among the sands nor to be fainting from fatigue or hunger or thirst or fear nothing about him gave any suggestion of a child lost in the middle of the desert a thousand miles from any human habitation when at last i was able to speak i said to him but what are you doing here and in answer he repeated very slowly as if he were speaking of a matter of great consequence if you please draw me a sheep when a mystery is too overpowering one dare not disobey absurd as it might seem to me a thousand miles from any human habitation and in danger of death i took out of my pocket a sheet of paper and my fountain pen but then i remembered how my studies had been concentrated on geography history arithmetic and grammar and i told the little chap a little crossly too that i did not know how to draw he answered me that doesn t matter draw me a sheep but i had never drawn a sheep so i drew for him one of the two pictures i had drawn so often it was that of the boa constrictor from the outside and i was astounded to hear the little fellow greet it with no no no i do not want an elephant inside a boa constrictor a boa constrictor is a very dangerous creature and an elephant is very cumbersome where i live everything is very small what i need is a sheep draw me a sheep so then i made a drawing he looked at it carefully then he said no this sheep is already very sickly make me another so i made another drawing my friend smiled gently and indulgenty you see yourself he said that this is not a sheep this is a ram it has horns so then i did my drawing over once more but it was rejected too just like the others this one is too old i want a sheep that will live a long time by this time my patience was exhausted because i was in a hurry to start taking my engine apart so i tossed off this drawing and i threw out an explanation with it this is only his box the sheep you asked for is inside i was very surprised to see a light break over the face of my young judge that is exactly the way i wanted it do you think that this sheep will have to have a great deal of grass why because where i live everything is very small there will surely be enough grass for him i said it is a very small sheep that i have given you he bent his head over the drawing not so small that look he has gone to sleep and that is how i made the acquaintance of the little prince chapter the narrator learns more about from where the little prince came it took me a long time to learn where he came from the little prince who asked me so many questions never seemed to hear the ones i asked him it was from words dropped by chance that little by little everything was revealed to me the first time he saw my airplane for instance i shall not draw my airplane that would be much too complicated for me he asked me what is that object that is not an object it flies it is an airplane it is my airplane and i was proud to have him learn that i could fly he cried out then what you dropped down from the sky yes i answered modestly oh that is funny and the little prince broke into a lovely peal of laughter which irritated me very much i like my misfortunes to be taken seriously then he added so you too come from the sky which is your planet at that moment i caught a gleam of light in the impenetrable mystery of his presence and i demanded abruptly do you come from another planet but he did not reply he tossed his head gently without taking his eyes from my plane it is true that on that you can t have come from very far away and he sank into a reverie which lasted a long time then taking my sheep out of his pocket he buried himself in the contemplation of his treasure you can imagine how my curiosity was aroused by this half confidence about the other planets i made a great effort therefore to find out more on this subject my little man where do you come from what is this where i live of which you speak where do you want to take your sheep after a reflective silence he answered the thing that is so good about the box you have given me is that at night he can use it as his house that is so and if you are good i will give you a string too so that you can tie him during the day and a post to tie him to but the little prince seemed shocked by this offer tie him what a queer idea but if you don t tie him i said he will wander off somewhere and get lost my friend broke into another peal of laughter but where do you think he would go anywhere straight ahead of him then the little prince said earnestly that doesn t matter where i live everything is so small and with perhaps a hint of sadness he added straight ahead of him nobody can go very far chapter the narrator speculates as to which asteroid from which the little prince came i had thus learned a second fact of great importance this was that the planet the little prince came from was scarcely any larger than a house but that did not really surprise me much i knew very well that in addition to the great planets such as the earth jupiter mars venus to which we have given names there are also hundreds of others some of which are so small that one has a hard time seeing them through the telescope when an astronomer discovers one of these he does not give it a name but only a number he might call it for example asteroid i have serious reason to believe that the planet from which the little prince came is the asteroid known as b this asteroid has only once been seen through the telescope that was by a turkish astronomer in on making his discovery the astronomer had presented it to the international astronomical congress in a great demonstration but he was in turkish costume and so nobody would believe what he said grown ups are like that fortunately however for the reputation of asteroid b a turkish dictator made a law that his subjects under pain of death should change to european costume so in the astronomer gave his demonstration all over again dressed with impressive style and elegance and this time everybody accepted his report if i have told you these details about the asteroid and made a note of its number for you it is on account of the grown ups and their ways when you tell them that you have made a new friend they never ask you any questions about essential matters they never say to you what does his voice sound like what games does he love best does he collect butterflies instead they demand how old is he how many brothers has he how much does he weigh how much money does his father make only from these figures do they think they have learned anything about him if you were to say to the grown ups i saw a beautiful house made of rosy brick with geraniums in the windows and doves on the roof they would not be able to get any idea of that house at all you would have to say to them i saw a house that cost then they would exclaim oh what a pretty house that is just so you might say to them the proof that the little prince existed is that he was charming that he laughed and that he was looking for a sheep if anybody wants a sheep that is a proof that he exists and what good would it do to tell them that they would shrug their shoulders and treat you like a child but if you said to them the planet he came from is asteroid b then they would be convinced and leave you in peace from their questions they are like that one must not hold it against them children should always show great forbearance toward grown up people but certainly for us who understand life figures are a matter of indifference i should have liked to begin this story in the fashion of the fairy tales i should have like to say once upon a time there was a little prince who lived on a planet that was scarcely any bigger than himself and who had need of a sheep to those who understand life that would have given a much greater air of truth to my story for i do not want any one to read my book carelessly i have suffered too much grief in setting down these memories six years have already passed since my friend went away from me with his sheep if i try to describe him here it is to make sure that i shall not forget him to forget a friend is sad not every one has had a friend and if i forget him i may become like the grown ups who are no longer interested in anything but figures it is for that purpose again that i have bought a box of paints and some pencils it is hard to take up drawing again at my age when i have never made any pictures except those of the boa constrictor from the outside and the boa constrictor from the inside since i was six i shall certainly try to make my portraits as true to life as possible but i am not at all sure of success one drawing goes along all right and another has no resemblance to its subject i make some errors too in the little prince s height in one place he is too tall and in another too short and i feel some doubts about the color of his costume so i fumble along as best i can now good now bad and i hope generally fair to middling in certain more important details i shall make mistakes also but that is something that will not be my fault my friend never explained anything to me he thought perhaps that i was like himself but i alas do not know how to see sheep through t he walls of boxes perhaps i am a little like the grown ups i have had to grow old chapter we are warned as to the dangers of the baobabs as each day passed i would learn in our talk something about the little prince s planet his departure from it his journey the information would come very slowly as it might chance to fall from his thoughts it was in this way that i heard on the third day about the catastrophe of the baobabs this time once more i had the sheep to thank for it for the little prince asked me abruptly as if seized by a grave doubt it is true isn t it that sheep eat little bushes yes that is true ah i am glad i did not understand why it was so important that sheep should eat little bushes but the little prince added then it follows that they also eat baobabs i pointed out to the little prince that baobabs were not little bushes but on the contrary trees as big as castles and that even if he took a whole herd of elephants away with him the herd would not eat up one single baobab the idea of the herd of elephants made the little prince laugh we would have to put them one on top of the other he said but he made a wise comment before they grow so big the baobabs start out by being little that is strictly correct i said but why do you want the sheep to eat the little baobabs he answered me at once oh come come as if he were speaking of something that was self evident and i was obliged to make a great mental effort to solve this problem without any assistance indeed as i learned there were on the planet where the little prince lived as on all planets good plants and bad plants in consequence there were good seeds from good plants and bad seeds from bad plants but seeds are invisible they sleep deep in the heart of the earth s darkness until some one among them is seized with the desire to awaken then this little seed will stretch itself and begin timidly at first to push a charming little sprig inoffensively upward toward the sun if it is only a sprout of radish or the sprig of a rose bush one would let it grow wherever it might wish but when it is a bad plant one must destroy it as soon as possible the very first instant that one recognizes it now there were some terrible seeds on the planet that was the home of the little prince and these were the seeds of the baobab the soil of that planet was infested with them a baobab is something you will never never be able to get rid of if you attend to it too late it spreads over the entire planet it bores clear through it with its roots and if the planet is too small and the baobabs are too many they split it in pieces it is a question of discipline the little prince said to me later on when you ve finished your own toilet in the morning then it is time to attend to the toilet of your planet just so with the greatest care you must see to it that you pull up regularly all the baobabs at the very first moment when they can be distinguished from the rosebushes which they resemble so closely in their earliest youth it is very tedious work the little prince added but very easy and one day he said to me you ought to make a beautiful drawing so that the children where you live can see exactly how all this is that would be very useful to them if they were to travel some day sometimes he added there is no harm in putting off a piece of work until another day but when it is a matter of baobabs that always means a catastrophe i knew a planet that was inhabited by a lazy man he neglected three little bushes so as the little prince described it to me i have made a drawing of that planet i do not much like to take the tone of a moralist but the danger of the baobabs is so little understood and such considerable risks would be run by anyone who might get lost on an asteroid that for once i am breaking through my reserve children i say plainly watch out for the baobabs my friends like myself have been skirting this danger for a long time without ever knowing it and so it is for them that i have worked so hard over this drawing the lesson which i pass on by this means is worth all the trouble it has cost me perhaps you will ask me why are there no other drawing in this book as magnificent and impressive as this drawing of the baobabs the reply is simple i have tried but with the others i have not been successful when i made the drawing of the baobabs i was carried beyond myself by the inspiring force of urgent necessity chapter the little prince and the narrator talk about sunsets oh little prince bit by bit i came to understand the secrets of your sad little life for a long time you had found your only entertainment in the quiet pleasure of looking at the sunset i learned that new detail on the morning of the fourth day w hen you said to me i am very fond of sunsets come let us go look at a sunset now but we must wait i said wait for what for the sunset we must wait until it is time at first you seemed to be very much surprised and then you laughed to yourself you said to me i am always thinking that i am at home just so everybody knows that when it is noon in the united states the sun is setting over france if you could fly to france in one minute you could go straight into the sunset right from noon unfortunately france is too far away for that but on your tiny planet my little prince all you need do is move your chair a few steps you can see the day end and the twilight falling whenever you like one day you said to me i saw the sunset forty four times and a little later you added you know one loves the sunset when one is so sad were you so sad then i asked on the day of the forty four sunsets but the little prince made no reply chapter the narrator learns about the secret of the little prince s life on the fifth day again as always it was thanks to the sheep the secret of the little prince s life was revealed to me abruptly without anything to lead up to it and as if the question had been born of long and silent meditation on his problem he demanded a sheep if it eats little bushes does it eat flowers too a sheep i answered eats anything it finds in its reach even flowers that have thorns yes even flowers that have thorns then the thorns what use are they i did not know at that moment i was very busy trying to unscrew a bolt that had got stuck in my engine i was very much worried for it was becoming clear to me that the breakdown of my plane was extremely serious and i had so little drinking water left that i had to fear for the worst the thorns what use are they the little prince never let go of a question once he had asked it as for me i was upset over that bolt and i answered with the first thing that came into my head the thorns are of no use at all flowers have thorns just for spite oh there was a moment of complete silence then the little prince flashed back at me with a kind of resentfulness i don t believe you flowers are weak creatures they are na 飗 e they reassure themselves as best they can they believe that their thorns are terrible weapons i did not answer at that instant i was saying to myself if this bolt still won t turn i am going to knock it out with the hammer again the little prince disturbed my thoughts and you actually believe that the flowers oh no i cried no no no i don t believe anything i answered you with the first thing that came into my head don t you see i am very busy with matters of consequence he stared at me thunderstruck matters of consequence he looked at me there with my hammer in my hand my fingers black with engine grease bending down over an object which seemed to him extremely ugly you talk just like the grown ups that made me a little ashamed but he went on relentlessly you mix everything up together you confuse everything he was really very angry he tossed his golden curls in the breeze i know a planet where there is a certain red faced gentleman he has never smelled a flower he has never looked at a star he has never loved any one he has never done anything in his life but add up figures and all day he says over and over just like you i am busy with matters of consequence and that makes him swell up with pride but he is not a man he is a mushroom a what a mushroom the little prince was now white with rage the flowers have been growing thorns for millions of years for millions of years the sheep have been eating them just the same and is it not a matter of consequence to try to understand why the flowers go to so much trouble to grow thorns which are never of any use to them is the warfare between the sheep and the flowers not important is this not of more consequence than a fat red faced gentleman s sums and if i know i myself one flower which is unique in the world which grows nowhere but on my planet but which one little sheep can destroy in a single bite some morning without even noticing what he is doing oh you think that is not important his face turned from white to red as he continued if some one loves a flower of which just one single blossom grows in all the millions and millions of stars it is enough to make him happy just to look at the stars he can say to himself somewhere my flower is there but if the sheep eats the flower in one moment all his stars will be darkened and you think that is not important he could not say anything more his words were choked by sobbing the night had fallen i had let my tools drop from my hands of what moment now was my hammer my bolt or thirst or death on one star one planet my planet the earth there was a little prince to be comforted i took him in my arms and rocked him i said to him the flower that you love is not in danger i will draw you a muzzle for your sheep i will draw you a railing to put around your flower i will i did not know what to say to him i felt awkward and blundering i did not know how i could reach him where i could overtake him and go on hand in hand with him once more it is such a secret place the land of tears chapter the rose arrives at the little prince s planet i soon learned to know this flower better on the little prince s planet the flowers had always been very simple they had only one ring of petals they took up no room at all they were a trouble to nobody one morning they would appear in the grass and by night they would have faded peacefully away but one day from a seed blown from no one knew where a new flower had come up and the little prince had watched very closely over this small sprout which was not like any other small sprouts on his planet it might you see have been a new kind of baobab the shrub soon stopped growing and began to get ready to produce a flower the little prince who was present at the first appearance of a huge bud felt at once that some sort of miraculous apparition must emerge from it but the flower was not satisfied to complete the preparations for her beauty in the shelter of her green chamber she chose her colours with the greatest care she adjusted her petals one by one she did not wish to go out into the world all rumpled like the field poppies it was only in the full radiance of her beauty that she wished to appear oh yes she was a coquettish creature and her mysterious adornment lasted for days and days then one morning exactly at sunrise she suddenly showed herself and after working with all this painstaking precision she yawned and said ah i am scarcely awake i beg that you will excuse me my petals are still all disarranged but the little prince could not restrain his admiration oh how beautiful you are am i not the flower responded sweetly and i was born at the same moment as the sun the little prince could guess easily enough that she was not any too modest but how moving and exciting she was i think it is time for breakfast she added an instant later if you would have the kindness to think of my needs and the little prince completely abashed went to look for a sprinkling can of fresh water so he tended the flower so too she began very quickly to torment him with her vanity which was if the truth be known a little difficult to deal with one day for instance when she was speaking of her four thorns she said to the little prince let the tigers come with their claws there are no tigers on my planet the little prince objected and anyway tigers do not eat weeds i am not a weed the flower replied sweetly please excuse me i am not at all afraid of tigers she went on but i have a horror of drafts i suppose you wouldn t have a screen for me a horror of drafts that is bad luck for a plant remarked the little prince and added to himself this flower is a very complex creature at night i want you to put me under a glass globe it is very cold where you live in the place i came from but she interrupted herself at that point she had come in the form of a seed she could not have known anything of any other worlds embarassed over having let herself be caught on the verge of such a na 飗 e untruth she coughed two or three times in order to put the little prince in the wrong the screen i was just going to look for it when you spoke to me then she forced her cough a little more so that he should suffer from remorse just the same so the little prince in spite of all the good will that was inseparable from his love had soon come to doubt her he had taken seriously words which were without importance and it made him very unhappy i ought not to have listened to her he confided to me one day one never ought to listen to the flowers one should simply look at them and breathe their fragrance mine perfumed all my planet but i did not know how to take pleasure in all her grace this tale of claws which disturbed me so much should only have filled my heart with tenderness and pity and he continued his confidences the fact is that i did not know how to understand anything i ought to have judged by deeds and not by words she cast her fragrance and her radiance over me i ought never to have run away from her i ought to have guessed all the affection that lay behind her poor little strategems flowers are so inconsistent but i was too young to know how to love her chapter the little prince leaves his planet i believe that for his escape he took advantage of the migration of a flock of wild birds on the morning of his departure he put his planet in perfect order he carefully cleaned out his active volcanoes he possessed two active volcanoes and they were very convenient for heating his breakfast in the morning he also had one volcano that was extinct but as he said one never knows so he cleaned out the extinct volcano too if they are well cleaned out volcanoes burn slowly and steadily without any eruptions volcanic eruptions are like fires in a chimney on our earth we are obviously much too small to clean out our volcanoes that is why they bring no end of trouble upon us the little prince also pulled up with a certain sense of dejection the last little shoots of the baobabs he believed that he would never want to return but on this last morning all these familiar tasks seemed very precious to him and when he watered the flower for the last time and prepared to place her under the shelter of her glass globe he realised that he was very close to tears goodbye he said to the flower but she made no answer goodbye he said again the flower coughed but it was not because she had a cold i have been silly she said to him at last i ask your forgiveness try to be happy he was surprised by this absence of reproaches he stood there all bewildered the glass globe held arrested in mid air he did not understand this quiet sweetness of course i love you the flower said to him it is my fault that you have not known it all the while that is of no importance but you you have been just as foolish as i try to be happy let the glass globe be i don t want it any more but the wind my cold is not so bad as all that the cool night air will do me good i am a flower but the animals well i must endure the presence of two or three caterpillars if i wish to become acquainted with the butterflies it seems that they are very beautiful and if not the butterflies and the caterpillars who will call upon me you will be far away as for the large animals i am not at all afraid of any of them i have my claws and na 飗 ely she showed her four thorns then she added don t linger like this you have decided to go away now go for she did not want him to see her crying she was such a proud flower chapter the little prince visits the king he found himself in the neighborhood of the asteroids and he began therefore by visiting them in order to add to his knowledge the first of them was inhabited by a king clad in royal purple and ermine he was seated upon a throne which was at the same time both simple and majestic ah here is a subject exclaimed the king when he saw the little prince coming and the little prince asked himself how could he recognize me when he had never seen me before he did not know how the world is simplified for kings to them all men are subjects approach so that i may see you better said the king who felt consumingly proud of being at last a king over somebody the little prince looked everywhere to find a place to sit down but the entire planet was crammed and obstructed by the king s magnificent ermine robe so he remained standing upright and since he was tired he yawned it is contrary to etiquette to yawn in the presence of a king the monarch said to him i forbid you to do so i can t help it i can t stop myself replied the little prince thoroughly embarrassed i have come on a long journey and i have had no sleep ah then the king said i order you to yawn it is years since i have seen anyone yawning yawns to me are objects of curiosity come now yawn again it is an order that frightens me i cannot any more murmured the little prince now completely abashed hum hum replied the king then i i order you sometimes to yawn and sometimes to he sputtered a little and seemed vexed for what the king fundamentally insisted upon was that his authority should be respected he tolerated no disobedience he was an absolute monarch but because he was a very good man he made his orders reasonable if i ordered a general he would say by way of example if i ordered a general to change himself into a sea bird and if the general did not obey me that would not be the fault of the general it would be my fault may i sit down came now a timid inquiry from the little prince i order you to do so the king answered him and majestically gathered in a fold of his ermine mantle but the little prince was wondering the planet was tiny over what could this king really rule sire he said to him i beg that you will excuse my asking you a question i order you to ask me a question the king hastened to assure him sire over what do you rule over everything said the king with magnificent simplicity over everything the king made a gesture which took in his planet the other planets and all the stars over all that asked the little prince over all that the king answered for his rule was not only absolute it was also universal and the stars obey you certainly they do the king said they obey instantly i do not permit insubordination such power was a thing for the little prince to marvel at if he had been master of such complete authority he would have been able to watch the sunset not forty four times in one day but seventy two or even a hundred or even two hundred times with out ever having to move his chair and because he felt a bit sad as he remembered his little planet which he had forsaken he plucked up his courage to ask the king a favor i should like to see a sunset do me that kindness order the sun to set if i ordered a general to fly from one flower to another like a butterfly or to write a tragic drama or to change himself into a sea bird and if the general did not carry out the order that he had received which one of us would be in the wrong the king demanded the general or myself you said the little prince firmly exactly one much require from each one the duty which each one can perform the king went on accepted authority rests first of all on reason if you ordered your people to go and throw themselves into the sea they would rise up in revolution i have the right to require obedience because my orders are reasonable then my sunset the little prince reminded him for he never forgot a question once he had asked it you shall have your sunset i shall command it but according to my science of government i shall wait until conditions are favorable when will that be inquired the little prince hum hum replied the king and before saying anything else he consulted a bulky almanac hum hum that will be about about that will be this evening about twenty minutes to eight and you will see how well i am obeyed the little prince yawned he was regretting his lost sunset and then too he was already beginning to be a little bored i have nothing more to do here he said to the king so i shall set out on my way again do not go said the king who was very proud of having a subject do not go i will make you a minister minister of what minster of of justice but there is nobody here to judge we do not know that the king said to him i have not yet made a complete tour of my kingdom i am very old there is no room here for a carriage and it tires me to walk oh but i have looked already said the little prince turning around to give one more glance to the other side of the planet on that side as on this there was nobody at all then you shall judge yourself the king answered that is the most difficult thing of all it is much more difficult to judge oneself than to judge others if you succeed in judging yourself rightly then you are indeed a man of true wisdom yes said the little prince but i can judge myself anywhere i do not need to live on this planet hum hum said the king i have good reason to believe that somewhere on my planet there is an old rat i hear him at night you can judge this old rat from time to time you will condemn him to death thus his life will depend on your justice but you will pardon him on each occasion for he must be treated thriftily he is the only one we have i replied the little prince do not like to condemn anyone to death and now i think i will go on my way no said the king but the little prince having now completed his preparations for departure had no wish to grieve the old monarch if your majesty wishes to be promptly obeyed he said he should be able to give me a reasonable order he should be able for example to order me to be gone by the end of one minute it seems to me that conditions are favorable as the king made no answer the little prince hesitated a moment then with a sigh he took his leave i made you my ambassador the king called out hastily he had a magnificent air of authority the grown ups are very strange the little prince said to himself as he continued on his journey chapter the little prince visits the conceited man the second planet was inhabited by a conceited man ah ah i am about to receive a visit from an admirer he exclaimed from afar when he first saw the little prince coming for to conceited men all other men are admirers good morning said the little prince that is a queer hat you are wearing it is a hat for salutes the conceited man replied it is to raise in salute when people acclaim me unfortunately nobody at all ever passes this way yes said the little prince who did not understand what the conceited man was talking about clap your hands one against the other the conceited man now directed him the little prince clapped his hands the conceited man raised his hat in a modest salute this is more entertaining than the visit to the king the little prince said to himself and he began again to clap his hands one against the other the conceited man against raised his hat in salute after five minutes of this exercise the little prince grew tired of the game s monotony and what should one do to make the hat come down he asked but the conceited man did not hear him conceited people never hear anything but praise do you really admire me very much he demanded of the little prince what does that mean admire to admire mean that you regard me as the handsomest the best dressed the richest and the most intelligent man on this planet but you are the only man on your planet do me this kindness admire me just the same i admire you said the little prince shrugging his shoulders slightly but what is there in that to interest you so much and the little prince went away the grown ups are certainly very odd he said to himself as he continued on his journey chapter the little prince visits the tippler the next planet was inhabited by a tippler this was a very short visit but it plunged the little prince into deep dejection what are you doing there he said to the tippler whom he found settled down in silence before a collection of empty bottles and also a collection of full bottles i am drinking replied the tippler with a lugubrious air why are you drinking demanded the little prince so that i may forget replied the tippler forget what inquired the little prince who already was sorry for him forget that i am ashamed the tippler confessed hanging his head ashamed of what insisted the little prince who wanted to help him ashamed of drinking the tippler brought his speech to an end and shut himself up in an impregnable silence and the little prince went away puzzled the grown ups are certainly very very odd he said to himself as he continued on his journey chapter the little prince visits the businessman the fourth planet belonged to a businessman this man was so much occupied that he did not even raise his head at the little prince s arrival good morning the little prince said to him your cigarette has gone out three and two make five five and seven make twelve twelve and three make fifteen good morning fifteen and seven make twenty two twenty two and six make twenty eight i haven t time to light it again twenty six and five make thirty one phew then that makes five hundred and one million six hundred twenty two thousand seven hundred thirty one five hundred million what asked the little prince eh are you still there five hundred and one million i can t stop i have so much to do i am concerned with matters of consequence i don t amuse myself with balderdash two and five make seven five hundred and one million what repeated the little prince who never in his life had let go of a question once he had asked it the businessman raised his head during the fifty four years that i have inhabited this planet i have been disturbed only three times the first time was twenty two years ago when some giddy goose fell from goodness knows where he made the most frightful noise that resounded all over the place and i made four mistakes in my addition the second time eleven years ago i was disturbed by an attack of rheumatism i don t get enough exercise i have no time for loafing the third time well this is it i was saying then five hundred and one millions millions of what the businessman suddenly realized that there was no hope of being left in peace until he answered this question millions of those little objects he said which one sometimes sees in the sky flies oh no little glittering objects bees oh no little golden objects that set lazy men to idle dreaming as for me i am concerned with matters of consequence there is no time for idle dreaming in my life ah you mean the stars yes that s it the stars and what do you do with five hundred millions of stars five hundred and one million six hundred twenty two thousand seven hundred thirty one i am concerned with matters of consequence i am accurate and what do you do with these stars what do i do with them yes nothing i own them you own the stars yes but i have already seen a king who kings do not own they reign over it is a very different matter and what good does it do you to own the stars it does me the good of making me rich and what good does it do you to be rich it makes it possible for me to buy more stars if any are ever discovered this man the little prince said to himself reasons a little like my poor tippler nevertheless he still had some more questions how is it possible for one to own the stars to whom do they belong the businessman retorted peevishly i don t know to nobody then they belong to me because i was the first person to think of it is that all that is necessary certainly when you find a diamond that belongs to nobody it is yours when you discover an island that belongs to nobody it is yours when you get an idea before any one else you take out a patent on it it is yours so with me i own the stars because nobody else before me ever thought of owning them yes that is true said the little prince and what do you do with them i administer them replied the businessman i count them and recount them it is difficult but i am a man who is naturally interested in matters of consequence the little prince was still not satisfied if i owned a silk scarf he said i could put it around my neck and take it away with me if i owned a flower i could pluck that flower and take it away with me but you cannot pluck the stars from heaven no but i can put them in the bank whatever does that mean that means that i write the number of my stars on a little paper and then i put this paper in a drawer and lock it with a key and that is all that is enough said the businessman it is entertaining thought the little prince it is rather poetic but it is of no great consequence on matters of consequence the little prince had ideas which were very different from those of the grown ups i myself own a flower he continued his conversation with the businessman which i water every day i own three volcanoes which i clean out every week for i also clean out the one that is extinct one never knows it is of some use to my volcanoes and it is of some use to my flower that i own them but you are of no use to the stars the businessman opened his mouth but he found nothing to say in answer and the little prince went away the grown ups are certainly altogether extraordinary he said simply talking to himself as he continued on his journey chapter the little prince visits the lamplighter the fifth planet was very strange it was the smallest of all there was just enough room on it for a street lamp and a lamplighter the little prince was not able to reach any explanation of the use of a street lamp and a lamplighter somewhere in the heavens on a planet which had no people and not one house but he said to himself nevertheless it may well be that this man is absurd but he is not so absurd as the king the conceited man the businessman and the tippler for at least his work has some meaning when he lights his street lamp it is as if he brought one more star to life or one flower when he puts out his lamp he sends the flower or the star to sleep that is a beautiful occupation and since it is beautiful it is truly useful when he arrived on the planet he respectfully saluted the lamplighter good morning why have you just put out your lamp those are the orders replied the lamplighter good morning what are the orders the orders are that i put out my lamp good evening and he lighted his lamp again but why have you just lighted it again those are the orders replied the lamplighter i do not understand said the little prince there is nothing to understand said the lamplighter orders are orders good morning and he put out his lamp then he mopped his forehead with a handkerchief decorated with red squares i follow a terrible profession in the old days it was reasonable i put the lamp out in the morning and in the evening i lighted it again i had the rest of the day for relaxation and the rest of the night for sleep and the orders have been changed since that time the orders have not been changed said the lamplighter that is the tragedy from year to year the planet has turned more rapidly and the orders have not been changed then what asked the little prince then the planet now makes a complete turn every minute and i no longer have a single second for repose once every minute i have to light my lamp and put it out that is very funny a day lasts only one minute here where you live it is not funny at all said the lamplighter while we have been talking together a month has gone by a month yes a month thirty minutes thirty days good evening and he lighted his lamp again as the little prince watched him he felt that he loved this lamplighter who was so faithful to his orders he remembered the sunsets which he himself had gone to seek in other days merely by pulling up his chair and he wanted to help his friend you know he said i can tell you a way you can rest whenever you want to i always want to rest said the lamplighter for it is possible for a man to be faithful and lazy at the same time the little prince went on with his explanation your planet is so small that three strides will take you all the way around it to be always in the sunshine you need only walk along rather slowly when you want to rest you will walk and the day will last as long as you like that doesn t do me much good said the lamplighter the one thing i love in life is to sleep then you re unlucky said the little prince i am unlucky said the lamplighter good morning and he put out his lamp that man said the little prince to himself as he continued farther on his journey that man would be scorned by all the others by the king by the conceited man by the tippler by the businessman nevertheless he is the only one of them all who does not seem to me ridiculous perhaps that is because he is thinking of something else besides himself he breathed a sigh of regret and said to himself again that man is the only one of them all whom i could have made my friend but his planet is indeed too small there is no room on it for two people what the little prince did not dare confess was that he was sorry most of all to leave this planet because it was blest every day with sunsets chapter the little prince visits the geographer the sixth planet was ten times larger than the last one it was inhabited by an old gentleman who wrote voluminous books oh look here is an explorer he exclaimed to himself when he saw the little prince coming the little prince sat down on the table and panted a little he had already traveled so much and so far where do you come from the old gentleman said to him what is that big book said the little prince what are you doing i am a geographer the old gentleman said to him what is a geographer asked the little prince a geographer is a scholar who knows the location of all the seas rivers towns mountains and deserts that is very interesting said the little prince here at last is a man who has a real profession and he cast a look around him at the planet of the geographer it was the most magnificent and stately planet that he had ever seen your planet is very beautiful he said has it any oceans i couldn t tell you said the geographer ah the little prince was disappointed has it any mountains i couldn t tell you said the geographer and towns and rivers and deserts i couldn t tell you that either but you are a geographer exactly the geographer said but i am not an explorer i haven t a single explorer on my planet it is not the geographer who goes out to count the towns the rivers the mountains the seas the oceans and the deserts the geographer is much too important to go loafing about he does not leave his desk but he receives the explorers in his study he asks them questions and he notes down what they recall of their travels and if the recollections of any one among them seem interesting to him the geographer orders an inquiry into that explorer s moral character why is that because an explorer who told lies would bring disaster on the books of the geographer so would an explorer who drank too much why is that asked the little prince because intoxicated men see double then the geographer would note down two mountains in a place where there was only one i know some one said the little prince who would make a bad explorer that is possible then when the moral character of the explorer is shown to be good an inquiry is ordered into his discovery one goes to see it no that would be too complicated but one requires the explorer to furnish proofs for example if the discovery in question is that of a large mountain one requires that large stones be brought back from it the geographer was suddenly stirred to excitement but you you come from far away you are an explorer you shall describe your planet to me and having opened his big register the geographer sharpened his pencil the recitals of explorers are put down first in pencil one waits until the explorer has furnished proofs before putting them down in ink well said the geographer expectantly oh where i live said the little prince it is not very interesting it is all so small i have three volcanoes two volcanoes are active and the other is extinct but one never knows one never knows said the geographer i have also a flower we do not record flowers said the geographer why is that the flower is the most beautiful thing on my planet we do not record them said the geographer because they are ephemeral what does that mean ephemeral geographies said the geographer are the books which of all books are most concerned with matters of consequence they never become old fashioned it is very rarely that a mountain changes its position it is very rarely that an ocean empties itself of its waters we write of eternal things but extinct volcanoes may come to life again the little prince interrupted what does that mean ephemeral whether volcanoes are extinct or alive it comes to the same thing for us said the geographer the thing that matters to us is the mountain it does not change but what does that mean ephemeral repeated the little prince who never in his life had let go of a question once he had asked it it means which is in danger of speedy disappearance is my flower in danger of speedy disappearance certainly it is my flower is ephemeral the little prince said to himself and she has only four thorns to defend herself against the world and i have left her on my planet all alone that was his first moment of regret but he took courage once more what place would you advise me to visit now he asked the planet earth replied the geographer it has a good reputation and the little prince went away thinking of his flower chapter the narrator discusses the earth s lamplighters so then the seventh planet was the earth the earth is not just an ordinary planet one can count there kings not forgetting to be sure the negro kings among them geographers businessmen tipplers conceited men that is to say about grown ups to give you an idea of the size of the earth i will tell you that before the invention of electricity it was necessary to maintain over the whole of the six continents a veritable army of lamplighters for the street lamps seen from a slight distance that would make a splendid spectacle the movements of this army would be regulated like those of the ballet in the opera first would come the turn of the lamplighters of new zealand and australia having set their lamps alight these would go off to sleep next the lamplighters of china and siberia would enter for their steps in the dance and then they too would be waved back into the wings after that would come the turn of the lamplighters of russia and the indies then those of africa and europe then those of south america then those of south america then those of north america and never would they make a mistake in the order of their entry upon the stage it would be magnificent only the man who was in charge of the single lamp at the north pole and his colleague who was responsible for the single lamp at the south pole only these two would live free from toil and care they would be busy twice a year chapter the little prince makes the acquaintance of the snake when one wishes to play the wit he sometimes wanders a little from the truth i have not been altogether honest in what i have told you about the lamplighters and i realize that i run the risk of giving a false idea of our planet to those who do not k now it men occupy a very small place upon the earth if the two billion inhabitants who people its surface were all to stand upright and somewhat crowded together as they do for some big public assembly they could easily be put into one public square twenty miles long and twenty miles wide all humanity could be piled up on a small pacific islet the grown ups to be sure will not believe you when you tell them that they imagine that they fill a great deal of space they fancy themselves as important as the baobabs you should advise them then to make their own calculations they adore fig ures and that will please them but do not waste your time on this extra task it is unnecessary you have i know confidence in me when the little prince arrived on the earth he was very much surprised not to see any people he was beginning to be afraid he had come to the wrong planet when a coil of gold the color of the moonlight flashed across the sand good evening said the little prince courteously good evening said the snake what planet is this on which i have come down asked the little prince this is the earth this is africa the snake answered ah then there are no people on the earth this is the desert there are no people in the desert the earth is large said the snake the little prince sat down on a stone and raised his eyes toward the sky i wonder he said whether the stars are set alight in heaven so that one day each one of us may find his own again look at my planet it is right there above us but how far away it is it is beautiful the snake said what has brought you here i have been having some trouble with a flower said the little prince ah said the snake and they were both silent where are the men the little prince at last took up the conversation again it is a little lonely in the desert it is also lonely among men the snake said the little prince gazed at him for a long time you are a funny animal he said at last you are no thicker than a finger but i am more powerful than the finger of a king said the snake the little prince smiled you are not very powerful you haven t even any feet you cannot even travel i can carry you farther than any ship could take you said the snake he twined himself around the little prince s ankle like a golden bracelet whomever i touch i send back to the earth from whence he came the snake spoke again but you are innocent and true and you come from a star the little prince made no reply you move me to pity you are so weak on this earth made of granite the snake said i can help you some day if you grow too homesick for your own planet i can oh i understand you very well said the little prince but why do you always speak in riddles i solve them all said the snake and they were both silent chapter the little prince goes looking for men and meets a flower the little prince crossed the desert and met with only one flower it was a flower with three petals a flower of no account at all good morning said the little prince good morning said the flower where are the men the little prince asked politely the flower had once seen a caravan passing men she echoed i think there are six or seven of them in existence i saw them several years ago but one never knows where to find them the wind blows them away they have no roots and that makes their life very difficult goodbye said the little prince goodbye said the flower chapter the little prince climbs a mountain range after that the little prince climbed a high mountain the only mountains he had ever known were the three volcanoes which came up to his knees and he used the extinct volcano as a footstool from a mountain as high as this one he said to himself i shall be able to see the whole planet at one glance and all the people but he saw nothing save peaks of rock that were sharpened like needles good morning he said courteously good morning good morning good morning answered the echo who are you said the little prince who are you who are you who are you answered the echo be my friends i am all alone he said i am all alone all alone all alone answered the echo what a queer planet he thought it is altogether dry and altogether pointed and altogether harsh and forbidding and the people have no imagination they repeat whatever one says to them on my planet i had a flower she always was the first to speak chapter the little prince discovers a garden of roses but it happened that after walking for a long time through sand and rocks and snow the little prince at last came upon a road and all roads lead to the abodes of men good morning he said he was standing before a garden all a bloom with roses good morning said the roses the little prince gazed at them they all looked like his flower who are you he demanded thunderstruck we are roses the roses said and he was overcome with sadness his flower had told him that she was the only one of her kind in all the universe and here were five thousand of them all alike in one single garden she would be very much annoyed he said to himself if she should see that she would cough most dreadfully and she would pretend that she was dying to avoid being laughed at and i should be obliged to pretend that i was nursing her back to life for if i did not do that to humble myself also she would really allow herself to die then he went on with his reflections i thought that i was rich with a flower that was unique in all the world and all i had was a common rose a common rose and three volcanoes that come up to my knees and one of them perhaps extinct forever that doesn t make me a very great prince and he lay down in the grass and cried chapter the little prince befriends the fox it was then that the fox appeared good morning said the fox good morning the little prince responded politely although when he turned around he saw nothing i am right here the voice said under the apple tree who are you asked the little prince and added you are very pretty to look at i am a fox said the fox come and play with me proposed the little prince i am so unhappy i cannot play with you the fox said i am not tamed ah please excuse me said the little prince but after some thought he added what does that mean tame you do not live here said the fox what is it that you are looking for i am looking for men said the little prince what does that mean tame men said the fox they have guns and they hunt it is very disturbing they also raise chickens these are their only interests are you looking for chickens no said the little prince i am looking for friends what does that mean tame it is an act too often neglected said the fox it means to establish ties to establish ties just that said the fox to me you are still nothing more than a little boy who is just like a hundred thousand other little boys and i have no need of you and you on your part have no need of me to you i am nothing more than a fox like a hundred thousand other foxes but if you tame me then we shall need each other to me you will be unique in all the world to you i shall be unique in all the world i am beginning to understand said the little prince there is a flower i think that she has tamed me it is possible said the fox on the earth one sees all sorts of things oh but this is not on the earth said the little prince the fox seemed perplexed and very curious on another planet yes are there hunters on this planet no ah that is interesting are there chickens no nothing is perfect sighed the fox but he came back to his idea my life is very monotonous the fox said i hunt chickens men hunt me all the chickens are just alike and all the men are just alike and in consequence i am a little bored but if you tame me it will be as if the sun came to shine on my life i shall know the sound of a step that will be different from all the others other steps send me hurrying back underneath the ground yours will call me like music out of my burrow and then look you see the grain fields down yonder i do not ea t bread wheat is of no use to me the wheat fields have nothing to say to me and that is sad but you have hair that is the colour of gold think how wonderful that will be when you have tamed me the grain which is also golden will bring me bac k the thought of you and i shall love to listen to the wind in the wheat the fox gazed at the little prince for a long time please tame me he said i want to very much the little prince replied but i have not much time i have friends to discover and a great many things to understand one only understands the things that one tames said the fox men have no more time to understand anything they buy things all ready made at the shops but there is no shop anywhere where one can buy friendship and so men have no friends any more if you want a friend tame me what must i do to tame you asked the little prince you must be very patient replied the fox first you will sit down at a little distance from me like that in the grass i shall look at you out of the corner of my eye and you will say nothing words are the source of misunderstandings but you will sit a little closer to me every day the next day the little prince came back it would have been better to come back at the same hour said the fox if for example you come at four o clock in the afternoon then at three o clock i shall begin to be happy i shall feel happier and happier as the hour advances at four o clock i shall already be worrying and jumping about i shall show you how happy i am but if you come at just any time i shall never know at what hour my heart is to be ready to greet you one must observe the proper rites what is a rite asked the little prince those also are actions too often neglected said the fox they are what make one day different from other days one hour from other hours there is a rite for example among my hunters every thursday they dance with the village girls so thursday is a wonderful day for me i can take a walk as far as the vineyards but if the hunters danced at just any time every day would be like every other day and i should never have any vacation at all so the little prince tamed the fox and when the hour of his departure drew near ah said the fox i shall cry it is your own fault said the little prince i never wished you any sort of harm but you wanted me to tame you yes that is so said the fox but now you are going to cry said the little prince yes that is so said the fox then it has done you no good at all it has done me good said the fox because of the color of the wheat fields and then he added go and look again at the roses you will understand now that yours is unique in all the world then come back to say goodbye to me and i will make you a present of a secret the little prince went away to look again at the roses you are not at all like my rose he said as yet you are nothing no one has tamed you and you have tamed no one you are like my fox when i first knew him he was only a fox like a hundred thousand other foxes but i have made him my friend and now he is unique in all the world and the roses were very much embarrassed you are beautiful but you are empty he went on one could not die for you to be sure an ordinary passerby would think that my rose looked just like you the rose that belongs to me but in herself alone she is more important than all the hundreds of you other roses because it is she that i have watered because it is she that i have put under the glass globe because it is she that i have sheltered behind the screen because it is for her that i have killed the caterpillars except the two or three that we saved to become butterflies because it is she that i have listened to when she grumbled or boasted or even sometimes when she said nothing because she is my rose and he went back to meet the fox goodbye he said goodbye said the fox and now here is my secret a very simple secret it is only with the heart that one can see rightly what is essential is invisible to the eye what is essential is invisible to the eye the little prince repeated so that he would be sure to remember it is the time you have wasted for your rose that makes your rose so important it is the time i have wasted for my rose said the little prince so that he would be sure to remember men have forgotten this truth said the fox but you must not forget it you become responsible forever for what you have tamed you are responsible for your rose i am responsible for my rose the little prince repeated so that he would be sure to remember chapter the little prince encounters a railway switchman good morning said the little prince good morning said the railway switchman what do you do here the little prince asked i sort out travelers in bundles of a thousand said the switchman i send off the trains that carry them now to the right now to the left and a brilliantly lighted express train shook the switchman s cabin as it rushed by with a roar like thunder they are in a great hurry said the little prince what are they looking for not even the locomotive engineer knows that said the switchman and a second brilliantly lighted express thundered by in the opposite direction are they coming back already demanded the little prince these are not the same ones said the switchman it is an exchange were they not satisfied where they were asked the little prince no one is ever satisfied where he is said the switchman and they heard the roaring thunder of a third brilliantly lighted express are they pursuing the first travelers demanded the little prince they are pursuing nothing at all said the switchman they are asleep in there or if they are not asleep they are yawning only the children are flattening their noses against the windowpanes only the children know what they are looking for said the little prince they waste their time over a rag doll and it becomes very important to them and if anybody takes it away from them they cry they are lucky the switchman said chapter the little prince encounters a merchant good morning said the little prince good morning said the merchant this was a merchant who sold pills that had been invented to quench thirst you need only swallow one pill a week and you would feel no need of anything to drink why are you selling those asked the little prince because they save a tremendous amount of time said the merchant computations have been made by experts with these pills you save fifty three minutes in every week and what do i do with those fifty three minutes anything you like as for me said the little prince to himself if i had fifty three minutes to spend as i liked i should walk at my leisure toward a spring of fresh water chapter the narrator and the little prince thirsty hunt for a well in the desert it was now the eighth day since i had had my accident in the desert and i had listened to the story of the merchant as i was drinking the last drop of my water supply ah i said to the little prince these memories of yours are very charming but i have not yet succeeded in repairing my plane i have nothing more to drink and i too should be very happy if i could walk at my leisure toward a spring of fresh water my friend the fox the little prince said to me my dear little man this is no longer a matter that has anything to do with the fox why not because i am about to die of thirst he did not follow my reasoning and he answered me it is a good thing to have had a friend even if one is about to die i for instance am very glad to have had a fox as a friend he has no way of guessing the danger i said to myself he has never been either hungry or thirsty a little sunshine is all he needs but he looked at me steadily and replied to my thought i am thirsty too let us look for a well i made a gesture of weariness it is absurd to look for a well at random in the immensity of the desert but nevertheless we started walking when we had trudged along for several hours in silence the darkness fell and the stars began to come out thirst had made me a little feverish and i looked at them as if i were in a dream the little prince s last words came reeling back into my memory then you are thirsty too i demanded but he did not reply to my question he merely said to me water may also be good for the heart i did not understand this answer but i said nothing i knew very well that it was impossible to cross examine him he was tired he sat down i sat down beside him and after a little silence he spoke again the stars are beautiful because of a flower that cannot be seen i replied yes that is so and without saying anything more i looked across the ridges of sand that were stretched out before us in the moonlight the desert is beautiful the little prince added and that was true i have always loved the desert one sits down on a desert sand dune sees nothing hears nothing yet through the silence something throbs and gleams what makes the desert beautiful said the little prince is that somewhere it hides a well i was astonished by a sudden understanding of that mysterious radiation of the sands when i was a little boy i lived in an old house and legend told us that a treasure was buried there to be sure no one had ever known how to find it perhaps no one had ever even looked for it but it cast an enchantment over that house my home was hiding a secret in the depths of its heart yes i said to the little prince the house the stars the desert what gives them their beauty is something that is invisible i am glad he said that you agree with my fox as the little prince dropped off to sleep i took him in my arms and set out walking once more i felt deeply moved and stirred it seemed to me that i was carrying a very fragile treasure it seemed to me even that there was nothing more fragile on all earth in the moonlight i looked at his pale forehead his closed eyes his locks of hair that trembled in the wind and i said to myself what i see here is nothing but a shell what is most important is invisible as his lips opened slightly with the suspicious of a half smile i said to myself again what moves me so deeply about this little prince who is sleeping here is his loyalty to a flower the image of a rose that shines through his whole being like the flame of a lamp even when he is asleep and i felt him to be more fragile still i felt the need of protecting him as if he himself were a flame that might be extinguished by a little puff of wind and as i walked on so i found the well at daybreak chapter finding a well the narrator and the little prince discuss his return to his planet men said the little prince set out on their way in express trains but they do not know what they are looking for then they rush about and get excited and turn round and round and he added it is not worth the trouble the well that we had come to was not like the wells of the sahara the wells of the sahara are mere holes dug in the sand this one was like a well in a village but there was no village here and i thought i must be dreaming it is strange i said to the little prince everything is ready for use the pulley the bucket the rope he laughed touched the rope and set the pulley to working and the pulley moaned like an old weathervane which the wind has long since forgotten do you hear said the little prince we have wakened the well and it is singing i did not want him to tire himself with the rope leave it to me i said it is too heavy for you i hoisted the bucket slowly to the edge of the well and set it there happy tired as i was over my achievement the song of the pulley was still in my ears and i could see the sunlight shimmer in the still trembling water i am thirsty for this water said the little prince give me some of it to drink and i understood what he had been looking for i raised the bucket to his lips he drank his eyes closed it was as sweet as some special festival treat this water was indeed a different thing from ordinary nourishment its sweetness was born of the walk under the stars the song of the pulley the effort of my arms it was good for the heart like a present when i was a little boy the lights of the christmas tree the music of the midnight mass the tenderness of smiling faces used to make up so the radiance of the gifts i received the men where you live said the little prince raise five thousand roses in the same garden and they do not find in it what they are looking for they do not find it i replied and yet what they are looking for could be found in one single rose or in a little water yes that is true i said and the little prince added but the eyes are blind one must look with the heart i had drunk the water i breathed easily at sunrise the sand is the color of honey and that honey color was making me happy too what brought me then this sense of grief you must keep your promise said the little prince softly as he sat down beside me once more what promise you know a muzzle for my sheep i am responsible for this flower i took my rough drafts of drawings out of my pocket the little prince looked them over and laughed as he said your baobabs they look a little like cabbages oh i had been so proud of my baobabs your fox his ears look a little like horns and they are too long and he laughed again you are not fair little prince i said i don t know how to draw anything except boa constrictors from the outside and boa constrictors from the inside oh that will be all right he said children understand so then i made a pencil sketch of a muzzle and as i gave it to him my heart was torn you have plans that i do not know about i said but he did not answer me he said to me instead you know my descent to the earth tomorrow will be its anniversary then after a silence he went on i came down very near here and he flushed and once again without understanding why i had a queer sense of sorrow one question however occurred to me then it was not by chance that on the morning when i first met you a week ago you were strolling along like that all alone a thousand miles from any inhabited region you were on the your back to the place where you landed the little prince flushed again and i added with some hesitancy perhaps it was because of the anniversary the little prince flushed once more he never answered questions but when one flushes does that not mean yes ah i said to him i am a little frightened but he interrupted me now you must work you must return to your engine i will be waiting for you here come back tomorrow evening but i was not reassured i remembered the fox one runs the risk of weeping a little if one lets himself be tamed chapter the little prince converses with the snake the little prince consoles the narrator the little prince returns to his planet beside the well there was the ruin of an old stone wall when i came back from my work the next evening i saw from some distance away my little price sitting on top of a wall with his feet dangling and i heard him say then you don t remember this is not the exact spot another voice must have answered him for he replied to it yes yes it is the right day but this is not the place i continued my walk toward the wall at no time did i see or hear anyone the little prince however replied once again exactly you will see where my track begins in the sand you have nothing to do but wait for me there i shall be there tonight i was only twenty metres from the wall and i still saw nothing after a silence the little prince spoke again you have good poison you are sure that it will not make me suffer too long i stopped in my tracks my heart torn asunder but still i did not understand now go away said the little prince i want to get down from the wall i dropped my eyes then to the foot of the wall and i leaped into the air there before me facing the little prince was one of those yellow snakes that take just thirty seconds to bring your life to an end even as i was digging into my pocked to get out my revolver i made a running step back but at the noise i made the snake let himself flow easily across the sand like the dying spray of a fountain and in no apparent hurry disappeared with a light metallic sound among the stones i reached the wall just in time to catch my little man in my arms his face was white as snow what does this mean i demanded why are you talking with snakes i had loosened the golden muffler that he always wore i had moistened his temples and had given him some water to drink and now i did not dare ask him any more questions he looked at me very gravely and put his arms around my neck i felt his heart beating like the heart of a dying bird shot with someone s rifle i am glad that you have found what was the matter with your engine he said now you can go back home how do you know about that i was just coming to tell him that my work had been successful beyond anything that i had dared to hope he made no answer to my question but he added i too am going back home today then sadly it is much farther it is much more difficult i realized clearly that something extraordinary was happening i was holding him close in my arms as if he were a little child and yet it seemed to me that he was rushing headlong toward an abyss from which i could do nothing to restrain him his look was very serious like some one lost far away i have your sheep and i have the sheep s box and i have the muzzle and he gave me a sad smile i waited a long time i could see that he was reviving little by little dear little man i said to him you are afraid he was afraid there was no doubt about that but he laughed lightly i shall be much more afraid this evening once again i felt myself frozen by the sense of something irreparable and i knew that i could not bear the thought of never hearing that laughter any more for me it was like a spring of fresh water in the desert little man i said i want to hear you laugh again but he said to me tonight it will be a year my star then can be found right above the place where i came to the earth a year ago little man i said tell me that it is only a bad dream this affair of the snake and the meeting place and the star but he did not answer my plea he said to me instead the thing that is important is the thing that is not seen yes i know it is just as it is with the flower if you love a flower that lives on a star it is sweet to look at the sky at night all the stars are a bloom with flowers yes i know it is just as it is with the water because of the pulley and the rope what you gave me to drink was like music you remember how good it was yes i know and at night you will look up at the stars where i live everything is so small that i cannot show you where my star is to be found it is better like that my star will just be one of the stars for you and so you will love to watch all the stars in the heavens they will all be your friends and besides i am going to make you a present he laughed again ah little prince dear little prince i love to hear that laughter that is my present just that it will be as it was when we drank the water what are you trying to say all men have the stars he answered but they are not the same things for different people for some who are travelers the stars are guides for others they are no more than little lights in the sky for others who are scholars they are problems for my businessman they were wealth but all these stars are silent you you alone will have the stars as no one else has them what are you trying to say in one of the stars i shall be living in one of them i shall be laughing and so it will be as if all the stars were laughing when you look at the sky at night you only you will have stars that can laugh and he laughed again and when your sorrow is comforted time soothes all sorrows you will be content that you have known me you will always be my friend you will want to laugh with me and you will sometimes open your window so for that pleasure and your friends w ill be properly astonished to see you laughing as you look up at the sky then you will say to them yes the stars always make me laugh and they will think you are crazy it will be a very shabby trick that i shall have played on you and he laughed again it will be as if in place of the stars i had given you a great number of little bells that knew how to laugh and he laughed again then he quickly became serious tonight you know do not come said the little prince i shall not leave you i said i shall look as if i were suffering i shall look a little as if i were dying it is like that do not come to see that it is not worth the trouble i shall not leave you but he was worried i tell you it is also because of the snake he must not bite you snakes they are malicious creatures this one might bite you just for fun i shall not leave you but a thought came to reassure him it is true that they have no more poison for a second bite that night i did not see him set out on his way he got away from me without making a sound when i succeeded in catching up with him he was walking along with a quick and resolute step he said to me merely ah you are there and he took me by the hand but he was still worrying it was wrong of you to come you will suffer i shall look as if i were dead and that will not be true i said nothing you understand it is too far i cannot carry this body with me it is too heavy i said nothing but it will be like an old abandoned shell there is nothing sad about old shells i said nothing he was a little discouraged but he made one more effort you know it will be very nice i too shall look at the stars all the stars will be wells with a rusty pulley all the stars will pour out fresh water for me to drink i said nothing that will be so amusing you will have five hundred million little bells and i shall have five hundred million springs of fresh water and he too said nothing more because he was crying here it is let me go on by myself and he sat down because he was afraid then he said again you know my flower i am responsible for her and she is so weak she is so naive she has four thorns of no use at all to protect herself against all the world i too sat down because i was not able to stand up any longer there now that is all he still hesitated a little then he got up he took one step i could not move there was nothing but a flash of yellow close to his ankle he remained motionless for an instant he did not cry out he fell as gently as a tree falls there was not even any sound because of the sand chapter the narrator s afterthoughts and now six years have already gone by i have never yet told this story the companions who met me on my return were well content to see me alive i was sad but i told them i am tired now my sorrow is comforted a little that is to say not entirely but i know that he did go back to his planet because i did not find his body at daybreak it was not such a heavy body and at night i love to listen to the stars it is like five hundred million little bells but there is one extraordinary thing when i drew the muzzle for the little prince i forgot to add the leather strap to it he will never have been able to fasten it on his sheep so now i keep wondering what is happening on his planet perhaps the sheep has eaten the flower at one time i say to myself surely not the little prince shuts his flower under her glass globe every night and he watches over his sheep very carefully then i am happy and there is sweetness in the laughter of all the stars but at another time i say to myself at some moment or other one is absent minded and that is enough on some one evening he forgot the glass globe or the sheep got out without making any noise in the night and then the little bells are changed to tears here then is a great mystery for you who also love the little prince and for me nothing in the universe can be the same if somewhere we do not know where a sheep that we never saw has yes or no eaten a rose look up at the sky ask yourselves is it yes or no has the sheep eaten the flower and you will see how everything changes and no grown up will ever understand that this is a matter of so much importance this is to me the loveliest and saddest landscape in the world it is the same as that on the preceding page but i have drawn it again to impress it on your memory it is here that the little prince appeared on earth and disappeared look at it carefully so that you will be sure to recognise it in case you travel some day to the african desert and if you should come upon this spot please do not hurry on wait for a time exactly under the star then if a little man appears who laughs who has golden hair and who refuses to answer questions you will know who he is if this should happen please comfort me send me word that he has come back please note there may be some problems with paragraph breaks when they occur just keep reading toni morrison beloved sixty million and more i will call them my people which were not my people and her beloved which was not beloved romans book one chapter was spiteful full of a baby s venom the women in the house knew it and so did the children for years each put up with the spite in his own way but by sethe and her daughter denver were its only victims the grandmother baby suggs was dead and the sons howard and buglar had run away by the time they were thirteen years old as soon as merely looking in a mirror shattered it that was the signal for buglar as soon as two tiny hand prints appeared in the cake that was it for howard neither boy waited to see more another kettleful of chickpeas smoking in a heap on the floor soda crackers crumbled and strewn in a line next to the door sill nor did they wait for one of the relief periods the weeks months even when nothing was disturbed no each one fled at once the moment the house committed what was for him the one insult not to be borne or witnessed a second time within two months in the dead of winter leaving their grandmother baby suggs sethe their mother and their little sister denver all by themselves in the gray and white house on bluestone road it didn t have a number then because cincinnati didn t stretch that far in fact ohio had been calling itself a state only seventy years when first one brother and then the next stuffed quilt packing into his hat snatched up his shoes and crept away from the lively spite the house felt for them baby suggs didn t even raise her head from her sickbed she heard them go but that wasn t the reason she lay still it was a wonder to her that her grandsons had taken so long to realize that every house wasn t like the one on bluestone road suspended between the nas tiness of life and the meanness of the dead she couldn t get interested in leaving life or living it let alone the fright of two creeping off boys her past had been like her present intolerable and since she knew death was anything but forgetfulness she used the little energy left her for pondering color bring a little lavender in if you got any pink if you don t and sethe would oblige her with anything from fabric to her own tongue winter in ohio was especially rough if you had an appetite for color sky provided the only drama and counting on a cincinnati horizon for life s principal joy was reckless indeed so sethe and the girl denver did what they could and what the house permitted for her together they waged a perfunctory battle against the outrageous behavior of that place against turned over slop jars smacks on the behind and gusts of sour air for they understood the source of the outrage as well as they knew the source of light baby suggs died shortly after the brothers left with no interest whatsoever in their leave taking or hers and right afterward sethe and denver decided to end the persecution by calling forth the ghost that tried them so perhaps a conversation they thought an exchange of views or something would help so they held hands and said come on come on you may as well just come on the sideboard took a step forward but nothing else did grandma baby must be stopping it said denver she was ten and still mad at baby suggs for dying sethe opened her eyes i doubt that she said then why don t it come you forgetting how little it is said her mother she wasn t even two years old when she died too little to understand too little to talk much even maybe she don t want to understand said denver maybe but if she d only come i could make it clear to her sethe released her daughter s hand and together they pushed the sideboard back against the wall outside a driver whipped his horse into the gallop local people felt necessary when they passed for a baby she throws a powerful spell said denver no more powerful than the way i loved her sethe answered and there it was again the welcoming cool of unchiseled headstones the one she selected to lean against on tiptoe her knees wide open as any grave pink as a fingernail it was and sprinkled with glittering chips ten minutes he said you got ten minutes i ll do it for free ten minutes for seven letters with another ten could she have gotten dearly too she had not thought to ask him and it bothered her still that it might have been possible that for twenty minutes a half hour say she could have had the whole thing every word she heard the preacher say at the funeral and all there was to say surely engraved on her baby s headstone dearly beloved but what she got settled for was the one word that mattered she thought it would be enough rutting among the headstones with the engraver his young son looking on the anger in his face so old the appetite in it quite new that should certainly be enough enough to answer one more preacher one more abolitionist and a town full of disgust counting on the stillness of her own soul she had forgotten the other one the soul of her baby girl who would have thought that a little old baby could harbor so much rage rutting among the stones under the eyes of the engraver s son was not enough not only did she have to live out her years in a house palsied by the baby s fury at having its throat cut but those ten minutes she spent pressed up against dawn colored stone studded with star chips her knees wide open as the grave were longer than life more alive more pulsating than the baby blood that soaked her fingers like oil we could move she suggested once to her mother in law what d be the point asked baby suggs not a house in the country ain t packed to its rafters with some dead negro s grief we lucky this ghost is a baby my husband s spirit was to come back in here or yours don t talk to me you lucky you got three left three pulling at your skirts and just one raising hell from the other side be thankful why don t you i had eight every one of them gone away from me four taken four chased and all i expect worrying somebody s house into evil baby suggs rubbed her eyebrows my first born all i can remember of her is how she loved the burned bottom of bread can you beat that eight children and that s all i remember that s all you let yourself remember sethe had told her but she was down to one herself one alive that is the boys chased off by the dead one and her memory of buglar was fading fast howard at least had a head shape nobody could forget as for the rest she worked hard to remember as close to nothing as was safe unfortunately her brain was devious she might be hurrying across a field running practically to get to the pump quickly and rinse the chamomile sap from her legs nothing else would be in her mind the picture of the men coming to nurse her was as lifeless as the nerves in her back where the skin buckled like a washboard nor was there the faintest scent of ink or the cherry gum and oak bark from which it was made nothing just the breeze cooling her face as she rushed toward water and then sopping the chamomile away with pump water and rags her mind fixed on getting every last bit of sap off on her carelessness in taking a shortcut across the field just to save a half mile and not noticing how high the weeds had grown until the itching was all the way to her knees then something the plash of water the sight of her shoes and stockings awry on the path where she had flung them or here boy lapping in the puddle near her feet and suddenly there was sweet home rolling rolling rolling out before her eyes and although there was not a leaf on that farm that did not make her want to scream it rolled itself out before her in shameless beauty it never looked as terrible as it was and it made her wonder if hell was a pretty place too fire and brimstone all right but hidden in lacy groves boys hanging from the most beautiful sycamores in the world it shamed her remembering the wonderful soughing trees rather than the boys try as she might to make it otherwise the sycamores beat out the children every time and she could not forgive her memory for that when the last of the chamomile was gone she went around to the front of the house collecting her shoes and stockings on the way as if to punish her further for her terrible memory sitting on the porch not forty feet away was paul d the last of the sweet home men and although she she said is that you what s left he stood up and smiled how you been girl besides barefoot when she laughed it came out loose and young messed up my legs back yonder chamomile he made a face as though tasting a teaspoon of something bitter i don t want to even hear bout it always did hate that stuff sethe balled up her stockings and jammed them into her pocket come on in porch is fine sethe cool out here he sat back down and looked at the meadow on the other side of the road knowing the eagerness he felt would be in his eyes eighteen years she said softly eighteen he repeated and i swear i been walking every one of em mind if i join you he nodded toward her feet and began unlacing his shoes you want to soak them let me get you a basin of water she moved closer to him to enter the house no uh uh can t baby feet a whole lot more tramping they got to do yet you can t leave right away paul d you got to stay awhile well long enough to see baby suggs anyway where is she dead aw no when eight years now almost nine was it hard i hope she didn t die hard sethe shook her head soft as cream being alive was the hard part sorry you missed her though is that what you came by for that s some of what i came for the rest is you but if all the truth be known i go anywhere these days anywhere they let me sit down you looking good devil s confusion he lets me look good long as i feel bad he looked at her and the word bad took on another meaning sethe smiled this is the way they were had been all of the sweet home men before and after halle treated her to a mild brotherly flirtation so subtle you had to scratch for it except for a heap more hair and some waiting in his eyes he looked the way he had in kentucky peachstone skin straight backed for a man with an immobile face it was amazing how ready it was to smile or blaze or be sorry with you as though all you had to do was get his attention and right away he produced the feeling you were feeling with less than a blink his face seemed to change underneath it lay the activity i wouldn t have to ask about him would i you d tell me if there was anything to tell wouldn t you sethe looked down at her feet and saw again the sycamores i d tell you sure i d tell you i don t know any more now than i did then except for the churn he thought and you don t need to know that you must think he s still alive no i think he s dead it s not being sure that keeps him alive what did baby suggs think same but to listen to her all her children is dead claimed she felt each one go the very day and hour when she say halle went eighteen fifty five the day my baby was born you had that baby did you never thought you d make it he chuckled running off pregnant had to couldn t be no waiting she lowered her head and thought as he did how unlikely it was that she had made it and if it hadn t been for that girl looking for velvet she never would have all by yourself too he was proud of her and annoyed by her proud she had done it annoyed that she had not needed halle or him in the doing almost by myself not all by myself a whitegirl helped me then she helped herself too god bless her you could stay the night paul d you don t sound too steady in the offer sethe glanced beyond his shoulder toward the closed door oh it s truly meant i just hope you ll pardon my house come on in talk to denver while i cook you something paul d tied his shoes together hung them over his shoulder and followed her through the door straight into a pool of red and undulating light that locked him where he stood you got company he whispered frowning off and on said sethe good god he backed out the door onto the porch what kind of evil you got in here it s not evil just sad come on just step through he looked at her then closely closer than he had when she first rounded the house on wet and shining legs holding her shoes and stockings up in one hand her skirts in the other halle s girl the one with iron eyes and backbone to match he had never seen her hair in kentucky and though her face was eighteen years older than when last he saw her it was softer now because of the hair a face too still for comfort irises the same color as her skin which in that still face used to make him think of a mask with mercifully punched out eyes halle s woman pregnant every year including the year she sat by the fire telling him she was going to run her three children she had already packed into a wagonload of others in a caravan of negroes crossing the river they were to be left with halle s mother near cincinnati even in that tiny shack leaning so close to the fire you could smell the heat in her dress her eyes did not pick up a flicker of light they were like two wells into which he had trouble gazing even punched out they needed to be covered lidded marked with some sign to warn folks of what that emptiness held so he looked instead at the fire while she told him because her husband was not there for the telling mr garner was dead and his wife had a lump in her neck the size of a sweet potato and unable to speak to anyone she leaned as close to the fire as her pregnant belly allowed and told him paul d the last of the sweet home men there had been six of them who belonged to the farm sethe the only female mrs garner crying like a baby had sold his brother to pay off the debts that surfaced the minute she was widowed then schoolteacher arrived to put things in order but what he did broke three more sweet home men and punched the glittering iron out of sethe s eyes leaving two open wells that did not reflect firelight now the iron was back but the face softened by hair made him trust her enough to step inside her door smack into a pool of pulsing red light she was right it was sad walking through it a wave of grief soaked him so thoroughly he wanted to cry it seemed a long way to the normal light surrounding the table but he made it dry eyed and lucky you said she died soft soft as cream he reminded her that s not baby suggs she said who then my daughter the one i sent ahead with the boys she didn t live no the one i was carrying when i run away is all i got left boys gone too both of em walked off just before baby suggs died paul d looked at the spot where the grief had soaked him the red was gone but a kind of weeping clung to the air where it had been probably best he thought if a negro got legs he ought to use them sit down too long somebody will figure out a way to tie them up still if her boys were gone no man you here by yourself me and denver she said that all right by you that s all right by me she saw his skepticism and went on i cook at a restaurant in town and i sew a little on the sly paul d smiled then remembering the bedding dress sethe was thirteen when she came to sweet home and already iron eyed she was a timely present for mrs garner who had lost baby suggs to her husband s high principles the five sweet home men looked at the new girl and decided to let her be they were young and so sick with the absence of women they had taken to calves yet they let the iron eyed girl be so she could choose in spite of the fact that each one would have beaten the others to mush to have her it took her a year to choose a long tough year of thrashing on pallets eaten up with dreams of her a year of yearning when rape seemed the solitary gift of life the restraint they had exercised possible only because they were sweet home men the ones mr garner bragged about while other farmers shook their heads in warning at the phrase y all got boys he told them young boys old boys picky boys stroppin boys now at sweet home my niggers is men every one of em bought em thataway raised em thataway men every one beg to differ garner ain t no nigger men not if you scared they ain t garner s smile was wide but if you a man yourself you ll want your niggers to be men too i wouldn t have no nigger men round my wife it was the reaction garner loved and waited for neither would i he said neither would i and there was always a pause before the neighbor or stranger or peddler or brother in law or whoever it was got the meaning then a fierce argument sometimes a fight and garner came home bruised and pleased having demonstrated one more time what a real kentuckian was one tough enough and smart enough to make and call his own niggers men and so they were paul d garner paul f garner paul a garner halle suggs and sixo the wild man all in their twenties minus women fucking cows dreaming of rape thrashing on pallets rubbing their thighs and waiting for the new girl the one who took baby suggs place after halle bought her with five years of sundays maybe that was why she chose him a twenty year old man so in love with his mother he gave up five years of sabbaths just to see her sit down for a change was a serious recommendation she waited a year and the sweet home men abused cows while they waited with her she chose halle and for their first bedding she sewed herself a dress on the sly won t you stay on awhile can t nobody catch up on eighteen years in a day out of the dimness of the room in which they sat a white staircase climbed toward the blue and white wallpaper of the second floor paul d could see just the beginning of the paper discreet flecks of yellow sprinkled among a blizzard of snowdrops all backed by blue the luminous white of the railing and steps kept him glancing toward it every sense he had told him the air above the stairwell was charmed and very thin but the girl who walked down out of that air was round and brown with the face of an alert doll paul d looked at the girl and then at sethe who smiled saying here she is my denver this is paul d honey from sweet home good morning mr d garner baby paul d garner yes sir glad to get a look at you last time i saw your mama you were pushing out the front of her dress still is sethe smiled provided she can get in it denver stood on the bottom step and was suddenly hot and shy it had been a long time since anybody good willed whitewoman preacher speaker or newspaperman sat at their table their sympathetic voices called liar by the revulsion in their eyes for twelve years long before grandma baby died there had been no visitors of any sort and certainly no friends no coloredpeople certainly no hazelnut man with too long hair and no notebook no charcoal no oranges no questions someone her mother wanted to talk to and would even consider talking to while barefoot looking in fact acting like a girl instead of the quiet queenly woman denver had known all her life the one who never looked away who when a man got stomped to death by a mare right in front of sawyer s restaurant did not look away and when a sow began eating her own litter did not look away then either and when the baby s spirit picked up here boy and slammed him into the wall hard enough to break two of his legs and dislocate his eye so hard he went into convulsions and chewed up his tongue still her mother had not looked away she had taken a hammer knocked the dog unconscious wiped away the blood and saliva pushed his eye back in his head and set his leg bones he recovered mute and off balance more because of his untrustworthy eye than his bent legs and winter summer drizzle or dry nothing could persuade him to enter the house again now here was this woman with the presence of mind to repair a dog gone savage with pain rocking her crossed ankles and looking away from her own daughter s body as though the size of it was more than vision could bear and neither she nor he had on shoes hot shy now denver was lonely all that leaving first her brothers then her grandmother serious losses since there were no children willing to circle her in a game or hang by their knees from her porch railing none of that had mattered as long as her mother did not look away as she was doing now making denver long downright long for a sign of spite from the baby ghost she s a fine looking young lady said paul d fine looking got her daddy s sweet face you know my father knew him knew him well did he ma am denver fought an urge to realign her affection of course he knew your daddy i told you he s from sweet home denver sat down on the bottom step there was nowhere else gracefully to go they were a twosome saying your daddy and sweet home in a way that made it clear both belonged to them and not to her that her own father s absence was not hers once the absence had belonged to grandma baby a son deeply mourned because he was the one who had bought her out of there then it was her mother s absent husband now it was this hazelnut stranger s absent friend only those who knew him knew him well could claim his absence for themselves just as only those who lived in sweet home could remember it whisper it and glance sideways at one another while they did again she wished for the baby ghost its anger thrilling her now where it used to wear her out wear her out we have a ghost in here she said and it worked they were not a twosome anymore her mother left off swinging her feet and being girlish memory of sweet home dropped away from the eyes of the man she was being girlish for he looked quickly up the lightning white stairs behind her so i hear he said but sad your mama said not evil no sir said denver not evil but not sad either what then rebuked lonely and rebuked is that right paul d turned to sethe i don t know about lonely said denver s mother mad maybe but i don t see how it could be lonely spending every minute with us like it does must be something you got it wants sethe shrugged it s just a baby my sister said denver she died in this house paul d scratched the hair under his jaw reminds me of that headless bride back behind sweet home remember that sethe used to roam them woods regular how could i forget worrisome how come everybody run off from sweet home can t stop talking about it look like if it was so sweet you would have stayed girl who you talking to paul d laughed true true she s right sethe it wasn t sweet and it sure wasn t home he shook his head but it s where we were said sethe all together comes back whether we want it to or not she shivered a little a light ripple of skin on her arm which she caressed back into sleep denver she said start up that stove can t have a friend stop by and don t feed him don t go to any trouble on my account paul d said bread ain t trouble the rest i brought back from where i work least i can do cooking from dawn to noon is bring dinner home you got any objections to pike if he don t object to me i don t object to him at it again thought denver her back to them she jostled the kindlin and almost lost the fire why don t you spend the night mr garner you and ma am can talk about sweet home all night long sethe took two swift steps to the stove but before she could yank denver s collar the girl leaned forward and began to cry what is the matter with you i never knew you to behave this way leave her be said paul d i m a stranger to her that s just it she got no cause to act up with a stranger oh baby what is it did something happen but denver was shaking now and sobbing so she could not speak the tears she had not shed for nine years wetting her far too womanly breasts i can t no more i can t no more can t what what can t you i can t live here i don t know where to go or what to do but i can t live here nobody speaks to us nobody comes by boys don t like me girls don t either honey honey what s she talking bout nobody speaks to you asked paul d it s the house people don t it s not it s not the house it s us and it s you denver leave off sethe it s hard for a young girl living in a haunted house that can t be easy it s easier than some other things think sethe i m a grown man with nothing new left to see or do and i m telling you it ain t easy maybe you all ought to move who owns this house over denver s shoulder sethe shot paul d a look of snow what you care they won t let you leave no sethe no moving no leaving it s all right the way it is you going to tell me it s all right with this child half out of her mind something in the house braced and in the listening quiet that followed sethe spoke i got a tree on my back and a haint in my house and nothing in between but the daughter i am holding in my arms no more running from nothing i will never run from another thing on this earth i took one journey and i paid for the ticket but let me tell you something paul d garner it cost too much do you hear me it cost too much now sit down and eat with us or leave us be paul d fished in his vest for a little pouch of tobacco concentrating on its contents and the knot of its string while sethe led denver into the keeping room that opened off the large room he was sitting in he had no smoking papers so he fiddled with the pouch and listened through the open door to sethe quieting her daughter when she came back she avoided his look and went straight to a small table next to the stove her back was to him and he could see all the hair he wanted without the distraction of her face what tree on your back huh sethe put a bowl on the table and reached under it for flour what tree on your back is something growing on your back i don t see nothing growing on your back it s there all the same who told you that whitegirl that s what she called it i ve never seen it and never will but that s what she said it looked like a chokecherry tree trunk branches and even leaves tiny little chokecherry leaves but that was eighteen years ago could have cherries too now for all i know sethe took a little spit from the tip of her tongue with her forefinger quickly lightly she touched the stove then she trailed her fingers through the flour parting separating small hills and ridges of it looking for mites finding none she poured soda and salt into the crease of her folded hand and tossed both into the flour then she reached into a can and scooped half a handful of lard deftly she squeezed the flour through it then with her left hand sprinkling water she formed the dough i had milk she said i was pregnant with denver but i had milk for my baby girl i hadn t stopped nursing her when i sent her on ahead with howard and buglar now she rolled the dough out with a wooden pin anybody could smell me long before he saw me and when he saw me he d see the drops of it on the front of my dress nothing i could do about that all i knew was i had to get my milk to my baby girl nobody was going to nurse her like me nobody was going to get it to her fast enough or take it away when she had enough and didn t know it nobody knew that she couldn t pass her air if you held her up on your shoulder only if she was lying on my knees nobody knew that but me and nobody had her milk but me i told that to the women in the wagon told them to put sugar water in cloth to suck from so when i got there in a few days she wouldn t have forgot me the milk would be there and i would be there with it men don t know nothing much said paul d tucking his pouch back into his vest pocket but they do know a suckling can t be away from its mother for long then they know what it s like to send your children off when your breasts are full we was talking bout a tree sethe after i left you those boys came in there and took my milk that s what they came in there for held me down and took it i told mrs garner on em she had that lump and couldn t speak but her eyes rolled out tears them boys found out i told on em schoolteacher made one open up my back and when it closed it made a tree it grows there still they used cowhide on you and they took my milk they beat you and you was pregnant and they took my milk the fat white circles of dough lined the pan in rows once more sethe touched a wet forefinger to the stove she opened the oven door and slid the pan of biscuits in as she raised up from the heat she felt paul d behind her and his hands under her breasts she straightened up and knew but could not feel that his cheek was pressing into the branches of her chokecherry tree not even trying he had become the kind of man who could walk into a house and make the women cry because with him in his presence they could there was something blessed in his manner women saw him and wanted to weep to tell him that their chest hurt and their knees did too strong women and wise saw him and told him things they only told each other that way past the change of life desire in them had suddenly become enormous greedy more savage than when they were fifteen and that it embarrassed them and made them sad that secretly they longed to die to be quit of it that sleep was more precious to them than any waking day young girls sidled up to him to confess or describe how well dressed the visitations were that had followed them straight from their dreams therefore although he did not understand why this was so he was not surprised when denver dripped tears into the stovefire nor fifteen minutes later after telling him about her stolen milk her mother wept as well behind her bending down his body an arc of kindness he held her breasts in the palms of his hands he rubbed his cheek on her back and learned that way her sorrow the roots of it its wide trunk and intricate branches raising his fingers to the hooks of her dress he knew without seeing them or hearing any sigh that the tears were coming fast and when the top of her dress was around her hips and he saw the sculpture her back had become like the decorative work of an ironsmith too passionate for display he could think but not say aw lord girl and he would tolerate no peace until he had touched every ridge and leaf of it with his mouth none of which sethe could feel because her back skin had been dead for years what she knew was that the responsibility for her breasts at last was in somebody else s hands would there be a little space she wondered a little time some way to hold off eventfulness to push busyness into the corners of the room and just stand there a minute or two naked from shoulder blade to waist relieved of the weight of her breasts smelling the stolen milk again and the pleasure of baking bread maybe this one time she could stop dead still in the middle of a cooking meal not even leave the stove and feel the hurt her back ought to trust things and remember things because the last of the sweet home men was there to catch her if she sank the stove didn t shudder as it adjusted to its heat denver wasn t stirring in the next room the pulse of red light hadn t come back and paul d had not trembled since and then for eighty three days in a row locked up and chained down his hands shook so bad he couldn t smoke or even scratch properly now he was trembling again but in the legs this time it took him a while to realize that his legs were not shaking because of worry but because the floorboards were and the grinding shoving floor was only part of it the house itself was pitching sethe slid to the floor and struggled to get back into her dress while down on all fours as though she were holding her house down on the ground denver burst from the keeping room terror in her eyes a vague smile on her lips god damn it hush up paul d was shouting falling reaching for anchor leave the place alone get the hell out a table rushed toward him and he grabbed its leg somehow he managed to stand at an angle and holding the table by two legs he bashed it about wrecking everything screaming back at the screaming house you want to fight come on god damn it she got enough without you she got enough the quaking slowed to an occasional lurch but paul d did not stop whipping the table around until everything was rock quiet sweating and breathing hard he leaned against the wall in the space the sideboard left sethe was still crouched next to the stove clutching her salvaged shoes to her chest the three of them sethe denver and paul d breathed to the same beat like one tired person another breathing was just as tired it was gone denver wandered through the silence to the stove she ashed over the fire and pulled the pan of biscuits from the oven the jelly cupboard was on its back its contents lying in a heap in the corner of the bottom shelf she took out a jar and looking around for a plate found half of one by the door these things she carried out to the porch steps where she sat down the two of them had gone up there stepping lightly easy footed they had climbed the white stairs leaving her down below she pried the wire from the top of the jar and then the lid under it was cloth and under that a thin cake of wax she removed it all and coaxed the jelly onto one half of the half a plate she took a biscuit and pulled off its black top smoke curled from the soft white insides she missed her brothers buglar and howard would be twenty two and twenty three now although they had been polite to her during the quiet time and gave her the whole top of the bed she remembered how it was before the pleasure they had sitting clustered on the white stairs she between the knees of howard or buglar while they made up die witch stories with proven ways of killing her dead and baby suggs telling her things in the keeping room she smelled like bark in the day and leaves at night for denver would not sleep in her old room after her brothers ran away now her mother was upstairs with the man who had gotten rid of the only other company she had denver dipped a bit of bread into the jelly slowly methodically miserably she ate it chapter not quite in a hurry but losing no time sethe and paul d climbed the white stairs overwhelmed as much by the downright luck of finding her house and her in it as by the certainty of giving her his sex paul d dropped twenty five years from his recent memory a stair step before him was baby suggs replacement the new girl they dreamed of at night and fucked cows for at dawn while waiting for her to choose merely kissing the wrought iron on her back had shook the house had made it necessary for him to beat it to pieces now he would do more she led him to the top of the stairs where light came straight from the sky because the second story windows of that house had been placed in the pitched ceiling and not the walls there were two rooms and she took him into one of them hoping he wouldn t mind the fact that she was not prepared that though she could remember desire she had forgotten how it worked the clutch and helplessness that resided in the hands how blindness was altered so that what leapt to the eye were places to lie down and all else door knobs straps hooks the sadness that crouched in corners and the passing of time was interference it was over before they could get their clothes off half dressed and short of breath they lay side by side resentful of one another and the skylight above them his dreaming of her had been too long and too long ago her deprivation had been not having any dreams of her own at all now they were sorry and too shy to make talk sethe lay on her back her head turned from him out of the corner of his eye paul d saw the float of her breasts and disliked it the spread away flat roundness of them that he could definitely live without never mind that downstairs he had held them as though they were the most expensive part of himself and the wrought iron maze he had explored in the kitchen like a gold miner pawing through pay dirt was in fact a revolting clump of scars not a tree as she said maybe shaped like one but nothing like any tree he knew because trees were inviting things you could trust and be near talk to if you wanted to as he frequently did since way back when he took the midday meal in the fields of sweet home always in the same place if he could and choosing the place had been hard because sweet home had more pretty trees than any farm around his choice he called brother and sat under it alone sometimes sometimes with halle or the other pauls but more often with sixo who was gentle then and still speaking english indigo with a flame red tongue sixo experimented with night cooked potatoes trying to pin down exactly when to put smoking hot rocks in a hole potatoes on top and cover the whole thing with twigs so that by the time they broke for the meal hitched the animals left the field and got to brother the potatoes would be at the peak of perfection he might get up in the middle of the night go all the way out there start the earth over by starlight or he would make the stones less hot and put the next day s potatoes on them right after the meal he never got it right but they ate those undercooked overcooked dried out or raw potatoes anyway laughing spitting and giving him advice time never worked the way sixo thought so of course he never got it right once he plotted down to the minute a thirty mile trip to see a woman he left on a saturday when the moon was in the place he wanted it to be arrived at her cabin before church on sunday and had just enough time to say good morning before he had to start back again so he d make the field call on time monday morning he had walked for seventeen hours sat down for one turned around and walked seventeen more halle and the pauls spent the whole day covering sixo s fatigue from mr garner they ate no potatoes that day sweet or white sprawled near brother his flame red tongue hidden from them his indigo face closed sixo slept through dinner like a corpse now there was a man and that was a tree himself lying in the bed and the tree lying next to him didn t compare paul d looked through the window above his feet and folded his hands behind his head an elbow grazed sethe s shoulder the touch of cloth on her skin startled her she had forgotten he had not taken off his shirt dog she thought and then remembered that she had not allowed him the time for taking it off nor herself time to take off her petticoat and considering she had begun undressing before she saw him on the porch that her shoes and stockings were already in her hand and she had never put them back on that he had looked at her wet bare feet and asked to join her that when she rose to cook he had undressed her further considering how quickly they had started getting naked you d think by now they would be but maybe a man was nothing but a man which is what baby suggs always said they encouraged you to put some of your weight in their hands and soon as you felt how light and lovely that was they studied your scars and tribulations after which they did what he had done ran her children out and tore up the house she needed to get up from there go downstairs and piece it all back together this house he told her to leave as though a house was a little thing a shirtwaist or a sewing basket you could walk off from or give away any old time she who had never had one but this one she who left a dirt floor to come to this one she who had to bring a fistful of salsify into mrs garner s kitchen every day just to be able to work in it feel like some part of it was hers because she wanted to love the work she did to take the ugly out of it and the only way she could feel at home on sweet home was if she picked some pretty growing thing and took it with her the day she forgot was the day butter wouldn t come or the brine in the barrel blistered her arms at least it seemed so a few yellow flowers on the table some myrtle tied around the handle of the flatiron holding the door open for a breeze calmed her and when mrs garner and she sat down to sort bristle or make ink she felt fine fine not scared of the men beyond the five who slept in quarters near her but never came in the night just touched their raggedy hats when they saw her and stared and if she brought food to them in the fields bacon and bread wrapped in a piece of clean sheeting they never took it from her hands they stood back and waited for her to put it on the ground at the foot of a tree and leave either they did not want to take anything from her or did not want her to see them eat twice or three times she lingered hidden behind honeysuckle she watched them how different they were without her how they laughed and played and urinated and sang all but sixo who laughed once at the very end halle of course was the nicest baby suggs eighth and last child who rented himself out all over the county to buy her away from there but he too as it turned out was nothing but a man a man ain t nothing but a man said baby suggs but a son well now that s somebody it made sense for a lot of reasons because in all of baby s life as well as sethe s own men and women were moved around like checkers anybody baby suggs knew let alone loved who hadn t run off or been hanged got rented out loaned out bought up brought back stored up mortgaged won stolen or seized so baby s eight children had six fathers what she called the nastiness of life was the shock she received upon learning that nobody stopped playing checkers just because the pieces included her children halle she was able to keep the longest twenty years a lifetime given to her no doubt to make up for hearing that her two girls neither of whom had their adult teeth were sold and gone and she had not been able to wave goodbye to make up for coupling with a straw boss for four months in exchange for keeping her third child a boy with her only to have him traded for lumber in the spring of the next year and to find herself pregnant by the man who promised not to and did that child she could not love and the rest she would not god take what he would she said and he did and he did and he did and then gave her halle who gave her freedom when it didn t mean a thing sethe had the amazing luck of six whole years of marriage to that somebody son who had fathered every one of her children a blessing she was reckless enough to take for granted lean on as though sweet home really was one as though a handful of myrtle stuck in the handle of a pressing iron propped against the door in a whitewoman s kitchen could make it hers as though mint sprig in the mouth changed the breath as well as its odor a bigger fool never lived sethe started to turn over on her stomach but changed her mind she did not want to call paul d s attention back to her so she settled for crossing her ankles but paul d noticed the movement as well as the change in her breathing he felt obliged to try again slower this time but the appetite was gone actually it was a good feeling not wanting her twenty five years and blip the kind of thing sixo would do like the time he arranged a meeting with patsy the thirty mile woman it took three months and two thirty four mile round trips to do it to persuade her to walk one third of the way toward him to a place he knew a deserted stone structure that redmen used way back when they thought the land was theirs sixo discovered it on one of his night creeps and asked its permission to enter inside having felt what it felt like he asked the redmen s presence if he could bring his woman there it said yes and sixo painstakingly instructed her how to get there exactly when to start out how his welcoming or warning whistles would sound since neither could go anywhere on business of their own and since the thirty mile woman was already fourteen and scheduled for somebody s arms the danger was real when he arrived she had not he whistled and got no answer he went into the redmen s deserted lodge she was not there he returned to the meeting spot she was not there he waited longer she still did not come he grew frightened for her and walked down the road in the direction she should be coming from three or four miles and he stopped it was hopeless to go on that way so he stood in the wind and asked for help listening close for some sign he heard a whimper he turned toward it waited and heard it again uncautious now he hollered her name she answered in a voice that sounded like life to him not death not move he shouted breathe hard i can find you he did she believed she was already at the meeting place and was crying because she thought he had not kept his promise now it was too late for the rendezvous to happen at the redmen s house so they dropped where they were later he punctured her calf to simulate snakebite so she could use it in some way as an excuse for not being on time to shake worms from tobacco leaves he gave her detailed directions about following the stream as a shortcut back and saw her off when he got to the road it was very light and he had his clothes in his hands suddenly from around a bend a wagon trundled toward him its driver wide eyed raised a whip while the woman seated beside him covered her face but sixo had already melted into the woods before the lash could unfurl itself on his indigo behind he told the story to paul f halle paul a and paul d in the peculiar way that made them cry laugh sixo went among trees at night for dancing he said to keep his bloodlines open he said privately alone he did it none of the rest of them had seen him at it but they could imagine it and the picture they pictured made them eager to laugh at him in daylight that is when it was safe but that was before he stopped speaking english because there was no future in it because of the thirty mile woman sixo was the only one not paralyzed by yearning for sethe nothing could be as good as the sex with her paul d had been imagining off and on for twenty five years his foolishness made him smile and think fondly of himself as he turned over on his side facing her sethe s eyes were closed her hair a mess looked at this way minus the polished eyes her face was not so attractive so it must have been her eyes that kept him both guarded and stirred up without them her face was manageable a face he could handle maybe if she would keep them closed like that but no there was her mouth nice halle never knew what he had although her eyes were closed sethe knew his gaze was on her face and a paper picture of just how bad she must look raised itself up before her mind s eye still there was no mockery coming from his gaze soft it felt soft in a waiting kind of way he was not judging her or rather he was judging but not comparing her not since halle had a man looked at her that way not loving or passionate but interested as though he were examining an ear of corn for quality halle was more like a brother than a husband his care suggested a family relationship rather than a man s laying claim for years they saw each other in full daylight only on sundays the rest of the time they spoke or touched or ate in darkness predawn darkness and the afterlight of sunset so looking at each other intently was a sunday morning pleasure and halle examined her as though storing up what he saw in sunlight for the shadow he saw the rest of the week and he had so little time after his sweet home work and on sunday afternoons was the debt work he owed for his mother when he asked her to be his wife sethe happily agreed and then was stuck not knowing the next step there should be a ceremony shouldn t there a preacher some dancing a party a something she and mrs garner were the only women there so she decided to ask her halle and me want to be married mrs garner so i heard she smiled he talked to mr garner about it are you already expecting no ma am well you will be you know that don t you yes ma am halle s nice sethe he ll be good to you but i mean we want to get married you just said so and i said all right is there a wedding mrs garner put down her cooking spoon laughing a little she touched sethe on the head saying you are one sweet child and then no more sethe made a dress on the sly and halle hung his hitching rope from a nail on the wall of her cabin and there on top of a mattress on top of the dirt floor of the cabin they coupled for the third time the first two having been in the tiny cornfield mr garner kept because it was a crop animals could use as well as humans both halle and sethe were under the impression that they were hidden scrunched down among the stalks they couldn t see anything including the corn tops waving over their heads and visible to everyone else sethe smiled at her and halle s stupidity even the crows knew and came to look uncrossing her ankles she managed not to laugh aloud the jump thought paul d from a calf to a girl wasn t all that mighty not the leap halle believed it would be and taking her in the corn rather than her quarters a yard away from the cabins of the others who had lost out was a gesture of tenderness halle wanted privacy for her and got public display who could miss a ripple in a cornfield on a quiet cloudless day he sixo and both of the pauls sat under brother pouring water from a gourd over their heads and through eyes streaming with well water they watched the confusion of tassels in the field below it had been hard hard hard sitting there erect as dogs watching corn stalks dance at noon the water running over their heads made it worse paul d sighed and turned over sethe took the opportunity afforded by his movement to shift as well looking at paul d s back she remembered that some of the corn stalks broke folded down over halle s back and among the things her fingers clutched were husk and cornsilk hair how loose the silk how jailed down the juice the jealous admiration of the watching men melted with the feast of new corn they allowed themselves that night plucked from the broken stalks that mr garner could not doubt was the fault of the raccoon paul f wanted his roasted paul a wanted his boiled and now paul d couldn t remember how finally they d cooked those ears too young to eat what he did remember was parting the hair to get to the tip the edge of his fingernail just under so as not to graze a single kernel the pulling down of the tight sheath the ripping sound always convinced her it hurt as soon as one strip of husk was down the rest obeyed and the ear yielded up to him its shy rows exposed at last how loose the silk how quick the jailed up flavor ran free no matter what all your teeth and wet fingers anticipated there was no accounting for the way that simple joy could shake you how loose the silk how fine and loose and free chapter denver s secrets were sweet accompanied every time by wild veronica until she discovered cologne the first bottle was a gift the next she stole from her mother and hid among boxwood until it froze and cracked that was the year winter came in a hurry at suppertime and stayed eight months one of the war years when miss bodwin the whitewoman brought christmas cologne for her mother and herself oranges for the boys and another good wool shawl for baby suggs talking of a war full of dead people she looked happy flush faced and although her voice was heavy as a man s she smelled like a roomful of flowers excitement that denver could have all for herself in the boxwood back beyond x was a narrow field that stopped itself at a wood on the yonder side of these woods a stream in these woods between the field and the stream hidden by post oaks five boxwood bushes planted in a ring had started stretching toward each other four feet off the ground to form a round empty room seven feet high its walls fifty inches of murmuring leaves bent low denver could crawl into this room and once there she could stand all the way up in emerald light it began as a little girl s houseplay but as her desires changed so did the play quiet primate and completely secret except for the noisome cologne signal that thrilled the rabbits before it confused them first a playroom where the silence was softer then a refuge from her brothers fright soon the place became the point in that bower closed off from the hurt of the hurt world denver s imagination produced its own hunger and its own food which she badly needed because loneliness wore her out wore her out veiled and protected by the live green walls she felt ripe and clear and salvation was as easy as a wish once when she was in the boxwood an autumn long before paul d moved into the house with her mother she was made suddenly cold by a combination of wind and the perfume on her skin she dressed herself bent down to leave and stood up in snowfall a thin and whipping snow very like the picture her mother had painted as she described the circumstances of denver s birth in a canoe straddled by a whitegirl for whom she was named shivering denver approached the house regarding it as she always did as a person rather than a structure a person that wept sighed trembled and fell into fits her steps and her gaze were the cautious ones of a child approaching a nervous idle relative someone dependent but proud a breastplate of darkness hid all the windows except one its dim glow came from baby suggs room when denver looked in she saw her mother on her knees in prayer which was not unusual what was unusual even for a girl who had lived all her life in a house peopled by the living activity of the dead was that a white dress knelt down next to her mother and had its sleeve around her mother s waist and it was the tender embrace of the dress sleeve that made denver remember the details of her birth that and the thin whipping snow she was standing in like the fruit of common flowers the dress and her mother together looked like two friendly grown up women one the dress helping out the other and the magic of her birth its miracle in fact testified to that friendliness as did her own name easily she stepped into the told story that lay before her eyes on the path she followed away from the window there was only one door to the house and to get to it from the back you had to walk all the way around to the front of past the storeroom past the cold house the privy the shed on around to the porch and to get to the part of the story she liked best she had to start way back hear the birds in the thick woods the crunch of leaves underfoot see her mother making her way up into the hills where no houses were likely to be how sethe was walking on two feet meant for standing still how they were so swollen she could not see her arch or feel her ankles her leg shaft ended in a loaf of flesh scalloped by five toenails but she could not would not stop for when she did the little antelope rammed her with horns and pawed the ground of her womb with impatient hooves while she was walking it seemed to graze quietly so she walked on two feet meant in this sixth month of pregnancy for standing still still near a kettle still at the churn still at the tub and ironing board milk sticky and sour on her dress attracted every small flying thing from gnats to grasshoppers by the time she reached the hill skirt she had long ago stopped waving them off the clanging in her head begun as a churchbell heard from a distance was by then a tight cap of pealing bells around her ears she sank and had to look down to see whether she was in a hole or kneeling nothing was alive but her nipples and the little antelope finally she was horizontal or must have been because blades of wild onion were scratching her temple and her cheek concerned as she was for the life of her children s mother sethe told denver she remembered thinking well at least i don t have to take another step a dying thought if ever there was one and she waited for the little antelope to protest and why she thought of an antelope sethe could not imagine since she had never seen one she guessed it must have been an invention held on to from before sweet home when she was very young of that place where she was born carolina maybe or was it louisiana she remembered only song and dance not even her own mother who was pointed out to her by the eight year old child who watched over the young ones pointed out as the one among many backs turned away from her stooping in a watery field patiently sethe waited for this particular back to gain the row s end and stand what she saw was a cloth hat as opposed to a straw one singularity enough in that world of cooing women each of whom was called ma am seth thuh ma am hold on to the baby yes ma am seth thuh ma am get some kindlin in here yes ma am oh but when they sang and oh but when they danced and sometimes they danced the antelope the men as well as the ma ams one of whom was certainly her own they shifted shapes and became something other some unchained demanding other whose feet knew her pulse better than she did just like this one in her stomach i believe this baby s ma am is gonna die in wild onions on the bloody side of the ohio river that s what was on her mind and what she told denver her exact words and it didn t seem such a bad idea all in all in view of the step she would not have to take but the thought of herself stretched out dead while the little antelope lived on an hour a day a day and a night in her lifeless body grieved her so she made the groan that made the person walking on a path not ten yards away halt and stand right still sethe had not heard the walking but suddenly she heard the standing still and then she smelled the hair the voice saying who s in there was all she needed to know that she was about to be discovered by a white boy that he too had mossy teeth an appetite that on a ridge of pine near the ohio river trying to get to her three children one of whom was starving for the food she carried that after her husband had disappeared that after her milk had been stolen her back pulped her children orphaned she was not to have an easeful death no she told denver that a something came up out of the earth into her like a freezing but moving too like jaws inside look like i was just cold jaws grinding she said suddenly she was eager for his eyes to bite into them to gnaw his cheek i was hungry she told denver just as hungry as i could be for his eyes i couldn t wait so she raised up on her elbow and dragged herself one pull two three four toward the young white voice talking about who that back in there come see i was thinking be the last thing you behold and sure enough here come the feet so i thought well that s where i ll have to start god do what he would i m gonna eat his feet off i m laughing now but it s true i wasn t just set to do it i was hungry to do it like a snake all jaws and hungry it wasn t no whiteboy at all was a girl the raggediest looking trash you ever saw saying look there a nigger if that don t beat all and now the part denver loved the best her name was amy and she needed beef and pot liquor like nobody in this world arms like cane stalks and enough hair for four or five heads slow moving eyes she didn t look at anything quick talked so much it wasn t clear how she could breathe at the same time and those cane stalk arms as it turned out were as strong as iron you bout the scariest looking something i ever seen what you doing back up in here down in the grass like the snake she believed she was sethe opened her mouth and instead of fangs and a split tongue out shot the truth running sethe told her it was the first word she had spoken all day and it came out thick because of her tender tongue them the feet you running on my jesus my she squatted down and stared at sethe s feet you got anything on you gal pass for food no sethe tried to shift to a sitting position but couldn t i like to die i m so hungry the girl moved her eyes slowly examining the greenery around her thought there d be huckleberries look like it that s why i come up in here didn t expect to find no nigger woman if they was any birds ate em you like huckleberries i m having a baby miss amy looked at her that mean you don t have no appetite well i got to eat me something combing her hair with her fingers she carefully surveyed the landscape once more satisfied nothing edible was around she stood up to go and sethe s heart stood up too at the thought of being left alone in the grass without a fang in her head where you on your way to miss she turned and looked at sethe with freshly lit eyes boston get me some velvet it s a store there called wilson i seen the pictures of it and they have the prettiest velvet they don t believe i m a get it but i am sethe nodded and shifted her elbow your ma am know you on the lookout for velvet the girl shook her hair out of her face my mama worked for these here people to pay for her passage but then she had me and since she died right after well they said i had to work for em to pay it off i did but now i want me some velvet they did not look directly at each other not straight into the eyes anyway yet they slipped effortlessly into yard chat about nothing in particular except one lay on the ground boston said sethe is that far ooooh yeah a hundred miles maybe more must be velvet closer by not like in boston boston got the best be so pretty on me you ever touch it no miss i never touched no velvet sethe didn t know if it was the voice or boston or velvet but while the whitegirl talked the baby slept not one butt or kick so she guessed her luck had turned ever see any she asked sethe i bet you never even seen any if i did i didn t know it what s it like velvet amy dragged her eyes over sethe s face as though she would never give out so confidential a piece of information as that to a perfect stranger what they call you she asked however far she was from sweet home there was no point in giving out her real name to the first person she saw lu said sethe they call me lu well lu velvet is like the world was just born clean and new and so smooth the velvet i seen was brown but in boston they got all colors carmine that means red but when you talk about velvet you got to say carmine she raised her eyes to the sky and then as though she had wasted enough time away from boston she moved off saying i gotta go picking her way through the brush she hollered back to sethe what you gonna do just lay there and foal i can t get up from here said sethe what she stopped and turned to hear i said i can t get up amy drew her arm across her nose and came slowly back to where sethe lay it s a house back yonder she said a house mmmmm i passed it ain t no regular house with people in it though a lean to kinda how far make a difference does it you stay the night here snake get you well he may as well come on i can t stand up let alone walk and god help me miss i can t crawl sure you can lu come on said amy and with a toss of hair enough for five heads she moved toward the path so she crawled and amy walked alongside her and when sethe needed to rest amy stopped too and talked some more about boston and velvet and good things to eat the sound of that voice like a sixteen year old boy s going on and on and on kept the little antelope quiet and grazing during the whole hateful crawl to the lean to it never bucked once nothing of sethe s was intact by the time they reached it except the cloth that covered her hair below her bloody knees there was no feeling at all her chest was two cushions of pins it was the voice full of velvet and boston and good things to eat that urged her along and made her think that maybe she wasn t after all just a crawling graveyard for a six month baby s last hours the lean to was full of leaves which amy pushed into a pile for sethe to lie on then she gathered rocks covered them with more leaves and made sethe put her feet on them saying i know a woman had her feet cut off they was so swole and she made sawing gestures with the blade of her hand across sethe s ankles zzz zzz zzz zzz i used to be a good size nice arms and everything wouldn t think it would you that was before they put me in the root cellar i was fishing off the beaver once catfish in beaver river sweet as chicken well i was just fishing there and a nigger floated right by me i don t like drowned people you your feet remind me of him all swole like then she did the magic lifted sethe s feet and legs and massaged them until she cried salt tears it s gonna hurt now said amy anything dead coming back to life hurts a truth for all times thought denver maybe the white dress holding its arm around her mother s waist was in pain if so it could mean the baby ghost had plans when she opened the door sethe was just leaving the keeping room i saw a white dress holding on to you denver said white maybe it was my bedding dress describe it to me had a high neck whole mess of buttons coming down the back buttons well that lets out my bedding dress i never had a button on nothing did grandma baby sethe shook her head she couldn t handle them even on her shoes what else a bunch at the back on the sit down part a bustle it had a bustle i don t know what it s called sort of gathered like below the waist in the back um hm a rich lady s dress silk cotton look like lisle probably white cotton lisle you say it was holding on to me how like you it looked just like you kneeling next to you while you were praying had its arm around your waist well i ll be what were you praying for ma am not for anything i don t pray anymore i just talk what were you talking about you won t understand baby yes i will i was talking about time it s so hard for me to believe in it some things go pass on some things just stay i used to think it was my rememory you know some things you forget other things you never do but it s not places places are still there if a house burns down it s gone but the place the picture of it stays and not just in my rememory but out there in the world what i remember is a picture floating around out there outside my head i mean even if i don t think it even if i die the picture of what i did or knew or saw is still out there right in the place where it happened can other people see it asked denver oh yes oh yes yes yes someday you be walking down the road and you hear something or see something going on so clear and you think it s you thinking it up a thought picture but no it s when you bump into a rememory that belongs to somebody else where i was before i came here that place is real it s never going away even if the whole farm every tree and grass blade of it dies the picture is still there and what s more if you go there you who never was there if you go there and stand in the place where it was it will happen again it will be there for you waiting for you so denver you can t never go there never because even though it s all over over and done with it s going to always be there waiting for you that s how come i had to get all my children out no matter what denver picked at her fingernails if it s still there waiting that must mean that nothing ever dies sethe looked right in denver s face nothing ever does she said you never told me all what happened just that they whipped you and you run off pregnant with me nothing to tell except schoolteacher he was a little man short always wore a collar even in the fields a schoolteacher she said that made her feel good that her husband s sister s husband had book learning and was willing to come farm sweet home after mr garner passed the men could have done it even with paul f sold but it was like halle said she didn t want to be the only white person on the farm and a woman too so she was satisfied when the schoolteacher agreed to come he brought two boys with him sons or nephews i don t know they called him onka and had pretty man ners all of em talked soft and spit in handkerchiefs gentle in a lot of ways you know the kind who know jesus by his first name but out of politeness never use it even to his face a pretty good farmer halle said not strong as mr garner but smart enough he liked the ink i made it was her recipe but he preferred how i mixed it and it was important to him because at night he sat down to write in his book it was a book about us but we didn t know that right away we just thought it was his manner to ask us questions he commenced to carry round a notebook and write down what we said i still think it was them questions that tore sixo up tore him up for all time she stopped denver knew that her mother was through with it for now anyway the single slow blink of her eyes the bottom lip sliding up slowly to cover the top and then a nostril sigh like the snuff of a candle flame signs that sethe had reached the point beyond which she would not go well i think the baby got plans said denver what plans i don t know but the dress holding on to you got to mean something maybe said sethe maybe it does have plans whatever they were or might have been paul d messed them up for good with a table and a loud male voice he had rid of its claim to local fame denver had taught herself to take pride in the condemnation negroes heaped on them the assumption that the haunting was done by an evil thing looking for more none of them knew the downright pleasure of enchantment of not suspecting but knowing the things behind things her brothers had known but it scared them grandma baby knew but it saddened her none could appreciate the safety of ghost company even sethe didn t love it she just took it for granted like a sudden change in the weather but it was gone now whooshed away in the blast of a hazelnut man s shout leaving denver s world flat mostly with the exception of an emerald closet standing seven feet high in the woods her mother had secrets things she wouldn t tell things she halfway told well denver had them too and hers were sweet sweet as lily of the valley cologne sethe had given little thought to the white dress until paul d came and then she remembered denver s interpretation plans the morning after the first night with paul d sethe smiled just thinking about what the word could mean it was a luxury she had not had in eighteen years and only that once before and since all her effort was directed not on avoiding pain but on getting through it as quickly as possible the one set of plans she had made getting away from sweet home went awry so completely she never dared life by making more yet the morning she woke up next to paul d the word her daughter had used a few years ago did cross her mind and she thought about what denver had seen kneeling next to her and thought also of the temptation to trust and remember that gripped her as she stood before the cooking stove in his arms would it be all right would it be all right to go ahead and feel go ahead and count on something she couldn t think clearly lying next to him listening to his breathing so carefully carefully she had left the bed kneeling in the keeping room where she usually went to talk think it was clear why baby suggs was so starved for color there wasn t any except for two orange squares in a quilt that made the absence shout the walls of the room were slate colored the floor earth brown the wooden dresser the color of itself curtains white and the dominating feature the quilt over an iron cot was made up of scraps of blue serge black brown and gray wool the full range of the dark and the muted that thrift and modesty allowed in that sober field two patches of orange looked wild like life in the raw sethe looked at her hands her bottle green sleeves and thought how little color there was in the house and how strange that she had not missed it the way baby did deliberate she thought it must be deliberate because the last color she remembered was the pink chips in the headstone of her baby girl after that she became as color conscious as a hen every dawn she worked at fruit pies potato dishes and vegetables while the cook did the soup meat and all the rest and she could not remember remembering a molly apple or a yellow squash every dawn she saw the dawn but never acknowledged or remarked its color there was something wrong with that it was as though one day she saw red baby blood another day the pink gravestone chips and that was the last of it was so full of strong feeling perhaps she was oblivious to the loss of anything at all there was a time when she scanned the fields every morning and every evening for her boys when she stood at the open window unmindful of flies her head cocked to her left shoulder her eyes searching to the right for them cloud shadow on the road an old woman a wandering goat untethered and gnawing bramble each one looked at first like howard no buglar little by little she stopped and their thirteen year old faces faded completely into their baby ones which came to her only in sleep when her dreams roamed outside anywhere they wished she saw them sometimes in beautiful trees their little legs barely visible in the leaves sometimes they ran along the railroad track laughing too loud apparently to hear her because they never did turn around when she woke the house crowded in on her there was the door where the soda crackers were lined up in a row the white stairs her baby girl loved to climb the corner where baby suggs mended shoes a pile of which were still in the cold room the exact place on the stove where denver burned her fingers and of course the spite of the house itself there was no room for any other thing or body until paul d arrived and broke up the place making room shifting it moving it over to someplace else then standing in the place he had made so kneeling in the keeping room the morning after paul d came she was distracted by the two orange squares that signaled how barren really was he was responsible for that emotions sped to the surface in his company things became what they were drabness looked drab heat was hot windows suddenly had view and wouldn t you know he d be a singing man little rice little bean no meat in between hard work ain t easy dry bread ain t greasy he was up now and singing as he mended things he had broken the day before some old pieces of song he d learned on the prison farm or in the war afterward nothing like what they sang at sweet home where yearning fashioned every note the songs he knew from georgia were flat headed nails for pounding and pounding and pounding lay my bead on the railroad line train come along pacify my mind if i had my weight in lime i d whip my captain till he went stone blind five cent nickel ten cent dime busting rocks is busting time but they didn t fit these songs they were too loud had too much power for the little house chores he was engaged in resetting table legs glazing he couldn t go back to storm upon the waters that they sang under the trees of sweet home so he contented himself with mmmmmmmmm throwing in a line if one occurred to him and what occurred over and over was bare feet and chamomile sap took off my shoes took off my hat it was tempting to change the words gimme back my shoes gimme back my hat because he didn t believe he could live with a woman any woman for over two out of three months that was about as long as he could abide one place after delaware and before that alfred georgia where he slept underground and crawled into sunlight for the sole purpose of breaking rock walking off when he got ready was the only way he could convince himself that he would no longer have to sleep pee eat or swing a sledge hammer in chains but this was not a normal woman in a normal house as soon as he had stepped through the red light he knew that compared to the rest of the world was bald after alfred he had shut down a generous portion of his head operating on the part that helped him walk eat sleep sing if he could do those things with a little work and a little sex thrown in he asked for no more for more required him to dwell on halle s face and sixo laughing to recall trembling in a box built into the ground grateful for the daylight spent doing mule work in a quarry because he did not tremble when he had a hammer in his hands the box had done what sweet home had not what working like an ass and living like a dog had not drove him crazy so he would not lose his mind by the time he got to ohio then to cincinnati then to halle suggs mother s house he thought he had seen and felt it all even now as he put back the window frame he had smashed he could not account for the pleasure in his surprise at seeing halle s wife alive barefoot with uncovered hair walking around the corner of the house with her shoes and stockings in her hands the closed portion of his head opened like a greased lock i was thinking of looking for work around here what you think ain t much river mostly and hogs well i never worked on water but i can pick up anything heavy as me hogs included whitepeople better here than kentucky but you may have to scramble some it ain t whether i scramble it s where you saying it s all right to scramble here better than all right your girl denver seems to me she s of a different mind why you say that she s got a waiting way about her something she s expecting and it ain t me i don t know what it could be well whatever it is she believes i m interrupting it don t worry about her she s a charmed child from the beginning is that right uh huh nothing bad can happen to her look at it everybody i knew dead or gone or dead and gone not her not my denver even when i was carrying her when it got clear that i wasn t going to make it which meant she wasn t going to make it either she pulled a whitegirl out of the hill the last thing you d expect to help and when the schoolteacher found us and came busting in here with the law and a shotgun schoolteacher found you took a while but he did finally and he didn t take you back oh no i wasn t going back there i don t care who found who any life but not that one i went to jail instead denver was just a baby so she went right along with me rats bit everything in there but her paul d turned away he wanted to know more about it but jail talk put him back in alfred georgia i need some nails anybody around here i can borrow from or should i go to town may as well go to town you ll need other things one night and they were talking like a couple they had skipped love and promise and went directly to you saying it s all right to scramble here to sethe the future was a matter of keeping the past at bay the better life she believed she and denver were living was simply not that other one the fact that paul d had come out of that other one into her bed was better too and the notion of a future with him or for that matter without him was beginning to stroke her mind as for denver the job sethe had of keeping her from the past that was still waiting for her was all that mattered chapter pleasantly troubled sethe avoided the keeping room and denver s sidelong looks as she expected since life was like that it didn t do any good denver ran a mighty interference and on the third day flat out asked paul d how long he was going to hang around the phrase hurt him so much he missed the table the coffee cup hit the floor and rolled down the sloping boards toward the front door hang around paul d didn t even look at the mess he had made denver what s got into you sethe looked at her daughter feeling more embarrassed than angry paul d scratched the hair on his chin maybe i should make tracks no sethe was surprised by how loud she said it he know what he needs said denver well you don t sethe told her and you must not know what you need either i don t want to hear another word out of you i just asked if hush you make tracks go somewhere and sit down denver picked up her plate and left the table but not before adding a chicken back and more bread to the heap she was carrying away paul d leaned over to wipe the spilled coffee with his blue handkerchief i ll get that sethe jumped up and went to the stove behind it various cloths hung each in some stage of drying in silence she wiped the floor and retrieved the cup then she poured him another cupful and set it carefully before him paul d touched its rim but didn t say anything as though even thank you was an obligation he could not meet and the coffee itself a gift he could not take sethe resumed her chair and the silence continued finally she realized that if it was going to be broken she would have to do it i didn t train her like that paul d stroked the rim of the cup and i m as surprised by her manners as you are hurt by em paul d looked at sethe is there history to her question history what you mean i mean did she have to ask that or want to ask it of anybody else before me sethe made two fists and placed them on her hips you as bad as she is come on sethe oh i am coming on i am you know what i mean i do and i don t like it jesus he whispered who sethe was getting loud again jesus i said jesus all i did was sit down for supper and i get cussed out twice once for being here and once for asking why i was cussed in the first place she didn t cuss no felt like it look here i apologize for her i m real you can t do that you can t apologize for nobody she got to do that then i ll see that she does sethe sighed what i want to know is is she asking a question that s on your mind too oh no no paul d oh no then she s of one mind and you another if you can call what ever s in her head a mind that is excuse me but i can t hear a word against her i ll chastise her you leave her alone risky thought paul d very risky for a used to be slave woman to love anything that much was dangerous especially if it was her children she had settled on to love the best thing he knew was to love just a little bit everything just a little bit so when they broke its back or shoved it in a croaker sack well maybe you d have a little love left over for the next one why he asked her why you think you have to take up for her apologize for her she s grown i don t care what she is grown don t mean nothing to a mother a child is a child they get bigger older but grown what s that supposed to mean in my heart it don t mean a thing it means she has to take it if she acts up you can t protect her every minute what s going to happen when you die nothing i ll protect her while i m live and i ll protect her when i ain t oh well i m through he said i quit that s the way it is paul d i can t explain it to you no better than that but that s the way it is if i have to choose well it s not even a choice that s the point the whole point i m not asking you to choose nobody would i thought well i thought you could there was some space for me she s asking me you can t go by that you got to say it to her tell her it s not about choosing somebody over her it s making space for somebody along with her you got to say it and if you say it and mean it then you also got to know you can t gag me there s no way i m going to hurt her or not take care of what she need if i can but i can t be told to keep my mouth shut if she s acting ugly you want me here don t put no gag on me maybe i should leave things the way they are she said how are they we get along what about inside i don t go inside sethe if i m here with you with denver you can go anywhere you want jump if you want to cause i ll catch you girl i ll catch you fore you fall go as far inside as you need to i ll hold your ankles make sure you get back out i m not saying this because i need a place to stay that s the last thing i need i told you i m a walking man but i been heading in this direction for seven years walking all around this place upstate downstate east west i been in territory ain t got no name never staying nowhere long but when i got here and sat out there on the porch waiting for you well i knew it wasn t the place i was heading toward it was you we can make a life girl a life i don t know i don t know leave it to me see how it goes no promises if you don t want to make any just see how it goes all right all right you willing to leave it to me well some of it some he smiled okay here s some there s a carnival in town thursday tomorrow is for coloreds and i got two dollars me and you and denver gonna spend every penny of it what you say no is what she said at least what she started out saying what would her boss say if she took a day off but even when she said it she was thinking how much her eyes enjoyed looking in his face the crickets were screaming on thursday and the sky stripped of blue was white hot at eleven in the morning sethe was badly dressed for the heat but this being her first social outing in eighteen years she felt obliged to wear her one good dress heavy as it was and a hat certainly a hat she didn t want to meet lady jones or ella with her head wrapped like she was going to work the dress a good wool castoff was a christmas present to baby suggs from miss bodwin the whitewoman who loved her denver and paul d fared better in the heat since neither felt the occasion required special clothing denver s bonnet knocked against her shoulder blades paul d wore his vest open no jacket and his shirt sleeves rolled above his elbows they were not holding hands but their shadows were sethe looked to her left and all three of them were gliding over the dust holding hands maybe he was right a life watching their hand holding shadows she was embarrassed at being dressed for church the others ahead and behind them would think she was putting on airs letting them know that she was different because she lived in a house with two stories tougher because she could do and survive things they believed she should neither do nor survive she was glad denver had resisted her urgings to dress up rebraid her hair at least but denver was not doing anything to make this trip a pleasure she agreed to go sullenly but her attitude was go head try and make me happy the happy one was paul d he said howdy to everybody within twenty feet made fun of the weather and what it was doing to him yelled back at the crows and was the first to smell the doomed roses all the time no matter what they were doing whether denver wiped perspiration from her forehead or stooped to retie her shoes whether paul d kicked a stone or reached over to meddle a child s face leaning on its mother s shoulder all the time the three shadows that shot out of their feet to the left held hands nobody noticed but sethe and she stopped looking after she decided that it was a good sign a life could be up and down the lumberyard fence old roses were dying the sawyer who had planted them twelve years ago to give his workplace a friendly feel something to take the sin out of slicing trees for a living was amazed by their abundance how rapidly they crawled all over the stake and post fence that separated the lumberyard from the open field next to it where homeless men slept children ran and once a year carnival people pitched tents the closer the roses got to death the louder their scent and everybody who attended the carnival associated it with the stench of the rotten roses it made them a little dizzy and very thirsty but did nothing to extinguish the eagerness of the coloredpeople filing down the road some walked on the grassy shoulders others dodged the wagons creaking down the road s dusty center all like paul d were in high spirits which the smell of dying roses that paul d called to everybody s attention could not dampen as they pressed to get to the rope entrance they were lit like lamps breathless with the excitement of seeing white people loose doing magic clowning without heads or with two heads twenty feet tall or two feet tall weighing a ton completely tattooed eating glass swallowing fire spitting ribbons twisted into knots forming pyramids playing with snakes and beating each other up all of this was advertisement read by those who could and heard by those who could not and the fact that none of it was true did not extinguish their appetite a bit the barker called them and their children names pickaninnies free but the food on his vest and the hole in his pants rendered it fairly harmless in any case it was a small price to pay for the fun they might not ever have again two pennies and an insult were well spent if it meant seeing the spectacle of whitefolks making a spectacle of themselves so although the carnival was a lot less than mediocre which is why it agreed to a colored thursday it gave the four hundred black people in its audience thrill upon thrill upon thrill one ton lady spit at them but her bulk shortened her aim and they got a big kick out of the helpless meanness in her little eyes arabian nights dancer cut her performance to three minutes instead of the usual fifteen she normally did earning the gratitude of the children who could hardly wait for abu snake charmer who followed her denver bought horehound licorice peppermint and lemonade at a table manned by a little whitegirl in ladies high topped shoes soothed by sugar surrounded by a crowd of people who did not find her the main attraction who in fact said hey denver every now and then pleased her enough to consider the possibility that paul d wasn t all that bad in fact there was something about him when the three of them stood together watching midget dance that made the stares of other negroes kind gentle something denver did not remember seeing in their faces several even nodded and smiled at her mother no one apparently able to withstand sharing the pleasure paul d was having he slapped his knees when giant danced with midget when two headed man talked to himself he bought everything denver asked for and much she did not he teased sethe into tents she was reluctant to enter stuck pieces of candy she didn t want between her lips when wild african savage shook his bars and said wa wa paul d told everybody he knew him back in roanoke paul d made a few acquaintances spoke to them about what work he might find sethe returned the smiles she got denver was swaying with delight and on the way home although leading them now the shadows of three people still held hands chapter a fully dressed woman walked out of the water she barely gained the dry bank of the stream before she sat down and leaned against a mulberry tree all day and all night she sat there her head resting on the trunk in a position abandoned enough to crack the brim in her straw hat everything hurt but her lungs most of all sopping wet and breathing shallow she spent those hours trying to negotiate the weight of her eyelids the day breeze blew her dress dry the night wind wrinkled it nobody saw her emerge or came accidentally by if they had chances are they would have hesitated before approaching her not because she was wet or dozing or had what sounded like asthma but because amid all that she was smiling it took her the whole of the next morning to lift herself from the ground and make her way through the woods past a giant temple of boxwood to the field and then the yard of the slate gray house exhausted again she sat down on the first handy place a stump not far from the steps of by then keeping her eyes open was less of an effort she could manage it for a full two minutes or more her neck its circumference no wider than a parlor service saucer kept bending and her chin brushed the bit of lace edging her dress women who drink champagne when there is nothing to celebrate can look like that their straw hats with broken brims are often askew they nod in public places their shoes are undone but their skin is not like that of the woman breathing near the steps of she had new skin lineless and smooth including the knuckles of her hands by late afternoon when the carnival was over and the negroes were hitching rides home if they were lucky walking if they were not the woman had fallen asleep again the rays of the sun struck her full in the face so that when sethe denver and paul d rounded the curve in the road all they saw was a black dress two unlaced shoes below it and here boy nowhere in sight look said denver what is that and for some reason she could not immediately account for the moment she got close enough to see the face sethe s bladder filled to capacity she said oh excuse me and ran around to the back of not since she was a baby girl being cared for by the eight year old girl who pointed out her mother to her had she had an emergency that unmanageable she never made the outhouse right in front of its door she had to lift her skirts and the water she voided was endless like a horse she thought but as it went on and on she thought no more like flooding the boat when denver was born so much water amy said hold on lu you going to sink us you keep that up but there was no stopping water breaking from a breaking womb and there was no stopping now she hoped paul d wouldn t take it upon himself to come looking for her and be obliged to see her squatting in front of her own privy making a mudhole too deep to be witnessed without shame just about the time she started wondering if the carnival would accept another freak it stopped she tidied herself and ran around to the porch no one was there all three were insidepaul d and denver standing before the stranger watching her drink cup after cup of water she said she was thirsty said paul d he took off his cap mighty thirsty look like the woman gulped water from a speckled tin cup and held it out for more four times denver filled it and four times the woman drank as though she had crossed a desert when she was finished a little water was on her chin but she did not wipe it away instead she gazed at sethe with sleepy eyes poorly fed thought sethe and younger than her clothes suggested good lace at the throat and a rich woman s hat her skin was flawless except for three vertical scratches on her forehead so fine and thin they seemed at first like hair baby hair before it bloomed and roped into the masses of black yarn under her hat you from around here sethe asked her she shook her head no and reached down to take off her shoes she pulled her dress up to the knees and rolled down her stockings when the hosiery was tucked into the shoes sethe saw that her feet were like her hands soft and new she must have hitched a wagon ride thought sethe probably one of those west virginia girls looking for something to beat a life of tobacco and sorghum sethe bent to pick up the shoes what might your name be asked paul d beloved she said and her voice was so low and rough each one looked at the other two they heard the voice first later the name beloved you use a last name beloved paul d asked her last she seemed puzzled then no and she spelled it for them slowly as though the letters were being formed as she spoke them sethe dropped the shoes denver sat down and paul d smiled he recognized the careful enunciation of letters by those like himself who could not read but had memorized the letters of their name he was about to ask who her people were but thought better of it a young coloredwoman drifting was drifting from ruin he had been in rochester four years ago and seen five women arriving with fourteen female children all their men brothers uncles fathers husbands sons had been picked off one by one by one they had a single piece of paper directing them to a preacher on devore street the war had been over four or five years then but nobody white or black seemed to know it odd clusters and strays of negroes wandered the back roads and cowpaths from schenectady to jackson dazed but insistent they searched each other out for word of a cousin an aunt a friend who once said call on me anytime you get near chicago just call on me some of them were running from family that could not support them some to family some were running from dead crops dead kin life threats and took over land boys younger than buglar and howard configurations and blends of families of women and children while elsewhere solitary hunted and hunting for were men men men forbidden public transportation chased by debt and filthy talking sheets they followed secondary routes scanned the horizon for signs and counted heavily on each other silent except for social courtesies when they met one another they neither described nor asked about the sorrow that drove them from one place to another the whites didn t bear speaking on everybody knew so he did not press the young woman with the broken hat about where from or how come if she wanted them to know and was strong enough to get through the telling she would what occupied them at the moment was what it might be that she needed underneath the major question each harbored another paul d wondered at the newness of her shoes sethe was deeply touched by her sweet name the remembrance of glittering headstone made her feel especially kindly toward her denver however was shaking she looked at this sleepy beauty and wanted more sethe hung her hat on a peg and turned graciously toward the girl that s a pretty name beloved take off your hat why don t you and i ll make us something we just got back from the carnival over near cincinnati everything in there is something to see bolt upright in the chair in the middle of sethe s welcome beloved had fallen asleep again miss miss paul d shook her gently you want to lay down a spell she opened her eyes to slits and stood up on her soft new feet which barely capable of their job slowly bore her to the keeping room once there she collapsed on baby suggs bed denver removed her hat and put the quilt with two squares of color over her feet she was breathing like a steam engine sounds like croup said paul d closing the door is she feverish denver could you tell no she s cold then she is fever goes from hot to cold could have the cholera said paul d reckon all that water sure sign poor thing and nothing in this house to give her for it she ll just have to ride it out that s a hateful sickness if ever there was one she s not sick said denver and the passion in her voice made them smile four days she slept waking and sitting up only for water denver tended her watched her sound sleep listened to her labored breathing and out of love and a breakneck possessiveness that charged her hid like a personal blemish beloved s incontinence she rinsed the sheets secretly after sethe went to the restaurant and paul d went scrounging for barges to help unload she boiled the underwear and soaked it in bluing praying the fever would pass without damage so intent was her nursing she forgot to eat or visit the emerald closet beloved denver would whisper beloved and when the black eyes opened a slice all she could say was i m here i m still here sometimes when beloved lay dreamy eyed for a very long time saying nothing licking her lips and heaving deep sighs denver panicked what is it she would ask heavy murmured beloved this place is heavy would you like to sit up no said the raspy voice it took three days for beloved to notice the orange patches in the darkness of the quilt denver was pleased because it kept her patient awake longer she seemed totally taken with those faded scraps of orange even made the effort to lean on her elbow and stroke them an effort that quickly exhausted her so denver rearranged the quilt so its cheeriest part was in the sick girl s sight line patience something denver had never known overtook her as long as her mother did not interfere she was a model of compassion turning waspish though when sethe tried to help did she take a spoonful of anything today sethe inquired she shouldn t eat with cholera you sure that s it was just a hunch of paul d s i don t know but she shouldn t eat anyway just yet i think cholera people puke all the time that s even more reason ain t it well she shouldn t starve to death either denver leave us alone ma am i m taking care of her she say anything i d let you know if she did sethe looked at her daughter and thought yes she has been lonesome very lonesome wonder where here boy got off to sethe thought a change of subject was needed he won t be back said denver how you know i just know denver took a square of sweet bread off the plate back in the keeping room denver was about to sit down when beloved s eyes flew wide open denver felt her heart race it wasn t that she was looking at that face for the first time with no trace of sleep in it or that the eyes were big and black nor was it that the whites of them were much too white blue white it was that deep down in those big black eyes there was no expression at all can i get you something beloved looked at the sweet bread in denver s hands and denver held it out to her she smiled then and denver s heart stopped bouncing and sat down relieved and easeful like a traveler who had made it home from that moment and through everything that followed sugar could always be counted on to please her it was as though sweet things were what she was born for honey as well as the wax it came in sugar sandwiches the sludgy molasses gone hard and brutal in the can lemonade taffy and any type of dessert sethe brought home from the restaurant she gnawed a cane stick to flax and kept the strings in her mouth long after the syrup had been sucked away denver laughed sethe smiled and paul d said it made him sick to his stomach sethe believed it was a recovering body s need after an illness for quick strength but it was a need that went on and on into glowing health because beloved didn t go anywhere there didn t seem anyplace for her to go she didn t mention one or have much of an idea of what she was doing in that part of the country or where she had been they believed the fever had caused her memory to fail just as it kept her slow moving a young woman about nineteen or twenty and slender she moved like a heavier one or an older one holding on to furniture resting her head in the palm of her hand as though it was too heavy for a neck alone you just gonna feed her from now on paul d feeling ungenerous and surprised by it heard the irritability in his voice denver likes her she s no real trouble i thought we d wait till her breath was better she still sounds a little lumbar to me something funny bout that gal paul d said mostly to himself funny how acts sick sounds sick but she don t look sick good skin bright eyes and strong as a bull she s not strong she can hardly walk without holding on to something that s what i mean can t walk but i seen her pick up the rocker with one hand you didn t don t tell me ask denver she was right there with her denver come in here a minute denver stopped rinsing the porch and stuck her head in the window paul d says you and him saw beloved pick up the rocking chair single handed that so long heavy lashes made denver s eyes seem busier than they were deceptive even when she held a steady gaze as she did now on paul d no she said i didn t see no such thing paul d frowned but said nothing if there had been an open latch between them it would have closed chapter rainwater held on to pine needles for dear life and beloved could not take her eyes off sethe stooping to shake the damper or snapping sticks for kindlin sethe was licked tasted eaten by beloved s eyes like a familiar she hovered never leaving the room sethe was in unless required and told to she rose early in the dark to be there waiting in the kitchen when sethe came down to make fast bread before she left for work in lamplight and over the flames of the cooking stove their two shadows clashed and crossed on the ceiling like black swords she was in the window at two when sethe returned or the doorway then the porch its steps the path the road till finally surrendering to the habit beloved began inching down bluestone road further and further each day to meet sethe and walk her back to it was as though every afternoon she doubted anew the older woman s return sethe was flattered by beloved s open quiet devotion the same adoration from her daughter had it been forthcoming would have annoyed her made her chill at the thought of having raised a ridiculously dependent child but the company of this sweet if peculiar guest pleased her the way a zealot pleases his teacher time came when lamps had to be lit early because night arrived sooner and sooner sethe was leaving for work in the dark paul d was walking home in it on one such evening dark and cool sethe cut a rutabaga into four pieces and left them stewing she gave denver a half peck of peas to sort and soak overnight then she sat herself down to rest the heat of the stove made her drowsy and she was sliding into sleep when she felt beloved touch her a touch no heavier than a feather but loaded nevertheless with desire sethe stirred and looked around first at beloved s soft new hand on her shoulder then into her eyes the longing she saw there was bottomless some plea barely in control sethe patted beloved s fingers and glanced at denver whose eyes were fixed on her pea sorting task where your diamonds beloved searched sethe s face diamonds what would i be doing with diamonds on your ears wish i did i had some crystal once a present from a lady i worked for tell me said beloved smiling a wide happy smile tell me your diamonds it became a way to feed her just as denver discovered and relied on the delightful effect sweet things had on beloved sethe learned the profound satisfaction beloved got from storytelling it amazed sethe as much as it pleased beloved because every mention of her past life hurt everything in it was painful or lost she and baby suggs had agreed without saying so that it was unspeakable to denver s inquiries sethe gave short replies or rambling incomplete reveries even with paul d who had shared some of it and to whom she could talk with at least a measure of calm the hurt was always there like a tender place in the corner of her mouth that the bit left but as she began telling about the earrings she found herself wanting to liking it perhaps it was beloved s distance from the events itself or her thirst for hearing it in any case it was an unexpected pleasure above the patter of the pea sorting and the sharp odor of cooking rutabaga sethe explained the crystal that once hung from her ears that lady i worked for in kentucky gave them to me when i got married what they called married hack there and back then i guess she saw how bad i felt when i found out there wasn t going to be no ceremony no preacher nothing i thought there should be something something to say it was right and true i didn t want it to be just me moving over a bit of pallet full of corn husks or just me bringing my night bucket into his cabin i thought there should be some ceremony dancing maybe a little sweet william in my hair sethe smiled i never saw a wedding but i saw mrs garner s wedding gown in the press and heard her go on about what it was like two pounds of currants in the cake she said and four whole sheep the people were still eating the next day that s what i wanted a meal maybe where me and halle and all the sweet home men sat down and ate something special invite some of the other colored people from over by covington or high trees those places sixo used to sneak off to but it wasn t going to be nothing they said it was all right for us to be husband and wife and that was it all of it well i made up my mind to have at the least a dress that wasn t the sacking i worked in so i took to stealing fabric and wound up with a dress you wouldn t believe the top was from two pillow cases in her mending basket the front of the skirt was a dresser scarf a candle fell on and burnt a hole in and one of her old sashes we used to test the flatiron on now the back was a problem for the longest time seem like i couldn t find a thing that wouldn t be missed right away because i had to take it apart afterwards and put all the pieces back where they were now halle was patient waiting for me to finish it he knew i wouldn t go ahead without having it finally i took the mosquito netting from a nail out the barn we used it to strain jelly through i washed it and soaked it best i could and tacked it on for the back of the skirt and there i was in the worst looking gown you could imagine only my wool shawl kept me from looking like a haint peddling i wasn t but fourteen years old so i reckon that s why i was so proud of myself anyhow mrs garner must have seen me in it i thought i was stealing smart and she knew everything i did even our honeymoon going down to the cornfield with halle that s where we went first a saturday afternoon it was he begged sick so he wouldn t have to go work in town that day usually he worked saturdays and sundays to pay off baby suggs freedom but he begged sick and i put on my dress and we walked into the corn holding hands i can still smell the ears roasting yonder where the pauls and sixo was next day mrs garner crooked her finger at me and took me upstairs to her bedroom she opened up a wooden box and took out a pair of crystal earrings she said i want you to have these sethe i said yes ma am are your ears pierced she said i said no ma am well do it she said so you can wear them i want you to have them and i want you and halle to be happy i thanked her but i never did put them on till i got away from there one day after i walked into this here house baby suggs unknotted my underskirt and took em out i sat right here by the stove with denver in my arms and let her punch holes in my ears for to wear them i never saw you in no earrings said denver where are they now gone said sethe long gone and she wouldn t say another word until the next time when all three of them ran through the wind back into the house with rainsoaked sheets and petticoats panting laughing they draped the laundry over the chairs and table beloved filled herself with water from the bucket and watched while sethe rubbed denver s hair with a piece of toweling maybe we should unbraid it asked sethe oh uh tomorrow denver crouched forward at the thought of a fine tooth comb pulling her hair today is always here said sethe tomorrow never it hurts denver said comb it every day it won t ouch your woman she never fix up your hair beloved asked sethe and denver looked up at her after four weeks they still had not got used to the gravelly voice and the song that seemed to lie in it just outside music it lay with a cadence not like theirs your woman she never fix up your hair was clearly a question for sethe since that s who she was looking at my woman you mean my mother if she did i don t remember i didn t see her but a few times out in the fields and once when she was working indigo by the time i woke up in the morning she was in line if the moon was bright they worked by its light sunday she slept like a stick she must of nursed me two or three weeks that s the way the others did then she went back in rice and i sucked from another woman whose job it was so to answer you no i reckon not she never fixed my hair nor nothing she didn t even sleep in the same cabin most nights i remember too far from the line up i guess one thing she did do she picked me up and carried me behind the smokehouse back there she opened up her dress front and lifted her breast and pointed under it right on her rib was a circle and a cross burnt right in the skin she said this is your ma am this and she pointed i am the only one got this mark now the rest dead if something happens to me and you can t tell me by my face you can know me by this mark scared me so all i could think of was how important this was and how i needed to have something important to say back but i couldn t think of anything so i just said what i thought yes ma am i said but how will you know me how will you know me mark me too i said mark the mark on me too sethe chuckled did she asked denver she slapped my face what for i didn t understand it then not till i had a mark of my own what happened to her hung by the time they cut her down nobody could tell whether she had a circle and a cross or not least of all me and i did look sethe gathered hair from the comb and leaning back tossed it into the fire it exploded into stars and the smell infuriated them oh my jesus she said and stood up so suddenly the comb she had parked in denver s hair fell to the floor ma am what s the matter with you ma am sethe walked over to a chair lifted a sheet and stretched it as wide as her arms would go then she folded refolded and double folded it she took another neither was completely dry but the folding felt too fine to stop she had to do something with her hands because she was remembering something she had forgotten she knew something privately shameful that had seeped into a slit in her mind right behind the slap on her face and the circled cross why they hang your ma am denver asked this was the first time she had heard anything about her mother s mother baby suggs was the only grandmother she knew i never found out it was a lot of them she said but what was getting clear and clearer as she folded and refolded damp laundry was the woman called nan who took her hand and yanked her away from the pile before she could make out the mark nan was the one she knew best who was around all day who nursed babies cooked had one good arm and half of another and who used different words words sethe understood then but could neither recall nor repeat now she believed that must be why she remembered so little before sweet home except singing and dancing and how crowded it was what nan told her she had forgotten along with the language she told it in the same language her ma am spoke and which would never come back but the message that was and had been there all along holding the damp white sheets against her chest she was picking meaning out of a code she no longer understood nighttime nan holding her with her good arm waving the stump of the other in the air telling you i am telling you small girl sethe and she did that she told sethe that her mother and nan were together from the sea both were taken up many times by the crew she threw them all away but you the one from the crew she threw away on the island the others from more whites she also threw away without names she threw them you she gave the name of the black man she put her arms around him the others she did not put her arms around never never telling you i am telling you small girl sethe as small girl sethe she was unimpressed as grown up woman sethe she was angry but not certain at what a mighty wish for baby suggs broke over her like surf in the quiet following its splash sethe looked at the two girls sitting by the stove her sickly shallow minded boarder her irritable lonely daughter they seemed little and far away paul d be here in a minute she said denver sighed with relief for a minute there while her mother stood folding the wash lost in thought she clamped her teeth and prayed it would stop denver hated the stories her mother told that did not concern herself which is why amy was all she ever asked about the rest was a gleaming powerful world made more so by denver s absence from it not being in it she hated it and wanted beloved to hate it too although there was no chance of that at all beloved took every opportunity to ask some funny question and get sethe going denver noticed how greedy she was to hear sethe talk now she noticed something more the questions beloved asked where your diamonds your woman she never fix up your hair and most perplexing tell me your earrings how did she know chapter beloved was shining and paul d didn t like it women did what strawberry plants did before they shot out their thin vines the quality of the green changed then the vine threads came then the buds by the time the white petals died and the mint colored berry poked out the leaf shine was gilded fight and waxy that s how beloved looked gilded and shining paul d took to having sethe on waking so that later when he went down the white stairs where she made bread under beloved s gaze his head was clear in the evening when he came home and the three of them were all there fixing the supper table her shine was so pronounced he wondered why denver and sethe didn t see it or maybe they did certainly women could tell as men could when one of their number was aroused paul d looked carefully at beloved to see if she was aware of it but she paid him no attention at all frequently not even answering a direct question put to her she would look at him and not open her mouth five weeks she had been with them and they didn t know any more about her than they did when they found her asleep on the stump they were seated at the table paul d had broken the day he arrived at its mended legs stronger than before the cabbage was all gone and the shiny ankle bones of smoked pork were pushed in a heap on their plates sethe was dishing up bread pudding murmuring her hopes for it apologizing in advance the way veteran cooks always do when something in beloved s face some petlike adoration that took hold of her as she looked at sethe made paul d speak ain t you got no brothers or sisters beloved diddled her spoon but did not look at him i don t have nobody what was you looking for when you came here he asked her this place i was looking for this place i could be in somebody tell you about this house she told me when i was at the bridge she told me must be somebody from the old days sethe said the days when was a way station where messages came and then their senders where bits of news soaked like dried beans in spring water until they were soft enough to digest how d you come who brought you now she looked steadily at him but did not answer he could feel both sethe and denver pulling in holding their stomach muscles sending out sticky spiderwebs to touch one another he decided to force it anyway i asked you who brought you here i walked here she said a long long long long way nobody bring me nobody help me you had new shoes if you walked so long why don t your shoes show it paul d stop picking on her i want to know he said holding the knife handle in his fist like a pole i take the shoes i take the dress the shoe strings don t fix she shouted and gave him a look so malevolent denver touched her arm i ll teach you said denver how to tie your shoes and got a smile from beloved as a reward paul d had the feeling a large silver fish had slipped from his hands the minute he grabbed hold of its tail that it was streaming back off into dark water now gone but for the glistening marking its route but if her shining was not for him who then he had never known a woman who lit up for nobody in particular who just did it as a general announcement always in his experience the light appeared when there was focus like the thirty mile woman dulled to smoke while he waited with her in the ditch and starlight when sixo got there he never knew himself to mistake it it was there the instant he looked at sethe s wet legs otherwise he never would have been bold enough to enclose her in his arms that day and whisper into her back this girl beloved homeless and without people beat all though he couldn t say exactly why considering the coloredpeople he had run into during the last twenty years during before and after the war he had seen negroes so stunned or hungry or tired or bereft it was a wonder they recalled or said anything who like him had hidden in caves and fought owls for food who like him stole from pigs who like him slept in trees in the day and walked by night who like him had buried themselves in slop and jumped in wells to avoid regulators raiders paterollers veterans hill men posses and merrymakers once he met a negro about fourteen years old who lived by himself in the woods and said he couldn t remember living anywhere else he saw a witless coloredwoman jailed and hanged for stealing ducks she believed were her own babies move walk run hide steal and move on only once had it been possible for him to stay in one spot with a woman or a family for longer than a few months that once was almost two years with a weaver lady in delaware the meanest place for negroes he had ever seen outside pulaski county kentucky and of course the prison camp in georgia from all those negroes beloved was different her shining her new shoes it bothered him maybe it was just the fact that he didn t bother her or it could be timing she had appeared and been taken in on the very day sethe and he had patched up their quarrel gone out in public and had a right good time like a family denver had come around so to speak sethe was laughing he had a promise of steady work was cleared up from spirits it had begun to look like a life and damn a water drinking woman fell sick got took in healed and hadn t moved a peg since he wanted her out but sethe had let her in and he couldn t put her out of a house that wasn t his it was one thing to beat up a ghost quite another to throw a helpless coloredgirl out in territory infected by the klan desperately thirsty for black blood without which it could not live the dragon swam the ohio at will sitting at table chewing on his after supper broom straw paul d decided to place her consult with the negroes in town and find her her own place no sooner did he have the thought than beloved strangled on one of the raisins she had picked out of the bread pudding she fell backward and off the chair and thrashed around holding her throat sethe knocked her on the back while denver pried her hands away from her neck beloved on her hands and knees vomited up her food and struggled for breath when she was quiet and denver had wiped up the mess she said go to sleep now come in my room said denver i can watch out for you up there no moment could have been better denver had worried herself sick trying to think of a way to get beloved to share her room it was hard sleeping above her wondering if she was going to be sick again fall asleep and not wake or god please don t get up and wander out of the yard just the way she wandered in they could have their talks easier there at night when sethe and paul d were asleep or in the daytime before either came home sweet crazy conversations full of half sentences daydreams and misunderstandings more thrilling than understanding could ever be when the girls left sethe began to clear the table she stacked the plates near a basin of water what is it about her vex you so paul d frowned but said nothing we had one good fight about denver do we need one about her too asked sethe i just don t understand what the hold is it s clear why she holds on to you but just can t see why you holding on to her sethe turned away from the plates toward him what you care who s holding on to who feeding her is no trouble i pick up a little extra from the restaurant is all and she s nice girl company for denver you know that and i know you know it so what is it got your teeth on edge i can t place it it s a feeling in me well feel this why don t you feel how it feels to have a bed to sleep in and somebody there not worrying you to death about what you got to do each day to deserve it feel how that feels and if that don t get it feel how it feels to be a coloredwoman roaming the roads with anything god made liable to jump on you feel that i know every bit of that sethe i wasn t born yesterday and i never mistreated a woman in my life that makes one in the world sethe answered not two no not two what halle ever do to you halle stood by you he never left you what d he leave then if not me i don t know but it wasn t you that s a fact then he did worse he left his children you don t know that he wasn t there he wasn t where he said he would be he was there then why didn t he show himself why did i have to pack my babies off and stay behind to look for him he couldn t get out the loft loft what loft the one over your head in the barn slowly slowly taking all the time allowed sethe moved toward the table he saw he saw he told you you told me what the day i came in here you said they stole your milk i never knew what it was that messed him up that was it i guess all i knew was that something broke him not a one of them years of saturdays sundays and nighttime extra never touched him but whatever he saw go on in that barn that day broke him like a twig he saw sethe was gripping her elbows as though to keep them from flying away he saw must have he saw them boys do that to me and let them keep on breathing air he saw he saw he saw hey hey listen up let me tell you something a man ain t a goddamn ax chopping hacking busting every goddamn minute of the day things get to him things he can t chop down because they re inside sethe was pacing up and down up and down in the lamplight the underground agent said by sunday they took my milk and he saw it and didn t come down sunday came and he didn t monday came and no halle i thought he was dead that s why then i thought they caught him that s why then i thought no he s not dead because if he was i d know it and then you come here after all this time and you didn t say he was dead because you didn t know either so i thought well he just found him another better way to live because if he was anywhere near here he d come to baby suggs if not to me but i never knew he saw what does that matter now if he is alive and saw that he won t step foot in my door not halle it broke him sethe paul d looked up at her and sighed you may as well know it all last time i saw him he was sitting by the chum he had butter all over his face nothing happened and she was grateful for that usually she could see the picture right away of what she heard but she could not picture what paul d said nothing came to mind carefully carefully she passed on to a reasonable question what did he say nothing not a word not a word did you speak to him didn t you say anything to him something i couldn t sethe i just couldn t why i had a bit in my mouth sethe opened the front door and sat down on the porch steps the day had gone blue without its sun but she could still make out the black silhouettes of trees in the meadow beyond she shook her head from side to side resigned to her rebellious brain why was there nothing it reused no misery no regret no hateful picture too rotten to accept like a greedy child it snatched up everything just once could it say no thank you i just ate and can t hold another bite i am full god damn it of two boys with mossy teeth one sucking on my breast the other holding me down their book reading teacher watching and writing it up i am still full of that god damn it i can t go back and add more add my husband to it watching above me in the loft hiding close by the one place he thought no one would look for him looking down on what i couldn t look at at all and not stopping them looking and letting it happen but my greedy brain says oh thanks i d love more so i add more and no sooner than i do there is no stopping there is also my husband squatting by the churn smearing the butter as well as its clabber all over his face because the milk they took is on his mind and as far as he is concerned the world may as well know it and if he was that broken then then he is also and certainly dead now and if paul d saw him and could not save or comfort him because the iron bit was in his mouth then there is still more that paul d could tell me and my brain would go right ahead and take it and never say no thank you i don t want to know or have to remember that i have other things to do worry for example about tomorrow about denver about beloved about age and sickness not to speak of love but her brain was not interested in the future loaded with the past and hungry for more it left her no room to imagine let alone plan for the next day exactly like that afternoon in the wild onions when one more step was the most she could see of the future other people went crazy why couldn t she other people s brains stopped turned around and went on to something new which is what must have happened to halle and how sweet that would have been the two of them back by the milk shed squatting by the churn smashing cold lumpy butter into their faces with not a care in the world feeling it slippery sticky rubbing it in their hair watching it squeeze through their fingers what a relief to stop it right there close shut squeeze the butter but her three children were chewing sugar teat under a blanket on their way to ohio and no butter play would change that paul d stepped through the door and touched her shoulder i didn t plan on telling you that i didn t plan on hearing it i can t take it back but i can leave it alone paul d said he wants to tell me she thought he wants me to ask him about what it was like for him about how offended the tongue is held down by iron how the need to spit is so deep you cry for it she already knew about it had seen it time after time in the place before sweet home men boys little girls women the wildness that shot up into the eye the moment the lips were yanked back days after it was taken out goose fat was rubbed on the corners of the mouth but nothing to soothe the tongue or take the wildness out of the eye sethe looked up into paul d s eyes to see if there was any trace left in them people i saw as a child she said who d had the bit always looked wild after that whatever they used it on them for it couldn t have worked because it put a wildness where before there wasn t any when i look at you i don t see it there ain t no wildness in your eye nowhere there s a way to put it there and there s a way to take it out i know em both and i haven t figured out yet which is worse he sat down beside her sethe looked at him in that unlit daylight his face bronzed and reduced to its bones smoothed her heart down you want to tell me about it she asked him i don t know i never have talked about it not to a soul sang it sometimes but i never told a soul go ahead i can hear it maybe maybe you can hear it i just ain t sure i can say it say it right i mean because it wasn t the bit that wasn t it what then sethe asked the roosters he said walking past the roosters looking at them look at me sethe smiled in that pine yeah paul d smiled with her must have been five of them perched up there and at least fifty hens mister too not right off but i hadn t took twenty steps before i seen him he come down off the fence post there and sat on the tub he loved that tub said sethe thinking no there is no stopping now didn t he like a throne was me took him out the shell you know he d a died if it hadn t been for me the hen had walked on off with all the hatched peeps trailing behind her there was this one egg left looked like a blank but then i saw it move so i tapped it open and here come mister bad feet and all i watched that son a bitch grow up and whup everything in the yard he always was hateful sethe said yeah he was hateful all right bloody too and evil crooked feet flapping comb as big as my hand and some kind of red he sat right there on the tub looking at me i swear he smiled my head was full of what i d seen of halle a while back i wasn t even thinking about the bit just halle and before him sixo but when i saw mister i knew it was me too not just them me too one crazy one sold one missing one burnt and me licking iron with my hands crossed behind me the last of the sweet home men mister he looked so free better than me stronger tougher son a bitch couldn t even get out the shell by hisself but he was still king and i was paul d stopped and squeezed his left hand with his right he held it that way long enough for it and the world to quiet down and let him go on mister was allowed to be and stay what he was but i wasn t allowed to be and stay what i was even if you cooked him you d be cooking a rooster named mister but wasn t no way i d ever be paul d again living or dead schoolteacher changed me i was something else and that something was less than a chicken sitting in the sun on a tub sethe put her hand on his knee and rubbed paul d had only begun what he was telling her was only the beginning when her fingers on his knee soft and reassuring stopped him just as well just as well saying more might push them both to a place they couldn t get back from he would keep the rest where it belonged in that tobacco tin buried in his chest where a red heart used to be its lid rusted shut he would not pry it loose now in front of this sweet sturdy woman for if she got a whiff of the contents it would shame him and it would hurt her to know that there was no red heart bright as mister s comb beating in him sethe rubbed and rubbed pressing the work cloth and the stony curves that made up his knee she hoped it calmed him as it did her like kneading bread in the half light of the restaurant kitchen before the cook arrived when she stood in a space no wider than a bench is long back behind and to the left of the milk cans working dough working working dough nothing better than that to start the day s serious work of beating back the past chapter upstairs beloved was dancing a little two step two step make a new step slide slide and strut on down denver sat on the bed smiling and providing the music she had never seen beloved this happy she had seen her pouty lips open wide with the pleasure of sugar or some piece of news denver gave her she had felt warm satisfaction radiating from beloved s skin when she listened to her mother talk about the old days but gaiety she had never seen not ten minutes had passed since beloved had fallen backward to the floor pop eyed thrashing and holding her throat now after a few seconds lying in denver s bed she was up and dancing where d you learn to dance denver asked her nowhere look at me do this beloved put her fists on her hips and commenced to skip on bare feet denver laughed now you come on said beloved you may as well just come on her black skirt swayed from side to side denver grew ice cold as she rose from the bed she knew she was twice beloved s size but she floated up cold and light as a snowflake beloved took denver s hand and placed another on denver s shoulder they danced then round and round the tiny room and it may have been dizziness or feeling light and icy at once that made denver laugh so hard a catching laugh that beloved caught the two of them merry as kittens swung to and fro to and fro until exhausted they sat on the floor beloved let her head fall back on the edge of the bed while she found her breath and denver saw the tip of the thing she always saw in its entirety when beloved undressed to sleep looking straight at it she whispered why you call yourself beloved beloved closed her eyes in the dark my name is beloved denver scooted a little closer what s it like over there where you were before can you tell me dark said beloved i m small in that place i m like this here she raised her head off the bed lay down on her side and curled up denver covered her lips with her fingers were you cold beloved curled tighter and shook her head hot nothing to breathe down there and no room to move in you see anybody heaps a lot of people is down there some is dead you see jesus baby suggs i don t know i don t know the names she sat up tell me how did you get here i wait then i got on the bridge i stay there in the dark in the daytime in the dark in the daytime it was a long time all this time you were on a bridge no after when i got out what did you come back for beloved smiled to see her face ma am s sethe yes sethe denver felt a little hurt slighted that she was not the main reason for beloved s return don t you remember we played together by the stream i was on the bridge said beloved you see me on the bridge no by the stream the water back in the woods oh i was in the water i saw her diamonds down there i could touch them what stopped you she left me behind by myself said beloved she lifted her eyes to meet denver s and frowned perhaps perhaps not the tiny scratches on her forehead may have made it seem so denver swallowed don t she said don t you won t leave us will you no never this is where i am suddenly denver who was sitting cross legged lurched forward and grabbed beloved s wrist don t tell her don t let ma am know who you are please you hear don t tell me what to do don t you never never tell me what to do but i m on your side beloved she is the one she is the one i need you can go but she is the one i have to have her eyes stretched to the limit black as the all night sky i didn t do anything to you i never hurt you i never hurt anybody said denver me either me either what you gonna do stay here i belong here i belong here too then stay but don t never tell me what to do don t never do that we were dancing just a minute ago we were dancing together let s i don t want to beloved got up and lay down on the bed their quietness boomed about on the walls like birds in panic finally denver s breath steadied against the threat of an unbearable loss tell me beloved said tell me how sethe made you in the boat she never told me all of it said denver tell me denver climbed up on the bed and folded her arms under her apron she had not been in the tree room once since beloved sat on their stump after the carnival and had not remembered that she hadn t gone there until this very desperate moment nothing was out there that this sister girl did not provide in abundance a racing heart dreaminess society danger beauty she swallowed twice to prepare for the telling to construct out of the strings she had heard all her life a net to hold beloved she had good hands she said the whitegirl she said had thin little arms but good hands she saw that right away she said hair enough for five heads and good hands she said i guess the hands made her think she could do it get us both across the river but the mouth was what kept her from being scared she said there ain t nothing to go by with whitepeople you don t know how they ll jump say one thing do another but if you looked at the mouth sometimes you could tell by that she said this girl talked a storm but there wasn t no meanness around her mouth she took ma am to that lean to and rubbed her feet for her so that was one thing and ma am believed she wasn t going to turn her over you could get money if you turned a runaway over and she wasn t sure this girl amy didn t need money more than anything especially since all she talked about was getting hold of some velvet what s velvet it s a cloth kind of deep and soft go ahead anyway she rubbed ma am s feet back to life and she cried she said from how it hurt but it made her think she could make it on over to where grandma baby suggs was and who is that i just said it my grandmother is that sethe s mother no my father s mother go ahead that s where the others was my brothers and the baby girl she sent them on before to wait for her at grandma baby s so she had to put up with everything to get there and this here girl amy helped denver stopped and sighed this was the part of the story she loved she was coming to it now and she loved it because it was all about herself but she hated it too because it made her feel like a bill was owing somewhere and she denver had to pay it but who she owed or what to pay it with eluded her now watching beloved s alert and hungry face how she took in every word asking questions about the color of things and their size her downright craving to know denver began to see what she was saying and not just to hear it there is this nineteen year old slave girl a year older than her self walking through the dark woods to get to her children who are far away she is tired scared maybe and maybe even lost most of all she is by herself and inside her is another baby she has to think about too behind her dogs perhaps guns probably and certainly mossy teeth she is not so afraid at night because she is the color of it but in the day every sound is a shot or a tracker s quiet step denver was seeing it now and feeling it through beloved feeling how it must have felt to her mother seeing how it must have looked and the more fine points she made the more detail she provided the more beloved liked it so she anticipated the questions by giving blood to the scraps her mother and grandmother had told herwand a heartbeat the monologue became iri fact a duet as they lay down together denver nursing beloved s interest like a lover whose pleasure was to overfeed the loved the dark quilt with two orange patches was there with them because beloved wanted it near her when she slept it was smelling like grass and feeling like hands the unrested hands of busy women dry warm prickly denver spoke beloved listened and the two did the best they could to create what really happened how it really was something only sethe knew because she alone had the mind for it and the time afterward to shape it the quality of amy s voice her breath like burning wood the quick change weather up in those hills cool at night hot in the day sudden fog how recklessly she behaved with this whitegirlna recklessness born of desperation and encouraged by amy s fugitive eyes and her tenderhearted mouth you ain t got no business walking round these hills miss looka here who s talking i got more business here n you got they catch you they cut your head off ain t nobody after me but i know somebody after you amy pressed her fingers into the soles of the slavewoman s feet whose baby that sethe did not answer you don t even know come here jesus amy sighed and shook her head hurt a touch good for you more it hurt more better it is can t nothing heal without pain you know what you wiggling for sethe raised up on her elbows lying on her back so long had raised a ruckus between her shoulder blades the fire in her feet and the fire on her back made her sweat my back hurt me she said your back gal you a mess turn over here and let me see in an effort so great it made her sick to her stomach sethe turned onto her right side amy unfastened the back of her dress and said come here jesus when she saw sethe guessed it must be bad because after that call to jesus amy didn t speak for a while in the silence of an amy struck dumb for a change sethe felt the fingers of those good hands lightly touch her back she could hear her breathing but still the whitegirl said nothing sethe could not move she couldn t lie on her stomach or her back and to keep on her side meant pressure on her screaming feet amy spoke at last in her dreamwalker s voice it s a tree lu a chokecherry tree see here s the trunk it s red and split wide open full of sap and this here s the parting for the branches you got a mighty lot of branches leaves too look like and dern if these ain t blossoms tiny little cherry blossoms just as white your back got a whole tree on it in bloom what god have in mind i wonder i had me some whippings but i don t remember nothing like this mr buddy had a right evil hand too whip you for looking at him straight sure would i looked right at him one time and he hauled off and threw the poker at me guess he knew what i was a thinking sethe groaned and amy cut her reverie short long enough to shift sethe s feet so the weight resting on leaf covered stones was above the ankles that better lord what a way to die you gonna die in here you know ain t no way out of it thank your maker i come along so s you wouldn t have to die outside in them weeds snake come along he bite you bear eat you up maybe you should of stayed where you was lu i can see by your back why you didn t ha ha whoever planted that tree beat mr buddy by a mile glad i ain t you well spiderwebs is bout all i can do for you what s in here ain t enough i ll look outside could use moss but sometimes bugs and things is in it maybe i ought to break them blossoms open get that pus to running you think wonder what god had in mind you must of did something don t run off nowhere now sethe could hear her humming away in the bushes as she hunted spiderwebs a humming she concentrated on because as soon as amy ducked out the baby began to stretch good question she was thinking what did he have in mind amy had left the back of sethe s dress open and now a tail of wind hit it taking the pain down a step a relief that let her feel the lesser pain of her sore tongue amy returned with two palmfuls of web which she cleaned of prey and then draped on sethe s back saying it was like stringing a tree for christmas we got a old nigger girl come by our place she don t know nothing sews stuff for mrs buddy real fine lace but can t barely stick two words together she don t know nothing just like you you don t know a thing end up dead that s what not me i m a get to boston and get myself some velvet carmine you don t even know about that do you now you never will bet you never even sleep with the sun in your face i did it a couple of times most times i m feeding stock before light and don t get to sleep till way after dark comes but i was in the back of the wagon once and fell asleep sleeping with the sun in your face is the best old feeling two times i did it once when i was little didn t nobody bother me then next time in back of the wagon it happened again and doggone if the chickens didn t get loose mr buddy whipped my tail kentucky ain t no good place to be in boston s the place to be in that s where my mother was before she was give to mr buddy joe nathan said mr buddy is my daddy but i don t believe that you sethe told her she didn t believe mr buddy was her daddy you know your daddy do you no said sethe neither me all i know is it ain t him she stood up then having finished her repair work and weaving about the lean to her slow moving eyes pale in the sun that lit her hair she sang when the busy day is done and my weary little one rocketh gently to and fro when the night winds softly blow and the crickets in the glen chirp and chirp and chirp again where pon the haunted green fairies dance around their queen then from yonder misty skies cometh lady button eyes suddenly she stopped weaving and rocking and sat down her skinny arms wrapped around her knees her good good hands cupping her elbows her slow moving eyes stopped and peered into the dirt at her feet that s my mama s song she taught me it through the muck and mist and glaam to our quiet cozy home where to singing sweet and low rocks a cradle to and fro where the clock s dull monotone telleth of the day that s done where the moonbeams hover o er playthings sleeping on the floor where my weary wee one lies cometh lady button eyes layeth she her hands upon my dear weary little one and those white hands overspread like a veil the curly head seem to fondle and caress every little silken tress then she smooths the eyelids down over those two eyes of brown in such soothing tender wise cometh lady button eyes amy sat quietly after her song then repeated the last line before she stood left the lean to and walked off a little ways to lean against a young ash when she came back the sun was in the valley below and they were way above it in blue kentucky light you ain t dead yet lu lu not yet make you a bet you make it through the night you make it all the way amy rearranged the leaves for comfort and knelt down to massage the swollen feet again give these one more real good rub she said and when sethe sucked air through her teeth she said shut up you got to keep your mouth shut careful of her tongue sethe bit down on her lips and let the good hands go to work to the tune of so bees sing soft and bees sing low afterward amy moved to the other side of the lean to where seated she lowered her head toward her shoulder and braided her hair saying don t up and die on me in the night you hear i don t want to see your ugly black face hankering over me if you do die just go on off somewhere where i can t see you hear i hear said sethe i ll do what i can miss sethe never expected to see another thing in this world so when she felt toes prodding her hip it took a while to come out of a sleep she thought was death she sat up stiff and shivery while amy looked in on her juicy back looks like the devil said amy but you made it through come down here jesus lu made it through that s because of me i m good at sick things can you walk you think i have to let my water some kind of way let s see you walk on em it was not good but it was possible so sethe limped holding on first to amy then to a sapling was me did it i m good at sick things ain t i yeah said sethe you good we got to get off this here hill come on i ll take you down to the river that ought to suit you me i m going to the pike take me straight to boston what s that all over your dress milk you one mess sethe looked down at her stomach and touched it the baby was dead she had not died in the night but the baby had if that was the case then there was no stopping now she would get that milk to her baby girl if she had to swim ain t you hungry amy asked her i ain t nothing but in a hurry miss whoa slow down want some shoes say what i figured how said amy and so she had she tore two pieces from sethe s shawl filled them with leaves and tied them over her feet chattering all the while how old are you lu i been bleeding for four years but i ain t having nobody s baby won t catch me sweating milk cause i know said sethe you going to boston at noon they saw it then they were near enough to hear it by late afternoon they could drink from it if they wanted to four stars were visible by the time they found not a riverboat to stow sethe away on or a ferryman willing to take on a fugitive passenger nothing like that but a whole boat to steal it had one oar lots of holes and two bird nests there you go lu jesus looking at you sethe was looking at one mile of dark water which would have to be split with one oar in a useless boat against a current dedicated to the mississippi hundreds of miles away it looked like home to her and the baby not dead in the least must have thought so too as soon as sethe got close to the river her own water broke loose to join it the break followed by the redundant announcement of labor arched her back what you doing that for asked amy ain t you got a brain in your head stop that right now i said stop it lu you the dumbest thing on this here earth lu lu sethe couldn t think of anywhere to go but in she waited for the sweet beat that followed the blast of pain on her knees again she crawled into the boat it waddled under her and she had just enough time to brace her leaf bag feet on the bench when another rip took her breath away panting under four summer stars she threw her legs over the sides because here come the head as amy informed her as though she did not know it as though the rip was a breakup of walnut logs in the brace or of lightning s jagged tear through a leather sky it was stuck face up and drowning in its mother s blood amy stopped begging jesus and began to curse his daddy push screamed amy pull whispered sethe and the strong hands went to work a fourth time none too soon for river water seeping through any hole it chose was spreading over sethe s hips she reached one arm back and grabbed the rope while amy fairly clawed at the head when a foot rose from the river bed and kicked the bottom of the boat and sethe s behind she knew it was done and permitted herself a short faint coming to she heard no cries just amy s encouraging coos nothing happened for so long they both believed they had lost it sethe arched suddenly and the afterbirth shot out then the baby whimpered and sethe looked twenty inches of cord hung from its belly and it trembled in the cooling evening air amy wrapped her skirt around it and the wet sticky women clambered ashore to see what indeed god had in mind spores of bluefern growing in the hollows along the riverbank float toward the water in silver blue lines hard to see unless you are in or near them lying right at the river s edge when the sunshots are low and drained often they are mistook for insects but they are seeds in which the whole generation sleeps confident of a future and for a moment it is easy to believe each one has one will become all of what is contained in the spore will live out its days as planned this moment of certainty lasts no longer than that longer perhaps than the spore itself on a riverbank in the cool of a summer evening two women struggled under a shower of silvery blue they never expected to see each other again in this world and at the moment couldn t care less but there on a summer night surrounded by bluefern they did something together appropriately and well a pateroller passing would have sniggered to see two throw away people two lawless outlaws a slave and a barefoot whitewoman with unpinned hair wrapping a ten minute old baby in the rags they wore but no pateroller came and no preacher the water sucked and swallowed itself beneath them there was nothing to disturb them at their work so they did it appropriately and well twilight came on and amy said she had to go that she wouldn t be caught dead in daylight on a busy river with a runaway after rinsing her hands and face in the river she stood and looked down at the baby wrapped and tied to sethe s chest she s never gonna know who i am you gonna tell her who brought her into this here world she lifted her chin looked off into the place where the sun used to be you better tell her you hear say miss amy denver of boston sethe felt herself falling into a sleep she knew would be deep on the lip of it just before going under she thought that s pretty denver real pretty chapter it was time to lay it all down before paul d came and sat on her porch steps words whispered in the keeping room had kept her going helped her endure the chastising ghost refurbished the baby faces of howard and buglar and kept them whole in the world because in her dreams she saw only their parts in trees and kept her husband shadowy but there somewhere now halle s face between the butter press and the churn swelled larger and larger crowding her eyes and making her head hurt she wished for baby suggs fingers molding her nape reshaping it saying lay em down sethe sword and shield down down both of em down down by the riverside sword and shield don t study war no more lay all that mess down sword and shield and under the pressing fingers and the quiet instructive voice she would her heavy knives of defense against misery regret gall and hurt she placed one by one on a bank where dear water rushed on below nine years without the fingers or the voice of baby suggs was too much and words whispered in the keeping room were too little the butter smeared face of a man god made none sweeter than demanded more an arch built or a robe sewn some fixing ceremony sethe decided to go to the clearing back where baby suggs had danced in sunlight before and everybody in it had closed down veiled over and shut away before it had become the plaything of spirits and the home of the chafed had been a cheerful buzzing house where baby suggs holy loved cautioned fed chastised and soothed where not one but two pots simmered on the stove where the lamp burned all night long strangers rested there while children tried on their shoes messages were left there for whoever needed them was sure to stop in one day soon talk was low and to the point for baby suggs holy didn t approve of extra everything depends on knowing how much she said and good is knowing when to stop it was in front of that that sethe climbed off a wagon her newborn tied to her chest and felt for the first time the wide arms of her mother in law who had made it to cincinnati who decided that because slave life had busted her legs back head eyes hands kidneys womb and tongue she had nothing left to make a living with but her heart which she put to work at once accepting no title of honor before her name but allowing a small caress after it she became an unchurched preacher one who visited pulpits and opened her great heart to those who could use it in winter and fall she carried it to ame s and baptists holinesses and sanctifieds the church of the redeemer and the redeemed uncalled unrobed un anointed she let her great heart beat in their presence when warm weather came baby suggs holy followed by every black man woman and child who could make it through took her great heart to the clearing a wide open place cut deep in the woods nobody knew for what at the end of a path known only to deer and whoever cleared the land in the first place in the heat of every saturday afternoon she sat in the clearing while the people waited among the trees after situating herself on a huge flat sided rock baby suggs bowed her head and prayed silently the company watched her from the trees they knew she was ready when she put her stick down then she shouted let the children come and they ran from the trees toward her let your mothers hear you laugh she told them and the woods rang the adults looked on and could not help smiling then let the grown men come she shouted they stepped out one by one from among the ringing trees let your wives and your children see you dance she told them and groundlife shuddered under their feet finally she called the women to her cry she told them for the living and the dead just cry and without covering their eyes the women let loose it started that way laughing children dancing men crying women and then it got mixed up women stopped crying and danced men sat down and cried children danced women laughed children cried until exhausted and riven all and each lay about the clearing damp and gasping for breath in the silence that followed baby suggs holy offered up to them her great big heart she did not tell them to clean up their lives or to go and sin no more she did not tell them they were the blessed of the earth its inheriting meek or its glorybound pure she told them that the only grace they could have was the grace they could imagine that if they could not see it they would not have it here she said in this here place we flesh flesh that weeps laughs flesh that dances on bare feet in grass love it love it hard yonder they do not love your flesh they despise it they don t love your eyes they d just as soon pick em out no more do they love the skin on your back yonder they flay it and o my people they do not love your hands those they only use tie bind chop off and leave empty love your hands love them raise them up and kiss them touch others with them pat them together stroke them on your face cause they don t love that either you got to love it you and no they ain t in love with your mouth yonder out there they will see it broken and break it again what you say out of it they will not heed what you scream from it they do not hear what you put into it to nourish your body they will snatch away and give you leavins instead no they don t love your mouth you got to love it this is flesh i m talking about here flesh that needs to be loved feet that need to rest and to dance backs that need support shoulders that need arms strong arms i m telling you and o my people out yonder hear me they do not love your neck unnoosed and straight so love your neck put a hand on it grace it stroke it and hold it up and all your inside parts that they d just as soon slop for hogs you got to love them the dark dark liver love it love it and the beat and beating heart love that too more than eyes or feet more than lungs that have yet to draw free air more than your life holding womb and your life giving private parts hear me now love your heart for this is the prize saying no more she stood up then and danced with her twisted hip the rest of what her heart had to say while the others opened their mouths and gave her the music long notes held until the four part harmony was perfect enough for their deeply loved flesh sethe wanted to be there now at the least to listen to the spaces that the long ago singing had left behind at the most to get a clue from her husband s dead mother as to what she should do with her sword and shield now dear jesus now nine years after baby suggs holy proved herself a liar dismissed her great heart and lay in the keeping room bed roused once in a while by a craving for color and not for another thing those white things have taken all i had or dreamed she said and broke my heartstrings too there is no bad luck in the world but whitefolks shut down and put up with the venom of its ghost no more lamp all night long or neighbors dropping by no low conversations after supper no watched barefoot children playing in the shoes of strangers baby suggs holy believed she had lied there was no grace imaginary or real and no sunlit dance in a clearing could change that her faith her love her imagination and her great big old heart began to collapse twenty eight days after her daughter in law arrived yet it was to the clearing that sethe determined to go to pay tribute to halle before the light changed while it was still the green blessed place she remembered misty with plant steam and the decay of berries she put on a shawl and told denver and beloved to do likewise all three set out late one sunday morning sethe leading the girls trotting behind not a soul in sight when they reached the woods it took her no time to find the path through it because big city revivals were held there regularly now complete with food laden tables banjos and a tent the old path was a track now but still arched over with trees dropping buckeyes onto the grass below there was nothing to be done other than what she had done but sethe blamed herself for baby suggs collapse however many times baby denied it sethe knew the grief at started when she jumped down off the wagon her newborn tied to her chest in the underwear of a whitegirl looking for boston followed by the two girls down a bright green corridor of oak and horse chestnut sethe began to sweat a sweat just like the other one when she woke mud caked on the banks of the ohio amy was gone sethe was alone and weak but alive and so was her baby she walked a ways downriver and then stood gazing at the glimmering water by and by a flatbed slid into view but she could not see if the figures on it were whitepeople or not she began to sweat from a fever she thanked god for since it would certainly keep her baby warm when the flatbed was beyond her sight she stumbled on and found herself near three coloredpeople fishing two boys and an older man she stopped and waited to be spoken to one of the boys pointed and the man looked over his shoulder at her a quick look since all he needed to know about her he could see in no time no one said anything for a while then the man said headin cross yes sir said sethe anybody know you coming yes sir he looked at her again and nodded toward a rock that stuck out of the ground above him like a bottom lip sethe walked to it and sat down the stone had eaten the sun s rays but was nowhere near as hot as she was too tired to move she stayed there the sun in her eyes making her dizzy sweat poured over her and bathed the baby completely she must have slept sitting up because when next she opened her eyes the man was standing in front of her with a smoking hot piece of fried eel in his hands it was an effort to reach for more to smell impossible to eat she begged him for water and he gave her some of the ohio in a jar sethe drank it all and begged more the clanging was back in her head but she refused to believe that she had come all that way endured all she had to die on the wrong side of the river the man watched her streaming face and called one of the boys over take off that coat he told him sir you heard me the boy slipped out of his jacket whining what you gonna do what i m gonna wear the man untied the baby from her chest and wrapped it in the boy s coat knotting the sleeves in front what i m gonna wear the old man sighed and after a pause said you want it back then go head and take it off that baby put the baby naked in the grass and put your coat back on and if you can do it then go on way somewhere and don t come back the boy dropped his eyes then turned to join the other with eel in her hand the baby at her feet sethe dozed dry mouthed and sweaty evening came and the man touched her shoulder contrary to what she expected they poled upriver far away from the rowboat amy had found just when she thought he was taking her back to kentucky he turned the flatbed and crossed the ohio like a shot there he helped her up the steep bank while the boy without a jacket carried the baby who wore it the man led her to a brush covered hutch with a beaten floor wait here somebody be here directly don t move they ll find you thank you she said i wish i knew your name so i could remember you right name s stamp he said stamp paid watch out for that there baby you hear i hear i hear she said but she didn t hours later a woman was right up on her before she heard a thing a short woman young with a croaker sack greeted her saw the sign a while ago she said but i couldn t get here no quicker what sign asked sethe stamp leaves the old sty open when there s a crossing knots a white rag on the post if it s a child too she knelt and emptied the sack my name s ella she said taking a wool blanket cotton cloth two baked sweet potatoes and a pair of men s shoes from the sack my husband john is out yonder a ways where you heading sethe told her about baby suggs where she had sent her three children ella wrapped a cloth strip tight around the baby s navel as she listened for the holes the things the fugitives did not say the questions they did not ask listened too for the unnamed unmentioned people left behind she shook gravel from the men s shoes and tried to force sethe s feet into them they would not go sadly they split them down the heel sorry indeed to ruin so valuable an item sethe put on the boy s jacket not daring to ask whether there was any word of the children they made it said ella stamp ferried some of that party left them on bluestone it ain t too far sethe couldn t think of anything to do so grateful was she so she peeled a potato ate it spit it up and ate more in quiet celebration they be glad to see you said ella when was this one born yesterday said sethe wiping sweat from under her chin i hope she makes it ella looked at the tiny dirty face poking out of the wool blanket and shook her head hard to say she said if anybody was to ask me i d say don t love nothing then as if to take the edge off her pronouncement she smiled at sethe you had that baby by yourself no whitegirl helped then we better make tracks baby suggs kissed her on the mouth and refused to let her see the children they were asleep she said and sethe was too uglylooking to wake them in the night she took the newborn and handed it to a young woman in a bonnet telling her not to clean the eyes till she got the mother s urine has it cried out yet asked baby a little time enough let s get the mother well she led sethe to the keeping room and by the light of a spirit lamp bathed her in sections starting with her face then while waiting for another pan of heated water she sat next to her and stitched gray cotton sethe dozed and woke to the washing of her hands and arms after each bathing baby covered her with a quilt and put another pan on in the kitchen tearing sheets stitching the gray cotton she supervised the woman in the bonnet who tended the baby and cried into her cooking when sethe s legs were done baby looked at her feet and wiped them lightly she cleaned between sethe s legs with two separate pans of hot water and then tied her stomach and vagina with sheets finally she attacked the unrecognizable feet you feel this feel what asked sethe nothing heave up she helped sethe to a rocker and lowered her feet into a bucket of salt water and juniper the rest of the night sethe sat soaking the crust from her nipples baby softened with lard and then washed away by dawn the silent baby woke and took her mother s milk pray god it ain t turned bad said baby and when you through call me as she turned to go baby suggs caught a glimpse of something dark on the bed sheet she frowned and looked at her daughter in law bending toward the baby roses of blood blossomed in the blanket covering sethe s shoulders baby suggs hid her mouth with her hand when the nursing was over and the newborn was asleep its eyes half open its tongue dream sucking wordlessly the older woman greased the flowering back and pinned a double thickness of cloth to the inside of the newly stitched dress it was not real yet not yet but when her sleepy boys and crawl ing already girl were brought in it didn t matter whether it was real or not sethe lay in bed under around over among but especially with them all the little girl dribbled clear spit into her face and sethe s laugh of delight was so loud the crawling already baby blinked buglar and howard played with her ugly feet after daring each other to be the first to touch them she kept kissing them she kissed the backs of their necks the tops of their heads and the centers of their palms and it was the boys who decided enough was enough when she liked their shirts to kiss their tight round bellies she stopped when and because they said pappie come she didn t cry she said soon and smiled so they would think the brightness in her eyes was love alone it was some time before she let baby suggs shoo the boys away so sethe could put on the gray cotton dress her mother in law had started stitching together the night before finally she lay back and cradled the crawling already girl in her arms she enclosed her left nipple with two fingers of her right hand and the child opened her mouth they hit home together baby suggs came in and laughed at them telling sethe how strong the baby girl was how smart already crawling then she stooped to gather up the ball of rags that had been sethe s clothes nothing worth saving in here she said sethe liked her eyes wait she called look and see if there s something still knotted up in the petticoat baby suggs inched the spoiled fabric through her fingers and came upon what felt like pebbles she held them out toward sethe going away present wedding present be nice if there was a groom to go with it she gazed into her hand what you think happened to him i don t know said sethe he wasn t where he said to meet him at i had to get out had to sethe watched the drowsy eyes of the sucking girl for a moment then looked at baby suggs face he ll make it if i made it halle sure can well put these on maybe they ll light his way convinced her son was dead she handed the stones to sethe i need holes in my ears i ll do it said baby suggs soon s you up to it sethe jingled the earrings for the pleasure of the crawling already girl who reached for them over and over again in the clearing sethe found baby s old preaching rock and remembered the smell of leaves simmering in the sun thunderous feet and the shouts that ripped pods off the limbs of the chestnuts with baby suggs heart in charge the people let go sethe had had twenty eight days the travel of one whole moon of unslaved life from the pure clear stream of spit that the little girl dribbled into her face to her oily blood was twenty eight days days of healing ease and real talk days of company knowing the names of forty fifty other negroes their views habits where they had been and what done of feeling their fun and sorrow along with her own which made it better one taught her the alphabet another a stitch all taught her how it felt to wake up at dawn and decide what to do with the day that s how she got through the waiting for halle bit by bit at and in the clearing along with the others she had claimed herself freeing yourself was one thing claiming ownership of that freed self was another now she sat on baby suggs rock denver and beloved watching her from the trees there will never be a day she thought when halle will knock on the door not knowing it was hard knowing it was harder just the fingers she thought just let me feel your fingers again on the back of my neck and i will lay it all down make a way out of this no way sethe bowed her head and sure enough they were there lighter now no more than the strokes of bird feather but unmistakably caressing fingers she had to relax a bit to let them do their work so light was the touch childlike almost more finger kiss than kneading still she was grateful for the effort baby suggs long distance love was equal to any skin close love she had known the desire let alone the gesture to meet her needs was good enough to lift her spirits to the place where she could take the next step ask for some clarifying word some advice about how to keep on with a brain greedy for news nobody could live with in a world happy to provide it she knew paul d was adding something to her life something she wanted to count on but was scared to now he had added more new pictures and old rememories that broke her heart into the empty space of not knowing about halle a space sometimes colored with righteous resentment at what could have been his cowardice or stupidity or bad luck that empty place of no definite news was filled now with a brand new sorrow and who could tell how many more on the way years ago when was alive she had women friends men friends from all around to share grief with then there was no one for they would not visit her while the baby ghost filled the house and she returned their disapproval with the potent pride of the mistreated but now there was someone to share it and he had beat the spirit away the very day he entered her house and no sign of it since a blessing but in its place he brought another kind of haunting halle s face smeared with butter and the dabber too his own mouth jammed full of iron and lord knows what else he could tell her if he wanted to the fingers touching the back of her neck were stronger now the strokes bolder as though baby suggs were gathering strength putting the thumbs at the nape while the fingers pressed the sides harder harder the fingers moved slowly around toward her windpipe making little circles on the way sethe was actually more surprised than frightened to find that she was being strangled or so it seemed in any case baby suggs fingers had a grip on her that would not let her breathe tumbling forward from her seat on the rock she clawed at the hands that were not there her feet were thrashing by the time denver got to her and then beloved ma am ma am denver shouted ma ammy and turned her mother over on her back the fingers left off and sethe had to swallow huge draughts of air before she recognized her daughter s face next to her own and beloved s hovering above you all right somebody choked me said sethe who sethe rubbed her neck and struggled to a sitting position grandma baby i reckon i just asked her to rub my neck like she used to and she was doing fine and then just got crazy with it i guess she wouldn t do that to you ma am grandma baby uh uh help me up from here look beloved was pointing at sethe s neck what is it what you see asked sethe bruises said denver on my neck here said beloved here and here too she reached out her hand and touched the splotches gathering color darker than sethe s dark throat and her fingers were mighty cool that don t help nothing denver said but beloved was leaning in her two hands stroking the damp skin that felt like chamois and looked like taffeta sethe moaned the girl s fingers were so cool and knowing sethe s knotted private walk on water life gave in a bit softened and it seemed that the glimpse of happiness she caught in the shadows swinging hands on the road to the carnival was a likelihood if she could just manage the news paul d brought and the news he kept to himself just manage it not break fall or cry each time a hateful picture drifted in front of her face not develop some permanent craziness like baby suggs friend a young woman in a bonnet whose food was full of tears like aunt phyllis who slept with her eyes wide open like jackson till who slept under the bed all she wanted was to go on as she had alone with her daughter in a haunted house she managed every damn thing why now with paul d instead of the ghost was she breaking up getting scared needing baby the worst was over wasn t it she had already got through hadn t she with the ghost in she could bear do solve anything now a hint of what had happened to halie and she cut out like a rabbit looking for its mother beloved s fingers were heavenly under them and breathing evenly again the anguish rolled down the peace sethe had come there to find crept into her we must look a sight she thought and closed her eyes to see it the three women in the middle of the clearing at the base of the rock where baby suggs holy had loved one seated yielding up her throat to the kind hands of one of the two kneeling before her denver watched the faces of the other two beloved watched the work her thumbs were doing and must have loved what she saw because she leaned over and kissed the tenderness under sethe s chin they stayed that way for a while because neither denver nor sethe knew how not to how to stop and not love the look or feel of the lips that kept on kissing then sethe grabbing beloved s hair and blinking rapidly separated herself she later believed that it was because the girl s breath was exactly like new milk that she said to her stern and frowning you too old for that she looked at denver and seeing panic about to become something more stood up quickly breaking the tableau apart come on up up sethe waved the girls to their feet as they left the clearing they looked pretty much the same as they had when they had come sethe in the lead the girls a ways back all silent as before but with a difference sethe was bothered not because of the kiss but because just before it when she was feeling so fine letting beloved massage away the pain the fingers she was loving and the ones that had soothed her before they strangled her had reminded her of something that now slipped her mind but one thing for sure baby suggs had not choked her as first she thought denver was right and walking in the dappled tree light clearer headed now away from the enchantment of the clearing sethe remembered the tou ch of those fingers that she knew better than her own they had bathed her in sections wrapped her womb combed her hair oiled her nipples stitched her clothes cleaned her feet greased her back and dropped just about anything they were doing to massage sethe s nape when especially in the early days her spirits fell down under the weight of the things she remembered and those she did not schoolteacher writing in ink she herself had made while his nephews played on her the face of the woman in a felt hat as she rose to stretch in the field if she lay among all the hands in the world she would know baby suggs just as she did the good hands of the whitegirl looking for velvet but for eighteen years she had lived in a house full of touches from the other side and the thumbs that pressed her nape were the same maybe that was where it had gone to after paul d beat it out of maybe it collected itself in the clearing reasonable she thought why she had taken denver and beloved with her didn t puzzle her now at the time it seemed impulse with a vague wish for protection and the girls had saved her beloved so agitated she behaved like a two year old like a faint smell of burning that disappears when the fire is cut off or the window opened for a breeze the suspicion that the girl s touch was also exactly like the baby s ghost dissipated it was only a tiny disturbance anyway not strong enough to divert her from the ambition welling in her now she wanted paul d no matter what he told and knew she wanted him in her life more than commemorating halle that is what she had come to the clearing to figure out and now it was figured trust and rememory yes the way she believed it could be when he cradled her before the cooking stove the weight and angle of him the true to life beard hair on him arched back educated hands his waiting eyes and awful human power the mind of him that knew her own her story was bearable because it was his as well to tell to refine and tell again the things neither knew about the other the things neither had word shapes for well it would come in time where they led him off to sucking iron the perfect death of her crawling already baby she wanted to get back fast set these idle girls to some work that would fill their wandering heads rushing through the green corridor cooler now because the sun had moved it occurred to her that the two were alike as sisters their obedience and absolute reliability shot through with surprise sethe understood denver solitude had made her secretive self manipulated years of haunting had dulled her in ways you wouldn t believe and sharpened her in ways you wouldn t believe either the consequence was a timid but hard headed daughter sethe would die to protect the other beloved she knew less nothing about except that there was nothing she wouldn t do for sethe and that denver and she liked each other s company now she thought she knew why they spent up or held on to their feelings in harmonious ways what one had to give the other was pleased to take they hung back in the trees that ringed the clearing then rushed into it with screams and kisses when sethe choked anyhow that s how she explained it to herself for she noticed neither competition between the two nor domination by one on her mind was the supper she wanted to fix for paul d something difficult to do something she would do just so to launch her newer stronger life with a tender man those litty bitty potatoes browned on all sides heavy on the pepper snap beans seasoned with rind yellow squash sprinkled with vinegar and sugar maybe corn cut from the cob and fried with green onions and butter raised bread even her mind searching the kitchen before she got to it was so full of her offering she did not see right away in the space under the white stairs the wooden tub and paul d sitting in it she smiled at him and he smiled back summer must be over she said come on in here uh uh girls right behind me i don t hear nobody i have to cook paul d me too he stood up and made her stay there while he held her in his arms her dress soaked up the water from his body his jaw was near her ear her chin touched his shoulder what you gonna cook i thought some snap beans oh yeah fry up a little corn yeah there was no question but that she could do it just like the day she arrived at sure enough she had milk enough for all beloved came through the door and they ought to have heard her tread but they didn t breathing and murmuring breathing and murmuring beloved heard them as soon as the door banged shut behind her she jumped at the slam and swiveled her head toward the whispers coming from behind the white stairs she took a step and felt like crying she had been so close then closer and it was so much better than the anger that ruled when sethe did or thought anything that excluded herself she could bear the hours nine or ten of them each day but one when sethe was gone bear even the nights when she was close but out of sight behind walls and doors lying next to him but now even the daylight time that beloved had counted on disciplined herself to be content with was being reduced divided by sethe s willingness to pay attention to other things him mostly him who said something to her that made her run out into the woods and talk to herself on a rock him who kept her hidden at night behind doors and him who had hold of her now whispering behind the stairs after beloved had rescued her neck and was ready now to put her hand in that woman s own beloved turned around and left denver had not arrived or else she was waiting somewhere outside beloved went to look pausing to watch a cardinal hop from limb to branch she followed the blood spot shifting in the leaves until she lost it and even then she walked on backward still hungry for another glimpse she turned finally and ran through the woods to the stream standing close to its edge she watched her reflection there when denver s face joined hers they stared at each other in the water you did it i saw you said denver what i saw your face you made her choke i didn t do it you told me you loved her i fixed it didn t i didn t i fix her neck after after you choked her neck i kissed her neck i didn t choke it the circle of iron choked it i saw you denver grabbed beloved s arm look out girl said beloved and snatching her arm away ran ahead as fast as she could along the stream that sang on the other side of the woods left alone denver wondered if indeed she had been wrong she and beloved were standing in the trees whispering while sethe sat on the rock denver knew that the clearing used to be where baby suggs preached but that was when she was a baby she had never been there herself to remember it and the field behind it were all the world she knew or wanted once upon a time she had known more and wanted to had walked the path leading to a real other house had stood outside the window listening four times she did it on her own crept away from early in the afternoon when her mother and grandmother had their guard down just before supper after chores the blank hour before gears changed to evening occupations denver had walked off looking for the house other children visited but not her when she found it she was too timid to go to the front door so she peeped in the window lady jones sat in a straight backed chair several children sat cross legged on the floor in front of her lady jones had a book the children had slates lady jones was saying something too soft for denver to hear the children were saying it after her four times denver went to look the fifth time lady jones caught her and said come in the front door miss denver this is not a side show so she had almost a whole year of the company of her peers and along with them learned to spell and count she was seven and those two hours in the afternoon were precious to her especially so because she had done it on her own and was pleased and surprised by the pleasure and surprise it created in her mother and her brothers for a nickel a month lady jones did what whitepeople thought unnecessary if not illegal crowded her little parlor with the colored children who had time for and interest in book learning the nickel tied to a handkerchief knot tied to her belt that she carried to lady jones thrilled her the effort to handle chalk expertly and avoid the scream it would make the capital w the little i the beauty of the letters in her name the deeply mournful sentences from the bible lady jones used as a textbook denver practiced every morning starred every afternoon she was so happy she didn t even know she was being avoided by her classmates that they made excuses and altered their pace not to walk with her it was nelson lord the boy as smart as she was who put a stop to it who asked her the question about her mother that put chalk the little i and all the rest that those afternoons held out of reach forever she should have laughed when he said it or pushed him down but there was no meanness in his face or his voice just curiosity but the thing that leapt up in her when he asked it was a thing that had been lying there all along she never went back the second day she didn t go sethe asked her why not denver didn t answer she was too scared to ask her brothers or anyone else nelson lord s question because certain odd and terrifying feelings about her mother were collecting around the thing that leapt up inside her later on after baby suggs died she did not wonder why howard and buglar had run away she did not agree with sethe that they left because of the ghost if so what took them so long they had lived with it as long as she had but if nelson lord was right no wonder they were sulky staying away from home as much as they could meanwhile the monstrous and unmanageable dreams about sethe found release in the concentration denver began to fix on the baby ghost before nelson lord she had been barely interested in its antics the patience of her mother and grandmother in its presence made her indifferent to it then it began to irritate her wear her out with its mischief that was when she walked off to follow the children to lady jones house school now it held for her all the anger love and fear she didn t know what to do with even when she did muster the courage to ask nelson lord s question she could not hear sethe s answer nor baby suggs words nor anything at all thereafter for two years she walked in a silence too solid for penetration but which gave her eyes a power even she found hard to believe the black nostrils of a sparrow sitting on a branch sixty feet above her head for instance for two years she heard nothing at all and then she heard close thunder crawling up the stairs baby suggs thought it was here boy padding into places he never went sethe thought it was the india rubber ball the boys played with bounding down the stairs is that damn dog lost his mind shouted baby suggs he s on the porch said sethe see for yourself well what s that i m hearing then sethe slammed the stove lid buglar buglar i told you all not to use that ball in here she looked at the white stairs and saw denver at the top she was trying to get upstairs what the cloth she used to handle the stove lid was balled in sethe s hand the baby said denver didn t you hear her crawling what to jump on first was the problem that denver heard anything at all or that the crawling already baby girl was still at it but more so the return of denver s hearing cut off by an answer she could not hear to hear cut on by the sound of her dead sister trying to climb the stairs signaled another shift in the fortunes of the people of from then on the presence was full of spite instead of sighs and accidents there was pointed and deliberate abuse buglar and howard grew furious at the company of the women in the house and spent in sullen reproach any time they had away from their odd work in town carrying water and feed at the stables until the spite became so personal it drove each off baby suggs grew tired went to bed and stayed there until her big old heart quit except for an occasional request for color she said practically nothing until the afternoon of the last day of her life when she got out of bed skipped slowly to the door of the keeping room and announced to sethe and denver the lesson she had learned from her sixty years a slave and ten years free that there was no bad luck in the world but white people they don t know when to stop she said and returned to her bed pulled up the quilt and left them to hold that thought forever shortly afterward sethe and denver tried to call up and reason with the baby ghost but got nowhere it took a man paul d to shout it off beat it off and take its place for himself and carnival or no carnival denver preferred the venomous baby to him any day during the first days after paul d moved in denver stayed in her emerald closet as long as she could lonely as a mountain and almost as big thinking everybody had somebody but her thinking even a ghost s company was denied her so when she saw the black dress with two unlaced shoes beneath it she trembled with secret thanks whatever her power and however she used it beloved was hers denver was alarmed by the harm she thought beloved planned for sethe but felt helpless to thwart it so unrestricted was her need to love another the display she witnessed at the clearing shamed her because the choice between sethe and beloved was without conflict walking toward the stream beyond her green bush house she let herself wonder what if beloved really decided to choke her mother would she let it happen murder nelson lord had said didn t your mother get locked away for murder wasn t you in there with her when she went it was the second question that made it impossible for so long to ask sethe about the first the thing that leapt up had been coiled in just such a place a darkness a stone and some other thing that moved by itself she went deaf rather than hear the answer and like the little four o clocks that searched openly for sunlight then closed themselves tightly when it left denver kept watch for the baby and withdrew from everything else until paul d came but the damage he did came undone with the miraculous resurrection of beloved just ahead at the edge of the stream denver could see her silhouette standing barefoot in the water liking her black skirts up above her calves the beautiful head lowered in rapt attention blinking fresh tears denver approached her eager for a word a sign of forgiveness denver took off her shoes and stepped into the water with her it took a moment for her to drag her eyes from the spectacle of beloved s head to see what she was staring at a turtle inched along the edge turned and climbed to dry ground not far behind it was another one headed in the same direction four placed plates under a hovering motionless bowl behind her in the grass the other one moving quickly quickly to mount her the impregnable strength of him earthing his feet near her shoulders the embracing necks hers stretching up toward his bending down the pat pat pat of their touching heads no height was beyond her yearning neck stretched like a finger toward his risking everything outside the bowl just to touch his face the gravity of their shields clashing countered and mocked the floating heads touching beloved dropped the folds of her skirt it spread around her the hem darkened in the water chapter out of sight of mister s sight away praise his name from the smiling boss of roosters paul d began to tremble not all at once and not so anyone could tell when he turned his head aiming for a last look at brother turned it as much as the rope that connected his neck to the axle of a buckboard allowed and later on when they fastened the iron around his ankles and clamped the wrists as well there was no outward sign of trembling at all nor eighteen days after that when he saw the ditches the one thousand feet of earth five feet deep five feet wide into which wooden boxes had been fitted a door of bars that you could lift on hinges like a cage opened into three walls and a roof of scrap lumber and red dirt two feet of it over his head three feet of open trench in front of him with anything that crawled or scurried welcome to share that grave calling itself quarters and there were forty five more he was sent there after trying to kill brandywine the man schoolteacher sold him to brandywine was leading him in a coffle with ten others through kentucky into virginia he didn t know exactly what prompted him to try other than halle sixo paul a paul f and mister but the trembling was fixed by the time he knew it was there still no one else knew it because it began inside a flutter of a kind in the chest then the shoulder blades it felt like rippling gentle at first and then wild as though the further south they led him the more his blood frozen like an ice pond for twenty years began thawing breaking into pieces that once melted had no choice but to swirl and eddy sometimes it was in his leg then again it moved to the base of his spine by the time they unhitched him from the wagon and he saw nothing but dogs and two shacks in a world of sizzling grass the roiling blood was shaking him to and fro but no one could tell the wrists he held out for the bracelets that evening were steady as were the legs he stood on when chains were attached to the leg irons but when they shoved him into the box and dropped the cage door down his hands quit taking instruction on their own they traveled nothing could stop them or get their attention they would not hold his penis to urinate or a spoon to scoop lumps of lima beans into his mouth the miracle of their obedience came with the hammer at dawn all forty six men woke to rifle shot all forty six three whitemen walked along the trench unlocking the doors one by one no one stepped through when the last lock was opened the three returned and lifted the bars one by one and one by one the blackmen emerged promptly and without the poke of a rifle butt if they had been there more than a day promptly with the butt if like paul d they had just arrived when all forty six were standing in a line in the trench another rifle shot signaled the climb out and up to the ground above where one thousand feet of the best hand forged chain in georgia stretched each man bent and waited the first man picked up the end and threaded it through the loop on his leg iron he stood up then and shuffling a little brought the chain tip to the next prisoner who did likewise as the chain was passed on and each man stood in the other s place the line of men turned around facing the boxes they had come out of not one spoke to the other at least not with words the eyes had to tell what there was to tell help me this mornin s bad i m a make it new man steady now steady chain up completed they knelt down the dew more likely than not was mist by then heavy sometimes and if the dogs were quiet and just breathing you could hear doves kneeling in the mist they waited for the whim of a guard or two or three or maybe all of them wanted it wanted it from one prisoner in particular or none or all breakfast want some breakfast nigger yes sir hungry nigger yes sir here you go occasionally a kneeling man chose gunshot in his head as the price maybe of taking a bit of foreskin with him to jesus paul d did not know that then he was looking at his palsied hands smelling the guard listening to his soft grunts so like the doves as he stood before the man kneeling in mist on his right convinced he was next paul d retched vomiting up nothing at all an observing guard smashed his shoulder with the rifle and the engaged one decided to skip the new man for the time being lest his pants and shoes got soiled by nigger puke hiiii it was the first sound other than yes sir a blackman was allowed to speak each morning and the lead chain gave it everything he had hiiii it was never clear to paul d how he knew when to shout that mercy they called him hi man and paul d thought at first the guards told him when to give the signal that let the prisoners rise up off their knees and dance two step to the music of hand forged iron later he doubted it he believed to this day that the hiiii at dawn and the hoooo when evening came were the responsibility hi man assumed because he alone knew what was enough what was too much when things were over when the time had come they chain danced over the fields through the woods to a trail that ended in the astonishing beauty of feldspar and there paul d s hands disobeyed the furious rippling of his blood and paid attention with a sledge hammer in his hands and hi man s lead the men got through they sang it out and beat it up garbling the words so they could not be understood tricking the words so their syllables yielded up other meanings they sang the women they knew the children they had been the animals they had tamed themselves or seen others tame they sang of bosses and masters and misses of mules and dogs and the shamelessness of life they sang lovingly of graveyards and sisters long gone of pork in the woods meal in the pan fish on the line cane rain and rocking chairs and they beat the women for having known them and no more no more the children for having been them but never again they killed a boss so often and so completely they had to bring him back to life to pulp him one more time tasting hot mealcake among pine trees they beat it away singing love songs to mr death they smashed his head more than the rest they killed the flirt whom folks called life for leading them on making them think the next sunrise would be worth it that another stroke of time would do it at last only when she was dead would they be safe the successful ones the ones who had been there enough years to have maimed mutilated maybe even buried her kept watch over the others who were still in her cock teasing hug caring and looking forward remembering and looking back they were the ones whose eyes said help me s bad or look out meaning this might be the day i bay or eat my own mess or run and it was this last that had to be guarded against for if one pitched and ran all all forty six would be yanked by the chain that bound them and no telling who or how many would be killed a man could risk his own life but not his brother s so the eyes said steady now and hang by me eighty six days and done life was dead paul d beat her butt all day every day till there was not a whimper in her eighty six days and his hands were still waiting serenely each rat rustling night for hiiii at dawn and the eager clench on the hammer s shaft life rolled over dead or so he thought it rained snakes came down from short leaf pine and hemlock it rained cypress yellow poplar ash and palmetto drooped under five days of rain without wind by the eighth day the doves were nowhere in sight by the ninth even the salamanders were gone dogs laid their ears down and stared over their paws the men could not work chain up was slow breakfast abandoned the two step became a slow drag over soupy grass and unreliable earth it was decided to lock everybody down in the boxes till it either stopped or lightened up so a whiteman could walk damnit without flooding his gun and the dogs could quit shivering the chain was threaded through forty six loops of the best hand forged iron in georgia it rained in the boxes the men heard the water rise in the trench and looked out for cottonmouths they squatted in muddy water slept above it peed in it paul d thought he was screaming his mouth was open and there was this loud throat splitting sound but it may have been somebody else then he thought he was crying something was running down his cheeks he lifted his hands to wipe away the tears and saw dark brown slime above him rivulets of mud slid through the boards of the roof when it come down he thought gonna crush me like a tick bug it happened so quick he had no time to ponder somebody yanked the chain once hard enough to cross his legs and throw him into the mud he never figured out how he knew how anybody did but he did know he did and he took both hands and yanked the length of chain at his left so the next man would know too the water was above his ankles flowing over the wooden plank he slept on and then it wasn t water anymore the ditch was caving in and mud oozed under and through the bars they waited each and every one of the forty six not screaming although some of them must have fought like the devil not to the mud was up to his thighs and he held on to the bars then it came another yank from the left this time and less forceful than the first because of the mud it passed through it started like the chain up but the difference was the power of the chain one by one from hi man back on down the line they dove down through the mud under the bars blind groping some had sense enough to wrap their heads in their shirts cover their faces with rags put on their shoes others just plunged simply ducked down and pushed out fighting up reaching for air some lost direction and their neighbors feeling the confused pull of the chain snatched them around for one lost all lost the chain that held them would save all or none and hi man was the delivery they talked through that chain like sam morse and great god they all came up like the unshriven dead zombies on the loose holding the chains in their hands they trusted the rain and the dark yes but mostly hi man and each other past the sheds where the dogs lay in deep depression past the two guard shacks past the stable of sleeping horses past the hens whose bills were bolted into their feathers they waded the moon did not help because it wasn t there the field was a marsh the track a trough all georgia seemed to be sliding melting away moss wiped their faces as they fought the live oak branches that blocked their way georgia took up all of alabama and mississippi then so there was no state line to cross and it wouldn t have mattered anyway if they had known about it they would have avoided not only alfred and the beautiful feldspar but savannah too and headed for the sea islands on the river that slid down from the blue ridge mountains but they didn t know daylight came and they huddled in a copse of redbud trees night came and they scrambled up to higher ground praying the rain would go on shielding them and keeping folks at home they were hoping for a shack solitary some distance from its big house where a slave might be making rope or heating potatoes at the grate what they found was a camp of sick cherokee for whom a rose was named decimated but stubborn they were among those who chose a fugitive life rather than oklahoma the illness that swept them now was reminiscent of the one that had killed half their number two hundred years earlier in between that calamity and this they had visited george iii in london published a newspaper made baskets led oglethorpe through forests helped andrew jackson fight creek cooked maize drawn up a constitution petitioned the king of spain been experimented on by dartmouth established asylums wrote their language resisted settlers shot bear and translated scripture all to no avail the forced move to the arkansas river insisted upon by the same president they fought for against the creek destroyed another quarter of their already shattered number that was it they thought and removed themselves from those cherokee who signed the treaty in order to retire into the forest and await the end of the world the disease they suffered now was a mere inconvenience compared to the devastation they remembered still they protected each other as best they could the healthy were sent some miles away the sick stayed behind with the dead to survive or join them the prisoners from alfred georgia sat down in semicircle near the encampment no one came and still they sat hours passed and the rain turned soft finally a woman stuck her head out of her house night came and nothing happened at dawn two men with barnacles covering their beautiful skin approached them no one spoke for a moment then hi man raised his hand the cherokee saw the chains and went away when they returned each carried a handful of small axes two children followed with a pot of mush cooling and thinning in the rain buffalo men they called them and talked slowly to the prisoners scooping mush and tapping away at their chains nobody from a box in alfred georgia cared about the illness the cherokee warned them about so they stayed all forty six resting planning their next move paul d had no idea of what to do and knew less than anybody it seemed he heard his co convicts talk knowledgeably of rivers and states towns and territories heard cherokee men describe the beginning of the world and its end listened to tales of other buffalo men they knew three of whom were in the healthy camp a few miles away hi man wanted to join them others wanted to join him some wanted to leave some to stay on weeks later paul d was the only buffalo man left without a plan all he could think of was tracking dogs although hi man said the rain they left in gave that no chance of success alone the last man with buffalo hair among the ailing cherokee paul d finally woke up and admitting his ignorance asked how he might get north free north magical north welcoming benevolent north the cherokee smiled and looked around the flood rains of a month ago had turned everything to steam and blossoms that way he said pointing follow the tree flowers he said only the tree flowers as they go you go you will be where you want to be when they are gone so he raced from dogwood to blossoming peach when they thinned out he headed for the cherry blossoms then magnolia chinaberry pecan walnut and prickly pear at last he reached a field of apple trees whose flowers were just becoming tiny knots of fruit spring sauntered north but he had to run like hell to keep it as his traveling companion from february to july he was on the lookout for blossoms when he lost them and found himself without so much as a petal to guide him he paused climbed a tree on a hillock and scanned the horizon for a flash of pink or white in the leaf world that surrounded him he did not touch them or stop to smell he merely followed in their wake a dark ragged figure guided by the blossoming plums the apple field turned out to be delaware where the weaver lady lived she snapped him up as soon as he finished the sausage she fed him and he crawled into her bed crying she passed him off as her nephew from syracuse simply by calling him that nephew s name eighteen months and he was looking out again for blossoms only this time he did the looking on a dray it was some time before he could put alfred georgia sixo schoolteacher halle his brothers sethe mister the taste of iron the sight of butter the smell of hickory notebook paper one by one into the tobacco tin lodged in his chest by the time he got to nothing in this world could pry it open chapter she moved him not the way he had beat off the baby s ghost all bang and shriek with windows smashed and icily iars rolled in a heap but she moved him nonetheless and paul d didn t know how to stop it because it looked like he was moving himself imperceptibly downright reasonably he was moving out of the beginning was so simple one day after supper he sat in the rocker by the stove bone tired river whipped and fell asleep he woke to the footsteps of sethe coming down the white stairs to make breakfast i thought you went out somewhere she said paul d moaned surprised to find himself exactly where he was the last time he looked don t tell me i slept in this chair the whole night sethe laughed me i won t say a word to you why didn t you rouse me i did called you two or three times i gave it up around midnight and then i thought you went out somewhere he stood expecting his back to fight it but it didn t not a creak or a stiff joint anywhere in fact he felt refreshed some things are like that he thought good sleep places the base of certain trees here and there a wharf a bench a rowboat once a haystack usually not always bed and here now a rocking chair which was strange because in his experience furniture was the worst place for a good sleep sleep the next evening he did it again and then again he was accustomed to sex with sethe just about every day and to avoid the confusion beloved s shining caused him he still made it his business to take her back upstairs in the morning or lie down with her after supper but he found a way and a reason to spend the longest part of the night in the rocker he told himself it must be his back something supportive it needed for a weakness left over from sleeping in a box in georgia it went on that way and might have stayed that way but one evening after supper after sethe he came downstairs sat in the rocker and didn t want to be there he stood up and realized he didn t want to go upstairs either irritable and longing for rest he opened the door to baby suggs room and dropped off to sleep on the bed the old lady died in that settled it so it seemed it became his room and sethe didn t object her bed made for two had been occupied by one for eighteen years before paul d came to call and maybe it was better this way with young girls in the house and him not being her true to life husband in any case since there was no reduction in his before breakfast or after supper appetites he never heard her complain it went on that way and might have stayed that way except one evening after supper after sethe he came downstairs and lay on baby suggs bed and didn t want to be there he believed he was having house fits the glassy anger men sometimes feel when a woman s house begins to bind them when they want to yell and break something or at least run off he knew all about that felt it lots of times in the delaware weaver s house for instance but always he associated the house fit with the woman in it this nervousness had nothing to do with the woman whom he loved a little bit more every day her hands among vegetables her mouth when she licked a thread end before guiding it through a needle or bit it in two when the seam was done the blood in her eye when she defended her girls and beloved was hers now or any coloredwoman from a slur also in this house fit there was no anger no suffocation no yearning to be elsewhere he just could not would not sleep upstairs or in the rocker or now in baby suggs bed so he went to the storeroom it went on that way and might have stayed that way except one evening after supper after sethe he lay on a pallet in the storeroom and didn t want to be there then it was the cold house and it was out there separated from the main part of curled on top of two croaker sacks full of sweet potatoes staring at the sides of a lard can that he realized the moving was involuntary he wasn t being nervous he was being prevented so he waited visited sethe in the morning slept in the cold room at night and waited she came and he wanted to knock her down in ohio seasons are theatrical each one enters like a prima donna convinced its performance is the reason the world has people in it when paul d had been forced out of into a shed behind it summer had been hooted offstage and autumn with its bottles of blood and gold had everybody s attention even at night when there should have been a restful intermission there was none because the voices of a dying landscape were insistent and loud paul d packed newspaper under himself and over to give his thin blanket some help but the chilly night was not on his mind when he heard the door open behind him he refused to turn and look what you want in here what you want he should have been able to hear her breathing i want you to touch me on the inside part and call me my name paul d never worried about his little tobacco tin anymore it was rusted shut so while she hoisted her skirts and turned her head over her shoulder the way the turtles had he just looked at the lard can silvery in moonlight and spoke quietly when good people take you in and treat you good you ought to try to be good back you don t sethe loves you much as her own daughter you know that beloved dropped her skirts as he spoke and looked at him with empty eyes she took a step he could not hear and stood close behind him she don t love me like i love her i don t love nobody but her then what you come in here for i want you to touch me on the inside part go on back in that house and get to bed you have to touch me on the inside part and you have to call me my name as long as his eyes were locked on the silver of the lard can he was safe if he trembled like lot s wife and felt some womanish need to see the nature of the sin behind him feel a sympathy perhaps for the cursing cursed or want to hold it in his arms out of respect for the connection between them he too would be lost call me my name no please call it i ll go if you call it beloved he said it but she did not go she moved closer with a footfall he didn t hear and he didn t hear the whisper that the flakes of rust made either as they fell away from the seams of his tobacco tin so when the lid gave he didn t know it what he knew was that when he reached the inside part he was saying red heart red heart over and over again softly and then so loud it woke denver then paul d himself red heart red heart red heart chapter to go back to the original hunger was impossible luckily for denver looking was food enough to last but to be looked at in turn was beyond appetite it was breaking through her own skin to a place where hunger hadn t been discovered it didn t have to happen often because beloved seldom looked right at her or when she did denver could tell that her own face was just the place those eyes stopped while the mind behind it walked on but sometimes at moments denver could neither anticipate nor create beloved rested cheek on knuckles and looked at denver with attention it was lovely not to be stared at not seen but being pulled into view by the interested uncritical eyes of the other having her hair examined as a part of her self not as material or a style having her lips nose chin caressed as they might be if she were a moss rose a gardener paused to admire denver s skin dissolved under that gaze and became soft and bright like the lisle dress that had its arm around her mother s waist she floated near but outside her own body feeling vague and intense at the same time needing nothing being what there was at such times it seemed to be beloved who needed somethingm wanted something deep down in her wide black eyes back behind the expressionlessness was a palm held out for a penny which denver would gladly give her if only she knew how or knew enough about her a knowledge not to be had by the answers to the questions sethe occasionally put to her you disremember everything i never knew my mother neither but i saw her a couple of times did you never see yours what kind of whites was they you don t remember none beloved scratching the back of her hand would say she remembered a woman who was hers and she remembered being snatched away from her other than that the clearest memory she had the one she repeated was the bridge standing on the bridge looking down and she knew one whiteman sethe found that remarkable and more evidence to support her conclusions which she confided to denver where d you get the dress them shoes beloved said she took them who from silence and a faster scratching of her hand she didn t know she saw them and just took them uh huh said sethe and told denver that she believed beloved had been locked up by some whiteman for his own purposes and never let out the door that she must have escaped to a bridge or someplace and rinsed the rest out of her mind something like that had happened to ella except it was two men a father and son and ella remembered every bit of it for more than a year they kept her locked in a room for themselves you couldn t think up ella had said what them two done to me sethe thought it explained beloved s behavior around paul d whom she hated so denver neither believed nor commented on sethe s speculations and she lowered her eyes and never said a word about the cold house she was certain that beloved was the white dress that had knelt with her mother in the keeping room the true to life presence of the baby that had kept her company most of her life and to be looked at by her however briefly kept her grateful for the rest of the time when she was merely the looker besides she had her own set of questions which had nothing to do with the past the present alone interested denver but she was careful to appear uninquisitive about the things she was dying to ask beloved for if she pressed too hard she might lose the penny that the held out palm wanted and lose therefore the place beyond appetite it was better to feast to have permission to be the looker because the old hunger the before beloved hunger that drove her into boxwood and cologne for just a taste of a life to feel it bumpy and not flat was out of the question looking kept it at bay so she did not ask beloved how she knew about the earrings the night walks to the cold house or the tip of the thing she saw when beloved lay down or came undone in her sleep the look when it came came when denver had been careful had explained things or participated in things or told stories to keep her occupied when sethe was at the restaurant no given chore was enough to put out the licking fire that seemed always to burn in her not when they wrung out sheets so tight the rinse water ran back up their arms not when they shoveled snow from the path to the outhouse or broke three inches of ice from the rain barrel scoured and boiled last summer s canning jars packed mud in the cracks of the hen house and warmed the chicks with their skirts all the while denver was obliged to talk about what they were doing the how and why of it about people denver knew once or had seen giving them more life than life had the sweet smelling whitewoman who brought her oranges and cologne and good wool skirts lady jones who taught them songs to spell and count by a beautiful boy as smart as she was with a birthmark like a nickel on his cheek a white preacher who prayed for their souls while sethe peeled potatoes and grandma baby sucked air and she told her about howard and buglar the parts of the bed that belonged to each the top reserved for herself that before she transferred to baby suggs bed she never knew them to sleep without holding hands she described them to beloved slowly to keep her attention dwelling on their habits the games they taught her and not the fright that drove them increasingly out of the house anywhere and finally far away this day they are outside it s cold and the snow is hard as packed dirt denver has finished singing the counting song lady jones taught her students beloved is holding her arms steady while denver unclasps frozen underwear and towels from the line one by one she lays them in beloved s arms until the pile like a huge deck of cards reaches her chin the rest aprons and brown stockings denver carries herself made giddy by the cold they return to the house the clothes will thaw slowly to a dampness perfect for the pressing iron which will make them smell like hot rain dancing around the room with sethe s apron beloved wants to know if there are flowers in the dark denver adds sticks to the stovefire and assures her there are twirling her face framed by the neckband her waist in the apron strings embrace she says she is thirsty denver suggests warming up some cider while her mind races to something she might do or say to interest and entertain the dancer denver is a strategist now and has to keep beloved by her side from the minute sethe leaves for work until the hour of her return when beloved begins to hover at the window then work her way out the door down the steps and near the road plotting has changed denver markedly where she was once indolent resentful of every task now she is spry executing even extending the assignments sethe leaves for them all to be able to say we got to and ma am said for us to otherwise beloved gets private and dreamy or quiet and sullen and denver s chances of being looked at by her go down to nothing she has no control over the evenings when her mother is anywhere around beloved has eyes only for sethe at night in bed anything might happen she might want to be told a story in the dark when denver can t see her or she might get up and go into the cold house where paul d has begun to sleep or she might cry silently she might even sleep like a brick her breath sugary from fingerfuls of molasses or sand cookie crumbs denver will turn toward her then and if beloved faces her she will inhale deeply the sweet air from her mouth if not she will have to lean up and over her every once in a while to catch a sniff for anything is better than the original hunger the time when after a year of the wonderful little i sentences rolling out like pie dough and the company of other children there was no sound coming through anything is better than the silence when she answered to hands gesturing and was indifferent to the movement of lips when she saw every little thing and colors leaped smoldering into view she will forgo the most violent of sunsets stars as fat as dinner plates and all the blood of autumn and settle for the palest yellow if it comes from her beloved the cider jug is heavy but it always is even when empty denver can carry it easily yet she asks beloved to help her it is in the cold house next to the molasses and six pounds of cheddar hard as bone a pallet is in the middle of the floor covered with newspaper and a blanket at the foot it has been slept on for almost a month even though snow has come and with it serious winter it is noon quite light outside inside it is not a few cuts of sun break through the roof and walls but once there they are too weak to shift for themselves darkness is stronger and swallows them like minnows the door bangs shut denver can t tell where beloved is standing where are you she whispers in a laughing sort of way here says beloved where come find me says beloved denver stretches out her right arm and takes a step or two she trips and falls down onto the pallet newspaper crackles under her weight she laughs again oh shoot beloved no one answers denver waves her arms and squinches her eyes to separate the shadows of potato sacks a lard can and a side of smoked pork from the one that might be human stop fooling she says and looks up toward the light to check and make sure this is still the cold house and not something going on in her sleep the minnows of light still swim there they can t make it down to where she is you the one thirsty you want cider or don t you denver s voice is mildly accusatory mildly she doesn t want to offend and she doesn t want to betray the panic that is creeping over her like hairs there is no sight or sound of beloved denver struggles to her feet amid the crackling newspaper holding her palm out she moves slowly toward the door there is no latch or knob just a loop of wire to catch a nail she pushes the door open cold sunlight displaces the dark the room is just as it was when they entered except beloved is not there there is no point in looking further for everything in the place can be seen at first sight denver looks anyway because the loss is ungovernable she steps back into the shed allowing the door to close quickly behind her darkness or not she moves rapidly around reaching touching cobwebs cheese slanting shelves the pallet interfering with each step if she stumbles she is not aware of it because she does not know where her body stops which part of her is an arm a foot or a knee she feels like an ice cake torn away from the solid surface of the stream floating on darkness thick and crashing against the edges of things around it breakable meltable and cold it is hard to breathe and even if there were light she wouldn t be able to see anything because she is crying just as she thought it might happen it has easy as walking into a room a magical appearance on a stump the face wiped out by sunlight and a magical disappearance in a shed eaten alive by the dark don t she is saying between tough swallows don t don t go back this is worse than when paul d came to and she cried helplessly into the stove this is worse then it was for herself now she is crying because she has no self death is a skipped meal compared to this she can feel her thickness thinning dissolving into nothing she grabs the hair at her temples to get enough to uproot it and halt the melting for a while teeth clamped shut denver brakes her sobs she doesn t move to open the door because there is no world out there she decides to stay in the cold house and let the dark swallow her like the minnows of light above she won t put up with another leaving another trick waking up to find one brother then another not at the bottom of the bed his foot jabbing her spine sitting at the table eating turnips and saving the liquor for her grandmother to drink her mother s hand on the keeping room door and her voice saying baby suggs is gone denver and when she got around to worrying about what would be the case if sethe died or paul d took her away a dream come true comes true just to leave her on a pile of newspaper in the dark no footfall announces her but there she is standing where before there was nobody when denver looked and smiling denver grabs the hem of beloved s skirt i thought you left me i thought you went back beloved smiles i don t want that place this the place i am she sits down on the pallet and laughing lies back looking at the cracklights above surreptitiously denver pinches a piece of beloved s skirt between her fingers and holds on a good thing she does because suddenly beloved sits up what is it asks denver look she points to the sunlit cracks what i don t see nothing denver follows the pointing finger beloved drops her hand i m like this denver watches as beloved bends over curls up and rocks her eyes go to no place her moaning is so small denver can hardly hear it you all right beloved beloved focuses her eyes over there her face denver looks where beloved s eyes go there is nothing but darkness there whose face who is it me it s me she is smiling again chapter the last of the sweet home men so named and called by one who would know believed it the other four believed it too once but they were long gone the sold one never returned the lost one never found one he knew was dead for sure one he hoped was because butter and clabber was no life or reason to live it he grew up thinking that of all the blacks in kentucky only the five of them were men allowed encouraged to correct garner even defy him to invent ways of doing things to see what was needed and attack it without permission to buy a mother choose a horse or a wife handle guns even learn reading if they wanted to but they didn t want to since nothing important to them could be put down on paper was that it is that where the manhood lay in the naming done by a whiteman who was supposed to know who gave them the privilege not of working but of deciding how to no in their relationship with garner was true metal they were believed and trusted but most of all they were listened to he thought what they said had merit and what they felt was serious deferring to his slaves opinions did not deprive him of authority or power it was schoolteacher who taught them otherwise a truth that waved like a scarecrow in rye they were only sweet home men at sweet home one step off that ground and they were trespassers among the human race watchdogs without teeth steer bulls without horns gelded workhorses whose neigh and whinny could not be translated into a language responsible humans spoke his strength had lain in knowing that schoolteacher was wrong now he wondered there was alfred georgia there was delaware there was sixo and still he wondered if schoolteacher was right it explained how he had come to be a rag doll picked up and put back down anywhere any time by a girl young enough to be his daughter fucking her when he was convinced he didn t want to whenever she turned her behind up the calves of his youth was that it cracked his resolve but it was more than appetite that humiliated him and made him wonder if schoolteacher was right it was being moved placed where she wanted him and there was nothing he was able to do about it for his life he could not walk up the glistening white stairs in the evening for his life he could not stay in the kitchen in the keeping room in the storeroom at night and he tried held his breath the way he had when he ducked into the mud steeled his heart the way he had when the trembling began but it was worse than that worse than the blood eddy he had controlled with a sledge hammer when he stood up from the supper table at and turned toward the stairs nausea was first then repulsion he he he who had eaten raw meat barely dead who under plum trees bursting with blossoms had crunched through a dove s breast before its heart stopped beating because he was a man and a man could do what he would be still for six hours in a dry well while night dropped fight raccoon with his hands and win watch another man whom he loved better than his brothers roast without a tear just so the roasters would know what a man was like and it was he that man who had walked from georgia to delaware who could not go or stay put where he wanted to in shame paul d could not command his feet but he thought he could still talk and he made up his mind to break out that way he would tell sethe about the last three weeks catch her alone coming from work at the beer garden she called a restaurant and tell it all he waited for her the winter afternoon looked like dusk as he stood in the alley behind sawyer s restaurant rehearsing imagining her face and letting the words flock in his head like kids before lining up to follow the leader well ah this is not the a man can t see but aw listen here it ain t that it really ain t ole garner what i mean is it ain t a weak ness the kind of weakness i can fight cause cause something is happening to me that girl is doing it i know you think i never liked her nohow but she is doing it to me fixing me sethe she s fixed me and i can t break it what a grown man fixed by a girl but what if the girl was not a girl but something in disguise a lowdown something that looked like a sweet young girl and fucking her or not was not the point it was not being able to stay or go where he wished in and the danger was in losing sethe because he was not man enough to break out so he needed her sethe to help him to know about it and it shamed him to have to ask the woman he wanted to protect to help him do it god damn it to hell paul d blew warm breath into the hollow of his cupped hands the wind raced down the alley so fast it sleeked the fur of four kitchen dogs waiting for scraps he looked at the dogs the dogs looked at him finally the back door opened and sethe stepped through holding a scrap pan in the crook of her arm when she saw him she said oh and her smile was both pleasure and surprise paul d believed he smiled back but his face was so cold he wasn t sure man you make me feel like a girl coming by to pick me up after work nobody ever did that before you better watch out i might start looking forward to it she tossed the largest bones into the dirt rapidly so the dogs would know there was enough and not fight each other then she dumped the skins of some things heads of other things and the insides of still more things what the restaurant could not use and she would not in a smoking pile near the animals feet got to rinse this out she said and then i ll be right with you he nodded as she returned to the kitchen the dogs ate without sound and paul d thought they at least got what they came for and if she had enough for them the cloth on her head was brown wool and she edged it down over her hairline against the wind you get off early or what i took off early anything the matter in a way of speaking he said and wiped his lips not cut back no no they got plenty work i just hm sethe you won t like what i m bout to say she stopped then and turned her face toward him and the hateful wind another woman would have squinted or at least teared if the wind whipped her face as it did sethe s another woman might have shot him a look of apprehension pleading anger even because what he said sure sounded like part one of goodbye i m gone sethe looked at him steadily calmly already ready to accept release or excuse an in need or trouble man agreeing saying okay all right in advance because she didn t believe any of them over the long haul could measure up and whatever the reason it was all right no fault nobody s fault he knew what she was thinking and even though she was wrong he was not leaving her wouldn t ever the thing he had in mind to tell her was going to be worse so when he saw the diminished expectation in her eyes the melancholy without blame he could not say it he could not say to this woman who did not squint in the wind i am not a man well say it paul d whether i like it or not since he could not say what he planned to he said something he didn t know was on his mind i want you pregnant sethe would you do that for me now she was laughing and so was he you came by here to ask me that you are one crazy headed man you right i don t like it don t you think i m too old to start that all over again she slipped her fingers in his hand for all the world like the hand holding shadows on the side of the road think about it he said and suddenly it was a solution a way to hold on to her document his manhood and break out of the girl s spell all in one he put the tips of sethe s fingers on his cheek laughing she pulled them away lest somebody passing the alley see them misbehaving in public in daylight in the wind still he d gotten a little more time bought it in fact and hoped the price wouldn t wreck him like paying for an afternoon in the coin of life to come they left off playing let go hands and hunched forward as they left the alley and entered the street the wind was quieter there but the dried out cold it left behind kept pedestrians fast moving stiff inside their coats no men leaned against door frames or storefront windows the wheels of wagons delivering feed or wood screeched as though they hurt hitched horses in front of the saloons shivered and closed their eyes four women walking two abreast approached their shoes loud on the wooden walkway paul d touched sethe s elbow to guide her as they stepped from the slats to the dirt to let the women pass half an hour later when they reached the city s edge sethe and paul d resumed catching and snatching each other s fingers stealing quick pats on the behind joyfully embarrassed to be that grownup and that young at the same time resolve he thought that was all it took and no motherless gal was going to break it up no lazy stray pup of a woman could turn him around make him doubt himself wonder plead or confess convinced of it that he could do it he threw his arm around sethe s shoulders and squeezed she let her head touch his chest and since the moment was valuable to both of them they stopped and stood that way not breathing not even caring if a passerby passed them by the winter light was low sethe closed her eyes paul d looked at the black trees lining the roadside their defending arms raised against attack softly suddenly it began to snow like a present come down from the sky sethe opened her eyes to it and said mercy and it seemed to paul d that it was a little mercy something given to them on purpose to mark what they were feeling so they would remember it later on when they needed to down came the dry flakes fat enough and heavy enough to crash like nickels on stone it always surprised him how quiet it was not like rain but like a secret run he said you run said sethe i been on my feet all day where i been sitting down and he pulled her along stop stop she said i don t have the legs for this then give em to me he said and before she knew it he had backed into her hoisted her on his back and was running down the road past brown fields turning white breathless at last he stopped and she slid back down on her own two feet weak from laughter you need some babies somebody to play with in the snow sethe secured her headcloth paul d smiled and warmed his hands with his breath i sure would like to give it a try need a willing partner though i ll say she answered very very willing it was nearly four o clock now and was half a mile ahead floating toward them barely visible in the drifting snow was a figure and although it was the same figure that had been meeting sethe for four months so complete was the attention she and paul d were paying to themselves they both felt a jolt when they saw her close in beloved did not look at paul d her scrutiny was for sethe she had no coat no wrap nothing on her head but she held in her hand a long shawl stretching out her arms she tried to circle it around sethe crazy girl said sethe you the one out here with nothing on and stepping away and in front of paul d sethe took the shawl and wrapped it around beloved s head and shoulders saying you got to learn more sense than that she enclosed her in her left arm snowflakes stuck now paul d felt icy cold in the place sethe had been before beloved came trailing a yard or so behind the women he fought the anger that shot through his stomach all the way home when he saw denver silhouetted in the lamplight at the window he could not help thinking and whose ally you it was sethe who did it unsuspecting surely she solved everything with one blow now i know you not sleeping out there tonight are you paul d she smiled at him and like a friend in need the chimney coughed against the rush of cold shooting into it from the sky window sashes shuddered in a blast of winter air paul d looked up from the stew meat you come upstairs where you belong she said and stay there the threads of malice creeping toward him from beloved s side of the table were held harmless in the warmth of sethe s smile once before and only once paul d had been grateful to a woman crawling out of the woods cross eyed with hunger and loneliness he knocked at the first back door he came to in the colored section of wilmington he told the woman who opened it that he d appreciate doing her woodpile if she could spare him something to eat she looked him up and down a little later on she said and opened the door wider she fed him pork sausage the worst thing in the world for a starving man but neither he nor his stomach objected later when he saw pale cotton sheets and two pillows in her bedroom he had to wipe his eyes quickly quickly so she would not see the thankful tears of a man s first time soil grass mud shucking leaves hay cobs sea shells all that he d slept on white cotton sheets had never crossed his mind he fell in with a groan and the woman helped him pretend he was making love to her and not her bed linen he vowed that night full of pork deep in luxury that he would never leave her she would have to kill him to get him out of that bed eighteen months later when he had been purchased by northpoint bank and railroad company he was still thankful for that introduction to sheets now he was grateful a second time he felt as though he had been plucked from the face of a cliff and put down on sure ground in sethe s bed he knew he could put up with two crazy girls as long as sethe made her wishes known stretched out to his full length watching snowflakes stream past the window over his feet it was easy to dismiss the doubts that took him to the alley behind the restaurant his expectations for himself were high too high what he might call cowardice other people called common sense tucked into the well of his arm sethe recalled paul d s face in the street when he asked her to have a baby for him although she laughed and took his hand it had frightened her she thought quickly of how good the sex would be if that is what he wanted but mostly she was frightened by the thought of having a baby once more needing to be good enough alert enough strong enough that caring again having to stay alive just that much longer o lord she thought deliver me unless carefree motherlove was a killer what did he want her pregnant for to hold on to her have a sign that he passed this way he probably had children everywhere anyway eighteen years of roaming he would have to have dropped a few no he resented the children she had that s what child she corrected herself child plus beloved whom she thought of as her own and that is what he resented sharing her with the girls hearing the three of them laughing at something he wasn t in on the code they used among themselves that he could not break maybe even the time spent on their needs and not his they were a family somehow and he was not the head of it can you stitch this up for me baby um hm soon s i finish this petticoat she just got the one she came here in and everybody needs a change any pie left i think denver got the last of it and not complaining not even minding that he slept all over and around the house now which she put a stop to this night out of courtesy sethe sighed and placed her hand on his chest she knew she was building a case against him in order to build a case against getting pregnant and it shamed her a little but she had all the children she needed if her boys came back one day and denver and beloved stayed on well it would be the way it was supposed to be no right after she saw the shadows holding hands at the side of the road hadn t the picture altered and the minute she saw the dress and shoes sitting in the front yard she broke water didn t even have to see the face burning in the sunlight she had been dreaming it for years paul d s chest rose and fell rose and fell under her hand chapter denver finished washing the dishes and sat down at the table beloved who had not moved since sethe and paul d left the room sat sucking her forefinger denver watched her face awhile and then said she likes him here beloved went on probing her mouth with her finger make him go away she said she might be mad at you if he leaves beloved inserting a thumb in her mouth along with the forefinger pulled out a back tooth there was hardly any blood but denver said ooooh didn t that hurt you beloved looked at the tooth and thought this is it next would be her arm her hand a toe pieces of her would drop maybe one at a time maybe all at once or on one of those mornings before denver woke and after sethe left she would fly apart it is difficult keeping her head on her neck her legs attached to her hips when she is by herself among the things she could not remember was when she first knew that she could wake up any day and find herself in pieces she had two dreams exploding and being swallowed when her tooth came out an odd fragment last in the row she thought it was starting must be a wisdom said denver don t it hurt yes then why don t you cry what if it hurts why don t you cry and she did sitting there holding a small white tooth in the palm of her smooth smooth hand cried the way she wanted to when turtles came out of the water one behind the other right after the blood red bird disappeared back into the leaves the way she wanted to when sethe went to him standing in the tub under the stairs with the tip of her tongue she touched the salt water that slid to the corner of her mouth and hoped denver s arm around her shoulders would keep them from falling apart the couple upstairs united didn t hear a sound but below them outside all around the snow went on and on and on piling itself burying itself higher deeper chapter at the back of baby suggs mind may have been the thought that if halle made it god do what he would it would be a cause for celebration if only this final son could do for himself what he had done for her and for the three children john and ella delivered to her door one summer night when the children arrived and no sethe she was afraid and grateful grateful that the part of the family that survived was her own grandchildren the first and only she would know two boys and a little girl who was crawling already but she held her heart still afraid to form questions what about sethe and halle why the delay why didn t sethe get on board too nobody could make it alone not only because trappers picked them off like buzzards or netted them like rabbits but also because you couldn t run if you didn t know how to go you could be lost forever if there wasn t nobody to show you the way so when sethe arrived all mashed up and split open but with another grandchild in her arms the idea of a whoop moved closer to the front of her brain but since there was still no sign of halle and sethe herself didn t know what had happened to him she let the whoop lie not wishing to hurt his chances by thanking god too soon it was stamp paid who started it twenty days after sethe got to he came by and looked at the baby he had tied up in his nephew s jacket looked at the mother he had handed a piece of fried eel to and for some private reason of his own went off with two buckets to a place near the river s edge that only he knew about where blackberries grew tasting so good and happy that to eat them was like being in church just one of the berries and you felt anointed he walked six miles to the riverbank did a slide run slide down into a ravine made almost inaccessible by brush he reached through brambles lined with blood drawing thorns thick as knives that cut through his shirt sleeves and trousers all the while suffering mosquitoes bees hornets wasps and the meanest lady spiders in the state scratched raked and bitten he maneuvered through and took hold of each berry with fingertips so gentle not a single one was bruised late in the afternoon he got back to and put two full buckets down on the porch when baby suggs saw his shredded clothes bleeding hands welted face and neck she sat down laughing out loud buglar howard the woman in the bonnet and sethe came to look and then laughed along with baby suggs at the sight of the sly steely old black man agent fisherman boatman tracker savior spy standing in broad daylight whipped finally by two pails of blackberries paying them no mind he took a berry and put it in the three week old denver s mouth the women shrieked she s too little for that stamp bowels be soup sickify her stomach but the baby s thrilled eyes and smacking lips made them follow suit sampling one at a time the berries that tasted like church finally baby suggs slapped the boys hands away from the bucket and sent stamp around to the pump to rinse himself she had decided to do something with the fruit worthy of the man s labor and his love that s how it began she made the pastry dough and thought she ought to tell ella and john to stop on by because three pies maybe four were too much to keep for one s own sethe thought they might as well back it up with a couple of chickens stamp allowed that perch and catfish were jumping into the boat didn t even have to drop a line from denver s two thrilled eyes it grew to a feast for ninety people shook with their voices far into the night ninety people who ate so well and laughed so much it made them angry they woke up the next morning and remembered the meal fried perch that stamp paid handled with a hickory twig holding his left palm out against the spit and pop of the boiling grease the corn pudding made with cream tired overfed children asleep in the grass tiny bones of roasted rabbit still in their hands and got angry baby suggs three maybe four pies grew to ten maybe twelve sethe s two hens became five turkeys the one block of ice brought all the way from cincinnati over which they poured mashed watermelon mixed with sugar and mint to make a punch became a wagonload of ice cakes for a washtub full of strawberry shrug rocking with laughter goodwill and food for ninety made them angry too much they thought where does she get it all baby suggs holy why is she and hers always the center of things how come she always knows exactly what to do and when giving advice passing messages healing the sick hiding fugitives loving cooking cooking loving preaching singing dancing and loving everybody like it was her job and hers alone now to take two buckets of blackberries and make ten maybe twelve pies to have turkey enough for the whole town pretty near new peas in september fresh cream but no cow ice and sugar batter bread bread pudding raised bread shortbread it made them mad loaves and fishes were his powers they did not belong to an ex slave who had probably never carried one hundred pounds to the scale or picked okra with a baby on her back who had never been lashed by a ten year old whiteboy as god knows they had who had not even escaped slavery had in fact been bought out of it by a doting son and driven to the ohio river in a wagon free papers folded between her breasts driven by the very man who had been her master who also paid her resettlement fee name of garner and rented a house with two floors and a well from the bodwins the white brother and sister who gave stamp paid ella and john clothes goods and gear for runaways because they hated slavery worse than they hated slaves it made them furious they swallowed baking soda the morning after to calm the stomach violence caused by the bounty the reckless generosity on display at whispered to each other in the yards about fat rats doom and uncalled for pride the scent of their disapproval lay heavy in the air baby suggs woke to it and wondered what it was as she boiled hominy for her grandchildren later as she stood in the garden chopping at the tight soil over the roots of the pepper plants she smelled it again she lifted her head and looked around behind her some yards to the left sethe squatted in the pole beans her shoulders were distorted by the greased flannel under her dress to encourage the healing of her back near her in a bushel basket was the three week old baby baby suggs holy looked up the sky was blue and clear not one touch of death in the definite green of the leaves she could hear birds and faintly the stream way down in the meadow the puppy here boy was burying the last bones from yesterday s party from somewhere at the side of the house came the voices of buglar howard and the crawling girl nothing seemed amiss yet the smell of disapproval was sharp back beyond the vegetable garden closer to the stream but in full sun she had planted corn much as they d picked for the party there were still ears ripening which she could see from where she stood baby suggs leaned back into the peppers and the squash vines with her hoe carefully with the blade at just the right angle she cut through a stalk of insistent rue its flowers she stuck through a split in her hat the rest she tossed aside the quiet clok clok clok of wood splitting reminded her that stamp was doing the chore he promised to the night before she sighed at her work and a moment later straightened up to sniff the disapproval once again resting on the handle of the hoe she concentrated she was accustomed to the knowledge that nobody prayed for her but this free floating repulsion was new it wasn t whitefolks that much she could tell so it must be colored ones and then she knew her friends and neighbors were angry at her because she had overstepped given too much offended them by excess baby closed her eyes perhaps they were right suddenly behind the disapproving odor way way back behind it she smelled another thing dark and coming something she couldn t get at because the other odor hid it she squeezed her eyes tight to see what it was but all she could make out was high topped shoes she didn t like the look of thwarted yet wondering she chopped away with the hoe what could it be this dark and coming thing what was left to hurt her now news of halle s death no she had been prepared for that better than she had for his life the last of her children whom she barely glanced at when he was born because it wasn t worth the trouble to try to learn features you would never see change into adulthood anyway seven times she had done that held a little foot examined the fat fingertips with her own fingers she never saw become the male or female hands a mother would recognize anywhere she didn t know to this day what their permanent teeth looked like or how they held their heads when they walked did patty lose her lisp what color did famous skin finally take was that a cleft in johnny s chin or just a dimple that would disappear soon s his jawbone changed four girls and the last time she saw them there was no hair under their arms does ardelia still love the burned bottom of bread all seven were gone or dead what would be the point of looking too hard at that youngest one but for some reason they let her keep him he was with her everywhere when she hurt her hip in carolina she was a real bargain costing less than halle who was ten then for mr garner who took them both to kentucky to a farm he called sweet home because of the hip she jerked like a three legged dog when she walked but at sweet home there wasn t a rice field or tobacco patch in sight and nobody but nobody knocked her down not once lillian garner called her jenny for some reason but she never pushed hit or called her mean names even when she slipped in cow dung and broke every egg in her apron nobody said you blackbitchwhat sthematterwith you and nobody knocked her down sweet home was tiny compared to the places she had been mr garner mrs garner herself halle and four boys over half named paul made up the entire population mrs garner hummed when she worked mr garner acted like the world was a toy he was supposed to have fun with neither wanted her in the field mr garner s boys including halle did all of that which was a blessing since she could not have managed it anyway what she did was stand beside the humming lillian garner while the two of them cooked preserved washed ironed made candles clothes soap and cider fed chickens pigs dogs and geese milked cows churned butter rendered fat laid fires nothing to it and nobody knocked her down her hip hurt every single day but she never spoke of it only halle who had watched her movements closely for the last four years knew that to get in and out of bed she had to lift her thigh with both hands which was why he spoke to mr garner about buying her out of there so she could sit down for a change sweet boy the one person who did something hard for her gave her his work his life and now his children whose voices she could just make out as she stood in the garden wondering what was the dark and coming thing behind the scent of disapproval sweet home was a marked improvement no question and no matter for the sadness was at her center the desolated center where the self that was no self made its home sad as it was that she did not know where her children were buried or what they looked like if alive fact was she knew more about them than she knew about herself having never had the map to discover what she was like could she sing was it nice to hear when she did was she pretty was she a good friend could she have been a loving mother a faithful wife have i got a sister and does she favor me if my mother knew me would she like me in lillian garner s house exempted from the field work that broke her hip and the exhaustion that drugged her mind in lillian garner s house where nobody knocked her down or up she listened to the whitewoman humming at her work watched her face light up when mr garner came in and thought it s better here but i m not the garners it seemed to her ran a special kind of slavery treating them like paid labor listening to what they said teaching what they wanted known and he didn t stud his boys never brought them to her cabin with directions to lay down with her like they did in carolina or rented their sex out on other farms it surprised and pleased her but worried her too would he pick women for them or what did he think was going to happen when those boys ran smack into their nature some danger he was courting and he surely knew it in fact his order for them not to leave sweet home except in his company was not so much because of the law but the danger of men bred slaves on the loose baby suggs talked as little as she could get away with because what was there to say that the roots of her tongue could manage so the whitewoman finding her new slave excellent if silent help hummed to herself while she worked when mr garner agreed to the arrangements with halle and when halle looked like it meant more to him that she go free than anything in the world she let herself be taken cross the river of the two hard thingsstanding on her feet till she dropped or leaving her last and probably only living child she chose the hard thing that made him happy and never put to him the question she put to herself what for what does a sixty odd year old slavewoman who walks like a three legged dog need freedom for and when she stepped foot on free ground she could not believe that halle knew what she didn t that halle who had never drawn one free breath knew that there was nothing like it in this world it scared her something s the matter what s the matter what s the matter she asked herself she didn t know what she looked like and was not curious but suddenly she saw her hands and thought with a clarity as simple as it was dazzling these hands belong to me these my hands next she felt a knocking in her chest and discovered something else new her own heartbeat had it been there all along this pounding thing she felt like a fool and began to laugh out loud mr garner looked over his shoulder at her with wide brown eyes and smiled himself what s funny jenny she couldn t stop laughing my heart s beating she said and it was true mr garner laughed nothing to be scared of jenny just keep your same ways you ll be all right she covered her mouth to keep from laughing too loud these people i m taking you to will give you what help you need name of bodwin a brother and a sister scots i been knowing them for twenty years or more baby suggs thought it was a good time to ask him something she had long wanted to know mr garner she said why you all call me jenny cause that what s on your sales ticket gal ain t that your name what you call yourself nothings she said i don t call myself nothing mr garner went red with laughter when i took you out of carolina whitlow called you jenny and jenny whitlow is what his bill said didn t he call you jenny no sir if he did i didn t hear it what did you answer to anything but suggs is what my husband name you got married jenny i didn t know it manner of speaking you know where he is this husband no sir is that halle s daddy no sir why you call him suggs then his bill of sale says whitlow too just like yours suggs is my name sir from my husband he didn t call me jenny what he call you baby well said mr garner going pink again if i was you i d stick to jenny whitlow mrs baby suggs ain t no name for a freed negro maybe not she thought but baby suggs was all she had left of the husband she claimed a serious melancholy man who taught her how to make shoes the two of them made a pact whichever one got a chance to run would take it together if possible alone if not and no looking back he got his chance and since she never heard otherwise she believed he made it now how could he find or hear tell of her if she was calling herself some bill of sale name she couldn t get over the city more people than carolina and enough whitefolks to stop the breath two story buildings everywhere and walkways made of perfectly cut slats of wood roads wide as garner s whole house this is a city of water said mr garner everything travels by water and what the rivers can t carry the canals take a queen of a city jenny everything you ever dreamed of they make it right here iron stoves buttons ships shirts hairbrushes paint steam engines books a sewer system make your eyes bug out oh this is a city all right if you have to live in a city this is it the bodwins lived right in the center of a street full of houses and trees mr garner leaped out and tied his horse to a solid iron post here we are baby picked up her bundle and with great difficulty caused by her hip and the hours of sitting in a wagon climbed down mr garner was up the walk and on the porch before she touched ground but she got a peep at a negro girl s face at the open door before she followed a path to the back of the house she waited what seemed a long time before this same girl opened the kitchen door and offered her a seat by the window can i get you anything to eat ma am the girl asked no darling i d look favorable on some water though the girl went to the sink and pumped a cupful of water she placed it in baby suggs hand i m janey ma am baby marveling at the sink drank every drop of water although it tasted like a serious medicine suggs she said blotting her lips with the back of her hand baby suggs glad to meet you mrs suggs you going to be staying here i don t know where i ll be mr garner that s him what brought me here he say he arrange something for me and then i m free you know janey smiled yes ma am your people live around here yes ma am all us live out on bluestone we scattered said baby suggs but maybe not for long great god she thought where do i start get somebody to write old whitlow see who took patty and rosa lee somebody name dunn got ardelia and went west she heard no point in trying for tyree or john they cut thirty years ago and if she searched too hard and they were hiding finding them would do them more harm than good nancy and famous died in a ship off the virginia coast before it set sail for savannah that much she knew the overseer at whitlow s place brought her the news more from a wish to have his way with her than from the kindness of his heart the captain waited three weeks in port to get a full cargo before setting off of the slaves in the hold who didn t make it he said two were whitlow pickaninnies name of but she knew their names she knew and covered her ears with her fists to keep from hearing them come from his mouth janey heated some milk and poured it in a bowl next to a plate of cornbread after some coaxing baby suggs came to the table and sat down she crumbled the bread into the hot milk and discovered she was hungrier than she had ever been in her life and that was saying something they going to miss this no said janey eat all you want it s ours anybody else live here just me mr woodruff he does the outside chores he comes by two three days a week just you two yes ma am i do the cooking and washing maybe your people know of somebody looking for help i be sure to ask but i know they take women at the slaughterhouse doing what i don t know something men don t want to do i reckon my cousin say you get all the meat you want plus twenty five cents the hour she make summer sausage baby suggs lifted her hand to the top of her head money money they would pay her money every single day money where is this here slaughterhouse she asked before janey could answer the bodwins came in to the kitchen with a grinning mr garner behind undeniably brother and sister both dressed in gray with faces too young for their snow white hair did you give her anything to eat janey asked the brother yes sir keep your seat jenny said the sister and that good news got better when they asked what work she could do instead of reeling off the hundreds of tasks she had performed she asked about the slaughterhouse she was too old for that they said she s the best cobbler you ever see said mr garner cobbler sister bodwin raised her black thick eyebrows who taught you that was a slave taught me said baby suggs new boots or just repair new old anything well said brother bodwin that ll be something but you ll need more what about taking in wash asked sister bodwin yes ma am two cents a pound yes ma am but where s the in what you said take in wash where is the in where i m going to be oh just listen to this jenny said mr garner these two angels got a house for you place they own out a ways it had belonged to their grandparents before they moved in town recently it had been rented out to a whole parcel of negroes who had left the state it was too big a house for jenny alone they said two rooms upstairs two down but it was the best and the only thing they could do in return for laundry some seamstress work a little canning and so on oh shoes too they would permit her to stay there provided she was clean the past parcel of colored wasn t baby suggs agreed to the situation sorry to see the money go but excited about a house with stepsnever mind she couldn t climb them mr garner told the bodwins that she was a right fine cook as well as a fine cobbler and showed his belly and the sample on his feet everybody laughed anything you need let us know said the sister we don t hold with slavery even garner s kind tell em jenny you live any better on any place before mine no sir she said no place how long was you at sweet home ten year i believe ever go hungry no sir cold no sir anybody lay a hand on you no sir did i let halle buy you or not yes sir you did she said thinking but you got my boy and i m all broke down you be renting him out to pay for me way after i m gone to glory woodruff they said would carry her out there they said and all three disappeared through the kitchen door i have to fix the supper now said janey i ll help said baby suggs you too short to reach the fire it was dark when woodruff clicked the horse into a trot he was a young man with a heavy beard and a burned place on his jaw the beard did not hide you born up here baby suggs asked him no ma am virginia been here a couple years i see you going to a nice house big too a preacher and his family was in there eighteen children have mercy where they go took off to illinois bishop allen gave him a congregation up there big what churches around here i ain t set foot in one in ten years how come wasn t none i dislike the place i was before this last one but i did get to church every sunday some kind of way i bet the lord done forgot who i am by now go see reverend pike ma am he ll reacquaint you i won t need him for that i can make my own acquaintance what i need him for is to reacquaint me with my children he can read and write i reckon sure good cause i got a lot of digging up to do but the news they dug up was so pitiful she quit after two years of messages written by the preacher s hand two years of washing sewing canning cobbling gardening and sitting in churches all she found out was that the whitlow place was gone and that you couldn t write to a man named dunn if all you knew was that he went west the good news however was that halle got married and had a baby coming she fixed on that and her own brand of preaching having made up her mind about what to do with the heart that started beating the minute she crossed the ohio river and it worked out worked out just fine until she got proud and let herself be overwhelmed by the sight of her daughter in law and halle s children one of whom was born on the way and have a celebration of blackberries that put christmas to shame now she stood in the garden smelling disapproval feeling a dark and coming thing and seeing high topped shoes that she didn t like the look of at all at all chapter when the four horsemen came schoolteacher one nephew one slave catcher and a sheriff the house on bluestone road was so quiet they thought they were too late three of them dismounted one stayed in the saddle his rifle ready his eyes trained away from the house to the left and to the right because likely as not the fugitive would make a dash for it although sometimes you could never tell you d find them folded up tight somewhere beneath floorboards in a pantry once in a chimney even then care was taken because the quietest ones the ones you pulled from a press a hayloft or that once from a chimney would go along nicely for two or three seconds caught red handed so to speak they would seem to recognize the futility of outsmarting a whiteman and the hopelessness of outrunning a rifle smile even like a child caught dead with his hand in the jelly jar and when you reached for the rope to tie him well even then you couldn t tell the very nigger with his head hanging and a little jelly jar smile on his face could all of a sudden roar like a bull or some such and commence to do disbelievable things grab the rifle at its mouth throw himself at the one holding it anything so you had to keep back a pace leave the tying to another otherwise you ended up killing what you were paid to bring back alive unlike a snake or a bear a dead nigger could not be skinned for profit and was not worth his own dead weight in coin six or seven negroes were walking up the road toward the house two boys from the slave catcher s left and some women from his right he motioned them still with his rifle and they stood where they were the nephew came back from peeping inside the house and after touching his lips for silence pointed his thumb to say that what they were looking for was round back the slave catcher dismounted then and joined the others schoolteacher and the nephew moved to the left of the house himself and the sheriff to the right a crazy old nigger was standing in the woodpile with an ax you could tell he was crazy right off because he was grunting making low cat noises like about twelve yards beyond that nigger was another one a woman with a flower in her hat crazy too probably because she too was standing stock still but fanning her hands as though pushing cobwebs out of her way both however were staring at the same place a shed nephew walked over to the old nigger boy and took the ax from him then all four started toward the shed inside two boys bled in the sawdust and dirt at the feet of a nigger woman holding a blood soaked child to her chest with one hand and an infant by the heels in the other she did not look at them she simply swung the baby toward the wall planks missed and tried to connect a second time when out of nowheremin the ticking time the men spent staring at what there was to stare the old nigger boy still mewing ran through the door behind them and snatched the baby from the arch of its mother s swing right off it was clear to schoolteacher especially that there was nothing there to claim the three now four because she d had the one coming when she cut pickaninnies they had hoped were alive and well enough to take back to kentucky take back and raise properly to do the work sweet home desperately needed were not two were lying open eyed in sawdust a third pumped blood down the dress of the main one the woman schoolteacher bragged about the one he said made fine ink damn good soup pressed his collars the way he liked besides having at least ten breeding years left but now she d gone wild due to the mishandling of the nephew who d overbeat her and made her cut and run schoolteacher had chastised that nephew telling him to think just think what would his own horse do if you beat it beyond the point of education or chipper or samson suppose you beat the hounds past that point thataway never again could you trust them in the woods or anywhere else you d be feeding them maybe holding out a piece of rabbit in your hand and the animal would revert bite your hand clean off so he punished that nephew by not letting him come on the hunt made him stay there feed stock feed himself feed lillian tend crops see how he liked it see what happened when you overbear creatures god had given you the responsibility of the trouble it was and the loss the whole lot was lost now five he could claim the baby struggling in the arms of the mewing old man but who d tend her because the woman something was wrong with her she was looking at him now and if his other nephew could see that look he would learn the lesson for sure you just can t mishandle creatures and expect success the nephew the one who had nursed her while his brother held her down didn t know he was shaking his uncle had warned him against that kind of confusion but the warning didn t seem to be taking what she go and do that for on account of a beating hell he d been beat a million times and he was white once it hurt so bad and made him so mad he d smashed the well bucket another time he took it out on samson a few tossed rocks was all but no beating ever made him i mean no way he could have what she go and do that for and that is what he asked the sheriff who was standing there amazed like the rest of them but not shaking he was swallowing hard over and over again what she want to go and do that for the sheriff turned then said to the other three you all better go on look like your business is over mine s started now schoolteacher beat his hat against his thigh and spit before leaving the woodshed nephew and the catcher backed out with him they didn t look at the woman in the pepper plants with the flower in her hat and they didn t look at the seven or so faces that had edged closer in spite of the catcher s rifle warning enough nigger eyes for now little nigger boy eyes open in sawdust little nigger girl eyes staring between the wet fingers that held her face so her head wouldn t fall off little nigger baby eyes crinkling up to cry in the arms of the old nigger whose own eyes were nothing but slivers looking down at his feet but the worst ones were those of the nigger woman who looked like she didn t have any since the whites in them had disappeared and since they were as black as her skin she looked blind they unhitched from schoolteacher s horse the borrowed mule that was to carry the fugitive woman back to where she belonged and tied it to the fence then with the sun straight up over their heads they trotted off leaving the sheriff behind among the damnedest bunch of coons they d ever seen all testimony to the results of a little so called freedom imposed on people who needed every care and guidance in the world to keep them from the cannibal life they preferred the sheriff wanted to back out too to stand in the sunlight outside of that place meant for housing wood coal kerosene fuel for cold ohio winters which he thought of now while resisting the urge to run into the august sunlight not because he was afraid not at all he was just cold and he didn t want to touch anything the baby in the old man s arms was crying and the woman s eyes with no whites were gazing straight ahead they all might have remained that way frozen till thursday except one of the boys on the floor sighed as if he were sunk in the pleasure of a deep sweet sleep he sighed the sigh that flung the sheriff into action i ll have to take you in no trouble now you ve done enough to last you come on now she did not move you come quiet hear and i won t have to tie you up she stayed still and he had made up his mind to go near her and some kind of way bind her wet red hands when a shadow behind him in the doorway made him turn the nigger with the flower in her hat entered baby suggs noticed who breathed and who did not and went straight to the boys lying in the dirt the old man moved to the woman gazing and said sethe you take my armload and gimme yours she turned to him and glancing at the baby he was holding made a low sound in her throat as though she d made a mistake left the salt out of the bread or something i m going out here and send for a wagon the sheriff said and got into the sunlight at last but neither stamp paid nor baby suggs could make her put her crawling already girl down out of the shed back in the house she held on baby suggs had got the boys inside and was bathing their heads rubbing their hands lifting their lids whispering beg your pardon i beg your pardon the whole time she bound their wounds and made them breathe camphor before turning her attention to sethe she took the crying baby from stamp paid and carried it on her shoulder for a full two minutes then stood in front of its mother it s time to nurse your youngest she said sethe reached up for the baby without letting the dead one go baby suggs shook her head one at a time she said and traded the living for the dead which she carried into the keeping room when she came back sethe was aiming a bloody nipple into the baby s mouth baby suggs slammed her fist on the table and shouted clean up clean yourself up they fought then like rivals over the heart of the loved they fought each struggling for the nursing child baby suggs lost when she slipped in a red puddle and fell so denver took her mother s milk right along with the blood of her sister and that s the way they were when the sheriff returned having commandeered a neighbor s cart and ordered stamp to drive it outside a throng now of black faces stopped murmuring holding the living child sethe walked past them in their silence and hers she climbed into the cart her profile knife clean against a cheery blue sky a profile that shocked them with its clarity was her head a bit too high her back a little too straight probably otherwise the singing would have begun at once the moment she appeared in the doorway of the house on bluestone road some cape of sound would have quickly been wrapped around her like arms to hold and steady her on the way as it was they waited till the cart turned about headed west to town and then no words humming no words at all baby suggs meant to run skip down the porch steps after the cart screaming no no don t let her take that last one too she meant to had started to but when she got up from the floor and reached the yard the cart was gone and a wagon was rolling up a red haired boy and a yellow haired girl jumped down and ran through the crowd toward her the boy had a half eaten sweet pepper in one hand and a pair of shoes in the other mama says wednesday he held them together by their tongues she says you got to have these fixed by wednesday baby suggs looked at him and then at the woman holding a twitching lead horse to the road she says wednesday you hear baby baby she took the shoes from him high topped and muddy saying i beg your pardon lord i beg your pardon i sure do out of sight the cart creaked on down bluestone road nobody in it spoke the wagon rock had put the baby to sleep the hot sun dried sethe s dress stiff like rigor morris chapter that ain t her mouth anybody who didn t know her or maybe somebody who just got a glimpse of her through the peephole at the restaurant might think it was hers but paul d knew better oh well a little something around the forehead a quietness that kind of reminded you of her but there was no way you could take that for her mouth and he said so told stamp paid who was watching him carefully i don t know man don t look like it to me i know sethe s mouth and this ain t it he smoothed the clipping with his fingers and peered at it not at all disturbed from the solemn air with which stamp had unfolded the paper the tenderness in the old man s fingers as he stroked its creases and flattened it out first on his knees then on the split top of the piling paul d knew that it ought to mess him up that whatever was written on it should shake him pigs were crying in the chute all day paul d stamp paid and twenty more had pushed and prodded them from canal to shore to chute to slaughterhouse although as grain farmers moved west st louis and chicago now ate up a lot of the business cincinnati was still pig port in the minds of ohioans its main job was to receive slaughter and ship up the river the hogs that northerners did not want to live without for a month or so in the winter any stray man had work if he could breathe the stench of offal and stand up for twelve hours skills in which paul d was admirably trained a little pig shit rinsed from every place he could touch remained on his boots and he was conscious of it as he stood there with a light smile of scorn curling his lips usually he left his boots in the shed and put his walking shoes on along with his day clothes in the corner before he went home a route that took him smack dab through the middle of a cemetery as old as sky rife with the agitation of dead miami no longer content to rest in the mounds that covered them over their heads walked a strange people through their earth pillows roads were cut wells and houses nudged them out of eternal rest outraged more by their folly in believing land was holy than by the disturbances of their peace they growled on the banks of licking river sighed in the trees on catherine street and rode the wind above the pig yards paul d heard them but he stayed on because all in all it wasn t a bad job especially in winter when cincinnati reassumed its status of slaughter and riverboat capital the craving for pork was growing into a mania in every city in the country pig farmers were cashing in provided they could raise enough and get them sold farther and farther away and the germans who flooded southern ohio brought and developed swine cooking to its highest form pig boats jammed the ohio river and their captains hollering at one another over the grunts of the stock was as common a water sound as that of the ducks flying over their heads sheep cows and fowl too floated up and down that river and all a negro had to do was show up and there was work poking killing cutting skinning case packing and saving offal a hundred yards from the crying pigs the two men stood behind a shed on western row and it was clear why stamp had been eyeing paul d this last week of work why he paused when the evening shift came on to let paul d s movements catch up to his own he had made up his mind to show him this piece of paper newspaper with a picture drawing of a woman who favored sethe except that was not her mouth nothing like it paul d slid the clipping out from under stamp s palm the print meant nothing to him so he didn t even glance at it he simply looked at the face shaking his head no no at the mouth you see and no at whatever it was those black scratches said and no to whatever it was stamp paid wanted him to know because there was no way in hell a black face could appear in a newspaper if the story was about something anybody wanted to hear a whip of fear broke through the heart chambers as soon as you saw a negro s face in a paper since the face was not there because the person had a healthy baby or outran a street mob nor was it there because the person had been killed or maimed or caught or burned or jailed or whipped or evicted or stomped or raped or cheated since that could hardly qualify as news in a newspaper it would have to be something out of the ordinary something whitepeople would find interesting truly different worth a few minutes of teeth sucking if not gasps and it must have been hard to find news about negroes worth the breath catch of a white citizen of cincinnati so who was this woman with a mouth that was not sethe s but whose eyes were almost as calm as hers whose head was turned on her neck in the manner he loved so well it watered his eye to see it and he said so this ain t her mouth i know her mouth and this ain t it before stamp paid could speak he said it and even while he spoke paul d said it again oh he heard all the old man was saying but the more he heard the stranger the lips in the drawing became stamp started with the party the one baby suggs gave but stopped and backed up a bit to tell about the berries where they were and what was in the earth that made them grow like that they open to the sun but not the birds cause snakes down in there and the birds know it so they just grow fat and sweet with nobody to bother em cept me because don t nobody go in that piece of water but me and ain t too many legs willing to glide down that bank to get them me neither but i was willing that day somehow or nother i was willing and they whipped me i m telling you tore me up but i filled two buckets anyhow and took em over to baby suggs house it was on from then on such a cooking you never see no more we baked fried and stewed everything god put down here everybody came everybody stuffed cooked so much there wasn t a stick of kirdlin left for the next day i volunteered to do it and next morning i come over like i promised to do it but this ain t her mouth paul d said this ain t it at all stamp paid looked at him he was going to tell him about how restless baby suggs was that morning how she had a listening way about her how she kept looking down past the corn to the stream so much he looked too in between ax swings he watched where baby was watching which is why they both missed it they were looking the wrong way toward water and all the while it was coming down the road four riding close together bunched up like and righteous he was going to tell him that because he thought it was important why he and baby suggs both missed it and about the party too because that explained why nobody ran on ahead why nobody sent a fleet footed son to cut cross a field soon as they saw the four horses in town hitched for watering while the riders asked questions not ella not john not anybody ran down or to bluestone road to say some new whitefolks with the look just rode in the righteous look every negro learned to recognize along with his ma am s tit like a flag hoisted this righteousness telegraphed and announced the faggot the whip the fist the lie long before it went public nobody warned them and he d always believed it wasn t the exhaustion from a long day s gorging that dulled them but some other thing like well like meanness that let them stand aside or not pay attention or tell themselves somebody else was probably bearing the news already to the house on bluestone road where a pretty woman had been living for almost a month young and deft with four children one of which she delivered herself the day before she got there and who now had the full benefit of baby suggs bounty and her big old heart maybe they just wanted to know if baby really was special blessed in some way they were not he was going to tell him that but paul d was laughing saying uh uh no way a little semblance round the forehead maybe but this ain t her mouth so stamp paid did not tell him how she flew snatching up her children like a hawk on the wing how her face beaked how her hands worked like claws how she collected them every which way one on her shoulder one under her arm one by the hand the other shouted forward into the woodshed filled with just sunlight and shavings now because there wasn t any wood the party had used it all which is why he was chopping some nothing was in that shed he knew having been there early that morning nothing but sunlight sunlight shavings a shovel the ax he himself took out nothing else was in there except the shovel and of course the saw you forgetting i knew her before paul d was saying back in kentucky when she was a girl i didn t just make her acquaintance a few months ago i been knowing her a long time and i can tell you for sure this ain t her mouth may look like it but it ain t so stamp paid didn t say it all instead he took a breath and leaned toward the mouth that was not hers and slowly read out the words paul d couldn t and when he finished paul d said with a vigor fresher than the first time i m sorry stamp it s a mistake somewhere cause that ain t her mouth stamp looked into paul d s eyes and the sweet conviction in them almost made him wonder if it had happened at all eighteen years ago that while he and baby suggs were looking the wrong way a pretty little slavegirl had recognized a hat and split to the woodshed to kill her children chapter she was crawling already when i got here one week less and the baby who was sitting up and turning over when i put her on the wagon was crawling already devil of a time keeping her off the stairs nowadays babies get up and walk soon s you drop em but twenty years ago when i was a girl babies stayed babies longer howard didn t pick up his own head till he was nine months baby suggs said it was the food you know if you ain t got nothing but milk to give em well they don t do things so quick milk was all i ever had i thought teeth meant they was ready to chew wasn t nobody to ask mrs garner never had no children and we was the only women there she was spinning round and round the room past the jelly cupboard past the window past the front door another window the sideboard the keeping room door the dry sink the stove back to the jelly cupboard paul d sat at the table watching her drift into view then disappear behind his back turning like a slow but steady wheel sometimes she crossed her hands behind her back other times she held her ears covered her mouth or folded her arms across her breasts once in a while she rubbed her hips as she turned but the wheel never stopped remember aunt phyllis from out by minnoveville mr garner sent one a you all to get her for each and every one of my babies that d be the only time i saw her many s the time i wanted to get over to where she was just to talk my plan was to ask mrs garner to let me off at minnowville whilst she went to meeting pick me up on her way back i believe she would a done that if i was to ask her i never did cause that s the only day halle and me had with sunlight in it for the both of us to see each other by so there wasn t nobody to talk to i mean who d know when it was time to chew up a little something and give it to em is that what make the teeth come on out or should you wait till the teeth came and then solid food well i know now because baby suggs fed her right and a week later when i got here she was crawling already no stopping her either she loved those steps so much we painted them so she could see her way to the top sethe smiled then at the memory of it the smile broke in two and became a sudden suck of air but she did not shudder or close her eyes she wheeled i wish i d a known more but like i say there wasn t nobody to talk to woman i mean so i tried to recollect what i d seen back where i was before sweet home how the women did there oh they knew all about it how to make that thing you use to hang the babies in the trees so you could see them out of harm s way while you worked the fields was a leaf thing too they gave em to chew on mint i believe or sassafras comfrey maybe i still don t know how they constructed that basket thing but i didn t need it anyway because all my work was in the barn and the house but i forgot what the leaf was i could have used that i tied buglar when we had all that pork to smoke fire everywhere and he was getting into everything i liked to lost him so many times once he got up on the well right on it i flew snatched him just in time so when i knew we d be rendering and smoking and i couldn t see after him well i got a rope and tied it round his ankle just long enough to play round a little but not long enough to reach the well or the fire i didn t like the look of it but i didn t know what else to do it s hard you know what i mean by yourself and no woman to help you get through halle was good but he was debt working all over the place and when he did get down to a little sleep i didn t want to be bothering him with all that sixo was the biggest help i don t spect you rememory this but howard got in the milk parlor and red cora i believe it was mashed his hand turned his thumb backwards when i got to him she was getting ready to bite it i don t know to this day how i got him out sixo heard him screaming and come running know what he did turned the thumb right back and tied it cross his palm to his little finger see i never would have thought of that never taught me a lot sixo it made him dizzy at first he thought it was her spinning circling him the way she was circling the subject round and round never changing direction which might have helped his head then he thought no it s the sound of her voice it s too near each turn she made was at least three yards from where he sat but listening to her was like having a child whisper into your ear so close you could feel its lips form the words you couldn t make out because they were too close he caught only pieces of what she said which was fine because she hadn t gotten to the main part the answer to the question he had not asked outright but which lay in the clipping he showed her and lay in the smile as well because he smiled too when he showed it to her so when she burst out laughing at the joke the mix up of her face put where some other coloredwoman s ought to be well he d be ready to laugh right along with her can you beat it he would ask and stamp done lost his mind she would giggle plumb lost it but his smile never got a chance to grow it hung there small and alone while she examined the clipping and then handed it back perhaps it was the smile or maybe the ever ready love she saw in his eyes easy and upfront the way colts evangelists and children look at you with love you don t have to deserve that made her go ahead and tell him what she had not told baby suggs the only person she felt obliged to explain anything to otherwise she would have said what the newspaper said she said and no more sethe could recognize only seventy five printed words half of which appeared in the newspaper clipping but she knew that the words she did not understand hadn t any more power than she had to explain it was the smile and the upfront love that made her try i don t have to tell you about sweet home what it was but maybe you don t know what it was like for me to get away from there covering the lower half of her face with her palms she paused to consider again the size of the miracle its flavor i did it i got us all out without halle too up till then it was the only thing i ever did on my own decided and it came off right like it was supposed to we was here each and every one of my babies and me too i birthed them and i got em out and it wasn t no accident i did that i had help of course lots of that but still it was me doing it me saying go on and now me having to look out me using my own head but it was more than that it was a kind of selfishness i never knew nothing about before it felt good good and right i was big paul d and deep and wide and when i stretched out my arms all my children could get in between i was that wide look like i loved em more after i got here or maybe i couldn t love em proper in kentucky because they wasn t mine to love but when i got here when i jumped down off that wagon there wasn t nobody in the world i couldn t love if i wanted to you know what i mean paul d did not answer because she didn t expect or want him to but he did know what she meant listening to the doves in alfred georgia and having neither the right nor the permission to enjoy it because in that place mist doves sunlight copper dirt moon every thing belonged to the men who had the guns little men some of them big men too each one of whom he could snap like a twig if he wanted to men who knew their manhood lay in their guns and were not even embarrassed by the knowledge that without gunshot fox would laugh at them and these men who made even vixen laugh could if you let them stop you from hearing doves or loving moonlight so you protected yourself and loved small picked the tiniest stars out of the sky to own lay down with head twisted in order to see the loved one over the rim of the trench before you slept stole shy glances at her between the trees at chain up grass blades salamanders spiders woodpeckers beetles a kingdom of ants anything bigger wouldn t do a woman a child a brother a big love like that would split you wide open in alfred georgia he knew exactly what she meant to get to a place where you could love anything you chose not to need permission for desire well now that was freedom circling circling now she was gnawing something else instead of getting to the point there was this piece of goods mrs garner gave me calico stripes it had with little flowers in between bout a yard not enough for more n a head tie but i been wanting to make a shift for my girl with it had the prettiest colors i don t even know what you call that color a rose but with yellow in it for the longest time i been meaning to make it for her and do you know like a fool i left it behind no more than a yard and i kept putting it off because i was tired or didn t have the time so when i got here even before they let me get out of bed i stitched her a little something from a piece of cloth baby suggs had well all i m saying is that s a selfish pleasure i never had before i couldn t let all that go back to where it was and i couldn t let her nor any of em live under schoolteacher that was out sethe knew that the circle she was making around the room him the subject would remain one that she could never close in pin it down for anybody who had to ask if they didn t get it right off she could never explain because the truth was simple not a long drawn out record of flowered shifts tree cages selfishness ankle ropes and wells simple she was squatting in the garden and when she saw them coming and recognized schoolteacher s hat she heard wings little hummingbirds stuck their needle beaks right through her headcloth into her hair and beat their wings and if she thought anything it was no no nono nonono simple she just flew collected every bit of life she had made all the parts of her that were precious and fine and beautiful and carried pushed dragged them through the veil out away over there where no one could hurt them over there outside this place where they would be safe and the hummingbird wings beat on sethe paused in her circle again and looked out the window she remembered when the yard had a fence with a gate that somebody was always latching and unlatching in the time when was busy as a way station she did not see the whiteboys who pulled it down yanked up the posts and smashed the gate leaving desolate and exposed at the very hour when everybody stopped dropping by the shoulder weeds of bluestone road were all that came toward the house when she got back from the jail house she was glad the fence was gone that s where they had hitched their horses where she saw floating above the railing as she squatted in the garden school teacher s hat by the time she faced him looked him dead in the eye she had something in her arms that stopped him in his tracks he took a backward step with each jump of the baby heart until finally there were none i stopped him she said staring at the place where the fence used to be i took and put my babies where they d be safe the roaring in paul d s head did not prevent him from hearing the pat she gave to the last word and it occurred to him that what she wanted for her children was exactly what was missing in safety which was the very first message he got the day he walked through the door he thought he had made it safe had gotten rid of the danger beat the shit out of it run it off the place and showed it and everybody else the difference between a mule and a plow and because she had not done it before he got there her own self he thought it was because she could not do it that she lived with in helpless apologetic resignation because she had no choice that minus husband sons mother in law she and her slow witted daughter had to live there all alone making do the prickly mean eyed sweet home girl he knew as halle s girl was obedient like halle shy like halle and work crazy like halle he was wrong this here sethe was new the ghost in her house didn t bother her for the very same reason a room and board witch with new shoes was welcome this here sethe talked about love like any other woman talked about baby clothes like any other woman but what she meant could cleave the bone this here sethe talked about safety with a handsaw this here new sethe didn t know where the world stopped and she began suddenly he saw what stamp paid wanted him to see more important than what sethe had done was what she claimed it scared him your love is too thick he said thinking that bitch is looking at me she is right over my head looking down through the floor at me too thick she said thinking of the clearing where baby suggs commands knocked the pods off horse chestnuts love is or it ain t thin love ain t love at all yeah it didn t work did it did it work he asked it worked she said how your boys gone you don t know where one girl dead the other won t leave the yard how did it work they ain t at sweet home schoolteacher ain t got em maybe there s worse it ain t my job to know what s worse it s my job to know what is and to keep them away from what i know is terrible i did that what you did was wrong sethe i should have gone on back there taken my babies back there there could have been a way some other way what way you got two feet sethe not four he said and right then a forest sprang up between them trackless and quiet later he would wonder what made him say it the calves of his youth or the conviction that he was being observed through the ceiling how fast he had moved from his shame to hers from his cold house secret straight to her too thick love meanwhile the forest was locking the distance between them giving it shape and heft he did not put his hat on right away first he fingered it deciding how his going would be how to make it an exit not an escape and it was very important not to leave without looking he stood up turned and looked up the white stairs she was there all right standing straight as a line with her back to him he didn t rush to the door he moved slowly and when he got there he opened it before asking sethe to put supper aside for him because he might be a little late getting back only then did he put on his hat sweet she thought he must think i can t bear to hear him say it that after all i have told him and after telling me how many feet i have goodbye would break me to pieces ain t that sweet so long she murmured from the far side of the trees book two chapter was loud stamp paid could hear it even from the road he walked toward the house holding his head as high as possible so nobody looking could call him a sneak although his worried mind made him feel like one ever since he showed that newspaper clipping to paul d and learned that he d moved out of that very day stamp felt uneasy having wrestled with the question of whether or not to tell a man about his woman and having convinced himself that he should he then began to worry about sethe had he stopped the one shot she had of the happiness a good man could bring her was she vexed by the loss the free and unasked for revival of gossip by the man who had helped her cross the river and who was her friend as well as baby suggs i m too old he thought for clear thinking i m too old and i seen too much he had insisted on privacy during the revelation at the slaughter yard now he wondered whom he was protecting paul d was the only one in town who didn t know how did information that had been in the newspaper become a secret that needed to be whispered in a pig yard a secret from whom sethe that s who he d gone behind her back like a sneak but sneaking was his job his life though always for a clear and holy purpose before the war all he did was sneak runaways into hidden places secret information to public places underneath his legal vegetables were the contraband humans that he ferried across the river even the pigs he worked in the spring served his purposes whole families lived on the bones and guts he distributed to them he wrote their letters and read to them the ones they received he knew who had dropsy and who needed stovewood which children had a gift and which needed correction he knew the secrets of the ohio river and its banks empty houses and full the best dancers the worst speakers those with beautiful voices and those who could not carry a tune there was nothing interesting between his legs but he remembered when there had been when that drive drove the driven and that was why he considered long and hard before opening his wooden box and searching for the eighteen year old clipping to show paul d as proof afterward not before he considered sethe s feelings in the matter and it was the lateness of this consideration that made him feel so bad maybe he should have left it alone maybe sethe would have gotten around to telling him herself maybe he was not the high minded soldier of christ he thought he was but an ordinary plain meddler who had interrupted something going along just fine for the sake of truth and forewarning things he set much store by now was back like it was before paul d came to town worrying sethe and denver with a pack of haunts he could hear from the road even if sethe could deal with the return of the spirit stamp didn t believe her daughter could denver needed somebody normal in her life by luck he had been there at her very birth almost before she knew she was alive and it made him partial to her it was seeing her alive don t you know and looking healthy four weeks later that pleased him so much he gathered all he could carry of the best blackberries in the county and stuck two in her mouth first before he presented the difficult harvest to baby suggs to this day he believed his berries which sparked the feast and the wood chopping that followed were the reason denver was still alive had he not been there chopping firewood sethe would have spread her baby brains on the planking maybe he should have thought of denver if not sethe before he gave paul d the news that ran him off the one normal somebody in the girl s life since baby suggs died and right there was the thorn deeper and more painful than his belated concern for denver or sethe scorching his soul like a silver dollar in a fool s pocket was the memory of baby suggs the mountain to his sky it was the memory of her and the honor that was her due that made him walk straight necked into the yard of although he heard its voices from the road he had stepped foot in this house only once after the misery which is what he called sethe s rough response to the fugitive bill and that was to carry baby suggs holy out of it when he picked her up in his arms she looked to him like a gift and he took the pleasure she would have knowing she didn t have to grind her hipbone anymore that at last somebody carried bar had she waited just a little she would have seen the end of the war its short flashy results they could have celebrated together gone to hear the great sermons preached on the occasion as it was he went alone from house to joyous house drinking what was offered but she hadn t waited and he attended her funeral more put out with her than bereaved sethe and her daughter were dry eyed on that occasion sethe had no instructions except take her to the clearing which he tried to do but was prevented by some rule the whites had invented about where the dead should rest baby suggs went down next to the baby with its throat cut a neighborliness that stamp wasn t sure had baby suggs approval the setting up was held in the yard because nobody besides himself would enter an injury sethe answered with another by refusing to attend the service reverend pike presided over she went instead to the gravesite whose silence she competed with as she stood there not joining in the hymns the others sang with all their hearts that insult spawned another by the mourners back in the yard of they ate the food they brought and did not touch sethe s who did not touch theirs and forbade denver to so baby suggs holy having devoted her freed life to harmony was buried amid a regular dance of pride fear condemnation and spite just about everybody in town was longing for sethe to come on difficult times her outrageous claims her self sufficiency seemed to demand it and stamp paid who had not felt a trickle of meanness his whole adult life wondered if some of the pride goeth before a fall expectations of the townsfolk had rubbed off on him anyhow which would explain why he had not considered sethe s feelings or denver s needs when he showed paul d the clipping he hadn t the vaguest notion of what he would do or say when and if sethe opened the door and turned her eyes on his he was willing to offer her help if she wanted any from him or receive her anger if she harbored any against him beyond that he trusted his instincts to right what he may have done wrong to baby suggs kin and to guide him in and through the stepped up haunting was subject to as evidenced by the voices he heard from the road other than that he would rely on the power of jesus christ to deal with things older but not stronger than he himself was what he heard as he moved toward the porch he didn t understand out on bluestone road he thought he heard a conflagration of hasty voices loud urgent all speaking at once so he could not make out what they were talking about or to whom the speech wasn t nonsensical exactly nor was it tongues but something was wrong with the order of the words and he couldn t describe or cipher it to save his life all he could make out was the word mine the rest of it stayed outside his mind s reach yet he went on through when he got to the steps the voices drained suddenly to less than a whisper it gave him pause they had become an occasional mutter like the interior sounds a woman makes when she believes she is alone and unobserved at her work a sth when she misses the needle s eye a soft moan when she sees another chip in her one good platter the low friendly argument with which she greets the hens nothing fierce or startling just that eternal private conversation that takes place between women and their tasks stamp paid raised his fist to knock on the door he had never knocked on because it was always open to or for him and could not do it dispensing with that formality was all the pay he expected from negroes in his debt once stamp paid brought you a coat got the message to you saved your life or fixed the cistern he took the liberty of walking in your door as though it were his own since all his visits were beneficial his step or holler through a doorway got a bright welcome rather than forfeit the one privilege he claimed for himself he lowered his hand and left the porch over and over again he tried it made up his mind to visit sethe broke through the loud hasty voices to the mumbling beyond it and stopped trying to figure out what to do at the door six times in as many days he abandoned his normal route and tried to knock at but the coldness of the gesture its sign that he was indeed a stranger at the gate overwhelmed him retracing his steps in the snow he sighed spirit willing flesh weak while stamp paid was making up his mind to visit for baby suggs sake sethe was trying to take her advice to lay it all down sword and shield not just to acknowledge the advice baby suggs gave her but actually to take it four days after paul d reminded her of how many feet she had sethe rummaged among the shoes of strangers to find the ice skates she was sure were there digging in the heap she despised herself for having been so trusting so quick to surrender at the stove while paul d kissed her back she should have known that he would behave like everybody else in town once he knew the twenty eight days of having women friends a mother in law and all her children together of being part of a neighborhood of in fact having neighbors at all to call her own all that was long gone and would never come back no more dancing in the clearing or happy feeds no more discussions stormy or quiet about the true meaning of the fugitive bill the settlement fee god s ways and negro pews antislavery manumission skin voting republicans dred scott book learning sojourner s high wheeled buggy the colored ladies of delaware ohio and the other weighty issues that held them in chairs scraping the floorboards or pacing them in agony or exhilaration no anxious wait for the north star or news of a beat off no sighing at a new betrayal or handclapping at a small victory those twenty eight happy days were followed by eighteen years of disapproval and a solitary life then a few months of the sun splashed life that the shadows holding hands on the road promised her tentative greetings from other coloredpeople in paul d s company a bed life for herself except for denver s friend every bit of it had disappeared was that the pattern she wondered every eighteen or twenty years her unlivable life would be interrupted by a short lived glory well if that s the way it was that s the way it was she had been on her knees scrubbing the floor denver trailing her with the drying rags when beloved appeared saying what these do on her knees scrub brush in hand she looked at the girl and the skates she held up sethe couldn t skate a lick but then and there she decided to take baby suggs advice lay it all down she left the bucket where it was told denver to get out the shawls and started searching for the other skates she was certain were in that heap somewhere anybody feeling sorry for her anybody wandering by to peep in and see how she was getting on including paul d would discover that the woman junkheaped for the third time because she loved her children that woman was sailing happily on a frozen creek hurriedly carelessly she threw the shoes about she found one blade a man s well she said we ll take turns two skates on one one skate on one and shoe slide for the other nobody saw them falling holding hands bracing each other they swirled over the ice beloved wore the pair denver wore one step gliding over the treacherous ice sethe thought her two shoes would hold and anchor her she was wrong two paces onto the creek she lost her balance and landed on her behind the girls screaming with laughter joined her on the ice sethe struggled to stand and discovered not only that she could do a split but that it hurt her bones surfaced in unexpected places and so did laughter making a circle or a line the three of them could not stay upright for one whole minute but nobody saw them falling each seemed to be helping the other two stay upright yet every tumble doubled their delight the live oak and soughing pine on the banks enclosed them and absorbed their laughter while they fought gravity for each other s hands their skirts flew like wings and their skin turned pewter in the cold and dying light nobody saw them falling exhausted finally they lay down on their backs to recover breath the sky above them was another country winter stars close enough to lick had come out before sunset for a moment looking up sethe entered the perfect peace they offered then denver stood up and tried for a long independent glide the tip of her single skate hit an ice bump and as she fell the flapping of her arms was so wild and hopeless that all three sethe beloved and denver herself laughed till they coughed sethe rose to her hands and knees laughter still shaking her chest making her eyes wet she stayed that way for a while on all fours but when her laughter died the tears did not and it was some time before beloved or denver knew the difference when they did they touched her lightly on the shoulders walking back through the woods sethe put an arm around each girl at her side both of them had an arm around her waist making their way over hard snow they stumbled and had to hold on tight but nobody saw them fall inside the house they found out they were cold they took off their shoes wet stockings and put on dry woolen ones denver fed the fire sethe warmed a pan of milk and stirred cane syrup and vanilla into it wrapped in quilts and blankets before the cooking stove they drank wiped their noses and drank again we could roast some taters said denver tomorrow said sethe time to sleep she poured them each a bit more of the hot sweet milk the stovefire roared you finished with your eyes asked beloved sethe smiled yes i m finished with my eyes drink up time for bed but none of them wanted to leave the warmth of the blankets the fire and the cups for the chill of an unheated bed they went on sipping and watching the fire when the click came sethe didn t know what it was afterward it was clear as daylight that the click came at the very beginning a beat almost before it started before she heard three notes before the melody was even clear leaning forward a little beloved was humming softly it was then when beloved finished humming that sethe recalled the click the settling of pieces into places designed and made especially for them no milk spilled from her cup because her hand was not shaking she simply turned her head and looked at beloved s profile the chin mouth nose forehead copied and exaggerated in the huge shadow the fire threw on the wall behind her her hair which denver had braided into twenty or thirty plaits curved toward her shoulders like arms from where she sat sethe could not examine it not the hairline nor the eyebrows the lips nor all i remember baby suggs had said is how she loved the burned bottom of bread her little hands i wouldn t know em if they slapped me the birthmark nor the color of the gums the shape of her ears nor here look here this is your ma am if you can t tell me by my face look here the fingers nor their nails nor even but there would be time the click had clicked things were where they ought to be or poised and ready to glide in i made that song up said sethe i made it up and sang it to my children nobody knows that song but me and my children beloved turned to look at sethe i know it she said a hobnail casket of jewels found in a tree hollow should be fondled before it is opened its lock may have rusted or broken away from the clasp still you should touch the nail heads and test its weight no smashing with an ax head before it is decently exhumed from the grave that has hidden it all this time no gasp at a miracle that is truly miraculous because the magic lies in the fact that you knew it was there for you all along sethe wiped the white satin coat from the inside of the pan brought pillows from the keeping room for the girls heads there was no tremor in her voice as she instructed them to keep the fire if not come on upstairs with that she gathered her blanket around her elbows and asc ended the lily white stairs like a bride outside snow solidified itself into graceful forms the peace of winter stars seemed permanent fingering a ribbon and smelling skin stamp paid approached again my marrow is tired he thought i been tired all my days bone tired but now it s in the marrow must be what baby suggs felt when she lay down and thought about color for the rest of her life when she told him what her aim was he thought she was ashamed and too shamed to say so her authority in the pulpit her dance in the clearing her powerful call she didn t deliver sermons or preach insisting she was too ignorant for that she called and the hearing heard all that had been mocked and rebuked by the bloodspill in her backyard god puzzled her and she was too ashamed of him to say so instead she told stamp she was going to bed to think about the colors of things he tried to dissuade her sethe was in jail with her nursing baby the one he had saved her sons were holding hands in the yard terrified of letting go strangers and familiars were stopping by to hear how it went one more time and suddenly baby declared peace she just up and quit by the time sethe was released she had exhausted blue and was well on her way to yellow at first he would see her in the yard occasionally or delivering food to the jail or shoes in town then less and less he believed then that shame put her in the bed now eight years after her contentious funeral and eighteen years after the misery he changed his mind her marrow was tired and it was a testimony to the heart that fed it that it took eight years to meet finally the color she was hankering after the onslaught of her fatigue like his was sudden but lasted for years after sixty years of losing children to the people who chewed up her life and spit it out like a fish bone after five years of freedom given to her by her last child who bought her future with his exchanged it so to speak so she could have one whether he did or not to lose him too to acquire a daughter and grandchildren and see that daughter slay the children or try to to belong to a community of other free negroes to love and be loved by them to counsel and be counseled protect and be protected feed and be fed and then to have that community step back and hold itself at a distance well it could wear out even a baby suggs holy listen here girl he told her you can t quit the word it s given to you to speak you can t quit the word i don t care what all happen to you they were standing in richmond street ankle deep in leaves lamps lit the downstairs windows of spacious houses and made the early evening look darker than it was the odor of burning leaves was brilliant quite by chance as he pocketed a penny tip for a delivery he had glanced across the street and recognized the skipping woman as his old friend he had not seen her in weeks quickly he crossed the street scuffing red leaves as he went when he stopped her with a greeting she returned it with a face knocked clean of interest she could have been a plate a carpetbag full of shoes in her hand she waited for him to begin lead or share a conversation if there had been sadness in her eyes he would have understood it but indifference lodged where sadness should have been you missed the clearing three saturdays running he told her she turned her head away and scanned the houses along the street folks came he said folks come folks go she answered here let me carry that he tried to take her bag from her but she wouldn t let him i got a delivery someplace long in here she said name of tucker yonder he said twin chestnuts in the yard sick too they walked a bit his pace slowed to accommodate her skip well well what saturday coming you going to call or what if i call them and they come what on earth i m going to say say the word he checked his shout too late two whitemen burning leaves turned their heads in his direction bending low he whispered into her ear the word the word that s one other thing took away from me she said and that was when he exhorted her pleaded with her not to quit no matter what the word had been given to her and she had to speak it had to they had reached the twin chestnuts and the white house that stood behind them see what i mean he said big trees like that both of em together ain t got the leaves of a young birch i see what you mean she said but she peered instead at the white house you got to do it he said you got to can t nobody call like you you have to be there what i have to do is get in my bed and lay down i want to fix on something harmless in this world what world you talking about ain t nothing harmless down here yes it is blue that don t hurt nobody yellow neither you getting in the bed to think about yellow i likes yellow then what when you get through with blue and yellow then what can t say it s something can t be planned you blaming god he said that s what you doing no stamp i ain t you saying the whitefolks won that what you saying i m saying they came in my yard you saying nothing counts i m saying they came in my yard sethe s the one did it and if she hadn t you saying god give up nothing left for us but pour out our own blood i m saying they came in my yard you punishing him ain t you not like he punish me you can t do that baby it ain t right was a time i knew what that was you still know what i know is what i see a nigger woman hauling shoes aw baby he licked his lips searching with his tongue for the words that would turn her around lighten her load we have to be steady these things too will pass what you looking for a miracle no she said i m looking for what i was put here to look for the back door and skipped right to it they didn t let her in they took the shoes from her as she stood on the steps and she rested her hip on the railing while the whitewoman went looking for the dime stamp paid rearranged his way too angry to walk her home and listen to more he watched her for a moment and turned to go before the alert white face at the window next door had come to any conclusion trying to get to for the second time now he regretted that conversation the high tone he took his refusal to see the effect of marrow weariness in a woman he believed was a mountain now too late he understood her the heart that pumped out love the mouth that spoke the word didn t count they came in her yard anyway and she could not approve or condemn sethe s rough choice one or the other might have saved her but beaten up by the claims of both she went to bed the whitefolks had tired her out at last and him eighteen seventy four and whitefolks were still on the loose whole towns wiped clean of negroes eighty seven lynchings in one year alone in kentucky four colored schools burned to the ground grown men whipped like children children whipped like adults black women raped by the crew property taken necks broken he smelled skin skin and hot blood the skin was one thing but human blood cooked in a lynch fire was a whole other thing the stench stank stank up off the pages of the north star out of the mouths of witnesses etched in crooked handwriting in letters delivered by hand detailed in documents and petitions full of whereas and presented to any legal body who d read it it stank but none of that had worn out his marrow none of that it was the ribbon tying his flatbed up on the bank of the licking river securing it the best he could he caught sight of something red on its bottom reaching for it he thought it was a cardinal feather stuck to his boat he tugged and what came loose in his hand was a red ribbon knotted around a curl of wet woolly hair clinging still to its bit of scalp he untied the ribbon and put it in his pocket dropped the curl in the weeds on the way home he stopped short of breath and dizzy he waited until the spell passed before continuing on his way a moment later his breath left him again this time he sat down by a fence rested he got to his feet but before he took a step he turned to look back down the road he was traveling and said to its frozen mud and the river beyond what are these people you tell me jesus what are they when he got to his house he was too tired to eat the food his sister and nephews had prepared he sat on the porch in the cold till way past dark and went to his bed only because his sister s voice calling him was getting nervous he kept the ribbon the skin smell nagged him and his weakened marrow made him dwell on baby suggs wish to consider what in the world was harmless he hoped she stuck to blue yellow maybe green and never fixed on red mistaking her upbraiding her owing her now he needed to let her know he knew and to get right with her and her kin so in spite of his exhausted marrow he kept on through the voices and tried once more to knock at the door of this time although he couldn t cipher but one word he believed he knew who spoke them the people of the broken necks of fire cooked blood and black girls who had lost their ribbons what a roaring sethe had gone to bed smiling eager to lie down and unravel the proof for the conclusion she had already leapt to fondle the day and circumstances of beloved s arrival and the meaning of that kiss in the clearing she slept instead and woke still smiling to a snow bright morning cold enough to see her breath she lingered a moment to collect the courage to throw off the blankets and hit a chilly floor for the first time she was going to be late for work downstairs she saw the girls sleeping where she d left them but back to back now each wrapped tight in blankets breathing into their pillows the pair and a half of skates were lying by the front door the stockings hung on a nail behind the cooking stove to dry had not sethe looked at beloved s face and smiled quietly carefully she stepped around her to wake the fire first a bit of paper then a little kindlin not too much just a taste until it was strong enough for more she fed its dance until it was wild and fast when she went outside to collect more wood from the shed she did not notice the man s frozen footprints she crunched around to the back to the cord piled high with snow after scraping it clean she filled her arms with as much dry wood as she could she even looked straight at the shed smiling smiling at the things she would not have to remember now thinking she ain t even mad with me not a bit obviously the hand holding shadows she had seen on the road were not paul d denver and herself but us three the three holding on to each other skating the night before the three sipping flavored milk and since that was so if her daughter could come back home from the timeless place certainly her sons could and would come back from wherever they had gone to sethe covered her front teeth with her tongue against the cold hunched forward by the burden in her arms she walked back around the house to the porch not once noticing the frozen tracks she stepped in inside the girls were still sleeping although they had changed positions while she was gone both drawn to the fire dumping the armload into the woodbox made them stir but not wake sethe started the cooking stove as quietly as she could reluctant to wake the sisters happy to have them asleep at her feet while she made breakfast too bad she would be late for work too too bad once in sixteen years that s just too bad she had beaten two eggs into yesterday s hominy formed it into patties and fried them with some ham pieces before denver woke completely and groaned back stiff ooh yeah sleeping on the floor s supposed to be good for you hurts like the devil said denver could be that fall you took denver smiled that was fun she turned to look down at beloved snoring lightly should i wake her no let her rest she likes to see you off in the morning i ll make sure she does said sethe and thought be nice to think first before i talk to her let her know i know think about all i ain t got to remember no more do like baby said think on it then lay it down for good paul d convinced me there was a world out there and that i could live in it should have known better did know better whatever is going on outside my door ain t for me the world is in this room this here s all there is and all there needs to be they ate like men ravenous and intent saying little content with the company of the other and the opportunity to look in her eyes when sethe wrapped her head and bundled up to go to town it was already midmorning and when she left the house she neither saw the prints nor heard the voices that ringed like a noose trudging in the ruts left earlier by wheels sethe was excited to giddiness by the things she no longer had to remember i don t have to remember nothing i don t even have to explain she understands it all i can forget how baby suggs heart collapsed how we agreed it was consumption without a sign of it in the world her eyes when she brought my food i can forget that and how she told me that howard and buglar were all right but wouldn t let go each other s hands played that way stayed that way especially in their sleep she handed me the food from a basket things wrapped small enough to get through the bars whispering news mr bodwin going to see the judge in chambers she kept on saying in chambers like i knew what it meant or she did the colored ladies of delaware ohio had drawn up a petition to keep me from being hanged that two white preachers had come round and wanted to talk to me pray for me that a newspaperman came too she told me the news and i told her i needed something for the rats she wanted denver out and slapped her palms when i wouldn t let her go where your earrings she said i ll hold em for you i told her the jailer took them to protect me from myself he thought i could do some harm with the wire baby suggs covered her mouth with her hand schoolteacher left town she said filed a claim and rode on off they going to let you out for the burial she said not the funeral just the burial and they did the sheriff came with me and looked away when i fed denver in the wagon neither howard nor buglar would let me near them not even to touch their hair i believe a lot of folks were there but i just saw the box reverend pike spoke in a real loud voice but i didn t catch a word except the first two and three months later when denver was ready for solid food and they let me out for good i went and got you a gravestone but i didn t have money enough for the carving so i exchanged bartered you might say what i did have and i m sorry to this day i never thought to ask him for the whole thing all i heard of what reverend pike said dearly beloved which is what you are to me and i don t have to be sorry about getting only one word and i don t have to remember the slaughterhouse and the saturday girls who worked its yard i can forget that what i did changed baby suggs life no clearing no company just laundry and shoes i can forget it all now because as soon as i got the gravestone in place you made your presence known in the house and worried us all to distraction i didn t understand it then i thought you were mad with me and now i know that if you was you ain t now because you came back here to me and i was right all along there is no world outside my door i only need to know one thing how bad is the scar as sethe walked to work late for the first time in sixteen years and wrapped in a timeless present stamp paid fought fatigue and the habit of a lifetime baby suggs refused to go to the clearing because she believed they had won he refused to acknowledge any such victory baby had no back door so he braved the cold and a wall of talk to knock on the one she did have he clutched the red ribbon in his pocket for strength softly at first then harder at the last he banged furiously disbelieving it could happen that the door of a house with coloredpeople in it did not fly open in his presence he went to the window and wanted to cry sure enough there they were not a one of them heading for the door worrying his scrap of ribbon to shreds the old man turned and went down the steps now curiosity joined his shame and his debt two backs curled away from him as he looked in the window one had a head he recognized the other troubled him he didn t know her and didn t know anybody it could be nobody but nobody visited that house after a disagreeable breakfast he went to see ella and john to find out what they knew perhaps there he could find out if after all these years of clarity he had misnamed himself and there was yet another debt he owed born joshua he renamed himself when he handed over his wife to his master s son handed her over in the sense that he did not kill anybody thereby himself because his wife demanded he stay alive otherwise she reasoned where and to whom could she return when the boy was through with that gift he decided that he didn t owe anybody anything whatever his obligations were that act paid them off he thought it would make him rambunctious renegade a drunkard even the debtlessness and in a way it did but there was nothing to do with it work well work poorly work a little work not at all make sense make none sleep wake up like somebody dislike others it didn t seem much of a way to live and it brought him no satisfaction so he extended this debtlessness to other people by helping them pay out and off whatever they owed in misery beaten runaways he ferried them and rendered them paid for gave them their own bill of sale so to speak you paid it now life owes you and the receipt as it were was a welcome door that he never had to knock on like john and ella s in front of which he stood and said who in there only once and she was pulling on the hinge where you been keeping yourself i told john must be cold if stamp stay inside oh i been out he took off his cap and massaged his scalp out where not by here ella hung two suits of underwear on a line behind the stove was over to baby suggs this morning what you want in there asked ella somebody invite you in that s baby s kin i don t need no invite to look after her people sth ella was unmoved she had been baby suggs friend and sethe s too till the rough time except for a nod at the carnival she hadn t given sethe the time of day somebody new in there a woman thought you might know who is she ain t no new negroes in this town i don t know about she said what she look like you sure that wasn t denver i know denver this girl s narrow you sure i know what i see might see anything at all at true better ask paul d she said can t locate him said stamp which was the truth although his efforts to find paul d had been feeble he wasn t ready to confront the man whose life he had altered with his graveyard information he s sleeping in the church said ella the church stamp was shocked and very hurt yeah asked reverend pike if he could stay in the cellar it s cold as charity in there i expect he knows that what he do that for hes a touch proud seem like he don t have to do that any number ll take him in ella turned around to look at stamp paid can t nobody read minds long distance all he have to do is ask somebody why why he have to ask can t nobody offer what s going on since when a blackman come to town have to sleep in a cellar like a dog unrile yourself stamp not me i m going to stay riled till somebody gets some sense and leastway act like a christian it s only a few days he been there shouldn t be no days you know all about it and don t give him a hand that don t sound like you ella me and you been pulling coloredfolk out the water more n twenty years now you tell me you can t offer a man a bed a working man too a man what can pay his own way he ask i give him anything why s that necessary all of a sudden i don t know him all that well you know he s colored stamp don t tear me up this morning i don t feel like it it s her ain t it her who sethe he took up with her and stayed in there and you don t want nothing to hold on don t jump if you can t see bottom girl give it up we been friends too long to act like this well who can tell what all went on in there look here i don t know who sethe is or none of her people what all i know is she married baby suggs boy and i ain t sure i know that where is he huh baby never laid eyes on her till john carried her to the door with a baby i strapped on her chest i strapped that baby and you way off the track with that wagon her children know who she was even if you don t so what i ain t saying she wasn t their ma ammy but who s to say they was baby suggs grandchildren how she get on board and her husband didn t and tell me this how she have that baby in the woods by herself said a whitewoman come out the trees and helped her shoot you believe that a whitewoman well i know what kind of white that was aw no ella anything white floating around in the woods if it ain t got a shotgun it s something i don t want no part of you all was friends yeah till she showed herself ella i ain t got no friends take a handsaw to their own children you in deep water girl uh uh i m on dry land and i m going to stay there you the one wet what s any of what you talking got to do with paul d what run him off tell me that i run him off you i told him about i showed him the newspaper about the what sethe did read it to him he left that very day you didn t tell me that i thought he knew he didn t know nothing except her from when they was at that place baby suggs was at he knew baby suggs sure he knew her her boy halle too and left when he found out what sethe did look like he might have a place to stay after all what you say casts a different light i thought but stamp paid knew what she thought you didn t come here asking about him ela said you came about some new girl that s so well paul d must know who she is or what she is your mind is loaded with spirits everywhere you look you see one you know as well as i do that people who die bad don t stay in the ground he couldn t deny it jesus christ himself didn t so stamp ate a piece of ella s head cheese to show there were no bad feelings and set out to find paul d he found him on the steps of holy redeemer holding his wrists between his knees and looking red eyed sawyer shouted at her when she entered the kitchen but she just turned her back and reached for her apron there was no entry now no crack or crevice available she had taken pains to keep them out but knew full well that at any moment they could rock her rip her from her moorings send the birds twittering back into her hair drain her mother s milk they had already done divided her back into plant life that too driven her fat bellied into the woods they had done that all news of them was rot they buttered halle s face gave paul d iron to eat crisped sixo hanged her own mother she didn t want any more news about whitefolks didn t want to know what ella knew and john and stamp paid about the world done up the way whitefolks loved it all news of them should have stopped with the birds in her hair once long ago she was soft trusting she trusted mrs garner and her husband too she knotted the earrings into her underskirt to take along not so much to wear but to hold earrings that made her believe she could discriminate among them that for every schoolteacher there would be an amy that for every pupil there was a garner or bodwin or even a sheriff whose touch at her elbow was gentle and who looked away when she nursed but she had come to believe every one of baby suggs last words and buried all recollection of them and luck paul d dug it up gave her back her body kissed her divided back stirred her rememory and brought her more news of clabber of iron of roosters smiling but when he heard her news he counted her feet and didn t even say goodbye don t talk to me mr sawyer don t say nothing to me this morning what what what you talking back to me i m telling you don t say nothing to me you better get them pies made sethe touched the fruit and picked up the paring knife when pie juice hit the bottom of the oven and hissed sethe was well into the potato salad sawyer came in and said not too sweet you make it too sweet they don t eat it make it the way i always did yeah too sweet none of the sausages came back the cook had a way with them and sawyer s restaurant never had leftover sausage if sethe wanted any she put them aside soon as they were ready but there was some passable stew problem was all her pies were sold too only rice pudding left and half a pan of gingerbread that didn t come out right had she been paying attention instead of daydreaming all morning she wouldn t be picking around looking for her dinner like a crab she couldn t read clock time very well but she knew when the hands were closed in prayer at the top of the face she was through for the day she got a metal top jar filled it with stew and wrapped the gingerbread in butcher paper these she dropped in her outer skirt pockets and began washing up none of it was anything like what the cook and the two waiters walked off with mr sawyer included midday dinner in the terms of the job along with o a week and she made him understand from the beginning she would take her dinner home but matches sometimes a bit of kerosene a little salt butter too these things she took also once in a while and felt ashamed because she could afford to buy them she just didn t want the embarrassment of waiting out back of phelps store with the others till every white in ohio was served before the keeper turned to the cluster of negro faces looking through a hole in his back door she was ashamed too because it was stealing and sixo s argument on the subject amused her but didn t change the way she felt just as it didn t change schoolteacher s mind did you steal that shoat you stole that shoat schoolteacher was quiet but firm like he was just going through the motions not expecting an answer that mattered sixo sat there not even getting up to plead or deny he just sat there the streak of lean in his hand the gristle clustered in the tin plate like gemstones rough unpolished but loot nevertheless you stole that shoat didn t you no sir said sixo but he had the decency to keep his eyes on the meat you telling me you didn t steal it and i m looking right at you no sir i didn t steal it schoolteacher smiled did you kill it yes sir i killed it did you butcher it yes sir did you cook it yes sir well then did you eat it yes sir i sure did and you telling me that s not stealing no sir it ain t what is it then improving your property sir what sixo plant rye to give the high piece a better chance sixo take and feed the soil give you more crop sixo take and feed sixo give you more work clever but schoolteacher beat him anyway to show him that definitions belonged to the definers not the defined after mr garner died with a hole in his ear that mrs garner said was an exploded ear drum brought on by stroke and sixo said was gunpowder everything they touched was looked on as stealing not just a rifle of corn or two yard eggs the hen herself didn t even remember everything schoolteacher took away the guns from the sweet home men and deprived of game to round out their diet of bread beans hominy vegetables and a little extra at slaughter time they began to pilfer in earnest and it became not only their right but their obligation sethe understood it then but now with a paying job and an employer who was kind enough to hire an ex convict she despised herself for the pride that made pilfering better than standing in line at the window of the general store with all the other negroes she didn t want to jostle them or be jostled by them feel their judgment or their pity especially now she touched her forehead with the back of her wrist and blotted the perspiration the workday had come to a close and already she was feeling the excitement not since that other escape had she felt so alive slopping the alley dogs watching their frenzy she pressed her lips today would be a day she would accept a lift if anybody on a wagon offered it no one would and for sixteen years her pride had not let her ask but today oh today now she wanted speed to skip over the long walk home and be there when sawyer warned her about being late again she barely heard him he used to be a sweet man patient tender in his dealings with his help but each year following the death of his son in the war he grew more and more crotchety as though sethe s dark face was to blame un huh she said wondering how she could hurry tine along and get to the no time waiting for her she needn t have worried wrapped tight hunched forward as she started home her mind was busy with the things she could forget thank god i don t have to rememory or say a thing because you know it all you know i never would a left you never it was all i could think of to do when the train came i had to be ready schoolteacher was teaching us things we couldn t learn i didn t care nothing about the measuring string we all laughed about that except sixo he didn t laugh at nothing but i didn t care schoolteacher d wrap that string all over my head cross my nose around my behind number my teeth i thought he was a fool and the questions he asked was the biggest foolishness of all then me and your brothers come up from the second patch the first one was close to the house where the quick things grew beans onions sweet peas the other one was further down for long lasting things potatoes pumpkin okra pork salad not much was up yet down there it was early still some young salad maybe but that was all we pulled weeds and hoed a little to give everything a good start after that we hit out for the house the ground raised up from the second patch not a hill exactly but kind of enough for buglar and howard to run up and roll down run up and roll down that s the way i used to see them in my dreams laughing their short fat legs running up the hill now all i see is their backs walking down the railroad tracks away from me always away from me but that day they was happy running up and rolling down it was early still the growing season had took hold but not much was up i remember the peas still had flowers the grass was long though full of white buds and those tall red blossoms people call diane and something there with the leastest little bit of blue light like a cornflower but pale pale real pale i maybe should have hurried because i left you back at the house in a basket in the yard away from where the chickens scratched but you never know anyway i took my time getting back but your brothers didn t have patience with me staring at flowers and sky every two or three steps they ran on ahead and i let em something sweet lives in the air that time of year and if the breeze is right it s hard to stay indoors when i got back i could hear howard and buglar laughing down by the quarters i put my hoe down and cut across the side yard to get to you the shade moved so by the time i got back the sun was shining right on you right in your face but you wasn t woke at all still asleep i wanted to pick you up in my arms and i wanted to look at you sleeping too didn t know which you had the sweetest face yonder not far was a grape arbor mr garner made always full of big plans he wanted to make his own wine to get drunk off never did get more than a kettle of jelly from it i don t think the soil was right for grapes your daddy believed it was the rain not the soil sixo said it was bugs the grapes so little and tight sour as vinegar too but there was a little table in there so i picked up your basket and carried you over to the grape arbor cool in there and shady i set you down on the little table and figured if i got a piece of muslin the bugs and things wouldn t get to you and if mrs garner didn t need me right there in the kitchen i could get a chair and you and me could set out there while i did the vegetables i headed for the back door to get the clean muslin we kept in the kitchen press the grass felt good on my feet i got near the door and i heard voices schoolteacher made his pupils sit and learn books for a spell every afternoon if it was nice enough weather they d sit on the side porch all three of em he d talk and they d write or he would read and they would write down what he said i never told nobody this not your pap not nobody i almost told mrs garner but she was so weak then and getting weaker this is the first time i m telling it and i m telling it to you because it might help explain something to you although i know you don t need me to do it to tell it or even think over it you don t have to listen either if you don t want to but i couldn t help listening to what i heard that day he was talking to his pupils and i heard him say which one are you doing and one of the boys said sethe that s when i stopped because i heard my name and then i took a few steps to where i could see what they was doing schoolteacher was standing over one of them with one hand behind his back he licked a forefinger a couple of times and turned a few pages slow i was about to turn around and keep on my way to where the muslin was when i heard him say no no that s not the way i told you to put her human characteristics on the left her animal ones on the right and don t forget to line them up i commenced to walk backward didn t even look behind me to find out where i was headed i just kept lifting my feet and pushing back when i bumped up against a tree my scalp was prickly one of the dogs was licking out a pan in the yard i got to the grape arbor fast enough but i didn t have the muslin flies settled all over your face rubbing their hands my head itched like the devil like somebody was sticking fine needles in my scalp i never told halle or nobody but that very day i asked mrs garner a part of it she was low then not as low as she ended up but failing a kind of bag grew under her jaw it didn t seem to hurt her but it made her weak first she d be up and spry in the morning and by the second milking she couldn t stand up next she took to sleeping late the day i went up there she was in bed the whole day and i thought to carry her some bean soup and ask her then when i opened the bedroom door she looked at me from underneath her nightcap already it was hard to catch life in her eyes her shoes and stockings were on the floor so i knew she had tried to get dressed i brung you some bean soup i said she said i don t think i can swallow that try a bit i told her too thick i m sure it s too thick want me to loosen it up with a little water no take it away bring me some cool water that s all yes ma am ma am could i ask you something what is it sethe what do characteristics mean what a word characteristics oh she moved her head around on the pillow features who taught you that i heard the schoolteacher say it change the water sethe this is warm yes ma am features water sethe cool water i put the pitcher on the tray with the white bean soup and went downstairs when i got back with the fresh water i held her head while she drank it took her a while because that lump made it hard to swallow she laid back and wiped her mouth the drinking seemed to satisfy her but she frowned and said i don t seem able to wake up sethe all i seem to want is sleep then do it i told her i m take care of things then she went on what about this what about that said she knew halle was no trouble but she wanted to know if schoolteacher was handling the pauls all right and sixo yes ma am i said look like it do they do what he tells them they don t need telling good that s a mercy i should be back downstairs in a day or two i just need more rest doctor s due back tomorrow is it you said features ma am what features umm like a feature of summer is heat a characteristic is a feature a thing that s natural to a thing can you have more than one you can have quite a few you know say a baby sucks its thumb that s one but it has others too keep billy away from red corn mr garner never let her calve every other year sethe you hear me come away from that window and listen yes ma am ask my brother in law to come up after supper yes ma am if you d wash your hair you could get rid of that lice ain t no lice in my head ma am whatever it is a good scrubbing is what it needs not scratching don t tell me we re out of soap no ma am all right now i m through talking makes me tired yes ma am and thank you sethe yes ma am you was too little to remember the quarters your brothers slept under the window me you and your daddy slept by the wall the night after i heard why schoolteacher measured me i had trouble sleeping when halle came in i asked him what he thought about schoolteacher he said there wasn t nothing to think about said he s white ain t he i said but i mean is he like mr garner what you want to know sethe him and her i said they ain t like the whites i seen before the ones in the big place i was before i came here how these different he asked me well i said they talk soft for one thing it don t matter sethe what they say is the same loud or soft mr garner let you buy out your mother i said yep he did well if he hadn t of she would of dropped in his cooking stove still he did it let you work it off uh huh wake up halle i said uh huh he could of said no he didn t tell you no no he didn t tell me no she worked here for ten years if she worked another ten you think she would ve made it out i pay him for her last years and in return he got you me and three more coming up i got one more year of debt work one more schoolteacher in there told me to quit it said the reason for doing it don t hold i should do the extra but here at sweet home is he going to pay you for the extra nope then how you going to pay it off how much is it o don t he want it back he want something what i don t know something but he don t want me off sweet home no more say it don t pay to have my labor somewhere else while the boys is small what about the money you owe he must have another way of getting it what way i don t know sethe then the only question is how how he going get it no that s one question there s one more what s that he leaned up and turned over touching my cheek with his knuckles the question now is who s going buy you out or me or her he pointed over to where you was laying what if all my labor is sweet home including the extra what i got left to sell he turned over then and went back to sleep and i thought i wouldn t but i did too for a while something he said maybe or something he didn t say woke me i sat up like somebody hit me and you woke up too and commenced to cry i rocked you some but there wasn t much room so i stepped outside the door to walk you up and down i went up and down everything dark but lamplight in the top window of the house she must ve been up still i couldn t get out of my head the thing that woke me up while the boys is small that s what he said and it snapped me awake they tagged after me the whole day weeding milking getting firewood for now for now that s when we should have begun to plan but we didn t i don t know what we thought but getting away was a money thing to us buy out running was nowhere on our minds all of us some where to how to go it was sixo who brought it up finally after paul f mrs garner sold him trying to keep things up already she lived two years off his price but it ran out i guess so she wrote schoolteacher to come take over four sweet home men and she still believed she needed her brother in law and two boys cause people said she shouldn t be alone out there with nothing but negroes so he came with a big hat and spectacles and a coach box full of paper talking soft and watching hard he beat paul a not hard and not long but it was the first time anyone had because mr garner disallowed it next time i saw him he had company in the prettiest trees you ever saw sixo started watching the sky he was the only one who crept at night and halle said that s how he learned about the train that way halle was pointing over the stable where he took my ma am sixo say freedom is that way a whole train is going and if we can get there don t need to be no buyout train what s that i asked him they stopped talking in front of me then even halle but they whispered among themselves and sixo watched the sky not the high part the low part where it touched the trees you could tell his mind was gone from sweet home the plan was a good one but when it came time i was big with denver so we changed it a little a little just enough to butter halle s face so paul d tells me and make sixo laugh at last but i got you out baby and the boys too when the signal for the train come you all was the only ones ready i couldn t find halle or nobody i didn t know sixo was burned up and paul d dressed in a collar you wouldn t believe not till later so i sent you all to the wagon with the woman who waited in the corn ha ha no notebook for my babies and no measuring string neither what i had to get through later i got through because of you passed right by those boys hanging in the trees one had paul a s shirt on but not his feet or his head i walked right on by because only me had your milk and god do what he would i was going to get it to you you remember that don t you that i did that when i got here i had milk enough for all one more curve in the road and sethe could see her chimney it wasn t lonely looking anymore the ribbon of smoke was from a fire that warmed a body returned to her just like it never went away never needed a headstone and the heart that beat inside it had not for a single moment stopped in her hands she opened the door walked in and locked it tight behind her the day stamp paid saw the two backs through the window and then hurried down the steps he believed the undecipherable language clamoring around the house was the mumbling of the black and angry dead very few had died in bed like baby suggs and none that he knew of including baby had lived a livable life even the educated colored the long school people the doctors the teachers the paper writers and businessmen had a hard row to hoe in addition to having to use their heads to get ahead they had the weight of the whole race sitting there you needed two heads for that whitepeople believed that whatever the manners under every dark skin was a jungle swift unnavigable waters swinging screaming baboons sleeping snakes red gums ready for their sweet white blood in a way he thought they were right the more coloredpeople spent their strength trying to convince them how gentle they were how clever and loving how human the more they used themselves up to persuade whites of something negroes believed could not be questioned the deeper and more tangled the jungle grew inside but it wasn t the jungle blacks brought with them to this place from the other livable place it was the jungle whitefolks planted in them and it grew it spread in through and after life it spread until it invaded the whites who had made it touched them every one changed and altered them made them bloody silly worse than even they wanted to be so scared were they of the jungle they had made the screaming baboon lived under their own white skin the red gums were their own meantime the secret spread of this new kind of whitefolks jungle was hidden silent except once in a while when you could hear its mumbling in places like stamp paid abandoned his efforts to see about sethe after the pain of knocking and not gaining entrance and when he did was left to its own devices when sethe locked the door the women inside were free at last to be what they liked see whatever they saw and say whatever was on their minds almost mixed in with the voices surrounding the house recognizable but undecipherable to stamp paid were the thoughts of the women of unspeakable thoughts unspoken chapter beloved she my daughtyer she mine see she come back to me of her own free will and i don t have to explain a thing i didn t have time to explain before because it had to be done quick quick she had to be safe and i put her where she would be but my love was tough and she back now i knew she would be paul d ran her off so she had no choice but to come back to me in the flesh i bet you baby suggs on the other side helped i won t never let her go i ll explain to her even though i don t have to why i did it how if i hadn t killed her she would have died and that is something i could not bear to happen to her when i explain it she ll understand because she understands everything already i ll tend her as no mother ever tended a child a daughter nobody will ever get my milk no more except my own children i never had to give it to nobody else and the one time i did it was took from me they held me down and took it milk that belonged to my baby nan had to nurse whitebabies and me too because ma am was in the rice the little whitebabies got it first and i got what was left or none there was no nursing milk to call my own i know what it is to be without the milk that belongs to you to have to fight and holler for it and to have so little left i ll tell beloved about that she ll understand she my daughter the one i managed to have milk for and to get it to her even after they stole it after they handled me like i was the cow no the goat back behind the stable because it was too nasty to stay in with the horses but i wasn t too nasty to cook their food or take care of mrs garner i tended her like i would have tended my own mother if she needed me if they had let her out the rice field because i was the one she didn t throw away i couldn t have done more for that woman than i would my own ma am if she was to take sick and need me and i d have stayed with her till she got well or died and i would have stayed after that except nan snatched me back before i could check for the sign it was her all right but for a long time i didn t believe it i looked everywhere for that hat stuttered after that didn t stop it till i saw halle oh but that s all over now i m here i lasted and my girl come home now i can look at things again because she s here to see them too after the shed i stopped now in the morning when i light the fire i mean to look out the window to see what the sun is doing to the day does it hit the pump handle first or the spigot see if the grass is gray green or brown or what now i know why baby suggs pondered color her last years she never had time to see let alone enjoy it before took her a long time to finish with blue then yellow then green she was well into pink when she died i don t believe she wanted to get to red and i understand why because me and beloved outdid ourselves with it matter of fact that and her pinkish headstone was the last color i recall now i ll be on the lookout think what spring will he for us i ll plant carrots just so she can see them and turnips have you ever seen one baby a prettier thing god never made white and purple with a tender tail and a hard head feels good when you hold it in your hand and smells like the creek when it floods bitter but happy we ll smell them together beloved beloved because you mine and i have to show you these things and teach you what a mother should funny how you lose sight of some things and memory others i never will forget that whitegirl s hands amy but i forget the color of all that hair on her head eyes must have been gray though seem like i do rememory that mrs garner s was light brown while she was well got dark when she took sick a strong woman used to be and when she talked off her head she d say it i used to be strong as a mule jenny called me jenny when she was babbling and i can bear witness to that tall and strong the two of us on a cord of wood was as good as two men hurt her like the devil not to be able to raise her head off the pillow still can t figure why she thought she needed schoolteacher though i wonder if she lasted like i did last time i saw her she couldn t do nothing but cry and i couldn t do a thing for her but wipe her face when i told her what they done to me somebody had to know it hear it somebody maybe she lasted schoolteacher wouldn t treat her the way he treated me first beating i took was the last nobody going to keep me from my children hadn t been for me taking care of her maybe i would have known what happened maybe halle was trying to get to me i stood by her bed waiting for her to finish with the slop jar then i got her back in the bed she said she was cold hot as blazes and she wanted quilts said to shut the window i told her no she needed the cover i needed the breeze long as those yellow curtains flapped i was all right should have heeded her maybe what sounded like shots really was maybe i would have seen somebody or something maybe anyhow i took my babies to the corn halle or no jesus then i heard that woman s rattle she said any more i told her i didn t know she said i been here all night can t wait i tried to make her she said can t do it come on hoo not a man around boys scared you asleep on my back denver sleep in my stomach felt like i was split in two i told her to take you all i had to go back in case she just looked at me said woman bit a piece of my tongue off when they opened my back it was hanging by a shred i didn t mean to clamped down on it it come right off i thought good god i m going to eat myself up they dug a hole for my stomach so as not to hurt the baby denver don t like for me to talk about it she hates anything about sweet home except how she was born but you was there and even if you too young to memory it i can tell it to you the grape arbor you memory that i ran so fast flies beat me to you i would have known right away who you was when the sun blotted out your face the way it did when i took you to the grape arbor i would have known at once when my water broke the minute i saw you sitting on the stump it broke and when i did see your face it had more than a hint of what you would look like after all these years i would have known who you were right away because the cup after cup of water you drank proved and connected to the fact that you dribbled clear spit on my face the day i got to i would have known right off but paul d distracted me otherwise i would have seen my fingernail prints right there on your forehead for all the world to see from when i held your head up out in the shed and later on when you asked me about the earrings i used to dangle for you to play with i would have recognized you right off except for paul d seems to me he wanted you out from the beginning but i wouldn t let him what you think and look how he ran when he found out about me and you in the shed too rough for him to listen to too thick he said my love was too thick what he know about it who in the world is he willing to die for would he give his privates to a stranger in return for a carving some other way he said there must have been some other way let schoolteacher haul us away i guess to measure your behind before he tore it up i have felt what it felt like and nobody walking or stretched out is going to make you feel it too not you not none of mine and when i tell you you mine i also mean i m yours i wouldn t draw breath without my children i told baby suggs that and she got down on her knees to beg god s pardon for me still it s so my plan was to take us all to the other side where my own ma am is they stopped me from getting us there but they didn t stop you from getting here ha ha you came right on back like a good girl like a daughter which is what i wanted to be and would have been if my ma am had been able to get out of the rice long enough before they hanged her and let me be one you know what she d had the bit so many times she smiled when she wasn t smiling she smiled and i never saw her own smile i wonder what they was doing when they was caught running you think no not that because she was my ma am and nobody s ma am would run off and leave her daughter would she would she now leave her in the yard with a one armed woman even if she hadn t been able to suckle the daughter for more than a week or two and had to turn her over to another woman s tit that never had enough for all they said it was the bit that made her smile when she didn t want to like the saturday girls working the slaughterhouse yard when i came out of jail i saw them plain they came when the shift changed on saturday when the men got paid and worked behind the fences back of the outhouse some worked standing up leaning on the toolhouse door they gave some of their nickels and dimes to the foreman as they left but by then their smiles was over some of them drank liquor to keep from feeling what they felt some didn t drink a drop just beat it on over to phelps to pay for what their children needed or their ma ammies working a pig yard that has got to be something for a woman to do and i got close to it myself when i got out of jail and bought so to speak your name but the bodwins got me the cooking job at sawyer s and left me able to smile on my own like now when i think about you but you know all that because you smart like everybody said because when i got here you was crawling already trying to get up the stairs baby suggs had them painted white so you could see your way to the top in the dark where lamplight didn t reach lord you loved the stairsteps i got close i got close to being a saturday girl i had already worked a stone mason s shop a step to the slaughterhouse would have been a short one when i put that headstone up i wanted to lay in there with you put your head on my shoulder and keep you warm and i would have if buglar and howard and denver didn t need me because my mind was homeless then i couldn t lay down with you then no matter how much i wanted to i couldn t lay down nowhere in peace back then now i can i can sleep like the drowned have mercy she come back to me my daughter and she is mine chapter beloved is my sister i swallowed her blood right along with my mother s milk the first thing i heard after not hearing anything was the sound of her crawling up the stairs she was my secret company until paul d came he threw her out ever since i was little she was my company and she helped me wait for my daddy me and her waited for him i love my mother but i know she killed one of her own daughters and tender as she is with me i m scared of her because of it she missed killing my brothers and they knew it they told me die witch stories to show me the way to do it if ever i needed to maybe it was getting that close to dying made them want to fight the war that s what they told me they were going to do i guess they rather be around killing men than killing women and there sure is something in her that makes it all right to kill her own all the time i m afraid the thing that happened that made it all right for my mother to kill my sister could happen again i don t know what it is i don t know who it is but maybe there is something else terrible enough to make her do it again i need to know what that thing might be but i don t want to whatever it is it comes from outside this house outside the yard and it can come right on in the yard if it wants to so i never leave this house and i watch over the yard so it can t happen again and my mother won t have to kill me too not since miss lady jones house have i left by myself never the only other times two times in all i was with my mother once to see grandma baby put down next to beloved she s my sister the other time paul d went too and when we came back i thought the house would still be empty from when he threw my sister s ghost out but no when i came back to there she was beloved waiting for me tired from her long journey back ready to be taken care of ready for me to protect her this time i have to keep my mother away from her that s hard but i have to it s all on me i ve seen my mother in a dark place with scratching noises a smell coming from her dress i have been with her where something little watched us from the corners and touched sometimes they touched i didn t remember it for a long time until nelson lord made me i asked her if it was true but couldn t hear what she said and there was no point in going back to lady jones if you couldn t hear what anybody said so quiet made me have to read faces and learn how to figure out what people were thinking so i didn t need to hear what they said that s how come me and beloved could play together not talking on the porch by the creek in the secret house it s all on me now but she can count on me i thought she was trying to kill her that day in the clearing kill her back but then she kissed her neck and i have to warn her about that don t love her too much don t maybe it s still in her the thing that makes it all right to kill her children i have to tell her i have to protect her she cut my head off every night buglar and howard told me she would and she did her pretty eyes looking at me like i was a stranger not mean or anything but like i was somebody she found and felt sorry for like she didn t want to do it but she had to and it wasn t going to hurt that it was just a thing grown up people do like pull a splinter out your hand touch the corner of a towel in your eye if you get a cinder in it she looks over at buglar and howard see if they all right then she comes over to my side i know she ll be good at it careful that when she cuts it off it ll be done right it won t hurt after she does it i lie there for a minute with just my head then she carries it downstairs to braid my hair i try not to cry but it hurts so much to comb it when she finishes the combing and starts the braiding i get sleepy i want to go to sleep but i know if i do i won t wake up so i have to stay awake while she finishes my hair then i can sleep the scary part is waiting for her to come in and do it not when she does it but when i wait for her to only place she can t get to me in the night is grandma baby s room the room we sleep in upstairs used to be where the help slept when whitepeople lived here they had a kitchen outside too but grandma baby turned it into a woodshed and toolroom when she moved in and she boarded up the back door that led to it because she said she didn t want to make that journey no more she built around it to make a storeroom so if you want to get in you have to come by her said she didn t care what folks said about her fixing a two story house up like a cabin where you cook inside she said they told her visitors with nice dresses don t want to sit in the same room with the cook stove and the peelings and the grease and the smoke she wouldn t pay them no mind she said i was safe at night in there with her all i could hear was me breathing but sometimes in the day i couldn t tell whether it was me breathing or somebody next to me i used to watch here boy s stomach go in and out in and out to see if it matched mine holding my breath to get off his rhythm releasing it to get on just to see whose it was that sound like when you blow soft in a bottle only regular regular am i making that sound is howard who is that was when everybody was quiet and i couldn t hear anything they said i didn t care either because the quiet let me dream my daddy better i always knew he was coming something was holding him up he had a problem with the horse the river flooded the boat sank and he had to make a new one sometimes it was a lynch mob or a windstorm he was coming and it was a secret i spent all of my outside self loving ma am so she wouldn t kill me loving her even when she braided my head at night i never let her know my daddy was coming for me grandma baby thought he was coming too for a while she thought so then she stopped i never did even when buglar and howard ran away then paul d came in here i heard his voice downstairs and ma am laughing so i thought it was him my daddy nobody comes to this house anymore but when i got downstairs it was paul d and he didn t come for me he wanted my mother at first then he wanted my sister too but she got him out of here and i m so glad he s gone now it s just us and i can protect her till my daddy gets here to help me watch out for ma am and anything come in the yard my daddy do anything for runny fried eggs dip his bread in it grandma used to tell me his things she said anytime she could make him a plate of soft fried eggs was christmas made him so happy she said she was always a little scared of my daddy he was too good she said from the beginning she said he was too good for the world scared her she thought he ll never make it through nothing whitepeople must have thought so too because they never got split up so she got the chance to know him look after him and he scared her the way he loved things animals and tools and crops and the alphabet he could count on paper the boss taught him offered to teach the other boys but only my daddy wanted it she said the other boys said no one of them with a number for a name said it would change his mind make him forget things he shouldn t and memorize things he shouldn t and he didn t want his mind messed up but my daddy said if you can t count they can cheat you if you can t read they can beat you they thought that was funny grandma said she didn t know but it was because my daddy could count on paper and figure that he bought her away from there and she said she always wished she could read the bible like real preachers so it was good for me to learn how and i did until it got quiet and all i could hear was my own breathing and one other who knocked over the milk jug while it was sitting on the table nobody near it ma am whipped buglar but he didn t touch it then it messed up all the ironed clothes and put its hands in the cake look like i was the only one who knew right away who it was just like when she came back i knew who she was too not right away but soon as she spelled her name not her given name but the one ma am paid the stonecutter for i knew and when she wondered about ma am s earrings something i didn t know about well that just made the cheese more binding my sister come to help me wait for my daddy my daddy was an angel man he could look at you and tell where you hurt and he could fix it too he made a hanging thing for grandma baby so she could pull herself up from the floor when she woke up in the morning and he made a step so when she stood up she was level grandma said she was always afraid a whiteman would knock her down in front of her children she behaved and did everything right in front of her children because she didn t want them to see her knocked down she said it made children crazy to see that at sweet home nobody did or said they would so my daddy never saw it there and never went crazy and even now i bet he s trying to get here if paul d could do it my daddy could too angel man we should all be together me him and beloved ma am could stay or go off with paul d if she wanted to unless daddy wanted her himself but i don t think he would now since she let paul d in her bed grandma baby said people look down on her because she had eight children with different men coloredpeople and whitepeople both look down on her for that slaves not supposed to have pleasurable feelings on their own their bodies not supposed to be like that but they have to have as many children as they can to please whoever owned them still they were not supposed to have pleasure deep down she said for me not to listen to all that that i should always listen to my body and love it the secret house when she died i went there ma am wouldn t let me go outside in the yard and eat with the others we stayed inside that hurt i know grandma baby would have liked the party and the people who came to it because she got low not seeing anybody or going anywhere just grieving and thinking about colors and how she made a mistake that what she thought about what the heart and the body could do was wrong the whitepeople came anyway in her yard she had done everything right and they came in her yard anyway and she didn t know what to think all she had left was her heart and they busted it so even the war couldn t rouse her she told me all my daddy s things how hard he worked to buy her after the cake was ruined and the ironed clothes all messed up and after i heard my sister crawling up the stairs to get back to her bed she told me my things too that i was charmed my birth was and i got saved all the time and that i shouldn t be afraid of the ghost it wouldn t harm me because i tasted its blood when ma am nursed me she said the ghost was after ma am and her too for not doing anything to stop it but it would never hurt me i just had to watch out for it because it was a greedy ghost and needed a lot of love which was only natural considering and i do love her i do she played with me and always came to be with me whenever i needed her she s mine beloved she s mine chapter i am beloved and she is mine i see her take flowers away from leaves she puts them in a round basket the leaves are not for her she fills the basket she opens the grass i would help her but the clouds are in the way how can i say things that are pictures i am not separate from her there is no place where i stop her face is my own and i want to be there in the place where her face is and to be looking at it too a hot thing all of it is now it is always now there will never be a time when i am not crouching and watching others who are crouching too i am always crouching the man on my face is dead his face is not mine his mouth smells sweet but his eyes are locked some who eat nasty themselves i do not eat the men without skin bring us their morning water to drink we have none at night i cannot see the dead man on my face daylight comes through the cracks and i can see his locked eyes i am not big small rats do not wait for us to sleep someone is thrashing but there is no room to do it in if we had more to drink we could make tears we cannot make sweat or morning water so the men without skin bring us theirs one time they bring us sweet rocks to suck we are all trying to leave our bodies behind the man on my face has done it it is hard to make yourself die forever you sleep short and then return in the beginning we could vomit now we do not now we cannot his teeth are pretty white points someone is trembling i can feel it over here he is fighting hard to leave his body which is a small bird trembling there is no room to tremble so he is not able to die my own dead man is pulled away from my face i miss his pretty white points we are not crouching now we are standing but my legs are like my dead man s eyes i cannot fall because there is no room to the men without skin are making loud noises i am not dead the bread is sea colored i am too hungry to eat it the sun closes my eyes those able to die are in a pile i cannot find my man the one whose teeth i have loved a hot thing the little hill of dead people a hot thing the men without skin push them through with poles the woman is there with the face i want the face that is mine they fall into the sea which is the color of the bread she has nothing in her ears if i had the teeth of the man who died on my face i would bite the circle around her neck bite it away i know she does not like it now there is room to crouch and to watch the crouching others it is the crouching that is now always now inside the woman with my face is in the sea a hot thing in the beginning i could see her i could not help her because the clouds were in the way in the beginning i could see her the shining in her ears she does not like the circle around her neck i know this i look hard at her so she will know that the clouds are in the way i am sure she saw me i am looking at her see me she empties out her eyes i am there in the place where her face is and telling her the noisy clouds were in my way she wants her earrings she wants her round basket i want her face a hot thing in the beginning the women are away from the men and the men are away from the women storms rock us and mix the men into the women and the women into the men that is when i begin to be on the back of the man for a long time i see only his neck and his wide shoulders above me i am small i love him because he has a song when he turned around to die i see the teeth he sang through his singing was soft his singing is of the place where a woman takes flowers away from their leaves and puts them in a round basket before the clouds she is crouching near us but i do not see her until he locks his eyes and dies on my face we are that way there is no breath coming from his mouth and the place where breath should be is sweet smelling the others do not know he is dead i know his song is gone now i love his pretty little teeth instead i cannot lose her again my dead man was in the way like the noisy clouds when he dies on my face i can see hers she is going to smile at me she is going to her sharp earrings are gone the men without skin are making loud noises they push my own man through they do not push the woman with my face through she goes in they do not push her she goes in the little hill is gone she was going to smile at me she was going to a hot thing they are not crouching now we are they are floating on the water they break up the little hill and push it through i cannot find my pretty teeth i see the dark face that is going to smile at me it is my dark face that is going to smile at me the iron circle is around our neck she does not have sharp earrings in her ears or a round basket she goes in the water with my face i am standing in the rain falling the others are taken i am not taken i am falling like the rain is i watch him eat inside i am crouching to keep from falling with the rain i am going to be in pieces he hurts where i sleep he puts his finger there i drop the food and break into pieces she took my face away there is no one to want me to say me my name i wait on the bridge because she is under it there is night and there is day again again night day night day i am waiting no iron circle is around my neck no boats go on this water no men without skin my dead man is not floating here his teeth are down there where the blue is and the grass so is the face i want the face that is going to smile at me it is going to in the day diamonds are in the water where she is and turtles in the night i hear chewing and swallowing and laughter it belongs to me she is the laugh i am the laugher i see her face which is mine it is the face that was going to smile at me in the place where we crouched now she is going to her face comes through the water a hot thing her face is mine she is not smiling she is chewing and swallowing i have to have my face i go in the grass opens she opens it i am in the water and she is coming there is no round basket no iron circle around her neck she goes up where the diamonds are i follow her we are in the diamonds which are her earrings now my face is coming i have to have it i am looking for the join i am loving my face so much my dark face is close to me i want to join she whispers to me she whispers i reach for her chewing and swallowing she touches me she knows i want to join she chews and swallows me i am gone now i am her face my own face has left me i see me swim away a hot thing i see the bottoms of my feet i am alone i want to be the two of us i want the join i come out of blue water after the bottoms of my feet swim away from me i come up i need to find a place to be the air is heavy i am not dead i am not there is a house there is what she whispered to me i am where she told me i am not dead i sit the sun closes my eyes when i open them i see the face i lost sethe s is the face that lef me sethe sees me see her and i see the smile her smiling face is the place for me it is the face i lost she is my face smiling at me doing it at last a hot thing now we can join a hot thing chapter i am beloved and she is mine sethe is the one that picked flowers yellow flowers in the place before the crouching took them away from their green leaves they are on the quilt now where we sleep she was about to smile at me when the men without skin came and took us up into the sunlight with the dead and shoved them into the sea sethe went into the sea she went there they did not push her she went there she was getting ready to smile at me and when she saw the dead people pushed into the sea she went also and left me there with no face or hers sethe is the face i found and lost in the water under the bridge when i went in i saw her face coming to me and it was my face too i wanted to join i tried to join but she went up into the pieces of light at the top of the water i lost her again but i found the house she whispered to me and there she was smiling at last it s good but i cannot lose her again all i want to know is why did she go in the water in the place where we crouched why did she do that when she was just about to smile at me i wanted to join her in the sea but i could not move i wanted to help her when she was picking the flowers but the clouds of gunsmoke blinded me and i lost her three times i lost her once with the flowers because of the noisy clouds of smoke once when she went into the sea instead of smiling at me once under the bridge when i went in to j oin her and she came toward me but did not smile she whispered to me chewed me and swam away now i have found her in this house she smiles at me and it is my own face smiling i will not lose her again she is mine tell me the truth didn t you come from the other side yes i was on the other side you came back because of me yes you rememory me yes i remember you you never forgot me your face is mine do you forgive me will you stay you safe here now where are the men without skin out there way off can they get in here no they tried that once but i stopped them they won t ever come back one of them was in the house i was in he hurt me they can t hurt us no more where are your earrings they took them from me the men without skin took them yes i was going to help you but the clouds got in the way there re no clouds here if they put an iron circle around your neck i will bite it away beloved i will make you a round basket you re back you re back will we smile at me can t you see i m smiling i love your face we played by the creek i was there in the water in the quiet time we played the clouds were noisy and in the way when i needed you you came to be with me i needed her face to smile i could only hear breathing the breathing is gone only the teeth are left she said you wouldn t hurt me she hurt me i will protect you i want her face don t love her too much i am loving her too much watch out for her she can give you dreams she chews and swallows don t fall asleep when she braids your hair she is the laugh i am the laughter i watch the house i watch the yard she left me daddy is coming for us a hot thing beloved you are my sister you are my daughter you are my face you are me i have found you again you have come back to me you are my beloved you are mine you are mine you are mine i have your milk i have your smile i will take care of you you are my face i am you why did you leave me who am you i will never leave you again don t ever leave me again you will never leave me again you went in the water i drank your blood i brought your milk you forgot to smile i loved you you hurt me you came back to me you left me i waited for you you are mine you are mine you are mine chapter it was a tiny church no bigger than a rich man s parlor the pews had no backs and since the congregation was also the choir it didn t need a stall certain members had been assigned the construction of a platform to raise the preacher a few inches above his congregation but it was a less than urgent task since the major elevation a white oak cross had already taken place before it was the church of the holy redeemer it was a dry goods shop that had no use for side windows just front ones for display these were papered over while members considered whether to paint or curtain them how to have privacy without losing the little light that might want to shine on them in the summer the doors were left open for ventilation in winter an iron stove in the aisle did what it could at the front of the church was a sturdy porch where customers used to sit and children laughed at the boy who got his head stuck between the railings on a sunny and windless day in january it was actually warmer out there than inside if the iron stove was cold the damp cellar was fairly warm but there was no light lighting the pallet or the washbasin or the nail from which a man s clothes could be hung and a oil lamp in a cellar was sad so paul d sat on the porch steps and got additional warmth from a bottle of liquor jammed in his coat pocket warmth and red eyes he held his wrist between his knees not to keep his hands still but because he had nothing else to hold on to his tobacco tin blown open spilled contents that floated freely and made him their play and prey he couldn t figure out why it took so long he may as well have jumped in the fire with sixo and they both could have had a good laugh surrender was bound to come anyway why not meet it with a laugh shouting seven o why not why the delay he had already seen his brother wave goodbye from the back of a dray fried chicken in his pocket tears in his eyes mother father didn t remember the one never saw the other he was the youngest of three half brothers same mother different fathers sold to garner and kept there forbidden to leave the farm for twenty years once in maryland he met four families of slaves who had all been together for a hundred years great grands grands mothers fathers aunts uncles cousins children half white part white all black mixed with indian he watched them with awe and envy and each time he discovered large families of black people he made them identify over and over who each was what relation who in fact belonged to who that there s my auntie this here s her boy yonder is my pap s cousin my ma am was married twice this my half sister and these her two children now my wife nothing like that had ever been his and growing up at sweet home he didn t miss it he had his brothers two friends baby suggs in the kitchen a boss who showed them how to shoot and listened to what they had to say a mistress who made their soap and never raised her voice for twenty years they had all lived in that cradle until baby left sethe came and halle took her he made a family with her and sixo was hell bent to make one with the thirty mile woman when paul d waved goodbye to his oldest brother the boss was dead the mistress nervous and the cradle already split sixo said the doctor made mrs garner sick said he was giving her to drink what stallions got when they broke a leg and no gunpowder could be spared and had it not been for schoolteacher s new rules he would have told her so they laughed at him sixo had a knowing tale about everything including mr garner s stroke which he said was a shot in his ear put there by a jealous neighbor where s the blood they asked him there was no blood mr garner came home bent over his mare s neck sweating and blue white not a drop of blood sixo grunted the only one of them not sorry to see him go later however he was mighty sorry they all were why she call on him paul d asked why she need the schoolteacher she need somebody can figure said halle you can do figures not like that no man said sixo she need another white on the place what for what you think what you think well that s the way it was nobody counted on garner dying nobody thought he could how bout that everything rested on garner being alive without his life each of theirs fell to pieces now ain t that slavery or what is it at the peak of his strength taller than tall men and stronger than most they clipped him paul d first his shotgun then his thoughts for schoolteacher didn t take advice from negroes the information they offered he called backtalk and developed a variety of corrections which he recorded in his notebook to reeducate them he complained they ate too much rested too much talked too much which was certainly true compared to him because schoolteacher ate little spoke less and rested not at all once he saw them playing a pitching game and his look of deeply felt hurt was enough to make paul d blink he was as hard on his pupils as he was on them except for the corrections for years paul d believed schoolteacher broke into children what garner had raised into men and it was that that made them run off now plagued by the contents of his tobacco tin he wondered how much difference there really was between before schoolteacher and after garner called and announced them men but only on sweet home and by his leave was he naming what he saw or creating what he did not that was the wonder of sixo and even halle it was always clear to paul d that those two were men whether garner said so or not it troubled him that concerning his own manhood he could not satisfy himself on that point oh he did manly things but was that garner s gift or his own will what would he have been anyway before sweet home without garner in sixo s country or his mother s or god help him on the boat did a whiteman saying it make it so suppose garner woke up one morning and changed his mind took the word away would they have run then and if he didn t would the pauls have stayed there all their lives why did the brothers need the one whole night to decide to discuss whether they would join sixo and halle because they had been isolated in a wonderful lie dismissing halle s and baby suggs life before sweet home as bad luck ignorant of or amused by sixo s dark stories protected and convinced they were special never suspecting the problem of alfred georgia being so in love with the look of the world putting up with anything and everything just to stay alive in a place where a moon he had no right to was nevertheless there loving small and in secret his little love was a tree of course but not like brother old wide and beckoning in alfred georgia there was an aspen too young to call sapling just a shoot no taller than his waist the kind of thing a man would cut to whip his horse song murder and the aspen he stayed alive to sing songs that murdered life and watched an aspen that confirmed it and never for a minute did he believe he could escape until it rained afterward after the cherokee pointed and sent him running toward blossoms he wanted simply to move go pick up one day and be somewhere else the next resigned to life without aunts cousins children even a woman until sethe and then she moved him just when doubt regret and every single unasked question was packed away long after he believed he had willed himself into being at the very time and place he wanted to take root she moved him from room to room like a rag doll sitting on the porch of a dry goods church a little bit drunk and nothing much to do he could have these thoughts slow what if thoughts that cut deep but struck nothing solid a man could hold on to so he held his wrists passing by that woman s life getting in it and letting it get in him had set him up for this fall wanting to live out his life with a whole woman was new and losing the feeling of it made him want to cry and think deep thoughts that struck nothing solid when he was drifting thinking only about the next meal and night s sleep when everything was packed tight in his chest he had no sense of failure of things not working out anything that worked at all worked out now he wondered what all went wrong and starting with the plan everything had it was a good plan too worked out in detail with every possibility of error eliminated sixo hitching up the horses is speaking english again and tells halle what his thirty mile woman told him that seven negroes on her place were joining two others going north that the two others had done it before and knew the way that one of the two a woman would wait for them in the corn when it was high one night and half of the next day she would wait and if they came she would take them to the caravan where the others would be hidden that she would rattle and that would be the sign sixo was going his woman was going and halle was taking his whole family the two pauls say they need time to think about it time to wonder where they will end up how they will live what work who will take them in should they try to get to paul f whose owner they remember lived in something called the trace it takes them one evening s conversation to decide now all they have to do is wait through the spring till the corn is as high as it ever got and the moon as fat and plan is it better to leave in the dark to get a better start or go at daybreak to be able to see the way better sixo spits at the suggestion night gives them more time and the protection of color he does not ask them if they are afraid he manages some dry runs to the corn at night burying blankets and two knives near the creek will sethe be able to swim the creek they ask him it will be dry he says when the corn is tall there is no food to put by but sethe says she will get a jug of cane syrup or molasses and some bread when it is near the time to go she only wants to be sure the blankets are where they should be for they will need them to tie her baby on her back and to cover them during the journey there are no clothes other than what they wear and of course no shoes the knives will help them eat but they bury rope and a pot as well a good plan they watch and memorize the comings and goings of schoolteacher and his pupils what is wanted when and where how long it takes mrs garner restless at night is sunk in sleep all morning some days the pupils and their teacher do lessons until breakfast one day a week they skip breakfast completely and travel ten miles to church expecting a large dinner upon their return schoolteacher writes in his notebook after supper the pupils clean mend or sharpen tools sethe s work is the most uncertain because she is on call for mrs garner anytime including nighttime when the pain or the weakness or the downright loneliness is too much for her so sixo and the pauls will go after supper and wait in the creek for the thirty mile woman halle will bring sethe and the three children before dawn before the sun before the chickens and the milking cow need attention so by the time smoke should be coming from the cooking stove they will be in or near the creek with the others that way if mrs garner needs sethe in the night and calls her sethe will be there to answer they only have to wait through the spring but sethe was pregnant in the spring and by august is so heavy with child she may not be able to keep up with the men who can carry the children but not her but neighbors discouraged by garner when he was alive now feel free to visit sweet home and might appear in the right place at the wrong time but sethe s children cannot play in the kitchen anymore so she is dashing back and forth between house and quarters fidgety and frustrated trying to watch over them they are too young for men s work and the baby girl is nine months old without mrs garner s help her work increases as do schoolteacher s demands but after the conversation about the shoat sixo is tied up with the stock at night and locks are put on bins pens sheds coops the tackroom and the barn door there is no place to dart into or congregate sixo keeps a nail in his mouth now to help him undo the rope when he has to but halle is told to work his extra on sweet home and has no call to be anywhere other than where schoolteacher tells him only sixo who has been stealing away to see his woman and halle who has been hired away for years know what lies outside sweet home and how to get there it is a good plan it can be done right under the watchful pupils and their teacher but they had to alter it just a little first they change the leaving they memorize the directions halle gives them sixo needing time to untie himself break open the door and not disturb the horses will leave later joining them at the creek with the thirty mile woman all four will go straight to the corn halle who also needs more time now because of sethe decides to bring her and the children at night not wait till first light they will go straight to the corn and not assemble at the creek the corn stretches to their shoulders it will never be higher the moon is swelling they can hardly harvest or chop or clear or pick or haul for listening for a rattle that is not bird or snake then one midmorning they hear it or halle does and begins to sing it to the others hush hush somebody s calling my name hush hush somebody s calling my name o my lord o my lord what shall i do on his dinner break he leaves the field he has to he has to tell sethe that he has heard the sign for two successive nights she has been with mrs garner and he can t chance it that she will not know that this night she cannot be the pauls see him go from underneath brother s shade where they are chewing corn cake they see him swinging along the bread tastes good they lick sweat from their lips to give it a saltier flavor schoolteacher and his pupils are already at the house eating dinner halle swings along he is not singing now nobody knows what happened except for the churn that was the last anybody ever saw of halle what paul d knew was that halle disappeared never told sethe anything and was next seen squatting in butter maybe when he got to the gate and asked to see sethe schoolteacher heard a tint of anxiety in his voice the tint that would make him pick up his ever ready shotgun maybe halle made the mistake of saying my wife in some way that would put a light in schoolteacher s eye sethe says now that she heard shots but did not look out the window of mrs garner s bedroom but halle was not killed or wounded that day because paul d saw him later after she had run off with no one s help after sixo laughed and his brother disappeared saw him greased and flat eyed as a fish maybe schoolteacher shot after him shot at his feet to remind him of the trespass maybe halle got in the barn hid there and got locked in with the rest of schoolteacher s stock maybe anything he disappeared and everybody was on his own paul a goes back to moving timber after dinner they are to meet at quarters for supper he never shows up paul d leaves for the creek on time believing hoping paul a has gone on ahead certain schoolteacher has learned something paul d gets to the creek and it is as dry as sixo promised he waits there with the thirty mile woman for sixo and paul a only sixo shows up his wrists bleeding his tongue licking his lips like a flame you see paul a no halle no no sign of them no sign nobody in quarters but the children sethe her children sleep she must be there still i can t leave without paul a i can t help you should i go back and look for them i can t help you what you think i think they go straight to the corn sixo turns then to the woman and they clutch each other and whisper she is lit now with some glowing some shining that comes from inside her before when she knelt on creek pebbles with paul d she was nothing a shape in the dark breathing lightly sixo is about to crawl out to look for the knives he buried he hears something he hears nothing forget the knives now the three of them climb up the bank and schoolteacher his pupils and four other whitemen move toward them with lamps sixo pushes the thirty mile woman and she runs further on in the creekbed paul d and sixo run the other way toward the woods both are surrounded and tied the air gets sweet then perfumed by the things honeybees love tied like a mule paul d feels how dewy and inviting the grass is he is thinking about that and where paul a might be when sixo turns and grabs the mouth of the nearest pointing rifle he begins to sing two others shove paul d and tie him to a tree schoolteacher is saying alive alive i want him alive sixo swings and cracks the ribs of one but with bound hands cannot get the weapon in position to use it in any other way all the whitemen have to do is wait for his song perhaps to end five guns are trained on him while they listen paul d cannot see them when they step away from lamplight finally one of them hits sixo in the head with his rifle and when he comes to a hickory fire is in front of him and he is tied at the waist to a tree schoolteacher has changed his mind this one will never be suitable the song must have convinced him the fire keeps failing and the whitemen are put out with themselves at not being prepared for this emergency they came to capture not kill what they can manage is only enough for cooking hominy dry faggots are scarce and the grass is slick with dew by the light of the hominy fire sixo straightens he is through with his song he laughs a rippling sound like sethe s sons make when they tumble in hay or splash in rainwater his feet are cooking the cloth of his trousers smokes he laughs something is funny paul d guesses what it is when sixo interrupts his laughter to call out seven o seven o smoky stubborn fire they shoot him to shut him up have to shackled walking through the perfumed things honeybees love paul d hears the men talking and for the first time learns his worth he has always known or believed he did his value as a hand a laborer who could make profit on a farm but now he discovers his worth which is to say he learns his price the dollar value of his weight his strength his heart his brain his penis and his future as soon as the whitemen get to where they have tied their horses and mount them they are calmer talking among themselves about the difficulty they face the problems voices remind schoolteacher about the spoiling these particular slaves have had at garner s hands there s laws against what he done letting niggers hire out their own time to buy themselves he even let em have guns and you think he mated them niggers to get him some more hell no he planned for them to marry if that don t beat all schoolteacher sighs and says doesn t he know it he had come to put the place aright now it faced greater ruin than what garner left for it because of the loss of two niggers at the least and maybe three because he is not sure they will find the one called halle the sister in law is too weak to help out and doggone if now there ain t a full scale stampede on his hands he would have to trade this here one for if he could get it and set out to secure the breeding one her foal and the other one if he found him with the money from this here one he could get two young ones twelve or fifteen years old and maybe with the breeding one her three pickaninnies and whatever the foal might be he and his nephews would have seven niggers and sweet home would be worth the trouble it was causing him look to you like lillian gonna make it touch and go touch and go you was married to her sister in law wasn t you i was she frail too a bit fever took her well you don t need to stay no widower in these parts my cogitation right now is sweet home can t say as i blame you that s some spread they put a three spoke collar on him so he can t lie down and they chain his ankles together the number he heard with his ear is now in his head two two two niggers lost paul d thinks his heart is jumping they are going to look for halle not paul a they must have found paul a and if a whiteman finds you it means you are surely lost schoolteacher looks at him for a long time before he closes the door of the cabin carefully he looks paul d does not look back it is sprinkling now a teasing august rain that raises expectations it cannot fill he thinks he should have sung along loud something loud and rolling to go with sixo s tune but the words put him off he didn t understand the words although it shouldn t have mattered because he understood the sound hatred so loose it was juba the warm sprinkle comes and goes comes and goes he thinks he hears sobbing that seems to come from mrs garner s window but it could be anything anyone even a she cat making her yearning known tired of holding his head up he lets his chin rest on the collar and speculates on how he can hobble over to the grate boil a little water and throw in a handful of meal that s what he is doing when sethe comes in rain wet and big bellied saying she is going to cut she has just come back from taking her children to the corn the whites were not around she couldn t find halle who was caught did sixo get away paul a he tells her what he knows sixo is dead the thirty mile woman ran and he doesn t know what happened to paul a or halle where could he be she asks paul d shrugs because he can t shake his head you saw sixo die you sure i m sure was he woke when it happened did he see it coming he was woke woke and laughing sixo laughed you should have heard him sethe sethe s dress steams before the little fire over which he is boiling water it is hard to move about with shackled ankles and the neck jewelry embarrasses him in his shame he avoids her eyes but when he doesn t he sees only black in them no whites she says she is going and he thinks she will never make it to the gate but he doesn t dissuade her he knows he will never see her again and right then and there his heart stopped the pupils must have taken her to the barn for sport right afterward and when she told mrs garner they took down the cowhide who in hell or on this earth would have thought that she would cut anyway they must have believed what with her belly and her back that she wasn t going anywhere he wasn t surprised to learn that they had tracked her down in cincinnati because when he thought about it now her price was greater than his property that reproduced itself without cost remembering his own price down to the cent that schoolteacher was able to get for him he wondered what sethe s would have been what had baby suggs been how much did halle owe still besides his labor what did mrs garner get for paul f more than nine hundred dollars how much more ten dollars twenty schoolteacher would know he knew the worth of everything it accounted for the real sorrow in his voice when he pronounced sixo unsuitable who could be fooled into buying a singing nigger with a gun shouting seven o seven o because his thirty mile woman got away with his blossoming seed what a laugh so rippling and full of glee it put out the fire and it was sixo s laughter that was on his mind not the bit in his mouth when they hitched him to the buckboard then he saw halle then the rooster smiling as if to say you ain t seen nothing yet how could a rooster know about alfred georgia chapter howdy stamp paid was still fingering the ribbon and it made a little motion in his pants pocket paul d looked up noticed the side pocket agitation and snorted i can t read you got any more newspaper for me just a waste of time stamp withdrew the ribbon and sat down on the steps no this here s something else he stroked the red cloth between forefinger and thumb something else paul d didn t say anything so the two men sat in silence for a few moments this is hard for me said stamp but i got to do it two things i got to say to you i m a take the easy one first paul d chuckled if it s hard for you might kill me dead no no nothing like that i come looking for you to ask your pardon apologize for what paul d reached in his coat pocket for his bottle you pick any house any house where colored live in all of cincinnati pick any one and you welcome to stay there i m apologizing because they didn t offer or tell you but you welcome anywhere you want to be my house is your house too john and ella miss lady able woodruff willie pike anybody you choose you ain t got to sleep in no cellar and i apologize for each and every night you did i don t know how that preacher let you do it i knowed him since he was a boy whoa stamp he offered did well well i wanted i didn t want to i just wanted to be off by myself a spell he offered every time i see him he offers again that s a load off i thought everybody gone crazy paul d shook his head just me you planning to do anything about it oh yeah i got big plans he swallowed twice from the bottle any planning in a bottle is short thought stamp but he knew from personal experience the pointlessness of telling a drinking man not to he cleared his sinuses and began to think how to get to the second thing he had come to say very few people were out today the canal was frozen so that traffic too had stopped they heard the dop of a horse approaching its rider sat a high eastern saddle but everything else about him was ohio valley as he rode by he looked at them and suddenly reined his horse and came up to the path leading to the church he leaned forward hey he said stamp put his ribbon in his pocket yes sir i m looking for a gal name of judy works over by the slaughterhouse don t believe i know her no sir said she lived on plank road plank road yes sir that s up a ways mile maybe you don t know her judy works in the slaughterhouse no sir but i know plank road bout a mile up thataway paul d lifted his bottle and swallowed the rider looked at him and then back at stamp paid loosening the right rein he turned his horse toward the road then changed his mind and came back look here he said to paul d there s a cross up there so i guess this here s a church or used to be seems to me like you ought to show it some respect you follow me yes sir said stamp you right about that that s just what i come over to talk to him about just that the rider clicked his tongue and trotted off stamp made small circles in the palm of his left hand with two fingers of his right you got to choose he said choose anyone they let you be if you want em to my house ella willie pike none of us got much but all of us got room for one more pay a little something when you can don t when you can t think about it you grown i can t make you do what you won t but think about it paul d said nothing if i did you harm i m here to rectify it no need for that no need at all a woman with four children walked by on the other side of the road she waved smiling hoo oo i can t stop see you at meeting i be there stamp returned her greeting there s another one he said to paul d scripture woodruff able s sister works at the brush and tallow factory you ll see stay around here long enough you ll see ain t a sweeter bunch of colored anywhere than what s right here pride well that bothers em a bit they can get messy when they think somebody s too proud but when it comes right down to it they good people and anyone will take you in what about judy she take me in depends what you got in mind you know judy judith i know everybody out on plank road everybody well she take me in stamp leaned down and untied his shoe twelve black buttonhooks six on each side at the bottom led to four pairs of eyes at the top he loosened the laces all the way down adjusted the tongue carefully and wound them back again when he got to the eyes he rolled the lace tips with his fingers before inserting them let me tell you how i got my name the knot was tight and so was the bow they called me joshua he said i renamed myself he said and i m going to tell you why i did it and he told him about vashti i never touched her all that time not once almost a year we was planting when it started and picking when it stopped seemed longer i should have killed him she said no but i should have i didn t have the patience i got now but i figured maybe somebody else didn t have much patience either his own wife took it in my head to see if she was taking it any better than i was vashti and me was in the fields together in the day and every now and then she be gone all night i never touched her and damn me if i spoke three words to her a day i took any chance i had to get near the great house to see her the young master s wife nothing but a boy seventeen twenty maybe i caught sight of her finally standing in the backyard by the fence with a glass of water she was drinking out of it and just gazing out over the yard i went over stood back a ways and took off my hat i said scuse me miss scuse me she turned to look i m smiling scuse me you seen vashti my wife vashti a little bitty thing she was black hair face no bigger than my hand she said what vashti i say yes m vashti my wife she say she owe you all some eggs you know if she brung em you know her if you see her wear a black ribbon on her neck she got rosy then and i knowed she knowed he give vashti that to wear a cameo on a black ribbon she used to put it on every time she went to him i put my hat back on you see her tell her i need her thank you thank you ma am i backed off before she could say something i didn t dare look back till i got behind some trees she was standing just as i left her looking in her water glass i thought it would give me more satisfaction than it did i also thought she might stop it but it went right on till one morning vashti came in and sat by the window a sunday we worked our own patches on sunday she sat by the window looking out of it i m back she said i m back josh i looked at the back of her neck she had a real small neck i decided to break it you know like a twig just snap it i been low but that was as low as i ever got did you snap it uh uh i changed my name how you get out of there how you get up here boat on up the mississippi to memphis walked from memphis to cumberland vashti too no she died aw man tie your other shoe what tie your goddamn shoe it s sitting right in front of you tie it that make you feel better no paul d tossed the bottle on the ground and stared at the golden chariot on its label no horses just a golden coach draped in blue cloth i said i had two things to say to you i only told you one i have to tell you the other i don t want to know it i don t want to know nothing just if judy will take me in or won t she i was there paul d you was where there in the yard when she did it judy sethe jesus it ain t what you think you don t know what i think she ain t crazy she love those children she was trying to out hurt the hurter leave off and spread it stamp let me off i knew her when she was a girl she scares me and i knew her when she was a girl you ain t scared of sethe i don t believe you sethe scares me i scare me and that girl in her house scares me the most who is that girl where she come from i don t know just shot up one day sitting on a stump huh look like you and me the only ones outside lay eyes on her she don t go nowhere where d you see her sleeping on the kitchen floor i peeped in first minute i saw her i didn t want to be nowhere around her something funny about her talks funny acts funny paul d dug his fingers underneath his cap and rubbed the scalp over his temple she reminds me of something something look like i m supposed to remember she never say where she was from where s her people she don t know or says she don t all i ever heard her say was something about stealing her clothes and living on a bridge what kind of bridge who you asking no bridges around here i don t know about but don t nobody live on em under em neither how long she been over there with sethe last august day of the carnival that s a bad sign was she at the carnival no when we got back there she was sleep on a stump silk dress brand new shoes black as oil you don t say huh was a girl locked up in the house with a whiteman over by deer creek found him dead last summer and the girl gone maybe that s her folks say he had her in there since she was a pup well now she s a bitch is she what run you off not what i told you bout sethe a shudder ran through paul d a bone cold spasm that made him clutch his knees he didn t know if it was bad whiskey nights in the cellar pig fever iron bits smiling roosters fired feet laughing dead men hissing grass rain apple blossoms neck jewelry judy in the slaughterhouse halle in the butter ghost white stairs chokecherry trees cameo pins aspens paul a s face sausage or the loss of a red red heart tell me something stamp paul d s eyes were rheumy tell me this one thing how much is a nigger supposed to take tell me how much all he can said stamp paid all he can why why why why why book three chapter was quiet denver who thought she knew all about silence was surprised to learn hunger could do that quiet you down and wear you out neither sethe nor beloved knew or cared about it one way or another they were too busy rationing their strength to fight each other so it was she who had to step off the edge of the world and die because if she didn t they all would the flesh between her mother s forefinger and thumb was thin as china silk and there wasn t a piece of clothing in the house that didn t sag on her beloved held her head up with the palms of her hands slept wherever she happened to be and whined for sweets although she was getting bigger plumper by the day everything was gone except two laying hens and somebody would soon have to decide whether an egg every now and then was worth more than two fried chickens the hungrier they got the weaker the weaker they got the quieter they were which was better than the furious arguments the poker slammed up against the wall all the shouting and crying that followed that one happy january when they played denver had joined in the play holding back a bit out of habit even though it was the most fun she had ever known but once sethe had seen the scar the tip of which denver had been looking at whenever beloved undressed the little curved shadow of a smile in the kootchy kootchy coo place under her chin once sethe saw it fingered it and closed her eyes for a long time the two of them cut denver out of the games the cooking games the sewing games the hair and dressing up games games her mother loved so well she took to going to work later and later each day until the predictable happened sawyer told her not to come back and instead of looking for another job sethe played all the harder with beloved who never got enough of anything lullabies new stitches the bottom of the cake bowl the top of the milk if the hen had only two eggs she got both it was as though her mother had lost her mind like grandma baby calling for pink and not doing the things she used to but different because unlike baby suggs she cut denver out completely even the song that she used to sing to denver she sang for beloved alone high johnny wide johnny don t you leave my side johnny at first they played together a whole month and denver loved it from the night they ice skated under a star loaded sky and drank sweet milk by the stove to the string puzzles sethe did for them in afternoon light and shadow pictures in the gloaming in the very teeth of winter and sethe her eyes fever bright was plotting a garden of vegetables and flowers talking talking about what colors it would have she played with beloved s hair braiding puffing tying oiling it until it made denver nervous to watch her they changed beds and exchanged clothes walked arm in arm and smiled all the time when the weather broke they were on their knees in the backyard designing a garden in dirt too hard to chop the thirty eight dollars of life savings went to feed themselves with fancy food and decorate themselves with ribbon and dress goods which sethe cut and sewed like they were going somewhere in a hurry bright clothes with blue stripes and sassy prints she walked the four miles to john shillito s to buy yellow ribbon shiny buttons and bits of black lace by the end of march the three of them looked like carnival women with nothing to do when it became clear that they were only interested in each other denver began to drift from the play but she watched it alert for any sign that beloved was in danger finally convinced there was none and seeing her mother that happy that smiling how could it go wrong she let down her guard and it did her problem at first was trying to find out who was to blame her eye was on her mother for a signal that the thing that was in her was out and she would kill again but it was beloved who made demands anything she wanted she got and when sethe ran out of things to give her beloved invented desire she wanted sethe s company for hours to watch the layer of brown leaves waving at them from the bottom of the creek in the same place where as a little girl denver played in the silence with her now the players were altered as soon as the thaw was complete beloved gazed at her gazing face rippling folding spreading disappearing into the leaves below she flattened herself on the ground dirtying her bold stripes and touched the rocking faces with her own she filled basket after basket with the first things warmer weather let loose in the ground dandelions violets forsythia presenting them to sethe who arranged them stuck them wound them all over the house dressed in sethe s dresses she stroked her skin with the palm of her hand she imitated sethe talked the way she did laughed her laugh and used her body the same way down to the walk the way sethe moved her hands sighed through her nose held her head sometimes coming upon them making men and women cookies or tacking scraps of cloth on baby suggs old quilt it was difficult for denver to tell who was who then the mood changed and the arguments began slowly at first a complaint from beloved an apology from sethe a reduction of pleasure at some special effort the older woman made wasn t it too cold to stay outside beloved gave a look that said so what was it past bedtime the light no good for sewing beloved didn t move said do it and sethe complied she took the best of everything first the best chair the biggest piece the prettiest plate the brightest ribbon for her hair and the more she took the more sethe began to talk explain describe how much she had suffered been through for her children waving away flies in grape arbors crawling on her knees to a lean to none of which made the impression it was supposed to beloved accused her of leaving her behind of not being nice to her not smiling at her she said they were the same had the same face how could she have left her and sethe cried saying she never did or meant to that she had to get them out away that she had the milk all the time and had the money too for the stone but not enough that her plan was always that they would all be together on the other side forever beloved wasn t interested she said when she cried there was no one that dead men lay on top of her that she had nothing to eat ghosts without skin stuck their fingers in her and said beloved in the dark and bitch in the light sethe pleaded for forgiveness counting listing again and again her reasons that beloved was more important meant more to her than her own life that she would trade places any day give up her life every minute and hour of it to take back just one of beloved s tears did she know it hurt her when mosquitoes bit her baby that to leave her on the ground to run into the big house drove her crazy that before leaving sweet home beloved slept every night on her chest or curled on her back beloved denied it sethe never came to her never said a word to her never smiled and worst of all never waved goodbye or even looked her way before running away from her when once or twice sethe tried to assert herself be the unquestioned mother whose word was law and who knew what was best beloved slammed things wiped the table clean of plates threw salt on the floor broke a windowpane she was not like them she was wild game and nobody said get on out of here girl and come back when you get some sense nobody said you raise your hand to me and i will knock you into the middle of next week ax the trunk the limb will die honor thy mother and father that thy days may be long upon the land which the lord thy god giveth thee i will wrap you round that doorknob don t nobody work for you and god don t love ugly ways no no they mended the plates swept the salt and little by little it dawned on denver that if sethe didn t wake up one morning and pick up a knife beloved might frightened as she was by the thing in sethe that could come out it shamed her to see her mother serving a girl not much older than herself when she saw her carrying out beloved s night bucket denver raced to relieve her of it but the pain was unbearable when they ran low on food and denver watched her mother go without pick eating around the edges of the table and stove the hominy that stuck on the bottom the crusts and rinds and peelings of things once she saw her run her longest finger deep in an empty jam jar before rinsing and putting it away they grew tired and even beloved who was getting bigger seemed nevertheless as exhausted as they were in any case she substituted a snarl or a tooth suck for waving a poker around and was quiet listless and sleepy with hunger denver saw the flesh between her mother s forefinger and thumb fade saw sethe s eyes bright but dead alert but vacant paying attention to everything about beloved her lineless palms her forehead the smile under her jaw crooked and much too long everything except her basket fat stomach she also saw the sleeves of her own carnival shirtwaist cover her fingers hems that once showed her ankles now swept the floor she saw themselves beribboned decked out limp and starving but locked in a love that wore everybody out then sethe spit up something she had not eaten and it rocked denver like gunshot the job she started out with protecting beloved from sethe changed to protecting her mother from beloved now it was obvious that her mother could die and leave them both and what would beloved do then whatever was happening it only worked with three not two and since neither beloved nor sethe seemed to care what the next day might bring sethe happy when beloved was beloved lapping devotion like cream denver knew it was on her she would have to leave the yard step off the edge of the world leave the two behind and go ask somebody for help who would it be who could she stand in front of who wouldn t shame her on learning that her mother sat around like a rag doll broke down finally from trying to take care of and make up for denver knew about several people from hearing her mother and grandmother talk but she knew personally only two an old man with white hair called stamp and lady jones well paul d of course and that boy who told her about sethe but they wouldn t do at all her heart kicked and an itchy burning in her throat made her swallow all her saliva away she didn t even know which way to go when sethe used to work at the restaurant and when she still had money to shop she turned right back when denver went to lady jones school it was left the weather was warm the day beautiful it was april and everything alive was tentative denver wrapped her hair and her shoulders in the brightest of the carnival dresses and wearing a stranger s shoes she stood on the porch of ready to be swallowed up in the world beyond the edge of the porch out there where small things scratched and sometimes touched where words could be spoken that would close your ears shut where if you were alone feeling could overtake you and stick to you like a shadow out there where there were places in which things so bad had happened that when you went near them it would happen again like sweet home where time didn t pass and where like her mother said the bad was waiting for her as well how would she know these places what was more much more out there were whitepeople and how could you tell about them sethe said the mouth and sometimes the hands grandma baby said there was no defense they could prowl at will change from one mind to another and even when they thought they were behaving it was a far cry from what real humans did they got me out of jail sethe once told baby suggs they also put you in it she answered they drove you cross the river on my son s back they gave you this house nobody gave me nothing i got a job from them he got a cook from them girl oh some of them do all right by us and every time it s a surprise ain t it you didn t used to talk this way don t box with me there s more of us they drowned than there is all of them ever lived from the start of time lay down your sword this ain t a battle it s a rout remembering those conversations and her grandmother s last and final words denver stood on the porch in the sun and couldn t leave it her throat itched her heart kicked and then baby suggs laughed clear as anything you mean i never told you nothing about carolina about your daddy you don t remember nothing about how come i walk the way i do and about your mother s feet not to speak of her back i never told you all that is that why you can t walk down the steps my jesus my but you said there was no defense there ain t then what do i do know it and go on out the yard go on it came back a dozen years had passed and the way came back four houses on the right sitting close together in a line like wrens the first house had two steps and a rocking chair on the porch the second had three steps a broom propped on the porch beam two broken chairs and a clump of forsythia at the side no window at the front a little boy sat on the ground chewing a stick the third house had yellow shutters on its two front windows and pot after pot of green leaves with white hearts or red denver could hear chickens and the knock of a badly hinged gate at the fourth house the buds of a sycamore tree had rained down on the roof and made the yard look as though grass grew there a woman standing at the open door lifted her hand halfway in greeting then froze it near her shoulder as she leaned forward to see whom she waved to denver lowered her head next was a tiny fenced plot with a cow in it she remembered the plot but not the cow under her headcloth her scalp was wet with tension beyond her voices male voices floated coming closer with each step she took denver kept her eyes on the road in case they were whitemen in case she was walking where they wanted to in case they said something and she would have to answer them suppose they flung out at her grabbed her tied her they were getting closer maybe she should cross the road now was the woman who half waved at her still there in the open door would she come to her rescue or angry at denver for not waving back would she withhold her help maybe she should turn around get closer to the waving woman s house before she could make up her mind it was too late they were right in front of her two men negro denver breathed both men touched their caps and murmured morning morning denver believed her eyes spoke gratitude but she never got her mouth open in time to reply they moved left of her and passed on braced and heartened by that easy encounter she picked up speed and began to look deliberately at the neighborhood surrounding her she was shocked to see how small the big things were the boulder by the edge of the road she once couldn t see over was a sitting on rock paths leading to houses weren t miles long dogs didn t even reach her knees letters cut into beeches and oaks by giants were eye level now she would have known it anywhere the post and scrap lumber fence was gray now not white but she would have known it anywhere the stone porch sitting in a skirt of ivy pale yellow curtains at the windows the laid brick path to the front door and wood planks leading around to the back passing under the windows where she had stood on tiptoe to see above the sill denver was about to do it again when she realized how silly it would be to be found once more staring into the parlor of mrs lady jones the pleasure she felt at having found the house dissolved suddenly in doubt suppose she didn t live there anymore or remember her former student after all this time what would she say denver shivered inside wiped the perspiration from her forehead and knocked lady jones went to the door expecting raisins a child probably from the softness of the knock sent by its mother with the raisins she needed if her contribution to the supper was to be worth the trouble there would be any number of plain cakes potato pies she had reluctantly volunteered her own special creation but said she didn t have raisins so raisins is what the president said would be provided early enough so there would be no excuses mrs jones dreading the fatigue of beating batter had been hoping she had forgotten her bake oven had been cold all week getting it to the right temperature would be awful since her husband died and her eyes grew dim she had let up to snuff housekeeping fall away she was of two minds about baking something for the church on the one hand she wanted to remind everybody of what she was able to do in the cooking line on the other she didn t want to have to when she heard the tapping at the door she sighed and went to it hoping the raisins had at least been cleaned she was older of course and dressed like a chippy but the girl was immediately recognizable to lady jones everybody s child was in that face the nickel round eyes bold yet mistrustful the large powerful teeth between dark sculptured lips that did not cover them some vulnerability lay across the bridge of the nose above the cheeks and then the skin flawless economical just enough of it to cover the bone and not a bit more she must be eighteen or nineteen by now thought lady jones looking at the face young enough to be twelve heavy eyebrows thick baby lashes and the unmistakable love call that shimmered around children until they learned better why denver she said look at you lady jones had to take her by the hand and pull her in because the smile seemed all the girl could manage other people said this child was simple but lady jones never believed it having taught her watched her eat up a page a rule a figure she knew better when suddenly she had stopped coming lady jones thought it was the nickel she approached the ignorant grandmother one day on the road a woods preacher who mended shoes to tell her it was all right if the money was owed the woman said that wasn t it the child was deaf and deaf lady jones thought she still was until she offered her a seat and denver heard that it s nice of you to come see me what brings you denver didn t answer well nobody needs a reason to visit let me make us some tea lady jones was mixed gray eyes and yellow woolly hair every strand of which she hated though whether it was the color or the texture even she didn t know she had married the blackest man she could find had five rainbow colored children and sent them all to wilberforce after teaching them all she knew right along with the others who sat in her parlor her light skin got her picked for a coloredgirls normal school in pennsylvania and she paid it back by teaching the unpicked the children who played in dirt until they were old enough for chores these she taught the colored population of cincinnati had two graveyards and six churches but since no school or hospital was obliged to serve them they learned and died at home she believed in her heart that except for her husband the whole world including her children despised her and her hair she had been listening to all that yellow gone to waste and white nigger since she was a girl in a houseful of silt black children so she disliked everybody a little bit because she believed they hated her hair as much as she did with that education pat and firmly set she dispensed with rancor was indiscriminately polite saving her real affection for the unpicked children of cincinnati one of whom sat before her in a dress so loud it embarrassed the needlepoint chair seat sugar yes thank you denver drank it all down more no ma am here go ahead yes ma am how s your family honey denver stopped in the middle of a swallow there was no way to tell her how her family was so she said what was at the top of her mind i want work miss lady work yes ma am anything lady jones smiled what can you do i can t do anything but i would learn it for you if you have a little extra extra food my ma am she doesn t feel good oh baby said mrs jones oh baby denver looked up at her she did not know it then but it was the word baby said softly and with such kindness that inaugurated her life in the world as a woman the trail she followed to get to that sweet thorny place was made up of paper scraps containing the handwritten names of others lady jones gave her some rice four eggs and some tea denver said she couldn t be away from home long because of her mother s condition could she do chores in the morning lady jones told her that no one not herself not anyone she knew could pay anybody anything for work they did themselves but if you all need to eat until your mother is well all you have to do is say so she mentioned her church s committee invented so nobody had to go hungry that agitated her guest who said no no as though asking for help from strangers was worse than hunger lady jones said goodbye to her and asked her to come back anytime anytime at all two days later denver stood on the porch and noticed something lying on the tree stump at the edge of the yard she went to look and found a sack of white beans another time a plate of cold rabbit meat one morning a basket of eggs sat there as she lifted it a slip of paper fluttered down she picked it up and looked at it m lucille williams was written in big crooked letters on the back was a blob of flour water paste so denver paid a second visit to the world outside the porch although all she said when she returned the basket was thank you welcome said m lucille williams every now and then all through the spring names appeared near or in gifts of food obviously for the return of the pan or plate or basket but also to let the girl know if she cared to who the donor was because some of the parcels were wrapped in paper and though there was nothing to return the name was nevertheless there many had x s with designs about them and lady jones tried to identify the plate or pan or the covering towel when she could only guess denver followed her directions and went to say thank you anywaym whether she had the right benefactor or not when she was wrong when the person said no darling that s not my bowl mine s got a blue ring on it a small conversation took place all of them knew her grandmother and some had even danced with her in the clearing others remembered the days when was a way station the place they assembled to catch news taste oxtail soup leave their children cut out a skirt one remembered the tonic mixed there that cured a relative one showed her the border of a pillowslip the stamens of its pale blue flowers french knotted in baby suggs kitchen by the light of an oil lamp while arguing the settlement fee they remembered the party with twelve turkeys and tubs of strawberry smash one said she wrapped denver when she was a single day old and cut shoes to fit her mother s blasted feet maybe they were sorry for her or for sethe maybe they were sorry for the years of their own disdain maybe they were simply nice people who could hold meanness toward each other for just so long and when trouble rode bareback among them quickly easily they did what they could to trip him up in any case the personal pride the arrogant claim staked out at seemed to them to have run its course they whispered naturally wondered shook their heads some even laughed outright at denver s clothes of a hussy but it didn t stop them caring whether she ate and it didn t stop the pleasure they took in her soft thank you at least once a week she visited lady jones who perked up enough to do a raisin loaf especially for her since denver was set on sweet things she gave her a book of bible verse and listened while she mumbled words or fairly shouted them by june denver had read and memorized all fifty two pages one for each week of the year as denver s outside life improved her home life deteriorated if the whitepeople of cincinnati had allowed negroes into their lunatic asylum they could have found candidates in strengthened by the gifts of food the source of which neither sethe nor beloved questioned the women had arrived at a doomsday truce designed by the devil beloved sat around ate went from bed to bed sometimes she screamed rain rain and clawed her throat until rubies of blood opened there made brighter by her midnight skin then sethe shouted no and knocked over chairs to get to her and wipe the jewels away other times beloved curled up on the floor her wrists between her knees and stayed there for hours or she would go to the creek stick her feet in the water and whoosh it up her legs afrerward she would go to sethe run her fingers over the woman s teeth while tears slid from her wide black eyes then it seemed to denver the thing was done beloved bending over sethe looked the mother sethe the teething child for other than those times when beloved needed her sethe confined herself to a corner chair the bigger beloved got the smaller sethe became the brighter beloved s eyes the more those eyes that used never to look away became slits of sleeplessness sethe no longer combed her hair or splashed her face with water she sat in the chair licking her lips like a chastised child while beloved ate up her life took it swelled up with it grew taller on it and the older woman yielded it up without a murmur denver served them both washing cooking forcing cajoling her mother to eat a little now and then providing sweet things for beloved as often as she could to calm her down it was hard to know what she would do from minute to minute when the heat got hot she might walk around the house naked or wrapped in a sheet her belly protruding like a winning watermelon denver thought she understood the connection between her mother and beloved sethe was trying to make up for the handsaw beloved was making her pay for it but there would never be an end to that and seeing her mother diminished shamed and infuriated her yet she knew sethe s greatest fear was the same one denver had in the beginning that beloved might leave that before sethe could make her understand what it meant what it took to drag the teeth of that saw under the little chin to feel the baby blood pump like oil in her hands to hold her face so her head would stay on to squeeze her so she could absorb still the death spasms that shot through that adored body plump and sweet with life beloved might leave leave before sethe could make her realize that worse than that far worse was what baby suggs died of what ella knew what stamp saw and what made paul d tremble that anybody white could take your whole self for anything that came to mind not just work kill or maim you but dirty you dirty you so bad you couldn t like yourself anymore dirty you so bad you forgot who you were and couldn t think it up and though she and others lived through and got over it she could never let it happen to her own the best thing she was was her children whites might dirty bet all right but not her best thing her beautiful magical best thing the part of her that was cl ean no undreamable dreams about whether the headless feetless torso hanging in the tree with a sign on it was her husband or paul a whether the bubbling hot girls in the colored school fire set by patriots included her daughter whether a gang of whites invaded her daughter s private parts soiled her daughter s thighs and threw her daughter out of the wagon she might have to work the slaughterhouse yard but not her daughter and no one nobody on this earth would list her daughter s characteristics on the animal side of the paper no oh no maybe baby suggs could worry about it live with the likelihood of it sethe had refused and refused still this and much more denver heard her say from her corner chair trying to persuade beloved the one and only person she felt she had to convince that what she had done was right because it came from true love beloved her fat new feet propped on the seat of a chair in front of the one she sat in her unlined hands resting on her stomach looked at her uncomprehending everything except that sethe was the woman who took her face away leaving her crouching in a dark dark place forgetting to smile her father s daughter after all denver decided to do the necessary decided to stop relying on kindness to leave something on the stump she would hire herself out somewhere and although she was afraid to leave sethe and beloved alone all day not knowing what calamity either one of them would create she came to realize that her presence in that house had no influence on what either woman did she kept them alive and they ignored her growled when they chose sulked explained demanded strutted cowered cried and provoked each other to the edge of violence then over she had begun to notice that even when beloved was quiet dreamy minding her own business sethe got her going again whispering muttering some justification some bit of clarifying information to beloved to explain what it had been like and why and how come it was as though sethe didn t really want forgiveness given she wanted it refused and beloved helped her out somebody had to be saved but unless denver got work there would be no one to save no one to come home to and no denver either it was a new thought having a self to look out for and preserve and it might not have occurred to her if she hadn t met nelson lord leaving his grandmother s house as denver entered it to pay a thank you for half a pie all he did was smile and say take care of yourself denver but she heard it as though it were what language was made for the last time he spoke to her his words blocked up her ears now they opened her mind weeding the garden pulling vegetables cooking washing she plotted what to do and how the bodwins were most likely to help since they had done it twice once for baby suggs and once for her mother why not the third generation as well she got lost so many times in the streets of cincinnati it was noon before she arrived though she started out at sunrise the house sat back from the sidewalk with large windows looking out on a noisy busy street the negro woman who answered the front door said yes may i come in what you want i want to see mr and mrs bodwin miss bodwin they brother and sister oh what you want em for i m looking for work i was thinking they might know of some you baby suggs kin ain t you yes ma am come on in you letting in flies she led denver toward the kitchen saying first thing you have to know is what door to knock on but denver only half heard her because she was stepping on something soft and blue all around her was thick soft and blue glass cases crammed full of glistening things books on tables and shelves pearl white lamps with shiny metal bottoms and a smell like the cologne she poured in the emerald house only better sit down the woman said you know my name no ma am janey janey wagon how do you do fairly i heard your mother took sick that so yes ma am who s looking after her i am but i have to find work janey laughed you know what i ve been here since i was fourteen and i remember like yesterday when baby suggs holy came here and sat right there where you are whiteman brought her that s how she got that house you all live in other things too yes ma am what s the trouble with sethe janey leaned against an indoor sink and folded her arms it was a little thing to pay but it seemed big to denver nobody was going to help her unless she told it told all of it it was clear janey wouldn t and wouldn t let her see the bodwins otherwise so denver told this stranger what she hadn t told lady jones in return for which janey admitted the bodwins needed help although they didn t know it she was alone there and now that her employers were getting older she couldn t take care of them like she used to more and more she was required to sleep the night there maybe she could talk them into letting denver do the night shift come right after supper say maybe get the breakfast that way denver could care for sethe in the day and earn a little something at night how s that denver had explained the girl in her house who plagued her mother as a cousin come to visit who got sick too and bothered them both janey seemed more interested in sethe s condition and from what denver told her it seemed the woman had lost her mind that wasn t the sethe she remembered this sethe had lost her wits finally as janey knew she would trying to do it all alone with her nose in the air denver squirmed under the criticism of her mother shifting in the chair and keeping her eyes on the inside sink janey wagon went on about pride until she got to baby suggs for whom she had nothing but sweet words i never went to those woodland services she had but she was always nice to me always never be another like her i miss her too said denver bet you do everybody miss her that was a good woman denver didn t say anything else and janey looked at her face for a while neither one of your brothers ever come back to see how you all was no ma am ever hear from them no ma am nothing guess they had a rough time in that house tell me this here woman in your house the cousin she got any lines in her hands no said denver well said janey i guess there s a god after all the interview ended with janey telling her to come back in a few days she needed time to convince her employers what they needed night help because janey s own family needed her i don t want to quit these people but they can t have all my days and nights too what did denver have to do at night be here in case in case what janey shrugged in case the house burn down she smiled then or bad weather slop the roads so bad i can t get here early enough for them case late guests need serving or cleaning up after anything don t ask me what whitefolks need at night they used to be good whitefolks oh yeah they good can t say they ain t good i wouldn t trade them for another pair tell you that with those assurances denver left but not before she had seen sitting on a shelf by the back door a blackboy s mouth full of money his head was thrown back farther than a head could go his hands were shoved in his pockets bulging like moons two eyes were all the face he had above the gaping red mouth his hair was a cluster of raised widely spaced dots made of nail heads and he was on his knees his mouth wide as a cup held the coins needed to pay for a delivery or some other small service but could just as well have held buttons pins or crab apple jelly painted across the pedestal he knelt on were the words at yo service the news that janey got hold of she spread among the other coloredwomen sethe s dead daughter the one whose throat she cut had come back to fix her sethe was worn down speckled dying spinning changing shapes and generally bedeviled that this daughter beat her tied her to the bed and pulled out all her hair it took them days to get the story properly blown up and themselves agitated and then to calm down and assess the situation they fell into three groups those that believed the worst those that believed none of it and those like ella who thought it through ella what s all this i m hearing about sethe tell me it s in there with her that s all i know the daughter the killed one that s what they tell me how they know that s her it s sitting there sleeps eats and raises hell whipping sethe every day i ll be a baby no grown the age it would have been had it lived you talking about flesh i m talking about flesh whipping her like she was batter guess she had it coming nobody got that coming but ella but nothing what s fair ain t necessarily right you can t just up and kill your children no and the children can t just up and kill the mama it was ella more than anyone who convinced the others that rescue was in order she was a practical woman who believed there was a root either to chew or avoid for every ailment cogitation as she called it clouded things and prevented action nobody loved her and she wouldn t have liked it if they had for she considered love a serious disability her puberty was spent in a house where she was shared by father and son whom she called the lowest yet it was the lowest yet who gave her a disgust for sex and against whom she measured all atrocities a killing a kidnap a rape whatever she listened and nodded nothing compared to the lowest yet she understood sethe s rage in the shed twenty years ago but not her reaction to it which ella thought was prideful misdirected and sethe herself too complicated when she got out of jail and made no gesture toward anybody and lived as though she were alone ella junked her and wouldn t give her the time of day the daughter however appeared to have some sense after all at least she had stepped out the door asked or the help she needed and wanted work when ella heard was occupied by something or other beating up on sethe it infuriated her and gave her another opportunity to measure what could very well be the devil himself against the lowest yet there was also something very personal in her fury whatever sethe had done ella didn t like the idea of past errors taking possession of the present sethe s crime was staggering and her pride outstripped even that but she could not countenance the possibility of sin moving on in the house unleashed and sassy daily life took as much as she had the future was sunset the past something to leave behind and if it didn t stay behind well you might have to stomp it out slave life freed life every day was a test and a trial nothing could be counted on in a world where even when you were a solution you were a problem sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof and nobody needed more nobody needed a grown up evil sitting at the table with a grudge as long as the ghost showed out from its ghostly place shaking stuff crying smashing and such ella respected it but if it took flesh and came in her world well the shoe was on the other foot she didn t mind a little communication between the two worlds but this was an invasion shall we pray asked the women uh huh said ella first then we got to get down to business the day denver was to spend her first night at the bodwins mr bodwin had some business on the edge of the city and told janey he would pick the new girl up before supper denver sat on the porch steps with a bundle in her lap her carnival dress sun faded to a quieter rainbow she was looking to the right in the direction mr bodwin would be coming from she did not see the women approaching accumulating slowly in groups of twos and threes from the left denver was looking to the right she was a little anxious about whether she would prove satisfactory to the bodwins and uneasy too because she woke up crying from a dream about a running pair of shoes the sadness of the dream she hadn t been able to shake and the heat oppressed her as she went about the chores far too early she wrapped a nightdress and hairbrush into a bundle nervous she fidgeted the knot and looked to the right some brought what they could and what they believed would work stuffed in apron pockets strung around their necks lying in the space between their breasts others brought christian faith as shield and sword most brought a little of both they had no idea what they would do once they got there they just started out walked down bluestone road and came together at the agreed upon time the heat kept a few women who promised to go at home others who believed the story didn t want any part of the confrontation and wouldn t have come no matter what the weather and there were those like lady jones who didn t believe the story and hated the ignorance of those who did so thirty women made up that company and walked slowly slowly toward it was three in the afternoon on a friday so wet and hot cincinnati s stench had traveled to the country from the canal from hanging meat and things rotting in jars from small animals dead in the fields town sewers and factories the stench the heat the moisture trust the devil to make his presence known otherwise it looked almost like a regular workday they could have been going to do the laundry at the orphanage or the insane asylum corn shucking at the mill or to dean fish rinse offal cradle whitebabies sweep stores scrape hog skin press lard case pack sausage or hide in tavern kitchens so whitepeople didn t have to see them handle their food but not today when they caught up with each other all thirty and arrived at the first thing they saw was not denver sitting on the steps but themselves younger stronger even as little girls lying in the grass asleep catfish was popping grease in the pan and they saw themselves scoop german potato salad onto the plate cobbler oozing purple syrup colored their teeth they sat on the porch ran down to the creek teased the men hoisted children on their hips or if they were the children straddled the ankles of old men who held their little hands while giving them a horsey ride baby suggs laughed and skipped among them urging more mothers dead now moved their shoulders to mouth harps the fence they had leaned on and climbed over was gone the stump of the butternut had split like a fan but there they were young and happy playing in baby suggs yard not feeling the envy that surfaced the next day denver heard mumbling and looked to the left she stood when she saw them they grouped murmuring and whispering but did not step foot in the yard denver waved a few waved back but came no closer denver sat back down wondering what was going on a woman dropped to her knees half of the others did likewise denver saw lowered heads but could not hear the lead prayer only the earnest syllables of agreement that backed it yes yes yes oh yes hear me hear me do it maker do it yes among those not on their knees who stood holding in a fixed glare was ella trying to see through the walls behind the door to what was really in there was it true the dead daughter come back or a pretend was it whipping sethe ella had been beaten every way but down she remembered the bottom teeth she had lost to the brake and the scars from the bell were thick as rope around her waist she had delivered but would not nurse a hairy white thing fathered by the lowest yet it lived five days never making a sound the idea of that pup coming back to whip her too set her jaw working and then ella hollered instantly the kneelers and the standers joined her they stopped praying and took a step back to the beginning in the beginning there were no words in the beginning was the sound and they all knew what that sound sounded like edward bodwin drove a cart down bluestone road it displeased him a bit because he preferred his figure astride princess curved over his own hands holding the reins made him look the age he was but he had promised his sister a detour to pick up a new girl he didn t have to think about the way he was headed for the house he was born in perhaps it was his destination that turned his thoughts to time the way it dripped or ran he had not seen the house for thirty years not the butternut in front the stream at the rear nor the block house in between not even the meadow across the road very few of the interior details did he remember because he was three years old when his family moved into town but he did remember that the cooking was done behind the house the well was forbidden to play near and that women died there his mother grandmother an aunt and an older sister before he was born the men his father and grandfather moved with himself and his baby sister to court street sixty seven years ago the land of course eighty acres of it on both sides of bluestone was the central thing but he felt something sweeter and deeper about the house which is why he rented it for a little something if he could get it but it didn t trouble him to get no rent at all since the tenants at least kept it from the disrepair total abandonment would permit there was a time when he buried things there precious things he wanted to protect as a child every item he owned was available and accountable to his family privacy was an adult indulgence but when he got to be one he seemed not to need it the horse trotted along and edward bodwin cooled his beautiful mustache with his breath it was generally agreed upon by the women in the society that except for his hands it was the most attractive feature he had dark velvety its beauty was enhanced by his strong clean shaven chin but his hair was white like his sister s and had been since he was a young man it made him the most visible and memorable person at every gathering and cartoonists had fastened onto the theatricality of his white hair and big black mustache whenever they depicted local political antagonism twenty years ago when the society was at its height in opposing slavery it was as though his coloring was itself the heart of the matter the bleached nigger was what his enemies called him and on a trip to arkansas some mississippi rivermen enraged by the negro boatmen they competed with had caught him and shoe blackened his face and his hair those heady days were gone now what remained was the sludge of ill will dashed hopes and difficulties beyond repair a tranquil republic well not in his lifetime even the weather was getting to be too much for him he was either too hot or freezing and this day was a blister he pressed his hat down to keep the sun from his neck where heatstroke was a real possibility such thoughts of mortality were not new to him he was over seventy now but they still had the power to annoy as he drew closer to the old homestead the place that continued to surface in his dreams he was even more aware of the way time moved measured by the wars he had lived through but not fought in against the miami the spaniards the secessionists it was slow but measured by the burial of his private things it was the blink of an eye where exactly was the box of tin soldiers the watch chain with no watch and who was he hiding them from his father probably a deeply religious man who knew what god knew and told everybody what it was edward bodwin thought him an odd man in so many ways yet he had one clear directive human life is holy all of it and that his son still believed although he had less and less reason to nothing since was as stimulating as the old days of letters petitions meetings debates recruitment quarrels rescue and downright sedition yet it had worked more or less and when it had not he and his sister made themselves available to circumvent obstacles as they had when a runaway slavewoman lived in his homestead with her mother in law and got herself into a world of trouble the society managed to turn infanticide and the cry of savagery around and build a further case for abolishing slavery good years they were full of spit and conviction now he just wanted to know where his soldiers were and his watchless chain that would be enough for this day of unbearable heat bring back the new girl and recall exactly where his treasure lay then home supper and god willing the sun would drop once more to give him the blessing of a good night s sleep the road curved like an elbow and as he approached it he heard the singers before he saw them when the women assembled outside sethe was breaking a lump of ice into chunks she dropped the ice pick into her apron pocket to scoop the pieces into a basin of water when the music entered the window she was wringing a cool cloth to put on beloved s forehead beloved sweating profusely was sprawled on the bed in the keeping room a salt rock in her hand both women heard it at the same time and both lifted their heads as the voices grew louder beloved sat up licked the salt and went into the bigger room sethe and she exchanged glances and started toward the window they saw denver sitting on the steps and beyond her where the yard met the road they saw the rapt faces of thirty neighborhood women some had their eyes closed others looked at the hot cloudless sky sethe opened the door and reached for beloved s hand together they stood in the doorway for sethe it was as though the clearing had come to her with all its heat and simmering leaves where the voices of women searched for the right combination the key the code the sound that broke the back of words building voice upon voice until they found it and when they did it was a wave of sound wide enough to sound deep water and knock the pods off chestnut trees it broke over sethe and she trembled like the baptized in its wash the singing women recognized sethe at once and surprised themselves by their absence of fear when they saw what stood next to her the devil child was clever they thought and beautiful it had taken the shape of a pregnant woman naked and smiling in the heat of the afternoon sun thunderblack and glistening she stood on long straight legs her belly big and tight vines of hair twisted all over her head jesus her smile was dazzling sethe feels her eyes burn and it may have been to keep them clear that she looks up the sky is blue and clear not one touch of death in the definite green of the leaves it is when she lowers her eyes to look again at the loving faces before her that she sees him guiding the mare slowing down his black hat wide brimmed enough to hide his face but not his purpose he is coming into her yard and he is coming for her best thing she hears wings little hummingbirds stick needle beaks right through her headcloth into her hair and beat their wings and if she thinks anything it is no no no nonono she flies the ice pick is not in her hand it is her hand standing alone on the porch beloved is smiling but now her hand is empty sethe is running away from her running and she feels the emptiness in the hand sethe has been holding now she is running into the faces of the people out there joining them and leaving beloved behind alone again then denver running too away from her to the pile of people out there they make a hill a hill of black people falling and above them all rising from his place with a whip in his hand the man without skin looking he is looking at her chapter bare feet and chamomile sap took off my shoes took off my hat bare feet and chamomile sap gimme back my shoes gimme back my hat lay my head on a potato sack devil sneak up behind my back steam engine got a lonesome whine love that woman till you go stone blind stone blind stone blind sweet home gal make you lose your mind his coming is the reverse route of his going first the cold house the storeroom then the kitchen before he tackles the beds here boy feeble and shedding his coat in patches is asleep by the pump so paul d knows beloved is truly gone disappeared some say exploded right before their eyes ella is not so sure maybe she says maybe not could be hiding in the trees waiting for another chance but when paul d sees the ancient dog eighteen years if a day he is certain is clear of her but he opens the door to the cold house halfway expecting to hear her touch me touch me on the inside part and call me my name there is the pallet spread with old newspapers gnawed at the edges by mice the lard can the potato sacks too but empty now they lie on the dirt floor in heaps in daylight he can t imagine it in darkness with moonlight seeping through the cracks nor the desire that drowned him there and forced him to struggle up up into that girl like she was the clear air at the top of the sea coupling with her wasn t even fun it was more like a brainless urge to stay alive each time she came pulled up her skirts a life hunger overwhelmed him and he had no more control over it than over his lungs and afterward beached and gobbling air in the midst of repulsion and personal shame he was thankful too for having been escorted to some ocean deep place he once belonged to sifting daylight dissolves the memory turns it into dust motes floating in light paul d shuts the door he looks toward the house and surprisingly it does not look back at him unloaded is just another weathered house needing repair quiet just as stamp paid said used to be voices all round that place quiet now stamp said i been past it a few times and i can t hear a thing chastened i reckon cause mr bodwin say he selling it soon s he can that the name of the one she tried to stab that one yep his sister say it s full of trouble told janey she was going to get rid of it and him asked paul d janey say he against it but won t stop it who they think want a house out there anybody got the money don t want to live out there beats me stamp answered it ll be a spell i guess before it get took off his hands he don t plan on taking her to the law don t seem like it janey say all he wants to know is who was the naked blackwoman standing on the porch he was looking at her so hard he didn t notice what sethe was up to all he saw was some coloredwomen fighting he thought sethe was after one of them janey say janey tell him any different no she say she so glad her boss ain t dead if ella hadn t clipped her she say she would have scared her to death have that woman kill her boss she and denver be looking for a job who janey tell him the naked woman was told him she didn t see none you believe they saw it well they saw something i trust ella anyway and she say she looked it in the eye it was standing right next to sethe but from the way they describe it don t seem like it was the girl i saw in there the girl i saw was narrow this one was big she say they was holding hands and sethe looked like a little girl beside it little girl with a ice pick how close she get to him right up on him they say before denver and them grabbed her and ella put her fist in her jaw he got to know sethe was after him he got to maybe i don t know if he did think it i reckon he decided not to that be just like him too he s somebody never turned us down steady as a rock i tell you something if she had got to him it d be the worst thing in the world for us you know don t you he s the main one kept sethe from the gallows in the first place yeah damn that woman is crazy crazy yeah well ain t we all they laughed then a rusty chuckle at first and then more louder and louder until stamp took out his pocket handkerchief and wiped his eyes while paul d pressed the heel of his hand in his own as the scene neither one had witnessed took shape before them its seriousness and its embarrassment made them shake with laughter every time a whiteman come to the door she got to kill somebody for all she know the man could be coming for the rent good thing they don t deliver mail out that way wouldn t nobody get no letter except the postman be a mighty hard message and his last when their laughter was spent they took deep breaths and shook their heads and he still going to let denver spend the night in his house ha aw no hey lay off denver paul d that s my heart i m proud of that girl she was the first one wrestle her mother down before anybody knew what the devil was going on she saved his life then you could say you could you could said stamp thinking suddenly of the leap the wide swing and snatch of his arm as he rescued the little curly headed baby from within inches of a split skull i m proud of her she turning out fine fine it was true paul d saw her the next morning when he was on his way to work and she was leaving hers thinner steady in the eyes she looked more like halle than ever she was the first to smile good morning mr d well it is now her smile no longer the sneer he remembered had welcome in it and strong traces of sethe s mouth paul d touched his cap how you getting along don t pay to complain you on your way home she said no she had heard about an afternoon job at the shirt factory she hoped that with her night work at the bodwins and another one she could put away something and help her mother too when he asked her if they treated her all right over there she said more than all right miss bodwin taught her stuff he asked her what stuff and she laughed and said book stuff she says i might go to oberlin she s experimenting on me and he didn t say watch out watch out nothing in the world more dangerous than a white schoolteacher instead he nodded and asked the question he wanted to your mother all right no said denver no no not a bit all right you think i should stop by would she welcome it i don t know said denver i think i ve lost my mother paul d they were both silent for a moment and then he said uh that girl you know beloved yes you think she sure nough your sister denver looked at her shoes at times at times i think she was more she fiddled with her shirtwaist rubbing a spot of something suddenly she leveled her eyes at his but who would know that better than you paul d i mean you sure nough knew her he licked his lips well if you want my opinion i don t she said i have my own you grown he said yes sir well well good luck with the job thank you and paul d you don t have to stay way but be careful how you talk to my ma am hear don t worry he said and left her then or rather she left him because a young man was running toward her saying hey miss denver wait up she turned to him her face looking like someone had turned up the gas jet he left her unwillingly because he wanted to talk more make sense out of the stories he had been hearing whiteman came to take denver to work and sethe cut him baby ghost came back evil and sent sethe out to get the man who kept her from hanging one point of agreement is first they saw it and then they didn t when they got sethe down on the ground and the ice pick out of her hands and looked back to the house it was gone later a little boy put it out how he had been looking for bait back of down by the stream and saw cutting through the woods a naked woman with fish for hair as a matter of fact paul d doesn t care how it went or even why he cares about how he left and why then he looks at himself through garner s eyes he sees one thing through sixo s another one makes him feel righteous one makes him feel ashamed like the time he worked both sides of the war running away from the northpoint bank and railway to join the th colored regiment in tennessee he thought he had made it only to discover he had arrived at another colored regiment forming under a commander in new jersey he stayed there four weeks the regiment fell apart before it got started on the question of whether the soldiers should have weapons or not not it was decided and the white commander had to figure out what to command them to do instead of kill other white men some of the ten thousand stayed there to clean haul and build things others drifted away to another regiment most were abandoned left to their own devices with bitterness for pay he was trying to make up his mind what to do when an agent from northpoint bank caught up with him and took him back to delaware where he slave worked a year then northpoint took in exchange for his services in alabama where he worked for the rebellers first sorting the dead and then smelting iron when he and his group combed the battlefields their job was to pull the confederate wounded away from the confederate dead care they told them take good care coloredmen and white their faces wrapped to their eyes picked their way through the meadows with lamps listening in the dark for groans of life in the indifferent silence of the dead mostly young men some children and it shamed him a little to feel pity for what he imagined were the sons of the guards in alfred georgia in five tries he had not had one permanent success every one of his escapes from sweet home from brandywine from alfred georgia from wilmington from northpoint had been frustrated alone undisguised with visible skin memorable hair and no whiteman to protect him he never stayed uncaught the longest had been when he ran with the convicts stayed with the cherokee followed their advice and lived in hiding with the weaver woman in wilmington delaware three years and in all those escapes he could not help being astonished by the beauty of this land that was not his he hid in its breast fingered its earth for food clung to its banks to lap water and tried not to love it on nights when the sky was personal weak with the weight of its own stars he made himself not love it its graveyards and low lying rivers or just a house solitary under a chinaberry tree maybe a mule tethered and the light hitting its hide just so anything could stir him and he tried hard not to love it after a few months on the battlefields of alabama he was impressed to a foundry in selma along with three hundred captured lent or taken coloredmen that s where the war s end found him and leaving alabama when he had been declared free should have been a snap he should have been able to walk from the foundry in selma straight to philadelphia taking the main roads a train if he wanted to or passage on a boat but it wasn t like that when he and two colored soldiers who had been captured from the th he had looked for walked from selma to mobile they saw twelve dead blacks in the first eighteen miles two were women four were little boys he thought this for sure would be the walk of his life the yankees in control left the rebels out of control they got to the outskirts of mobile where blacks were putting down tracks for the union that earlier they had torn up for the rebels one of the men with him a private called keane had been with the massachusetts th he told paul d they had been paid less than white soldiers it was a sore point with him that as a group they had refused the offer massachusetts made to make up the difference in pay paul d was so impressed by the idea of being paid money to fight he looked at the private with wonder and envy keane and his friend a sergeant rossiter confiscated a skiff and the three of them floated in mobile bay there the private hailed a union gunboat which took all three aboard keane and rossiter disembarked at memphis to look for their commanders the captain of the gunboat let paul d stay aboard all the way to wheeling west virginia he made his own way to new jersey by the time he got to mobile he had seen more dead people than living ones but when he got to trenton the crowds of alive people neither hunting nor hunted gave him a measure of free life so tasty he never forgot it moving down a busy street full of whitepeople who needed no explanation for his presence the glances he got had to do with his disgusting clothes and unforgivable hair still nobody raised an alarm then came the miracle standing in a street in front of a row of brick houses he heard a whiteman call him say there yo to help unload two trunks from a coach cab afterward the whiteman gave him a coin paul d walked around with it for hours not sure what it could buy a suit a meal a horse and if anybody would sell him anything finally he saw a greengrocer selling vegetables from a wagon paul d pointed to a bunch of turnips the grocer handed them to him took his one coin and gave him several more stunned he backed away looking around he saw that nobody seemed interested in the mistake or him so he walked along happily chewing turnips only a few women looked vaguely repelled as they passed his first earned purchase made him glow never mind the turnips were withered dry that was when he decided that to eat walk and sleep anywhere was life as good as it got and he did it for seven years till he found himself in southern ohio where an old woman and a girl he used to know had gone now his coming is the reverse of his going first he stands in the back near the cold house amazed by the riot of late summer flowers where vegetables should be growing sweet william morning glory chrysanthemums the odd placement of cans jammed with the rotting stems of things the blossoms shriveled like sores dead ivy twines around bean poles and door handles faded newspaper pictures are nailed to the outhouse and on trees a rope too short for anything but skip jumping lies discarded near the washtub and jars and jars of dead lightning bugs like a child s house the house of a very tall child he walks to the front door and opens it it is stone quiet in the place where once a shaft of sad red light had bathed him locking him where he stood is nothing a bleak and minus nothing more like absence but an absence he had to get through with the same determination he had when he trusted sethe and stepped through the pulsing light he glances quickly at the lightning white stairs the entire railing is wound with ribbons bows bouquets paul d steps inside the outdoor breeze he brings with him stirs the ribbons carefully not quite in a hurry but losing no time he climbs the luminous stairs he enters sethe s room she isn t there and the bed looks so small he wonders how the two of them had lain there it has no sheets and because the roof windows do not open the room is stifling brightly colored clothes lie on the floor hanging from a wall peg is the dress beloved wore when he first saw her a pair of ice skates nestles in a basket in the corner he turns his eyes back to the bed and keeps looking at it it seems to him a place he is not with an effort that makes him sweat he forces a picture of himself lying there and when he sees it it lifts his spirit he goes to the other bedroom denver s is as neat as the other is messy but still no sethe maybe she has gone back to work gotten better in the days since he talked to denver he goes back down the stairs leaving the image of himself firmly in place on the narrow bed at the kitchen table he sits down something is missing from something larger than the people who lived there something more than beloved or the red light he can t put his finger on it but it seems for a moment that just beyond his knowing is the glare of an outside thing that embraces while it accuses to the right of him where the door to the keeping room is ajar he hears humming someone is humming a tune something soft and sweet like a lullaby then a few words sounds like high johnny wide johnny sweet william bend down low of course he thinks that s where she is and she is lying under a quilt of merry colors her hair like the dark delicate roots of good plants spreads and curves on the pillow her eyes fixed on the window are so expressionless he is not sure she will know who he is there is too much light here in this room things look sold jackweed raise up high she sings lambswool over my shoulder buttercup and clover fly she is fingering a long clump of her hair paul d clears his throat to interrupt her sethe she turns her head paul d aw sethe i made the ink paul d he couldn t have done it if i hadn t made the ink what ink who you shaved yeah look bad no you looking good devil s confusion what s this i hear about you not getting out of bed she smiles lets it fade and turns her eyes back to the window i need to talk to you he tells her she doesn t answer i saw denver she tell you she comes in the daytime denver she s still with me my denver you got to get up from here girl he is nervous this reminds him of something i m tired paul d so tired i have to rest a while now he knows what he is reminded of and he shouts at her don t you die on me this is baby suggs bed is that what you planning he is so angry he could kill her he checks himself remembering denver s warning and whispers what you planning sethe oh i don t have no plans no plans at all look he says denver be here in the day i be here in the night i m a take care of you you hear starting now first off you don t smell right stay there don t move let me heat up some water he stops is it all right sethe if i heat up some water and count my feet she asks him he steps closer rub your feet sethe closes her eyes and presses her lips together she is thinking no this little place by a window is what i want and rest there s nothing to rub now and no reason to nothing left to bathe assuming he even knows how will he do it in sections first her face then her hands her thighs her feet her back ending with her exhausted breasts and if he bathes her in sections will the parts hold she opens her eyes knowing the danger of looking at him she looks at him the peachstone skin the crease between his ready waiting eyes and sees it the thing in him the blessedness that has made him the kind of man who can walk in a house and make the women cry because with him in his presence they could cry and tell him things they only told each other that time didn t stay put that she called but howard and buglar walked on down the railroad track and couldn t hear her that amy was scared to stay with her because her feet were ugly and her back looked so bad that her ma am had hurt her feelings and she couldn t find her hat anywhere and paul d what baby she left me aw girl don t cry she was my best thing paul d sits down in the rocking chair and examines the quilt patched in carnival colors his hands are limp between his knees there are too many things to feel about this woman his head hurts suddenly he remembers sixo trying to describe what he felt about the thirty mile woman she is a friend of my mind she gather me man the pieces i am she gather them and give them back to me in all the right order it s good you know when you got a woman who is a friend of your mind he is staring at the quilt but he is thinking about her wrought iron back the delicious mouth still puffy at the corner from ella s fist the mean black eyes the wet dress steaming before the fire her tenderness about his neck jewelry its three wands like attentive baby rattlers curving two feet into the air how she never mentioned or looked at it so he did not have to feel the shame of being collared like a beast only this woman sethe could have left him his manhood like that he wants to put his story next to hers sethe he says me and you we got more yesterday than anybody we need some kind of tomorrow he leans over and takes her hand with the other he touches her face you your best thing sethe you are his holding fingers are holding hers me me chapter there is a loneliness that can be rocked arms crossed knees drawn up holding holding on this motion unlike a ship s smooths and contains the rocker it s an inside kind wrapped tight like skin then there is a loneliness that roams no rocking can hold it down it is alive on its own a dry and spreading thing that makes the sound of one s own feet going seem to come from a far off place everybody knew what she was called but nobody anywhere knew her name disremembered and unaccounted for she cannot be lost because no one is looking for her and even if they were how can they call her if they don t know her name although she has claim she is not claimed in the place where long grass opens the girl who waited to be loved and cry shame erupts into her separate parts to make it easy for the chewing laughter to swallow her all away it was not a story to pass on they forgot her like a bad dream after they made up their tales shaped and decorated them those that saw her that day on the porch quickly and deliberately forgot her it took longer for those who had spoken to her lived with her fallen in love with her to forget until they realized they couldn t remember or repeat a single thing she said and began to believe that other than what they themselves were thinking she hadn t said anything at all so in the end they forgot her too remembering seemed unwise they never knew where or why she crouched or whose was the underwater face she needed like that where the memory of the smile under her chin might have been and was not a latch latched and lichen attached its apple green bloom to the metal what made her think her fingernails could open locks the rain rained on it was not a story to pass on so they forgot her like an unpleasant dream during a troubling sleep occasionally however the rustle of a skirt hushes when they wake and the knuckles brushing a cheek in sleep seem to belong to the sleeper sometimes the photograph of a close friend or relative looked at too long shifts and something more familiar than the dear face itself moves there they can touch it if they like but don t because they know things will never be the same if they do this is not a story to pass on down by the stream in back of her footprints come and go come and go they are so familiar should a child an adult place his feet in them they will fit take them out and they disappear again as though nobody ever walked there by and by all trace is gone and what is forgotten is not only the footprints but the water too and what it is down there the rest is weather not the breath of the disremembered and unaccounted for but wind in the eaves or spring ice thawing too quickly just weather certainly no clamor for a kiss beloved the end the myth of sisyphus an absurd reasoning absurdity and suicide there is but one truly serious philosophical problem and that is suicide judging whether life is or is not worth living amounts to answering the fundamental question of philosophy all the rest whether or not the world has three dimensions whether the mind has nine or twelve categories comes afterwards these are games one must first answer and if it is true as nietzsche claims that a philosopher to deserve our respect must preach by example you can appreciate the importance of that reply for it will precede the definitive act these are facts the heart can feel yet they call for careful study before they become clear to the intellect if i ask myself how to judge that this question is more urgent than that i reply that one judges by the actions it entails i have never seen anyone die for the ontologi cal argument galileo who held a scientific truth of great importance abjured it with the greatest ease as soon as it endangered his life in a certain sense he did right that truth was not worth the stake whether the earth or the sun revolves around the other is a matter of profound indifference to tell the truth it is a futile question on the other hand i see many people die because they judge that life is not worth living i see others paradoxically getting killed for the ideas or illusions that give them a reason for living what is called a reason for living is also an excellent reason for dying i therefore conclude that the meaning of life is the most urgent of questions how to answer it on all essential problems i mean thereby those that run the risk of leading to death or those that intensify the passion of living there are probably but two methods of thought the method of la palisse and the method of don quixote solely the balance between evidence and lyricism can allow us to achieve simultaneously emotion and lucidity in a subject at once so humble and so heavy with emotion the learned and classical dialectic must yield one can see to a more modest attitude of mind deriving at one and the same time from common sense and understanding suicide has never been dealt with except as a social phenomenon on the contrary we are concerned here at the outset with the relationship between individual thought and suicide an act like this is prepared within the silence of the heart as is a great work of art the man himself is ignorant of it one evening he pulls the trigger or jumps of an apartment building manager who had killed himself i was told that he had lost his daughter five years before that be bad changed greatly since and that that experience had undermined him a more exact word cannot be imagined beginning to think is beginning to be undermined society has but little connection with such beginnings the worm is in man s heart that is where it must be sought one must follow and understand this fatal game that leads from lucidity in the face of existence to flight from light there are many causes for a suicide and generally the most obvious ones were not the most powerful rarely is suicide committed yet the hypothesis is not excluded through reflection what sets off the crisis is almost always unverifiable newspapers often speak of personal sorrows or of incurable illness these explanations are plausible but one would have to know whether a friend of the desperate man had not that very day addressed him indifferently he is the guilty one for that is enough to precipitate all the rancors and all the boredom still in suspension but if it is hard to fix the precise instant the subtle step when the mind opted for death it is easier to deduce from the act itself the consequences it implies in a sense and as in melodrama killing yourself amounts to confessing it is confessing that life is too much for you or that you do not understand it let s not go too far in such analogies however but rather return to everyday words it is merely confessing that that is not worth the trouble living naturally is never easy you continue making the gestures commanded by existence for many reasons the first of which is habit dying voluntarily implies that you have recognized even instinc tively the ridiculous character of that habit the absence of any profound reason for living the insane character of that daily agitation and the uselessness of suffering what then is that incalculable feeling that deprives the mind of the sleep necessary to life a world that can be explained even with bad reasons is a familiar world but on the other hand in a universe suddenly divested of illusions and lights man feels an alien a stranger his exile is without remedy since he is deprived of the memory of a lost home or the hope of a promised land this divorce between man and this life the actor and his setting is properly the feeling of absurdity all healthy men having thought of their own suicide it can be seen without further explanation that there is a direct connection between this feeling and the longing for death the subject of this essay is precisely this relationship between the absurd and suicide the exact degree to which suicide is a solution to the absurd the principle can be established that for a man who does not cheat what he believes to be true must determine his action belief in the absurdity of existence must then dictate his conduct it is legitimate to wonder clearly and without false pathos whether a conclusion of this importance requires forsaking as rapidly as possible an incomprehensible condition i am speaking of course of men inclined to be in harmony with themselves stated clearly this problem may seem both simple and insoluble but it is wrongly assumed that simple questions involve answers that are no less simple and that evidence implies evidence a priori and reversing the terms of the problem just as one does or does not kill oneself it seems that there are but two philosophical solutions either yes or no this would be too easy but allowance must be made for those who without concluding continue questioning here i am only slightly indulging in irony this is the majority i notice also that those who answer no act as if they thought yes as a matter of fact if i accept the nietzschean criterion they think yes in one way or another on the other hand it often happens that those who commit suicide were assured of the meaning of life these contradictions are constant it may even be said that they have never been so keen as on this point where on the contrary logic seems so desirable it is a commonplace to compare philosophical theories and the behavior of those who profess them but it must be said that of the thinkers who refused a meaning to life none except kirilov who belongs to literature peregrinos who is born of legend and jules lequier who belongs to hypothesis admitted his logic to the point of refusing that life schopenhauer is often cited as a fit subject for laughter because he praised suicide while seated at a well set table this is no subject for joking that way of not taking the tragic seriously is not so grievous but it helps to judge a man in the face of such contradictions and obscurities must we conclude that there is no relationship between the opinion one has about life and the act one commits to leave it let us not exaggerate in this direction in a man s attachment to life there is something stronger than all the ills in the world the body s judgment is as good as the mind s and the body shrinks from annihilation we get into the habit of living before acquiring the habit of thinking in that race which daily hastens us toward death the body maintains its irreparable lead in short the essence of that contradiction lies in what i shall call the act of eluding because it is both less and more than diversion in the pascalian sense eluding is the invariable game the typical act of eluding the fatal evasion that constitutes the third theme of this essay is hope hope of another life one must deserve or trickery of those who live not for life itself but for some great idea that will transcend it refine it give it a meaning and betray it thus everything contributes to spreading confusion hitherto and it has not been wasted effort people have played on words and pretended to believe that refusing to grant a meaning to life necessarily leads to declaring that it is not worth living in truth there is no necessary common measure between these two judgments one merely has to refuse to he misled by the confusions divorces and inconsistencies previously pointed out one must brush everything aside and go straight to the real problem one kills oneself because life is not worth living that is certainly a truth yet an unfruitful one because it is a truism but does that insult to existence that flat denial in which it is plunged come from the fact that it has no meaning does its absurdity require one to escape it through hope or suicide this is what must be clarified hunted down and elucidated while brushing aside all the rest does the absurd dictate death this problem must be given priority over others outside all methods of thought and all exercises of the disinterested mind shades of meaning contradictions the psychology that an objective mind can always introduce into all problems have no place in this pursuit and this passion it calls simply for an unjust in other words logical thought that is not easy it is always easy to be logical it is almost impossible to be logical to the bitter end men who die by their own hand consequently follow to its conclusion their emotional inclination reflection on suicide gives me an opportunity to raise the only problem to interest me is there a logic to the point of death i cannot know unless i pursue without reckless passion in the sole light of evidence the reasoning of which i am here suggesting the source this is what i call an absurd reasoning many have begun it i do not yet know whether or not they kept to it when karl jaspers revealing the impossibility of constituting the world as a unity exclaims this limitation leads me to myself where i can no longer withdraw behind an objective point of view that i am merely representing where neither i myself nor the existence of others can any longer become an object for me he is evoking after many others those waterless deserts where thought reaches its confines after many others yes indeed but how eager they were to get out of them at that last crossroad where thought hesitates many men have arrived and even some of the humblest they then abdicated what was most precious to them their life others princes of the mind abdicated likewise but they initiated the suicide of their thought in its purest revolt the real effort is to stay there rather in so far as that is possible and to examine closely the odd vegetation of those distant regions tenacity and acumen are privileged spectators of this inhuman show in which absurdity hope and death carry on their dialogue the mind can then analyze the figures of that elementary yet subtle dance before illustrating them and reliving them itself absurd walls like great works deep feelings always mean more than they are conscious of saying the regularity of an impulse or a repulsion in a soul is encountered again in habits of doing or thinking is reproduced in consequences of which the soul itself knows nothing great feelings take with them their own universe splendid or abject they light up with their passion an exclusive world in which they recognize their climate there is a universe of jealousy of ambition of selfishness or of generosity a universe in other words a metaphysic and an attitude of mind what is true of already specialized feelings will be even more so of emotions basically as indeterminate simultaneously as vague and as definite as remote and as present as those furnished us by beauty or aroused by absurdity at any streetcorner the feeling of absurdity can strike any man in the face as it is in its distressing nudity in its light without effulgence it is elusive but that very difficulty deserves reflection it is probably true that a man remains forever unknown to us and that there is in him something irreducible that escapes us but practically i know men and recognize them by their behavior by the totality of their deeds by the consequences caused in life by their presence likewise all those irrational feelings which offer no purchase to analysis i can define them practically appreciate them practically by gathering together the sum of their consequences in the domain of the intelligence by seizing and noting all their aspects by outlining their universe it is certain that apparently though i have seen the same actor a hundred times i shall not for that reason know him any better personally yet if i add up the heroes he has personified and if i say that i know him a little better at the hundredth character counted off this will be felt to contain an element of truth for this apparent paradox is also an apologue there is a moral to it it teaches that a man defines himself by his make believe as well as by his sincere impulses there is thus a lower key of feelings inaccessible in the heart but partially disclosed by the acts they imply and the attitudes of mind they assume it is clear that in this way i am defining a method but it is also evident that that method is one of analysis and not of knowledge for methods imply metaphysics unconsciously they disclose conclusions that they often claim not to know yet similarly the last pages of a book are already contained in the first pages such a link is inevitable the method defined here acknowledges the feeling that all true knowledge is impossible solely appearances can be enumerated and the climate make itself felt perhaps we shall be able to overtake that elusive feeling of absurdity in the different but closely related worlds of intelligence of the art of living or of art itself the climate of absurdity is in the beginning the end is the absurd universe and that attitude of mind which lights the world with its true colors to bring out the privileged and implacable visage which that attitude has discerned in it all great deeds and all great thoughts have a ridiculous beginning great works are often born on a street corner or in a restaurant s revolving door so it is with absurdity the absurd world more than others derives its nobility from that abject birth in certain situations replying nothing when asked what one is thinking about may be pretense in a man those who are loved are well aware of this but if that reply is sincere if it symbolizes that odd state of soul in which the void be comes eloquent in which the chain of daily gestures is broken in which the heart vainly seeks the link that will connect it again then it is as it were the first sign of absurdity it happens that the stage sets collapse rising streetcar four hours in the office or the factory meal streetcar four hours of work meal sleep and monday tuesday wednesday thursday friday and saturday accord ing to the same rhythm this path is easily followed most of the time but one day the why arises and everything begins in that weariness tinged with amazement begins this is important weariness comes at the end of the acts of a mechanical life but at the same time it inaugurates the impulse of consciousness it awakens consciousness and provokes what follows what follows is the gradual return into the chain or it is the definitive awakening at the end of the awakening comes in time the consequence suicide or recovery in itself weariness has something sickening about it here i must conclude that it is good for everything be gins with consciousness and nothing is worth anything except through it there is nothing original about these remarks but they are obvious that is enough for a while during a sketchy reconnaissance in the origins of the absurd mere anxiety as heidegger says is at the source of everything likewise and during every day of an unillustrious life time carries us but a moment always comes when we have to carry it we live on the future tomorrow later on when you have made your way you will understand when you are old enough such irrelevan cies are wonderful for after all it s a matter of dying yet a day comes when a man notices or says that he is thirty thus he asserts his youth but simultaneously he situates himself in relation to time he takes his place in it he admits that he stands at a certain point on a curve that he acknowledges having to travel to its end he belongs to time and by the horror that seizes him he recognizes his worst enemy tomorrow he was longing for tomorrow whereas everything in him ought to reject it that revolt of the flesh is the absurd a step lower and strangeness creeps in perceiving that the world is dense sensing to what a degree a stone is foreign and irreducible to us with what intensity nature or a landscape can negate us at the heart of all beauty lies something inhuman and these hills the softness of the sky the outline of these trees at this very minute lose the illusory meaning with which we had clothed them henceforth more remote than a lost paradise the primitive hostility of the world rises up to face us across millennia for a second we cease to understand it because for centuries we have understood in it solely the images and designs that we had at tributed to it beforehand because henceforth we lack the power to make use of that artifice the world evades us because it becomes itself again that stage scenery masked by habit becomes again what it is it withdraws at a distance from us just as there are days when under the familial face of a woman we see as a stranger her we had loved months or years ago perhaps we shall come even to desire what suddenly leaves us so alone but the time has not yet come just one thing that denseness and that strangeness of the world is the absurd men too secrete the inhuman at certain moments of lucidity the mechanical aspect of their gestures their meaningless pantomime makes silly everything that surrounds them a man is talking on the telephone behind a glass partition you cannot hear him but you see his incomprehensible dumb show you wonder why he is alive this discomfort in the face of man s own inhumanity this incalculable tumble before the image of what we are this nausea as a writer of today calls it is also the absurd likewise the stranger who at certain seconds comes to meet us in a mirror the familiar and yet alarming brother we encounter in our own photographs is also the absurd i come at last to death and to the attitude we have toward it on this point everything has been said and it is only proper to avoid pathos yet one will never be sufficiently surprised that everyone lives as if no one knew this is because in reality there is no experience of death properly speaking nothing has been experienced but what has been lived and made conscious here it is barely possible to speak of the experience of others deaths it is a substitute an illusion and it never quite convinces us that melancholy convention cannot be persuasive the horror comes in reality from the mathematical aspect of the event if time frightens us this is because it works out the problem and the solution comes afterward all the pretty speeches about the soul will have their contrary convincingly proved at least for a time from this inert body on which a slap makes no mark the soul has disappeared this elementary and definitive aspect of the adventure constitutes the absurd feeling under the fatal lighting of that destiny its uselessness becomes evident no code of ethics and no effort are justifiable a priori in the face of the cruel mathematics that command our condition let me repeat all this has been said over and over i am limiting myself here to making a rapid classification and to pointing out these obvious themes they run through all literatures and all philosophies everyday conversation feeds on them there is no question of reinventing them but it is essential to be sure of these facts in order to be able to question oneself subsequently on the primordial question i am interested let me repeat again not go much in absurd discoveries as in their consequences if one is assured of these facts what is one to conclude how far is one to go to elude nothing is one to die voluntarily or to hope in spite of everything beforehand it is necessary to take the same rapid inventory on the plane of the intelligence the mind s first step is to distinguish what is true from what is false however as soon as thought reflects on itself what it first discovers is a contradiction useless to strive to be convincing in this case over the centuries no one has furnished a clearer and more elegant demonstration of the business than aristotle the often ridiculed consequence of these opinions is that they destroy themselves for by asserting that all is true we assert the truth of the contrary assertion and consequently the falsity of our own thesis for the contrary assertion does not admit that it can be true and if one says that all is false that assertion is itself false if we declare that solely the assertion opposed to ours is false or else that solely ours is not false we are nevertheless forced to admit an infinite number of true or false judgments for the one who expresses a true assertion proclaims simultaneously that it is true and so on ad infinitum this vicious circle is but the first of a series in which the mind that studies itself gets lost in a giddy whirling the very simplicity of these paradoxes makes them irreducible whatever may be the plays on words and the acrobatics of logic to understand is above all to unify the mind s deepest desire even in its most elaborate operations parallels man s unconscious feeling in the face of his universe it is an insistence upon familiarity an appetite for clarity understanding the world for a man is reducing it to the human stamping it with his seal the cat s universe is not the universe of the anthill the truism all thought is anthropomorphic has no other meaning likewise the mind that aims to understand reality can consider itself satisfied only by reducing it to terms of thought if man realized that the universe like him can love and suffer he would be reconciled if thought discovered in the shimmering mirrors of phenomena eternal relations capable of summing them up and summing themselves up in a single principle then would be seen an intellectual joy of which the myth of the blessed would be but a ridiculous imitation that nostalgia for unity that appetite for the absolute illustrates the essential impulse of the human drama but the fact of that nostalgia s existence does not imply that it is to be immediately satisfied for if bridging the gulf that separates desire from conquest we assert with parmenides the reality of the one whatever it may be we fall into the ridiculous contradiction of a mind that asserts total unity and proves by its very assertion its own difference and the diversity it claimed to resolve this other vicious circle is enough to stifle our hopes these are again truisms i shall again repeat that they are not interesting in themselves but in the consequences that can be deduced from them i know another truism it tells me that man is mortal one can nevertheless count the minds that have deduced the extreme conclusions from it it is essential to consider as a constant point of reference in this essay the regular hiatus between what we fancy we know and what we really know practical assent and simulated ignorance which allows us to live with ideas which if we truly put them to the test ought to upset our whole life faced with this inextricable contradiction of the mind we shall fully grasp the divorce separating us from our own creations so long as the mind keeps silent in the motionless world of its hopes everything is reflected and arranged in the unity of its nostalgia but with its first move this world cracks and tumbles an infinite number of shimmering fragments is offered to the understanding we must despair of ever reconstructing the familiar calm surface which would give us peace of heart after so many centuries of inquiries so many abdications among thinkers we are well aware that this is true for all our knowledge with the exception of professional rationalists today people despair of true knowledge if the only significant history of human thought were to be written it would have to be the history of its successive regrets and its impotences of whom and of what indeed can i say i know that this heart within me i can feel and i judge that it exists this world i can touch and i likewise judge that it exists there ends all my knowledge and the rest is construction for if i try to seize this self of which i feel sure if i try to define and to summarize it it is nothing but water slipping through my fingers i can sketch one by one all the aspects it is able to assume all those likewise that have been attributed to it this upbringing this origin this ardor or these silences this nobility or this vileness but aspects cannot be added up this very heart which is mine will forever remain indefinable to me between the certainty i have of my existence and the content i try to give to that assurance the gap will never be filled forever i shall be a stranger to myself in psychology as in logic there are truths but no truth socrates know thyself has as much value as the be virtuous of our confessionals they reveal a nostalgia at the same time as an ignorance they are sterile exercises on great subjects they are legitimate only in precisely so far as they are approximate and here are trees and i know their gnarled surface water and i feel its taste these scents of grass and stars at night certain evenings when the heart relaxes how shall i negate this world whose power and strength i feel yet all the knowledge on earth will give me nothing to assure me that this world is mine you describe it to me and you teach me to classify it you enumerate its laws and in my thirst for knowledge i admit that they are true you take apart its mechanism and my hope increases at the final stage you teach me that this wondrous and multicolored universe can be reduced to the atom and that the atom itself can be reduced to the electron all this is good and i wait for you to continue but you tell me of an invisible planetary system in which electrons gravitate around a nucleus you explain this world to me with an image i realize then that you have been reduced to poetry i shall never know have i the time to become indignant you have already changed theories so that science that was to teach me everything ends up in a hypothesis that lucidity founders in metaphor that uncertainty is resolved in a work of art what need had i of so many efforts the soft lines of these hills and the hand of evening on this troubled heart teach me much more i have returned to my beginning i realize that if through science i can seize phenomena and enumerate them i cannot for all that apprehend the world were i to trace its entire relief with my finger i should not know any more and you give me the choice between a description that is sure but that teaches me nothing and hypotheses that claim to teach me but that are not sure a stranger to myself and to the world armed solely with a thought that negates itself as soon as it asserts what is this condition in which i can have peace only by refusing to know and to live in which the appetite for conquest bumps into walls that defy its assaults to will is to stir up paradoxes everything is ordered in such a way as to bring into being that poisoned peace produced by thoughtlessness lack of heart or fatal renunciations hence the intelligence too tells me in its way that this world is absurd its contrary blind reason may well claim that all is clear i was waiting for proof and longing for it to be right but despite so many pretentious centuries and over the heads of so many eloquent and persuasive men i know that is false on this plane at least there is no happiness if i cannot know that universal reason practical or ethical that determinism those categories that explain everything are enough to make a decent man laugh they have nothing to do with the mind they negate its profound truth which is to be enchained in this unintelligible and limited universe man s fate henceforth assumes its meaning a horde of irrationals has sprung up and surrounds him until his ultimate end in his recovered and now studied lucidity the feeling of the absurd becomes clear and definite i said that the world is absurd but i was too hasty this world in itself is not reasonable that is all that can be said but what is absurd is the confrontation of this irrational and the wild longing for clarity whose call echoes in the human heart the absurd depends as much on man as on the world for the moment it is all that links them together it binds them one to the other as only hatred can weld two creatures together this is all i can discern clearly in this measureless universe where my adventure takes place let us pause here if i hold to be true that absurdity that determines my relationship with life if i become thoroughly imbued with that sentiment that seizes me in face of the world s scenes with that lucidity imposed on me by the pursuit of a science i must sacrifice everything to these certainties and i must see them squarely to be able to maintain them above all i must adapt my behavior to them and pursue them in all their consequences i am speaking here of decency but i want to know beforehand if thought can live in those deserts i already know that thought has at least entered those deserts there it found its bread there it realized that it had previously been feeding on phantoms it justified some of the most urgent themes of human reflection from the moment absurdity is recognized it becomes a passion the most harrowing of all but whether or not one can live with one s passions whether or not one can accept their law which is to burn the heart they simultaneously exalt that is the whole question it is not however the one we shall ask just yet it stands at the center of this experience there will be time to come back to it let us recognize rather those themes and those impulses born of the desert it will suffice to enumerate them they too are known to all today there have always been men to defend the rights of the irrational the tradition of what may be called humiliated thought has never ceased to exist the criticism of rationalism has been made so often that it seems unnecessary to begin again yet our epoch is marked by the rebirth of those paradoxical systems that strive to trip up the reason as if truly it had always forged ahead but that is not so much a proof of the efficacy of the reason as of the intensity of its hopes on the plane of history such a constancy of two attitudes illustrates the essential passion of man torn between his urge toward unity and the clear vision he may have of the walls enclosing him but never perhaps at any time has the attack on reason been more violent than in ours since zarathustra s great outburst by chance it is the oldest nobility in the world i conferred it upon all things when i proclaimed that above them no eternal will was exercised since kierkegaard s fatal illness that malady that leads to death with nothing else following it the significant and tormenting themes of absurd thought have followed one another or at least and this proviso is of capital importance the themes of irrational and religious thought from jaspers to heidegger from kierkegaard to che stov from the phenomenologists to scheler on the logical plane and on the moral plane a whole family of minds related by their nostalgia but opposed by their methods or their aims have persisted in blocking the royal road of reason and in recovering the direct paths of truth here i assume these thoughts to be known and lived whatever may be or have been their ambitions all started out from that indescribable universe where contradiction antinomy anguish or impotence reigns and what they have in common is precisely the themes so far disclosed for them too it must be said that what matters above all is the conclusions they have managed to draw from those discoveries that matters so much that they must be examined separately but for the moment we are concerned solely with their discoveries and their initial experiments we are concerned solely with noting their agreement if it would be presumptuous to try to deal with their philosophies it is possible and sufficient in any case to bring out the climate that is common to them heidegger considers the human condition coldly and announces that that existence is humiliated the only reality is anxiety in the whole chain of beings to the man lost in the world and its diversions this anxiety is a brief fleeting fear but if that fear becomes conscious of itself it becomes anguish the perpetual climate of the lucid man in whom existence is concentrated this professor of philosophy writes without trembling and in the most abstract language in the world that the finite and limited character of human existence is more primordial than man himself his interest in kant extends only to recognizing the restricted character of his pure reason this is to coincide at the end of his analyses that the world can no longer offer anything to the man filled with anguish this anxiety seems to him so much more important than all the categories in the world that he thinks and talks only of it he enumerates its aspects boredom when the ordinary man strives to quash it in him and benumb it terror when the mind contemplates death he too does not separate consciousness from the absurd the consciousness of death is the call of anxiety and existence then delivers itself its own summons through the intermediary of consciousness it is the very voice of anguish and it adjures existence to return from its loss in the anonymous they for him too one must not sleep but must keep alert until the consummation he stands in this absurd world and points out its ephemeral character he seeks his way amid these ruins jaspers despairs of any ontology because he claims that we have lost naivete he knows that we can achieve nothing that will transcend the fatal game of appearances he knows that the end of the mind is failure he tarries over the spiritual adventures revealed by history and pitilessly discloses the flaw in each system the illusion that saved everything the preaching that hid nothing in this ravaged world in which the impossibility of knowledge is established in which everlasting nothingness seems the only reality and irremediable despair seems the only attitude he tries to recover the ariadne s thread that leads to divine secrets chestov for his part throughout a wonderfully monotonous work constantly straining toward the same truths tirelessly demonstrates that the tightest system the most universal rationalism always stumbles eventually on the irrational of human thought none of the ironic facts or ridiculous contradictions that depreciate the reason escapes him one thing only interests him and that is the exception whether in the domain of the heart or of the mind through the dostoevskian experiences of the condemned man the exacerbated adventures of the nietzschean mind hamlet s imprecations or the bitter aristocracy of an ibsen he tracks down il luminates and magnifies the human revolt against the irremediable he refuses the reason its reasons and begins to advance with some decision only in the middle of that colorless desert where all certainties have become stones of all perhaps the most engaging kierkegaard for a part of his existence at least does more than discover the absurd he lives it the man who writes the surest of stubborn silences is not to hold one s tongue but to talk makes sure in the beginning that no truth is absolute or can render satisfactory an existence that is impossible in itself don juan of the understanding he multiplies pseudonyms and contradictions writes his discourses of edification at the same time as that manual of cynical spiritualism the diary of the seducer he refuses consolations ethics reliable principles as for that thorn he feels in his heart he is careful not to quiet its pain on the contrary he awakens it and in the desperate joy of a man crucified and happy to be so he builds up piece by piece lucidity refusal make believe a category of the man possessed that face both tender and sneering those pirouettes followed by a cry from the heart are the absurd spirit itself grappling with a reality beyond its comprehension and the spiritual adventure that leads kierkegaard to his beloved scandals begins likewise in the chaos of an experience divested of its setting and relegated to its original incoherence on quite a different plane that of method husserl and the phenomenologists by their very extravagances reinstate the world in its diversity and deny the transcendent power of the reason the spiritual universe becomes incalculably enriched through them the rose petal the milestone or the human hand are as important as love desire or the laws of gravity thinking ceases to be unifying or making a semblance familiar in the guise of a major principle thinking is learning all over again to see to be attentive to focus consciousness it is turning every idea and every image in the manner of proust into a privileged moment what justifies thought is its extreme consciousness though more positive than kierkegaard s or chestov s husserl s manner of proceeding in the beginning nevertheless negates the classic method of the reason disappoints hope opens to intuition and to the heart a whole proliferation of phenomena the wealth of which has about it something inhuman these paths lead to all sciences or to none this amounts to saying that in this case the means are more important than the end all that is involved is an attitude for understanding and not a consolation let me repeat in the beginning at very least how can one fail to feel the basic relationship of these minds how can one fail to see that they take their stand around a privileged and bitter moment in which hope has no further place i want everything to be explained to me or nothing and the reason is impotent when it hears this cry from the heart the mind aroused by this insistence seeks and finds nothing but contradictions and nonsense what i fail to understand is nonsense the world is peopled with such irrationals the world itself whose single meaning i do not understand is but a vast irrational if one could only say just once this is clear all would be saved but these men vie with one another in proclaiming that nothing is clear all is chaos that all man has is his lucidity and his definite knowledge of the walls surrounding him all these experiences agree and confirm one another the mind when it reaches its limits must make a judgment and choose its conclusions this is where suicide and the reply stand but i wish to reverse the order of the inquiry and start out from the intelligent adventure and come back to daily acts the experiences called to mind here were born in the desert that we must not leave behind at least it is essential to know how far they went at this point of his effort man stands face to face with the irrational he feels within him his longing for happiness and for reason the absurd is born of this confrontation between the human need and the unreasonable silence of the world this must not be forgotten this must be clung to because the whole consequence of a life can depend on it the irrational the human nostalgia and the absurd that is born of their encounter these are the three characters in the drama that must necessarily end with all the logic of which an existence is capable philosophical suicide the feeling of the absurd is not for all that the notion of the absurd it lays the foundations for it and that is all it is not limited to that notion except in the brief moment when it passes judgment on the universe subsequently it has a chance of going further it is alive in other words it must die or else reverberate so it is with the themes we have gathered together but there again what interests me is not works or minds criticism of which would call for another form and another place but the discovery of what their conclusions have in common never perhaps have minds been so different and yet we recognize as identical the spiritual landscapes in which they get under way likewise despite such dissimilar zones of knowledge the cry that terminates their itinerary rings out in the same way it is evident that the thinkers we have just recalled have a common climate to say that that climate is deadly scarcely amounts to playing on words living under that stifling sky forces one to get away or to stay the important thing is to find out how people get away in the first case and why people stay in the second case this is how i define the problem of suicide and the possible interest in the conclusions of existential philosophy but first i want to detour from the direct path up to now we have managed to circumscribe the absurd from the outside one can however wonder how much is clear in that notion and by direct analysis try to discover its meaning on the one hand and on the other the consequences it involves if i accuse an innocent man of a monstrous crime if i tell a virtuous man that he has coveted his own sister he will reply that this is absurd his indignation has its comical aspect but it also has its fundamental reason the virtuous man illustrates by that reply the definitive antinomy existing between the deed i am attributing to him and his lifelong principles it s absurd means it s impossible but also it s contradictory if i see a man armed only with a sword attack a group of machine guns i shall consider his act to be absurd but it is so solely by virtue of the disproportion between his intention and the reality he will encounter of the contradiction i notice between his true strength and the aim he has in view likewise we shall deem a verdict absurd when we contrast it with the verdict the facts apparently dictated and similarly a demonstration by the absurd is achieved by comparing the consequences of such a reasoning with the logical reality one wants to set up in all these cases from the simplest to the most complex the magnitude of the absurdity will be in direct ratio to the distance between the two terms of my comparison there are absurd marriages challenges rancors silences wars and even peace treaties for each of them the absurdity springs from a comparison i am thus justified in saying that the feeling of absurdity does not spring from the mere scrutiny of a fact or an impression but that it bursts from the comparison between a bare fact and a certain reality between an action and the world that transcends it the absurd is essentially a divorce it lies in neither of the elements compared it is born of their confrontation in this particular case and on the plane of intelligence i can therefore say that the absurd is not in man if such a metaphor could have a meaning nor in the world but in their presence together for the moment it is the only bond uniting them if wish to limit myself to facts i know what man wants i know what the world offers him and now i can say that i also know what links them i have no need to dig deeper a single certainty is enough for the seeker he simply has to derive all the consequences from it the immediate consequence is also a rule of method the odd trinity brought to light in this way is certainly not a startling discovery but it resembles the data of experience in that it is both infinitely simple and infinitely complicated its first distinguishing feature in this regard is that it cannot be divided to destroy one of its terms is to destroy the whole there can be no absurd outside the human mind thus like everything else the absurd ends with death but there can be no absurd outside this world either and it is by this elementary criterion that i judge the notion of the absurd to be essential and consider that it can stand as the first of my truths the rule of method alluded to above appears here if i judge that a thing is true i must preserve it if i attempt to solve a problem at least i must not by that very solution conjure away one of the terms of the problem for me the sole datum is the absurd the first and after all the only condition of my inquiry is to preserve the very thing that crushes me consequently to respect what i consider essential in it i have just defined it as a confrontation and an unceasing struggle and carrying this absurd logic to its conclusion i must admit that that struggle implies a total absence of hope which has nothing to do with despair a continual rejection which must not be confused with renunciation and a conscious dissatisfaction which must not be compared to immature unrest everything that destroys conjures away or exorcises these requirements and to begin with consent which overthrows divorce ruins the absurd and devaluates the attitude that may then be proposed the absurd has meaning only in so far as it is not agreed to there exists an obvious fact that seems utterly moral namely that a man is always a prey to his truths once he has admitted them he cannot free himself from them one has to pay something a man who has be come conscious of the absurd is forever bound to it a man devoid of hope and conscious of being so has ceased to belong to the future that is natural but it is just as natural that he should strive to escape the universe of which he is the creator all the foregoing has significance only on account of this paradox certain men starting from a critique of rationalism have admitted the absurd climate nothing is more instructive in this regard than to scrutinize the way in which they have elaborated their consequences now to limit myself to existential philosophies i see that all of them without exception suggest escape through an odd reasoning starting out from the absurd over the ruins of reason in a closed universe limited to the human they deify what crushes them and find reason to hope in what impoverishes them that forced hope is religious in all of them it deserves attention i shall merely analyze here as examples a few themes dear to chestov and kierkegaard but jaspers will provide us in caricatural form a typical example of this attitude as a result the rest will be clearer he is left powerless to realize the transcendent incapab le of plumbing the depth of experience and conscious of that universe upset by failure will he advance or at least draw the conclusions from that failure he contributes nothing new he has found nothing in experience but the confession of his own impotence and no occasion to infer any satisfactory principle yet without justification as he says to himself he suddenly asserts all at once the transcendent the essence of experience and the superhuman significance of life when he writes does not the failure reveal beyond any possible explanation and interpretation not the absence but the existence of transcendence that existence which suddenly and through a blind act of human confidence explains everything he defines as the unthinkable unity of the general and the particular thus the absurd becomes god in the broadest meaning of this word and that inability to understand becomes the existence that illuminates everything nothing logically prepares this reasoning i can call it a leap and para doxically can be understood jaspers s insistence his infinite patience devoted to making the experience of the transcendent impossible to realize for the more fleeting that approximation is the more empty that definition proves to be and the more real that transcendent is to him for the passion he devotes to asserting it is in direct proportion to the gap between his powers of explanation and the irrationality of the world and of experience it thus appears that the more bitterly jaspers destroys the reason s preconceptions the more radically he will explain the world that apostle of humiliated thought will find at the very end of humiliation the means of regenerating being to its very depth mystical thought has familiarized us with such devices they are just as legitimate as any attitude of mind but for the moment i am acting as if i took a certain problem seriously without judging beforehand the general value of this attitude or its educative power i mean simply to consider whether it answers the conditions i set myself whether it is worthy of the conflict that concerns me thus i return to chestov a commentator relates a remark of his that deserves interest the only true solution he said is precisely where human judgment sees no solution otherwise what need would we have of god we turn toward god only to obtain the impossible as for the possible men suffice if there is a chestovian philosophy i can say that it is altogether summed up in this way for when at the conclusion of his passionate analyses chestov discovers the fundamental absurdity of all existence he does not say this is the absurd but rather this is god we must rely on him even if he does not correspond to any of our rational categories so that confusion may not be possible the russian philosopher even hints that this god is perhaps full of hatred and hateful incomprehensible and contradictory but the more hideous is his face the more he asserts his power his greatness is his incoherence his proof is his inhumanity one must spring into him and by this leap free oneself from rational illusions thus for chestov acceptance of the absurd is contemporaneous with the absurd itself being aware of it amounts to accepting it and the whole logical effort of his thought is to bring it out so that at the same time the tremendous hope it involves may burst forth let me repeat that this attitude is legitimate but i am persisting here in considering a single problem and all its consequences i do not have to examine the emotion of a thought or of an act of faith i have a whole lifetime to do that i know that the rationalist finds chestov s attitude annoying but i also feel that chestov is right rather than the rationalist and i merely want to know if he remains faithful to the commandments of the absurd now if it is admitted that the absurd is the contrary of hope it is seen that existential thought for chestov presupposes the absurd but proves it only to dispel it such subtlety of thought is a conjuror s emotional trick when chestov elsewhere sets his absurd in opposition to current morality and reason he calls it truth and redemption hence there is basically in that definition of the absurd an approbation that chestov grants it if it is admitted that all the power of that notion lies in the way it runs counter to our elementary hopes if it is felt that to remain the absurd requires not to be consented to then it can be clearly seen that it has lost its true aspect its human and relative character in order to enter an eternity that is both incomprehensible and satisfying if there is an absurd it is in man s universe the moment the notion transforms itself into eternity s springboard it ceases to be linked to human lucidity the absurd is no longer that evidence that man ascertains without consenting to it the struggle is eluded man integrates the absurd and in that communion causes to disappear its essential character which is opposition laceration and divorce this leap is an escape chestov who is so fond of quoting hamlet s remark the time is out of joint writes it down with a sort of savage hope that seems to belong to him in particular for it is not in this sense that hamlet says it or shakespeare writes it the intoxication of the irrational and the vocation of rapture turn a lucid mind away from the absurd to chestov reason is useless but there is something beyond reason to an absurd mind reason is useless and there is nothing beyond reason this leap can at least enlighten us a little more as to the true nature of the absurd we know that it is worthless except in an equilibrium that it is above all in the comparison and not in the terms of that comparison but it so happens that chestov puts all the emphasis on one of the terms and destroys the equilibrium our appetite for understanding our nostalgia for the absolute are explicable only in so far precisely as we can understand and explain many things it is useless to negate the reason absolutely it has its order in which it is efficacious it is properly that of human experience whence we wanted to make everything clear if we cannot do so if the absurd is born on that occasion it is born precisely at the very meeting point of that efficacious but limited reason with the ever resurgent irrational now when chestov rises up against a hegelian proposition such as the motion of the solar system takes place in conformity with immutable laws and those laws are its reason when he devotes all his passion to upsetting spinoza s rationalism he concludes in effect in favor of the vanity of all reason whence by a natural and illegitimate reversal to the pre eminence of the irrational but the transition is not evident for here may intervene the notion of limit and the notion of level the laws of nature may be operative up to a certain limit beyond which they turn against themselves to give birth to the absurd or else they may justify themselves on the level of description without for that reason being true on the level of explanation everything is sacrificed here to the irrational and the demand for clarity being conjured away the absurd disappears with one of the terms of its comparison the absurd man on the other hand does not undertake such a leveling process he recognizes the struggle does not absolutely scorn reason and admits the irrational thus he again embraces in a single glance all the data of experience and he is little inclined to leap before knowing he knows simply that in that alert awareness there is no further place for hope what is perceptible in leo chestov will be perhaps even more so in kierkegaard to be sure it is hard to outline clear propositions in so elusive a writer but despite apparently opposed writings beyond the pseudonyms the tricks and the smiles can be felt throughout that work as it were the presentiment at the same time as the apprehension of a truth which eventually bursts forth in the last works kierkegaard likewise takes the leap his childhood having been so frightened by christianity he ultimately returns to its harshest aspect for him too antinomy and paradox become criteria of the religious thus the very thing that led to despair of the meaning and depth of this life now gives it its truth and its clarity christianity is the scandal and what kierkegaard calls for quite plainly is the third sacrifice required by ignatius loyola the one in which god most rejoices the sacrifice of the intellect this effect of the leap is odd but must not surprise us any longer he makes of the absurd the criterion of the other world whereas it is simply a residue of the experience of this world in his failure says kierkegaard the believer finds his triumph it is not for me to wonder to what stirring preaching this attitude is linked i merely have to wonder if the spectacle of the absurd and its own character justifies it on this point i know that it is not so upon considering again the content of the absurd one understands better the method that inspired kierkegaard between the irrational of the world and the insurgent nostalgia of the absurd he does not maintain the equilibrium he does not respect the relationship that constitutes properly speaking the feeling of absurdity sure of being unable to escape the irrational he wants at least to save himself from that desperate nostalgia that seems to him sterile and devoid of implication but if he may be right on this point in his judgment he could not be in his negation if he substitutes for his cry of revolt a frantic adherence at once he is led to blind himself to the absurd which hitherto enlightened him and to deify the only certainty he henceforth possesses the irrational the important thing as abbe galiani said to mme d epinay is not to be cured but to live with one s ailments kierkegaard wants to be cured to be cured is his frenzied wish and it runs throughout his whole journal the entire effort of his intelligence is to escape the antinomy of the human condition an all the more desperate effort since he intermittently perceives its vanity when he speaks of himself as if neither fear of god nor piety were capable of bringing him to peace thus it is that through a strained subterfuge he gives the irrational the appearance and god the attributes of the absurd unjust incoherent and incomprehensible intelligence alone in him strives to stifle the underlying demands of the human heart since nothing is proved everything can be proved indeed kierkegaard himself shows us the path taken i do not want to suggest anything here but how can one fail to read in his works the signs of an almost intentional mutilation of the soul to balance the mutilation accepted in regard to the absurd it is the leitmotiv of the journal what i lacked was the animal which also belongs to human destiny but give me a body then and further on oh especially in my early youth what should i not have given to be a man even for six months what i lack basically is a body and the physical conditions of existence elsewhere the same man nevertheless adopts the great cry of hope that has come down through so many centuries and quickened so many hearts except that of the absurd man but for the christian death is certainly not the end of everything and it implies infinitely more hope than life implies for us even when that life is overflowing with health and vigor reconciliation through scandal is still reconciliation it allows one perhaps as can be seen to derive hope of its contrary which is death but even if fellow feeling inclines one toward that attitude still it must be said that excess justifies nothing that transcends as the saying goes the human scale therefore it must be superhuman but this therefore is superfluous there is no logical certainty here there is no experimental probability either all i can say is that in fact that transcends my scale if i do not draw a negation from it at least i do not want to found anything on the incomprehensible i want to know whether i can live with what i know and with that alone i am told again that here the intelligence must sacrifice its pride and the reason bow down but if i recognize the limits of the reason i do not therefore negate it recognizing its relative powers i merely want to remain in this middle path where the intelligence can remain clear if that is its pride i see no sufficient reason for giving it up nothing more profound for example than kierkegaard s view according to which despair is not a fact but a state the very state of sin for sin is what alienates from god the absurd which is the metaphysical state of the conscious man does not lead to god perhaps this notion will become clearer if i risk this shocking statement the absurd is sin without god it is a matter of living in that state of the absurd i know on what it is founded this mind and this world straining against each other without being able to embrace each other i ask for the rule of life of that state and what i am offered neglects its basis negates one of the terms of the painful opposition demands of me a resignation i ask what is involved in the condition i recognize as mine i know it implies obscurity and ignorance and i am assured that this ignorance explains everything and that this darkness is my light but there is no reply here to my intent and this stirring lyricism cannot hide the paradox from me one must therefore turn away kierkegaard may shout in warning if man had no eternal consciousness if at the bottom of everything there were merely a wild seething force producing everything both large and trifling in the storm of dark passions if the bottomless void that nothing can fill underlay all things what would life be but despair this cry is not likely to stop the absurd man seeking what is true is not seeking what is desirable if in order to elude the anxious question what would life be one must like the donkey feed on the roses of illusion then the absurd mind rather than resigning itself to falsehood prefers to adopt fearlessly kierkegaard s reply despair everything considered a determined soul will always manage i am taking the liberty at this point of calling the existential attitude philosophical suicide but this does not imply a judgment it is a convenient way of indicating the movement by which a thought negates itself and tends to transcend itself in its very negation for the existentials negation is their god to be precise that god is maintained only through the negation of human reason but like suicides gods change with men there are many ways of leaping the essential being to leap those redeeming negations those ultimate contradictions which negate the obstacle that has not yet been leaped over may spring just as well this is the paradox at which this reasoning aims from a certain religious inspiration as from the rational order they always lay claim to the eternal and it is solely in this that they take the leap it must be repeated that the reasoning developed in this essay leaves out altogether the most widespread spiritual attitude of our enlightened age the one based on the principle that all is reason which aims to explain the world it is natural to give a clear view of the world after accepting the idea that it must be clear that is even legitimate but does not concern the reasoning we are following out here in fact our aim is to shed light upon the step taken by the mind when starting from a philosophy of the world s lack of meaning it ends up by finding a meaning and depth in it the most touching of those steps is religious in essence it becomes obvious in the theme of the irrational but the most paradoxical and most significant is certainly the one that attributes rational reasons to a world it originally imagined as devoid of any guiding principle it is impossible in any case to reach the consequences that concern us without having given an idea of this new attainment of the spirit of nostalgia i shall examine merely the theme of the intention made fashionable by husserl and the phenomenologists i have already alluded to it originally husserl s method negates the classic procedure of the reason let me repeat thinking is not unifying or making the appearance familiar under the guise of a great principle thinking is learning all over again how to see directing one s consciousness making of every image a privileged place in other words phenomenology declines to explain the world it wants to be merely a description of actual experience it confirms absurd thought in its initial assertion that there is no truth but merely truths from the evening breeze to this hand on my shoulder everything has its truth consciousness illuminates it by paying attention to it consciousness does not form the object of its understanding it merely focuses it is the act of attention and to borrow a bergsonian image it resembles the projector that suddenly focuses on an image the difference is that there is no scenario but a successive and incoherent illustration in that magic lantern all the pictures are privileged consciousness suspends in experience the objects of its attention through its miracle it isolates them henceforth they are beyond all judgments this is the intention that characterizes consciousness but the word does not imply any idea of finality it is taken in its sense of direction its only value is topographical at first sight it certainly seems that in this way nothing contradicts the absurd spirit that apparent modesty of thought that limits itself to describing what it declines to explain that intentional discipline whence results paradoxically a profound enrichment of experience and the rebirth of the world in its prolixity are absurd procedures at least at first sight for methods of thought in this case as elsewhere always assume two aspects one psychological and the other metaphysical thereby they harbor two truths if the theme of the intentional claims to illustrate merely a psychological attitude by which reality is drained instead of being explained nothing in fact separates it from the absurd spirit it aims to enumerate what it cannot transcend it affirms solely that without any unifying principle thought can still take delight in describing and understanding every aspect of experience the truth involved then for each of those aspects is psychological in nature it simply testifies to the interest that reality can offer it is a way of awaking a sleeping world and of making it vivid to the mind but if one attempts to extend and give a rational basis to that notion of truth if one claims to discover in this way the essence of each object of knowledge one restores its depth to experience for an absurd mind that is incomprehensible now it is this wavering between modesty and assurance that is noticeable in the intentional attitude and this shimmering of phenomenological thought will illustrate the absurd reasoning better than anything else for husserl speaks likewise of extra temporal essences brought to light by the intention and he sounds like plato all things are not explained by one thing but by all things i see no difference to be sure those ideas or those essences that consciousness effectuates at the end of every description are not yet to be considered perfect models but it is asserted that they are directly present in each datum of perception there is no longer a single idea explaining everything but an infinite number of essences giving a meaning to an infinite number of objects the world comes to a stop but also lights up platonic realism becomes intuitive but it is still realism kierkegaard was swallowed up in his god parmenides plunged thought into the one but here thought hurls itself into an abstract polytheism but this is not all hallucinations and fictions likewise belong to extra temporal essences in the new world of ideas the species of centaurs collaborates with the more modest species of metropolitan man for the absurd man there was a truth as well as a bitterness in that purely psychological opinion that all aspects of the world are privileged to say that everything is privileged is tantamount to saying that everything is equivalent but the metaphysical aspect of that truth is so far reaching that through an elementary reaction he feels closer perhaps to plato he is taught in fact that every image presupposes an equally privileged essence in this ideal world without hierarchy the formal army is composed solely of generals to be sure transcendency had been eliminated but a sudden shift in thought brings back into the world a sort of fragmentary immanence which restores to the universe its depth am i to fear having carried too far a theme handled with greater circumspection by its creators i read merely these assertions of husserl apparently paradoxical yet rigorously logical if what precedes is accepted that which is true is true absolutely in itself truth is one identical with itself however different the creatures who perceive it men monsters angels or gods reason triumphs and trumpets forth with that voice i cannot deny what can its assertions mean in the absurd world the perception of an angel or a god has no meaning for me that geometrical spot where divine reason ratifies mine will always be incomprehensible to me there too i discern a leap and though performed in the abstract it nonetheless means for me forgetting just what i do not want to forget when farther on husserl exclaims if all masses subject to attraction were to disappear the law of attraction would not be destroyed but would simply remain without any possible application i know that i am faced with a metaphysic of consolation and if i want to discover the point where thought leaves the path of evidence i have only to reread the parallel reasoning that husserl voices regarding the mind if we could contemplate clearly the exact laws of psychic processes they would be seen to be likewise eternal and invariable like the basic laws of theoretical natural science hence they would be valid even if there were no psychic process even if the mind were not its laws would be i see then that of a psychological truth husserl aims to make a rational rule after having denied the integrating power of human reason he leaps by this expedient to eternal reason husserl s theme of the concrete universe cannot then surprise me if i am told that all essences are not formal but that some are material that the first are the object of logic and the second of science this is merely a question of definition the abstract i am told indicates but a part without consistency in itself of a concrete universal but the wavering already noted allows me to throw light on the confusion of these terms for that may mean that the concrete object of my attention this sky the reflection of that water on this coat alone preserve the prestige of the real that my interest isolates in the world and i shall not deny it but that may mean also that this coat itself is universal has its particular and sufficient essence belongs to the world of forms i then realize that merely the order of the procession has been changed this world has ceased to have its reflection in a higher universe but the heaven of forms is figured in the host of images of this earth this changes nothing for me rather than encountering here a taste for the concrete the meaning of the human condition i find an intellectualism sufficiently unbridled to generalize the concrete itself it is futile to be amazed by the apparent paradox that leads thought to its own negation by the opposite paths of humiliated reason and triumphal reason from the abstract god of husserl to the dazzling god of kierkegaard the distance is not so great reason and the irrational lead to the same preaching in truth the way matters but little the will to arrive suffices the abstract philosopher and the religious philosopher start out from the same disorder and support each other in the same anxiety but the essential is to explain nostalgia is stronger here than knowledge it is significant that the thought of the epoch is at once one of the most deeply imbued with a philosophy of the non significance of the world and one of the most divided in its conclusions it is constantly oscillating between extreme rationalization of reality which tends to break up that thought into standard reasons and its extreme irrationalization which tends to deify it but this divorce is only apparent it is a matter of reconciliation and in both cases the leap suffices it is always wrongly thought that the notion of reason is a oneway notion to tell the truth however rigorous it may be in its ambition this concept is nonetheless just as unstable as others reason bears a quite human aspect but it also is able to turn toward the divine since plotinus who was the first to reconcile it with the eternal climate it has learned to turn away from the most cherished of its principles which is contradiction in order to integrate into it the strangest the quite magic one of participation it is an instrument of thought and not thought itself above all a man s thought is his nostalgia just as reason was able to soothe the melancholy of plotinus it provides modern anguish the means of calming itself in the familiar setting of the eternal the absurd mind has less luck for it the world is neither so rational nor so irrational it is unreasonable and only that with husserl the reason eventually has no limits at all the absurd on the contrary establishes its lim its since it is powerless to calm its anguish kierkegaard independently asserts that a single limit is enough to negate that anguish but the absurd does not go so far for it that limit is directed solely at the reason s ambitions the theme of the irrational as it is conceived by the existentials is reason becoming confused and escaping by negating itself the absurd is lucid reason noting its limits only at the end of this difficult path does the absurd man recognize his true motives upon comparing his inner exigence and what is then offered him he suddenly feels he is going to turn away in the universe of husserl the world becomes clear and that longing for familiarity that man s heart harbors becomes useless in kierkegaard s apocalypse that desire for clarity must be given up if it wants to be satisfied sin is not so much knowing if it were everybody would be innocent as wanting to know indeed it is the only sin of which the absurd man can feel that it constitutes both his guilt and his innocence he is offered a solution in which all the past contradictions have become merely polemical games but this is not the way he experienced them their truth must be preserved which consists in not being satisfied he does not want preaching my reasoning wants to be faithful to the evidence that aroused it that evidence is the absurd it is that divorce between the mind that desires and the world that disappoints my nostalgia for unity this fragmented universe and the contradiction that binds them together kierkegaard suppresses my nostalgia and husserl gathers together that universe that is not what i was expecting it was a matter of living and thinking with those dislocations of knowing whether one had to accept or refuse there can be no question of masking the evidence of suppressing the absurd by denying one of the terms of its equation it is essential to know whether one can live with it or whether on the other hand logic commands one to die of it i am not interested in philosophical suicide but rather in plain suicide i merely wish to purge it of its emotional content and know its logic and its integrity any other position implies for the absurd mind deceit and the mind s retreat before what the mind itself has brought to light husserl claims to obey the desire to escape the inveterate habit of living and thinking in certain well known and convenient conditions of existence but the final leap restores in him the eternal and its comfort the leap does not represent an extreme danger as kierkegaard would like it to do the danger on the contrary lies in the subtle instant that precedes the leap being able to remain on that dizzying crest that is integrity and the rest is subterfuge i know also that never has helplessness inspired such striking harmonies as those of kierkegaard but if helplessness has its place in the indifferent landscapes of history it has none in a reasoning whose exigence is now known absurd freedom now the main thing is done i hold certain facts from which i cannot separate what i know what is certain what i cannot deny what i cannot reject this is what counts i can negate everything of that part of me that lives on vague nostalgias except this desire for unity this longing to solve this need for clarity and cohesion i can refute everything in this world surrounding me that offends or enraptures me except this chaos this sovereign chance and this divine equivalence which springs from anarchy i don t know whether this world has a meaning that transcends it but i know that i do not know that meaning and that it is impossible for me just now to know it what can a meaning outside my condition mean to me i can understand only in human terms what i touch what resists me that is what i understand and these two certainties my appetite for the absolute and for unity and the impossibility of reducing this world to a rational and reasonable principle i also know that i cannot reconcile them what other truth can i admit without lying without bringing in a hope i lack and which means nothing within the limits of my condition if i were a tree among trees a cat among animals this life would have a meaning or rather this problem would not arise for i should belong to this world i should be this world to which i am now opposed by my whole consciousness and my whole insistence upon familiarity this ridiculous reason is what sets me in opposition to all creation i cannot cross it out with a stroke of the pen what i believe to be true i must therefore preserve what seems to me so obvious even against me i must support and what constitutes the basis of that conflict of that break between the world and my mind but the awareness of it if therefore i want to preserve it i can through a constant awareness ever revived ever alert this is what for the moment i must remember at this moment the absurd so obvious and yet so hard to win returns to a man s life and finds its home there at this moment too the mind can leave the arid dried up path of lucid effort that path now emerges in daily life it encounters the world of the anonymous impersonal pronoun one but henceforth man enters in with his revolt and his lucidity he has forgotten how to hope this hell of the present is his kingdom at last all problems recover their sharp edge abstract evidence retreats before the poetry of forms and colors spiritual conflicts become embodied and return to the abject and magnificent shelter of man s heart none of them is settled but all are transfigured is one going to die escape by the leap rebuild a mansion of ideas and forms to one s own scale is one on the contrary going to take up the heart rending and marvelous wager of the absurd let s make a final effort in this regard and draw all our conclusions the body affection creation action human nobility will then resume their places in this mad world at last man will again find there the wine of the absurd and the bread of indifference on which he feeds his greatness let us insist again on the method it is a matter of persisting at a certain point on his path the absurd man is tempted history is not lacking in either religions or prophets even without gods he is asked to leap all he can reply is that he doesn t fully understand that it is not obvious indeed he does not want to do anything but what he fully understands he is assured that this is the sin of pride but he does not understand the notion of sin that perhaps hell is in store but he has not enough imagination to visualize that strange future that he is losing immortal life but that seems to him an idle consideration an attempt is made to get him to admit his guilt he feels innocent to tell the truth that is all he feels his irreparable innocence this is what allows him everything hence what he demands of himself is to live solely with what he knows to accommodate himself to what is and to bring in nothing that is not certain he is told that nothing is but this at least is a certainty and it is with this that he is concerned he wants to find out if it is possible to live without appeal now i can broach the notion of suicide it has already been felt what solution might be given at this point the problem is reversed it was previously a question of finding out whether or not life had to have a meaning to be lived it now becomes clear on the contrary that it will be lived all the better if it has no meaning living an experience a particular fate is accepting it fully now no one will live this fate knowing it to be absurd unless he does everything to keep before him that absurd brought to light by consciousness negating one of the terms of the opposition on which he lives amounts to escaping it to abolish conscious revolt is to elude the problem the theme of permanent revolution is thus carried into individual experience living is keeping the absurd alive keeping it alive is above all contemplating it unlike eurydice the absurd dies only when we turn away from it one of the only coherent philosophical positions is thus revolt it is a constant confrontation between man and his own obscurity it is an insistence upon an impossible transparency it challenges the world anew every second just as danger provided man the unique opportunity of seizing awareness so metaphysical revolt extends awareness to the whole of experience it is that constant presence of man in his own eyes it is not aspiration for it is devoid of hope that revolt is the certainly of a crushing fate without the resignation that ought to accompany it this is where it is seen to what a degree absurd experience is remote from suicide it may be thought that suicide follows revolt but wrongly for it does not represent the logical outcome of revolt it is just the contrary by the consent it presupposes suicide like the leap is acceptance at its extreme everything is over and man returns to his essential history his future his unique and dreadful future he sees and rushes toward it in its way suicide settles the absurd it engulfs the absurd in the same death but i know that in order to keep alive the absurd cannot be settled it escapes suicide to the extent that it is simultaneously awareness and rejection of death it is at the extreme limit of the condemned man s last thought that shoelace that despite everything he sees a few yards away on the very brink of his dizzying fall the contrary of suicide in fact is the man condemned to death that revolt gives life its value spread out over the whole length of a life it restores its majesty to that life to a man devoid of blinders there is no finer sight than that of the intelligence at grips with a reality that transcends it the sight of human pride is unequaled no disparagement is of any use that discipline that the mind imposes on itself that will conjured up out of nothing that face to face struggle have something exceptional about them to impoverish that reality whose inhumanity constitutes man s majesty is tantamount to impoverishing him himself i understand then why the doctrines that explain everything to me also debilitate me at the same time they relieve me of the weight of my own life and yet i must carry it alone at this juncture i cannot conceive that a skeptical metaphysics can be joined to an ethics of renunciation consciousness and revolt these rejections are the contrary of renunciation everything that is indomitable and passionate in a human heart quickens them on the contrary with its own life it is essential to die unrecon ciled and not of one s own free will suicide is a repudi ation the absurd man can only drain everything to the bitter end and deplete himself the absurd is his extreme tension which he maintains constantly by solitary effort for he knows that in that consciousness and in that day to day revolt he gives proof of his only truth which is defiance this is a first consequence if i remain in that prearranged position which consists in drawing all the conclusions and nothing else involved in a newly discovered notion i am faced with a second paradox in order to remain faithful to that method i have nothing to do with the problem of metaphysical liberty knowing whether or not man is free doesn t interest me i can experience only my own freedom as to it i can have no general notions but merely a few clear insights the problem of freedom as such has no meaning for it is linked in quite a different way with the problem of god knowing whether or not man is free involves knowing whether he can have a master the absurdity peculiar to this problem comes from the fact that the very notion that makes the problem of freedom possible also takes away all its meaning for in the presence of god there is less a problem of freedom than a problem of evil you know the alternative either we are not free and god the all powerful is responsible for evil or we are free and responsible but god is not all powerful all the scholastic subtleties have neither added anything to nor subtracted anything from the acuteness of this paradox this is why i cannot act lost in the glorification or the mere definition of a notion which eludes me and loses its meaning as soon as it goes beyond the frame of reference of my individual experience i cannot understand what kind of freedom would be given me by a higher being i have lost the sense of hierarchy the only conception of freedom i can have is that of the prisoner or the individual in the midst of the state the only one i know is freedom of thought and action now if the absurd cancels all my chances of eternal freedom it restores and magnifies on the other hand my freedom of action that privation of hope and future means an increase in man s availability before encountering the absurd the everyday man lives with aims a concern for the future or for justification with regard to whom or what is not the question he weighs his chances he counts on someday his retirement or the labor of his sons he still thinks that something in his life can be directed in truth he acts as if he were free even if all the facts make a point of contradicting that liberty but after the absurd everything is upset that idea that i am my way of acting as if everything has a meaning even if on occasion i said that nothing has all that is given the lie in vertiginous fashion by the absurdity of a possible death thinking of the future establishing aims for oneself having preferences all this presupposes a belief in freedom even if one occasionally ascertains that one doesn t feel it but at that moment i am well aware that that higher liberty that freedom to be which alone can serve as basis for a truth does not exist death is there as the only reality after death the chips are down i am not even free either to perpetuate myself but a slave and above all a slave without hope of an eternal revolution without recourse to contempt and who without revolution and without contempt can remain a slave what freedom can exist in the fullest sense without assurance of eternity but at the same time the absurd man realizes that hitherto he was bound to that postulate of freedom on the illusion of which he was living in a certain sense that hampered him to the extent to which he imagined a purpose to his life he adapted himself to the demands of a purpose to be achieved and became the slave of his liberty thus i could not act otherwise than as the father or the engineer or the leader of a nation or the post office sub clerk that i am preparing to be i think i can choose to be that rather than something else i think so unconsciously to be sure but at the same time i strengthen my postulate with the beliefs of those around me with the presumptions of my human environment others are so sure of being free and that cheerful mood is so contagious however far one may remain from any presumption moral or social one is partly influenced by them and even for the best among them there are good and bad presumptions one adapts one s life to them thus the absurd man realizes that he was not really free to speak clearly to the extent to which i hope to which i worry about a truth that might be individual to me about a way of being or creating to the extent to which i arrange my life and prove thereby that i accept its having a meaning i create for myself barriers between which i confine my life i do like so many bureaucrats of the mind and heart who only fill me with disgust and whose only vice i now see clearly is to take man s freedom seriously the absurd enlightens me on this point there is no future henceforth this is the reason for my inner freedom i shall use two comparisons here mystics to begin with find freedom in giving themselves by losing themselves in their god by accepting his rules they become secretly free in spontaneously accepted slavery they recover a deeper independence but what does that freedom mean it may be said above all that they feel free with regard to themselves and not so much free as liberated likewise completely turned toward death taken here as the most obvious absurdity the absurd man feels released from everything outside that passionate attention crystallizing in him he enjoys a freedom with regard to common rules it can be seen at this point that the initial themes of existential philosophy keep their entire value the return to consciousness the escape from everyday sleep represent the first steps of absurd freedom but it is existential preaching that is alluded to and with it that spiritual leap which basically escapes consciousness in the same way this is my second comparison the slaves of antiquity did not belong to themselves but they knew that freedom which consists in not feeling responsible death too has patrician hands which while crushing also liberate losing oneself in that bottomless certainty feeling henceforth sufficiently remote from one s own life to increase it and take a broad view of it this involves the principle of a liberation such new independence has a definite time limit like any freedom of action it does not write a check on eternity but it takes the place of the illusions of freedom which all stopped with death the divine availability of the condemned man before whom the prison doors open in a certain early dawn that unbelievable disinterestedness with regard to everything except for the pure flame of life it is clear that death and the absurd are here the principles of the only reasonable freedom that which a human heart can experience and live this is a second consequence the absurd man thus catches sight of a burning and frigid transparent and limited universe in which nothing is possible but everything is given and beyond which all is collapse and nothingness he can then decide to accept such a universe and draw from it his strength his refusal to hope and the unyielding evidence of a life without consolation but what does life mean in such a universe nothing else for the moment but indifference to the future and a desire to use up everything that is given belief in the meaning of life always implies a scale of values a choice our preferences belief in the absurd according to our definitions teaches the contrary but this is worth examining knowing whether or not one can live without appeal is all that interests me i do not want to get out of my depth this aspect of life being given me can i adapt myself to it now faced with this particular concern belief in the absurd is tantamount to substituting the quantity of experiences for the quality if i convince myself that this life has no other aspect than that of the absurd if i feel that its whole equilibrium depends on that perpetual opposition between my conscious revolt and the darkness in which it struggles if i admit that my freedom has no meaning except in relation to its limited fate then i must say that what counts is not the best living but the most living it is not up to me to wonder if this is vulgar or revolting elegant or deplorable once and for all value judgments are discarded here in favor of factual judgments i have merely to draw the conclusions from what i can see and to risk nothing that is hypothetical supposing that living in this way were not honorable then true propriety would command me to be dishonorable the most living in the broadest sense that rule means nothing it calls for definition it seems to begin with the fact that the notion of quantity has not been sufficiently explored for it can account for a large share of human experience a man s rule of conduct and his scale of values have no meaning except through the quantity and variety of experiences he has been in a position to accumulate now the conditions of modern life impose on the majority of men the same quantity of experiences and consequently the same profound experience to be sure there must also be taken into consideration the individual s spontaneous contribution the given element in him but i cannot judge of that and let me repeat that my rule here is to get along with the immediate evidence i see then that the individual character of a common code of ethics lies not so much in the ideal importance of its basic principles as in the norm of an experience that it is possible to measure to stretch a point somewhat the greeks had the code of their leisure just as we have the code of our eight hour day but already many men among the most tragic cause us to foresee that a longer experience changes this table of values they make us imagine that adventurer of the everyday who through mere quantity of experiences would break all records i am purposely using this sports expression and would thus win his own code of ethics yet let s avoid romanticism and just ask ourselves what such an attitude may mean to a man with his mind made up to take up his bet and to observe strictly what he takes to be the rules of the game breaking all the records is first and foremost being faced with the world as often as possible how can that be done without contradictions and without playing on words for on the one hand the absurd teaches that all experiences are unimportant and on the other it urges toward the greatest quantity of experiences how then can one fail to do as so many of those men i was speaking of earlier choose the form of life that brings us the most possible of that human matter thereby introducing a scale of values that on the other hand one claims to reject but again it is the absurd and its contradictory life that teaches us for the mistake is thinking that that quantity of experiences depends on the circumstances of our life when it depends solely on us here we have to be over simple to two men living the same number of years the world always provides the same sum of experiences it is up to us to be conscious of them being aware of one s life one s revolt one s freedom and to the maximum is living and to the maximum where lucidity dominates the scale of values becomes useless let s be even more simple let us say that the sole obstacle the sole deficiency to be made good is constituted by premature death thus it is that no depth no emotion no passion and no sacrifice could render equal in the eyes of the absurd man even if he wished it so a conscious life of forty years and a lucidity spread over sixty years madness and death are his irreparables man does not choose the absurd and the extra life it involves therefore do not defend on man s will but on its contrary which is death weighing words carefully it is altogether a question of luck one just has to be able to consent to this there will never be any substitute for twenty years of life and experience by what is an odd inconsistency in such an alert race the greeks claimed that those who died young were beloved of the gods and that is true only if you are willing to believe that entering the ridiculous world of the gods is forever losing the purest of joys which is feeling and feeling on this earth the present and the succession of presents before a constantly conscious soul is the ideal of the absurd man but the word ideal rings false in this connection it is not even his vocation but merely the third consequence of his reasoning having started from an anguished awareness of the inhuman the meditation on the absurd returns at the end of its itinerary to the very heart of the passionate flames of human revolt thus i draw from the absurd three consequences which are my revolt my freedom and my passion by the mere activity of consciousness i transform into a rule of life what was an invitation to death and i refuse suicide i know to be sure the dull resonance that vibrates throughout these days yet i have but a word to say that it is necessary when nietzsche writes it clearly seems that the chief thing in heaven and on earth is to obey at length and in a single direction in the long run there results something for which it is worth the trouble of living on this earth as for example virtue art music the dance reason the mind something that transfigures something delicate mad or divine he elucidates the rule of a really distinguished code of ethics but he also points the way of the absurd man obeying the flame is both the easiest and the hardest thing to do however it is good for man to judge himself occasionally he is alone in being able to do so prayer says alain is when night descends over thought but the mind must meet the night reply the mystics and the existentials yes indeed but not that night that is born under closed eyelids and through the mere will of man dark impenetrable night that the mind calls up in order to plunge into it if it must encounter a night let it be rather that of despair which remains lucid polar night vigil of the mind whence will arise perhaps that white and virginal brightness which outlines every object in the light of the intelligence at that degree equivalence encounters passionate understanding then it is no longer even a question of judging the existential leap it resumes its place amid the age old fresco of human attitudes for the spectator if he is conscious that leap is still absurd in so far as it thinks it solves the paradox it reinstates it intact on this score it is stirring on this score everything resumes its place and the absurd world is reborn in all its splendor and diversity but it is bad to stop hard to be satisfied with a single way of seeing to go without contradiction perhaps the most subtle of all spiritual forces the preceding merely defines a way of thinking but the point is to live the absurd man if stavrogin believes he does not think he believes if he does not believe he does not think he does not believe the possessed my field said goethe is time that is indeed the absurd speech what in fact is the absurd man he who without negating it does nothing for the eternal not that nostalgia is foreign to him but he prefers his courage and his reasoning the first teaches him to live without appeal and to get along with what he has the second informs him of his limits assured of his temporally limited freedom of his revolt devoid of future and of his mortal consciousness he lives out his adventure within the span of his lifetime that is his field that is his action which he shields from any judgment but his own a greater life cannot mean for him another life that would be unfair i am not even speaking here of that paltry eternity that is called posterity mme roland relied on herself that rashness was taught a lesson posterity is glad to quote her remark but forgets to judge it mme roland is indifferent to posterity there can be no question of holding forth on ethics i have seen people behave badly with great morality and i note every day that integrity has no need of rules there is but one moral code that the absurd man can accept the one that is not separated from god the one that is dictated but it so happens that he lives outside that god as for the others i mean also immoralism the absurd man sees nothing in them but justifications and he has nothing to justify i start out here from the principle of his innocence that innocence is to be feared everything is permitted exclaims ivan karamazov that too smacks of the absurd but on condition that it not be taken in the vulgar sense i don t know whether or not it has been sufficiently pointed out that it is not an outburst of relief or of joy but rather a bitter acknowledgment of a fact the certainty of a god giving a meaning to life far surpasses in attractiveness the ability to behave badly with impunity the choice would not be hard to make but there is no choice and that is where the bitterness comes in the absurd does not liberate it binds it does not authorize all actions everything is permitted does not mean that nothing is forbidden the absurd merely confers an equivalence on the consequences of those actions it does not recommend crime for this would be childish but it restores to remorse its futility likewise if all experiences are indifferent that of duty is as legitimate as any other one can be virtuous through a whim all systems of morality are based on the idea that an action has consequences that legitimize or cancel it a mind imbued with the absurd merely judges that those consequences must be considered calmly it is ready to pay up in other words there may be responsible persons but there are no guilty ones in its opinion at very most such a mind will consent to use past experience as a basis for its future actions time will prolong time and life will serve life in this field that is both limited and bulging with possibilities everything in himself except his lucidity seems unforeseeable to him what rule then could emanate from that unreasonable order the only truth that might seem instructive to him is not formal it comes to life and unfolds in men the absurd mind cannot so much expect ethical rules at the end of its reasoning as rather illustrations and the breath of human lives the few following images are of this type they prolong the absurd reasoning by giving it a specific attitude and their warmth do i need to develop the idea that an example is not necessarily an example to be followed even less so if possible in the absurd world and that these illustrations are not therefore models besides the fact that a certain vocation is required for this one becomes ridiculous with all due allowance when drawing from rousseau the conclusion that one must walk on all fours and from nietzsche that one must maltreat one s mother it is essential to be absurd writes a modern author it is not essential to be a dupe the attitudes of which i shall treat can assume their whole meaning only through consideration of their contraries a sub clerk in the post office is the equal of a conqueror if consciousness is common to them all experiences are indifferent in this regard there are some that do either a service or a disservice to man they do him a service if he is conscious otherwise that has no importance a man s failures imply judgment not of circumstances but of himself i am choosing solely men who aim only to expend themselves or whom i see to be expending themselves that has no further implications for the moment i want to speak only of a world in which thoughts like lives are devoid of future everything that makes man work and get excited utilizes hope the sole thought that is not mendacious is therefore a sterile thought in the absurd world the value of a notion or of a life is measured by its sterility don juanism if it were sufficient to love things would be too easy the more one loves the stronger the absurd grows it is not through lack of love that don juan goes from woman to woman it is ridiculous to represent him as a mystic in quest of total love but it is indeed because he loves them with the same passion and each time with his whole self that he must repeat his gift and his profound quest whence each woman hopes to give him what no one has ever given him each time they are utterly wrong and merely manage to make him feel the need of that repetition at last exclaims one of them i have given you love can we be surprised that don juan laughs at this at last no he says but once more why should it be essential to love rarely in order to love much is don juan melancholy this is not likely i shall barely have recourse to the legend that laugh the conquering insolence that playfulness and love of the theater are all clear and joyous every healthy creature tends to multiply himself so it is with don juan but furthermore melancholy people have two reasons for being so they don t know or they hope don juan knows and does not hope he reminds one of those artists who know their limits never go beyond them and in that precarious interval in which they take their spiritual stand enjoy all the wonderful ease of masters and that is indeed genius the intelligence that knows its frontiers up to the frontier of physical death don juan is ignorant of melancholy the moment he knows his laugh bursts forth and makes one forgive everything he was melancholy at the time when he hoped today on the mouth of that woman he recognizes the bitter and comforting taste of the only knowledge bitter barely that necessary imperfection that makes happiness perceptible it is quite false to try to see in don juan a man brought up on ecclesiastes for nothing is vanity to him except the hope of another life he proves this because he gambles that other life against heaven itself longing for desire killed by satisfaction that commonplace of the impotent man does not belong to him that is all right for faust who believed in god enough to sell himself to the devil for don juan the thing is simpler molina s burlador ever replies to the threats of hell what a long respite you give me what comes after death is futile and what a long succession of days for whoever knows how to be alive faust craved worldly goods the poor man had only to stretch out his hand it already amounted to selling his soul when he was unable to gladden it as for satiety don juan insists upon it on the contrary if he leaves a woman it is not absolutely because he has ceased to desire her a beautiful woman is always desirable but he desires another and no this is not the same thing this life gratifies his every wish and nothing is worse than losing it this madman is a great wise man but men who live on hope do not thrive in this universe where kindness yields to generosity affection to virile silence and communion to solitary courage and all hasten to say he was a weakling an idealist or a saint one has to disparage the greatness that insults people are sufficiently annoyed or that smile of complicity that debases what it admires by don juan s speeches and by that same remark that he uses on all women but to anyone who seeks quantity in his joys the only thing that matters is efficacy what is the use of complicating the passwords that have stood the test no one neither the woman nor the man listens to them but rather to the voice that pronounces them they are the rule the convention and the courtesy after they are spoken the most important still remains to be done don juan is already getting ready for it why should he give himself a problem in morality he is not like milosz s manara who damns himself through a desire to be a saint hell for him is a thing to be provoked he has but one reply to divine wrath and that is human honor i have honor he says to the commander and i am keeping my promise because i am a knight but it would be just as great an error to make an immoralist of him in this regard he is like everyone else he has the moral code of his likes and dislikes don juan can be properly understood only by constant reference to what he commonly symbolizes the ordinary seducer and the sexual athlete he is an ordinary seducer except for the difference that he is conscious and that is why he is absurd a seducer who has become lucid will not change for all that seducing is his condition in life only in novels does one change condition or become better yet it can be said that at the same time nothing is changed and everything is transformed what don juan realizes in action is an ethic of quantity whereas the saint on the contrary tends toward quality not to believe in the profound meaning of things belongs to the absurd man as for those cordial or wonder struck faces he eyes them stores them up and does not pause over them time keeps up with him the absurd man is he who is not apart from time don juan does not think of collecting women he exhausts their number and with them his chances of life collecting amounts to being capable of living off one s past but he rejects regret that other form of hope he is incapable of looking at portraits is he selfish for all that in his way probably but here too it is essential to understand one another there are those who are made for living and those who are made for loving at least don juan would be inclined to say so but he would do so in a very few words such as he is capable of choosing for the love we are speaking of here is clothed in illusions of the eternal as all the specialists in passion teach us there is no eternal love but what is thwarted there is scarcely any passion without struggle such a love culminates only in the ultimate contradiction of death one must be werther or nothing there too there are several ways of committing suicide one of which is the total gift and forget fulness of self don juan as well as anyone else knows that this can be stirring but he is one of the very few who know that this is not the important thing he knows just as well that those who turn away from all personal life through a great love enrich themselves perhaps but certainly impoverish those their love has chosen a mother or a passionate wife necessarily has a closed heart for it is turned away from the world a single emotion a single creature a single face but all is devoured quite a different love disturbs don juan and this one is liberating it brings with it all the faces in the world and its tremor comes from the fact that it knows itself to be mortal don juan has chosen to be nothing for him it is a matter of seeing clearly we call love what binds us to certain creatures only by reference to a collective way of seeing for which books and legends are responsible but of love i know only that mixture of desire affection and intelligence that binds me to this or that creature that compound is not the same for another person i do not have the right to cover all these experiences with the same name this exempts one from conducting them with the same gestures the absurd man multiplies here again what he cannot unify thus he discovers a new way of being which liberates him at least as much as it liberates those who approach him there is no noble love but that which recognizes itself to be both short lived and exceptional all those deaths and all those rebirths gathered together as in a sheaf make up for don juan the flowering of his life it is his way of giving and of vivifying i let it be decided whether or not one can speak of selfishness i think at this point of all those who absolutely insist that don juan be punished not only in another life but even in this one i think of all those tales legends and laughs about the aged don juan but don juan is already ready to a conscious man old age and what it portends are not a surprise indeed he is conscious only in so far as he does not conceal its horror from himself there was in athens a temple dedicated to old age children were taken there as for don juan the more people laugh at him the more his figure stands out thereby he rejects the one the romantics lent him no one wants to laugh at that tormented pitiful don juan he is pitied heaven itself will redeem him but that s not it in the universe of which don juan has a glimpse ridicule too is included he would consider it normal to be chastised that is the rule of the game and indeed it is typical of his nobility to have accepted all the rules of the game yet he knows he is right and that there can be no question of punishment a fate is not a punishment that is his crime and how easy it is to understand why the men of god call down punishment on his head he achieves a knowledge without illusions which negates everything they profess loving and possessing conquering and consuming that is his way of knowing there is significance in that favorite scriptural word that calls the carnal act knowing he is their worst enemy to the extent that he is ignorant of them a chronicler relates that the true burlador died assassinated by fransciscans who wanted to put an end to the excesses and blasphemies of don juan whose birth assured him impunity then they proclaimed that heaven had struck him down no one has proved that strange end nor has anyone proved the contrary but without wondering if it is probable i can say that it is logical i want merely to single out at this point the word birth and to play on words it was the fact of living that assured his innocence it was from death alone that he derived a guilt now become legendary what else does that stone commander signify that cold statue set in motion to punish the blood and courage that dared to think all the powers of eternal reason of order of universal morality all the foreign grandeur of a god open to wrath are summed up in him that gigantic and soulless stone merely symbolizes the forces that don juan negated forever but the commander s mission stops there the thunder and lightning can return to the imitation heaven whence they were called forth the real tragedy takes place quite apart from them no it was not under a stone hand that don juan met his death i am inclined to believe in the legendary bravado in that mad laughter of the healthy man provoking a non existent god but above all i believe that on that evening when don juan was waiting at anna s the commander didn t come and that after midnight the blasphemer must have felt the dreadful bitterness of those who have been right i accept even more readily the account of his life that has him eventually burying himself in a monastery not that the edifying aspect of the story can he considered probable what refuge can he go ask of god but this symbolizes rather the logical outcome of a life completely imbued with the absurd the grim ending of an existence turned toward short lived joys at this point sensual pleasure winds up in asceticism it is essential to realize that they may be as it were the two aspects of the same destitution what more ghastly image can be called up than that of a man betrayed by his body who simply because he did not die in time lives out the comedy while awaiting the end face to face with that god he does not adore serving him as he served life kneeling before a void and arms outstretched toward a heaven without eloquence that he knows to he also without depth i see don juan in a cell of one of those spanish monasteries lost on a hilltop and if he contemplates anything at all it is not the ghosts of past loves but perhaps through a narrow slit in the sun baked wall some silent spanish plain a noble soulless land in which he recognizes himself yes it is on this melancholy and radiant image that the curtain must be rung down the ultimate end awaited but never desired the ultimate end is negligible drama the play s the thing says hamlet wherein i ll catch the conscience of the king catch is indeed the word for conscience moves swiftly or withdraws within itself it has to be caught on the wing at that barely perceptible moment when it glances fleetingly at itself the everyday man does not enjoy tarrying everything on the contrary hurries him onward but at the same time nothing interests him more than himself especially his potentialities whence his interest in the theater in the show where so many fates are offered him where he can accept the poetry without feeling the sorrow there at least can be recognized the thoughtless man and he continues to hasten toward some hope or other the absurd man begins where that one leaves off where ceasing to admire the play the mind wants to enter in entering into all these lives experiencing them in their diversity amounts to acting them out i am not saying that actors in general obey that impulse that they are absurd men but that their fate is an absurd fate which might charm and attract a lucid heart it is necessary to establish this in order to grasp without misunderstanding what will follow the actor s realm is that of the fleeting of all kinds of fame it is known his is the most ephemeral at least this is said in conversation but all kinds of fame are ephemeral from the point of view of sirius goethe s works in ten thousand years will be dust and his name forgotten perhaps a handful of archaeologists will look for evidence as to our era that idea has always contained a lesson seriously meditated upon it reduces our perturbations to the profound nobility that is found in indifference above all it directs our concerns toward what is most certain that is toward the immediate of all kinds of fame the least deceptive is the one that is lived hence the actor has chosen multiple fame the fame that is hallowed and tested from the fact that everything is to die someday he draws the best conclusion an actor succeeds or does not succeed a writer has some hope even if he is not appreciated he assumes that his works will bear witness to what he was at best the actor will leave us a photograph and nothing of what he was himself his gestures and his silences his gasping or his panting with love will come down to us for him not to be known is not to act and not acting is dying a hundred times with all the creatures he would have brought to life or resuscitated why should we be surprised to find a fleeting fame built upon the most ephemeral of creations the actor has three hours to be iago or alceste phedre or gloucester in that short space of time he makes them come to life and die on fifty square yards of boards never has the absurd been so well illustrated or at such length what more revelatory epitome can be imagined than those marvelous lives those exceptional and total desti nies unfolding for a few hours within a stage set off the stage sigismundo ceases to count two hours later he is seen dining out then it is perhaps that life is a dream but after sigismundo comes another the hero suffering from uncertainty takes the place of the man roaring for his revenge by thus sweeping over centuries and minds by miming man as he can be and as he is the actor has much in common with that other absurd individual the traveler like him he drains something and is constantly on the move he is a traveler in time and for the best the hunted traveler pursued by souls if ever the ethics of quantity could find sustenance it is indeed on that strange stage to what degree the actor benefits from the characters is hard to say but that is not the important thing it is merely a matter of knowing how far he identifies himself with those irreplaceable lives it often happens that he carries them with him that they somewhat overflow the time and place in which they were born they accompany the actor who cannot very readily separate himself from what he has been occasionally when reaching for his glass he resumes hamlet s gesture of raising his cup no the distance separating him from the creatures into whom he infuses life is not so great he abundantly illustrates every month or every day that so suggestive truth that there is no frontier between what a man wants to be and what he is always concerned with better representing he demonstrates to what a degree appearing creates being for that is his art to simulate absolutely to project himself as deeply as possible into lives that are not his own at the end of his effort his vocation becomes clear to apply himself wholeheartedly to being nothing or to being several the narrower the limits allotted him for creating his character the more necessary his talent he will die in three hours under the mask he has assumed today within three hours he must experience and express a whole exceptional life that is called losing oneself to find oneself in those three hours he travels the whole course of the dead end path that the man in the audience takes a lifetime to cover a mime of the ephemeral the actor trains and perfects himself only in appearances the theatrical convention is that the heart expresses itself and communicates itself only through gestures and in the body or through the voice which is as much of the soul as of the body the rule of that art insists that everything be magnified and translated into flesh if it were essential on the stage to love as people really love to employ that irreplaceable voice of the heart to look as people contemplate in life our speech would be in code but here silences must make themselves heard love speaks up louder and immobility itself becomes spectacular the body is king not everyone can be theatrical and this unjustly maligned word covers a whole aesthetic and a whole ethic half a man s life is spent in implying in turning away and in keeping silent here the actor is the intruder he breaks the spell chaining that soul and at last the passions can rush onto their stage they speak in every gesture they live only through shouts and cries thus the actor creates his characters for display he outlines or sculptures them and slips into their imaginary form transfusing his blood into their phantoms i am of course speaking of great drama the kind that gives the actor an opportunity to fulfill his wholly physical fate take shakespeare for instance in that impulsive drama the physical passions lead the dance they explain everything without them all would collapse never would king lear keep the appointment set by madness without the brutal gesture that exiles cordelia and condemns edgar it is just that the unfolding of that tragedy should thenceforth be dominated by madness souls are given over to the demons and their saraband no fewer than four madmen one by trade another by intention and the last two through suffering four disordered bodies four unutterable aspects of a single condition the very scale of the human body is inadequate the mask and the buskin the make up that reduces and accentuates the face in its essential elements the costume that exaggerates and simplifies that universe sacrifices everything to appearance and is made solely for the eye through an absurd miracle it is the body that also brings knowledge i should never really understand iago unless i played his part it is not enough to hear him for i grasp him only at the moment when i see him of the absurd character the actor consequently has the monotony that single oppressive silhouette simultaneously strange and familiar that he carries about from hero to hero there too the great dramatic work contributes to this unity of tone this is where the actor contradicts himself the same and yet so various so many souls summed up in a single body yet it is the absurd contradiction itself that individual who wants to achieve everything and live everything that useless attempt that ineffectual persistence what always contradicts itself nevertheless joins in him he is at that point where body and mind converge where the mind tired of its defeats turns toward its most faithful ally and blest are those says hamlet whose blood and judgment are so well commingled that they are not a pipe for fortune s finger to sound what stop she please how could the church have failed to condemn such a practice on the part of the actor she repudiated in that art the heretical multiplication of souls the emotional debauch the scandalous presumption of a mind that objects to living but one life and hurls itself into all forms of excess she proscribed in them that preference for the present and that triumph of proteus which are the negation of everything she teaches eternity is not a game a mind foolish enough to prefer a comedy to eternity has lost its salvation between everywhere and forever there is no compromise whence that much maligned profession can give rise to a tremendous spiritual conflict what matters said nietzsche is not eternal life but eternal vivacity all drama is in fact in this choice celimene against elianthe the whole subject in the absurd consequence of a nature carried to its extreme and the verse itself the bad verse barely accented like the monotony of the character s nature adrienne lecouvreur on her deathbed was willing to confess and receive communion but refused to abjure her profession she thereby lost the benefit of the confession did this not amount in effect to choosing her absorbing passion in preference to god and that woman in the death throes refusing in tears to repudiate what she called her art gave evidence of a greatness that she never achieved behind the footlights this was her finest role and the hardest one to play choosing between heaven and a ridiculous fidelity preferring oneself to eternity or losing oneself in god is the age old tragedy in which each must play his part the actors of the era knew they were excommunicated entering the profession amounted to choosing hell and the church discerned in them her worst enemies a few men of letters protest what refuse the last rites to moliere but that was just and especially in one who died onstage and finished under the actor s make up a life entirely devoted to dispersion in his case genius is invoked which excuses everything but genius excuses nothing just because it refuses to do so the actor knew at that time what punishment was in store for him but what significance could such vague threats have compared to the final punishment that life itself was reserving for him this was the one that he felt in advance and accepted wholly to the actor as to the absurd man a premature death is irreparable nothing can make up for the sum of faces and centuries he would otherwise have traversed but in any case one has to die for the actor is doubtless everywhere but time sweeps him along too and makes its impression with him it requires but a little imagination to feel what an actor s fate means it is in time that he makes up and enumerates his characters it is in time likewise that he learns to dominate them the greater number of different lives he has lived the more aloof he can be from them the time comes when he must die to the stage and for the world what he has lived faces him he sees clearly he feels the harrowing and irreplaceable quality of that adventure he knows and can now die there are homes for aged actors conquest no says the conqueror don t assume that because i love action i have had to forget how to think on the contrary i can throughly define what i believe for i believe it firmly and i see it surely and clearly beware of those who say i know this too well to be able to express it for if they cannot do so this is because they don t know it or because out of laziness they stopped at the outer crust i have not many opinions at the end of a life man notices that he has spent years becoming sure of a single truth but a single truth if it is obvious is enough to guide an existence as for me i decidedly have something to say about the individual one must speak of him bluntly and if need be with the appropriate contempt a man is more a man through the things he keeps to himself than through those he says there are many that i shall keep to myself but i firmly believe that all those who have judged the individual have done so with much less experience than we on which to base their judgment the intelligence the stirring intelligence perhaps foresaw what it was essential to note but the era its ruins and its blood overwhelm us with facts it was possible for ancient nations and even for more recent ones down to our machine age to weigh one against the other the virtues of society and of the individual to try to find out which was to serve the other to begin with that was possible by virtue of that stubborn aberration in man s heart according to which human beings were created to serve or be served in the second place it was possible because neither society nor the individual had yet revealed all their ability i have seen bright minds express astonishment at the masterpieces of dutch painters born at the height of the bloody wars in flanders be amazed by the prayers of silesian mystics brought up during the frightful thirty years war eternal values survive secular turmoils before their astonished eyes but there has been progress since the painters of today are deprived of such serenity even if they have basically the heart the creator needs i mean the closed heart it is of no use for everyone including the saint himself is mobilized this is perhaps what i have felt most deeply at every form that miscarries in the trenches at every outline metaphor or prayer crushed under steel the eternal loses a round conscious that i cannot stand aloof from my time i have decided to be an integral part of it this is why i esteem the individual only because he strikes me as ridiculous and humiliated knowing that there are no victorious causes i have a liking for lost causes they require an uncontaminated soul equal to its defeat as to its temporary victories for anyone who feels bound up with this world s fate the clash of civilizations has something agonizing about it i have made that anguish mine at the same time that i wanted to join in between history and the eternal i have chosen history because i like certainties of it at least i am certain and how can i deny this force crushing me there always comes a time when one must choose between contemplation and action this is called becoming a man such wrenches are dreadful but for a proud heart there can be no compromise there is god or time that cross or this sword this world has a higher meaning that transcends its worries or nothing is true but those worries one must live with time and die with it or else elude it for a greater life i know that one can compromise and live in the world while believing in the eternal that is called accepting but i loathe this term and want all or nothing if i choose action don t think that contemplation is like an unknown country to me but it cannot give me everything and deprived of the eternal i want to ally myself with time i do not want to put down to my account either nostalgia or bitterness and i merely want to see clearly i tell you tomorrow you will be mobilized for you and for me that is a liberation the individual can do nothing and yet he can do everything in that wonderful unattached state you understand why i exalt and crush him at one and the same time it is the world that pulverizes him and i who liberate him i provide him with all his rights conquerors know that action is in itself useless there is but one useful action that of remaking man and the earth i shall never remake men but one must do as if for the path of struggle leads me to the flesh even humiliated the flesh is my only certainty i can live only on it the creature is my native land this is why i have chosen this absurd and ineffectual effort this is why i am on the side of the struggle the epoch lends itself to this as i have said hitherto the greatness of a conqueror was geographical it was measured by the extent of the conquered territories there is a reason why the word has changed in meaning and has ceased to signify the victorious general the greatness has changed camp it lies in protest and the blind alley sacrifice there too it is not through a preference for defeat victory would be desirable but there is but one victory and it is eternal that is the one i shall never have that is where i stumble and cling a revolution is always accomplished against the gods beginning with the revolution of prometheus the first of modern conquerors it is man s demands made against his fate the demands of the poor are but a pretext yet i can seize that spirit only in its historical act and that is where i make contact with it don t assume however that i take pleasure in it opposite the essential contradiction i maintain my human contradiction i establish my lucidity in the midst of what negates it i exalt man be fore what crushes him and my freedom my revolt and my passion come together then in that tension that lucidity and that vast repetition yes man is his own end and he is his only end if he aims to be something it is in this life now i know it only too well conquerors sometimes talk of vanquishing and overcoming but it is always overcoming oneself that they mean you are well aware of what that means every man has felt himself to be the equal of a god at certain moments at least this is the way it is expressed but this comes from the fact that in a flash he felt the amazing grandeur of the human mind the conquerors are merely those among men who are conscious enough of their strength to be sure of living constantly on those heights and fully aware of that grandeur it is a question of arithmetic of more or less the conquerors are capable of the more but they are capable of no more than man himself when he wants this is why they never leave the human crucible plunging into the seething soul of revolutions there they find the creature mutilated but they also encounter there the only values they like and admire man and his silence this is both their destitution and their wealth there is but one luxury for them that of human relations how can one fail to realize that in this vulnerable universe everything that is human and solely human assumes a more vivid meaning taut faces threatened fraternity such strong and chaste friendship among men these are the true riches because they are transitory in their midst the mind is most aware of its powers and limitations that is to say its efficacity some have spoken of genius but genius is easy to say i prefer the intelligence it must be said that it can be magnificent then it lights up this desert and dominates it it knows its obligations and illustrates them it will die at the same time as this body but knowing this constitutes its freedom we are not ignorant of the fact that all churches are against us a heart so keyed up eludes the eternal and all churches divine or political lay claim to the eternal happiness and courage retribution or justice are secondary ends for them it is a doctrine they bring and one must subscribe to it but i have no concern with ideas or with the eternal the truths that come within my scope can be touched with the hand i cannot separate from them this is why you cannot base anything on me nothing of the conqueror lasts not even his doctrines at the end of all that despite everything is death we know also that it ends everything this is why those cemeteries all over europe which obsess some among us are hideous people beautify only what they love and death repels us and tires our patience it too is to be conquered the last carrara a prisoner in padua emptied by the plague and besieged by the venetians ran screaming through the halls of his deserted palace he was calling on the devil and asking him for death this was a way of overcoming it and it is likewise a mark of courage characteristic of the occident to have made so ugly the places where death thinks itself honored in the rebel s universe death exalts injustice it is the supreme abuse others without compromising either have chosen the eternal and denounced the illusion of this world their cemeteries smile amid numerous flowers and birds that suits the conqueror and gives him a clear image of what he has rejected he has chosen on the contrary the black iron fence or the potter s field the best among the men of god occasionally are seized with fright mingled with consideration and pity for minds that can live with such an image of their death yet those minds derive their strength and justification from this our fate stands before us and we provoke him less out of pride than out of awareness of our ineffectual condition we too sometimes feel pity for ourselves it is the only compassion that seems acceptable to us a feeling that perhaps you hardly understand and that seems to you scarcely virile yet the most daring among us are the ones who feel it but we call the lucid ones virile and we do not want a strength that is apart from lucidity let me repeat that these images do not propose moral codes and involve no judgments they are sketches they merely represent a style of life the lover the actor or the adventurer plays the absurd but equally well if he wishes the chaste man the civil servant or the president of the republic it is enough to know and to mask nothing in italian museums are sometimes found little painted screens that the priest used to hold in front of the face of condemned men to hide the scaffold from them the leap in all its forms rushing into the divine or the eternal surrendering to the illusions of the everyday or of the idea all these screens hide the absurd but there are civil servants without screens and they are the ones of whom i mean to speak i have chosen the most extreme ones at this level the absurd gives them a royal power it is true that those princes are without a kingdom but they have this advantage over others they know that all royalties are illusory they know that is their whole nobility and it is useless to speak in relation to them of hidden misfortune or the ashes of disillusion being deprived of hope is not despairing the flames of earth are surely worth celestial perfumes neither i nor anyone can judge them here they are not striving to be better they are attempting to be consistent if the term wise man can be applied to the man who lives on what he has without speculating on what he has not then they are wise men one of them a conqueror but in the realm of mind a don juan but of knowledge an actor but of the intelligence knows this better than anyone you nowise deserve a privilege on earth and in heaven for having brought to perfection your dear little meek sheep you nonetheless continue to be at best a ridiculous dear little sheep with horns and nothing more even supposing that you do not burst with vanity and do not create a scandal by posing as a judge in any case it was essential to restore to the absurd reasoning more cordial examples the imagination can add many others inseparable from time and exile who likewise know how to live in harmony with a universe without future and without weakness this absurd godless world is then peopled with men who think clearly and have ceased to hope and i have not yet spoken of the most absurd character who is the creator absurd creation philosophy and fiction all those lives maintained in the rarefied air of the absurd could not persevere without some profound and constant thought to infuse its strength into them right here it can be only a strange feeling of fidelity conscious men have been seen to fulfill their task amid the most stupid of wars without considering themselves in contradiction this is because it was essential to elude nothing there is thus a metaphysical honor in enduring the world s absurdity conquest or play acting multiple loves absurd revolt are tributes that man pays to his dignity in a campaign in which he is defeated in advance it is merely a matter of being faithful to the rule of the battle that thought may suffice to sustain a mind it has supported and still supports whole civilizations war cannot be negated one must live it or die of it so it is with the absurd it is a question of breathing with it of recognizing its lessons and recovering their flesh in this regard the absurd joy par excellence is creation art and nothing but art said nietzsche we have art in order not to die of the truth in the experience that i am attempting to describe and to stress on several modes it is certain that a new torment arises wherever another dies the childish chasing after forgetfulness the appeal of satisfaction are now devoid of echo but the constant tension that keeps man face to face with the world the ordered delirium that urges him to be receptive to everything leave him another fever in this universe the work of art is then the sole chance of keeping his consciousness and of fixing its adventures creating is living doubly the groping anxious quest of a proust his meticulous collecting of flowers of wallpapers and of anxieties signifies nothing else at the same time it has no more significance than the continual and imperceptible creation in which the actor the conqueror and all absurd men indulge every day of their lives all try their hands at miming at repeating and at recreating the reality that is theirs we always end up by having the appearance of our truths all existence for a man turned away from the eternal is but a vast mime under the mask of the absurd creation is the great mime such men know to begin with and then their whole effort is to examine to enlarge and to enrich the ephemeral island on which they have just landed but first they must know for the absurd discovery coincides with a pause in which future passions are prepared and justified even men without a gospel have their mount of olives and one must not fall asleep on theirs either for the absurd man it is not a matter of explaining and solving but of experiencing and describing everything begins with lucid indifference describing that is the last ambition of an absurd thought science likewise having reached the end of its paradoxes ceases to propound and stops to contemplate and sketch the ever virgin landscape of phenomena the heart learns thus that the emotion delighting us when we see the world s aspects comes to us not from its depth but from their diversity explanation is useless but the sensation remains and with it the constant attractions of a universe inexhaustible in quantity the place of the work of art can be understood at this point it marks both the death of an experience and its multiplication it is a sort of monotonous and passionate repetition of the themes already orchestrated by the world the body inexhaustible image on the pediment of temples forms or colors number or grief it is therefore not indifferent as a conclusion to encounter once again the principal themes of this essay in the wonderful and childish world of the creator it would be wrong to see a symbol in it and to think that the work of art can be considered at last as a refuge for the absurd it is itself an absurd phenomenon and we are concerned merely with its description it does not offer an escape for the intellectual ailment rather it is one of the symptoms of that ailment which reflects it throughout a man s whole thought but for the first time it makes the mind get outside of itself and places it in opposition to others not for it to get lost but to show it clearly the blind path that all have entered upon in the time of the absurd reasoning creation follows indifference and discovery it marks the point from which absurd passions spring and where the reasoning stops its place in this essay is justified in this way it will suffice to bring to light a few themes common to the creator and the thinker in order to find in the work of art all the contradictions of thought involved in the absurd indeed it is not so much identical conclusions that prove minds to be related as the contradictions that are common to them so it is with thought and creation i hardly need to say that the same anguish urges man to these two attitudes this is where they coincide in the beginning but among all the thoughts that start from the absurd i have seen that very few remain within it and through their deviations or infidelities i have best been able to measure what belonged to the absurd similarly i must wonder is an absurd work of art possible it would be impossible to insist too much on the arbitrary nature of the former opposition between art and philosophy if you insist on taking it in too limited a sense it is certainly false if you mean merely that these two disciplines each have their peculiar climate that is probably true but remains vague the only acceptable argument used to lie in the contradiction brought up between the philosopher enclosed within his system and the artist placed before his work but this was pertinent for a certain form of art and of philosophy which we consider secondary here the idea of an art detached from its creator is not only outmoded it is false in opposition to the artist it is pointed out that no philosopher ever created several systems but that is true in so far indeed as no artist ever expressed more than one thing under different aspects the instantaneous perfection of art the necessity for its renewal this is true only through a preconceived notion for the work of art likewise is a construction and everyone knows how monotonous the great creators can be for the same reason as the thinker the artist commits himself and becomes himself in his work that osmosis raises the most important of aesthetic problems moreover to anyone who is convinced of the mind s singleness of purpose nothing is more futile than these distinctions based on methods and objects there are no frontiers between the disciplines that man sets himself for understanding and loving they interlock and the same anxiety merges them it is necessary to state this to begin with for an absurd work of art to be possible thought in its most lucid form must be involved in it but at the same time thought must not be apparent except as the regulating intelligence this paradox can be explained according to the absurd the work of art is born of the intelligence s refusal to reason the concrete it marks the triumph of the carnal it is lucid thought that provokes it but in that very act that thought repudiates itself it will not yield to the temptation of adding to what is described a deeper meaning that it knows to be illegitimate the work of art embodies a drama of the intelligence but it proves this only indirectly the absurd work requires an artist conscious of these limitations and an art in which the concrete signifies nothing more than itself it cannot be the end the meaning and the consolation of a life creating or not creating changes nothing the absurd creator does not prize his work he could repudiate it he does sometimes repudiate it an abyssinia suffices for this as in the case of rimbaud at the same time a rule of aesthetics can be seen in this the true work of art is always on the human scale it is essentially the one that says less there is a certain relationship between the global experience of the artist and the work that reflects that experience between wilhelm meister and goethe s maturity that relationship is bad when the work aims to give the whole experience in the lace paper of an explanatory literature that relationship is good when the work is but a piece cut out of experience a facet of the diamond in which the inner luster is epitomized without being limited in the first case there is overloading and pretension to the eternal in the second a fecund work because of a whole implied experience the wealth of which is suspected the problem for the absurd artist is to acquire this savoir vivre which transcends savoir faire and in the end the great artist under this climate is above all a great living being it being understood that living in this case is just as much experiencing as reflecting the work then embodies an intellectual drama the absurd work illustrates thought s renouncing of its prestige and its resignation to being no more than the intelligence that works up appearances and covers with images what has no reason if the world were clear art would not exist i am not speaking here of the arts of form or color in which description alone prevails in its splendid modesty expression begins where thought ends those adolescents with empty eyesockets who people temples and museums their philosophy has been expressed in gestures for an absurd man it is more educative than all libraries under another aspect the same is true for music if any art is devoid of lessons it is certainly music it is too closely related to mathematics not to have borrowed their gratuitousness that game the mind plays with itself according to set and measured laws takes place in the sonorous compass that belongs to us and beyond which the vibrations nevertheless meet in an inhuman universe there is no purer sensation these examples are too easy the absurd man recognizes as his own these harmonies and these forms but i should like to speak here of a work in which the temptation to explain remains greatest in which illusion offers itself automatically in which conclusion is almost inevitable i mean fictional creation i propose to inquire whether or not the absurd can hold its own there to think is first of all to create a world or to limit one s own world which comes to the same thing it is starting out from the basic disagreement that separates man from his experience in order to find a common ground according to one s nostalgia a universe hedged with reasons or lighted up with analogies but which in any case gives an opportunity to rescind the unbearable divorce the philosopher even if he is kant is a creator he has his characters his symbols and his secret action he has his plot endings on the contrary the lead taken by the novel over poetry and the essay merely represents despite appearances a greater intellectualiza tion of the art let there be no mistake about it i am speaking of the greatest the fecundity and the importance of a literary form are often measured by the trash it contains the number of bad novels must not make us forget the value of the best these indeed carry with them their universe the novel has its logic its reasonings its intuition and its postulates it also has its requirements of clarity the classical opposition of which i was speaking above is even less justified in this particular case it held in the time when it was easy to separate philosophy from its authors today when thought has ceased to lay claim to the universal when its best history would be that of its repentances we know that the system when it is worth while cannot be separated from its author the ethics itself in one of its aspects is but a long and reasoned personal confession abstract thought at last returns to its prop of flesh and likewise the fictional activities of the body and of the passions are regulated a little more according to the requirements of a vision of the world the writer has given up telling stories and creates his universe the great novelists are philosophical novelists that is the contrary of thesis writers for instance balzac sade melville stendhal dostoevsky proust malraux kafka to cite but a few but in fact the preference they have shown for writing in images rather than in reasoned arguments is revelatory of a certain thought that is common to them all convinced of the uselessness of any principle of explanation and sure of the educative message of perceptible appearance they consider the work of art both as an end and a beginning it is the outcome of an often unexpressed philosophy its illustration and its consummation but it is complete only through the implications of that philosophy it justifies at last that variant of an old theme that a little thought estranges from life whereas much thought reconciles to life incapable of refining the real thought pauses to mimic it the novel in question is the instrument of that simultaneously relative and inexhaustible knowledge so like that of love of love fictional creation has the initial wonder and the fecund rumination these at least are the charms i see in it at the outset but i saw them likewise in those princes of humiliated thought whose suicides i was later able to witness what interests me indeed is knowing and describing the force that leads them back toward the common path of illusion the same method will consequently help me here the fact of having already utilized it will allow me to shorten my argument and to sum it up without delay in a particular example i want to know whether accepting a life without appeal one can also agree to work and create without appeal and what is the way leading to these liberties i want to liberate my universe of its phantoms and to people it solely with flesh and blood truths whose presence i cannot deny i can perform absurd work choose the creative attitude rather than another but an absurd attitude if it is to remain so must remain aware of its gratuitousness so it is with the work of art if the commandments of the absurd are not respected if the work does not illustrate divorce and revolt if it sacrifices to illusions and arouses hope it ceases to be gratuitous i can no longer detach myself from it my life may find a meaning in it but that is trifling it ceases to be that exercise in detachment and passion which crowns the splendor and futility of a man s life in the creation in which the temptation to explain is the strongest can one overcome that temptation in the fictional world in which awareness of the real world is keenest can i remain faithful to the absurd without sacrificing to the desire to judge so many questions to be taken into consideration in a last effort it must be already clear what they signify they are the last scruples of an awareness that fears to forsake its initial and difficult lesson in favor of a final illusion what holds for creation looked upon as one of the possible attitudes for the man conscious of the absurd holds for all the styles of life open to him the conqueror or the actor the creator or don juan may forget that their exercise in living could not do without awareness of its mad character one becomes accustomed so quickly a man wants to earn money in order to be happy and his whole effort and the best of a life are devoted to the earning of that money happiness is forgotten the means are taken for the end likewise the whole effort of this conqueror will be diverted to ambition which was but a way toward a greater life don juan in turn will likewise yield to his fate be satisfied with that existence whose nobility is of value only through revolt for one it is awareness and for the other revolt in both cases the absurd has disappeared there is so much stubborn hope in the human heart the most destitute men often end up by accepting illusion that approval prompted by the need for peace inwardly parallels the existential consent there are thus gods of light and idols of mud but it is essential to find the middle path leading to the faces of man so far the failures of the absurd exigence have best informed us as to what it is in the same way if we are to be informed it will suffice to notice that fictional creation can present the same ambiguity as certain philosophies hence i can choose as illustration a work comprising everything that denotes awareness of the absurd having a clear starting point and a lucid climate its consequences will enlighten us if the absurd is not respected in it we shall know by what expedient illusion enters in a particular example a theme a creator s fidelity will suffice then this involves the same analysis that has already been made at greater length i shall examine a favorite theme of dostoevsky i might just as well have studied other works but in this work the problem is treated directly in the sense of nobility and emotion as for the existential philosophies already discussed this parallelism serves my purpose kirilov all of dostoevsky s heroes question themselves as to the meaning of life in this they are modern they do not fear ridicule what distinguishes modern sensibility from classical sensibility is that the latter thrives on moral problems and the former on metaphysical problems in dostoevsky s novels the question is propounded with such intensity that it can only invite extreme solutions existence is illusory or it is eternal if dostoevsky were satisfied with this inquiry he would be a philosopher but he illustrates the consequences that such intellectual pastimes may have in a man s life and in this regard he is an artist among those consequences his attention is arrested particularly by the last one which he himself calls logical suicide in his diary of a writer in the installments for december indeed he imagines the reasoning of logical suicide convinced that human existence is an utter absurdity for anyone without faith in immortality the desperate man comes to the following conclusions since in reply to my questions about happiness i am told through the intermediary of my consciousness that i cannot be happy except in harmony with the great all which i cannot conceive and shall never be in a position to conceive it is evident since finally in this connection i assume both the role of the plaintiff and that of the defendant of the accused and of the judge and since i consider this comedy perpetrated by nature altogether stupid and since i even deem it humiliating for me to deign to play it in my indisputable capacity of plaintiff and defendant of judge and accused i condemn that nature which with such impudent nerve brought me into being in order to suffer i condemn it to be annihilated with me there remains a little humor in that position this suicide kills himself because on the metaphysical plane he is vexed in a certain sense he is taking his revenge this is his way of proving that he will not be had it is known however that the same theme is embodied but with the most wonderful generality in kirilov of the possessed likewise an advocate of logical suicide kirilov the engineer declares somewhere that he wants to take his own life because it is his idea obviously the word must be taken in its proper sense it is for an idea a thought that he is getting ready for death this is the superior suicide progressively in a series of scenes in which kirilov s mask is gradually illuminated the fatal thought driving him is revealed to us the engineer in fact goes back to the arguments of the diary he feels that god is necessary and that he must exist but he knows that he does not and cannot exist why do you not realize he exclaims that this is sufficient reason for killing oneself that attitude involves likewise for him some of the absurd consequences through indifference he accepts letting his suicide be used to the advantage of a cause he despises i decided last night that i didn t care and finally he prepares his deed with a mixed feeling of revolt and freedom i shall kill myself in order to assert my insubordination my new and dreadful liberty it is no longer a question of revenge but of revolt kirilov is consequently an absurd character yet with this essential reservation he kills himself but he himself explains this contradiction and in such a way that at the same time he reveals the absurd secret in all its purity in truth he adds to his fatal logic an extraordinary ambition which gives the character its full perspective he wants to kill himself to become god the reasoning is classic in its clarity if god does not exist kirilov is god if god does not exist kirilov must kill himself kirilov must therefore kill himself to become god that logic is absurd but it is what is needed the interesting thing however is to give a meaning to that divinity brought to earth that amounts to clarifying the premise if god does not exist i am god which still remains rather obscure it is important to note at the outset that the man who flaunts that mad claim is indeed of this world he performs his gymnastics every morning to preserve his health he is stirred by the joy of chatov recovering his wife on a sheet of paper to be found after his death he wants to draw a face sticking out his tongue at them he is childish and irascible passionate methodical and sensitive of the superman he has nothing but the logic and the obsession whereas of man he has the whole catalogue yet it is he who speaks calmly of his divinity he is not mad or else dostoevsky is consequently it is not a megalomaniac s illusion that excites him and taking the words in their specific sense would in this instance be ridiculous kirilov himself helps us to understand in reply to a question from stavrogin he makes clear that he is not talking of a god man it might be thought that this springs from concern to distinguish himself from christ but in reality it is a matter of annexing christ kirilov in fact fancies for a moment that jesus at his death did not find himself in paradise he found out then that his torture had been useless the laws of nature says the engineer made christ live in the midst of falsehood and die for a falsehood solely in this sense jesus indeed personifies the whole human drama he is the complete man being the one who realized the most absurd condition he is not the god man but the man god and like him each of us can be crucified and victimized and is to a certain degree the divinity in question is therefore altogether terrestrial for three years says kirilov i sought the attribute of my divinity and i have found it the attribute of my divinity is independence now can be seen the meaning of kirilov s premise if god does not exist i am god to become god is merely to be free on this earth not to serve an immortal being above all of course it is drawing all the inferences from that painful independence if god exists all depends on him and we can do nothing against his will if he does not exist everything depends on us for kirilov as for nietzsche to kill god is to become god oneself it is to realize on this earth the eternal life of which the gospel speaks but if this metaphysical crime is enough for man s fulfillment why add suicide why kill oneself and leave this world after having won freedom that is contradictory kirilov is well aware of this for he adds if you feel that you are a tsar and far from killing yourself you will live covered with glory but men in general do not know it they do not feel that as in the time of prometheus they entertain blind hopes they need to be shown the way and cannot do without preaching consequently kirilov must kill himself out of love for humanity he must show his brothers a royal and difficult path on which he will be the first it is a pedagogical suicide kirilov sacrifices himself then but if he is crucified he will not be victimized he remains the man god convinced of a death without future imbued with evangelical melancholy i he says am unhappy because i am obliged to assert my freedom but once he is dead and men are at last enlightened this earth will be peopled with tsars and lighted up with human glory kirilov s pistol shot will be the signal for the last revolution thus it is not despair that urges him to death but love of his neighbor for his own sake before terminating in blood an indescribable spiritual adventure kirilov makes a remark as old as human suffering all is well this theme of suicide in dostoevsky then is indeed an absurd theme let us merely note before going on that kirilov reappears in other characters who themselves set in motion additional absurd themes stavrogin and ivan karamazov try out the absurd truths in practical life they are the ones liberated by kirilov s death they try their skill at being tsars stavrogin leads an ironic life and it is well known in what regard he arouses hatred around him and yet the key to the character is found in his farewell letter i have not been able to detest anything he is a tsar in indifference ivan is likewise by refusing to surrender the royal powers of the mind to those who like his brother prove by their lives that it is essential to humiliate oneself in order to believe he might reply that the condition is shameful his key word is everything is permitted with the appropriate shade of melancholy of course like nietzsche the most famous of god s assassins he ends in madness but this is a risk worth running and faced with such tragic ends the essential impulse of the absurd mind is to ask what does that prove thus the novels like the diary propound the absurd question they establish logic unto death exaltation dreadful freedom the glory of the tsars become human all is well everything is permitted and nothing is hateful these are absurd judgments but what an amazing creation in which those creatures of fire and ice seem so familiar to us the passionate world of indifference that rumbles in their hearts does not seem at all monstrous to us we recognize in it our everyday anxieties and probably no one so much as dostoevsky has managed to give the absurd world such familiar and tormenting charms yet what is his conclusion two quotations will show the complete metaphysical reversal that leads the writer to other revelations the argument of the one who commits logical suicide having provoked protests from the critics dostoevsky in the following installments of the diary amplifies his position and concludes thus if faith in immortality is so necessary to the human being that without it he comes to the point of killing himself it must therefore be the normal state of humanity since this is the case the immortality of the human soul exists without any doubt then again in the last pages of his last novel at the conclusion of that gigantic combat with god some children ask aliocha karamazov is it true what religion says that we shall rise from the dead that we shall see one another again and aliocha answers certainly we shall see one another again we shall joyfully tell one another everything that has happened thus kirilov stavrogin and ivan are defeated the brothers karamazov replies to the possessed and it is indeed a conclusion aliocha s case is not ambiguous as is that of prince muichkin ill the latter lives in a perpetual present tinged with smiles and indifference and that blissful state might be the eternal life of which the prince speaks on the contrary aliocha clearly says we shall meet again there is no longer any question of suicide and of madness what is the use for anyone who is sure of immortality and of its joys man exchanges his divinity for happiness we shall joyfully tell one another everything that has happened thus again kirilov s pistol rang out somewhere in russia but the world continued to cherish its blind hopes men did not understand that consequently it is not an absurd novelist addressing us but an existential novelist here too the leap is touching and gives its nobility to the art that inspires it it is a stirring acquiescence riddled with doubts uncertain and ardent speaking of the brothers karamazov dostoevsky wrote the chief question that will be pursued throughout this book is the very one from which i have suffered consciously or unconsciously all life long the existence of god it is hard to believe that a novel sufficed to transform into joyful certainty the suffering of a lifetime one commentator correctly pointed out that dostoevsky is on ivan s side and that the affirmative chapters took three months of effort whereas what he called the blasphemies were written in three weeks in a state of excitement there is not one of his characters who does not have that thorn in the flesh who does not aggravate it or seek a remedy for it in sensation or immortality in any case let us remain with this doubt here is a work which in a chiaroscuro more gripping than the light of day permits us to seize man s struggle against his hopes having reached the end the creator makes his choice against his characters that contradiction thus allows us to make a distinction it is not an absurd work that is involved here but a work that propounds the absurd problem dostoevsky s reply is humiliation shame according to stavrogin an absurd work on the contrary does not provide a reply that is the whole difference let us note this carefully in conclusion what contradicts the absurd in that work is not its christian character but rather its announcing a future life it is possible to be christian and absurd there are examples of christians who do not believe in a future life in regard to the work of art it should therefore be possible to define one of the directions of the absurd analysis that could have been anticipated in the preceding pages it leads to propounding the absurdity of the gospel it throws light upon this idea fertile in repercussions that convictions do not prevent incredulity on the contrary it is easy to see that the author of the possessed familiar with these paths in conclusion took a quite different way the surprising reply of the creator to his characters of do stoevsky to kirilov can indeed be summed up thus existence is illusory and it is eternal ephemeral creation at this point i perceive therefore that hope cannot be eluded forever and that it can beset even those who wanted to be free of it this is the interest i find in the works discussed up to this point i could at least in the realm of creation list some truly absurd works but everything must have a beginning the object of this quest is a certain fidelity the church has been so harsh with heretics only because she deemed that there is no worse enemy than a child who has gone astray but the record of gnostic effronteries and the persistence of manichean currents have contributed more to the construction of orthodox dogma than all the prayers with due allowance the same is true of the absurd one recognizes one s course by discovering the paths that stray from it at the very conclusion of the absurd reasoning in one of the attitudes dictated by its logic it is not a matter of indifference to find hope coming back in under one of its most touching guises that shows the difficulty of the absurd ascesis above all it shows the necessity of unfailing alertness and thus confirms the general plan of this essay but if it is still too early to list absurd works at least a conclusion can be reached as to the creative attitude one of those which can complete absurd existence art can never be so well served as by a negative thought its dark and humiliated proceedings are as necessary to the understanding of a great work as black is to white to work and create for nothing to sculpture in clay to know that one s creation has no future to see one s work destroyed in a day while being aware that fundamentally this has no more importance than building for centuries this is the difficult wisdom that absurd thought sanctions performing these two tasks simultaneously negating on the one hand and magnifying on the other is the way open to the absurd creator he must give the void its colors this leads to a special conception of the work of art too often the work of a creator is looked upon as a series of isolated testimonies thus artist and man of letters are confused a profound thought is in a constant state of becoming it adopts the experience of a life and assumes its shape likewise a man s sole creation is strengthened in its successive and multiple aspects his works one after another they complement one an other correct or overtake one another contradict one another too if something brings creation to an end it is not the victorious and illusory cry of the blinded artist i have said everything but the death of the creator which closes his experience and the book of his genius that effort that superhuman consciousness are not necessarily apparent to the reader there is no mystery in human creation will performs this miracle but at least there is no true creation without a secret to be sure a succession of works can be but a series of approximations of the same thought but it is possible to conceive of another type of creator proceeding by juxtaposition their works may seem to be devoid of interrelations to a certain degree they are contradictory but viewed all together they resume their natural grouping from death for instance they derive their definitive significance they receive their most obvious light from the very life of their author at the moment of death the succession of his works is but a collection of failures but if those failures all have the same resonance the creator has managed to repeat the image of his own condition to make the air echo with the sterile secret he possesses the effort to dominate is considerable here but human intelligence is up to much more it will merely indicate clearly the voluntary aspect of creation elsewhere i have brought out the fact that human will had no other purpose than to maintain awareness but that could not do without discipline of all the schools of patience and lucidity creation is the most effective it is also the staggering evidence of man s sole dignity the dogged revolt against his condition perseverance in an effort considered sterile it calls for a daily effort self mastery a precise estimate of the limits of truth measure and strength it constitutes an ascesis all that for nothing in order to repeat and mark time but perhaps the great work of art has less importance in itself than in the ordeal it demands of a man and the opportunity it provides him of overcoming his phantoms and approaching a little closer to his naked reality let there be no mistake in aesthetics it is not patient inquiry the unceasing sterile illustration of a thesis that i am calling for here quite the contrary if i have made myself clearly understood the thesis novel the work that proves the most hateful of all is the one that most often is inspired by a smug thought you demonstrate the truth you feel sure of possessing but those are ideas one launches and ideas are the contrary of thought those creators are philosophers ashamed of themselves those i am speaking of or whom i imagine are on the contrary lucid thinkers at a certain point where thought turns back on itself they raise up the images of their works like the obvious symbols of a limited mortal and rebellious thought they perhaps prove something but those proofs are ones that the novelists provide for themselves rather than for the world in general the essential is that the novelists should triumph in the concrete and that this constitute their nobility this wholly carnal triumph has been prepared for them by a thought in which abstract powers have been humiliated when they are completely so at the same time the flesh makes the creation shine forth in all its absurd luster after all ironic philosophies produce passionate works any thought that abandons unity glorifies diversity and diversity is the home of art the only thought to liberate the mind is that which leaves it alone certain of its limits and of its impending end no doctrine tempts it it awaits the ripening of the work and of life detached from it the work will once more give a barely muffled voice to a soul forever freed from hope or it will give voice to nothing if the creator tired of his activity intends to turn away that is equivalent thus i ask of absurd creation what i required from thought revolt freedom and diversity later on it will manifest its utter futility in that daily effort in which intelligence and passion mingle and delight each other the absurd man discovers a discipline that will make up the greatest of his strengths the required diligence the doggedness and lucidity thus resemble the conqueror s attitude to create is likewise to give a shape to one s fate for all these characters their work defines them at least as much as it is defined by them the actor taught us this there is no frontier between being and appearing let me repeat none of all this has any real meaning on the way to that liberty there is still a progress to be made the final effort for these related minds creator or conqueror is to manage to free themselves also from their undertakings succeed in granting that the very work whether it be conquest love or creation may well not be consummate thus the utter futility of any individual life indeed that gives them more freedom in the realization of that work just as becoming aware of the absurdity of life authorized them to plunge into it with every excess all that remains is a fate whose outcome alone is fatal outside of that single fatality of death everything joy or happiness is liberty a world remains of which man is the sole master what bound him was the illusion of another world the outcome of his thought ceasing to be renunciatory flowers in images it frolics in myths to be sure but myths with no other depth than that of human suffering and like it inexhaustible not the divine fable that amuses and blinds but the terrestrial face gesture and drama in which are summed up a difficult wisdom and an ephemeral passion the myth of sisyphus the gods had condemned sisyphus to ceaselessly rolling a rock to the top of a mountain whence the stone would fall back of its own weight they had thought with some reason that there is no more dreadful punishment than futile and hopeless labor if one believes homer sisyphus was the wisest and most prudent of mortals according to another tradition however he was disposed to practice the profession of highwayman i see no contradiction in this opinions differ as to the reasons why he became the futile laborer of the underworld to begin with he is accused of a certain levity in regard to the gods he stole their secrets aegina the daughter of aesopus was carried off by jupiter the father was shocked by that disappearance and complained to sisyphus he who knew of the abduction offered to tell about it on condition that aesopus would give water to the citadel of corinth to the celestial thunderbolts he preferred the benediction of water he was punished for this in the underworld homer tells us also that sisyphus had put death in chains pluto could not endure the sight of his deserted silent empire he dispatched the god of war who liberated death from the hands of her conqueror it is said also that sisyphus being near to death rashly wanted to test his wife s love he ordered her to cast his unburied body into the middle of the public square sisyphus woke up in the underworld and there annoyed by an obedience so contrary to human love he obtained from pluto permission to return to earth in order to chastise his wife but when he had seen again the face of this world enjoyed water and sun warm stones and the sea he no longer wanted to go back to the infernal darkness recalls signs of anger warnings were of no avail many years more he lived facing the curve of the gulf the sparkling sea and the smiles of earth a decree of the gods was necessary mercury came and seized the impudent man by the collar and snatching him from his joys led him forcibly back to the underworld where his rock was ready for him you have already grasped that sisyphus is the absurd hero he is as much through his passions as through his torture his scorn of the gods his hatred of death and his passion for life won him that unspeakable penalty in which the whole being is exerted toward accomplishing nothing this is the price that must be paid for the passions of this earth nothing is told us about sisyphus in the underworld myths are made for the imagination to breathe life into them as for this myth one sees merely the whole effort of a body straining to raise the huge stone to roll it and push it up a slope a hundred times over one sees the face screwed up the cheek tight against the stone the shoulder bracing the clay covered mass the foot wedging it the fresh start with arms outstretched the wholly human security of two earth clotted hands at the very end of his long effort measured by skyless space and time without depth the purpose is achieved then sisyphus watches the stone rush down in a few moments toward that lower world whence he will have to push it up again toward the summit he goes back down to the plain it is during that return that pause that sisyphus interests me a face that toils so close to stones is already stone itself i see that man going back down with a heavy yet measured step toward the torment of which he will never know the end that hour like a breathing space which returns as surely as his suffering that is the hour of consciousness at each of those moments when he leaves the heights and gradually sinks toward the lairs of the gods he is superior to his fate he is stronger than his rock if this myth is tragic that is because its hero is conscious where would his torture be indeed if at every step the hope of succeeding upheld him the workman of today works every day in his life at the same tasks and this fate is no less absurd but it is tragic only at the rare moments when it becomes conscious sisyphus proletarian of the gods powerless and rebellious knows the whole extent of his wretched condition it is what he thinks of during his descent the lucidity that was to constitute his torture at the same time crowns his victory there is no fate that cannot be surmounted by scorn if the descent is thus sometimes performed in sorrow it can also take place in joy this word is not too much again i fancy sisyphus returning toward his rock and the sorrow was in the beginning when the images of earth cling too tightly to memory when the call of happiness becomes too insistent it happens that melancholy rises in man s heart this is the rock s victory this is the rock itself the boundless grief is too heavy to bear these are our nights of gethsemane but crushing truths perish from being acknowledged thus cedipus at the outset obeys fate without knowing it but from the moment he knows his tragedy begins yet at the same moment blind and desperate he realizes that the only bond linking him to the world is the cool hand of a girl then a tremendous remark rings out despite so many ordeals my advanced age and the nobility of my soul make me conclude that all is well sophocles cedipus like dostoevsky s kirilov thus gives the recipe for the absurd victory ancient wisdom confirms modern heroism one does not discover the absurd without being tempted to write a manual of happiness what by such narrow ways there is but one world however happiness and the absurd are two sons of the same earth they are inseparable it would be a mistake to say that happiness necessarily springs from the absurd discovery it happens as well that the feeling of the absurd springs from happiness i conclude that all is well says cedipus and that remark is sacred it echoes in the wild and limited universe of man it teaches that all is not has not been exhausted it drives out of this world a god who had come into it with dissatisfaction and a preference for futile sufferings it makes of fate a human matter which must be settled among men all sisyphus silent joy is contained therein his fate belongs to him his rock is his thing likewise the absurd man when he contemplates his torment silences all the idols in the universe suddenly restored to its silence the myriad wondering little voices of the earth rise up unconscious secret calls invitations from all the faces they are the necessary reverse and price of victory there is no sun without shadow and it is es sential to know the night the absurd man says yes and his effort will henceforth be unceasing if there is a personal fate there is no higher destiny or at least there is but one which he concludes is inevitable and despicable for the rest he knows himself to be the master of his days at that subtle moment when man glances backward over his life sisyphus returning toward his rock in that slight pivoting he contemplates that series of unrelated actions which becomes his fate created by him combined under his memory s eye and soon sealed by his death thus convinced of the wholly human origin of all that is human a blind man eager to see who knows that the night has no end he is still on the go the rock is still rolling i leave sisyphus at the foot of the mountain one always finds one s burden again but sisyphus teaches the higher fidelity that negates the gods and raises rocks he too concludes that all is well this universe henceforth without a master seems to him neither sterile nor futile each atom of that stone each mineral flake of that night filled mountain in itself forms a world the struggle itself toward the heights is enough to fill a man s heart one must imagine sisyphus happy appendix hope and the absurd in the work of franz kafka the whole art of kafka consists in forcing the reader to reread his endings or his absence of endings suggest explanations which however are not revealed in clear language but before they seem justified require that the story be reread from another point of view sometimes there is a double possibility of interpretation whence appears the necessity for two readings this is what the author wanted but it would be wrong to try to interpret everything in kafka in detail a symbol is always in general and however precise its translation an artist can restore to it only its movement there is no word for word rendering moreover nothing is harder to understand than a symbolic work a symbol always transcends the one who makes use of it and makes him say in reality more than he is aware of expressing in this regard the surest means of getting hold of it is not to provoke it to begin the work without a preconceived attitude and not to look for its hidden currents for kafka in particular it is fair to agree to his rules to approach the drama through its externals and the novel through its form at first glance and for a casual reader they are disturbing adventures that carry off quaking and dogged characters into pursuit of problems they never formulate in the trial joseph k is accused but he doesn t know of what he is doubtless eager to defend himself but he doesn t know why the lawyers find his case difficult meanwhile he does not neglect to love to eat or to read his paper then he is judged but the courtroom is very dark he doesn t understand much he merely assumes that he is condemned but to what he barely wonders at times he suspects just the same and he continues living some time later two well dressed and polite gentlemen come to get him and invite him to follow them most courteously they lead him into a wretched suburb put his head on a stone and slit his throat before dying the condemned man says merely like a dog you see that it is hard to speak of a symbol in a tale whose most obvious quality just happens to be naturalness but naturalness is a hard category to understand there are works in which the event seems natural to the reader but there are others rarer to be sure in which the character considers natural what happens to him by an odd but obvious paradox the more extraordinary the character s adventures are the more noticeable will be the naturalness of the story it is in proportion to the divergence we feel between the strangeness of a man s life and the simplicity with which that man accepts it it seems that this naturalness is kafka s and precisely one is well aware what the trial means people have spoken of an image of the human condition to be sure yet it is both simpler and more complex i mean that the significance of the novel is more particular and more personal to kafka to a certain degree he is the one who does the talking even though it is me he confesses he lives and he is condemned he learns this on the first pages of the novel he is pursuing in this world and if he tries to cope with this he nonetheless does so without surprise he will never show sufficient astonishment at this lack of astonishment it is by such contradictions that the first signs of the absurd work are recognized the mind projects into the concrete its spiritual tragedy and it can do so solely by means of a perpetual paradox which confers on colors the power to express the void and on daily gestures the strength to translate eternal ambitions likewise the castle is perhaps a theology in action but it is first of all the individual adventure of a soul in quest of its grace of a man who asks of this world s objects their royal secret and of women the signs of the god that sleeps in them metamorphosis in turn certainly represents the horrible imagery of an ethic of lucidity but it is also the product of that incalculable amazement man feels at being conscious of the beast he becomes effortlessly in this fundamental ambiguity lies kafka s secret these perpetual oscillations between the natural and the extraordinary the individual and the universal the tragic and the everyday the absurd and the logical are found throughout his work and give it both its resonance and its meaning these are the paradoxes that must be enumerated the contradictions that must be strengthened in order to understand the absurd work a symbol indeed assumes two planes two worlds of ideas and sensations and a dictionary of correspondences between them this lexicon is the hardest thing to draw up but awaking to the two worlds brought face to face is tantamount to getting on the trail of their secret relationships in kafka these two worlds are that of everyday life on the one hand and on the other that of supernatural anxiety it seems that we are witnessing here an interminable exploitation of nietzsche s remark great problems are in the street there is in the human condition and this is a commonplace of all literatures a basic absurdity as well as an implacable nobility the two coincide as is natural both of them are represented let me repeat in the ridiculous divorce separating our spiritual excesses and the ephemeral joys of the body the absurd thing is that it should be the soul of this body which it transcends so inordinately whoever would like to represent this absurdity must give it life in a series of parallel contrasts thus it is that kafka expresses tragedy by the everyday and the absurd by the logical an actor lends more force to a tragic character the more careful he is not to exaggerate it if he is moderate the horror he inspires will be immoderate in this regard greek tragedy is rich in lessons in a tragic work fate always makes itself felt better in the guise of logic and naturalness cedipus s fate is announced in advance it is decided supernaturally that he will commit the murder and the incest the drama s whole effort is to show the logical system which from deduction to deduction will crown the hero s misfortune merely to announce to us that uncommon fate is scarcely horrible because it is improbable but if its necessity is demonstrated to us in the framework of everyday life society state familiar emotion then the horror is hallowed in that revolt that shakes man and makes him say that is not possible there is an element of desperate certainty that that can be this is the whole secret of greek tragedy or at least of one of its aspects for there is another which by a reverse method would help us to understand kafka better the human heart has a tiresome tendency to label as fate only what crushes it but happiness likewise in its way is without reason since it is inevitable modern man however takes the credit for it himself when he doesn t fail to recognize it much could be said on the contrary about the privileged fates of greek tragedy and those favored in legend who like ulysses in the midst of the worst adventures are saved from themselves it was not so easy to return to ithaca what must be remembered in any case is that secret complicity that joins the logical and the everyday to the tragic this is why samsa the hero of metamorphosis is a traveling salesman this is why the only thing that disturbs him in the strange adventure that makes a vermin of him is that his boss will be angry at his absence legs and feelers grow out on him his spine arches up white spots appear on his belly and i shall not say that this does not astonish him for the effect would be spoiled but it causes him a slight annoyance the whole art of kafka is in that distinction in his central work the castle the details of everyday life stand out and yet in that strange novel in which nothing concludes and everything begins over again it is the essential adventure of a soul in quest of its grace that is represented that translation of the problem into action that coincidence of the general and the particular are recognized likewise in the little artifices that belong to every great creator in the trial the hero might have been named schmidt or franz kafka but he is named joseph k he is not kafka and yet he is kafka he is an average european he is like everybody else but he is also the entity k who is the x of this flesh and blood equation likewise if kafka wants to express the absurd he will make use of consistency you know the story of the crazy man who was fishing in a bathtub a doctor with ideas as to psychiatric treatments asked him if they were biting to which he received the harsh reply of course not you fool since this is a bathtub that story belongs to the baroque type but in it can be grasped quite clearly to what a degree the absurd effect is linked to an excess of logic kafka s world is in truth an indescribable universe in which man allows himself the tormenting luxury of fishing in a bathtub knowing that nothing will come of it consequently i recognize here a work that is absurd in its principles as for the trial for instance i can indeed say that it is a complete success flesh wins out nothing is lacking neither the unexpressed revolt but it is what is writing nor lucid and mute despair but it is what is creating nor that amazing freedom of manner which the characters of the novel exemplify until their ultimate death yet this world is not so closed as it seems into this universe devoid of progress kafka is going to introduce hope in a strange form in this regard the trial and the castle do not follow the same direction they complement each other the barely perceptible progression from one to the other represents a tremendous conquest in the realm of evasion the trial propounds a problem which the castle to a certain degree solves the first describes according to a quasi scientific method and without concluding the second to a certain degree explains the trial diagnoses and the castle imagines a treatment but the remedy proposed here does not cure it merely brings the malady back into normal life it helps to accept it in a certain sense let us think of kierkegaard it makes people cherish it the land surveyor k cannot imagine another anxiety than the one that is tormenting him the very people around him become attached to that void and that nameless pain as if suffering assumed in this case a privileged aspect how i need you frieda says to k how forsaken i feel since knowing you when you are not with me this subtle remedy that makes us love what crushes us and makes hope spring up in a world without issue this sudden leap through which everything is changed is the secret of the existential revolution and of the castle itself few works are more rigorous in their development than the castle k is named land surveyor to the castle and he arrives in the village but from the village to the castle it is impossible to communicate for hundreds of pages k persists in seeking his way makes every advance uses trickery and expedients never gets angry and with disconcerting good will tries to assume the duties entrusted to him each chapter is a new frustration and also a new beginning it is not logic but consistent method the scope of that insistence constitutes the work s tragic quality when k telephones to the castle he hears confused mingled voices vague laughs distant invitations that is enough to feed his hope like those few signs appearing in summer skies or those evening anticipations which make up our reason for living here is found the secret of the melancholy peculiar to kafka the same in truth that is found in proust s work or in the landscape of plotinus a nostalgia for a lost paradise i become very sad says olga when barnabas tells me in the morning that he is going to the castle that probably futile trip that probably wasted day that probably empty hope probably on this implication kafka gambles his entire work but nothing avails the quest of the eternal here is meticulous and those inspired automata kafka s characters provide us with a precise image of what we should be if we were deprived of our distractions and utterly consigned to the humiliations of the divine in the castle that surrender to the everyday becomes an ethic the great hope of k is to get the castle to adopt him unable to achieve this alone his whole effort is to deserve this favor by becoming an inhabitant of the village by losing the status of foreigner that everyone makes him feel what he wants is an occupation a home the life of a healthy normal man he can t stand his madness any longer he wants to be reasonable he wants to cast off the peculiar curse that makes him a stranger to the village the episode of frieda is significant in this regard if he takes as his mistress this woman who has known one of the castle s officials this is because of her past he derives from her something that transcends him while being aware of what makes her forever unworthy of the castle this makes one think of kierkegaard s strange love for regina olsen in certain men the fire of eternity consuming them is great enough for them to burn in it the very heart of those closest to them the fatal mistake that consists in giving to god what is not god s is likewise the subject of this episode of the castle but for kafka it seems that this is not a mistake it is a doctrine and a leap there is nothing that is not god s even more significant is the fact that the land surveyor breaks with frieda in order to go toward the barnabas sisters for the barnabas family is the only one in the village that is utterly forsaken by the castle and by the village itself amalia the elder sister has rejected the shameful propositions made her by one of the castle s officials the immoral curse that followed has forever cast her out from the love of god being incapable of losing one s honor for god amounts to making oneself unworthy of his grace you recognize a theme familiar to existential philosophy truth contrary to morality at this point things are far reaching for the path pursued by kafka s hero from frieda to the barnabas sisters is the very one that leads from trusting love to the deification of the absurd here again kafka s thought runs parallel to kierkegaard it is not surprising that the barnabas story is placed at the end of the book the land surveyor s last attempt is to recapture god through what negates him to recognize him not according to our categories of goodness and beauty but behind the empty and hideous aspects of his indifference of his injustice and of his hatred that stranger who asks the castle to adopt him is at the end of his voyage a little more exiled because this time he is unfaithful to himself forsaking morality logic and intellectual truths in order to try to enter endowed solely with his mad hope the desert of divine grace the word hope used here is not ridiculous on the contrary the more tragic the condition described by kafka the firmer and more aggressive that hope becomes the more truly absurd the trial is the more moving and illegitimate the impassioned leap of the castle seems but we find here again in a pure state the paradox of existential thought as it is expressed for instance by kierkegaard earthly hope must be killed only then can one be saved by true hope which can be translated one has to have written the trial to undertake the castle most of those who have spoken of kafka have indeed defined his work as a desperate cry with no recourse left to man but this calls for review there is hope and hope to me the optimistic work of henri bordeaux seems peculiarly discouraging this is because it has nothing for the discriminating malraux s thought on the other hand is always bracing but in these two cases neither the same hope nor the same despair is at issue i see merely that the absurd work itself may lead to the infidelity i want to avoid the work which was but an ineffectual repetition of a sterile condition a lucid glorification ol the ephemeral becomes here a cradle of illusions it explains it gives a shape to hope the creator can no longer divorce himself from it it is not the tragic game it was to be it gives a meaning to the author s life it is strange in any case that works of related inspiration like those of kafka kierkegaard or chestov those in short of existential novelists and philosophers completely oriented toward the absurd and its consequences should in the long run lead to that tremendous cry of hope they embrace the god that consumes them it is through humility that hope enters in for the absurd of this existence assures them a little more of supernatural reality if the course of this life leads to god there is an outcome after all and the perseverance the insistence with which kierkegaard chestov and kafka s heroes repeat their itineraries are a special warrant of the uplifting power of that certainty kafka refuses his god moral nobility evidence virtue coherence but only the better to fall into his arms the absurd is recognized accepted and man is resigned to it but from then on we know that it has ceased to be the absurd within the limits of the human condition what greater hope than the hope that allows an escape from that condition as i see once more existential thought in this regard and contrary to current opinion is steeped in a vast hope the very hope which at the time of early christianity and the spreading of the good news inflamed the ancient world but in that leap that characterizes all existential thought in that insistence in that surveying of a divinity devoid of surface how can one fail to see the mark of a lucidity that repudiates itself it is merely claimed that this is pride abdicating to save itself such a repudiation would be fecund but this does not change that the moral value of lucidity cannot be diminished in my eyes by calling it sterile like all pride for a truth also by its very definition is sterile all facts are in a world where everything is given and nothing is explained the fecundity of a value or of a metaphysic is a notion devoid of meaning in any case you see here in what tradition of thought kafka s work takes its place it would indeed be intelligent to consider as inevitable the progression leading from the trial to the castle joseph k and the land surveyor k are merely two poles that attract kafka i shall speak like him and say that his work is probably not absurd but that should not deter us from seeing its nobility and universality they come from the fact that he managed to represent so fully the everyday passage from hope to grief and from desperate wisdom to intentional blindness his work is universal a really absurd work is not universal to the extent to which it represents the emotionally moving face of man fleeing humanity deriving from his contradictions reasons for believing reasons for hoping from his fecund despairs and calling life his terrifying apprenticeship in death it is universal because its inspiration is religious as in all religions man is freed of the weight of his own life but if i know that if i can even admire it i also know that i am not seeking what is universal but what is true the two may well not coincide this particular view will be better understood if i say that truly hopeless thought just happens to be defined by the opposite criteria and that the tragic work might be the work that after all future hope is exiled describes the life of a happy man the more exciting life is the more absurd is the idea of losing it this is perhaps the secret of that proud aridity felt in nietzsche s work in this connection nietzsche appears to be the only artist to have derived the extreme consequences of an aesthetic of the absurd inasmuch as his final message lies in a sterile and conquering lucidity and an obstinate negation of any supernatural consolation the preceding should nevertheless suffice to bring out the capital importance of kafka in the framework of this essay here we are carried to the confines of human thought in the fullest sense of the word it can be said that everything in that work is essential in any case it propounds the absurd problem altogether if one wants to compare these conclusions with our initial remarks the content with the form the secret meaning of the castle with the natural art in which it is molded k s passionate proud quest with the everyday setting against which it takes place then one will realize what may be its greatness for if nostalgia is the mark of the human perhaps no one has given such flesh and volume to these phantoms of regret but at the same time will be sensed what exceptional nobility the absurd work calls for which is perhaps not found here if the nature of art is to bind the general to the particular ephemeral eternity of a drop of water to the play of its lights it is even truer to judge the greatness of the absurd writer by the distance he is able to introduce between these two worlds his secret consists in being able to find the exact point where they meet in their greatest disproportion and to tell the truth this geometrical locus of man and the inhuman is seen everywhere by the pure in heart if faust and don quixote are eminent creations of art this is because of the immeasurable nobilities they point out to us with their earthly hands yet a moment always comes when the mind negates the truths that those hands can touch a moment comes when the creation ceases to be taken tragically it is merely taken seriously then man is concerned with hope but that is not his business his business is to turn away from subterfuge yet this is just what i find at the conclusion of the vehement proceedings kafka institutes against the whole universe his unbelievable verdict is this hideous and upsetting world in which the very moles dare to hope summer in algiers for jacques heurgon the loves we share with a city are often secret loves old walled towns like paris prague and even florence are closed in on themselves and hence limit the world that belongs to them but algiers together with certain other privileged places such as cities on the sea opens to the sky like a mouth or a wound in algiers one loves the commonplaces the sea at the end of every street a certain volume of sunlight the beauty of the race and as always in that unashamed offering there is a secret fragrance in paris it is possible to be homesick for space and a beating of wings here at least man is gratified in every wish and sure of his desires can at last measure his possessions probably one has to live in algiers for some time in order to realize how paralyzing an excess of nature s bounty can be there is nothing here for whoever would learn educate himself or better himself this country has no lessons to teach it neither promises nor affords glimpses it is satisfied to give but in abundance it is completely accessible to the eyes and you know it the moment you enjoy it its pleasures are without remedy and its joys without hope above all it requires clairvoyant souls that is without solace it insists upon one s performing an act of lucidity as one performs an act of faith strange country that gives the man it nourishes both his splendor and his misery it is not surprising that the sensual riches granted to a sensitive man of these regions should coincide with the most extreme destitution no truth fails to carry with it its bitterness how can one be surprised then if i never feel more affection for the face of this country than amid its poorest men during their entire youth men find here a life in proportion to their beauty then later on the downhill slope and obscurity they wagered on the flesh but knowing they were to lose in algiers whoever is young and alive finds sanctuary and occasion for triumphs everywhere in the bay the sun the red and white games on the seaward terraces the flowers and sports stadiums the cool legged girls but for whoever has lost his youth there is nothing to cling to and nowhere where melancholy can escape itself elsewhere italian terraces european cloisters or the profile of the provencal hills all places where man can flee his humanity and gently liberate himself from himself but everything here calls for solitude and the blood of young men goethe on his deathbed calls for light and this is a historic remark at belcourt and bab el oued old men seated in the depths of cafes listen to the bragging of young men with plastered hair summer betrays these beginnings and ends to us in algiers during those months the city is deserted but the poor remain and the sky we join the former as they go down toward the harbor and man s treasures warmth of the water and the brown bodies of women in the evening sated with such wealth they return to the oilcloth and kerosene lamp that constitute the whole setting of their life in algiers no one says go for a swim but rather indulge in a swim the implications are clear people swim in the harbor and go to rest on the buoys anyone who passes near a buoy where a pretty girl already is sunning herself shouts to his friends i tell you it s a seagull these are healthy amusements they must obviously constitute the ideal of those youths since most of them continue the same life in the winter undressing every day at noon for a frugal lunch in the sun not that they have read the boring sermons of the nudists those protestants of the flesh there is a theory of the body quite as tiresome as that of the mind but they are simply comfortable in the sunlight the importance of this custom for our epoch can never be overestimated for the first time in two thousand years the body has appeared naked on beaches for twenty centuries men have striven to give decency to greek insolence and naivete to diminish the flesh and complicate dress today despite that history young men running on mediterranean beaches repeat the gestures of the athletes of delos and living thus among bodies and through one s body one becomes aware that it has its connotations its life and to risk nonsense a psychology of its own the body s evolution like that of the mind has its history its vicissitudes its progress and its deficiency with this distinction however color when you frequent the beach in summer you become aware of a simultaneous progression of all skins from white to golden to tanned ending up in a tobacco color which marks the extreme limit of the effort of transformation of which the body is capable above the harbor stands the set of white cubes of the kasbah when you are at water level against the sharp while background of the arab town the bodies describe a copper colored frieze and as the month of august progresses and the sun grows the white of the houses becomes more blinding and skins take on a darker warmth how can one fail to participate then in that dialogue of stone and flesh in tune with the sun and seasons the whole morning has been spent in diving in bursts of laughter amid splashing water in vigorous paddles around the red and black freighters those from norway with all the scents of wood those that come from germany full of the smell of oil those that go up and down the coast and smell of wine and old casks at the hour when the sun overflows from every corner of the sky at once the orange canoe loaded with brown bodies brings us home in a mad race and when having suddenly interrupted the cadenced beat of the double paddle s bright colored wings we glide slowly in the calm water of the inner harbor how can i fail to feel that i am piloting through the smooth waters a savage cargo of gods in whom i recognize my brothers but at the other end of the city summer is already offering us by way of contrast its other riches i mean its silence and its boredom that silence is not always of the same quality depending on whether it springs from the shade or the sunlight there is the silence of noon on the place du gouvernement in the shade of the trees surrounding it arabs sell for five sous glasses of iced lemonade flavored with orange flowers their cry cool cool can be heard across the empty square after their cry silence again falls under the burning sun in the vendor s jug the ice moves and i can hear its tinkle there is the silence of the siesta in the streets of the marine in front of the dirty barbershops it can be measured in the melodious buzzing of flies behind the hollow reed curtains elsewhere in the moorish cafes of the kasbah the body is silent unable to tear itself away to leave the glass of tea and rediscover time with the pulsing of its own blood but above all there is the silence of summer evenings those brief moments when day topples into night must be peopled with secret signs and summons for my algiers to be so closely linked to them when i spend some time far from that town i imagine its twilights as promises of happiness on the hills above the city there are paths among the mastics and olive trees and toward them my heart turns at such moments i see flights of black birds rise against the green horizon in the sky suddenly divested of its sun something relaxes a whole little nation of red clouds stretches out until it is absorbed in the air almost immediately afterward appears the first star that had been seen taking shape and consistency in the depth of the sky and then suddenly all consuming night what exceptional quality do the fugitive algerian evenings possess to be able to release so many things in me i haven t time to tire of that sweetness they leave on my lips before it has disappeared into night is this the secret of its persistence this country s affection is overwhelming and furtive but during the moment it is present one s heart at least surrenders completely to it at padovani beach the dance hall is open every day and in that huge rectangular box with its entire side open to the sea the poor young people of the neighborhood dance until evening often i used to await there a moment of exceptional beauty during the day the hall is protected by sloping wooden awnings when the sun goes down they are raised then the hall is filled with an odd green light born of the double shell of the sky and the sea when one is seated far from the windows one sees only the sky and silhouetted against it the faces of the dancers passing in succession sometimes a waltz is being played and against the green background the black profiles whirl obstinately like those cut out silhouettes that are attached to a phonograph s turntable night comes rapidly after this and with it the lights but i am unable to relate the thrill and secrecy that subtle instant holds for me i recall at least a magnificent tall girl who had danced all afternoon she was wearing a jasmine garland on her tight blue dress wet with perspiration from the small of her back to her legs she was laughing as she danced and throwing back her head as she passed the tables she left behind her a mingled scent of flowers and flesh when evening came i could no longer see her body pressed tight to her partner but against the sky whirled alternating spots of white jasmine and black hair and when she would throw back her swelling breast i would hear her laugh and see her partner s profile suddenly plunge forward i owe to such evenings the idea i have of innocence in any case i learn not to separate these creatures bursting with violent energy from the sky where their desires whirl in the neighborhood movies in algiers peppermint lozenges are sometimes sold with stamped in red all that is necessary to the awakening of love questions when will you marry me do you love me and replies madly next spring after having prepared the way you pass them to your neighbor who answers likewise or else turns a deaf ear at belcourt marriages have been arranged this way and whole lives been pledged by the mere exchange of peppermint lozenges and this really depicts the childlike people of this region the distinguishing mark of youth is perhaps a magnificent vocation for facile joys but above all it is a haste to live that borders on waste at belcourt as at bab el oued people get married young they go to work early and in ten years exhaust the experience of a lifetime a thirty year old workman has already played all the cards in his hand he awaits the end between his wife and his children his joys have been sudden and merciless as has been his life one realizes that he is born of this country where everything is given to be taken away in that plenty and profusion life follows the sweep of great passions sudden exacting and generous it is not to be built up but to be burned up stopping to think and becoming better are out of the question the notion of hell for instance is merely a funny joke here such imaginings are allowed only to the very virtuous and i really think that virtue is a meaningless word in all algeria not that these men lack principles they have their code and a very special one you are not disrespectful to your mother you see that your wife is respected in the street you show consideration for a pregnant woman you don t double up on an adversary because that looks bad whoever does not observe these elementary commandments is not a man and the question is decided this strikes me as fair and strong there are still many of us who automatically observe this code of the street the only disinterested one i know but at the same time the shopkeeper s ethics are unknown i have always seen faces around me filled with pity at the sight of a man between two policemen and before knowing whether the man had stolen killed his father or was merely a nonconformist they would say the poor fellow or else with a hint of admiration he s a pirate all right there are races born for pride and life they are the ones that nourish the strangest vocation for boredom it is also among them that the attitude toward death is the most repulsive aside from sensual pleasure the amusements of this race are among the silliest a society of bowlers and association banquets the three franc movies and parish feasts have for years provided the recreation of those over thirty algiers sundays are among the most sinister how then could this race devoid of spirituality clothe in myths the profound horror of its life everything related to death is either ridiculous or hateful here this populace without religion and without idols dies alone after having lived in a crowd i know no more hideous spot than the cemetery on boulevard bru opposite one of the most beautiful landscapes in the world an accumulation of bad taste among the black fencings allows a dreadful melancholy to rise from this spot where death shows her true likeness everything fades say the heart shaped ex votos except memory and all insist on that paltry eternity provided us cheaply by the hearts of those who loved us the same words fit all despairs addressed to the dead man they speak to him in the second person our memory will never forsake you lugubrious pretense which attributes a body and desires to what is at best a black liquid elsewhere amid a deadly profusion of marble flowers and birds this bold assertion never will your grave be without flowers but never fear the inscription surrounds a gilded stucco bouquet very time saving for the living like those immortelles which owe their pompous name to the gratitude of those who still jump onto moving buses inasmuch as it is essential to keep up with the times the classic warbler is sometimes replaced by an astounding pearl airplane piloted by a silly angel who without regard for logic is provided with an impressive pair of wings yet how to bring out that these images of death are never separated from life here the values are closely linked the favorite joke of algerian undertakers when driving an empty hearse is to shout want a ride sister to any pretty girls they meet on the way there is no objection to seeing a symbol in this even if somewhat untoward it may seem blasphemous likewise to reply to the announcement of a death while winking one s left eye poor fellow he ll never sing again or like that woman of oran who bad never loved her husband god gave him to me and god has taken him from me but all in all i see nothing sacred in death and am well aware on the other hand of the distance there is between fear and respect everything here suggests the horror of dying in a country that invites one to live and yet it is under the very walls of this cemetery that the young of belcourt have their assignations and that the girls offer themselves to kisses and caresses i am well aware that such a race cannot be accepted by all here intelligence has no place as in italy this race is indifferent to the mind it has a cult for and admiration of the body whence its strength its innocent cynicism and a puerile vanity which explains why it is so severely judged it is commonly blamed for its mentality that is a way of seeing and of living and it is true that a certain intensity of life is inseparable from injustice yet here is a rate without past without tradition and yet not without poetry but a poetry whose quality i know well harsh carnal far from tenderness that of their very sky the only one in truth to move me and bring me inner peace the contrary of a civilized nation is a creative nation i have the mad hope that without knowing it perhaps these barbarians lounging on beaches are actually modeling the image of a culture in which the greatness of man will at last find its true likeness this race wholly cast into its present lives without myths without solace it has put all its possessions on this earth and therefore remains without defense against death all the gifts of physical beauty have been lavished on it and with them the strange avidity that always accompanies that wealth without future everything that is done here shows a horror of stability and a disregard for the future people are in haste to live and if an art were to be born here it would obey that hatred of permanence that made the dorians fashion their first column in wood and yet yes one can find measure as well as excess in the violent and keen face of this race in this summer sky with nothing tender in it before which all truths can be uttered and on which no deceptive divinity has traced the signs of hope or of redemption between this sky and these faces turned toward it nothing on which to hang a mythology a literature an ethic or a religion but stones flesh stars and those truths the hand can touch to feel one s attachment to a certain region one s love for a certain group of men to know that there is always a spot where one s heart will feel at peace these are many certainties for a single human life and yet this is not enough but at certain moments everything yearns for that spiritual home yes we must go back there there indeed is there anything odd in finding on earth that union that plotinus longed for unity is expressed here in terms of sun and sea the heart is sensitive to it through a certain savor of flesh which constitutes its bitterness and its grandeur i learn that there is no superhuman happiness no eternity outside the sweep of days these paltry and essential belongings these relative truths are the only ones to stir me as for the others the ideal truths i have not enough soul to understand them not that one must be an animal but i find no meaning in the happiness of angels i know simply that this sky will last longer than i and what shall i call eternity except what will continue after my death i am not expressing here the creature s satisfaction with his condition it is quite a different matter it is not always easy to be a man still less to be a pure man but being pure is recovering that spiritual home where one can feel the world s relationship where one s pulse beats coincide with the violent throbbing of the two o clock sun it is well known that one s native land is always recognized at the moment of losing it for those who are too uneasy about themselves their native land is the one that negates them i should not like to be brutal or seem extravagant but after all what negates me in this life is first of all what kills me everything that exalts life at the same time increases its absurdity in the algerian summer i learn that one thing only is more tragic than suffering and that is the life of a happy man but it may be also the way to a greater life because it leads to not cheating many in fact feign love of life to evade love itself they try their skill at enjoyment and at indulging in experiences but this is illusory it requires a rare vocation to be a sensualist the life of a man is fulfilled without the aid of his mind with its backward and forward movements at one and the same time its solitude and its presences to see these men of belcourt working protecting their wives and children and often without a reproach i think one can feel a secret shame to be sure i have no illusions about it there is not much love in the lives i am speaking of i ought to say that not much remains but at least they have evaded nothing there are words i have never really understood such as sin yet i believe these men have never sinned against life for if there is a sin against life it consists perhaps not so much in despairing of life as in hoping for another life and in eluding the implacable grandeur of this life these men have not cheated gods of summer they were at twenty by their enthusiasm for life and they still are deprived of all hope i have seen two of them die they were full of horror but silent it is better thus from pandora s box where all the ills of humanity swarmed the greeks drew out hope after all the others as the most dreadful of all i know no more stirring symbol for contrary to the general belief hope equals resignation and to live is not to resign oneself this at least is the bitter lesson of algerian summers but already the season is wavering and summer totters the first september rains after such violence and hardening are like the liberated earth s first tears as if for a few days this country tried its hand at tenderness yet at the same period the carob trees cover all of algeria with a scent of love in the evening or after the rain the whole earth its womb moist with a seed redolent of bitter almond rests after having given herself to the sun all summer long and again that scent hallows the union of man and earth and awakens in us the only really virile love in this world ephemeral and noble the minotaur or the stop in oran for pierre galindo this essay dates from the reader will have to bear this in mind to judge of the present day oran impassioned protests from that beautiful city assure me as a matter of fact that all the imperfections have been or will be remedied on the other hand the beauties extolled in this essay have been jealously respected happy and realistic city oran has no further need of writers she is awaiting tourists there are no more deserts there are no more islands yet there is a need for them in order to understand the world one has to turn away from it on occasion in order to serve men better one has to hold them at a distance for a time but where can one find the solitude necessary to vigor the deep breath in which the mind collects itself and courage gauges its strength there remain big cities simply certain conditions are required the cities europe offers us are too full of the din of the past a practiced ear can make out the flapping of wings a fluttering of souls the giddy whirl of centuries of revolutions of fame can be felt there there one cannot forget that the occident was forged in a series of uproars all that does not make for enough silence paris is often a desert for the heart but at certain moments from the heights of pere lachaise there blows a revolutionary wind that suddenly fills that desert with flags and fallen glories so it is with certain spanish towns with florence or with prague salzburg would be peaceful without mozart but from time to time there rings out over the salzach the great proud cry of don juan as he plunges toward hell vienna seems more silent she is a youngster among cities her stones are no older than three centuries and their youth is ignorant of melancholy but vienna stands at a crossroads of history around her echoes the clash of empires certain evenings when the sky is suffused with blood the stone horses on the ring monuments seem to take wing in that fleeting moment when everything is reminiscent of power and history can he distinctly heard under the charge of the polish squadrons the crashing fall of the ottoman empire that does not make for enough silence either to be sure it is just that solitude amid others that men come looking for in european cities at least men with a purpose in life there they can choose their company take it or leave it how many minds have been tempered in the trip between their hotel room and the old stones of the ile saint louis it is true that others have died there of isolation as for the first at any rate there they found their reasons for growing and asserting themselves they were alone and they weren t alone centuries of history and beauty the ardent testimony of a thousand lives of the past accompanied them along the seine and spoke to them both of traditions and of conquests but their youth urged them to invite such company there comes a time there come periods when it is unwelcome it s between us two exclaims rasti gnac facing the vast mustiness of paris two yes but that is still too many the desert itself has assumed significance it has been glutted with poetry for all the world s sorrows it is a hallowed spot but at certain moments the heart wants nothing so much as spots devoid of poetry descartes planning to meditate chose his desert the most mercantile city of his era there he found his solitude and the occasion for perhaps the greatest of our virile poems the first precept was never to accept anything as true unless i knew it to be obviously so it is possible to have less ambition and the same nostalgia but during the last three centuries amsterdam has spawned museums in order to flee poetry and yet recapture the peace of stones other deserts are needed other spots without soul and without reprieve oran is one of these the street i have often heard the people of oran complain there is no interesting circle no indeed you wouldn t want one a few right thinking people tried to introduce the customs of another world into this desert faithful to the principle that it is impossible to advance art or ideas without grouping together the result is such that the only instructive circles remain those of poker players boxing enthusiasts bowlers and the local associations there at least the unsophisticated prevails after all there exists a certain nobility that does not lend itself to the lofty it is sterile by nature and those who want to find it leave the circles and go out into the street the streets of oran are doomed to dust pebbles and heat if it rains there is a deluge and a sea of mud but rain or shine the shops have the same extravagant and absurd look all the bad taste of europe and the orient has managed to converge in them one finds helter skelter marble greyhounds ballerinas with swans versions of diana the huntress in green galalith discus throwers and reapers everything that is used for birthday and wedding gifts the whole race of painful figurines constantly called forth by a commercial and playful genie on our mantelpieces but such perseverance in bad taste takes on a baroque aspect that makes one forgive all here presented in a casket of dust are the contents of a show window frightful plaster models of deformed feet a group of rembrandt drawings sacrificed at francs each practical jokes tricolored wallets an eighteenth century pastel a mechanical donkey made of plush bottles of provence water for preserving green olives and a wretched wooden virgin with an indecent smile so that no one can go away ignorant the management has propped at its base a card saying wooden virgin there can be found in oran cafes with filter glazed counters sprinkled with the legs and wings of flies the proprietor always smiling despite his always empty cafe a small black coffee used to cost twelve sous and a large one eighteen photographers studios where there has been no progress in technique since the invention of sensitized paper they exhibit a strange fauna impossible to encounter in the streets from the pseudo sailor leaning on a console table to the marriageable girl badly dressed and arms dangling standing in front of a sylvan background it is possible to assume that these are not portraits from life they are creations an edifying abundance of funeral establishments it is not that people die more in oran than elsewhere but i fancy merely that more is made of it the attractive naivete of this nation of merchants is displayed even in their advertising i read in the handbill of an oran movie theater the advertisement for a third rate film i note the adjectives sumptuous splendid extraordinary amazing staggering and tremendous at the end the management informs the public of the considerable sacrifices it has undertaken to be able to present this startling realization nevertheless the price of tickets will not be increased it would be wrong to assume that this is merely a manifestation of that love of exaggeration characteristic of the south rather the authors of this marvelous handbill are revealing their sense of psychology it is essential to overcome the indifference and profound apathy felt in this country the moment there is any question of choosing between two shows two careers and often even two women people make up their minds only when forced to do so and advertising is well aware of this it will assume american proportions having the same reasons both here and there for getting desperate the streets of oran inform us as to the two essential pleasures of the local youth getting one s shoes shined and displaying those same shoes on the boulevard in order to have a clear idea of the first of these delights one has to entrust one s shoes at ten o clock on a sunday morning to the shoe shiners in boulevard gal lieni perched on high armchairs one can enjoy that peculiar satisfaction produced even upon a rank outsider by the sight of men in love with their job as the shoe shiners of oran obviously are everything is worked over in detail several brushes three kinds of cloths the polish mixed with gasoline one might think the operation is finished when a perfect shine comes to life under the soft brush but the same insistent hand covers the glossy surface again with polish rubs it dulls it makes the cream penetrate the heart of the leather and then brings forth under the same brush a double and really definitive gloss sprung from the depths of the leather the wonders achieved in this way are then exhibited to the connoisseurs in order to appreciate such pleasures of the boulevard you ought to see the masquerade of youth taking place every evening on the main arteries of the city between the ages of sixteen and twenty the young people of oran society borrow their models of elegance from american films and put on their fancy dress before going out to dinner with wavy oiled hair protruding from under a felt hat slanted over the left ear and peaked over the right eye the neck encircled by a collar big enough to accommodate the straggling hair the microscopic knot of the necktie kept in place by a regulation pin with thigh length coat and waist close to the hips with light colored and noticeably short trousers with dazzlingly shiny triple soled shoes every evening those youths make the sidewalks ring with their metal tipped soles in all things they are bent on imitating the bearing forthrightness and superiority of mr clark gable for this reason the local carpers commonly nickname those youths by favor of a casual pronunciation clarques at any rate the main boulevards of oran are invaded late in the afternoon by an army of attractive adolescents who go to the greatest trouble to look like a bad lot inasmuch as the girls of oran feel traditionally engaged to these softhearted gangsters they likewise flaunt the make up and elegance of popular american actresses consequently the same wits call them marlenes thus on the evening boulevards when the sound of birds rises skyward from the palm trees dozens of clarques and marlenes meet eye and size up one another happy to be alive and to cut a figure indulging for an hour in the intoxication of perfect existences there can then be witnessed the jealous say the meetings of the american commission but in these words lies the bitterness of those over thirty who have no connection with such diversions they fail to appreciate those daily congresses of youth and romance these are in truth the parliaments of birds that are met in hindu literature but no one on the boulevards of oran debates the problem of being or worries about the way to perfection there remains nothing but flappings of wings plumed struttings coquettish and victorious graces a great burst of carefree song that disappears with the night from here i can hear klestakov i shall soon have to be concerned with something lofty alas he is quite capable of it if he were urged he would people this desert within a few years but for the moment a somewhat secret soul must liberate itself in this facile city with its parade of painted girls unable nevertheless to simulate emotion feigning coyness so badly that the pretense is immediately obvious be concerned with something lofty just see santa cruz cut out of the rock the mountains the flat sea the violent wind and the sun the great cranes of the harbor the trains the hangars the quays and the huge ramps climbing up the city s rock and in the city itself these diversions and this boredom this hubbub and this solitude perhaps indeed all this is not sufficiently lofty but the great value of such overpopulated islands is that in them the heart strips bare silence is no longer possible except in noisy cities from amsterdam descartes writes to the aged guez de balzac i go out walking every day amid the confusion of a great crowd with as much freedom and tranquillity as you could do on your garden paths the desert in oran obliged to live facing a wonderful landscape the people of oran have overcome this fearful ordeal by covering their city with very ugly constructions one expects to find a city open to the sea washed and refreshed by the evening breeze and aside from the spanish quarter one finds a walled town that turns its back to the sea that has been built up by turning back on itself like a snail oran is a great circular yellow wall covered over with a leaden sky in the beginning you wander in the labyrinth seeking the sea like the sign of ariadne but you turn round and round in pale and oppressive streets and eventually the minotaur devours the people of oran the minotaur is boredom for some time the citizens of oran have given up wandering they have accepted being eaten it is impossible to know what stone is without coming to oran in that dustiest of cities the pebble is king it is so much appreciated that shopkeepers exhibit it in their show windows to hold papers in place or even for mere display piles of them are set up along the streets doubtless for the eyes delight since a year later the pile is still there whatever elsewhere derives its poetry from the vegetable kingdom here takes on a stone face the hundred or so trees that can be found in the business section have been carefully covered with dust they are petrified plants whose branches give off an acrid dusty smell in algiers the arab cemeteries have a well known mellowness in oran above the ras el ain ravine facing the sea this time flat against the blue sky are fields of chalky friable pebbles in which the sun blinds with its fires amid these bare bones of the earth a purple geranium from time to time contributes its life and fresh blood to the landscape the whole city has solidified in a stony matrix seen from les planteurs the depth of the cliffs surrounding it is so great that the landscape becomes unreal so mineral it is man is outlawed from it so much heavy beauty seems to come from another world if the desert can be defined as a soulless place where the sky alone is king then oran is awaiting her prophets all around and above the city the brutal nature of africa is indeed clad in her burning charms she bursts the unfortunate stage setting with which she is covered she shrieks forth between all the houses and over all the roofs if one climbs one of the roads up the mountain of santa cruz the first thing to be visible is the scattered colored cubes of oran but a little higher and already the jagged cliffs that surround the plateau crouch in the sea like red beasts still a little higher and a great vortex of sun and wind sweeps over airs out and obscures the untidy city scattered in disorder all over a rocky landscape the opposition here is between magnificent human anarchy and the permanence of an unchanging sea this is enough to make a staggering scent of life rise toward the mountainside road there is something implacable about the desert the mineral sky of oran her streets and trees in their coating of dust everything contributes to creating this dense and impassible universe in which the heart and mind are never distracted from themselves nor from their sole object which is man i am speaking here of difficult places of retreat books are written on florence or athens those cities have formed so many european minds that they must have a meaning they have the means of moving to tears or of uplifting they quiet a certain spiritual hunger whose bread is memory but can one be moved by a city where nothing attracts the mind where the very ugliness is anonymous where the past is reduced to nothing emptiness boredom an indifferent sky what are the charms of such places doubtless solitude and perhaps the human creature for a certain race of men wherever the human creature is beautiful is a bitter native land oran is one of its thousand capitals sports the central sporting club on rue du fondouk in oran is giving an evening of boxing which it insists will be appreciated by real enthusiasts interpreted this means that the boxers on the bill are far from being stars that some of them are entering the ring for the first time and that consequently you can count if not on the skill at least on the courage of the opponents a native having thrilled me with the firm promise that blood would flow i find myself that evening among the real enthusiasts apparently the latter never insist on comfort to be sure a ring has been set up at the back of a sort of whitewashed garage covered with corrugated iron and violently lighted folding chairs have been lined up in a square around the ropes these are the honor rings most of the length of the hall has been filled with seats and behind them opens a large free space called lounge by reason of the fact that not one of the five hundred persons in it could take out a handkerchief without causing serious accidents in this rectangular box live and breathe some thousand men and two or three women the kind who according to my neighbor always insist on attracting attention everybody is sweating fiercely while waiting for the fights of the young hopefuls a gigantic phonograph grinds out a tino rossi record this is the sentimental song before the murder the patience of a true enthusiast is unlimited the fight announced for nine o clock has not even begun at nine thirty and no one has protested the spring weather is warm and the smell of a humanity in shirt sleeves is exciting lively discussion goes on among the periodic explosions of lemon soda corks and the tireless lament of the corsican singer a few late arrivals are wedged into the audience when a spotlight throws a blinding light onto the ring the fights of the young hopefuls begin the young hopefuls or beginners who are fighting for the fun of it are always eager to prove this by massacring each other at the earliest opportunity in defiance of technique they were never able to last more than three rounds the hero of the evening in this regard is young kid airplane who in regular life sells lottery tickets on cafe terraces his opponent indeed hurtled awkwardly out of the ring at the beginning of the second round after contact with a fist wielded like a propeller the crowd got somewhat excited but this is still an act of courtesy gravely it breathes in the hallowed air of the embrocation it watches these series of slow rites and unregulated sacrifices made even more authentic by the propitiatory designs on the white wall of the fighters shadows these are the deliberate ceremonial prologues of a savage religion the trance will not come until later and it so happens that the loudspeaker announces amar the tough oranese who has never disarmed against perez the slugger from algiers an uninitiate would misinterpret the yelling that greets the introduction of the boxers in the ring he would imagine some sensational combat in which the boxers were to settle a personal quarrel known to the public to tell the truth it is a quarrel they are going to settle but it is the one that for the past hundred years has mortally separated algiers and oran back in history these two north african cities would have already bled each other white as pisa and florence did in happier times their rivalry is all the stronger just because it probably has no basis having every reason to like each other they loathe each other proportionately the oranese accuse the citizens of algiers of sham the people of algiers imply that the oranese are rustic these are bloodier insults than they might seem because they are metaphysical and unable to lay siege to each other oran and algiers meet compete and insult each other on the field of sports statistics and public works thus a page of history is unfolding in the ring and the tough oranese backed by a thousand yelling voices is defending against perez a way of life and the pride of a province truth forces me to admit that amar is not conducting his discussion well his argument has a flaw he lacks reach the slugger from algiers on the contrary has the required reach in his argument it lands persuasively between his contradictor s eyes the oranese bleeds magnificently amid the vociferations of a wild audience despite the repeated encouragements of the gallery and of my neighbor despite the dauntless shouts of kill him floor him the insidious below the belt oh the referee missed that one the optimistic he s pooped he can t take any more nevertheless the man from algiers is proclaimed the winner on points amid interminable catcalls my neighbor who is inclined to talk of sportsmanship applauds ostensibly while slipping to me in a voice made faint by so many shouts so that he won t be able to say back there that we of oran are savages but throughout the audience fights not included on the program have already broken out chairs are brandished the police clear a path excitement is at its height in order to calm these good people and contribute to the return of silence the management without losing a moment commissions the loudspeaker to boom out sambre et meuse for a few minutes the audience has a really warlike look confused clusters of com batants and voluntary referees sway in the grip of policemen the gallery exults and calls for the rest of the program with wild cries cock a doodle doo s and mocking catcalls drowned in the irresistible flood from the military band but the announcement or the big fight is enough to restore calm this takes place suddenly without flourishes just as actors leave the stage once the play is finished with the greatest unconcern hats are dusted off chairs are put back in place and without transition all faces assume the kindly expression of the respectable member of the audience who has paid for his ticket to a family concert the last fight pits a french champion of the navy against an oran boxer this time the difference in reach is to the advantage of the latter but his superiorities during the first rounds do not stir the crowd they are sleeping off the effects of their first excitement they are sobering up they are still short of breath if they applaud there is no passion in it they hiss without animosity the audience is divided into two camps as is appropriate in the interest of fairness but each individual s choice obeys that indifference that follows on great expenditures of energy if the frenchman holds his own if the oranese forgets that one doesn t lead with the head the boxer is bent under a volley of hisses but immediately pulled upright again by a burst of applause not until the seventh round does sport rise to the surface again at the same time that the real enthusiasts begin to emerge from their fatigue the frenchman to tell the truth has touched the mat and eager to win back points has hurled himself on his opponent what did i tell you said my neighbor it s going to be a fight to the finish indeed it is a fight to the finish covered with sweat under the pitiless light both boxers open their guard close their eyes as they hit shove with shoulders and knees swap their blood and snort with rage as one man the audience has stood up and punctuates the efforts of its two heroes it receives the blows returns them echoes them in a thousand hollow panting voices the same ones who had chosen their favorite in indifference cling to their choice through obstinacy and defend it passionately every ten seconds a shout from my neighbor pierces my right ear go to it gob come on navy while another man in front of us shouts to the oranese anda hombre the man and the gob go to it and together with them in this temple of whitewash iron and cement an audience completely given over to gods with cauliflower ears every blow that gives a dull sound on the shining pectorals echoes in vast vibrations in the very body of the crowd which with the boxers is making its last effort in such an atmosphere a draw is badly received indeed it runs counter to a quite manichean tendency in the audience there is good and there is evil the winner and the loser one must be either right or wrong the conclusion of this impeccable logic is immediately provided by two thousand energetic lungs accusing the judges of being sold or bought but the gob has walked over and embraced his rival in the ring drinking in his fraternal sweat this is enough to make the audience reversing its view burst out in sudden applause my neighbor is right they are not savages the crowd pouring out under a sky full of silence and stars has just fought the most exhausting fight it keeps quiet and disappears furtively without any energy left for post mortems there is good and there is evil that religion is merciless the band of faithful is now no more than a group of black and white shadows disappearing into the night for force and violence are solitary gods they contribute nothing to memory on the contrary they distribute their miracles by the handful in the present they are made for this race without past which celebrates its communions around the prize ring these are rather difficult rites but ones that simplify everything good and evil winner and loser at corinth two temples stood side by side the temple of violence and the temple of necessity monuments for many reasons due as much to economics as to metaphysics it may be said that the oranese style if there is one forcefully and clearly appears in the extraordinary edifice called the maison du colon oran hardly lacks monuments the city has its quota of imperial marshals ministers and local benefactors they are found on dusty little squares resigned to rain and sun they too converted to stone and boredom but in any case they represent contributions from the outside in that happy barbary they are the regrettable marks of civilization oran on the other hand has raised up her altars and rostra to her own honor in the very heart of the mercantile city having to construct a common home for the innumerable agricultural organizations that keep this country alive the people of oran conceived the idea of building solidly a convincing image of their virtues the maison du colon to judge from the edifice those virtues are three in number boldness in taste love of violence and a feeling for historical syntheses egypt byzantium and munich collaborated in the delicate construction of a piece of pastry in the shape of a bowl upside down multicolored stones most vigorous in effect have been brought in to outline the roof these mosaics are so exuberantly persuasive that at first you see nothing but an amorphous effulgence but with a closer view and your attention called to it you discover that they have a meaning a graceful colonist wearing a bow tie and white pith helmet is receiving the homage of a procession of slaves dressed in classical style the edifice and its colored illustrations have been set down in the middle of a square in the to and fro of the little two car trams whose filth is one of the charms of the city oran greatly cherishes also the two lions of its place d armes or parade ground since they have been sitting in state on opposite sides of the municipal stairs their author was named ain they have majesty and a stubby torso it is said that at night they get down from their pedestal one after the other silently pace around the dark square and on occasion uninate at length under the big dusty ficus trees these of course are rumors to which the people of oran lend an indulgent ear but it is unlikely despite a certain amount of research i have not been able to get interested in cain i merely learned that he had the reputation of being a skillful animal sculptor yet i often think of him this is an intellectual bent that comes naturally in oran here is a sonorously named artist who left an unimportant work here several hundred thousand people are familiar with the easygoing beasts he put in front of a pretentious town hall this is one way of succeeding in art to be sure these two lions like thousands of works of the same type are proof of something else than talent others have created the night watch saint francis receiving the stigmata david or the pharsalian bas relief called the glorification of the flower cain on the other hand set up two hilarious snouts on the square of a mercantile province overseas but the david will go down one day with florence and the lions will perhaps be saved from the catastrophe let me repeat they are proof of something else can one state this idea clearly in this work there are insignificance and solidity spirit counts for nothing and matter for a great deal mediocrity insists upon lasting by all means including bronze it is refused a right to eternity and every day it takes that right is it not eternity itself in any event such perseverance is capable of stirring and it involves its lesson that of all the monuments of oran and of oran herself an hour a day every so often it forces you to pay attention to something that has no importance the mind profits from such recurrences in a sense this is its hygiene and since it absolutely needs its moments of humility it seems to me that this chance to indulge in stupidity is better than others everything that is ephemeral wants to last let us say that everything wants to last human productions mean nothing else and in this regard cain s lions have the same chances as the ruins of angkor this disposes one toward modesty there are other oranese monuments or at least they deserve this name because they too stand for their city and perhaps in a more significant way they are the public works at present covering the coast for some ten kilometers apparently it is a matter of transforming the most luminous of bays into a gigantic harbor in reality it is one more chance for man to come to grips with stone in the paintings of certain flemish masters a theme of strikingly general application recurs insistently the building of the tower of babel vast landscapes rocks climbing up to heaven steep slopes teeming with workmen animals ladders strange machines cords pulleys man moreover is there only to give scale to the inhuman scope of the construction this is what the oran coast makes one think of west of the city clinging to vast slopes rails dump cars cranes tiny trains under a broiling sun toy like locomotives round huge blocks of stone amid whistles dust and smoke day and night a nation of ants bustles about on the smoking carcass of the mountain clinging all up and down a single cord against the side of the cliff dozens of men their bellies pushing against the handles of automatic drills vibrate in empty space all day long and break off whole masses of rock that hurtle down in dust and rumbling farther on dump carts tip their loads over the slopes and the rocks suddenly poured seaward bound and roll into the water each large lump followed by a scattering of lighter stones at regular intervals at dead of night or in broad daylight detonations shake the whole mountain and stir up the sea itself man in this vast construction field makes a frontal attack on stone and if one could forget for a moment at least the harsh slavery that makes this work possible one would have to admire these stones torn from the mountain serve man in his plans they pile up under the first waves gradually emerge and finally take their place to form a jetty soon covered with men and machines which advance day after day toward the open sea without stopping huge steel jaws bite into the cliff s belly turn round and disgorge into the water their overflowing gravel as the coastal cliff is lowered the whole coast encroaches irresistibly on the sea of course destroying stone is not possible it is merely moved from one place to another in any case it will last longer than the men who use it for the moment it satisfies their will to action that in itself is probably useless but moving things about is the work of men one must choose doing that or nothing obviously the people of oran have chosen in front of that indifferent bay for many years more they will pile up stones along the coast in a hundred years tomorrow in other words they will have to begin again but today these heaps of rocks testify for the men in masks of dust and sweat who move about among them the true monuments of oran are still her stones ariadne s stone it seems that the people of oran are like that friend of flaubert who on the point of death casting a last glance at this irreplaceable earth exclaimed close the window it s too beautiful they have closed the window they have walled themselves in they have cast out the landscape but flaubert s friend le poittevin died and after him days continued to be added to days likewise beyond the yellow walls of oran land and sea continue their indifferent dialogue that permanence in the world has always had contrary charms for man it drives him to despair and excites him the world never says but one thing first it interests then it bores but eventually it wins out by dint of obstinacy it is always right already at the very gates of oran nature raises its voice in the direction of canastel there are vast wastelands covered with fragrant brush there sun and wind speak only of solitude above oran there is the mountain of santa cruz the plateau and the myriad ravines leading to it roads once carriageable cling to the slopes overhanging the sea in the month of january some are covered with flowers daisies and buttercups turn them into sumptuous paths embroidered in yellow and white about sant cruzz everything has been said but if i were to speak of it i should forget the sacred processions that climb the rugged hill on feast days in order to recall other pilgrimages solitary they walk in the red stone rise above the motionless bay and come to dedicate to nakedness a luminous perfect hour oran has also its deserts of sand its beaches those encountered near the gates are deserted only in winter and spring then they are plateaus covered with asphodels peopled with bare little cottages among the flowers the sea rumbles a bit down below yet already the sun the faint breeze the whiteness of the asphodels the sharp blue of the sky everything makes one fancy summer the golden youth then covering the beach the long hours on the sand and the sudden softness of evening each year on these shores there is a new harvest of girls in flower apparently they have but one season the following year other cordial blossoms take their place which the summer before were still little girls with bodies as hard as buds at eleven a m coming down from the plateau all that young flesh lightly clothed in motley materials breaks on the sand like a multicolored wave one has to go farther strangely close however to that spot where two hundred thousand men are laboring to discover a still virgin landscape long deserted dunes where the passage of men has left no other trace than a worm eaten hut from time to time an arab shepherd drives along the top of the dunes the black and beige spots of his flock of goats on the beaches of the oran country every summer morning seems to be the first in the world each twilight seems to be the last solemn agony announced at sunset by a final glow that darkens every hue the sea is ultramarine the road the color of clotted blood the beach yellow everything disappears with the green sun an hour later the dunes are bathed in moonlight then there are incomparable nights under a rain of stars occasionally storms sweep over them and the lightning flashes flow along the dunes whiten the sky and give the sand and one s eyes orange colored glints but this cannot be shared one has to have lived it so much solitude and nobility give these places an unforgettable aspect in the warm moment before daybreak after confronting the first bitter black waves a new creature breasts night s heavy enveloping water the memory of those joys does not make me regret them and thus i recognize that they were good after so many years they still last somewhere in this heart which finds unswerving loyalty so difficult and i know that today if i were to go to the deserted dune the same sky would pour down on me its cargo of breezes and stars these are lands of innocence but innocence needs sand and stones and man has forgotten how to live among them at least it seems so for he has taken refuge in this extraordinary city where boredom sleeps nevertheless that very confrontation constitutes the value of oran the capital of boredom besieged by innocence and beauty it is surrounded by an army in which every stone is a soldier in the city and at certain hours however what a temptation to go over to the enemy what a temptation to identify oneself with those stones to melt into that burning and impassive universe that defies history and its ferments that is doubtless futile but there is in every man a profound instinct which is neither that of destruction nor that of creation it is merely a matter of resembling nothing in the shadow of the warm walls of oran on its dusty asphalt that invitation is sometimes heard it seems that for a time the minds that yield to it are never disappointed this is the darkness of eurydice and the sleep of isis here are the deserts where thought will collect itself the cool hand of evening on a troubled heart on this mount of olives vigil is futile the mind recalls and approves the sleeping apostles were they really wrong they nonetheless had their revelation just think of sakyamuni in the desert he remained there for years on end squatting motionless with his eyes on heaven the very gods envied him that wisdom and that stone like destiny in his outstretched hands the swallows had made their nest but one day they flew away answering the call of distant lands and he who had stifled in himself desire and will fame and suffering began to cry it happens thus that flowers grow on rocks yes let us accept stone when it is necessary that secret and that rapture we ask of faces can also be given us by stone to be sure this cannot last but what can last after all the secret of faces fades away and there we are cast back to the chain of desires and if stone can do no more for us than the human heart at least it can do just as much oh to be nothing for thousands of years this great cry has roused millions of men to revolt against desire and pain its dying echoes have reached this far across centuries and oceans to the oldest sea in the world they still reverberate dully against the compact cliffs of oran everybody in this country follows this advice without knowing it of course it is almost futile nothingness cannot be achieved any more than the absolute can but since we receive as favors the eternal signs brought us by roses or by human suffering let us not refuse either the rare invitations to sleep that the earth addresses us each has as much truth as the other this perhaps is the ariadne s thread of this somnambulist and frantic city here one learns the virtues provisional to be sure of a certain kind of boredom in order to be spared one must say yes to the minotaur this is an old and fecund wisdom above the sea silent at the base of the red cliffs it is enough to maintain a delicate equilibrium halfway between the two massive headlands which on the right and left dip into the clear water in the puffing of a coast guard vessel crawling along the water far out bathed in radiant light is distinctly heard the muffled call of inhuman and glittering forces it is the minotaur s farewell it is noon the very day is being weighed in the balance his rite accomplished the traveler receives the reward of his liberation the little stone dry and smooth as an asphodel that he picks up on the cliff for the initiate the world is no heavier to bear than this stone atlas s task is easy it is sufficient to choose one s hour then one realizes that for an hour a month a year these shores can indulge in freedom they welcome pell mell without even looking at them the monk the civil servant or the conqueror there are days when i expected to meet in the streets of oran descartes or cesare borgia that did not happen but perhaps another will be more fortunate a great deed a great work virile meditation used to call for the solitude of sands or of the convent there were kept the spiritual vigils of arms where could they be better celebrated now than in the emptiness of a big city established for some time in unintellectual beauty here is the little stone smooth as an asphodel it is at the beginning of everything flowers tears if you insist departures and struggles are for tomorrow in the middle of the day when the sky opens its fountains of light in the vast sonorous space all the headlands of the coast look like a fleet about to set out those heavy galleons of rock and light are trembling on their keels as if they were preparing to steer for sunlit isles o mornings in the country of oran from the high plateaus the swallows plunge into huge troughs where the air is seething the whole coast is ready for departure a shiver of adventure ripples through it tomorrow perhaps we shall leave together helen s exile the mediterranean sun has something tragic about it quite different from the tragedy of fogs certain evenings at the base of the seaside mountains night falls over the flawless curve of a little bay and there rises from the silent waters a sense of anguished fulfillment in such spots one can understand that if the greeks knew despair they always did so through beauty and its stifling quality in that gilded calamity tragedy reaches its highest point our time on the other hand has fed its despair on ugliness and convulsions this is why europe would be vile if suffering could ever be so we have exiled beauty the greeks took up arms for her first difference but one that has a history greek thought always took refuge behind the conception of limits it never carried anything to extremes neither the sacred nor reason because it negated nothing neither the sacred nor reason it took everything into consideration balancing shadow with light our europe on the other hand off in the pursuit of totality is the child of disproportion she negates beauty as she negates whatever she does not glorify and through all her diverse ways she glorifies but one thing which is the future rule of reason in her madness she extends the eternal limits and at that very moment dark erinyes fall upon her and tear her to pieces nemesis the goddess of measure and not of revenge keeps watch all those who overstep the limit are pitilessly punished by her the greeks who for centuries questioned themselves as to what is just could understand nothing of our idea of justice for them equity implied a limit whereas our whole continent is convulsed in its search for a justice that must be total at the dawn of greek thought hera clitus was already imagining that justice sets limits for the physical universe itself the sun will not overstep his measures if he does the erinyes the handmaids of justice will find him out we who have cast the universe and spirit out of our sphere laugh at that threat in a drunken sky we light up the suns we want but nonetheless the boundaries exist and we know it in our wildest aberrations we dream of an equilibrium we have left behind which we naively expect to find at the end of our errors childish presumption which justifies the fact that child nations inheriting our follies are now directing our history a fragment attributed to the same heraclitus simply states presumption regression of progress and many centuries after the man of ephesus socrates facing the threat of being condemned to death acknowledged only this one superiority in himself what he did not know he did not claim to know the most exemplary life and thought of those centuries close on a proud confession of ignorance forgetting that we have forgotten our virility we have preferred the power that apes greatness first alexander and then the roman conquerors whom the authors of our schoolbooks through some incomparable vulgarity teach us to admire we too have conquered moved boundaries mastered bywater s translation translator s note heaven and earth our reason has driven all away alone at last we end up by ruling over a desert what imagination could we have left for that higher equilibrium in which nature balanced history beauty virtue and which applied the music of numbers even to blood tragedy we turn our backs on nature we are ashamed of beauty our wretched tragedies have a smell of the office clinging to them and the blood that trickles from them is the color of printer s ink this is why it is improper to proclaim today that we are the sons of greece or else we are the renegade sons placing history on the throne of god we are progressing toward theocracy like those whom the greeks called barbarians and whom they fought to death in the waters of salamis in order to realize how we differ one must turn to him among our philosophers who is the true rival of plato only the modern city hegel dares write offers the mind a field in which it can become aware of itself we are thus living in the period of big cities deliberately the world has been amputated of all that constitutes its permanence nature the sea hilltops evening meditation consciousness is to be found only in the streets because history is to be found only in the streets this is the edict and consequently our most significant works show the same bias landscapes are not to be found in great european literature since dostoevsky history explains neither the natural universe that existed before it nor the beauty that exists above it hence it chose to be ignorant of them whereas plato contained everything nonsense reason and myth our philosophers contain nothing but nonsense or reason because they have closed their eyes to the rest the mole is meditating it is christianity that began substituting the tragedy of the soul for contemplation of the world but at least christianity referred to a spiritual nature and thereby preserved a certain fixity with god dead there remains only history and power for some time the entire effort of our philosophers has aimed solely at replacing the notion of human nature with that of situation and replacing ancient harmony with the disorderly advance of chance or reason s pitiless progress whereas the greeks gave to will the boundaries of reason we have come to put the will s impulse in the very center of reason which has as a result become deadly for the greeks values pre existed all action of which they definitely set the limits modern philosophy places its values at the end of action they are not but are becoming and we shall know them fully only at the completion of history with values all limit disappears and since conceptions differ as to what they will be since all struggles without the brake of those same values spread indefinitely today s messianisms confront one another and their clamors mingle in the clash of empires disproportion is a conflagration according to heraclitus the conflagration is spreading nietzsche is outdistanced europe no longer philosophizes by striking a hammer but by shooting a cannon nature is still there however she contrasts her calm skies and her reasons with the madness of men until the atom too catches fire and history ends in the triumph of reason and the agony of the species but the greeks never said that the limit could not he overstepped they said it existed and that whoever dared to exceed it was mercilessly struck down nothing in present history can contradict them the historical spirit and the artist both want to remake the world but the artist through an obligation of his nature knows his limits which the historical spirit fails to recognize this is why the latter s aim is tyranny whereas the former s passion is freedom all those who are struggling for freedom today are ultimately fighting for beauty of course it is not a question of defending beauty for itself beauty cannot do without man and we shall not give our era its nobility and serenity unless we follow it in its misfortune never again shall we be hermits but it is no less true that man cannot do without beauty and this is what our era pretends to want to disregard it steels itself to attain the absolute and authority it wants to transfigure the world before having exhausted it to set it to rights before having understood it whatever it may say our era is deserting this world ulysses can choose at calypso s bidding between immortality and the land of his fathers he chooses the land and death with it such simple nobility is foreign to us today others will say that we lack humility but all things considered this word is ambiguous like dostoevsky s fools who boast of everything soar to heaven and end up flaunting their shame in any public place we merely lack man s pride which is fidelity to his limits lucid love of his condition i hate my time saint exupery wrote shortly before his death for reasons not far removed from those i have spoken of but however upsetting that exclamation coming from him who loved men for their admirable qualities we shall not accept responsibility for it yet what a temptation at certain moments to turn one s back on this bleak fleshless world but this time is ours and we cannot live hating ourselves it has fallen so low only through the excess of its virtues as well as through the extent of its vices we shall fight for the virtue that has a history what virtue the horses of patroclus weep for their master killed in battle all is lost but achilles resumes the fight and victory is the outcome because friendship has just been assassinated friendship is a virtue admission of ignorance rejection of fanaticism the limits of the world and of man the beloved face and finally beauty this is where we shall be on the side of the greeks in a certain sense the direction history will take is not the one we think it lies in the struggle between creation and inquisition despite the price which artists will pay for their empty hands we may hope for their victory once more the philosophy of darkness will break and fade away over the dazzling sea o midday thought the trojan war is being fought far from the battlefields once more the dreadful walls of the modern city will fall to deliver up soul serene as the ocean s calm the beauty of helen return to tipasa you have navigated with raging soul far from the paternal home passing beyond the sea s double rocks and you now inhabit a foreign land medea for five days rain had been falling ceaselessly on algiers and had finally wet the sea itself from an apparently inexhaustible sky constant downpours viscous in their density streamed down upon the gulf gray and soft as a huge sponge the sea rose slowly in the ill defined bay but the surface of the water seemed almost motionless under the steady rain only now and then a barely perceptible swelling motion would raise above the sea s surface a vague puff of smoke that would come to dock in the harbor under an arc of wet boulevards the city itself all its white walls dripping gave off a different steam that went out to meet the first steam whichever way you turned you seemed to be breathing water to be drinking the air in front of the soaked sea i walked and waited in that december algiers which was for me the city of summers i had fled europe s night the winter of faces but the summer city herself had been emptied of her laughter and offered me only bent and shining backs in the evening in the crudely lighted cafes where i took refuge i read my age in faces i recognized without being able to name them i merely knew that they had been young with me and that they were no longer so yet i persisted without very well knowing what i was waiting for unless perhaps the moment to go back to tipasa to be sure it is sheer madness almost always punished to return to the sites of one s youth and try to relive at forty what one loved or keenly enjoyed at twenty but i was forewarned of that madness once already i had returned to tipasa soon after those war years that marked for me the end of youth i hoped i think to recapture there a freedom i could not forget in that spot indeed more than twenty years ago i had spent whole mornings wandering among the ruins breathing in the wormwood warming myself against the stones discovering little roses soon plucked of their petals which outlive the spring only at noon at the hour when the cicadas themselves fell silent as if overcome i would flee the greedy glare of an all consuming light sometimes at night i would sleep open eyed under a sky dripping with stars i was alive then fifteen years later i found my ruins a few feet from the first waves i followed the streets of the forgotten walled city through fields covered with bitter trees and on the slopes overlooking the hay i still caressed the bread colored columns but the ruins were now surrounded with barbed wire and could be entered only through certain openings it was also forbidden for reasons which it appears that morality approves to walk there at night by day one encountered an official guardian it just happened that morning that it was raining over the whole extent of the ruins disoriented walking through the wet solitary countryside i tried at least to recapture that strength hitherto always at hand that helps me to accept what is when once i have admitted that i cannot change it and i could not indeed reverse the course of time and restore to the world the appearance i had loved which had disappeared in a day long before the second of september in fact i had not gone to greece as i was to do war on the contrary had come to us then it had spread over greece herself that distance those years separating the warm ruins from the barbed wire were to be found in me too that day as i stood before the sarcophaguses full of black water or under the sodden tamarisks originally brought up surrounded by beauty which was my only wealth i had begun in plenty then had come the barbed wire i mean tyrannies war police forces the era of revolt one had had to put oneself right with the authorities of night the day s beauty was but a memory and in this muddy tipasa the memory itself was becoming dim it was indeed a question of beauty plenty or youth in the light from conflagrations the world had suddenly shown its wrinkles and its wounds old and new it had aged all at once and we with it i had come here looking for a certain lift but i realized that it inspires only the man who is unaware that he is about to launch forward no love without a little innocence where was the innocence empires were tumbling down nations and men were tearing at one another s throats our hands were soiled originally innocent without knowing it we were now guilty without meaning to be the mystery was increasing with our knowledge this is why o mockery we were concerned with morality weak and disabled i was dreaming of virtue in the days of innocence i didn t even know that morality existed i knew it now and i was not capable of living up to its standard on the promontory that i used to love among the wet columns of the ruined temple i seemed to be walking behind someone whose steps i could still hear on the stone slabs and mosaics but whom i should never again overtake i went back to paris and remained several years before returning home yet i obscurely missed something during all those years when one has once had the good luck to love intensely life is spent in trying to recapture that ardor and that illumination forsaking beauty and the sensual happiness attached to it exclusively serving misfortune calls for a nobility i lack but after all nothing is true that forces one to exclude isolated beauty ends up simpering solitary justice ends up oppressing whoever aims to serve one exclusive of the other serves no one not even himself and eventually serves injustice twice a day comes when thanks to rigidity nothing causes wonder any more everything is known and life is spent in beginning over again these are the days of exile of desiccated life of dead souls to come alive again one needs a special grace self forgetfulness or a homeland certain mornings on turning a corner a delightful dew falls on the heart and then evaporates but its coolness remains and this is what the heart requires always i had to set out again and in algiers a second time still walking under the same downpour which seemed not to have ceased since a departure i had thought definitive amid the same vast melancholy smelling of rain and sea despite this misty sky these backs fleeing under the shower these cafes whose sulphureous light distorted faces i persisted in hoping didn t i know besides that algiers rains despite their appearance of never meaning to end nonetheless stop in an instant like those streams in my country which rise in two hours lay waste acres of land and suddenly dry up one evening in fact the rain ceased i waited one night more a limpid morning rose dazzling over the pure sea from the sky fresh as a daisy washed over and over again by the rains reduced by these repeated washings to its finest and clearest texture emanated a vibrant light that gave to each house and each tree a sharp outline an astonished newness in the world s morning the earth must have sprung forth in such a light i again took the road for tipasa for me there is not a single one of those sixty nine kilometers that is not filled with memories and sensations turbulent childhood adolescent daydreams in the drone of the bus s motor mornings unspoiled girls beaches young muscles always at the peak of their effort evening s slight anxiety in a sixteen year old heart lust for life fame and ever the same sky throughout the years unfailing in strength and light itself insatiable consuming one by one over a period of months the victims stretched out in the form of crosses on the beach at the deathlike hour of noon always the same sea too almost impalpable in the morning light which i again saw on the horizon as soon as the road leaving the sahel and its bronze colored vineyards sloped down toward the coast but i did not stop to look at it i wanted to see again the chenoua that solid heavy mountain cut out of a single block of stone which borders the bay of tipasa to the west before dropping down into the sea itself it is seen from a distance long before arriving a light blue haze still confused with the sky but gradually it is condensed as you advance toward it until it takes on the color of the surrounding waters a huge motionless wave whose amazing leap upward has been brutally solidified above the sea calmed all at once still nearer almost at the gates of tipasa here is its frowning bulk brown and green here is the old mossy god that nothing will ever shake a refuge and harbor for its sons of whom i am one while watching it i finally got through the barbed wire and found myself among the ruins and under the glorious december light as happens but once or twice in lives which ever after can consider themselves favored to the full i found exactly what i had come seeking what despite the era and the world was offered me truly to me alone in that forsaken nature from the forum strewn with olives could be seen the village down below no sound came from it wisps of smoke rose in the limpid air the sea likewise was silent as if smothered under the unbroken shower of dazzling cold light from the chenoua a distant cock s crow alone celebrated the day s fragile glory in the direction of the ruins as far as the eye could see there was nothing but pock marked stones and wormwood trees and perfect columns in the transparence of the crystalline air it seemed as if the morning were stabilized the sun stopped for an incalculable moment in this light and this silence years of wrath and night melted slowly away i listened to an almost forgotten sound within myself as if my heart long stopped were calmly beginning to beat again and awake now i recognized one by one the imperceptible sounds of which the silence was made up the figured bass of the birds the sea s faint brief sighs at the foot of the rocks the vibration of the trees the blind singing of the columns the rustling of the wormwood plants the furtive lizards i heard that i also listened to the happy torrents rising within me it seemed to me that i had at last come to harbor for a moment at least and that henceforth that moment would be endless but soon after the sun rose visibly a degree in the sky a magpie preluded briefly and at once from all directions birds songs burst out with energy jubilation joyful discordance and infinite rapture the day started up again it was to carry me to evening at noon on the half sandy slopes covered with heliotropes like a foam left by the furious waves of the last few days as they withdrew i watched the sea barely swelling at that hour with an exhausted motion and i satisfied the two thirsts one cannot long neglect without drying up i mean loving and admiring for there is merely bad luck in not being loved there is misfortune in not loving all of us today are dying of this misfortune for violence and hatred dry up the heart itself the long fight for justice exhausts the love that nevertheless gave birth to it in the clamor in which we live love is impossible and justice does not suffice this is why europe hates daylight and is only able to set injustice up against injustice but in order to keep justice from shriveling up like a beautiful orange fruit containing nothing but a bitter dry pulp i discovered once more at tipasa that one must keep intact in oneself a freshness a cool wellspring of joy love the day that escapes injustice and return to combat having won that light here i recaptured the former beauty a young sky and i measured my luck realizing at last that in the worst years of our madness the memory of that sky had never left me this was what in the end had kept me from despairing i had always known that the ruins of tipasa were younger than our new constructions or our bomb damage there the world began over again every day in an ever new light o light this is the cry of all the characters of ancient drama brought face to face with their fate this last resort was ours too and i knew it now in the middle of winter i at last discovered that there was in me an invincible summer i have again left tipasa i have returned to europe and its struggles but the memory of that day still uplifts me and helps me to welcome equally what delights and what crushes in the difficult hour we are living what else can i desire than to exclude nothing and to learn how to braid with white thread and black thread a single cord stretched to the breaking point in everything i have done or said up to now i seem to recognize these two forces even when they work at cross purposes i have not been able to disown the light into which i was born and yet i have not wanted to reject the servitudes of this time it would be too easy to contrast here with the sweet name of tipasa other more sonorous and crueler names for men of today there is an inner way which i know well from having taken it in both directions leading from the spiritual hilltops to the capitals of crime and doubtless one can always rest fall asleep on the hilltop or board with crime but if one forgoes a part of what is one must forgo being oneself one must forgo living or loving otherwise than by proxy there is thus a will to live without rejecting anything of life which is the virtue i honor most in this world from time to time at least it is true that i should like to have practiced it inasmuch as few epochs require as much as ours that one should be equal to the best as to the worst i should like indeed to shirk nothing and to keep faithfully a double memory yes there is beauty and there are the humiliated whatever may be the difficulties of the undertaking i should like never to be unfaithful either to one or to the others but this still resembles a moral code and we live for something that goes farther than morality if we could only name it what silence on the hill of sainte salsa to the east of tipasa the evening is inhabited it is still light to tell the truth but in this light an almost invisible fading announces the day s end a wind rises young like the night and suddenly the waveless sea chooses a direction and flows like a great barren river from one end of the horizon to the other the sky darkens then begins the mystery the gods of night the beyond pleasure but how to translate this the little coin i am carrying away from here has a visible surface a woman s beautiful face which repeats to me all i have learned in this day and a worn surface which i feel under my fingers during the return what can that lipless mouth be saying except what i am told by another mysterious voice within me which every day informs me of my ignorance and my happiness the secret i am seeking lies hidden in a valley full of olive trees under the grass and the cold violets around an old house that smells of wood smoke for more than twenty years i rambled over that valley and others resembling it i questioned mute goatherds i knocked at the door of deserted ruins occasionally at the moment of the first star in the still bright sky under a shower of shimmering light i thought i knew i did know in truth i still know perhaps but no one wants any of this secret i don t want any myself doubtless and i cannot stand apart from my people i live in my family which thinks it rules over rich and hideous cities built of stones and mists day and night it speaks up and everything bows before it which bows before nothing it is deaf to all secrets its power that carries me bores me nevertheless and on occasion its shouts weary me but its misfortune is mine and we are of the same blood a cripple likewise an accomplice and noisy have i not shouted among the stones consequently i strive to forget i walk in our cities of iron and fire i smile bravely at the night i hail the storms i shall be faithful i have forgotten in truth active and deaf henceforth but perhaps someday when we are ready to die of exhaustion and ignorance i shall be able to disown our garish tombs and go and stretch out in the valley under the same light and learn for the last time what i know the artist and his time i as an artist have you chosen the role of witness this would take considerable presumption or a vocation i lack personally i don t ask for any role and i have but one real vocation as a man i have a preference for happiness as an artist it seems to me that i still have characters to bring to life without the help of wars or of law courts but i have been sought out as each individual has been sought out artists of the past could at least keep silent in the face of tyranny the tyrannies of today are improved they no longer admit of silence or neutrality one has to take a stand be either for or against well in that case i am against but this does not amount to choosing the comfortable role of witness it is merely accepting the time as it is minding one s own business in short moreover you are forgetting that today judges accused and witnesses exchange positions with exemplary rapidity my choice if you think i am making one would at least be never to sit on a judge s bench or beneath it like so many of our philosophers aside from that there is no dearth of opportunities for action in the relative trade unionism is today the first and the most fruitful among them ii is not the quixotism that has been criticized in your recent works an idealistic and romantic definition of the artist s role however words are perverted they provisionally keep their meaning and it is clear to me that the romantic is the one who chooses the perpetual motion of history the grandiose epic and the announcement of a miraculous event at the end of time if i have tried to define something it is on the contrary simply the common existence of history and of man everyday life with the most possible light thrown upon it the dogged struggle against one s own degradation and that of others it is likewise idealism and of the worse kind to end up by hanging all action and all truth on a meaning of history that is not implicit in events and that in any case implies a mythical aim would it therefore be realism to take as the laws of history the future in other words just what is not yet history something of whose nature we know nothing it seems to me on the contrary that i am arguing in favor of a true realism against a mythology that is both illogical and deadly and against romantic nihilism whether it be bourgeois or allegedly revolutionary to tell the truth far from being romantic i believe in the necessity of a rule and an order i merely say that there can be no question of just any rule whatsoever and that it would be surprising if the rule we need were given us by this disordered society or on the other hand by those doctrinaires who declare themselves liberated from all rules and all scruples iii the marxists and their followers likewise think they are humanists but for them human nature will be formed in the classless society of the future to begin with this proves that they reject at the present moment what we all are those humanists are accusers of man how can we be surprised that such a claim should have developed in the world of court trials they reject the man of today in the name of the man of the future that claim is religious in nature why should it be more justified than the one which announces the kingdom of heaven to come in reality the end of history cannot have within the limits of our condition any definable significance it can only be the object of a faith and of a new mystification a mystification that today is no less great than the one that of old based colonial oppression on the necessity of saving the souls of infidels iv is not that what in reality separates you from the intellectuals of the left you mean that is what separates those intellectuals from the left traditionally the left has always been at war against injustice obscurantism and oppression it always thought that those phenomena were interdependent the idea that obscurantism can lead to justice the national interest to liberty is quite recent the truth is that certain intellectuals of the left not all fortunately are today hypnotized by force and efficacy as our intellectuals of the right were before and during the war their attitudes are different but the act of resignation is the same the first wanted to be realistic nationalists the second want to be realistic socialists in the end they betray nationalism and socialism alike in the name of a realism henceforth without content and adored as a pure and illusory technique of efficacy this is a temptation that can after all be understood but still however the question is looked at the new position of the people who call themselves or think themselves leftists consists in saying certain oppressions are justifiable because they follow the direction which cannot be justified of history hence there are presumably privileged executioners and privileged by nothing this is about what was said in another context by joseph de maistre who has never been taken for an incendiary but this is a thesis which personally i shall always reject allow me to set up against it the traditional point of view of what has been hitherto called the left all executioners are of the same family v what can the artist do in the world of today he is not asked either to write about co operatives or conversely to lull to sleep in himself the sufferings endured by others throughout history and since you have asked me to speak personally i am going to do so as simply as i can considered as artists we perhaps have no need to interfere in the affairs of the world but considered as men yes the miner who is exploited or shot down the slaves in the camps those in the colonies the legions of persecuted throughout the world they need all those who can speak to communicate their silence and to keep in touch with them i have not written day after day fighting articles and texts i have not taken part in the common struggles because i desire the world to be covered with greek statues and masterpieces the man who has such a desire does exist in me except that he has something better to do in trying to instill life into the creatures of his imagination but from my first articles to my latest book i have written so much and perhaps too much only because i cannot keep from being drawn toward everyday life toward those whoever they may be who are humiliated and debased they need to hope and if all keep silent or if they are given a choice between two kinds of humiliation they will be forever deprived of hope and we with them it seems to me impossible to endure that idea nor can he who cannot endure it lie down to sleep in his tower not through virtue as you see but through a sort of almost organic intolerance which you feel or do not feel indeed i see many who fail to feel it but i cannot envy their sleep this does not mean however that we must sacrifice our artist s nature to some social preaching or other i have said elsewhere why the artist was more than ever necessary but if we intervene as men that experience will have an effect upon our language and if we are not artists in our language first of all what sort of artists are we even if militants in our lives we speak in our works of deserts and of selfish love the mere fact that our lives are militant causes a special tone of voice to people with men that desert and that love i shall certainly not choose the moment when we are beginning to leave nihilism behind to stupidly deny the values of creation in favor of the values of humanity or vice versa in my mind neither one is ever separated from the other and i measure the greatness of an artist moliere tolstoy melville by the balance he managed to maintain between the two today under the pressure of events we are obliged to transport that tension into our lives likewise this is why so many artists bending under the burden take refuge in the ivory tower or conversely in the social church but as for me i see in both choices a like act of resignation we must simultaneously serve suffering and beauty the long patience the strength the secret cunning such service calls for are the virtues that establish the very renascence we need one word more this undertaking i know cannot be accomplished without dangers and bitterness we must accept the dangers the era of chairbound artists is over but we must reject the bitterness one of the temptations of the artist is to believe himself solitary and in truth he bears this shouted at him with a certain base delight but this is not true he stands in the midst of all in the same rank neither higher nor lower with all those who are working and struggling his very vocation in the face of oppression is to open the prisons and to give a voice to the sorrows and joys of all this is where art against its enemies justifies itself by proving precisely that it is no one s enemy by itself art could probably not produce the renascence which implies justice and liberty but without it that renascence would be without forms and consequently would be nothing without culture and the relative freedom it implies society even when perfect is but a jungle this is why any authentic creation is a gift to the future