What do you think?
Rate this book
Auf See
"Ich spüre, wie der Rausch des Alleinseins in mich eindringt, der süße Rausch der Ruhe, die nichts stören wird, kein weißer Brief, kein blaues Telegramm, nicht die Klingel meiner Tür, noch das Bellen meines Hundes. Ich bin allein, wirklich allein, wirklich frei." Und tatsächlich wird Maupassant während einer zehntägigen Kreuzfahrt mit der kleinen Jacht Bel-Ami durch nichts gestört als seine beiden treuen Matrosen (die sich höchstens ab und zu über die Windrichtung streiten). An Bord unternimmt er leidenschaftliche Exkurse ins Reich der Gedanken, sinniert über die Oberflächlichkeit der Welt des Geldes in Cannes und ihr prätentiöses Verhältnis zur Kunst, über die Selbstreflektiertheit des Künstlers, über Glück und Einsamkeit. Doch der Willkür von Wind und Wellen entsprechend, die das Boot mal vorwärtstreiben, mal zum Verweilen zwingen, kommt Maupassant um einige Landgänge nicht herum - und die haben es in sich. Ob er von einer Trauung berichtet oder von der Herrenrunde am Nebentisch, von in elenden Verhältnissen lebenden Bauern oder der Scheinwelt der reichen Kurorte und Casinos: Maupassants Liebe zum Kosmos, die sich auf See Bahn bricht, steht sein kritisch-sezierender Blick auf die Mitmenschen an Land gegenüber.
Maupassants 1888 im Proginal erschienener und dank Cornelia Hastings kongenialer Übersetzung nun endlich auf Deutsch erhältlicher Text ist weit mehr als der Bericht über eine Kreuzfahrt von Antibes bis Saint-Tropez: 'Auf See' ist ein so vielschichtiges wie kurzweiliges und inspiriertes Stück Literatur, ein Mosaik von Zeitungsartikeln und Erzählungen aus sieben Jahren schriftstellerischer Arbeit, eine Trouvaille von zeitloser Überzeugungskraft.
Maupassants 1888 im Proginal erschienener und dank Cornelia Hastings kongenialer Übersetzung nun endlich auf Deutsch erhältlicher Text ist weit mehr als der Bericht über eine Kreuzfahrt von Antibes bis Saint-Tropez: 'Auf See' ist ein so vielschichtiges wie kurzweiliges und inspiriertes Stück Literatur, ein Mosaik von Zeitungsartikeln und Erzählungen aus sieben Jahren schriftstellerischer Arbeit, eine Trouvaille von zeitloser Überzeugungskraft.
192 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 1888
27 people are currently reading
817 people want to read
About the author
Guy de Maupassant
7,488 books3,050 followersHenri René Albert Guy de Maupassant was a popular 19th-century French writer. He is one of the fathers of the modern short story. A protege of Flaubert, Maupassant's short stories are characterized by their economy of style and their efficient effortless dénouement. He also wrote six short novels. A number of his stories often denote the futility of war and the innocent civilians who get crushed in it - many are set during the Franco-Prussian War of the 1870s.
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 30 of 55 reviews
July 25, 2017
Un relato muy corto, pero lo que he disfrutado con ese principio...
June 13, 2017
"Я один, в самом деле один, в самом деле свободен!" - дневник свободного человека, отдыхающего от всего на яхте, на воде. Легкий морской бриз относит прочь суету и мелочность мира, приземленность и озабоченность своей персоной.
Очищенный от всего этого, повествователь рассуждает о вечном: о преклонении перед вышестоящими чинами (Канн - обиталище принцев и герцогов), о духовном окостенении завсегдатаев салонов, о войне ("Люди войны - это бедствие мира."), о любви (история полковничьей дочери, сбежавшей с дезертиром), о самодурстве монархов и о луне ("Человек, нормально любящий при солнце, неистово обожает при луне.")
P.S. Thanks to one of my friends here for inspiration!
Очищенный от всего этого, повествователь рассуждает о вечном: о преклонении перед вышестоящими чинами (Канн - обиталище принцев и герцогов), о духовном окостенении завсегдатаев салонов, о войне ("Люди войны - это бедствие мира."), о любви (история полковничьей дочери, сбежавшей с дезертиром), о самодурстве монархов и о луне ("Человек, нормально любящий при солнце, неистово обожает при луне.")
P.S. Thanks to one of my friends here for inspiration!
October 8, 2015
This is an odd, half-hearted sort of book which purports to be one thing and shades into another. At first, we are presented with Guy de Maupassant as amateur captain of a sailboat named the Bel-Ami, after his most popular novel. He complains about being forced to be a sociable human being, yet for all his pretensions, he is sailing only a few nautical miles between St Tropez and Antibes with frequent overnight stops at inns along the way.
Afloat has one little authorial tic that is almost unique: Virtually every series ends in an anticlimax. It is as if Maupassant was eager to embark on a line of thought but, somewhere along the way, loses steam.
Still, there are some nice essayistic passages, such as his condemnation of war and of "table-chat" (to which he is nonetheless addicted). There are spurious paragraphs such as this one:
Still, Afloat is not a bad read, and it tells us a lot more about its author than of the places along the Riviera he visits.
Afloat has one little authorial tic that is almost unique: Virtually every series ends in an anticlimax. It is as if Maupassant was eager to embark on a line of thought but, somewhere along the way, loses steam.
Still, there are some nice essayistic passages, such as his condemnation of war and of "table-chat" (to which he is nonetheless addicted). There are spurious paragraphs such as this one:
Oh, how I sometimes wish not to be able to think or feel, to live like an animal in some light, sunny country, a yellow country where there's no coarse, grass greenery, in one of those Oriental countries where you drop off peacefully to sleep and wake up cheerfully, go about your business without worry, where you can love without feeling distress, where you're barely aware of existing.Is there such a place? I think not. If it speaks of anything, it speaks of Maupassant's overweening restlessness.
Still, Afloat is not a bad read, and it tells us a lot more about its author than of the places along the Riviera he visits.
February 21, 2025
Timeless.
"Invading a country, cutting someone's throat because he was defending his home, because he's wearing a smock and not a uniform, a kepi, burning down the houses of poor wretches who haven't even a crust of bread, smashing up or stealing furniture, drinking wine they've discovered in a cellar, raping women who happen to be on the street, burning millions of banknotes to ashes and then going away leaving destitution and cholera behind them."
"Invading a country, cutting someone's throat because he was defending his home, because he's wearing a smock and not a uniform, a kepi, burning down the houses of poor wretches who haven't even a crust of bread, smashing up or stealing furniture, drinking wine they've discovered in a cellar, raping women who happen to be on the street, burning millions of banknotes to ashes and then going away leaving destitution and cholera behind them."
November 19, 2021
This is part of a collection of odd short stories that I had never read before - the most interesting aspect of all of them is that the ending is always rather mysterious and unlike the untying of the knot which readers tend to expect (or at least used to expect at the time when Maupassant was writing). The ending leads us away from the content of the story and makes us wonder what could happen next. Interesting.
March 3, 2019
I have just reread with great pleasure Guy de Maupassant's compact logbook Afloat, which purports to chronicle nine days aboard his yacht Bel-Ami in spring 1887, as he and his two-man crew set sail from Antibes. However, the title is a bit misleading as, thanks to the weather, Maupassant spends more time ashore than afloat. However, the 100-page memoir actually takes place neither at sea nor on land but in the fertile consciousness of the famed writer, where his musings and ironic commentary drift beguilingly from French history to Parisian society, from architecture to death; from tuberculosis to war, from mobocracy to friendship. But always built on a foundation of enchanting and evocative descriptions of nature—the sea, the sky, the wind, the mountains, and the land.
Afloat enables a rare, direct connection with the author for fans of Maupassant, like me. Over the years I have read and reread all his hundreds of short stories in translation, often keeping an anthology bedside. In the past year I read for the first time his 1885 novel Bel-Ami (his yacht’s namesake), which compares favorably with other noted 19th century young-provincial-seeks-fortune-in-Paris novels: Stendhal’s The Red and the Black (1830), Flaubert’s A Sentimental Education (1869) and, my favorite, Balzac’s Père Goriot (1834). However, in Maupassant’s voluminous short fiction, the author per se is seldom visible (though Bel-Ami is seemingly autobiographic to large degree.)
He writes with a sharp eye and keen ear not only of Parisian society but also of provincial petite bourgeoisie, peasants, and sportsmen, always with clarity and heart but sans sentimentality, and always focused on the consciousnesses of his characters and, at times, his narrator, not of the author. So here, in Afloat, we glimpse Guy on a busman’s holiday of sorts: a writer still writing but without the curtain of form and story that generally conceals him.
Thus we get here from Maupassant a very funny description of royalty worship in Cannes, both cynicism and lyricism as his moods swing with the weather and his migraines, a vicious indictment of war, and a penetrating exposé of the tortures of being a hypersensitive fiction writer who views and catalogues life solely as source material. We find thoughtful digressions on peasants, love, land speculation, friendship, and the perils of office work. Along the way we also come to appreciate his considerable good sense, his iconoclastic wisdom and his well-wrought credo. We get to know him as a man as well as an author, sharing with him a fortifying voyage I will likely take again.
Also worthwhile here is the informative introduction (best read, like most introductions, after reading the book) by translator Douglas Parmée. His 2008 English rendering of Sur l’eau captures Maupassant’s subtle wit, informality and directness of expression that often escaped earlier translators of his work.
Afloat enables a rare, direct connection with the author for fans of Maupassant, like me. Over the years I have read and reread all his hundreds of short stories in translation, often keeping an anthology bedside. In the past year I read for the first time his 1885 novel Bel-Ami (his yacht’s namesake), which compares favorably with other noted 19th century young-provincial-seeks-fortune-in-Paris novels: Stendhal’s The Red and the Black (1830), Flaubert’s A Sentimental Education (1869) and, my favorite, Balzac’s Père Goriot (1834). However, in Maupassant’s voluminous short fiction, the author per se is seldom visible (though Bel-Ami is seemingly autobiographic to large degree.)
He writes with a sharp eye and keen ear not only of Parisian society but also of provincial petite bourgeoisie, peasants, and sportsmen, always with clarity and heart but sans sentimentality, and always focused on the consciousnesses of his characters and, at times, his narrator, not of the author. So here, in Afloat, we glimpse Guy on a busman’s holiday of sorts: a writer still writing but without the curtain of form and story that generally conceals him.
Thus we get here from Maupassant a very funny description of royalty worship in Cannes, both cynicism and lyricism as his moods swing with the weather and his migraines, a vicious indictment of war, and a penetrating exposé of the tortures of being a hypersensitive fiction writer who views and catalogues life solely as source material. We find thoughtful digressions on peasants, love, land speculation, friendship, and the perils of office work. Along the way we also come to appreciate his considerable good sense, his iconoclastic wisdom and his well-wrought credo. We get to know him as a man as well as an author, sharing with him a fortifying voyage I will likely take again.
Also worthwhile here is the informative introduction (best read, like most introductions, after reading the book) by translator Douglas Parmée. His 2008 English rendering of Sur l’eau captures Maupassant’s subtle wit, informality and directness of expression that often escaped earlier translators of his work.
February 14, 2009
"Two short books in a row, this one barely one hundred pages!" Well, I'm trying to close the gap on Doug. Even reading can be a competitive sport. Moreover, it is Guy de Maupassant, for Heaven's sake! Must I apologize for reading him, however brief the book? And what a book it is. This purports to be a diary of a yacht trip between Nice and St. Tropez Maupassant undertook in the late 1880's. Critics say that he has actually distilled it from several trips and has inserted into the "travelogue" episodes that surely sprang from his fertile imagination (see the fascinating review in The New York Review of Books, February 26, 2009). "Afloat" contains some of the most misanthropic passages I've ever read, and yet in the end one can't quite label Maupassant a misanthrope. As he himself acknowledges, he possesses too much animal instinct, too much joie de vivre, too much curiosity for to sink into total nihilism. On the one side, Maupassant lounges on his boat, contemplating his disgust for human beings, their stench and their meaningless activity; but on the other side, he is eager to be ashore, investigating the intriguing behavior he elsewhere condemns. Mixed with this are his keen observations of the natural beauty of the Mediterranean coastline. Some of his "vignettes" are unforgettable: the murderer that the ruler of Monte Carlo can't find a way to execute and so ends up supporting; the loyal wife who rejects all to follow a husband into exile and poverty, only to discover that for thirty years he has been having an affair with someone else; etc. "Afloat" also contains trenchant sections against militarism, about French wit, concerning the vacuousness of "table talk," and numerous other topics. Indeed, I can't end this review without sharing two brief quotations that give a taste of Maupassant's sharp verbal sword: "When people mention cannibalism, we smile smugly to show how superior we are to savages. But who are the real savages--the ones who fight in order to eat those they've killed or the ones who kill for the sake of killing?" (p. 30). "We don't know anything, do anything, solve anything, imagine anything, we're shut up, imprisoned within ourselves. And there are people who think that the human race is wonderful!" (p. 25).
July 24, 2018
Gran Coup de Coeur por este pequeño libro de apenas 160 páginas. Un corto periplo, a bordo de un pequeño navío por la costa del sur de Francia, en el que los pensamientos de Maupassant son los principales protagonistas.
El escritor, mecido por las olas y el viento e inspirado por el paisaje que lo rodea, va desgranando pensamientos y opiniones acerca de todo lo que cruza por su mente: la sensación de libertad que uno experimenta al encontrarse completamente solo; el desprecio por la guerra; su condición de escritor, alegría y, al mismo tiempo, condena; la monotonía de la existencia y las cadenas que uno se impone para huir de la soledad; el amor, el matrimonio, la vejez...
Todo pasa por el juicio certero y la bellísima escritura de Maupassant. El resultado, un manojo de divagaciones que remueven el espíritu, y permanecen, aún después de cerrar la última página.
El escritor, mecido por las olas y el viento e inspirado por el paisaje que lo rodea, va desgranando pensamientos y opiniones acerca de todo lo que cruza por su mente: la sensación de libertad que uno experimenta al encontrarse completamente solo; el desprecio por la guerra; su condición de escritor, alegría y, al mismo tiempo, condena; la monotonía de la existencia y las cadenas que uno se impone para huir de la soledad; el amor, el matrimonio, la vejez...
Todo pasa por el juicio certero y la bellísima escritura de Maupassant. El resultado, un manojo de divagaciones que remueven el espíritu, y permanecen, aún después de cerrar la última página.
March 1, 2022
An exquisite little book that everyone should read. The more I read from de Maupassant the more I grow to appreciate him. Let yourself be transported to a voyage along the French Riviera and explore the depths of a great human mind and soul. In these pages de Maupassant, feeling alone and free for a few days at last, writes down his thoughts on life, love, art, nature, and society.
March 31, 2010
Maupassant's description of himself reminds me of someone I know:
He seems to possess two souls, one of which records and comments on every sensation of its neighbor, the usual, natural sort which he shares with us all. He feels himself fated, always, at all times, to be a reflection of himself and of everybody else, condemned to watch himself feeling, acting, loving, suffering, thinking--and yet never feeling, acting, loving, suffering, thinking in the same way as other people, simply, openly, straightforwardly, without analyzing every feeling of joy, every feeling of sorrow.
And when he loves, if he loves a woman, he will dissect her as one dissects a corpse in a morgue. Everything she says or does is instantly weighed in the finely adjusted scales of his inner observation and graded for its documentary value. If she throws herself impulsively, without thinking, into his arms, he'll analyze her action: was it well judged, appropriate, dramatically effective? And if he feels it was a sham or badly executed, he'll condemn it.
Being simultaneously the actor and the spectator, of himself and of other people, he's never really acted like your normal straightforward sort of person. Everything surrounding him is seen, as it were, in a mirror--people's hearts, actions, secret intentions--and he suffers from a strange disorder, a sort of split personality which turns him into a terrifyingly complicated, vibrant machine, immensely exhausting for himself. His unique and unhealthy sensitivity makes him like someone being skinned alive, for his sensations always cause him pain.
-From April 10
He seems to possess two souls, one of which records and comments on every sensation of its neighbor, the usual, natural sort which he shares with us all. He feels himself fated, always, at all times, to be a reflection of himself and of everybody else, condemned to watch himself feeling, acting, loving, suffering, thinking--and yet never feeling, acting, loving, suffering, thinking in the same way as other people, simply, openly, straightforwardly, without analyzing every feeling of joy, every feeling of sorrow.
And when he loves, if he loves a woman, he will dissect her as one dissects a corpse in a morgue. Everything she says or does is instantly weighed in the finely adjusted scales of his inner observation and graded for its documentary value. If she throws herself impulsively, without thinking, into his arms, he'll analyze her action: was it well judged, appropriate, dramatically effective? And if he feels it was a sham or badly executed, he'll condemn it.
Being simultaneously the actor and the spectator, of himself and of other people, he's never really acted like your normal straightforward sort of person. Everything surrounding him is seen, as it were, in a mirror--people's hearts, actions, secret intentions--and he suffers from a strange disorder, a sort of split personality which turns him into a terrifyingly complicated, vibrant machine, immensely exhausting for himself. His unique and unhealthy sensitivity makes him like someone being skinned alive, for his sensations always cause him pain.
-From April 10
July 1, 2018
Despite having a read many short stories by Guy de Maupassant (never one of the novels), the first thing I tend to think about when Maupassant is called to mind is Max Ophüls' 1952 anthology film LE PLAISIR, which adapts three of the esteemed 19th century writer's stories, one after the other. I think especially of the opening piece, which I have always found the most indelible, based on "Le Masque" (which appeared in 1889, one year after the appearance of AFLOAT). "Le Masque" tells the story of a mysterious man who appears at a masked ball, entreats a young woman to dance, dances like an absolute maniac, then collapses; after the man's mask is removed, revealing that he is a far older man than his earlier joie de vivre may have led us to believe, he is returned home to his wife, who proceeds to explain that her poor old husband was once quite a lady's man and that he just can't seem to let go of that old ardor, the poor dear. This story displays what I hold to be two key themes (though hardly the only two) at the heart of Maupassant: high society as pestilential seductress, and the fact that one's passions very often have a tendency to shipwreck one. That Guy de Maupassant has a conflicted relationship to high society and, well, pretty much everything else, is a fact central to AFLOAT, his clearly-taking-extreme-liberties-with-fact "journal" detailing a week in his yacht (named, like the novel that made this brat from Normandy a superstar, Bel-Ami) along the French Mediterranean. AFLOAT charts a course along the coast, but it also charts undulations of mood, and might most fundamentally be said to supply a cartography of malaise. You see, Maupassant is a cantankerous fellow. The highs and the lows of mood he experiences also mean that he is very likely to poetically valorize something he has not long ago been seen denigrating. When he is feeling especially low he will even let us know how stupid and pointless nature itself is. Later, of course, he can be found making love to the moon, say, or a "little patch of water in which are mirrored the whole of space, the whole sky, every dream." Mood. This is not only a man of moods but a man with a mood problem (and he almost certainly already has the syphilis that will drive him mad and kill him). But if you think he can be mean to the natural world when he is in a funk, check out what he has in store for mankind! And do check it out! The misanthropic diatribes that liberally pepper AFLOAT are well worth the price of admission. They're probably the main attraction. Fans of subsequent super-grumps Louis-Ferdinand Céline and Thomas Bernhard will especially wish to take note. He actually talks about how much he hates looking at everybody's stupid face. And believe me: he means EVERYBODY ... at least at that moment. At one point he has a migraine, sniffs some ether, and is knocked out for quite some time. He wants us to know that he is familiar with the effects of opium and hashish, as well as the lowest and highest specimens found within the ranks of womankind. This is a man who was shipwrecked less by his passions than by his animal appetites. It would appear celebrity has had a ... corrupting effect. He hates being a celebrity. And oh my Lord how he also loves it. This is a man who is sick to death of people, can't stand them, gets on his yacht to fuck off away from them, and then subsequently can't stop going to shore to share in their company. Mood. Paradox. Cognitive dissonance. Oh buddy, tell me about it. I get it, Guy. Believe me. All you want to do is get on your yacht with the two dudes you pay to do all the work, and disappear, yet somehow your journal ends with you hooking up with a buddy at a casino in Monte Carlo. You cannot seem to disattach from your attachments. AFLOAT also tends to break out in spasms of short story. Here is where things get extremely apocryphal. You know he is taking liberties. People he meets (sure, whatever), stories he recalls. Very interesting vignettes serving both as counterpoint and also a reminder that Maupassant is involved in a novel writerly undertaking. He knows he has to entertain but he has provided himself license to be a little naughty, a little wicked. I love the part where he suddenly has an upswell of good fellow feeling in his breast for his countrymen and claims (hilariously) that ONLY the French are witty and understand wit. It were almost as though Oscar Wilde were not a rising star across the English Channel AT THE VERY MOMENT. I would also like to note that I think of late 19th century Paris as a wild, insane, debautched place. AFLOAT was published in 1888. That is not too long after the Paris Commune. It is also four years before the guillotining of anarchist bomber Ravachol. Alfred Jarry and UBU ROI are not all that far off. Even if Baudelaire does sit on his night table and even if he does enjoy the odd puff of opium now and then, Maupassant, coddled to an extent as he was by ol ' Flaubert, represents something older, something maybe on the way out. Something soon to go mad and die of syphilis. In saying all this, however, I risk making you think I don't totally love this guy. Dude. I totally love this guy!
January 17, 2019
Maupassant, I wish you’d sunk this time into writing more stories instead of being a pretentious prick.
Want to read
June 29, 2015https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2XPO8...
oops
the real link is here: https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/49318
yet no, I won't wipe the mistake
January 7, 2018
D’après Maupassant, il a écrit ce récit pour lui-même, pour « arrêter les idées errantes » qu’il a eu dans sa tête, mais qu’il a été demandé de le faire publier toute de suite, sans révision ou quoi que ce soit, et il l’a fait. Et tous ces éléments sont évidents.
Il commence une partie avec ses mouvements sur le bateau avec ses matelots Bernard et Raymond, et dès qu’il voit quelque chose ou il fait quelque chose qui lui fait souvenir d’un évènement, d’une histoire qu’il a vécu ou entendu, il nous les raconte. Donc ce récit est vraiment un rassemblement des nouvelles, des aperçus de la vie et la terre de la Côte d’Azur en 1888. Et de cette manière, son style d’écriture ici est un peux dans la même veine que les écritures de Virginia Woolf quelques années plus tard. Et comme elle, avec ce récit on vague d’un moment à un autre, d’un évènement à une idée, d’un récit des faits/actions à des songes philosophiques et historiques. Il n’y a pas de but, ni de logique d’une histoire à la suivante, mais si vous avez le temps de vaguer sur son chemin, il a des choses intéressantes et pertinentes à vous dire.
Comme celles-ci :
Il commence une partie avec ses mouvements sur le bateau avec ses matelots Bernard et Raymond, et dès qu’il voit quelque chose ou il fait quelque chose qui lui fait souvenir d’un évènement, d’une histoire qu’il a vécu ou entendu, il nous les raconte. Donc ce récit est vraiment un rassemblement des nouvelles, des aperçus de la vie et la terre de la Côte d’Azur en 1888. Et de cette manière, son style d’écriture ici est un peux dans la même veine que les écritures de Virginia Woolf quelques années plus tard. Et comme elle, avec ce récit on vague d’un moment à un autre, d’un évènement à une idée, d’un récit des faits/actions à des songes philosophiques et historiques. Il n’y a pas de but, ni de logique d’une histoire à la suivante, mais si vous avez le temps de vaguer sur son chemin, il a des choses intéressantes et pertinentes à vous dire.
Comme celles-ci :
September 30, 2023
4.5 rounded up. An entertaining read that provides a glimpse into the intelligent, moody, always compelling mind of Maupassant. Some favorite passages:
"We all feel emptiness around ourselves, an unfathomable emptiness, which nags away at our troubled hearts and minds and makes us go, madly, with open arms and eager lips in search of someone to hold in our arms."
"I hate letters, they frighten me: they tie me down. The sound of these little oblong pieces of paper being torn open is like the clink of shackles binding me to living people...they're all saying the same thing, 'where are you? What are you doing?...How can you expect anyone to like you if you keep deserting your friends? You'll end by hurting their feelings.' Allright then, don't get to like me!"
"Lucky indeed are those who've never felt utter revulsion at endlessly repeating the same actions, who have the strength, day after day, to undertake the same tasks...under the same sky, going along the same streets where they'll see the same faces...Lucky are those who aren't disgusted when they realise that nothing ever changes, nothing happens--and what a bore it all is!"
"We all feel emptiness around ourselves, an unfathomable emptiness, which nags away at our troubled hearts and minds and makes us go, madly, with open arms and eager lips in search of someone to hold in our arms."
"I hate letters, they frighten me: they tie me down. The sound of these little oblong pieces of paper being torn open is like the clink of shackles binding me to living people...they're all saying the same thing, 'where are you? What are you doing?...How can you expect anyone to like you if you keep deserting your friends? You'll end by hurting their feelings.' Allright then, don't get to like me!"
"Lucky indeed are those who've never felt utter revulsion at endlessly repeating the same actions, who have the strength, day after day, to undertake the same tasks...under the same sky, going along the same streets where they'll see the same faces...Lucky are those who aren't disgusted when they realise that nothing ever changes, nothing happens--and what a bore it all is!"
January 26, 2021
This isn't a "novel" per say, though the translator considers it a nice blending of fiction and travelogue. Everyone's favorite French syphilitic, de Maupassant spent a few days sailing up and down the coast between various resorts. Don't be fooled, though, for the always masterful Maupy uses much of the space of his journal to expound on women, society and its scourge, art, death, life, and various other topics. He is always a gem to read and there are several strange little anecdotes of his coastal wanderings put forth here that intrigue and entice. Likely for the completist only.
August 11, 2025
C’est tellement random mais ça va
April 23, 2022
THE RULE OF SILENCE
IN WHICH SUCCESS AND HAPPINESS MISCARRY
HAS BEEN IMPOSED UPON ME
IN THE WORLD OF MAN
WHOSE AVOIDANCE IS THE ONLY VIABLE STATE I KNOW OF
IN THIS INFECTION DISGRACING ALL HUMANITY
IN THAT HUSHED LONE SEA OF MINE
MAN'S AIR OF PESTILENT INFLUENCE AND PERFIDIOUS AND SUBTLE DECEIT
NO LONGER MEANDERS THROUGH IT-
THIS IS MY DEDICATION TO
GUY DE MAUPASSANT
WHOM I REVERE PROFOUNDLY :
---
I ALWAYS HAVE TO ASK MYSELF :
NOTHING BUT THE SIGHT OF INSUFFERABLE
INIMITABLY PLATITUDINOUS MONOTONOUS PEOPLE
FILLING THEIR SHOALS WITH WEEDY THOUGHTS
WHICH MAKE THEIR EYES SHINE ON EMPTY FACES
SUFFUSED WITH THE GELID RIME OF CRIMES SO VILE
AND TESTIFYING TO APPETITES BASE -
SO OVERWHELMED AND DISGUSTED AND RACKED I AM
BY ALL THIS THAT I CANNOT QUENCH MY YEARNING
FOR DEATH , THAT I DO NOT WISH TO DELAY IT ANY LONGER ,
DRUNKEN WITH THE FERVOUR OF SOMETHING INEXPLICABLE
WHICH CONJURES UP A DESIRE OF THE ABANDONMENT OF THAT
WHICH THEY CALL '' THE UNIVERSE '' WHICH MAKES THEM UP -
WHAT IS LARGE ABOUT THE UNIVERSE ?
THE LITTLENESS OF ITS BEING LARGE
WHICH IS SO DIMINUTIVE AS TO BE OBLIGED
TO MOUNT ALL MEN'S LUNACY TO BEHOLD IT IN THAT INFINITUDE ! ,
THAT NOTHING OF THEIR UNIVERSE REVOLTS ME
AS A CRUEL HATE OF A DIVINE FATE OF LUNATICS ! ,
THE GLOOMINESS OF AN AUTUMN IN CHASTENED LIGHTS
ENVELOPS ME , OPPRESSES ME , STIFLES ME
AS AN OMNIPRESENT OGERISH DELUSION OF A PHANTOM OF THEIRS
THAT APPEARS TO BE ALIVE AND WILL NOT LET GO OF ME ,
AN OUTCAST AND A STRANGER THAT I AM
WHO HAS BEEN WASHED ASHORE HERE
TO EVER SHOAL AS THEY DO ,
A SHALLOWESS SO PROFUND THAT
IT IMPERSONATES THE VANITY OF THEIR UNIVERSE !
CREEPING UP INTO MY GARRET
BREATHING WITH DIFFICULTY
IN THAT DARKENED ROOM IN WHICH I NOW SIT
ALL IMPORTANCE VANISHING
ALL TOO WELL ACQAINTED WITH THE DISTRESS OF THE GRAVITY OF BEING
THE EXPRESSION OF DESPAIR ON MY FACE
GRADUALLY FLOODING ME , DROWNING ME
ENTERTAIN THE BOORISH AND IGNORANT PUBLIC
ASKING FOR VULGARITY ONLY ,
AS VULGARITY IS ALL THAT THEY ARE CAPABLE OF UNDERSTANDING
THERE IS THIS SORDID MOISTURE IN THE AIR
GATHEREING LIKE DARK RAINCLOUDS ALL ABOUT ME
READY TO DISCHARGE THEIR FITS OF ANGER AND FEAR ANY MINUTE
TO SPITE ME
TO HANG MYSELF ON THEM ,
EVERY RAINCLOUD LIKE AN UNAVOIDABLE COMMITMENT
MOVES IN MY DIRECTION AS A SLANTINGLY SQUINTING PROPENSITY TO CORRUPTION
STORMING MY ENTRENCHMENT
TO DELUGE ME WITH ITS BANEFUL EXISTENCE
UNTIL THEY HAVE CONTRIVED TO CORRUPT ME AS WELL :
YOU LOATHSOME SOLDIERY , YOU MILITARY MANIACS
I WILL MAINTAIN MY INSUBORDINATION TO YOU
WHILE I CAN !
YOU NAUSEOUS PARADE OF MILITARY OFFICERS
ALL PACKED TOGETHER IN YOUR UNITED WORLD -
WHAT IS UNITED IN IT
BUT YOUR IGNORANCE AND INDIFFERENCE ?
SLAUGHTERING THROUGH IGNORANCE AND INDIFFERENCE
EVILDOERS AND BACKSLIDERS FROM GOD IS WHAT YOU ARE
FALLING INTO FORNICATION WITH THE SANE MIND
BLUNDERING THROUGH YOUR THICK-WITTEDNESS ON EARTH
EXACTLY AS THE UNITED NATIONS ARE
NOW WATCHING THIS HUMAN LUNACY BEING UNLEASHED IN THE UKRAINE -
WHERE ARE THE BLASTED UNITED NATIONS NOW ?
WHERE IS THAT UNITED WORLD OF DASHINGLY FINE JACK-A-DANDIES ?
CONSTITUTING AN INCAPACITY TO'' BE ''
SAVE BY LOUNGING AWAY DULL HOURS IN SICKNESS
AND GRANDILOQUENT SPEECHES DISGORGING INTO INUTILITY ! ,
CONSTITUTING AN UNFITNESS TO '' BE ''
AS THE SACRILEGE THEREOF ,
WITH NO ONE CARING TO SAY :
HEY ! THE UKRAINIAN WAR ,
THAT IS A GROSS WRONG -
WE MUST PREVENT THIS IN THE 21st CENTURY !
WE MUST STICK TOGETHER ,
THIS CANNOT HAPPEN !
THIS WAR IN THE UKRAINE CANNOT HAPPEN !
AND YET IT DOES HAPPEN ,
IT ENERVATES ME , BECAUSE SEEMINGLY
I HAVEN'T LOST MY MEMORY YET LIKE THEM!
EVERYTHING IN YOUR WORLD IS AN INTOLERABLE LINSEY - WOOLSEY
WHICH ASSUMES THE ASPECT OF BEING CULTIVATED AND HUMANE
THE TRUE ENJOYMENT OF IT ALL BEING EMPTY CAN BE DERIVED FROM
THE GENTEEL TRAGEDY OF HUMAN EXISTENCE
THE PETTIFOGGING MODE OF PRACTISING HUMAN JUSTICE
SWAYING FROM SIDE TO SIDE
LIKE AN UNCEASINGLY SWILLING , FELONIOUS MADMAN
WITH A SHAM PLEA OF GUILTLESSNESS
KNOCK THAT FACE OF HUMAN JUSTICE AND ITS FALSE DELICACY TO A JELLY
THAT NO LONGER IT MAY LIKE ITS DISLIKE FOR ITSELF
APPREHEND THAT FELON OF HUMAN JUSTICE
WITH THE JUDGES AND ATTORNEYS AND ALL THOSE OTHER VENERABLE COURTIERS
BEING THE GREATEST OFFENDERS
THEN PUT IT TO DEATH
THE TRUTH IS UNDERSTAFFED -
DO WE NOT ALL HAVE A CRIMINAL RECORD
IN HAVING CHANGED LIFE INTO A CRIME ?
OR IS LIFE A CRIME PER SE ?
IT IS SOMETHING I HAVE ALWAYS MARVELLED AT :
JUVENILE DETENTION CENTRES , PRISONS , ASYLUMS , SCHOOLS AND SO ON
TEACHERS LOCKING CHILDREN IN SCHOOLS
JUDGES LOCKING HUMANS IN PRISONS ,
( BECAUSE THEY ARE BAD
AND ALL THE OTHERS ARE THE GOOD ONES ! )
IS THERE SOMETHING WRONG WITH MAN ?
DOES INTELLECTUALISM NOT WORK IN THE WAY
IT WAS MEANT TO , IT WAS DESIGNED TO ?
ALL MEN ARE CRIMINALS IN ONE WAY OR THE OTHER :
IF YOU DO NOT AGREE WITH SOCIETY ,
YOU ARE MARKED ,
YOU ARE A CRIMINAL ,
AND IF YOU DO AGREE WITH SOCIETY ,
YOU BECOME A TOOL FOR TORTURING AND KILLING OTHERS -
THEY DID NOT TEACH YOU HOW TO LIVE AT SCHOOL WHAT DID THEY TEACH YOU THEN BUT TO BE A CRIMNAL ?
WHILE YOU ARE ALIVE ,
YOU ARE CAUGHT IN A MIST OF BEING
IN WHICH ALL OF YOUR CRIES HUSH WITHIN
IN BEING KEPT IN CUSTODY IN THE CRIME OF BEING -
DEFENDANT , PROSECUTOR , DEFENCE COUNCEL , JUDGE :
IN OBSERVING THIS PREPOSTEROUS DISPLAY OF HUMAN TRUTH
HAVE YOU NOT BEEN FORCIBLY OUSTED FROM BEING ?
BUT WHO FAILS TO ASSSENT HERE ?
WHO WILL NOT UNDERTAKE THE TASK OF
BEING INSTRUMENTAL IN THIS HUMAN TRUTH OF BEING ?
YOU MUST BE PUNISHED FOR YOUR FREEDOM ,
FOR THE PARADOX OF YOUR FREEDOM
DETERMINED BY RULES AND OBLIGATIONS
OOZING OUT OF YOUR COURTHOUSES AS ANOTHER LIE
BY BEING EXECUTED BY THE JUSTICE OF VERITY !
JUDGES DISPENSING JUSTICE
TO DEFEND ALL THOSE RESPECTABLE CITIZENS OF SOCIETY
WHO REPESENT JUSTICE : VORACIOUS SCOUNDRELS
AVID FOR REPRESENTING AND ADHERING TO THE LAW OF MAN ,
THE LAW OF MAN BEING A PROTECTIVE ACT TO
UPHOLD THE LUNACY OF HUMAN EXISTENCE ,
AN ACT WHICH MUST NEVER BE REVOKED ,
AS IT IS BUILT ON THE ACADEMIC SCHOLARSHIP
AVID FOR THE SELF-GLORIFICATION OF ITS AUTOCRACY ONLY !
AN IMMATERIAL PUELLA OF INTANGIBLE REMORSE IN THE DISTANCE
STROLLING OUT INTO THE SUNSET
NO LONGER CLOYED BY LIVING ON THE VILLAINY OF MAN
LOSING HER REASON
SPURNING EACH LAW
NO MORE BREATHING STALE MUSTY SANE AIR
CONTAMINATED BY ALL THOSE MEN
WHO GLUT THEIR VORACIOUS PHARYNGES
ON THE CORRUPTION OF TRUTH
TO PROP THE KNAVERY OF THEIR THRONE !
AND SHE ASKS :
'' WHAT CAN BE DONE ?
WHO IS A DISPENSER OF WISDOM
IN THE ANIMOSITY OF MAN'S WORLD
TO BESPEAK HIM SAGELY
AND CAUTION HIM AGAINST HIS LEGAL KNOWLEDGE
ENCHANTING HIM WITH HER GLANCE OF PRUDENCE ? ''
SHE WAS CALLED '' GLOAMING OF SUNSET '' ,
IT WAS HER REAL NAME
FOR THEREIN SHE WAS FINALLY INCARNATED -
ALL MOULDINESS AND STAGNANT WATERS OF MAN
HAD DWINDLED AWAY AND SHE WAS PLUNGED INTO
A SCENTED HYPNOTIC SLEEP OF WILD FRENZY ,
AS HER LIFE HAD ALWAYS BEEN ,
THEN SURROUNDED BY THAT SYCOPHANTIC CREW
ENTOMBED ALIVE IN THEIR JUSTICE AND APPARENTLY BEING HUMAN...
---
THE EVENING TWILIGHT OF REASON IN TREMBLING YOUTH
SEEKS THE REASON
TO DECLARE THE JOURNEY OF ERRING BEING
WHEN PAIN HAS NOT YET BEEN FORGED
TO FOLLOW THE HOLLOW TEMPO OF ADULT MAN
WHEN THE FEROCITY OF YOUTH IN VERDANT SPRING UNDWINDLING
PREVENTS THEM FROM BESMEARING THEMSELVES WITH
WHAT OFFENDS AGAINST THE FIERY BLOSSOMS OF FREEDOM
TASTING THE ENCHANTMENT OF HER LONGING
HIDING IN DARK ABYSMAL DEPTHS SHIMMERING,
WITHIN THEMSELVES ,
AS THE TENDER YEARS OF HER OWN YOUTH'S UNDYING RADIANCE
TO ALLURE THEM TO SET FREE HER HEAVY SUN AND MIGHTY SKY
AND HEADY FRAGRANCE OF SADNESS
AS A LUXURIANT MAGNIFICENCE OF STINGLESS LEAVES OF BRILLIANT LIGHT ,
THE DAYS OF WHICH ARE NO MORE DUMB
IN WHICH MAN IS BEING RENDERED NUMB
EXHALING CONTAGIOUS RESIGNATION
RIGID WITH HORROR BLASPHEMING THE HOLINESS OF HIS OWN RELIGION
O WHAT A TWILIGHT MANIA WHEREIN ALL DAYLIGHT DWINDLES ,
THE SAP OF WHICH DRIPPING AS THE DEW OF AURORA'S RUDDY MORNING
FINALLY BRINGING EASE FROM MAN'S LUNACY FOR EVER
NOT VAUNTING ANY VAINNESS ,
AS A TUMULTUOUS SWOON
FROM WHICH SHE EMERGES AS A STRANGE DELIRIOUS DREAM,
TO DISSPIPATE DOUBTS OF HER SIGHING TRANSIENCE
IN THE BARREN STERILE LAND OF MAN
HAVING BEING FOUND GUILITY OF
STREWING REPENTANCE ON HER
UNABLE TO APPREHEND HER
SAVE AS PLIGHTING HIMSELF TO HER BEING UNLAWFUL,
TO LOOSE HER SOMBRE HAIR IN RAPTURE
THAT IT FALL ON EVERYONE AND TRANSCEND IGNORANCE
BY LOOSENING THE HOLD OF ALL THOSE NUMBERLESS LAWS
WHICH CONSTITUTE HIS VERY EXISTENCE UNINTELLIGIBLE,
EXTINGUISHING THE NIGHT OF ETERNAL SMOULDERING ASHES,
THAT PRECIPITOUS DESCENT TO SUBJECT HIM AND OVERHWLEM HIM
AS A CONSTANCY OF EXISTENCE WHIRLING ITSELF TO ITS BANE,
YOU MEN ARE BUT TONGUELESS PRISONERS OF DESPAIR
IN YOUR WORLD OF APPEARANCES
AND APPEARANCES CANNOT BE PROVED
YOUR ENTIRE INTELLECTUALISM IS BASED ON APPEARANCES
IS NOT INTELLECTUALISM A BELIEF ?
YOU CANNOT PROVE INTELLECTUALISM
SINCE YOU CANNOT PROVE A BELIEF !
AND IT IS ALSO THE WORST FORM OF BELIEF
BY WHICH THE MAJORITY OF PEOPLE ARE DISADVANTAGED
IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE VERY NATURE OF MAN
YOU HAVE ALWAYS BELIEVED IN THE WRONG CAUSE
FOUNDING THE SEMBLANCE OF LIFE , FREEDOM AND PEACE
SINCE THERE IS NO FREEDOM ,LIFE ,PEACE
ONLY THE FAECES OF FREEDOM, LIFE ,PEACE ARE PROCESSED
AS A FORM OF REMAND
FROM WHICH YOU WILL NEVER BE RELEASED
CONTINUING WHILE YOU ARE ALIVE ;
YOU ARE BUT A MASS FACTORY
INCESSANTLY PRODUCING ARTIFICIAL GREY HUMANS
AS A DIM DERISION OF DEAD SIGHS
NOT KNOWING WHAT ELSE TO DO
HAVING TO AVAIL YOURSELVES OF SUCH SEDUCTIVE CHARMS-
HOW ELSE ARE YOU TO TOLERATE THE DOCTRINES OF SOCIETY ?,
CREATIVE MASTERS OF THE EQUIVOCAL AND HENCE WORTHLESS
IN YOUR WORLD OF APPEARANCES :
YOU PESTIFEROUS MIXTURE OF
CORRODING RUST CONSUMED BY YOUR LIVES' FROST
AND BEING INVEIGLED AWAY BY IMBECILITY AND
BOTH MORAL AND SOCIAL PERVERTEDNESS ,
FOR IS THIS NOT THE ONLY MEANS
YOU HAVE AT YOUR DISPOSAL
TO KEEP THE HUMAN LIE GOING ?
WHO IS TO SEE WITH GAINFUL EYES ELUDING THEMSELVES ?
LIGHT FAILS YOU
YOUR VISION HAS BEEN EFFACED BY
THE ELUSORINESS OF YOUR LIVES !
ACCOMPLISH YOUR COMMANDS
UNDER THE GUARDIANSHIP OF YOUR PNEUMA'S HEALING POWERS
PROCLAIMING YOU FOR A SUPER-TERRESTRIAL RACE
IN THAT FURY OF A TWILIGHT MANIA !
O LANGUISHING BLOSSOMS OF LIFE IN INCOMPARABLE LUSTRE
I INHALE YOUR TWILIGHT AND SURRENDER
TAKE ME WITH YOU AND IMMOLATE ME IN YOUR CALAMITY,
BEWILDERMENT AND VACUITY OF EXPRESSION...
---
UPON '' A MEANS TO AN END '',
AN EXCERPT -
I CONSIDER THAT THE TRUTH ABOUT MAN
CAN BE FORMULATED IN AN EXTREMELY SIMPLE WAY,
YOU WILL FORGIVE ME
FOR MY BEING SO RUTHLSS AND OUTSPOKEN ABOUT THIS
BUT MY REPUGNANCE TO MAN AND HENCE TO MYSELF AS WELL
DEFIES THAT WHICH COULD BE DESCRIBED IN USING LANGUAGE,
YOU NEED TO VIEW MAN AS A PURCHASED SOLDIER ALWAYS
ROBBED OF REASON IN HIS HOMICIDAL LEANINGS
APPEALING TO THE '' INTELLECT OF POWER '' TO GUIDE HIM
ABIDING BY THE THEORIES THAT
INTELLECTUALISM HAS PROVIDED HIM WITH
IN ORDER TO NEVER BE RELEASED FROM THE BONDS OF
THE SCIENTIFIC AND SCHOLARLY INTELLECT
BY WHICH HE ALLOWS HIMSELF TO BE DECEIVED
INTELLECTUALITY DEGRADING REASON , DESTROYING IMAGINATION
PEOPLING THE HUMAN WORLD WITH AUTOMATONS
UNABLE TO THINK OR ACT OF THEIR OWN ACCORD
ALL OF THEM PRESENTING THE SEMBLANCE OF TRUTH
AS ILLUSIONS OF BEAUTIFUL CREATIONS
IN WHICH THEY ARE CLOTHED IN THEIR INTERDEPENDENCE ,
IN OTHER WORDS,
EVERY SPECIMEN BEING A SUPPRESSED PRODUCTION OF '' HUMAN TRUTH '',
THUS STAKING A CLAIM TO SURVIVAL
IN BEING ON A PAR WITH THE INTELLECTUAL SYSTEM
THROUGH HIS OBEDIENCE TO IT
AS '' A MEANS TO AN END '' -
EVERYTHING REGARDING THE HUMAN NATURE ,
MIND YOU , I SPEAK IN GENERAL TERMS
BECAUSE THE GENERAL CASE IS WHAT DEFINES MAN ,
NOT EXCEPTIONS WILLING TO THROW THEMSELVES AWAY
BEING IN REVOLT AGAINST THE HUMAN CONDITIONS
AS THEY HAVE BEEN ESTABLISHED BY CIVILISATION
CARRYING AN INEVITABLE INFELICITY OF BEING
WHICH IS FELT BY THEM , THOSE EXCEPTIONS,
NOT FOLLOWING THE HERD-DRIVE
AS A GENERALITY OF '' HUMAN TRUTH '',
AS UNBEARBALE BODLIY AND MENTAL SUFFERING
BY WHICH THEY ARE HELD DOWN AND NULLIFIED ,
A TOTAL NULLIFICATION IN THE REALM OF HUMANITY,
WHICH IS FELT BY THEM
AS AN INTOLERABLE DEIFICATION OF ALL THE PRIMITIVE STAGES
THAT MAN HAS UNDERGONE THROUGHOUT HUMAN HISTORY,
NOW HAVING REACHED THE ULTIMATE MOST PRIMITIVE STAGE -
GLOBALISATION AS SOMETHING MORE CHANGELESS
THAN ANYTHING PRECEDING IT
TO FACILITATE THE TOTAL EXPLOITATION OF THE WHOLE WORLD
AS A SUPRA - MODERN CONDITION OF CIVILISATION
TO PROMOTE GREED MORE THAN EVER BEFORE IN HUMAN HISTORY,
AND THERE IS NO LAW AGAINST GREED
OTHERWISE YOU WOULD HAVE TO LOCK ALL OF MANKIND UP
AND THEREFORE HUMAN JUSTICE AS WELL,
ALL DESTITUTE OF MORALITY , REAL LIFE , FEELINGS
TWINING ROUND THE TOWER OF BEING TO DARKEN IT
AS AN EVIL THAT EXPANDS HIGHER THAN HE HIMSELF IS
TO ENGENDER THE SEMBLANCE OF PERFECTION
SUFFOCATING AND MURDERING EVERYTHING
THAT IS LINKED TO REASON!
AND LET NO ONE CROSS THIS KIND OF HUMAN JUSTICE
IN WHICH EVERYTHING IS LEGAL OTHER THAN VERITY!
AND IT IS THIS GENERAL CASE REGARDING MEN THAT
EMBODIES THE SUBSTANCE,
THE CONTENT OF THEIR DAILY ACTIONS :
A MEANS TO AN END!
MAN IS DEVOID OF VIRTUES-
ALL VIRTUES SERVE AS A MEANS TO AN END
SUCH AS LOVE , AFFECTION , FREEDOM , PEACE , RELIGION
AND SO ON - THEY ARE NOTHING BUT A PAGEANT
TO ADVANCE IN LIFE SUCH AS CREATED BY MAN
A PAGEANT WHICH IS ON A PAR WITH THE TRIVIAL '' TRUTH '' OF MAN
FOUNDED ON THE NOTION OF SUCCESS , WEALTH AND HENCE MONEY :
ALL THOSE VIRTUES ARE VENAL
SINCE THEY PROMOTE THE EGOISM OF MAN
INHERENT IN HIS NATURE,
ABOVE ALL,
IS NOT INTELLECTUALISM A MEANS TO AN END
ATHIRST FOR GLORY
ITS PESTILENTIAL RAYS FALLING ASLANT TO BLIGHT LIFE
ENDEAVOURING TO DIMINSH THE WORLD
BY MORAL INSTRUCTION
INCLINING THE INTELLECTUAL TO REPROOF OF IMPROVEMENT
BY DEJECTING THOSE WHO WILL NOT LISTEN TO SUCH REPROOF,
WHEREBY SUSTAINING HIMSELF ON MORAL PROFIT
REMOVING SUCH REFRACTORY OBSTACLES
IMPEDING THE ACCEPTANCE OF
HIS '' PARADOXICAL BELIEF '' MASKED AS TRUTH-
CONFIDING THE POEM OF LIFE TO ANOTHER HUMAN BEING
CAN NO LONGER BE A MEANS TO AN END
FOR YOU NEED TO PRESUPPOSE THE EXISTENCE OF SUCH HUMAN BEING !
DOES NOT GENUINE POETRY CHARGE MAN WITH THE CRIME OF HIS WICKED BEING
JUSTIFIED BY '' INTELLECTUAL TRUTHS '',
HOW CAN IT BE A MEANS TO AN END THEN,
AS INTELLECTUALISM IS,
IF IT IS PROFITLESS?
IT IS MERELY WICKEDNESS AND VICIOUSNESS
THAT HAVE BEEN FOUNDED ON EARTH
ON THE PRINCIPLE OF INTELLECTUALISM
CORRESPONDING WITH THE ESSENCE OF
MAKING WHAT IS OVERDONE AND ARTIFICIAL
AND YET DESERVING THE DESIGNATION OF '' BEING HUMAN ''
AS A MEANS TO AN END
TO EXPLOIT THE MAJORITY OF PEOPLE
AND TO BENEFIT INTELLECTUALISM
AS AN AUTOCRATIC RULER OF THE WORLD !
SOMETHING UTTERLY TRIVIAL
CAN BE INFERRED FROM THIS :
ONCE YOU ABOLISH '' THE END '' ,
THERE CAN BE NO MORE HUMAN LIFE,
ITS '' FLOWER OF TRUTH '' BLIGHTED FOR GOOD,
THE SUPER-EARTHLY GLORY NO LONGER
GOING FORTH INTO THE AIR AS A PARANOID LUNATIC
SURROUNDED BY HIS MERCENARIES
TO AFFORD HIM PROTECTION :
HE COULD NOT MAKE FREEDOM ,LIFE ,PEACE
AND LOVE A POSSESION OF HIS
BY ACQUIRING THEM THROUGH PECUNIARY MEANS ;
AND IS THE POEM OF LIFE NOT WITHOUT THAT END
IN THAT UNPOETICAL WORLD
WHERE YOU SEE ALL THOSE MEN BEHIND
THEIR LATTICED WINDOW PANES
BETRAYING NO SIGN OF LIFE
OTHER THAN THE RECOGNITION
OF THE INABILTY THEREO,
THE ILLUSORY APPEARANCES
OF WHICH THE HUMAN WORLD CONSIST ALONE
ARE THE CREATIONS OF THE MIND,
WHICH NATURALLY INCLUDES HIS UNIVERSE:
THE RENUNCIATION OF '' THE END WITHIN A MEANS ''
WOULD THUS PREDIPOSE HIM TO AN ABNORMAL
CONDITION OF REAL LUNACY
UNABLE TO HANDLE A NON-MENTAL WORLD
WHICH WOULD NO LONGER PROVIDE FOR HIM!
HE COULD NO LONGER BE SINGLED OUT FROM
THE WORLD OF ILLUSIONS TO SUBSTANTIATE THEM ,
HE WOULD FALL AWAY FROM HIS WORLD OF PERFECTION,
REPRESENTING SOMETHING AMISS,
IMMORTALITY BECOMING A TRANSITORY DARKNESS
AND THEN ?
WHAT THEN ?
I SHALL STOP AT THIS POINT
BECAUSE THE UNPREMIDATED SONG OF
PECKSNIFFIAN SAINTLINESS IN THE REAL
WORLD OF ILLUSIONS ENABLING HIM
TO ACCOUNT TO HIMSELF FOR THE ORIGIN OF BEING
DISGUSTS ME BEYOND WORDS,
SINCE THERE IS NO ORIGIN,
HE IS BUT THE VICTIM OF ILLUSIONS
IN HIS REAL WORLD
WHEREIN THE MIND DIRECTS
THE FORMATION OF HIS ORIGIN
IN WHICH HIS UNIVERSE IS ANCHORED :
MAN IS A TOTALITY OF APPEARANCES
MADE OF THOUGHT AND DEEMED REAL,
ATTRIBUTING REALITY TO THEM !
REAL AND ILLUSORY ,
WHICH IS WHICH ,
HOW CAN YOU TELL ONE FROM THE OTHER ?
AFTER BEING CREMATED OR
COMMITTED TO THE GROUND ?...
SPEAKING OF EXCEPTIONS,
I DOUBT THAT THEY ARE PRESENT TODAY,
AT ANY RATE , I HAVE NOT SEEN ANY,
ONLY THE GLOBALISATION OF STUPIDITY
WITHOUT ANYONE SUFFERING FROM
A NASTY STUPIDITY - HEADACHE ! ?
THE UNAVAILING PAGEANT OF '' BEING ''-
PUSHED ACROSS VACANT SPACE
GIVING YOU AN AFFECTIONATE AND OBSERVANT LOOK
AND THEIR PASSING NASTY KISSES,
MOMENTARILY WEDGED AGAINST ITS SANITY,
REPUGNATED WITH IT ALL TO DEATH,
AND PUSHED ONWARDS AND EVER ONWARDS,
IN AN ATTEMPT AT FLEEING FROM THEIR VACANT SPACE
WITHOUT BEING SUCCESSFUL IN DOING SO,
RUSHING INTO UNRESTRICTED INSANITY
EMPTY OF VACANT SPACE AND SQUASHED AGAINST IT FOR EVER -
THE HERMITAGE OF INSANITY
TO PUNISH YOURSELF FOR BEING BORN ,
THE MALICIOUS URGE TO INFLICT
RUTHLESS PUNISHMENT ON YOURSELF
BY BEING TORTURED BY THE STUPIDITY OF ALL MEN !
CHASTISEMENT AS A WAY OUT?
POLITICIANS , SCIENTISTS , PHILOSOPHERS , WORKMEN,
THEY ARE ALL AT CROSS-PURPOSES,
BECAUSE THEY CANNOT PULL TOGETHER,
BECAUSE THAT IS NOT WHAT THEY ARE PAID FOR,
THEY ARE PAID FOR BEING AT CROSS-PURPOSES,
BECAUSE OF THIS ILLUSION WHICH HAS BEEN ERECTED
AS THE HUMAN WORLD AND WHICH NO ONE CAN UNDERSTAND -
THE STREAMLET OF VERITY FLOWING PAST US
NO LONGER REFLECTING US ,ONLY THE GRANDEUR OF HERSELF
IN HER TIMIDITY AND MODESTY TO WARN US AGAINST OURSELVES
WHICH WE HAVE DEBASED IN HAVING BECOME ALIEN TO OURSELVES !,
THE STREAMLET OF VERITY WHICH CAN NO LONGER BE FOUND,
NO LONGER BE TRACKED ,LEAVING US TO OURSELVES AND OUR
OWN MADNESS , SHE HAS CRACKED AND VANISHED IN
THE DEEP CRACKS OF OUR UNDEFEATABLE GREEDY COLLECTIVE SUPER EGO
WHICH HAS HAVOCED ANY VESTIGES OF EXISTENCE,
WHICH ALSO BECOMES QUITE APPARENT
UPON SEEING WHAT MANKIND HAS TURNED INTO -
INTO SOMETHING STATIONARY UNABLE TO MOVE ONWARDS
AS STATIONARY AS THE HUMAN TRAFFIC WITH ALL ITS
STATIONARY VEHICLES ,STRANDED IN THEIR OWN DAMNATION
EVERYBODY WITH THEIR EYES SCREWED UP NO LONGER BEING
ABLE TO DISCERN IN WHICH DIRECTION TO MOVE
AS IT ALL HAS BECOME ONE UNIFORM MOVEMENT
THAT NO LONGER MOVES UNDER THE GUIDANCE OF POTENTATES,
AS IT HAS ALL BECOME STATIONARY, HAS COME TO A HALT,
TO A TOTAL STANDSTILL, AND PEOPLE CALL THAT LIFE!
AND PEOPLE LOOK FOR VERITY,HOW CAN THAT BE ?
WHO IS TO SUBDUE THIS COMPLETE REPUGNANCE TO BEING,
WHICH IS ALL THAT I AM AM STILL CAPABLE OF SENSING,
BEING = THIS INSUFFERABILITY OF HAVING TO LIVE,
TO THE TOTAL OBLIGATION IT HAS BEEN TURNED INTO ?
WHO ?
MAN ?
GOD ?
WHERE AM I ?...
IN WHICH SUCCESS AND HAPPINESS MISCARRY
HAS BEEN IMPOSED UPON ME
IN THE WORLD OF MAN
WHOSE AVOIDANCE IS THE ONLY VIABLE STATE I KNOW OF
IN THIS INFECTION DISGRACING ALL HUMANITY
IN THAT HUSHED LONE SEA OF MINE
MAN'S AIR OF PESTILENT INFLUENCE AND PERFIDIOUS AND SUBTLE DECEIT
NO LONGER MEANDERS THROUGH IT-
THIS IS MY DEDICATION TO
GUY DE MAUPASSANT
WHOM I REVERE PROFOUNDLY :
---
I ALWAYS HAVE TO ASK MYSELF :
NOTHING BUT THE SIGHT OF INSUFFERABLE
INIMITABLY PLATITUDINOUS MONOTONOUS PEOPLE
FILLING THEIR SHOALS WITH WEEDY THOUGHTS
WHICH MAKE THEIR EYES SHINE ON EMPTY FACES
SUFFUSED WITH THE GELID RIME OF CRIMES SO VILE
AND TESTIFYING TO APPETITES BASE -
SO OVERWHELMED AND DISGUSTED AND RACKED I AM
BY ALL THIS THAT I CANNOT QUENCH MY YEARNING
FOR DEATH , THAT I DO NOT WISH TO DELAY IT ANY LONGER ,
DRUNKEN WITH THE FERVOUR OF SOMETHING INEXPLICABLE
WHICH CONJURES UP A DESIRE OF THE ABANDONMENT OF THAT
WHICH THEY CALL '' THE UNIVERSE '' WHICH MAKES THEM UP -
WHAT IS LARGE ABOUT THE UNIVERSE ?
THE LITTLENESS OF ITS BEING LARGE
WHICH IS SO DIMINUTIVE AS TO BE OBLIGED
TO MOUNT ALL MEN'S LUNACY TO BEHOLD IT IN THAT INFINITUDE ! ,
THAT NOTHING OF THEIR UNIVERSE REVOLTS ME
AS A CRUEL HATE OF A DIVINE FATE OF LUNATICS ! ,
THE GLOOMINESS OF AN AUTUMN IN CHASTENED LIGHTS
ENVELOPS ME , OPPRESSES ME , STIFLES ME
AS AN OMNIPRESENT OGERISH DELUSION OF A PHANTOM OF THEIRS
THAT APPEARS TO BE ALIVE AND WILL NOT LET GO OF ME ,
AN OUTCAST AND A STRANGER THAT I AM
WHO HAS BEEN WASHED ASHORE HERE
TO EVER SHOAL AS THEY DO ,
A SHALLOWESS SO PROFUND THAT
IT IMPERSONATES THE VANITY OF THEIR UNIVERSE !
CREEPING UP INTO MY GARRET
BREATHING WITH DIFFICULTY
IN THAT DARKENED ROOM IN WHICH I NOW SIT
ALL IMPORTANCE VANISHING
ALL TOO WELL ACQAINTED WITH THE DISTRESS OF THE GRAVITY OF BEING
THE EXPRESSION OF DESPAIR ON MY FACE
GRADUALLY FLOODING ME , DROWNING ME
ENTERTAIN THE BOORISH AND IGNORANT PUBLIC
ASKING FOR VULGARITY ONLY ,
AS VULGARITY IS ALL THAT THEY ARE CAPABLE OF UNDERSTANDING
THERE IS THIS SORDID MOISTURE IN THE AIR
GATHEREING LIKE DARK RAINCLOUDS ALL ABOUT ME
READY TO DISCHARGE THEIR FITS OF ANGER AND FEAR ANY MINUTE
TO SPITE ME
TO HANG MYSELF ON THEM ,
EVERY RAINCLOUD LIKE AN UNAVOIDABLE COMMITMENT
MOVES IN MY DIRECTION AS A SLANTINGLY SQUINTING PROPENSITY TO CORRUPTION
STORMING MY ENTRENCHMENT
TO DELUGE ME WITH ITS BANEFUL EXISTENCE
UNTIL THEY HAVE CONTRIVED TO CORRUPT ME AS WELL :
YOU LOATHSOME SOLDIERY , YOU MILITARY MANIACS
I WILL MAINTAIN MY INSUBORDINATION TO YOU
WHILE I CAN !
YOU NAUSEOUS PARADE OF MILITARY OFFICERS
ALL PACKED TOGETHER IN YOUR UNITED WORLD -
WHAT IS UNITED IN IT
BUT YOUR IGNORANCE AND INDIFFERENCE ?
SLAUGHTERING THROUGH IGNORANCE AND INDIFFERENCE
EVILDOERS AND BACKSLIDERS FROM GOD IS WHAT YOU ARE
FALLING INTO FORNICATION WITH THE SANE MIND
BLUNDERING THROUGH YOUR THICK-WITTEDNESS ON EARTH
EXACTLY AS THE UNITED NATIONS ARE
NOW WATCHING THIS HUMAN LUNACY BEING UNLEASHED IN THE UKRAINE -
WHERE ARE THE BLASTED UNITED NATIONS NOW ?
WHERE IS THAT UNITED WORLD OF DASHINGLY FINE JACK-A-DANDIES ?
CONSTITUTING AN INCAPACITY TO'' BE ''
SAVE BY LOUNGING AWAY DULL HOURS IN SICKNESS
AND GRANDILOQUENT SPEECHES DISGORGING INTO INUTILITY ! ,
CONSTITUTING AN UNFITNESS TO '' BE ''
AS THE SACRILEGE THEREOF ,
WITH NO ONE CARING TO SAY :
HEY ! THE UKRAINIAN WAR ,
THAT IS A GROSS WRONG -
WE MUST PREVENT THIS IN THE 21st CENTURY !
WE MUST STICK TOGETHER ,
THIS CANNOT HAPPEN !
THIS WAR IN THE UKRAINE CANNOT HAPPEN !
AND YET IT DOES HAPPEN ,
IT ENERVATES ME , BECAUSE SEEMINGLY
I HAVEN'T LOST MY MEMORY YET LIKE THEM!
EVERYTHING IN YOUR WORLD IS AN INTOLERABLE LINSEY - WOOLSEY
WHICH ASSUMES THE ASPECT OF BEING CULTIVATED AND HUMANE
THE TRUE ENJOYMENT OF IT ALL BEING EMPTY CAN BE DERIVED FROM
THE GENTEEL TRAGEDY OF HUMAN EXISTENCE
THE PETTIFOGGING MODE OF PRACTISING HUMAN JUSTICE
SWAYING FROM SIDE TO SIDE
LIKE AN UNCEASINGLY SWILLING , FELONIOUS MADMAN
WITH A SHAM PLEA OF GUILTLESSNESS
KNOCK THAT FACE OF HUMAN JUSTICE AND ITS FALSE DELICACY TO A JELLY
THAT NO LONGER IT MAY LIKE ITS DISLIKE FOR ITSELF
APPREHEND THAT FELON OF HUMAN JUSTICE
WITH THE JUDGES AND ATTORNEYS AND ALL THOSE OTHER VENERABLE COURTIERS
BEING THE GREATEST OFFENDERS
THEN PUT IT TO DEATH
THE TRUTH IS UNDERSTAFFED -
DO WE NOT ALL HAVE A CRIMINAL RECORD
IN HAVING CHANGED LIFE INTO A CRIME ?
OR IS LIFE A CRIME PER SE ?
IT IS SOMETHING I HAVE ALWAYS MARVELLED AT :
JUVENILE DETENTION CENTRES , PRISONS , ASYLUMS , SCHOOLS AND SO ON
TEACHERS LOCKING CHILDREN IN SCHOOLS
JUDGES LOCKING HUMANS IN PRISONS ,
( BECAUSE THEY ARE BAD
AND ALL THE OTHERS ARE THE GOOD ONES ! )
IS THERE SOMETHING WRONG WITH MAN ?
DOES INTELLECTUALISM NOT WORK IN THE WAY
IT WAS MEANT TO , IT WAS DESIGNED TO ?
ALL MEN ARE CRIMINALS IN ONE WAY OR THE OTHER :
IF YOU DO NOT AGREE WITH SOCIETY ,
YOU ARE MARKED ,
YOU ARE A CRIMINAL ,
AND IF YOU DO AGREE WITH SOCIETY ,
YOU BECOME A TOOL FOR TORTURING AND KILLING OTHERS -
THEY DID NOT TEACH YOU HOW TO LIVE AT SCHOOL WHAT DID THEY TEACH YOU THEN BUT TO BE A CRIMNAL ?
WHILE YOU ARE ALIVE ,
YOU ARE CAUGHT IN A MIST OF BEING
IN WHICH ALL OF YOUR CRIES HUSH WITHIN
IN BEING KEPT IN CUSTODY IN THE CRIME OF BEING -
DEFENDANT , PROSECUTOR , DEFENCE COUNCEL , JUDGE :
IN OBSERVING THIS PREPOSTEROUS DISPLAY OF HUMAN TRUTH
HAVE YOU NOT BEEN FORCIBLY OUSTED FROM BEING ?
BUT WHO FAILS TO ASSSENT HERE ?
WHO WILL NOT UNDERTAKE THE TASK OF
BEING INSTRUMENTAL IN THIS HUMAN TRUTH OF BEING ?
YOU MUST BE PUNISHED FOR YOUR FREEDOM ,
FOR THE PARADOX OF YOUR FREEDOM
DETERMINED BY RULES AND OBLIGATIONS
OOZING OUT OF YOUR COURTHOUSES AS ANOTHER LIE
BY BEING EXECUTED BY THE JUSTICE OF VERITY !
JUDGES DISPENSING JUSTICE
TO DEFEND ALL THOSE RESPECTABLE CITIZENS OF SOCIETY
WHO REPESENT JUSTICE : VORACIOUS SCOUNDRELS
AVID FOR REPRESENTING AND ADHERING TO THE LAW OF MAN ,
THE LAW OF MAN BEING A PROTECTIVE ACT TO
UPHOLD THE LUNACY OF HUMAN EXISTENCE ,
AN ACT WHICH MUST NEVER BE REVOKED ,
AS IT IS BUILT ON THE ACADEMIC SCHOLARSHIP
AVID FOR THE SELF-GLORIFICATION OF ITS AUTOCRACY ONLY !
AN IMMATERIAL PUELLA OF INTANGIBLE REMORSE IN THE DISTANCE
STROLLING OUT INTO THE SUNSET
NO LONGER CLOYED BY LIVING ON THE VILLAINY OF MAN
LOSING HER REASON
SPURNING EACH LAW
NO MORE BREATHING STALE MUSTY SANE AIR
CONTAMINATED BY ALL THOSE MEN
WHO GLUT THEIR VORACIOUS PHARYNGES
ON THE CORRUPTION OF TRUTH
TO PROP THE KNAVERY OF THEIR THRONE !
AND SHE ASKS :
'' WHAT CAN BE DONE ?
WHO IS A DISPENSER OF WISDOM
IN THE ANIMOSITY OF MAN'S WORLD
TO BESPEAK HIM SAGELY
AND CAUTION HIM AGAINST HIS LEGAL KNOWLEDGE
ENCHANTING HIM WITH HER GLANCE OF PRUDENCE ? ''
SHE WAS CALLED '' GLOAMING OF SUNSET '' ,
IT WAS HER REAL NAME
FOR THEREIN SHE WAS FINALLY INCARNATED -
ALL MOULDINESS AND STAGNANT WATERS OF MAN
HAD DWINDLED AWAY AND SHE WAS PLUNGED INTO
A SCENTED HYPNOTIC SLEEP OF WILD FRENZY ,
AS HER LIFE HAD ALWAYS BEEN ,
THEN SURROUNDED BY THAT SYCOPHANTIC CREW
ENTOMBED ALIVE IN THEIR JUSTICE AND APPARENTLY BEING HUMAN...
---
THE EVENING TWILIGHT OF REASON IN TREMBLING YOUTH
SEEKS THE REASON
TO DECLARE THE JOURNEY OF ERRING BEING
WHEN PAIN HAS NOT YET BEEN FORGED
TO FOLLOW THE HOLLOW TEMPO OF ADULT MAN
WHEN THE FEROCITY OF YOUTH IN VERDANT SPRING UNDWINDLING
PREVENTS THEM FROM BESMEARING THEMSELVES WITH
WHAT OFFENDS AGAINST THE FIERY BLOSSOMS OF FREEDOM
TASTING THE ENCHANTMENT OF HER LONGING
HIDING IN DARK ABYSMAL DEPTHS SHIMMERING,
WITHIN THEMSELVES ,
AS THE TENDER YEARS OF HER OWN YOUTH'S UNDYING RADIANCE
TO ALLURE THEM TO SET FREE HER HEAVY SUN AND MIGHTY SKY
AND HEADY FRAGRANCE OF SADNESS
AS A LUXURIANT MAGNIFICENCE OF STINGLESS LEAVES OF BRILLIANT LIGHT ,
THE DAYS OF WHICH ARE NO MORE DUMB
IN WHICH MAN IS BEING RENDERED NUMB
EXHALING CONTAGIOUS RESIGNATION
RIGID WITH HORROR BLASPHEMING THE HOLINESS OF HIS OWN RELIGION
O WHAT A TWILIGHT MANIA WHEREIN ALL DAYLIGHT DWINDLES ,
THE SAP OF WHICH DRIPPING AS THE DEW OF AURORA'S RUDDY MORNING
FINALLY BRINGING EASE FROM MAN'S LUNACY FOR EVER
NOT VAUNTING ANY VAINNESS ,
AS A TUMULTUOUS SWOON
FROM WHICH SHE EMERGES AS A STRANGE DELIRIOUS DREAM,
TO DISSPIPATE DOUBTS OF HER SIGHING TRANSIENCE
IN THE BARREN STERILE LAND OF MAN
HAVING BEING FOUND GUILITY OF
STREWING REPENTANCE ON HER
UNABLE TO APPREHEND HER
SAVE AS PLIGHTING HIMSELF TO HER BEING UNLAWFUL,
TO LOOSE HER SOMBRE HAIR IN RAPTURE
THAT IT FALL ON EVERYONE AND TRANSCEND IGNORANCE
BY LOOSENING THE HOLD OF ALL THOSE NUMBERLESS LAWS
WHICH CONSTITUTE HIS VERY EXISTENCE UNINTELLIGIBLE,
EXTINGUISHING THE NIGHT OF ETERNAL SMOULDERING ASHES,
THAT PRECIPITOUS DESCENT TO SUBJECT HIM AND OVERHWLEM HIM
AS A CONSTANCY OF EXISTENCE WHIRLING ITSELF TO ITS BANE,
YOU MEN ARE BUT TONGUELESS PRISONERS OF DESPAIR
IN YOUR WORLD OF APPEARANCES
AND APPEARANCES CANNOT BE PROVED
YOUR ENTIRE INTELLECTUALISM IS BASED ON APPEARANCES
IS NOT INTELLECTUALISM A BELIEF ?
YOU CANNOT PROVE INTELLECTUALISM
SINCE YOU CANNOT PROVE A BELIEF !
AND IT IS ALSO THE WORST FORM OF BELIEF
BY WHICH THE MAJORITY OF PEOPLE ARE DISADVANTAGED
IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE VERY NATURE OF MAN
YOU HAVE ALWAYS BELIEVED IN THE WRONG CAUSE
FOUNDING THE SEMBLANCE OF LIFE , FREEDOM AND PEACE
SINCE THERE IS NO FREEDOM ,LIFE ,PEACE
ONLY THE FAECES OF FREEDOM, LIFE ,PEACE ARE PROCESSED
AS A FORM OF REMAND
FROM WHICH YOU WILL NEVER BE RELEASED
CONTINUING WHILE YOU ARE ALIVE ;
YOU ARE BUT A MASS FACTORY
INCESSANTLY PRODUCING ARTIFICIAL GREY HUMANS
AS A DIM DERISION OF DEAD SIGHS
NOT KNOWING WHAT ELSE TO DO
HAVING TO AVAIL YOURSELVES OF SUCH SEDUCTIVE CHARMS-
HOW ELSE ARE YOU TO TOLERATE THE DOCTRINES OF SOCIETY ?,
CREATIVE MASTERS OF THE EQUIVOCAL AND HENCE WORTHLESS
IN YOUR WORLD OF APPEARANCES :
YOU PESTIFEROUS MIXTURE OF
CORRODING RUST CONSUMED BY YOUR LIVES' FROST
AND BEING INVEIGLED AWAY BY IMBECILITY AND
BOTH MORAL AND SOCIAL PERVERTEDNESS ,
FOR IS THIS NOT THE ONLY MEANS
YOU HAVE AT YOUR DISPOSAL
TO KEEP THE HUMAN LIE GOING ?
WHO IS TO SEE WITH GAINFUL EYES ELUDING THEMSELVES ?
LIGHT FAILS YOU
YOUR VISION HAS BEEN EFFACED BY
THE ELUSORINESS OF YOUR LIVES !
ACCOMPLISH YOUR COMMANDS
UNDER THE GUARDIANSHIP OF YOUR PNEUMA'S HEALING POWERS
PROCLAIMING YOU FOR A SUPER-TERRESTRIAL RACE
IN THAT FURY OF A TWILIGHT MANIA !
O LANGUISHING BLOSSOMS OF LIFE IN INCOMPARABLE LUSTRE
I INHALE YOUR TWILIGHT AND SURRENDER
TAKE ME WITH YOU AND IMMOLATE ME IN YOUR CALAMITY,
BEWILDERMENT AND VACUITY OF EXPRESSION...
---
UPON '' A MEANS TO AN END '',
AN EXCERPT -
I CONSIDER THAT THE TRUTH ABOUT MAN
CAN BE FORMULATED IN AN EXTREMELY SIMPLE WAY,
YOU WILL FORGIVE ME
FOR MY BEING SO RUTHLSS AND OUTSPOKEN ABOUT THIS
BUT MY REPUGNANCE TO MAN AND HENCE TO MYSELF AS WELL
DEFIES THAT WHICH COULD BE DESCRIBED IN USING LANGUAGE,
YOU NEED TO VIEW MAN AS A PURCHASED SOLDIER ALWAYS
ROBBED OF REASON IN HIS HOMICIDAL LEANINGS
APPEALING TO THE '' INTELLECT OF POWER '' TO GUIDE HIM
ABIDING BY THE THEORIES THAT
INTELLECTUALISM HAS PROVIDED HIM WITH
IN ORDER TO NEVER BE RELEASED FROM THE BONDS OF
THE SCIENTIFIC AND SCHOLARLY INTELLECT
BY WHICH HE ALLOWS HIMSELF TO BE DECEIVED
INTELLECTUALITY DEGRADING REASON , DESTROYING IMAGINATION
PEOPLING THE HUMAN WORLD WITH AUTOMATONS
UNABLE TO THINK OR ACT OF THEIR OWN ACCORD
ALL OF THEM PRESENTING THE SEMBLANCE OF TRUTH
AS ILLUSIONS OF BEAUTIFUL CREATIONS
IN WHICH THEY ARE CLOTHED IN THEIR INTERDEPENDENCE ,
IN OTHER WORDS,
EVERY SPECIMEN BEING A SUPPRESSED PRODUCTION OF '' HUMAN TRUTH '',
THUS STAKING A CLAIM TO SURVIVAL
IN BEING ON A PAR WITH THE INTELLECTUAL SYSTEM
THROUGH HIS OBEDIENCE TO IT
AS '' A MEANS TO AN END '' -
EVERYTHING REGARDING THE HUMAN NATURE ,
MIND YOU , I SPEAK IN GENERAL TERMS
BECAUSE THE GENERAL CASE IS WHAT DEFINES MAN ,
NOT EXCEPTIONS WILLING TO THROW THEMSELVES AWAY
BEING IN REVOLT AGAINST THE HUMAN CONDITIONS
AS THEY HAVE BEEN ESTABLISHED BY CIVILISATION
CARRYING AN INEVITABLE INFELICITY OF BEING
WHICH IS FELT BY THEM , THOSE EXCEPTIONS,
NOT FOLLOWING THE HERD-DRIVE
AS A GENERALITY OF '' HUMAN TRUTH '',
AS UNBEARBALE BODLIY AND MENTAL SUFFERING
BY WHICH THEY ARE HELD DOWN AND NULLIFIED ,
A TOTAL NULLIFICATION IN THE REALM OF HUMANITY,
WHICH IS FELT BY THEM
AS AN INTOLERABLE DEIFICATION OF ALL THE PRIMITIVE STAGES
THAT MAN HAS UNDERGONE THROUGHOUT HUMAN HISTORY,
NOW HAVING REACHED THE ULTIMATE MOST PRIMITIVE STAGE -
GLOBALISATION AS SOMETHING MORE CHANGELESS
THAN ANYTHING PRECEDING IT
TO FACILITATE THE TOTAL EXPLOITATION OF THE WHOLE WORLD
AS A SUPRA - MODERN CONDITION OF CIVILISATION
TO PROMOTE GREED MORE THAN EVER BEFORE IN HUMAN HISTORY,
AND THERE IS NO LAW AGAINST GREED
OTHERWISE YOU WOULD HAVE TO LOCK ALL OF MANKIND UP
AND THEREFORE HUMAN JUSTICE AS WELL,
ALL DESTITUTE OF MORALITY , REAL LIFE , FEELINGS
TWINING ROUND THE TOWER OF BEING TO DARKEN IT
AS AN EVIL THAT EXPANDS HIGHER THAN HE HIMSELF IS
TO ENGENDER THE SEMBLANCE OF PERFECTION
SUFFOCATING AND MURDERING EVERYTHING
THAT IS LINKED TO REASON!
AND LET NO ONE CROSS THIS KIND OF HUMAN JUSTICE
IN WHICH EVERYTHING IS LEGAL OTHER THAN VERITY!
AND IT IS THIS GENERAL CASE REGARDING MEN THAT
EMBODIES THE SUBSTANCE,
THE CONTENT OF THEIR DAILY ACTIONS :
A MEANS TO AN END!
MAN IS DEVOID OF VIRTUES-
ALL VIRTUES SERVE AS A MEANS TO AN END
SUCH AS LOVE , AFFECTION , FREEDOM , PEACE , RELIGION
AND SO ON - THEY ARE NOTHING BUT A PAGEANT
TO ADVANCE IN LIFE SUCH AS CREATED BY MAN
A PAGEANT WHICH IS ON A PAR WITH THE TRIVIAL '' TRUTH '' OF MAN
FOUNDED ON THE NOTION OF SUCCESS , WEALTH AND HENCE MONEY :
ALL THOSE VIRTUES ARE VENAL
SINCE THEY PROMOTE THE EGOISM OF MAN
INHERENT IN HIS NATURE,
ABOVE ALL,
IS NOT INTELLECTUALISM A MEANS TO AN END
ATHIRST FOR GLORY
ITS PESTILENTIAL RAYS FALLING ASLANT TO BLIGHT LIFE
ENDEAVOURING TO DIMINSH THE WORLD
BY MORAL INSTRUCTION
INCLINING THE INTELLECTUAL TO REPROOF OF IMPROVEMENT
BY DEJECTING THOSE WHO WILL NOT LISTEN TO SUCH REPROOF,
WHEREBY SUSTAINING HIMSELF ON MORAL PROFIT
REMOVING SUCH REFRACTORY OBSTACLES
IMPEDING THE ACCEPTANCE OF
HIS '' PARADOXICAL BELIEF '' MASKED AS TRUTH-
CONFIDING THE POEM OF LIFE TO ANOTHER HUMAN BEING
CAN NO LONGER BE A MEANS TO AN END
FOR YOU NEED TO PRESUPPOSE THE EXISTENCE OF SUCH HUMAN BEING !
DOES NOT GENUINE POETRY CHARGE MAN WITH THE CRIME OF HIS WICKED BEING
JUSTIFIED BY '' INTELLECTUAL TRUTHS '',
HOW CAN IT BE A MEANS TO AN END THEN,
AS INTELLECTUALISM IS,
IF IT IS PROFITLESS?
IT IS MERELY WICKEDNESS AND VICIOUSNESS
THAT HAVE BEEN FOUNDED ON EARTH
ON THE PRINCIPLE OF INTELLECTUALISM
CORRESPONDING WITH THE ESSENCE OF
MAKING WHAT IS OVERDONE AND ARTIFICIAL
AND YET DESERVING THE DESIGNATION OF '' BEING HUMAN ''
AS A MEANS TO AN END
TO EXPLOIT THE MAJORITY OF PEOPLE
AND TO BENEFIT INTELLECTUALISM
AS AN AUTOCRATIC RULER OF THE WORLD !
SOMETHING UTTERLY TRIVIAL
CAN BE INFERRED FROM THIS :
ONCE YOU ABOLISH '' THE END '' ,
THERE CAN BE NO MORE HUMAN LIFE,
ITS '' FLOWER OF TRUTH '' BLIGHTED FOR GOOD,
THE SUPER-EARTHLY GLORY NO LONGER
GOING FORTH INTO THE AIR AS A PARANOID LUNATIC
SURROUNDED BY HIS MERCENARIES
TO AFFORD HIM PROTECTION :
HE COULD NOT MAKE FREEDOM ,LIFE ,PEACE
AND LOVE A POSSESION OF HIS
BY ACQUIRING THEM THROUGH PECUNIARY MEANS ;
AND IS THE POEM OF LIFE NOT WITHOUT THAT END
IN THAT UNPOETICAL WORLD
WHERE YOU SEE ALL THOSE MEN BEHIND
THEIR LATTICED WINDOW PANES
BETRAYING NO SIGN OF LIFE
OTHER THAN THE RECOGNITION
OF THE INABILTY THEREO,
THE ILLUSORY APPEARANCES
OF WHICH THE HUMAN WORLD CONSIST ALONE
ARE THE CREATIONS OF THE MIND,
WHICH NATURALLY INCLUDES HIS UNIVERSE:
THE RENUNCIATION OF '' THE END WITHIN A MEANS ''
WOULD THUS PREDIPOSE HIM TO AN ABNORMAL
CONDITION OF REAL LUNACY
UNABLE TO HANDLE A NON-MENTAL WORLD
WHICH WOULD NO LONGER PROVIDE FOR HIM!
HE COULD NO LONGER BE SINGLED OUT FROM
THE WORLD OF ILLUSIONS TO SUBSTANTIATE THEM ,
HE WOULD FALL AWAY FROM HIS WORLD OF PERFECTION,
REPRESENTING SOMETHING AMISS,
IMMORTALITY BECOMING A TRANSITORY DARKNESS
AND THEN ?
WHAT THEN ?
I SHALL STOP AT THIS POINT
BECAUSE THE UNPREMIDATED SONG OF
PECKSNIFFIAN SAINTLINESS IN THE REAL
WORLD OF ILLUSIONS ENABLING HIM
TO ACCOUNT TO HIMSELF FOR THE ORIGIN OF BEING
DISGUSTS ME BEYOND WORDS,
SINCE THERE IS NO ORIGIN,
HE IS BUT THE VICTIM OF ILLUSIONS
IN HIS REAL WORLD
WHEREIN THE MIND DIRECTS
THE FORMATION OF HIS ORIGIN
IN WHICH HIS UNIVERSE IS ANCHORED :
MAN IS A TOTALITY OF APPEARANCES
MADE OF THOUGHT AND DEEMED REAL,
ATTRIBUTING REALITY TO THEM !
REAL AND ILLUSORY ,
WHICH IS WHICH ,
HOW CAN YOU TELL ONE FROM THE OTHER ?
AFTER BEING CREMATED OR
COMMITTED TO THE GROUND ?...
SPEAKING OF EXCEPTIONS,
I DOUBT THAT THEY ARE PRESENT TODAY,
AT ANY RATE , I HAVE NOT SEEN ANY,
ONLY THE GLOBALISATION OF STUPIDITY
WITHOUT ANYONE SUFFERING FROM
A NASTY STUPIDITY - HEADACHE ! ?
THE UNAVAILING PAGEANT OF '' BEING ''-
PUSHED ACROSS VACANT SPACE
GIVING YOU AN AFFECTIONATE AND OBSERVANT LOOK
AND THEIR PASSING NASTY KISSES,
MOMENTARILY WEDGED AGAINST ITS SANITY,
REPUGNATED WITH IT ALL TO DEATH,
AND PUSHED ONWARDS AND EVER ONWARDS,
IN AN ATTEMPT AT FLEEING FROM THEIR VACANT SPACE
WITHOUT BEING SUCCESSFUL IN DOING SO,
RUSHING INTO UNRESTRICTED INSANITY
EMPTY OF VACANT SPACE AND SQUASHED AGAINST IT FOR EVER -
THE HERMITAGE OF INSANITY
TO PUNISH YOURSELF FOR BEING BORN ,
THE MALICIOUS URGE TO INFLICT
RUTHLESS PUNISHMENT ON YOURSELF
BY BEING TORTURED BY THE STUPIDITY OF ALL MEN !
CHASTISEMENT AS A WAY OUT?
POLITICIANS , SCIENTISTS , PHILOSOPHERS , WORKMEN,
THEY ARE ALL AT CROSS-PURPOSES,
BECAUSE THEY CANNOT PULL TOGETHER,
BECAUSE THAT IS NOT WHAT THEY ARE PAID FOR,
THEY ARE PAID FOR BEING AT CROSS-PURPOSES,
BECAUSE OF THIS ILLUSION WHICH HAS BEEN ERECTED
AS THE HUMAN WORLD AND WHICH NO ONE CAN UNDERSTAND -
THE STREAMLET OF VERITY FLOWING PAST US
NO LONGER REFLECTING US ,ONLY THE GRANDEUR OF HERSELF
IN HER TIMIDITY AND MODESTY TO WARN US AGAINST OURSELVES
WHICH WE HAVE DEBASED IN HAVING BECOME ALIEN TO OURSELVES !,
THE STREAMLET OF VERITY WHICH CAN NO LONGER BE FOUND,
NO LONGER BE TRACKED ,LEAVING US TO OURSELVES AND OUR
OWN MADNESS , SHE HAS CRACKED AND VANISHED IN
THE DEEP CRACKS OF OUR UNDEFEATABLE GREEDY COLLECTIVE SUPER EGO
WHICH HAS HAVOCED ANY VESTIGES OF EXISTENCE,
WHICH ALSO BECOMES QUITE APPARENT
UPON SEEING WHAT MANKIND HAS TURNED INTO -
INTO SOMETHING STATIONARY UNABLE TO MOVE ONWARDS
AS STATIONARY AS THE HUMAN TRAFFIC WITH ALL ITS
STATIONARY VEHICLES ,STRANDED IN THEIR OWN DAMNATION
EVERYBODY WITH THEIR EYES SCREWED UP NO LONGER BEING
ABLE TO DISCERN IN WHICH DIRECTION TO MOVE
AS IT ALL HAS BECOME ONE UNIFORM MOVEMENT
THAT NO LONGER MOVES UNDER THE GUIDANCE OF POTENTATES,
AS IT HAS ALL BECOME STATIONARY, HAS COME TO A HALT,
TO A TOTAL STANDSTILL, AND PEOPLE CALL THAT LIFE!
AND PEOPLE LOOK FOR VERITY,HOW CAN THAT BE ?
WHO IS TO SUBDUE THIS COMPLETE REPUGNANCE TO BEING,
WHICH IS ALL THAT I AM AM STILL CAPABLE OF SENSING,
BEING = THIS INSUFFERABILITY OF HAVING TO LIVE,
TO THE TOTAL OBLIGATION IT HAS BEEN TURNED INTO ?
WHO ?
MAN ?
GOD ?
WHERE AM I ?...
October 11, 2008
How can I not love Guy de Maupassant? To read his short stories and become dizzy with rapture is one thing; to read words coming out of this personal diary....
A peek into the mind of this unique and bizarre writer, a true primus inter pares if there ever was one, is as great as reading from his prose. His passionate condemnation of war is the best I've ever read from anyone, his observations on the pettiness of humanity, on the truth of the writer, and on existentialist tenets well ahead of his time, and more shrewd and concise than Kierkegaard's, makes him a fitting forerunner of that ideology. Peppered with delicious historical anecdotes, - him visiting the place where Paganini was buried, or his looking at the fortress where the Man in the Iron Mask was purportedly held - and beautiful geographical descriptions, Afloats ranks amongst the sweetest diaries I've ever read, and probably will ever read.
A peek into the mind of this unique and bizarre writer, a true primus inter pares if there ever was one, is as great as reading from his prose. His passionate condemnation of war is the best I've ever read from anyone, his observations on the pettiness of humanity, on the truth of the writer, and on existentialist tenets well ahead of his time, and more shrewd and concise than Kierkegaard's, makes him a fitting forerunner of that ideology. Peppered with delicious historical anecdotes, - him visiting the place where Paganini was buried, or his looking at the fortress where the Man in the Iron Mask was purportedly held - and beautiful geographical descriptions, Afloats ranks amongst the sweetest diaries I've ever read, and probably will ever read.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
November 20, 2015
Free download available at Project Gutenberg.
Title: Afloat
(Sur l'eau)
Author: Guy de Maupassant
Illustrator: Riou
Translator: Laura Ensor
Release Date: June 29, 2015 [EBook #49318]
Language: English
Produced by Dagny and Marc D'Hooghe at http://www.freeliterature.org (Images generously made available by the Hathi Trust)
This Diary contains no story and no very thrilling adventure. While cruising about on the coasts of the Mediterranean last Spring, I amused myself by writing down every day what I saw and what I thought.
I saw but the water, the sun, clouds and rocks,—I can tell of nought else,—and my thoughts were mere nothings, such as are suggested by the rocking of the waves, lulling and bearing one along.
Title: Afloat
(Sur l'eau)
Author: Guy de Maupassant
Illustrator: Riou
Translator: Laura Ensor
Release Date: June 29, 2015 [EBook #49318]
Language: English
Produced by Dagny and Marc D'Hooghe at http://www.freeliterature.org (Images generously made available by the Hathi Trust)
This Diary contains no story and no very thrilling adventure. While cruising about on the coasts of the Mediterranean last Spring, I amused myself by writing down every day what I saw and what I thought.
I saw but the water, the sun, clouds and rocks,—I can tell of nought else,—and my thoughts were mere nothings, such as are suggested by the rocking of the waves, lulling and bearing one along.
August 30, 2023
I don't think I have ever read de Maupassant and been disappointed. His prose is famously efficient, so the payback for time invested is usually excellent. This account of time spent off the south coast of France is a prime example. Just don't expect a "normal" travelogue. It's more in the vein of an unreliable memoir which de Maupassant uses as a vehicle for a collection of short stories. I read this book ten years ago when I came across it in my local library. Ten years later, I still remember the glisten of the setting sun on the waves, the warm breeze on my cheeks and salt in my nostrils that this book evoked. Although not as celebrated as Boule de Suif, Bel Ami, or The Necklace, I highly recommend Afloat as a terrific short read.
September 4, 2008
Short story/essay collection disguised as a travelogue. It packs a lot in a small package.
Here's a quotation:
"Calm reigns everywhere, the warm, gentle, calm of the Midi and it seems weeks and months and years since I’ve had anything to do with people who dash around and never stop talking. I can enjoy the thrill of being alone, the quiet thrill of being able to rest and never be disturbed by a letter or a telegram, the sound of a doorbell, or even the barking of my dog. Nobody can call on me, invite me out, depress me with smiles, harass me with flattery. I’m alone, really alone, and I’m free.” (p. 9)
Here's a quotation:
"Calm reigns everywhere, the warm, gentle, calm of the Midi and it seems weeks and months and years since I’ve had anything to do with people who dash around and never stop talking. I can enjoy the thrill of being alone, the quiet thrill of being able to rest and never be disturbed by a letter or a telegram, the sound of a doorbell, or even the barking of my dog. Nobody can call on me, invite me out, depress me with smiles, harass me with flattery. I’m alone, really alone, and I’m free.” (p. 9)
February 19, 2013
Mopasan je izvrstan pripovedač, jedan od meni najdražih, a ovde ulazimo u njegov svet misli koje se nižu baš onako kako ih je on formirao, tokom putešestvija njegovim brodom Bel Ami. Ovo je više dnevnik nego knjiga, odnosno novela, i sam Mopasan nije hteo da se to objavi, ali je posle smrti to urađeno.
Iako je prisutan onaj pripovedački ton koji se oseti u njegovim delima, ovde je razvodnjen, jer je pisac dao sebi oduška, smatrajući kako ne piše za masu već za sebe, a usput se borio sa opasnim migrenama, koje su ga na kraju i na žalost, koštale života.
Iako je prisutan onaj pripovedački ton koji se oseti u njegovim delima, ovde je razvodnjen, jer je pisac dao sebi oduška, smatrajući kako ne piše za masu već za sebe, a usput se borio sa opasnim migrenama, koje su ga na kraju i na žalost, koštale života.
January 1, 2016
A delightful little book about a man's meditations on a sailboat. As he passes through ports and islands, sometimes forced to spend extra days there on account of bad weather, he recounts some tales about those places. But at other times, the thoughts become more reflective - about the repetitive nature of life, about war, about the curse of a writer who cannot help but detail out of each moment as a spectator, about sadness of a moonstruck night.
Like Lila, and like Rings of Saturn, it makes me yearn for a Long meditative journey
Like Lila, and like Rings of Saturn, it makes me yearn for a Long meditative journey
March 24, 2015
de Maupassant was in a far better mood when he wrote AFLOAT than he was during his writings of the rest of his novels. I wish he would have really described some place in detail that he didn't like, such as Naples, which he only mentioned all too briefly. Everything was so utterly picture perfect in the book that it actually became borderline monotonous towards the end, such as reading an antiquated tour brochure from Liberty Travel!
August 24, 2012
Maupassant paints a nice picture. his descriptions of the scenery and action occurring are striking and well written. quite a nice read in my opinion, as Maupassant has some interesting views on certain topic of the period. he says it himself-nothing really happens in this book- and its all the better for it.
September 8, 2012
A really charming journal of a trip around the South of France in a sailing boat in the nineteenths century. Maupassant mixes his themes of satire bordering on misanthropy with some funny anecdotes and genuinely fascinating anecdotes. Like all the best travel writers, he's a lover of the digression!
February 23, 2016
This is a collection of short stories of the legendary french author, divided into 3 thematic parts: horror stories, love stories and social stories.
Even though Maupassant is a realist author by his style, he is often far from it in his thematic interests - supernatural, uncanny, deviant and strange.
Even though Maupassant is a realist author by his style, he is often far from it in his thematic interests - supernatural, uncanny, deviant and strange.
March 16, 2018
"Afloat" is a short journal of a short sailing venture on the French Riviera. He begins fairly straight forward with his nautical descriptions, but soon digresses to his thoughts on various subjects including the insanity of war. I think we can take that from this book and apply it to the present times as well as all of human history. I do want to read "Bel Ami" now.
Read
June 6, 2008Beautiful, philosophical, smart, funny and most of all...surprisingly simple. A much needed (for me) breath of fresh air.
Displaying 1 - 30 of 55 reviews