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thing of beauty: nothing is forbidden.”
    â€œThat has nothing to do with it.”
    â€œWomen are filthy slabs of meat. Sometimes it is said of a particularly ugly woman that she is a lump of fat: the truth of the matter is that all women are lumps of fat.”
    â€œAllow me to ask you then what you think you are!”
    â€œA lump of lard. Can you not tell?”
    â€œSo do you think that men are beautiful?”
    â€œI didn’t say that. Men’s bodies are less horrible than women’s. But that does not make them beautiful.”
    â€œSo no one is beautiful?”
    â€œNo, some children are very beautiful. Unfortunately, it does not last.”
    â€œDo you consider childhood to be a blessed time?”
    â€œDid you hear what you’ve just said? ‘Childhood is a blessed time.’”
    â€œIt’s a cliché, but it’s true, no?”
    â€œOf course it’s true, animal! But is it necessary to say so? Everybody knows it.”
    â€œMonsieur Tach, you are a wretched person.”
    â€œAnd you only just figured that out? You need some rest, young man, so much genius is going to wear you out.”
    â€œWhat is the source of your despair?”
    â€œEverything. It’s not just the world that is badly made, but life. Another feature of contemporary bad faith is the way we go around claiming the opposite. Haven’t you ever heard them all bleating unanimously, ‘Life is beaueau-ti-ful! We love life!’ It makes me climb the walls to hear such drivel.”
    â€œSuch drivel may be sincere.”
    â€œI believe that too, which makes it even worse: it proves that treachery is working, that people will swallow any lie. So they have their shitty lives with their shitty jobs, they live in horrible places with dreadful people, and they embrace their abject condition and then call it happiness.”
    â€œGood for them, if they’re happy that way!”
    â€œGood for them, as you say.”
    â€œAnd you, Monsieur Tach, what makes you happy?”
    â€œNothing at all. I have peace and quiet, that’s already something—well, I did have peace and quiet.”
    â€œHave you never been happy?”
    Silence.
    â€œAm I to understand that you have been happy? . . . Or am I to understand that you have never been happy?”
    â€œBe quiet, I’m thinking. No, I have never been happy.”
    â€œThat’s terrible.”
    â€œWould you like a handkerchief?”
    â€œEven during your childhood?”
    â€œI was never a child.”
    â€œWhat do you mean by that?”
    â€œExactly what I said.”
    â€œWell you must have been little!”
    â€œI was little, yes, but I was not a child. I was already Prétextat Tach.”
    â€œIt’s true that we know nothing about your childhood. Your biographers always start with your adult life.”
    â€œThat’s normal, because I had no childhood.”
    â€œBut you had parents, after all.”
    â€œYou do pile on your brilliant conclusions, young man.”
    â€œWhat did your parents do?”
    â€œNothing.”
    â€œWhat do you mean?”
    â€œThey lived off their income. A very old family fortune.”
    â€œAre there any other family members besides yourself?”
    â€œWas it the tax man who sent you?”
    â€œNo, I just wanted to know if—”
    â€œMind your own business.”
    â€œOne’s duty as a journalist, Monsieur Tach, is to mind other people’s business.”
    â€œChange your profession.”
    â€œThat’s out of the question. I like my profession.”
    â€œMy poor boy.”
    â€œLet me put it to you in another way: tell me about the time in your life when you were happiest.”
    Silence.
    â€œShould I phrase my question in another way?”
    â€œDo you take me for a fool or what? What sort of game are you playing at? Is this some sort of
Belle marquise, vos beaux yeux me font mourir