Read Online I Am a Japanese Writer by Dany Laferrière - Free Book Online Page B

poet Gaston Miron brushes past, determined, ruminating over the latest poem he wrote, his powerful alligator jaws chewing away. He is going to go see Françoise the bookseller, a friend to starving poets and young novelists who’ve won their first prizes and have already been forgotten. The whole neighborhood is literary, completely different from my old working-class district in the east. One morning I left the factory behind, having decided to take my time in life. I read, I write, I am a flâneur. I hardly know anyone at all, except the Korean who shows up every time I think about him.
    “Did you see Midori?” he asked.
    “Yes.”
    “How was it?”
    A brief silence.
    “Okay... Someone else showed up.”
    “I know,” he said, turning away.
    It’s important to keep the myth alive. As it turns out, I happened to be reading a wonderful little book on the subject by Paul Veyne, the great historian of the Greco-Roman world: Did the Greeks Believe in their Myths? Veyne writes cold— that is, without having smoked anything illicit. “There was a time when poets and historians dreamed up royal dynasties out of whole cloth, complete with the name of every potentate and his family tree. They were not counterfeiters, nor were they in bad faith. They were simply following the usual way of the time of reaching the truths they needed.” I’m into it up to my ears. I’ll create something, then I’ll believe in it afterwards. I can’t get along without those girls. They’re more alive than the ones I see in the street. They’re devouring my whole life. I only have thoughts for them. I’m drowning in their world. I see them when I wake, I feel them, as if they have captured me whole. They are there in the shadows of my room with glowing eyes, awaiting just a single word in order to take hold of my imagination. I write the name Midori. I know it’s true; everyone I’ve talked to about her can see her too. Just the way they can see Fumi, Noriko, Hideko, Tomo, Haruki, Eiko and Takashi. I should leave them before they take over my days. So far, I’ve been able to keep them in the space of my nights. If they ever break into the day, I’m finished. I’d better defend the little bit of light I have left. So, farewell to the world of the night, and to solitude.

THE TROJAN WAR
    I SEE A guy going by with three souvlakis tightly wrapped in transparent paper. I know what his problem is. He goes there to see Helena. She’s the reason I rented this room across from the park and next to the bookstore. She’s the landlord’s daughter, and a waitress at Zorba’s. Helena’s game is so subtle it took me a hell of a long time before I could make the link between the souvlaki and my horrible nightly heartburn. When she can, she sits at the back of the restaurant, by the bathroom. She’s never in a hurry; she takes all the time she needs to cast her big dark eyes on you. And then you’re paralyzed. At the beginning, I was dumb enough to think that, at last, my charm was having an effect on her. Since she moved so slowly, I pictured myself as the patient fisherman. Until the day I understood that I was the fish wriggling on the end of her line. I’ll never know what made me get up in the middle of the night and go out to buy a souvlaki without a prescription. Her eyes are so dark you think it’s midnight when it’s noon, but all she has to do is turn her face in your direction and dawn breaks anew. I’d do anything to hear the sound of her voice.
    “Nice day, don’t you think so?”
    Not a word of reply.
    “I always have the lamb souvlaki. That’s because I don’t like chicken.”
    A pause.
    “Maybe I should try the chicken. What do you think?”
    Silence.
    “I know your name is Helena. I live across the street. Your father is my landlord.”
    She goes back to her spot without a word. There’s only one way to get her to come back.
    “I’d like another souvlaki, please.”
    She’s like one of those dealers who never