understand why I repeat the same words over and over: my re-creation of Neutria has failed. I wanted to arrive at that city, using the same methods as Violeta; alcoholic excess took me elsewhere, somewhere far wetter and more fateful than paper. Now my body is paying for that compulsion, if Iâm brave enough to sit down with a pen Iâll explain later.
While I made the bed and vacuumed the hallway, I thought about F. Perézâs (or Roland Barthesâs) explanatory sentences regarding his article on Couve: he doesnât structure the text as a daily diary for rhetorical authenticity, not at all, rather he does so out of a desire to construct a discourse with marks of the process by which it was written. I refuse to let myself agree, I write this way because I lack the indifference necessary to construct a narrativeobject thatâs alien to me, even if only in appearance. I admire this in Couve, Donoso, Balzac, Henry James, all those who, lashed by the storm, are able to cling to a third person, to produce dialogues without the intervention of the I, to describe, to divide themselves into chapters. As if in the middle of his suffering, in the moment they activated the electric chair, the condemned man ran through his mind a fairytale heâd composed in his cell, and he felt no pain, because his head was so occupied with finding the precise perspective from which to approach the final scene, when the protagonist finds the girlâs body. (âI regret nothingâ is the only thing that Violeta wrote, every day during the second half of July; the days of August were left blank, and then, furiously, she recounts a dream similar to one I had, if Iâm able Iâll write about it later.) Is that not, perhaps, what Violeta is doing, inventing a false city to escape from the days of Santiago, from the fact that thereâs someone stalking her with letters and phone calls, following her to class, perhaps not just one someone, but several? The doorbell is ringing.
            August 27 th
            7:56 P.M.
âJust like dogs, I experience that need for the infinite.â Here in Santiago, nobody barks, and even if I heard barking I wouldnât be able to go see what was going on, who is biting what. I wish I were Lautréamont, I wish I could write just one sentence without paraphrasing, I wish Iâd been born before the printing press, andthat I didnât speak with someone elseâs voice whenever I want to make myself understood, to say what it is I imagine. (Iâm going up to Alicia during a break, ready to blurt out whatâs eating me up inside: I love her. She looks at me stiffly, even though these days the spring air is sweet and lifts spirits, she doesnât smile at me. Just arcs her eyebrows. I open my mouth: âLike the dogs, I thirst for the infinite.â Her surprise is barely visible. I donât get it, whatâre you trying to say. I donât know, I answer, quieter all the time. But thatâs the sentence.)
But no, I would not have liked growing up without a library in the house. Honestly Iâd despise my own ignorance even more, Iâd believe in the ability to know everything through reading, Iâd be a fucking parody of an academic. What is Alicia reading? I only know what she told me this afternoon: a costume party, a movie, a book all afternoon, and alone. I turned back toward the window and for a moment she was plainly sad, the pain in her bright eyes, the unusual movement of her fingers is unwritable, just like Jâs hypocritical smile last night. Did I mention that I saw herâsmaller than ever, a shy little girlâon the dance floor? Sheâs not pretty anymore, her thin waist developed rickets, the neck I sometimes bite in one of my nightmares was a vulgar piece of flesh. (Frightening, today, my inability to hold the pen. I endure getting the
While I made the bed and vacuumed the hallway, I thought about F. Perézâs (or Roland Barthesâs) explanatory sentences regarding his article on Couve: he doesnât structure the text as a daily diary for rhetorical authenticity, not at all, rather he does so out of a desire to construct a discourse with marks of the process by which it was written. I refuse to let myself agree, I write this way because I lack the indifference necessary to construct a narrativeobject thatâs alien to me, even if only in appearance. I admire this in Couve, Donoso, Balzac, Henry James, all those who, lashed by the storm, are able to cling to a third person, to produce dialogues without the intervention of the I, to describe, to divide themselves into chapters. As if in the middle of his suffering, in the moment they activated the electric chair, the condemned man ran through his mind a fairytale heâd composed in his cell, and he felt no pain, because his head was so occupied with finding the precise perspective from which to approach the final scene, when the protagonist finds the girlâs body. (âI regret nothingâ is the only thing that Violeta wrote, every day during the second half of July; the days of August were left blank, and then, furiously, she recounts a dream similar to one I had, if Iâm able Iâll write about it later.) Is that not, perhaps, what Violeta is doing, inventing a false city to escape from the days of Santiago, from the fact that thereâs someone stalking her with letters and phone calls, following her to class, perhaps not just one someone, but several? The doorbell is ringing.
            August 27 th
            7:56 P.M.
âJust like dogs, I experience that need for the infinite.â Here in Santiago, nobody barks, and even if I heard barking I wouldnât be able to go see what was going on, who is biting what. I wish I were Lautréamont, I wish I could write just one sentence without paraphrasing, I wish Iâd been born before the printing press, andthat I didnât speak with someone elseâs voice whenever I want to make myself understood, to say what it is I imagine. (Iâm going up to Alicia during a break, ready to blurt out whatâs eating me up inside: I love her. She looks at me stiffly, even though these days the spring air is sweet and lifts spirits, she doesnât smile at me. Just arcs her eyebrows. I open my mouth: âLike the dogs, I thirst for the infinite.â Her surprise is barely visible. I donât get it, whatâre you trying to say. I donât know, I answer, quieter all the time. But thatâs the sentence.)
But no, I would not have liked growing up without a library in the house. Honestly Iâd despise my own ignorance even more, Iâd believe in the ability to know everything through reading, Iâd be a fucking parody of an academic. What is Alicia reading? I only know what she told me this afternoon: a costume party, a movie, a book all afternoon, and alone. I turned back toward the window and for a moment she was plainly sad, the pain in her bright eyes, the unusual movement of her fingers is unwritable, just like Jâs hypocritical smile last night. Did I mention that I saw herâsmaller than ever, a shy little girlâon the dance floor? Sheâs not pretty anymore, her thin waist developed rickets, the neck I sometimes bite in one of my nightmares was a vulgar piece of flesh. (Frightening, today, my inability to hold the pen. I endure getting the
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