resolve his own problems, and if he could resolve his own problems, then everything else would be insignificant, everything else would be inconsequential.
He no longer shouldered any burdens, and had cancelled emotional debts by purging his past. If he again loved or embraced a woman, it would only be if this was what she wanted, and she accepted him. Otherwise, at most, it would be going for coffee or beer in a cafe, having a chat, a bit of a flirt, then each going their separate ways.
He wrote because he needed to. It was the only way he could enjoy total freedom; he didn't write for a livelihood. He also did not use his pen as a weapon to fight for some cause, and he didn't have a sense of mission. He wrote for his own pleasure, talking to himself so that he could listen to and observe himself. It was a means of experiencing those feelings of the little life that remained for him.
The only thing in his past he didn't break with was the language. He could, of course, write in another language, but he didn't abandon his language, because it was convenient and he didn't need to look up words in a dictionary. However, conventional language did not suit him, and he had to look for his own voice. He wanted to listen intently to what he was saying, as if he were listening to music, but he found language always lacking in refinement. He was certain that one day he would abandon language and rely on other media to convey his feelings.
He admired the agile bodies of some performers, especially dancers. He would love to be able to use his body to freely express himself: to casually stumble, fall over, get up, and go on dancing. However, age was unrelenting, and he could very well end up injuring himself. He was no longer capable of dancing, and could only somersault about in language. Language was light and portable, and it had him under its spell. He was a carnival performer in language, an incurable addict, he had to talk, and even alone he was always talking to himself. This inner voice had become the affirmation of his existence. He had already formed the habit of transforming his feelings into language, and not to do so left him feeling unfulfilled, but the joy it brought him was like groaning or calling out when making love.
He is sitting in front of you, looking right at you, and laughing loudly in the mirror.
57
The place is New York. On the first day, it is ten degrees below zero, and snowing, and the very next, it suddenly turns warm. Dirty lumps of ice are everywhere, your shoes become soggy, and you have to buy a pair of heavy boots because of the lousy weather… You prefer the mild Paris winter. There are large numbers of Chinese here, and, from time to time, on the streets, you hear the speech of Beijing, Shanghai, Shandong, and even the He'nan village dialect spoken near the reform-through-labor farm where you were once sent. Also, there is every kind of Chinese food you can think of, even crab-roe dumplings and hand-shaved noodles. Chinatowns are everywhere, whether downtown in Manhattan, or in Flushing, Queens.
This is China, more Chinese than China, as Chinese New Yorkers construct their own virtual hometowns.
You don't have a hometown, and, in America, you do not have to put on a play with Chinese actors. You wanted local Western actors, and had hoped they would find a uniquely American woman to play the lead role. But it was after the premiere that you again saw the beautiful Linda. She was one-quarter Turkish, and you first met her at a drama festival in Italy, at the dinner following the performance of your play. She came over to your table, embraced you, kissed you passionately on both cheeks, and said, 'I loved your play. If you ever come to New York to put on a play, don't forget to look me up!'
You were delighted to see her so visibly moved, and had not forgotten to give the theater group her telephone number and address.
However, nobody called her, and she also missed the advertisement for auditions. There are just so many beautiful women in New York, and plenty of good actors. She came to the performance, and wept after it had ended, but you were not sure whether it was because she had seen you, or the play, or because she was sorry she had missed the chance to perform in the play. In any case, you, too, were deeply moved.
You are, in fact, not so alone in the world, and have many close friends, as well as some you have just made. You find it is often easier to communicate with them than with some of your fellow Chinese. You can be more direct, and when you make love with Western women, there are fewer obstacles. In the middle of the night, you answer a telephone call from Paris, and you say that you had just been thinking of her. 'What about?' she says on the phone. You say you had been thinking of the smell of her body. 'Then what if I send it wet and sloppy over the phone?' she laughs. 'It wouldn't be enough.' You say you had been thinking of her, the whole of her, from top to bottom. 'Don't you have another woman in your bed?' she asks. 'Not right now, but who knows, maybe there will be one along any moment,' you say. 'You rascal!' she says. 'But I'll still kiss you, kiss you all over!'
You're not an 'upright gentleman,' and don't have to put on an act of being virtuous. What you want to do is to spray your lust all over the world, turn it awash! Of course, that is sheer fantasy, and you can't help feeling a sort of sadness. But you know your sadness has been diluted, in fact, you rejoice in having salvaged your life. You belong now to that rascal, you. But you have allowed yourself to be enjoyed by the French filly that called you a rascal, you willingly gave yourself to her so that she, too, gets all wet, and you can enjoy her.
Everything in the past already seems so remote and far away, you have wandered all over the world and you are not really sad. You like jazz and the freedom of the blues. That was how you had come to write that play. One day among the props in the theater storeroom, you found an old picture frame, and you hung on it the plastic leg of a display model. You wrote on the leg 'what' in fancy lettering, and it counted as your signature. You poke fun at the world, and you poke fun at yourself, and it is by offsetting the one against the other that life is fun. You would like to become a piece of jazz, like that classic recorded by the black singer Johnny Hartman:
They say that falling in love is wonderful It's wonderful…
At rehearsal, the actors say that a black singer was shot when he got out of his car on the highway to fix something. The newspapers that day have photographs of the person killed, and, although you have never heard the man's songs, you can't help feeling sad.
It would be hard for you to love a Chinese woman again. When you left China, you dumped the little nurse, but now you no longer reproach yourself for it, you no longer spend your days reproaching yourself.
Gentle moonlight, hazy mountain, shadowy thatched huts, paddy fields after harvest in the valley, a dirt track crawling over the slope past the door of a storehouse. A rustic poem so old that it has lost its impact. You seem to see this dream scene, see the shut door of that tamped-earth building. It was there that your student was raped, no one could have saved her. She had no choice, she was hoping to earn merit points for a work permit so that she would not have to go on growing her own grain in order to be able to eat. That was the price she had to pay. She is far away, on the other side of the world, and has long since forgotten that a person like you ever existed. You lament in vain, but it is lust, rather than fond memories, that is evoked.
She says that right now she has no lust. She says she wants to cry, and, immediately, tears are streaming from her eyes. You say you are full of uncontrollable lust. But she says she doesn't want to be a substitute, says it's not she that you want to penetrate, and she can't penetrate your heart, because you're somewhere far away. You say you're by her side, that it's because tonight you're in bed with her, want to excite her, that you're telling her this story. But she says not to use her to pour out the secret pains in your heart. You say you didn't think that a French filly like her would be like that. She says so what if she is? You ask how can she possibly not know about male wickedness? But she says lying together like this is so good, she treasures her relationship with you, don't make this beautiful feeling into something dirty, just let her lie there peacefully. She goes on to say she, too, can be wild. If it was a man she didn't know, she would have let him go ahead, it's because she loves you and doesn't want suddenly to ruin her relationship with you. You remind her that she had said she was a whore. She says she did say this, and she still is your little whore, but not right now. You ask when she would be. She says she doesn't know when, but she would be your little whore, and, at that time, she would give you anything you wanted. But you haven't brought a condom, and she's afraid of getting some disease. Don't get cross with her. She says who told you to come unprepared? Where can one of those things be found in the middle of the night? If you really must, you can spray it over her, but definitely not into her. You embrace her, sniff her, and fondle her all over. You rub your semen, her tears, and your mixed sweat onto her belly, breasts, and nipples. You ask her if she's happy. She says you can do anything you like, only don't ask. She embraces you, lets you press against her swelling
