July 28th 1998, Tuesday
Robert sat down as if her gentle voice had been a command. He stayed perhaps ten minutes longer. Mr Thierolf at last sat down on the sofa beside his wife. They asked Robert questions about himself, whether he was going to stay on in Langley or not. He told them of his intention to visit his mother in New Mexico. Mrs Thierolf, with a frankness and simplicity that reminded Robert of Jenny, told him that for about ten days before Jenny's death, Jenny had suspected that he killed Greg the nigh of the fight. Her friends had been talking to her. The Thierolfs said they hadn't known what to believe. The wrongness of it embarrassed Robert, as if they were uncovering an area of stupidity in Jenny. It made him feel odd, defensive about her, ashamed for himself. They did not even indirectly ask his feelings about Jenny; they seemed to know what Jenny had cared more about him than he for her. When he got up to leave, and Mrs. Thierolf offered to make him some tea 'to drive back on', Robert felt at first touched, then curiously annoyed by it. He declined the tea politely. He felt that they had communicated and yet not communicated. Mr Thierolf's attitude was decidedly more friendly by the time Robert left. His wife's manner seemed simply that of a basically kind woman whose grief left no room for resentment, no energy for hostility. And he felt that perhaps Mrs Thierolf had tolerated him, suspended her judgment of him, because she knew Jenny had liked him --even loved him.
(Patricia Highsmith, The Cry of the Owl)
The cry of the owl is that of death -—the background sound in Robert Forester's way. This is an extraordinary story, although a deeply real one. Forester is guilty —unforgivably, as all transgressors are. Only he knows of his radical innocence, but also he knows how useless his justification is. Everything here is unusual, although there's nothing unfounded. Highsmith's relentless writing leaves no way out for his character —she never does, in her best novels. This is.
July 23th 1998, Thursday
"What have you been up to since I saw you last?" he asked at length.
I had not very much to say. It was a record of hard work and of little adventure; of experiments in this direction and in that; of the gradual acquisition of the knowledge of books and of men.
(William Somerset Maugham, The Moon and Sixpence)
The problem with a kind of lifelike mine is —it seems you're doing nothing, and whatever you do, it goes without notice, even for yourself. 'What have you been doing lately?' is always an awkwardly inconvenient question for me to respond. That's the reason I felt comforted by the answer Maugham gave through his character Strickland in the above citation (Not that I want to compare myself with Maugham, alas). When I first read Rain, it impressed me deeply —such a relentless description of moral perversion. Then I read that masterful short story, The Fall of Edward Barnard, which can be seen as Rain with a revenge: the life that has been taken to Mrs Thompson is regained with unconscious courage by Edward Barnard in his abandonment of the world. A few years later I read The razor's edge, and once again I felt comforted —Maugham's strong defense of one's own way helps me to justify mine. Now I've finished The Moon and Sixpence, which I've read with great pleasure. I marvel at Maugham's masterful literary skills and deep human wisdom.
July 22th 1998, Wednesday
Although I get up very early in the morning, it's a pleasure (a real luxury) not to have to. Sure, if I had to get up at 5:30 in the morning, I would feel like the sorriest guy in universe. Doing it at my free will makes me the happier. Pretty well I know the day I'd rather stay at bed than leap out of it I'll begin worrying. Nothing scares me most than finding I have nothing I feel like doing.
Life is easier to live when you know by heart what to do, every time of day. I don't. Since I dropped out of the University seven months ago, and decided my academic career was over, I have no obligations other than working (lightly) six hours a day in the evening. So I must decide what to do, every moment, and how to do it. Should I be methodical, devise a schedule and abide by it? Or rather be kind of an anarchist, following no plans? What's better, to read a book and then another when finished with the first one, or read some of them at the same time? Specializing in a field of knowledge, in a step by step rational approach, or flying about from flower to flower, the way a tastaolletes does? At home or at the library? Wouldn't it better having another job, be productive and look higher?
Believe it or not, I'm learning only now, in my thirties, to do whatever I feel like, the moment I feel like, and not to feel guilty for that. Hope I'll succeed.
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