WM_0014 ::::::::: Me and JP
May 25, 2003
The good thing about the week long holiday funeral
is the amount of time one has to read. I read
three full novels, including an old Mordecai Richler
book starring Jake Hersh and an even older Jean
Paul Sartre book entitled, simply, Nausea.
Big fucking mistake.
Note to all readers, never bring existentialist
novel anywhere near a funeral parlour. If there
was any doubt as to what exactly is going on in
the world, old JP sure strips it away. His main
character is a historian who becomes overwhelmed
by what he calls the nauseau,
which is a variety of extreme malaise brought
on by the existence of, essentially, existence.
The character spends a great deal of the book
holding objects and letting their presence shock
and sicken him.
As an athiest, this is not the kind of thing
that shocks me, and I don't think JP went quite
far enough in many respects. Existence is one
thing, human motivation is another and there's
more to it than setting events mindlessly in motion.
We are all animals, and the binary engine
of all creatures is to survive and to procreate,
that being the real fountainhead of all human
endeavours.
The Binary Engine. You heard it here first.
Still, it can be easy to forget this from day
to day and by burying one's self in the working
details, pretend that there is some point to it
all. But it certainly wakes one up and does not
provide any comfort while looking at the closed
eyes of any dead man, and watching poor Chloe
or any other weeping female touch the cold hand.
Me and JP and old Albert and Friedrich, walking
down the cold path, swinging and singing and getting
strange looks from the Irish wakers, but what
the fuck can one do?
Death's a coming, lads, and don't you fucking
kid yourself. |
