Le Clezio - The Interrogation

You feel as though you were waiting for something, don't you? Something unpleasant - unpleasand rather than dangerous? - isn't that right? You feel as though you were waiting for something unpleasant. Well, listen to me. I'll tell you. It's the same with me. I have the same impression of waiting. But you must realize one thing: I personally shouldn't worry about the impression of waiting, except that i'm positive that's bound to happen - that this unpleasant something - or - other will inevitably happen to me sooner or later. So that now, in point of fact, it's no longer something unpleasant that i'm expecting, it's something dangerous. You understand? It's simply a way of keeping one's feet on the ground. If you'd told me what you haven't told me, for instance, that you have the impression of waiting for something that you know, you understand, you know that it must be death, then okay. I understand you. Because there always comes a day when one proves to be right in waiting for death. But you understand, don't you, that what matters is not the unpleasand impression, but the fact that not a moment goes by without our consciously or unconsciously waiting for death. That's the point. You know what that means? It means that in a certain system of life which ine puts into application by the mere fact of existing, you're leaving a negative element - which as it were, perfectly rounds off the human unit. It reminds me of Parmenides. You know, what he says, I think: "How, then, can what is be going to be in the future? Or how could it come into being? If it came into being, it is not; nor if it is going to be in the future. Thus is becoming extinguished and passing away not to be heard of"That is the way to talk. One must have an inkling of it. Otherwise, Michele, it's not worth being able to think, Talking's not use you know Michele, no use at all"