Sergio Pitol - The Art of Flight

WEDNESDAY, 9 JULY

I woke up today at three in the afternoon, yesterday at four thirty, which is definitely not normal. I work until two in the morning and then I’m completely tense for five or six hours, unable to sleep, not even able to read. In this way, time seems to dissolve in my hands. A waste that reminds me of the worst times of my life, the most squalid I’ve ever lived, and even worse. I haven’t seen any of Barcelona, I don’t know it. Actually, what has made me this way, paralyzed, frozen, is my lack of resources, perhaps even the expectation of an impending departure. I feel sick. I’ll inquire about a doctor that’s not too expensive. On Monday I’ll receive a partial payment for translation of Cosmos . I have to finish the Jean Franco translation in twenty days. Is it crazy to stay in Barcelona, in this hovel, in this disgusting neighborhood, drowning in debt?

11 JULY

Today, at noon, I witnessed a murder, just two meters from me, on the corner of Los Caracoles. Both the murderer and the victim were probably a little over twenty. I mean, I think he killed him. He plunged a knife into his stomach. Afterward, the hotel owner’s nieces, the girls who do the cleaning, asked me: “Did a lot of people gather around? Did they catch the thug? He didn’t get away, did he?” I didn’t know what to tell them, I still don’t know for sure what happened. The only thing I remember is that the guy who was stabbed fell against the wall, then, looking more surprised than anyone, tried to throw his body forward, but wasn’t able to. Instead, he doubled over like an accordion that was closing. Did I really witness them pull the bloody knife from his body, or am I making it up? My memory is blurry. I kept walking. I went inside a secondhand bookshop, where the smell of mold made me queasy. I’m sure I bought Jacob’s Room , by Virginia Woolf, in an edition by Janes that I wasn’t familiar with. But the truth is when I got back to my room I didn’t have it.

SUNDAY, 20 JULY

I saw a live broadcast of the first men on the moon. They looked like giant pandas. It was as if I were not seeing them. There was no element of surprise because I had already read about it in my childhood, but in a more attractive form, in Verne and in Wells. I had also seen it happen with more glamour in the movies. Today makes a month since I arrived, and I still don’t know Barcelona. Brutalizing work. Activities this month: translations of Gombrowicz and Jean Franco. Permanent lack of money. Friendship with the De Azúas. Little news from Mexico. Too many movies and weekly visits to the Donosos’ home. Urgent needs: a few days at the beach, clothes, books, money, friends, a doctor.

22 JULY

I talk to Ralph, the hippie with the iodine-colored hair. He reminds me of someone, but I can’t think of whom. In spite of the fact that his features are very manly, there’s something beneath them that reminds me of a woman I know, but I’m not able to put my finger on it. There’s an excessive concentration in his expressions; he wrinkles his face even when he laughs, which hints at a fit of hysteria. Our conversation is extremely chaotic: “What do you study?” “Oh, that was four years ago. Since then I’ve lived on the road : Nepal, India, Turkey”; he remains silent, lost in a daydream. He suddenly adds: “I did a lot of business in Tétouan. There’s no one here who can help me.” “Is that a good business, hash?” “Quiet, man, I don’t do it here. It’s six years in prison. I may go to London soon.” “It’s an expensive city,” I tell him. “Nothing’s expensive for me. I don’t have any money, it’s all the same. If I’m hungry, I beg for pesetas. I’ll show you a place where you can get soup for six pesetas. But you have to take a bowl or a cup.” A long silence, I drink three cognacs, one after another. “I live in the cheapest neighborhood in the city,” he adds. “Twenty-five pesetas a day, that’s nothing.” I’m still waiting for money from Mexico. I owe the hostel two weeks’ rent. Whose expression is that? Where have I seen those gestures? Perhaps at the movies, Jean Harlow, in China Seas , but imprinted on a man’s face. No one could imagine the chill that ran through me when he mentioned the six-peseta soup, honestly, taking your own bowl. As he said it to me, he seemed sure I’d be taking advantage of it soon. The invitation from Warsaw hasn’t come. Tonight we’ll go see a film by Richard Lester with John Lennon and Michael Crawford.

THURSDAY, 24TH

Wonderful movie! An excellent film by Lester, very Brechtian, a plea against war in the vein of Chaplin’s Monsieur Verdoux. Talking to Ralph always turns out to be predictable and at the same time overwhelming. At times his face is monstrous. “Have you been to Madrid?” I ask him. “What’s it like?” He answers: “Really bad. The people are mean. They won’t give you money. They tell you, go get a job! They threw me in jail for a month, you know? Here in Barcelona the people are nice, kind of silly.” He says he pays his room and board by selling blood at a clinic. I thought the pricks on his arms were from heroin. I’m not convinced that they’re not. Sometimes a wild look comes over his face. I’ve become destitute. The money from Mexico hasn’t arrived. I owe the hostel again. I’ll start the prologue to Conrad’s Nostromo tomorrow. And my novel? I’ll start it tomorrow too.

SATURDAY, 26 JULY

I didn’t sleep last night trying to organize my schedule. I was still awake at four in the morning. If I got into bed, I wouldn’t be able to fall asleep until well into the morning, and then I’d stay in bed most of the day. I decided not to sleep at all. I started work on my novel; what I read seemed utterly stupid. Does it make any sense to continue it? Perhaps the death of the old woman with elephantiasis is ruining the whole thing. What if I changed the ending? The scenes in Venice will hold up better, although they still require a lot of work. Later I began to read Mann, the Mountain, for the third time in six months. The first book by Mann I read was Doctor Faustus , about fifteen years ago. A task that at times seemed impossible. Nonetheless I continued. When I finished, I felt drunk. I had cleared the highest hurdle and crossed the finish line without suffering a single scratch. Then I set out to read the rest of his works, with the exception of his Joseph tetralogy. None impressed me as much as Faustus . I tried several times since adolescence to read The Magic Mountain . It was a book that we had at home and was widely recommended. I was never able to make it beyond page fifty. But during a long trip I took on a Yugoslavian freighter a few months ago, I was finally able to read it from start to finish. When I got to the last word I closed the book, and the next day I started to reread it, this time closely, which was the happiest reading I can remember. I’ve less than fifty pesetas in my pocket, and the money still hasn’t arrived. I have to pay rent again. No one writes me from Mexico. I haven’t heard from Zofia; I’m afraid she’s going through hard times in Warsaw, where a wave of officially sanctioned anti-Semitism has erupted. Maybe that’s why the invitation hasn’t arrived. Not being able to spend the rest of the summer there, which would cost me nothing, would spoil my plans and put me in a financially difficult situation. What a life! Horrible! Things being as they are, within a year I’ll have finished my first novel. I’m constantly changing the title.

SUNDAY, 27 JULY

The novel is turning out to be very hard for me. A lot more than I expected. I write chapters then undo them. It’s turning out to be a structural novel, if you can call this kind of novel that. I’ve gained something by not killing the protagonist. I redid the first two chapters, and now I’m revising the third, where Paz Naranjo and Gabino Rodríguez appear furtively, as does Carlos Ibarra; this way, all three stories will begin to intersect. There’s a line from Hamlet that would make a good title. I do not have it handy. Something like The Music of a Flute . So just like that I’m back to being poor? And miserably so! In a way I would never have guessed in my wildest imagination!