John Barth - Giles Goat-Boy

"Oh Harry! My goodness!"

"There, Chickie. There."

Just consider the state of the University, he challenged her: two armed campuses, each cynically lecturing Peace of Mind while it made ready to EAT the other. Great professors of poetry went begging; yet loud-shirted engineers drew fabulous salaries for developing WESCAC's weaponry, the very testing of which bid fair to poison the minds of undergraduates not yet matriculated. In vain did student leaders like himself exhort West Campus to seize the moral initiative by deprogramming unilaterally: their credo, Better East than beast, was shouted down by misguided alma-materists and advocates of "preventive riot" with their smugly belligerent slogan Better EAT than be EATen …

"Look at Spielman," he advised, and I pricked up my ears, though it was something else I strove to look at. "All he asked was that the flunking Computer not be programmed to EAT its enemies automatically. So they call him a Student-Unionist, and they strip him of his privileges — "

"Oh dear!" the female fretted, whose leotard now went the way of Max's rank and tenure.

"So it's all meaningless," the bearded one went on. "There aren't any Finals; there's no Dean o' Flunks at the South Exit to punish us if we don't Pass. Every question is multiple-choice; there's no final point or meaning in the University, it's — look here, it's like this: a naked physical fact!"

I gasped with Chickie.

"Like the Ismists say, it all comes down to distinctions in our minds; we can't ever get to the things themselves. We can thrust, and we can thrust…"

"No!"

"… but the screen … the flunking screen … it's always there. And when you try … to break through it… you're just affirming … that it's there ."

"Oh my!"

He paused. "Where I part company with the Ismists, though, is when they say our only choice is to accept the screen, and give up hope of ever knowing things absolutely. You'll have to read Footnotes to Sakhyan one of these days — it's the Syllabus of Beism, you know…"

"Don't talk!" his nan cried.

"Sure. You've got it exactly. You've got to say flunk that screen, and flunk True and False. Flunk all!"

"Flunk me, Harry! I know I'm going to shout…"

"It's no good asking what is — -"

"Shut up! Shut up!"

"— you've got to be, Chickie! Be! Be! "

Beyond any question then they Were, locked past discourse in their odd embrace. And I was fetched with them to the verge of Being; I who neither was nor was not, my blood and bones they shuddered to become!

As is the way of does, the girl called Chickie, having Been, craved yet again to Be; put off her wools, unhobbled her udder, and pled to Harry that he school her more in that verb's grammar. He, however, seemed done with conjugating.

"I didn't mean it the way it sounded when I said 'Shut up'," she apologized, hugging him round the neck.

"No, no, you were right, of course." But his voice was short, and he reached to open another tin as if nothing were pressing at his ribs.

Yet though she entreated and rebuked him, bit at his lobe and cavorted in the gorse, he could not be roused. Not even her offer to shout out verses while they Were could move him.

"Don't be coarse," he said.

She teased, she scolded, she declared her husband was a better man; yet there was nothing for it but to dress and depart. Her black garment had been flung upon the bush of autumn-olive that concealed me; she slipped into it not three feet from where I squatted.

"Some Beist," she pouted. Her friend had already gathered up the blanket and turned toward the road. "I've got twice as much Beist in me as you have."

She drew the waistband over her hips, and I trembled to seize what dimpled near me. Ah, Chickie! my green loins called as she followed after him: poor pretty doe fretful to be bucked, hie here if it's a beast you're after! Hie to one a-wrack with the yen to Be; one the mere sight of your haunch has caused whom to Become himself, willy-nilly, and to stand one moment later again at the ready! When the coast was clear I tore out of my wrapper and frisked Chickie-like through the brush, hooting joyfully my pain. To Be, and once more to Be! To burst into all creation; only to Be, always to Be, until no thing was: no Billy Bocksfuss, goat or Graduate, no I nor you nor University, but one placeless, timeless, nameless throb of Being!

The next day was the longest in the year. My lust went from me with the dew that steamed off the fields where I had lain drenched; not so my resolve. When I trotted to the barn for breakfast I met Max bringing the herd out into the pound. The does moved aside as I approached — but not in the way they'd shunned me when I smelt of soap. Rather, they were wary but not displeased, as if a randy buck had come upon them. I noted with satisfaction that pretty Hedda seemed especially flustered. She snorted when I stroked her ears; speaking softly I made bold to touch one speckled teat, never yet swollen with the charge of motherhood, and she danced away — but not far, and looked back wide-eyed over her shoulder. Max laughed with me, and hesitantly squeezed my arm. He had not slept either, it appeared; but in his face was much relief.

"So," he said. "You made your mind up?"

"Almost," I replied. "There's something I want to do first." Then I added quickly, for his old eyes clouded: "But I'm all right, Max. I'll know in a little while."

He nodded. "That's so; I see that. Well, well…" As if to calm himself he began explaining that the herd would remain in the pound until dinnertime, as he had work to do in the Livestock Branch of the Library, just across the Road. He was currently engaged with several notions in the field of applied cyclology, his own invention; perhaps I too would find them interesting; at any rate he would be pleased to set them forth to me that evening-assuming, of course…

But the assumption was left unmade, for there hove into sight just then a bicycle, and Lady Creamhair. My heart drew up: I had not expected her until evening. Had she then come to some resolve of her own, that she drove up full in Max's view? But I was reckoning without her nearsightedness: she peered and craned all the way along the fence; not until she was abreast of the pound did she seem to catch sight of us together, whereupon she ducked her head and pedaled on towards the grove of hemlocks.

Max thrust five fingers into his beard. "By George, now…"

I declared uncomfortably that I had no idea why the woman had come out so early, but I guessed she had the right to drive past whenever she pleased.

"Na, bah," Max said, "I didn't mean that. Thunder and lightning, though, if something doesn't wonder me…" He touched my shoulder, frowning and blinking. "She's waiting now for you, eh?"

"She can wait," I said. On a surly impulse I invited, or rather challenged him to come along and meet my friend, whose early appearance, however surprising, had inflamed my resolve. But he declined, quite distracted still.

" Ach, Billy, I don't know what to tell you. Almost I think — hah! No matter anyhow, either way! So. So." He thumped my shoulder. "What difference? If you are, you are; if you're not — no matter! But I'll see you again, you promise? You'll wait and tell me what's what, eh? And then maybe — we'll see!"

We parted, each in agitation, Max to his researches (still nodding and clucking), I across the pasture towards the hemlock grove. The noisy rooks and thrashers had done their first feeding; the sun was well up, hot on my wrapper. I broke into a trot. My puzzlement slipped away; through my spirit pulsed the verse I'd overheard: