William Gaddis - The Recognitions

— And you find them unnecessary, do you?

— If it give them comfort and sustain them.,

— No, but for you. For you. — No sar, it make itself an obstacle for me.

— And you just believe God is there.

Fuller answered, — We don't see him, sar, but we got to believe he there. And Fuller made wild anxious motions with his white hands in the space between them, like someone waving farewell to a friend on a departing ship, a friend constantly obscured by the waving arms and figures of other people. — So the preacher say. .

— The preacher?

— Sar?

They were both silent. Fuller's hands fumbled in the white gloves, at his sides, as though in caricature of the hands he was watching, opening and closing on nothing. — The preacher, sar, the Reverend Gilbert Sullivan, thahss the preacher whose meetin I attend upon occasion. Finally he become a hindrance too.

— Reverend Gilbert Sullivan?

— Yes sar. The Reverend Gilbert Sullivan a very highly trained preacher, but it seem like when he acquirin his high trainin he lose somewhere along the way the first thing he require to be a preacher to us. Fuller had pulled the white hands together behind him, and stood with his eyes lowered, as though finished. But then he looked up anxiously to add, — Not that I presume to make the judgment upon him. .

— But what requirement, Fuller? What requirement?

— Why sar, requirin the Reverend Gilbert Sullivan to believe he the mann for whom Jesus Christ died.

— And you. . you can believe that, Fuller? With no trouble, just that simply, you can believe it?

— Oh no, sar. It remain a challenge to believe, always. Not so simple to accept, like the mermaids.

— The mermaids. . the mermaids. .

— Yes, sar.

— And you can. . accept the mermaids, without much difficulty?

— Yes, sar, though they remain the complication of the mermaid mahns.

— Yes, there does. There does.

— But the mermaid womans. .

— Yes, the women. . you can believe in the women. .

— Oh yes sar, Fuller said, and then after a pause, — Woman bring you into the world, you got to stick with her.

— Wasn't it woman brought evil into the world, then?

— Sar?

— Yes. When she picked the fruit from the forbidden tree; and gave it to the man to eat?

— So the evil already there provided, and quite naturally she discover it.

— Yes, yes, and she gave it to the man…

— She share it with him, sar, said Fuller. — Thaht the reason why we love her.

The black poodle, which had been biting its nails, raised its head, then got up and went toward the hall doorway. Fuller looked at the back turned toward him, silent. Then he straightened his lapels, and followed the dog.

— Effluvium? Brown muttered, under his breath.

Sweet Norah Winebisquit bedewed with sleep Swept down through sooted flues of chimney-sweep. And where? she cried, can be this sceptered rod That men call Recktall Brown, and I call god. Straight through a frosted glass-partitioned door They led her, and she doubted now no more. (The fair, the chaste, and unexpressive she) Might no more question wherewithal of he: Dreadful he sat, bastioned in golden oak, The humanizing of some dirty joke The gods tell one another ere they stand To attend the last obscenity, called man.

His wide sleeve covered the rest of this work on the clear mahogany surface where, their right hands extended but not touching, the thin yellow hand shifting nervously, his own couching the weight of the diamonds, Recktall Brown faced a wild-eyed youth with one arm in a sling, who said — I hope you do find it, I mean find a copy, I need it, if you don't need it, I mean if you don't think you can use it?… There was hope in that last.

Brown raised his eyes from the poem, still muttering, the pools behind the lenses disturbed as he brought his attention up. — What are you asking me about a copy of it for? What makes you think you sent it to us? Ask the secretary.

— But I sent copies to… I know I sent one here, your secretary. . and your secretary isn't here today, she. .

— We get things from agents, and send them back to agents. Ask your agent. Then Brown appeared to notice that the reddened eyes of this young man, who looked enough in keeping with that stereotype of disheveled insanity suddenly assembled so often associated with genius, eyes strained open to abnormal width, were fixed on the scrawled page protruding from under his sleeve. He pulled some papers toward him, partially covering it, to return to the day's business correspondence. But the voice went on, the words coming out brokenly, — Yes sir, but, since I'm here… A new intensity brought Brown's eyes up again. — There's one thing, something I want to know, if I could ask you what you thought, because some people have said, or I mean they've intimated, that they think I've. . well that it really isn't mine, that I'd used some other. . that I'd. . plagiarized it.

— Plagiarized? Recktall Brown sat back. With a quick look over his desk, locating a manuscript, he pushed it forward with one hand and took off his glasses with the other. He fixed the figure across from him with his sharp eyes, and laughed. — Take a look at this, he sai'd, as the quivering yellow fingers received it. — This is lifted. The whole God-damned novel is lifted. One of our readers spotted it the first thing. A lawyer went over it, and it's safe. A couple of things changed around, it's safe and it's good, and it will sell.

Wild Gousse Chase, Otto read on the title page.

— So you picked up a few things here and there for yours, what the hell? What hasn't been written before? You take something good, change it around a little and it's still good.

Otto was staring at Max's name on the title page of Wild Gousse Chase.

— You just take the words and string them around a little different, Brown went on, raising his glasses again.

— But. . but words, Otto murmured helplessly. He looked up. — Words, they have to have a meaning.

— Let me give you some advice, boy, Brown said, standing. — Don't you worry about that. It's right when the idea's missing, the word pops up. You can do anything with the same words. You just follow the books, don't try to get a lot of smart ideas of your own. Brown pressed a button under his finger. There was belligerence and triumph in his voice; but it was belligerent solicitude as he finished, — It's all right there, you just take it out and write it down as though Jesus Christ himself dictated it.

— But this play, the retreating figure kept on, — it can't be lost, I'm sure a copy came here, she… it isn't plagiarized, I didn't steal it, I wrote it myself. .

But Recktall Brown was seated again; and, when a secretary appeared, already returned to muttering over the rest of the open scrawl which his sleeve, drawn to him, had uncovered.

Heaven's crown, brown-bought, fell lightly on his brow,

Lay heavy on her perspicacious Now.

(Still on the dreadful teeth of time she trod,

And marveled at the maleness of god.)

Sweet Norah Winebisquit, bedewed with sleep,

Awoke this decorated painted heap

Of present woman: could she doubt her sin?

Sought furiously for the flame within,

Presented in a naked leaping cry

The burning plunder of the present I.

Pride drew her garments up, and swathed her face

In lineaments incapable of disgrace.

Slipped then away, her face bedewed with do,

Beyond the glass, and knowing all, she knew

That the immortals have their ashcans too.

— Yes sir?

— What is this thing? Where the hell did it come from? Brown demanded, waving the paper in the air. He held it out to her.

— I don't knew, sir. It was in your mail this morning, I thought it might be something. . literary.