Javier Marias - The Man of Feeling

Natalia Manur would listen to me as attentively and compassionately as if she were being told of the misfortunes and privations of some Dickensian child, and she told me later, on more than one occasion, that she was, in part, attracted to me because of those stories and because she could relate her adult fate to that of mine as a child. Soon afterwards, I discovered that her history or past or life shared that same nineteenth-century quality. But, as I have said, prior to the performances of Verdi's Otello at the Teatro de la Zarzuela, what I mainly came to realize was my own unthinking conviction: I wanted to destroy Manur and I had to destroy Berta in order to go on seeing Natalia Manur without impediment of any kind. We were in odor of cruelty. The second act of destruction was easy enough, since it depended entirely on a decision I had already taken: I knew everything about Berta, far more than was necessary. The destruction of Manur, on the other hand, was far more difficult knowing, as I did, almost nothing about him and nothing at all about his weak points, and having seen his manner and glimpsed his smug self-satisfaction, his confidence in himself and in his qualities, it seemed to me impossible to make a fool of him in any direct confrontation, whether dialectical in nature or otherwise. He was clearly stronger and more flexible than I was, as well as more commanding. After thinking it over very quickly in my room one night (the night before the first performance, I remember it well), I realized at once that the only way of putting into effect my improvised or unexpected plans was to invert the order in which I have just listed them: I had only to go on seeing Natalia Manur every day and the destruction of Manur would come about by itself. As for the destruction of Berta, which I did not want, I had, nevertheless, to take it for granted — to put my signature once and for all to a longstanding sentence — and try to ensure that the whole process was as brief as possible and did not interfere with what, from then on, I imagined to be a conquest or a game. But that same night I found myself plunged into doubt as to what method to use. Should I speak openly to Natalia Manur? Declare myself to her in proper operatic fashion, before there was any kind of intimate contact between us? Use Dato as mediator? Or should I try to get her on her own on some propitious occasion — perhaps in my dressing room — and act like a classic — that is, old-fashioned — seducer, at the risk of failing at the first attempt with no possibility of putting things right later on? The fact that I had formulated to myself the nature of my feelings ("I must be in love or under the unknown influence of some powerful fancy to think like this and to feel such desire," I said to myself) suddenly seemed to be a terrible disadvantage that was forcing me to put into action a plan which was more or less premeditated (but which had still not got beyond the meditative stage) and which was forcing me, therefore, to act artificially, instead of letting things continue as they had until then, taking things, not passively exactly, but at least naturally, without forcing or directing anything, in a state of vague, unexpectant waiting. How tiring loving is, I thought. Striving, planning, longing, unable to content oneself with perseverance and immobility. How tiring the real world is, I thought, with its demands to be filled. And how tiring the as-yet-to-be is too. I have had to struggle so hard all my life to fulfill urgent needs: to grow up healthy and sane, to not be the object of other people's mockery, to lose weight, to not give in to my godfather's despotism, to remove myself from his house, to study music, to study singing, to study in Vienna, to leave Madrid, to enter the small, jealous circle of professional singers, to gain respect, to be an international star. So far I have triumphed in everything I have set out to do, and every morning, when I scrutinize myself long and hard in the mirror in order to spot any changes, I feel certain that triumph is written all over my face. I have an agent who looks after me and always tries to get me the best of everything, I travel the world (albeit alone), I make records and my name appears in third or fourth or fifth place on the album covers, I go to luxury hotels like this one (albeit alone), I have enough money and I know that soon I will have much more. I enjoy my profession, I like stepping out onto the stage in costume and transforming myself into many other people, and singing and acting and being applauded for my efforts and reading the ever longer and more glowing reviews in the newspapers of the world's cities. I like the fact that impresarios and journalists from all over the globe call me up to engage me or to interview me in my house in Barcelona. There I live with Berta, whom I may not love, whom I doubtless do not love, as I realized a few months ago during a performance of Turandot when Liu's famous pre-funeral arias moved me so much that I was filled by a sense of invincible love whose object was definitely not Berta, although neither was it anyone else, certainly not the singer playing the part of the enamoured, selfless slave (an excellent soprano, but a kind of German barrel, who has the unfortunate habit of spitting all over her fellow performers when she sings and whose name I will not give here because she is still working; indeed, nowadays she is, like me, a rising star). I don't feel excited about Berta; when I get home, I don't feel particularly glad to see her, nor do I feel any immediate need or desire to go to bed with her, I prefer to wait a few days, to watch a lot of television, to calm myself down, to get used to being back again and accustomed to a sedentary rhythm that doesn't really exist, going out to buy the bread or to the newsstand, going to see Barcelona play at home. The fact is that I find it more exciting to have a luxury call girl come up to my luxury room during some of the lonelier nights of my musical travels. But that doesn't make me unhappy, I mean the lack of excitement I feel about Berta. Relationships with other people have not, up until now, occupied an important place in my existence, perhaps because I have been too busy with the progress of my career, with my indispensable daily exercises, with perfecting my art and lavishing care on my voice, with my studies, the constant practicing and, yes, more studying. Now that I am beginning to reap the rewards and having to struggle less, I see that I have found my place in the wheel and that it will just be a question of that wheel continuing to turn as it should— with me on board — for glory and the plum roles (Calaf, Otello) to come my way. I have had a few love affairs, but none of them was very significant and none of them wrought any great changes in me. Berta is actually perfect. Organized, intelligent, discreet, affectionate and cheerful, mad about music, patient with my rehearsals, and most people find her very attractive, although for some time now (more or less since we began living together) I have not found her so (I am more attracted to the prostitutes whom, as I said, I occasionally summon, out of loneliness, curiosity or boredom). She is not odd or melancholy, like Natalia Manur, whom I nevertheless want to go on seeing every day. Why do I want to go on seeing her every day? Perhaps because I want to be like Liu or like Otello, because, at this particular moment in my history or pre-past or life, I need to try to destroy myself or to destroy someone else. Liu is a Chinese slave who is tortured and later kills herself with a dagger in order to save the life of Calaf, whom she loves and whose name the cruel Princess Turandot tries to drag out of her so that she, Turandot, will not have to marry him and can have him executed at dawn, as she has her previous suitors. Liu is a condemned woman, and that is how she sees herself from the start. Whatever option she chooses will bring her unhappiness. Either she dies and her beloved Calaf lives to marry Turandot, or else she confesses his name and lives, but then Calaf will die with the night. In neither case will her love be consummated, so it is a matter of choosing between one happiness (that of the beloved) and no happiness, or perhaps even between two happinesses and no happiness if we accept the idea that dying for the beloved can for the lover be a perfect form of happiness. Perhaps that is why for Liu the decision is clear. Otello's story is even better known. Among his options, he does not even consider anyone else's happiness, unless it were, in an impossible Otello, that of the supposed lovers, Desdemona and Cassio. It is unthinkable, Otello stepping aside to bring about the happiness of his wife and the man with whom, according to Iago, she has been unfaithful. If Otello had lacked, as Liu did, the notion of justice. . (But the lack of that notion only became acceptable in our century.) Berta is perfect for my career and for my general well-being, but not only do I want to go on seeing Natalia Manur every day, tonight, I thought then, I very much want to go to bed with her, as much as I very much do not want to go to bed with Berta ever again. It was, like nearly every night during that stay in Madrid, a spring night. I had the balcony doors open and I could hear, from outside, the murmur of cars and the occasional abrupt, angry, drunken voice. I could hear noises from inside too, keys opening the doors to other rooms, fragments of foreign conversations in the corridors, a waiter with a tray or with a trolley, knocking on a door; at one point, I heard the climax of a loud argument and something crashing into the wall of the room next to mine, it sounded like an ashtray thrown by a woman at a man, rather than by a man at a woman (he said, in Spanish with a Cuban or possibly a Canary Islands accent: "Well, if you didn't want to know, you know now!" and then she replied: "I'll show you, you bastard!" and then came the bang). Natalia and Manur would never argue like that, it wasn't their style, given their apparent sterility and coldness. Would I become the cause of an argument one day, soon, tomorrow, tonight, already? I tried to stop thinking these thoughts by rehearsing for the penultimate time — or, rather, recalling it, since I sang it to myself in my head — what would be one of my brief interventions the following day in the role of Cassio: Miracolo vago. . Miracolo vago. . and another immediately afterwards, alternating between the two: Non temo il ver. . non temo il ver … I was murmuring or singing these words to myself over and over, as if, after the third or fourth time, they had stayed in my head against my will, and then everything suddenly happened very fast, just as it did in my dream this morning. The image of Natalia Manur at the supper we had shared, and which had ended only half an hour before, kept going round and round in my head. She was wearing a raw silk dress, slightly decollete — a spring decolletage — that had made me notice her cleavage for the first time. It is always a serious moment when you notice for the first time one particular part of a woman's body, because the discovery is so dazzling that it stops you looking away even for an instant; it distracts you from the conversation and the other people around, and when you have no option but to turn your gaze towards, for example, a waiter who is asking you something, your eyes, as they return, do not travel through space from one point to another, nor do they slowly take in the view, instead they alight once more, without pause, on the one thing that they want to see and at which they cannot stop staring. It is impossible to behave correctly. Thus I spent the whole supper without addressing a single word to Dato and listening to Natalia without hearing a word she said, responding mechanically and in complimentary tones to her remarks, with my servile eyes almost fixed on the beginning of that space between what seemed to me to be Natalia's extraordinary breasts. It was a banal discovery, but then I am, in many ways, a banal man (sometimes I even do my best to appear vulgar). She must have noticed, and I must have seemed like a complete idiot, if not worse, but, looking on the bright side, any advances I made, now, tonight, would not come as a complete surprise. My desire was very strong that night, as desire always is when it makes its first identifiable or recognizable appearance in one's consciousness. I picked up the phone and asked to be put through to Natalia Manur's room. While I was waiting for the connection — it took, as it usually does, only a matter of seconds — I realized that I was also ringing Manur's room and that it was already half past midnight. As usual, Dato, Natalia, and I had said our goodbyes to each other in the elevator less than half an hour before. She would still be awake and Manur might not yet have returned from his presumed business supper. But if Manur picked up the phone, I would hang up without saying anything, exactly as if I were one of the lovers that Natalia Manur did not have. Manur's voice answered ("Allò?" it said two or three times in French, then corrected itself and said "Hello?" once) and I hung up, and it was for that reason and no other that I had a prostitute come up to my room that night. I realize that telling you this could make a very bad impression and lose me your sympathy, but the prostitute also appeared in this morning's dream, which is, after all, what I am describing to you.