Luke Williams: The Echo Chamber

Now I have mentioned it, let me pause to say a few words about that decrepit map, before returning to the matter of the pyre. Throughout this history I have noted its dissolution, mostly on account of the moths. What I have not realized until now is the ingenious effect the process of destruction has brought about. A moment ago I got up, unhooked the mappa mundi and threw it on the floor, with the other animal matter to be burned. And there on the wall, in the space where the map had hung, I noticed a series of patches — light, roughly circular shapes, set off against the darkness of the wood. I stepped back. I stared at the pattern on the wall, then understood. The moths had eaten holes in the mappa mundi, exposing the wooden boards beneath. Where the holes appeared, the sun (this, before I covered the skylight) had blanched the wood. And so the mappa mundi, that fantastic counterfeit which my father bought in 1963, has left a kind of negative impression of its decayed state, a series of brightnesses, like smaller continents themselves, joined by darker connecting lines. All that is left of the map is a record of the moths’ hunger, a static, lucent accumulation of all the seas, nations and races they have devoured, a disturbing image of dissolution that has reduced the original (if I may say this of a forgery) to a few faint patches on the attic wall. As I continue to gaze at the wall, I realize that this second map is not so much a negative impression, but rather a reinterpretation of the first. Of course, the moths did not honour national boundaries or geographical facts, but diverted rivers, joined states, parted continents, creating fresh rifts, new gulfs; they flattened mountain ranges and worked landmasses into disparate shapes. The process of creative destruction was arbitrary; or rather, the process was dictated entirely by the hunger of the moths. And yet it strikes me now that the map engendered by the moths is every bit as real or valid a representation of the world as the mappa mundi itself.

Where was I? The fire. After animal I will throw in all those objects made of vegetable matter: elephant grass, melon seeds, the length of twine which I stretched taut and passed my finger lightly across to produce a tremulous humming, as well as mother’s trunk itself. What next? Technology: the pocket watch, the tape recorder, the telephone from empty cans and lengths of string, not to mention Father’s bike, and the phonograph with its great horn. But how will I know if they will burn less readily than certain items of animal matter? It is not so easy to order my objects strictly in terms of inflammability.

Perhaps I should begin again, using a different method. Maybe I should burn my objects chronologically, according to their date of arrival in the world. No, this method would not be an easy thing to determine either. To judge the age of the elephant tusk, say, I would need to know the age of the elephant. And how to judge the age of the elephant in comparison to the chameleon, or the slate from Easdale, or the mappa mundi? (A further complication: should the impression of the map now be classed as an object? If so, how would I burn it without destroying my attic? And into what category would it fall? Animal? Vegetable? Unica ?). Impossible!

What I would like is to link each of my objects in a particular way, before throwing them into the fire. For instance, by common function: the feathers, pencils and printer’s set (systems of writing); the railway timetable, the elephant tusk, Father’s bike and the boat setting sail from an Eastern city (transport). Or else I would like to group them by relationships based not on similarity but on opposition, or by some tangential association, the gauzy dress followed by the chameleon skin, fireworks followed by candles and Father’s cigarettes, the machete followed by the mappa mundi, the feathers by the LP Damaris gave me when we lived in Bedouin. It would not be hard to burn my objects according to this system, but it would be nearly useless, for if I leave my objects unsorted and take a pair at random, I can be sure they will have at least three things in common. And does it matter what order I choose? In the end they will all be burned. And isn’t it precisely to do away with order that I have decided to burn my objects?

Forward.

So then, I will simply start a fire and throw everything into it, all the objects I have mentioned, and all those I have not. And if I find the radio I will throw that into the fire too. It will be a happy day. I will think about my history for a final time. I will shake with laughter, an indecent, shameful, helpless laughter. I have lived among this clutter for too long. I shall not put up with it any more. A superb day. A thousand useless possessions — the frightful prodigality of objects — which, undisturbed, might have survived for decades, will be destroyed in a single afternoon.

Will they make a noise as they burn? A great noise! They will burst, hissing and snapping, cracking like crinoline, like sticks, like flags. — And I note here the day in America, with Damaris, in San Francisco, the afternoon we found a ginger dog, and walked it back along the avenue with flags snapping in the wind, an incident Damaris started to relate in her diary, on 26 October 1972, but which she did not finish and whose conclusion I now recall: how when we got to his master’s door we knocked, and an old young man or a young old man with a white quiff answered; how we both began to laugh, as he cried, ‘Brumby!’; how Brumby cowered, and the man came out on to the porch and grabbed the dog by the collar to drag him into the house; how, as he did, we could see the hairs on the man’s arms turning into vines; how I wanted to grab Brumby but I couldn’t, so I clung to the railings; how Damaris clung to me; how the man said, ‘Damn dog’s always running away’; how, as he closed the door, Damaris said, ‘Can we have our reward?’; how the man stopped and looked at us, then stared and smiled, seeing the goodness in us, between us; how he went away, leaving the door open; how Brumby followed him tail down; how, as we stood there, we saw vines trailing from the wallpaper, choking the doorway; how the man suddenly materialized, parting the vines, plucking from them two glowing balls; how he said, ‘Here you go, girls’; how he closed the door; how we weighed the oranges in our hands; how I said, ‘Should we throw them away?’; and how Damaris said, ‘They are our reward’; how we noticed that they were the colour of Brumby’s eyes; how Damaris said, ‘We can’t throw them away’; how we heard the man shouting; how Brumby yelped; how I cried, ‘Brumby! Damaris! Do something!’; how Damaris said, ‘I can’t, he doesn’t belong to us’; how she threw her orange hard and we watched it burst and dribble down the man’s door; how I threw my orange, and it fell short and rolled back down the steps towards us, following us; how we backed away and looked at each other and grabbed hands and ran.

Forward.

The attic. On my return it will be nearly empty. The acoustics will be different, but that will not matter. There will be very little left. My computer, printer, wardrobe door, the volumes, and so on. That is all. That will be all. It is a moment I have been working towards for months. I will rebuild my desk. I will open my computer. I will choose one of my papers and begin to copy. Every now and then, as I work, I will print my transcriptions out and tape them over the skylight. And at the sight of those words which I will look at without knowing what they mean, I will feel happy, happier than I have done in years. A fresh start. I will live in my attic. I will never go out. I will take my supply of beans by delivery. I will sleep on my mattress, unless I decide to burn that too. In that case I will sleep on the floor, under my desk, my heater beside me. Perhaps, on occasion, a few faint sounds will break the calm, a little cry perhaps, a clock ticking. I will hear them. But I will not let them affect my work. The din of myself? It has not gone away, although it has lessened, now that I have begun to transcribe. That is not to say it will always be so. It will come and go, as it has always done. I am still terrified of it. Perhaps I will get to know it better, to understand what it wants. I will feel calm. Happy. Sometimes I will think of the silence. Knowing there is no such thing, I will think of it. I will listen. I will not hear. I will listen. I will listen into the silence, into its centre. That absence too will have to be imagined. There have been times in writing this history when I have asked myself what the first thing was that I ever heard. Once, when I was lying in the elephant grass, I tried to imagine the world before it was made. I was unable. I am no closer now. I will continue to try. I will continue to try to imagine the world as it was before the great noise which formed it, this world which could not have known such a noise because it existed — if that is the word — in silence.