The Anarchist (2 page)

CATHY
: How is your daughter?
ANN
: And during that time . . .

CATHY
: I'm sorry, go ahead.

ANN
: Thank you. And, during that time, you also met with the rabbi.

CATHY
: I met with them all.

ANN
: But, particularly?

CATHY
: The rabbi. Why “particularly?”

ANN
: Because.

CATHY
: Some people. Are born. Into a tradition. In which they perhaps feel other-than-comfortable.

ANN
: They . . .

CATHY
: Or, better, they, later in life, may discover a covenant, in which, for the first time, they find comfort.

ANN
: A covenant? . . .

CATHY
: A
home
. A mate. Or a profession. People, late in life, for example, may discover their true
sexuality
, or . . . the parallels are obvious. Mine dealt with Faith.

ANN
: Your?

CATHY
: Revelation.

ANN
: . . . your revelation.

CATHY
: Of Christ.

ANN
: But you continued . . .
(She consults notes)
During the first years, to meet with the rabbi.

CATHY
: That's right.

ANN
: After you had discovered this new Covenant.

CATHY
: Do you know? I didn't want to insult him.

ANN
: Really . . .

CATHY
: The others came so seldom. And the rabbi was additionally . . .

ANN
: Yes?

CATHY
: A sort of “entertainment,” faute de mieux.
(Pause)
I forgot a French verb. Yesterday.

ANN
: And you were reading . . .?

CATHY
: Actually, I was writing.

ANN
: In French.

CATHY
: Yes.

ANN
: What were you writing?

CATHY
: An attempt at a Translation.

ANN
: Of your book.

CATHY
: Oh very good.

ANN
: That's right?

CATHY
: Yes.

ANN
: An
attempt
at a translation. But you speak French.

CATHY
: I did.
(Pause)
Someone asked me, “Do you play an instrument?” I said, “No,” with some regret, and then remembered that I played the piano all my life. How about that?

(Pause.)

ANN
: You spoke French fluently.

CATHY
: As one does. With the vocabulary of one's interests. A sort of “waiter's French.”

ANN
: And what were your interests?

CATHY
: And the language of theology is rather abstruse.

ANN
: Your interest, then, was in theology?

CATHY
: Well, in hindsight, what else would you call it?

ANN
: You were translating your book.

CATHY
: I was attempting to.

ANN
: And you forgot a verb.

CATHY
: I did.

ANN
: But you must have had a dictionary.

CATHY
: I thought that to use the dictionary, would be admitting, a, a . . . No, I'm getting old. An “unworthiness.”

ANN
: But, you read widely, in French.

CATHY
: Well. That was the Language of the Movement.

ANN
: Of the Movement.

CATHY
: Yes.

(Pause.)

ANN
: Have you read them since? Those books?

CATHY
: Those books.

ANN
: Yes.

CATHY
: Would they be allowed here?

ANN
: Well—that's a fair question.

CATHY
: But, do you know. I've
thought
about them.

ANN
: The books.

CATHY
: And, in my
memory
, I couldn't make heads or tails of them.

ANN
:
Today
.

CATHY
: No. Nor sort out their
attraction
. No, that's not true. They were attractive as they were incendiary.

ANN
: “Revolutionary.”

CATHY
: If you will.

ANN
: In their ideas.

CATHY
: Not in their
ideas
, no. What
were
they? Finally?
(Pause)
They were essentially a sort of chant.

ANN
(Reads)
: “Words not meant to misdirect are wasted.”

CATHY
: Well, there you are . . . and their absence of meaning allowed us . . . or, we
understood
them. As a celebration of the transgressive. Because they had no meaning.

(Pause.)

ANN
: They wanted Revolution.

CATHY
: They?

ANN
: The writers.

CATHY
: They wanted . . . I suppose.

ANN
: And you found it attractive.

CATHY
: As the young do. No, it was
thrilling
.

ANN
: And now?

(Pause.)

CATHY
: They're quite immoral. Don't you think? The French.

ANN
: Tell me. Why?

CATHY
: They hold the view the world is an illusion.

ANN
: Is that their view?

CATHY
: Oh, yes. No wonder it sparked terrorism.

ANN
: Did it?

CATHY
: If nothing has meaning save that we ascribe to it. What reality is there, for example, in another's suffering? As a
result of which we find much tragedy.
(Pause)
No wonder they tend to lose wars.

ANN
: As in Algeria.

CATHY
: Well, yes.
(Pause)
Much tragedy . . .

ANN
: As Guillaume's, for example.

CATHY
: “Speaking of Algeria.”

ANN
: That's right.

CATHY
: But the meaninglessness—let me be more precise—it was
facing
the meaninglessness which led me to faith.

ANN
: It led you to faith.

CATHY
: Because, do you see, they're the same two choices.

ANN
: The same two as?

CATHY
: The bureaucrat and her make-work files. To rebel. Or to submit. And each is unacceptable.

ANN
: Is there a third choice?

CATHY
: Thank you. And that is the essence of the book.

ANN
: That the third choice is Faith.

CATHY
: What else could it be? And to believe . . . in the
possibility
of another choice, is to long for God. And to discover it is Faith.

ANN
: Faith without certainty.

CATHY
: If there were certainty, why would it be Faith?

(Pause.)

ANN
: Guillaume had Faith.

CATHY
: Faith. Did he?

ANN
(Takes a book from her desk and reads)
: “The growth . . .”

CATHY
: He had certainty.

ANN
(Continues reading)
: “The growth of consciousness, causing that pain which may only be . . .” Although a better rendering would be “the growth of
conscience
” don't you think?

CATHY
: It's the same word, in French.

ANN
: But “conscience” here would be, the better rendering.

CATHY
: You may be right. Yes. I think you're right.

ANN
: But that was not the translation on the poster.

CATHY
: On the poster, no. Not on the poster.

ANN
: Quote: “The growth of consciousness, causing that pain, which may only be expunged through violence.”

CATHY
: That's what the poster said.

ANN
: “
Consciousness
.”

CATHY
: Yes.

ANN
: Why?

CATHY
: Your point is that a translation as “conscience,” that “‘conscience' must lead to violence,” would have been recognized as absurd.

ANN
: That's right.

CATHY
: As absurd and monstrous.

ANN
: Monstrous, yes.

CATHY
: In any case as shocking. Or, say, certainly more
brutal
. The original was shocking.

ANN
: And yet.

CATHY
: Go on.

ANN
: Many were seduced by it.

CATHY
: Many were.

ANN
: And, I would assume. That it was more seductive in French, which, as you say, is the language of Philosophy.

CATHY
: Yes.

ANN
: And which additionally carried the romance of being Foreign.

CATHY
: Well: to the young, the foreign idea is seductive.

ANN
: Why is that?

CATHY
: As to the young, everything is foreign. Which is why they are the revolutionaries.

ANN
: Because?

CATHY
: It's easy. One may easily “make things anew” according to one's insights if one possesses no experience. The French word was “seduire” to seduce.

ANN
: “To seduce.”

CATHY
: “Seduire.” And why would I forget it? It's the same word. Funny.

ANN
: That was the verb.

CATHY
: That's right.

ANN
: And you two spoke it.

CATHY
: French.

ANN
: Yes.

CATHY
: Guillaume and I.

ANN
: In Algeria.

CATHY
: That's right. I wrote of it, in . . .

ANN
: No, I've marked it.
(She reads)
“‘Ecoute,' he would say, which was, to me, a magic incantation.” You say he affected not to understand English.

CATHY
: That's right.

ANN
: But he did understand.

CATHY
: He spoke it perfectly.

ANN
: But?

CATHY
: He thought it the language of Colonialism.

ANN
: More than French.

CATHY
: That's right.

ANN
: But he was fighting the Colonialism of the French.

CATHY
: Well, retrospectively, of course, it's all irrational. And yet they discount Religion. As based on Faith.

(Pause.)

ANN
: You wrote in French . . .

CATHY
:
Then
.

ANN
: Yes.

CATHY
:
Did
I . . .?

ANN
: The Speech.

CATHY
: . . . in
Algeria
. . .

ANN
: And it was quoted.

CATHY
: All right.

ANN
: And published.

CATHY
:
Published
.