Michael March: Lies lead to the truth
08. November 2016 11:57
When the reverse is true―punishment occasions crime.
Appearance appears as truth.
The Festival is the antidote to the American election.
While waiting for the barbarians―we read books.
In Crime and Punishment we find the line―:
“lies lead to the truth.”
The Festival seeks the application of truth―
licking the back of a stamp to see if it sticks.
*
John Maxwell Coetzee is a remarkable writer.
His masterpiece―Waiting for the Barbarians was first
published in London in 1980―then exported to South Africa.
In dealing with the South African security service―
the conversation comes around to torture―:
“What if your prisoner is telling the truth―yet he finds he is
not believed?
How do you ever know when a man is telling the truth?”
“There is a certain tone. A certain tone enters the voice
of a man who is telling the truth. Training and experience
teach us to recognize that tone.”
A tone―? There never was a tone―and there never will be.
In Waiting for the Barbarians―we read:
“Pain is truth―all else is subject to doubt.”
“Terrible things go on in the night while you and I are
asleep. The jackal rips out the hare’s bowls―but the night
rolls on.”
We feed on the images of disaster―but the night rolls on.
“The crime that is latent in us―we must inflict on ourselves.”
*
John Maxwell Coetzee is described as an outsider―
but he is the true insider―his imagination a wooden stick
beating on a tin drum.
*
There are too many false starts―how can the numberless
count on themselves?
*
In the Life & Times of Michael K―the need to escape is the
need for dignity. “In that way―he would say―one can live.”
In The Master of Petersburg―“if you do not kill―you are not
taken seriously.”
For Coetzee―we must find our own words―from ourselves―
otherwise it is not the truth.
*
In the age of the illogically of logic. Insecurity sells
The heavens have descended―the gate has closed.
The night rolls on―John Maxwell Coetzee―approaches.
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