"2 OR 3 THINGS I KNOW ABOUT HER" "HERE:" "THE PARIS REGION" "On August 19, a decree concerning the organization of state services in the Paris region was officially published." "Two days later, the government appointed Paul Delouvrier prefect of the Paris region, which, as the official release claimed, now enjoyed specific new infrastructures." "She is Marina Vlady." "She is an actress." "She's wearing a midnight-blue sweater with two yellow stripes." "She is of Russian origin." "She has dark chestnut or light brown hair." "I'm not sure which." "Yes, speak as though quoting the truth." "Old man Brecht said it:" "that actors should quote." "Now she turns her head to the right, but that means nothing." "She is Juliette Janson." "She lives here." "She's wearing a midnight-blue sweater with two yellow stripes." "She has dark chestnut or light brown hair." "I'm not sure which." "She's of Russian origin." "Two years ago, in Martinique." "Just like in a Simenon novel." "No, I don't know which book." "Yes, Banana Tourists... - that's the one." "I have to manage somehow." "I think Robert makes 110,000 francs a month." "Now she turns her head to the left, but that means nothing." "I infer that the Gaullist government poses as a reformer and modernizer, though it only normalizes the natural tendencies of capitalism." "I infer too that through centralization this same power further disrupts the nation's economy and undermines its moral fiber." "What am I looking at?" "The floor, that's all." "18 LESSONS ON INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY" "I can feel the tablecloth." " Terrific!" " Hear anything?" "What is it?" "Saigon-Washington." " Who's speaking?" " Johnson." "What's he saying?" ""In '65... to force Hanoi to negotiate... it was with a heavy heart that I ordered my pilots" "to bomb North Vietnam."" "And?" ""It was tremendous... but Hanoi wouldn't negotiate." "In '66... it was again with a heavy heart that I ordered my pilots to bomb Haiphong and Hanoi."" "Let me listen a bit." ""It was tremendous, but Hanoi wouldn't negotiate." "In July '67..." "I ordered my pilots, again with a heavy heart, to raze Chinese atomic installations." "It was tremendous, but Hanoi wouldn't negotiate."" ""In '67... to force Hanoi to negotiate... and again with a heavy heart," "I ordered my pilots to bomb Peking."" "And?" ""It was tremendous, but Hanoi wouldn't negotiate." "Now my missiles are aimed at Moscow."" "And?" ""President Johnson says... that Hanoi must understand" "that his patience is limited."" "Shit!" "I can't hear now." ""Should I wear trompe-I'?" "il ankle-sock designs on pantyhose designed by Louis Ferraud?" "They make daring dresses decent and make calves look pert and charming, if they're slender and young."" "Cut the crap!" " It's in Madame Express." " Never heard of it." "You've got no culture." "Come on, children." "It's the American generals now." "What are they saying?" "That they want to send the North Vietnamese back to the Stone Age." "Hey, Juliette..." ""stone" means the same as pierre, right?" "How'd you get your Austin?" "Juliette found it." "She's terrific." "She's great at finding bargains." "I could use a wife like her." "Dear George Washington, what madness made you play cruel William Pitt?" "Pax Americana, the economy-size brainwasher." "Like a "message from the beyond."" "I was doing the dishes." "I started to cry." "I heard a voice say to me..." ""You're indestructible."" "Me, myself, I." "All of us." "Juliette!" "It's all very mixed up." "Time?" "I don't really know." "No real definition." "Roger's leaving." "Be right out." "We often try to find, to analyze the meaning of words." "But we're too easily amazed." "Frankly, nothing is easier... than to take one thing or another for granted." "Naturally, such regional development facilitates the state's class discrimination policy and allows the large monopolies to shape its economy, regardless of the needs and aspirations of its eight million inhabitants." "The eyes are the body... and the noise is..." "Mommy, do you ever have dreams?" " You'll be late for school." " Tell me." "When I used to dream, it was like being sucked into a great big hole, disappearing down a big hole." "Now when I dream, it's like being scattered in a thousand pieces." "Before, when I'd wake up, even if it took a while," "I'd wake up all at once." "Now I'm afraid of missing pieces." "I had a dream last night." "About what?" "I dreamed I was walking alone along the edge of a cliff with room for only one person." "Suddenly two twins appeared and began walking toward me." "I wondered how they would get by." "And then, suddenly, one of the twins walked toward the other, and they came together to form a single person." "That was when I realized that these two persons were North and South Vietnam reuniting." "Mommy, what's language?" "Language is the house man lives in." "NEW LESSONS ON INDUSTRIAL SOCIETY" "Power company." "Where's the meter?" "This will hurt: 50,000 francs." "The mere fact of suddenly enjoying a new appliance spurs power consumption without regard for the bill." "It's the same old story:" "either no money for rent or no TV, or else a TVbut no car, or else a washer but no vacation." "In other words, in any case, no normal life." "Seven minutes left." "Hello, Mrs. Janson." "I brought Solange." "Aren't you forgetting something?" "It's all I have, but I'll do better next week." "Go join the others." "Three minutes left." "Go join the others." "Can we come in?" "Yes, in there." "I only have cat food." "Go join the other children." "Come and play." "We'll read a story." "We'll read a little story." "Come on, honey." "Sit there." "I'll read you a story." ""Picky Pouc." "By the riverside, Picky Pouc strolls along sitting on her eggs..." "Madame Pelican..."" "The same old story." "An embroiderer's apprentice gets hired by a small company." "She meets a boy who leaves her with a child." "A year later, a second guy, a second child, abandoned again." "She gets lectured at the maternity ward, where she makes girlfriends who tell her how to earn enough to feed her kids." "She goes back to her job but works nights as a prostitute." "One day, a stroke of luck:" "A nice man falls in love and marries her." "They move into a modern apartment... - too expensive, of course." "Two years later, a third child." "They can't get by." "The husband himself asks his wife to walk the streets." "Is this cotton?" " You have dresses like this?" " Upstairs." "I get off at 7:00." "I'm meeting Jean-Claude at 8:00." "We're going out to eat, and maybe to a movie." "Yes, I know how to talk." "Let's talk "ensemble."" ""Ensemble" is a word I like." "An "ensemble" (housing project) is thousands of people." "Maybe even a city." "Nobody knows what the city of tomorrow will look like." "Some of its past semantic richness will be lost, undoubtedly." "Undoubtedly." "Maybe." "The city's creative and formative role will be taken over by other systems of communication." "Maybe." "Television." "Radio." "Vocabulary and syntax." "Knowingly and intentionally." "I haven't had lunch yet and it's 3:00." "Navy-blue Shetland sweaters." "We'll need a new language." "I got up at 8:00." "I have hazel eyes." "PSYCHOLOG Y OF FORM" "May I help you?" " Can I try this on?" " Of course." "There are blues, reds and greens in here." "Yes, I'm sure of that." "My sweater is blue." "White suits you." "I'd like a cotton dress with sleeves." "I'll show you." " Because I see that it's blue." " This way, please." "Had we mistaken blue for green from the start, that would be serious." "This is fine, but when do you close?" "At 7:00." " I'll come back for it." " I can't put it aside." " Why not?" " Ask her." "Can you hold this while I go to my bank?" "Of course, but no later than 6:00." " I'll be back before 6:00." " Fine." "Because my impressions don't always relate to a specific object." "For instance, desire." "Sometimes we know the object of our desire." "Sometimes we don't." "Say I feel I'm missing something but I don't know what or I feel afraid, even if there's nothing to frighten me." "What expression... does not refer to a specific object?" "Oh, yes." "Order, logic." "Yes." "For instance, something can make me cry." "But the cause of my tears can't be found... in the traces they leave on my cheeks." "By this I mean..." "You can describe everything that happens when I do something... without necessarily indicating... what makes me do what I do." "I'll be back at 6:00." "I study the projects and their inhabitants and the bonds between them as intensely as the biologist studies the relationship between the individual and race in evolution." "Only then can I tackle problems of social pathology, nurturing hope for truly new projects." "Me, in a word?" "Indifference." "How are things?" "Not bad." "I got here this morning." "I'm staying a while." "I'm waiting for Jean-Paul." "I'm staying till tonight." "Do you have Winstons?" "Say, you've got new shoes." "I live in the tall apartment blocks in the southern suburbs." "I come to Paris twice a month." "You know, the big blue-and-white buildings." "A pack of Winstons and matches." "Yes, miss..." " I mean madam." "Yes, American shoes." "They trample Vietnamese toes in them." "And South American toes." "I think we've met." " Sure." "Not so fast." "Still don't want me to manage you?" "For only 10 %?" " Yeah, right." "Ask Colette about Isabelle." " I know." "Got her face slashed." " You're not scared?" "The war's over." "And it's only temporary." "Not for long, I hope." "A Coke, please." "This is how Juliette, at 3:37 p.m., looks at the pages of this object, which, in journalistic parlance, is called a magazine." "And this is how, some 150 frames later, another young woman, her fellow creature, her sister, sees the same object." "Where is the truth?" "In full-face or in profile?" "But first of all, what is an object?" "Maybe an object is what serves as a link between subjects, allowing us to live in society, to be together." "But since social relations are always ambiguous, since my thoughts divide as much as unite, and my words unite by what they express and isolate by what they omit, since a wide gulf separates my subjective certainty of myself" "from the objective truth others have of me, since I constantly end up guilty, even though I feel innocent, since every event changes my daily life, since I always fail to communicate, to understand, to love and be loved," "and every failure deepens my solitude, since..." "Since... since I cannot escape the objectivity crushing me nor the subjectivity expelling me, since I cannot rise to a state of being nor collapse into nothingness..." "I have to listen, more than ever I have to look around me at the world, my fellow creature, my brother." "The world alone." "Today, when revolutions are impossible and bloody wars loom, when capitalism is unsure of its rights and the working class is in retreat, when the lightning progress of science makes future centuries hauntingly present, when the future is more present than the present," "when distant galaxies are on my doorstep." "My fellow creature, my brother." "Where do we start?" "But start what?" "God created heaven and earth, sure, but that's too easy." "We should put it better:" "Say that the limits of language are the world's limits, that the limits of my language are my world's limits, and that when I speak, I limit the world, I finish it." "And one inevitable and mysterious day, death will come and abolish these limits, and there will be no questions nor answers." "It will all be a blur." "But if by chance things come into focus again, it may only be with the advent of conscience." "Everything will follow from there." "I don't know where or when... only that it happened." "I've tried to recapture the feeling all day." "There was the smell of trees." "I was the world." "The world was me." "A landscape is like a face." "Is this hotel for Jews only?" "Why?" "It only has one star." " Don't watch me undress." " Why not?" " Because I don't want you to." " But you'll be naked in a minute." "That's different." "I'm Parisian." "INTRODUCTION TO ETHNOLOG Y" "I work in the Metro." "There are two million Parisians there too." "You never see them because the police won't let anyone take photos." "Mind if I put the mirror here?" "No, I'm not to blame if I have a passive side." "Having sexual intercourse." "Why be ashamed of being a woman?" "Or if so, often it's being happy or indifferent." "That's what I'm ashamed of sometimes." "He's going to put his organ between my thighs." "I feel the weight of my arm when I move it." "Maybe I should dump Robert." "He doesn't want to climb the social ladder." "He's happy with what he's got." "He was like that in Martinique." "Why are you putting on lipstick?" "None of your business." "What do you want to do?" "I don't know." "Italian style?" "What's that?" "You stand, with me on my knees." "That way you can watch me." "All right." "Being sexually independent of a man is tempting." "But actually it revolts me." "No, humility isn't such a good idea." "Because it's depressing." "The same goes for shame." "If it could keep people from quarrelling... since it affects our actions... on the basis of approval or criticism." "The criticism of others." "It's also depressing... so it's no good." "Like self-contempt." "And feelings of that kind." "How about like this?" "Certainly not." "She offered me 30,000 francs a day to work in the Madeleine area." "Can you imagine?" "I'm a secretary." "I speak English and Italian." "But I can't find work because I'm too old." "Yesterday the agency said they had nothing for me." "What is art? "That by which forms become style," someone said." "Well, the style is the man, so art is what gives humanity to forms." "I look at the wall, at objects." "Now." "Never." "Here." "For the time being, I'm looking outside." "You're so tan." "Where were you?" "In Russia." " Where?" " Silence." "In Leningrad." "Are the Russians nice?" "Happiness." "They're like everyone else." "I was just asking." "They're nice enough." "Some noises." "Have you seen the Dupereys lately?" "I saw them as I walked by the St. Lazare station." "It's true, though, that people never really know each other." "It's broken." "Robert." "Christophe." "Blue spiral notebooks." "How have you been?" " Fine." "Not being forced to have sex." "It's better than the factory." "I wouldn't want to work in a factory either." "How are your kids?" "They're fine." "What I say with words is never what I'm really saying." "They're fine, but they don't behave." "I wait." "I look." " I'm using this one." " Okay." "My hair." "The telephone." "Marianne, it's for you." "Coming." " Yvonne's not here?" " She's out sick." "Mr. Michel." "Can I get off a half hour earlier again?" "Work it out with Colette." "I'm careful when I cross the street." "I think about the accident I might have... and my life ending there." "Unemployment... illness... old age." "Death, never." "I don't have plans for the future." "There are no prospects." "My name is Paulette Cadjaris." "I didn't make it as a secretary." "I don't believe in the future." "I go for walks." "I don't like being shut in." "I read whenever I can." "I really like to study people's characters." "I like walking, climbing... riding a bike." "Just for fun." "Movies two or three times a month... but not during the summer." "I've never been to a play... but I'd like to." "I prefer reading." "Biographies." "Studying people's lives, their characters... their achievements." "Travel writings... ancient history." "A tree." "Later, when I'm married to Fran?" "ois." "What else have I done?" "Lots of ordinary things." "There is increasing interaction between images and language." "You might say that living in modern society is virtually like living in a giant comic strip." "Still, language in itself cannot accurately define the image." "For instance..." "For instance:" "How do you describe an event?" "How do you say or depict that at 4:10 that afternoon," "Juliette and Marianne came to a garage where Juliette's husband works?" "Sense and nonsense." "How do you describe exactly what happened?" "Sure, there's Juliette, her husband, the garage." "But are these the right words and images to use?" "Aren't there other possibilities?" "Am I speaking too loud?" "Am I too close or too far?" "For example, there's foliage, and though Juliette is no Faulkner heroine, couldn't it be as dramatically valid as the foliage in Wild Palms?" "There's also another woman we will learn nothing about." "I won't even know how to say that with total honesty." "There's also a cloudy sky, provided I turn my head and don't stare straight ahead, and words on the walls." "Why all these signs that make me distrust language and submerge me in meanings, drowning reality, not freeing it of the imaginary?" "With images, anything goes... - the best and the worst." "Before me, ordinary common sense repairs the broken process of my reason." "Objects exist." "If we pay more attention to them than to people, it's because they exist more than those people." "Dead objects are still alive." "Living persons are often already dead." "All I'm doing is looking for reasons to live happily." "And if I now take this inquiry further," "I find there's simply a reason to live." "First, because there are memories." "Then there's the present, and the ability to stop and savor it." "Meaning, we have seized a reason to live as it goes by and held on to it for a few seconds, after its discovery amid the unique circumstances surrounding it." "The birth of the simplest things in the human world, man's possession of them with his mind, a new world where men and things can live in harmony... - such is my aim." "It is as political as it is poetic." "It explains, in any case, this longing for expression." "Whose?" "Mine." "Writer and painter." "It's 4:45 p.m." "Describe Juliette or foliage?" "In any case, talking about both is impossible." "Let's just say that both trembled gently, on this late October afternoon." "THE GREAT HOPE OF THE 20TH CENTURY" " How long have you been here?" " Three years." " Where are you from?" " Algeria." "You prefer it here to Algiers?" " Any sisters or brothers?" " A sister and a brother." " And your parents?" " They're home." "What does your father do?" "He works in aviation." "And your mother?" "She doesn't work." "In this image, three cultures meet." "The culture of leisure, the culture of the key chain, and the culture of sex." "If, by chance, you can't afford LSD, then buy a color TV." "This is it." "Didn't you know?" "I thought it was 15,000 for the night." "15,000 for the night." "Are you crazy?" "Should we go in?" "It's open." "He's not here." "I was thinking of things." "I don't know how they came to mind." "This place is big." "There's even a bathroom." "Thoughts agree with reality or challenge it." "To challenge." "Where's your guy?" " What did he say?" " To undress here." "I'll put it on later." " Where'd you get it?" " Vogue." "Not bad." "You know Paco Rabanne dresses?" " No, what are they?" "They're real funny." "Dresses made up of little colored metallic disks." "They're real funny." "For going out, naturally." "I could speak French." "They're crazy over there." "A dead Vietcong costs the U.S. Treasury one million dollars." "Johnson could enjoy 20,000 girls like these two for the same price." "I existed." "That's all I knew." "It's all I could say." "A MEDICINE FOR MELANCHOLY" "Your T-shirt is very America über alles." "Yes, a city is a construction in space." "The mobile elements of the projects?" "I don't know." "The inhabitants." "Yes, the mobile elements are as important as the fixed ones." "Even at its most ordinary, a city can provide a special pleasure." "No event exists in itself." "It's linked with everything around it." "Maybe the observer of this spectacle... is me." "Every inhabitant is connected to a specific part of the city." "And with what?" "Oh, yes." "The image is usually steeped in memories and meanings." "The physical sharpness of this image." "Paris is a mysterious city." "Stifling." "Natural." "Come here, Juliette." "What's this?" "Is he crazy?" "He enjoys it more if we don't look at him." "No, not that." "Never mind." "I'll do it." "It's a strange thing:" "that a person living in Europe on August 17, 1966... can think of another person living in Asia." "Thinking, meaning... " "they aren't activities like writing, running or eating." "They're deep inside you." "If someone asked me to keep singing that song," "I could continue." "What sort of process represents... this knowledge that we could keep doing something?" "I don't know." "For instance, I think of someone who isn't here." "I picture him... or suddenly bring him up with a remark." "Even if he's dead." "For instance, I come out and say..." ""I'm hot."" "No, rather: "I'm impatient."" "America über alles." "Now I understand the thought process." "It means substituting an effort of imagination... for the study of real objects." "Saying something, meaning something... " "maybe they're expressions of the muscular and nervous systems." "For instance, if I say..." ""I'm going to pick up Robert at the Elysées-Marbeuf."" "And now I try to think it, without words... neither out loud nor under my breath." "Waiting for someone?" "Yes, my wife." "How about you?" "I'm waiting for someone, but I don't know if he'll come." "You writing to her?" "No, it's for myself." "Got a light?" "Too bad it's raining." ""Fortunately, it wasn't like this under Comrade Lenin's leadership."" ""Léon Pélé:" "moving, transport, excursions." "108 rue Joubert Philips, by the cemetery." "Telephone 295."" ""The fountain's water flows, solemn as a dog's snout." "The rose intimidates me." "It never laughs."" ""'Purify yourself, stranger.' 'I shall enter pure,' said Demetrius." "With her hair soaked, the girl guarding the gate first moistened his eyelids, then his lips and fingers."" ""In the heart of the lovely Pyrenees, you'll find a wide choice of sites." "24 rue du 4 Septembre, Paris." "Telephone 742-21-34."" ""'I don't know which means will be employed to prevent the rash acts of madmen.' ..." " Nikita Khrushchev"" ""'I'll go work in Paris soon,' she said modestly, as though Mrs. Calendar could find her... -"" "Nothing else to say?" "Not really." "And you?" "Want to hear what I'm doing now?" "You told me." "You're writing." "Yes, I'm writing." "Something special." "I'm picking up messages from the beyond." "I saw a movie where someone did that." "Repeat what you said about the rain." "I like the rain." "That's not what you said." "You're right." "It's not." "You said... " "That the rain made me sad." "Is that it?" "Isn't that a trite thing to say?" "No, because the rain doesn't make everyone sad." "Tell me something else you find interesting." "People never really talk in a movie." "I wanted to do that with you." "You really want to talk with me?" "Only because you're a stranger." "I enjoy talking to strangers." "Go on, talk." "Do you know what talking is?" "Talking is saying words." "And what is saying words?" "Saying words is talking." "For saying stupid things or smart things." "For instance, how can we talk together?" "But really talk, with total commitment." "By taking an interesting topic and talking about it." "Then let's talk about sex." "Not that again." " Are you afraid to?" " Absolutely not." "I think you're afraid." "Think what you like, but I'm not." "Why would I be?" "Why does sex always frighten people?" "It doesn't frighten me." "For instance, I'll ask you to say something and I bet you won't say it." "Let's hear it." "You promise to repeat it?" "That depends on whether I like it or not, if it's intelligent or not." "See?" "You're afraid." "It's got nothing to do with fear." "Okay, here goes." ""My sex organs are between my legs."" "Repeat it." "We're not in school." "But you said you weren't afraid of sex." "I'm not." "Then say it." "What for?" "It's stupid." "It's as easy as lighting a cigarette." "If I light a cigarette, it's because I want to smoke." "Why bother saying something so obvious?" "Come on now." "You have sex organs like you have eyes, shoulders." " True." " Then talk about it." "I don't talk about my eyes or sex organs, that's all." " You should." "You have lovely eyes." " Big deal." " And a lovely mouth." " Big deal." "Isn't that guy over there the Nobel Prize winner?" "Ivanov?" " Could be." " Looks like him." "What will the communist ethic be?" "The same as it is now, I think." "Meaning what?" "Taking care of one another." "Working for one's country..." "Ioving it." "Loving the arts and sciences." "What difference will there be?" "Under communism, it'll be easier to explain." "I get it." "It's money." "It's a great evil, since you start to steal unwittingly." "Can I ask you something?" "Must one be honest with oneself?" "At your age, definitely." "And at yours?" "At my age... as often as possible." "No, always." "That's true." "You have to be attentive, feel the intoxication of life." " Can I ask you something else?" " Sure." "Is poetry instructive or just an embellishment?" "Everything that embellishes life is instructive." "You spoke of intoxication." "You mean beer or vodka?" "Neither." "Without anything." "I've never tried either." "What is the intoxication of life?" "I think... you know what it is." "Me?" "I often get depressed, you know." "I start to cry." "It's pathetic." "Do you have time to talk to me?" " Sure I do." "Maybe we should do it by writing." "But that might be even worse than here." "Could you not look at me?" "I'm ashamed of what I'm going to say, but only you can advise me." "Why me?" "I dunno." " Why me?" " I dunno." "Don't you have friends... teachers... parents?" "Sure I do." "They're not bad people?" "No, some of them are good." "And intelligent?" "Yes, intelligent." "So why me?" "Have you read my books?" "We study them at school, but I haven't read much." "So isn't it odd that I'd be the one you want to talk to?" "I thought you had more courage." "Perhaps it's not a question of courage... but of competence." "Then it's better by writing." "I'm going." "And what did you do all day, if you're so great?" "I worked this morning." "Where?" "At my garage." " Is it yours?" " No, it's not." "Then why did you say "my"?" "At the garage." "You're right." "You're not listening." "I am." "How do you know it's a garage?" "You sure they named it right?" "That it's not a pool or a hotel?" "It's possible." "It could be called something else." "Exactly." "Why do things have specific names?" "Because they're given them." "Who gives them?" "Since you know the world so well, do you know yourself?" "Not all that well." ""Gilbert frowned slightly." "Martine noticed and blushed."" ""If Hungary's success, sanctioned by its dualism, is a domestic event, the birth of Italy and Germany concerns all of Europe... -"" "Anything else, Mr. Bouvard?" "Another egg mayonnaise and a chocolate mousse." ""Involuntarily, my fingers twitched wildly." "'He's gonna talk,' a voice said." "The water was turned off, and my gag was removed." "I could breathe again." "I saw the lieutenant and the captain smoking cigarettes as they punched me in the gut so I'd throw up the water I'd swallowed."" ""However, thought is not merely the quest for non-thought."" " And you, Mr. Pécuchet?" " A "mystère" ice cream." "There's no mystery." ""Thought as such is bound to the birth of being insofar as being is birth." "Being has always been destined for thought, and being, as the destiny of thought... -"" "SOCIOLOG Y OF THE NOVEL" "You coming?" "I haven't got all day." "Hurry up!" " Why not here?" " You can see there's no room." "We no longer need chance events to photograph and kill people." "Return to the ABC of existence." "...or when." "All I remember is it happened." "Maybe it's not important." "Maybe it was when I was with the guy from the Metro going to the hotel." "I had a funny feeling." "I thought about it all day." "The feeling of my ties to the world." "Suddenly I felt I was the world... and the world was me." "It would take pages and pages to describe it." "Volumes and volumes." "A landscape is like a face." "We're tempted to say, "I just see a face... with a certain expression."" "But that doesn't mean it's an extraordinary expression... nor that you'll try to describe it." "We may feel like saying that it's this or that." ""She looks like Chekhov's Natasha."" ""Or the sister of Flaherty's Nanook."" "But you'd be right to say that you can't describe that with words." "Still, it seems to me that the expression on my face must mean something." "Something that stands out from the general design." "I mean... from the sort of form outlined." "It's as if you could say... that this face has a certain expression." "And then..." "And then?" "Actually, it's this one." "For instance... exhaustion." "I lived in a fancy area." "Our apartment was sold, and they stuck us here." "It's not the same thing." "What will we do?" "Start over again." "It's nice here." "It's a lot of fun." "But no playground." " They should have a playground." " The ladders are dangerous." "ON SALE HERE" " They took out the carousel." " And the swings too." " It's fun here." " If we could find something to do." "Go get the kids." "And the key." " Okay!" "There you are." "What are you doing?" " My homework." " What about?" " Comradeship." "I'll read it to you." ""This year, in my new school, boys and girls are together, so our class is mixed." "'Is comradeship between boys and girls possible and desirable?" "'" "Yes, because some girls are nice and honest." "Maryse, Martine, Ghislaine, Roselyne." "You can talk with them." "'Hello, kid,' I say to her." "'Hello,' she answers." "Then we talk until we disagree about something." "'Silence,' says the kid." "'But that's what you said.'" "'Calm down.'" "If I give in, we keep talking." "In that case, this comradeship is desirable since the girls are nice." "With Maryse and Roselyne I have more serious conversations." "'What did you get for the answer?" "' Roselyne asks."" "Hold on." "H'OB equals AOB." "No, A'OB equals AOB'l2." "Do what you want." ""In this case too, comradeship is possible and desirable." "But other girls are mean and sneaky-Iooking."" "Coming, Juliette?" ""With girls with glasses, we don't talk calmly... - we argue." "'Rrrr... you're impossible."'" "Come on." "Can I keep going, Mommy?" ""'Rrrr... you're impossible.'" "I give her a kick." "She throws a spitball at me, but then the teacher breaks in." "In this case, comradeship is neither possible nor desirable." "I'd prefer the electric chair with my feet in a glass of water." "These mean and nice girls are still clean and nice overall, which makes me feel better."" "We made it." " Made it where?" " Home." "Now what do we do?" "Sleep." "What's got into you?" "And then what?" "We wake up." " Then what?" " The same thing." "We start over." "We wake up again." "We eat." "And then what?" "I don't know." "We die." "And then what?" "Mommy, can I play a little and read?" " Sure you can." " Thanks, Mommy." "What does it mean to know something?" "Robert, bring Solange in, please." "Point to my eyes?" "I know they're my eyes because I see with them." "I know they're not my knees because I was told they're not." "Calm down." "What if I hadn't been told?" "And what about living?" "Let's go beddy-bye." "Don't you want to sleep with Christophe?" "If Hitler came, I'd shoot him." "How can I say that?" "Because I'd be waiting for him." "As soon as he came in, I'd shoot him." "No, I don't know where he is." "When I don't know, I imagine." "How can I imagine something if I don't know where it is?" "No, I don't know if he's still alive." "Yes, I may be confusing thought and reality." "Yes, I'd be tempted to say that." "That since there aren't always real objects... that can vouch... for the truth... the truth of our thoughts." "What we think is not reality... but a shadow of reality." "What?" "That's not certain." " The children are in bed." " Oh, okay." "Define myself in a word?" "Not dead yet." ""The man of tomorrow is of above-average practical intelligence." "This intelligence includes the ability to make decisions and one's range of knowledge." "Richardson, Buloz, Henry and Co." "found that among the 2,589 employees of its client firms, executives displayed a practical IQ of 84, managers and foremen a PQ of 78, and mechanics and manual workers, 74." "The man of tomorrow is confident but not aggressive."" "Did you underline that?" ""He's ready to admit he has problems and recognize his failings." "Such a man isn't afraid to say, 'I don't know.'" "Only the self-confident can admit to failure."" "I don't agree." "Then read something else." "Know the difference between true and false love?" "No, what?" "False love is when I remain the same." "True love is when I change, when my beloved changes." "Think I've changed?" "No, I'm just tired." "Not you." "Me." "I've changed, yet I've remained the same." "So what is it?" "I don't know." "If you don't know, give me a cigarette." "I listen to commercials on my transistor." "Thanks to E-S-S-O," "I serenely take the road to dreams and forget all else." "I forget Hiroshima and Auschwitz." "I forget Budapest." "I forget Vietnam and minimum wages." "I forget the housing crisis." "I forget the famine in India." "I've forgotten it all, except that since it takes me back to zero," "I have to start over from there."