Ahmed the Philosopher: Thirty-Four Short Plays for Children and Everyone Else 9780231536585

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Ahmed the Philosopher

AHMED THE PHILOSOPHER Thirty-Four Short Plays for Children & Everyone Else

Alain Badiou

Translated and with an Introduction by Joseph Litvak

Columbia University Press / New York

Columbia University Press Publishers Since 1893 New York

Chichester, West Sussex

cup.columbia.edu Copyright © 2014 Columbia University Press All rights reserved Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Badiou, Alain. [Ahmed philosophe. English.] Ahmed the philosopher: thirty-four short plays for children and everyone else / Alain Badiou; translated and with an introduction by Joseph Litvak. pages cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978-0-231-16692-8 (cloth: alk. paper) — ISBN 978-0-231-16693-5 (pbk.: alk. paper) — ISBN 978-0-231-53658-5 (e-book: alk. paper) I. Litvak, Joseph, translator. II. Title. PQ2662.A323A7513 2013 842’.914—dc23

2013035269

Columbia University Press books are printed on permanent and durable acid-free paper. This book is printed on paper with recycled content. Printed in the United States of America c 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 p 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 Cover & interior design by Martin N. Hinze References to Web sites (URLs) were accurate at the time of writing. Neither the author nor Columbia University Press is responsible for URLs that may have expired or changed since the manuscript was prepared.

CONTENTS

Preface to the English Translation of Ahmed philosophe vii Translator’s Introduction: Badiou the Comedian/Ahmed the Philosopher 1 Ahmed the Philosopher 23 Notes 203

Preface to the English Translation of Ahmed philosophe

I created the character of Ahmed, an Algerian who had been living in France for a very long time, in 1984, during the summer. I was outraged by the behavior of many “Frenchmen” who were attacking workers of foreign origin and their families in brutal, stupid, and, not to mince words, racist ways. A number of very young people had been targeted by snipers hiding behind their windows, on the pretext that they “were making noise”! It was clear that for these child-hunters, the life of an Arab wasn’t worth much. I was also outraged by the position of the state and of almost all of the political parties. No, the sinister Le Pen was by no means alone here. The prime minister himself, a socialist named by President Mitterrand, had said apropos of immigration that “Le Pen was raising some legitimate concerns.” Insidious laws were being readied to make life even more difficult for those workers who had the hardest jobs, who earned the least amount of money, and who lived in the most impoverished areas of the large cities. Sometimes, in order to express a revolt, laughter is a good method. Suddenly, I had the idea to transpose to the outskirts of a contemporary big city the characters and the events of a very well-known Molière play, Les Fourberies de Scapin (The Trickeries of Scapin). This is a great tradition of the comic theater: the hero is usually a representative of the lowest class. Comedy reveals the world of the rich and the powerful from the violent, ironic, and critical perspective of the oppressed and the poor. The hero of Plautus’s Latin plays is always a slave, that of Molière’s comedies is a valet. My hero would be Ahmed, the immigrant worker of our housing projects.

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And so, in a few weeks, my first comedy, Ahmed le subtil (Ahmed the Subtle), was written. The great director Antoine Vitez did an astonishing reading of it, in 1987, at the Théâtre National de Chaillot in Paris. The young director of the Théâtre de Rheims, Christian Schiaretti, staged it superbly for the Festival of Avignon in 1994. I followed the work of the Rheims actors passionately, and I had long and lively discussions with Christian Schiaretti. We decided to continue our work together. It was thus that, between 1994 and 1996, I wrote for Schiaretti’s troupe, in whose activity I had become directly involved, three other plays in which Ahmed was the central character: Ahmed philosophe (Ahmed the Philosopher), Ahmed se fâche (Ahmed Gets Angry), and Les Citrouilles (The Pumpkins). This entire theatrical episode has stayed with me as an enchanted memory. Ahmed the Philosopher was born from an idea of Schiaretti’s: to do in theatrical form short philosophy lessons for children. The final result, whose English translation you are about to read, is composed of thirtyfour sketches, each of which has as its title a classic philosophical concept. We therefore find Chance, Nothing, Contradiction, God, the Event, Language, Repetition, Death, Dialectics, the Subject, the Big and the Little, Morality, Time, Nature, etc. Sometimes the form is a monologue by Ahmed, drawing a lesson from one of his adventures. It can also be a dialogue between Ahmed and another character to whom Ahmed will teach a lesson. This other character is usually taken from Ahmed the Subtle: the stupid racist, Moustache; the bourgeois congresswoman, Madame Pompestan; the gabby and pretentious intellectual, Rhubarb; a young hooligan from the housing project, Camille; a young black woman, Fenda. Two others of these characters appear for the first time in Ahmed the Philosopher: an old Arab woman, Fatima, Ahmed’s mother; and the Demon of the Cities, a rancid old French informer. Only three of the sketches include three characters, Ahmed and his two understudies (the character of Ahmed’s understudy also appears in Ahmed Gets Angry and The Pumpkins). Only one sketch brings together almost the entire cast: Ahmed, Moustache, Madame Pompestan, Rhubarb, and Fenda. This is the sketch that asks the crucial question: what is philosophy? The work of Schiaretti and the actors of the Rheims company truly gave this ensemble the vitality of a popular theater, an itinerant theater, a theater for everyone. In several French cities there were performances for children, which had considerable success: the children intervened, asked

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questions, elaborated on the improvisations of Ahmed—the remarkable Didier Galas behind the magnificent mask designed by Erhard Stiefel. But all audiences have always given Ahmed the Philosopher a warm welcome. Since then, moreover, numerous troupes have performed this or that selection from Ahmed the Philosopher’s thirty-four scenes. And again, just recently, the director Grégoire Ingold has toured France with a wonderful spectacle, very different from the original version. The subject of these plays is in reality the power of thinking that resides in the people and their encounter with the materials of philosophy. It is also the ability of the people to invent a language not only to describe their living conditions but also to draw lessons from them, to think the content of their experience in a simultaneously very concrete and very abstract way, a very universal way. And of course, in these philosophical lessons there is the ridicule of the powerful, the weakness of their language, the empty vanity resulting from their positions of power. There is the scathing mockery that strikes at the ideological bloviation of a large number of intellectuals committed to the defense of the established order. I am really delighted that all this has been rendered in English thanks to the surprising innovations of Joe Litvak. It wasn’t easy: the language of Ahmed the Philosopher combines contemporary popular style and philosophical jargon in a way that is at once funny and disorienting. It is very much embedded in the idiomatic character of French, between the phrasings of classic theater and the brutalities of the language of today. What Joe Litvak had to do, almost sentence by sentence, was come up with English equivalents, based on a profound understanding of the meaning of the lines and of the acting style that can do justice to them. So well does this succeed that often I myself laugh harder reading the English text than reading the original that I wrote! I hope that readers of the English-speaking world will laugh too and will ask that these plays be performed. The games of the rich and powerful, seen in their weakness and their intellectual poverty by the people down below, are precisely, from Aristophanes in the fourth century b.c. to Chaplin in the twentieth century a.d., the universal law of great comedy.

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TRANSLATOR’S INTRODUCTION Badiou the Comedian/Ahmed the Philosopher

AHMED THE DIAGONAL

Alain Badiou is the most important contemporary French philosopher, and his philosophical work is well known in the English-speaking world, where his books are translated and published soon after they appear in France. What is less well known, however, is that Badiou, in the long French tradition represented most prominently in the twentieth century by Jean-Paul Sartre, is not just a philosopher but a philosopher-écrivain: a philosopher who is also the author of literary works, and whose literary writing is as important as his philosophical writing. Of all his works, both philosophical and literary, the one that Badiou considers his strongest, he has claimed recently, is a novel entitled Calme bloc ici-bas (Calm Block Fallen Here); the work that he considers his most beautiful is his tragic play L’Incident d’Antioche (The Incident at Antioch).1 He has also written a romanopéra or opera-novel called L’Écharpe rouge (The Red Scarf), which was in fact staged as an opera in 1984 by the great director Antoine Vitez. But Badiou’s most accessible and most immediately entertaining works, and the ones that have therefore known significant theatrical success in France, are the four comedies that I will refer to as the Ahmed plays: Ahmed le Subtil (Ahmed the Subtle), Ahmed philosophe (Ahmed the Philosopher), Ahmed se fâche (Ahmed Gets Angry), and Les Citrouilles (The Pumpkins).2 Along with Susan Spitzer’s translation of L’Incident d’Antioche (published by Columbia University Press in the same volume with the original French version of the play), the present translation of Ahmed philosophe—the most frequently performed and the most frankly pedagogical of these plays—should begin to compensate Anglophone readers for what has thus far been not only a truncated view of Badiou’s oeuvre but also a

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distorted reception of his philosophy itself, which entertains complex and intimate relations with his more obviously literary writings. Those relations are already signaled by the title of the play whose translation you are about to read. In Ahmed philosophe, written and first performed in 1995, the philosopher-playwright stages philosophy as theater, and as comic theater in particular. “Tout philosophe est un comédien” (“Every philosopher is an actor”), Badiou has said recently.3 From the time that he played the title role, at the age of sixteen, in his lycée’s production of Molière’s Les Fourberies de Scapin (The Trickeries of Scapin), Badiou (who impersonates some version of himself in Jean-Luc Godard’s 2010 Film socialisme) would seem to epitomize his assertion that every philosopher is an actor. (In the summer of 2011 Badiou publicly performed a role in one of the scenes from Ahmed the Philosopher, and he has spoken of performing other scenes from the Ahmed plays as well.)4 But if Ahmed philosophe presents the philosopher as a comédien, it also proposes—as though it were already speaking English as well as French—that every philosopher is a comedian. The play makes a case, that is, not just for its comic hero as a philosopher but for philosophy itself as comic performance. Originally subtitled “Twenty-two Short Plays for Children and Everybody Else”—constructed, in other words, as a series of philosophy lessons—Ahmed the Philosopher, which, as we shall see, eventually grew from twenty-two to thirty-four sketches, has as its twenty-second sketch a lesson in which Ahmed, explicitly assuming the role of philosophy professor that he has been playing all along, conducts an oral examination of the other characters in the play, to whom he poses the question: “What is philosophy?” After they have given their variously bad answers, Ahmed wraps up the examination by explaining to his “pupils” why he finds their performances so disappointing: “In thinking, there’s joy, there’s enthusiasm, there’s happiness, there’s pleasure. Which means that philosophy is also confronting and making room for the joy of thinking. You haven’t been very good in this oral final examination. And the main reason seems to me to be the following: not enough joy. Not enough confidence in the joy of thinking. Too much bickering, too much bitterness, too much resentment, too much rivalry.” In Ahmed the philosopher we see Badiou the comedian, enacting philosophy as what he candidly calls a gai savoir, mobilizing the joy of thinking, its violence along with its inventiveness, against the resentment-machine that constitutes the world of the other

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characters—indeed, the world of Western “democracies” as a whole, no less today than in 1995.5 The first Ahmed play, Ahmed the Subtle, has the alternative title, Scapin 84 (the play, as one might have guessed, was written in 1984), and indeed Ahmed is a modern version of that comic archetype, the treacherous servant. A young Algerian or, at least in the tenth sketch, French-born and of Algerian descent—in any case, a figure of shifting identity—Badiou’s updated Scapin lives in a banlieue, or low-income suburb, of a city that could well be Paris and presides, with a wily impudence as worthy of Groucho Marx as of Molière’s cunning valet, over a group of recurring characters emblematic of late twentieth-century France. To say that Ahmed is an avatar of the treacherous servant is to say, as does Badiou in his preface to the Ahmed tetralogy, that Ahmed induces “the becomingfarce of the world” (18). Ahmed the philosopher is therefore also “Ahmedthe-diagonal” (19), as Badiou, the most mathematical of contemporary European philosophers, calls him. Ahmed is a diagonal, Badiou continues, “in the sense in which the diagonal of the square is not commensurable with its sides. In the social square of a world given over to capitalist savagery pure and simple, Ahmed comes along and confuses matters in such a way that there suddenly appears, in and through laughter . . . a dimension that has, with this world, absolutely no common measure” (18–19). And, if the world through which Ahmed cuts a comically philosophical diagonal is given over to capitalist savagery, this world’s representatives are bad at philosophy because they have learned it from the loyal servants of capitalist savagery, that is to say, from journalists. Not surprisingly, the first of Ahmed’s pupils to answer the question “What is philosophy?” is the eager but dim-witted union organizer farcically named Rhubarb: “Philosophy [Rhubarb volunteers] is the love of wisdom. The wisdom of being humane in all human relationships. Humane relationships means respecting the difference of the other. The difference of the other is that he isn’t like me. And me is what’s at the basis of all existence. Therefore, philosophy is the love of what’s different from what’s at the basis of all existence” (290). Awarding Rhubarb three out of twenty points for this answer, Ahmed remarks, “No doubt about it, you’ve learned your philosophy from the newspapers!” As what passes for a good leftist after the gutting of socialism that was the Mitterrand era, and thus as a loyal supporter of the reactionary “sequence” that, according to Badiou, began around 1976 (and that

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may now be reaching its end), Rhubarb can only recite the “democratic” human-rights pieties purveyed by France’s omnipresent media intellectuals: the famous nouveaux philosophes, those spectacularly repentant revolutionaries of May 1968 who, ascending with the very counterrevolution that they helped to initiate, became not just philosopher-actors but also philosopher-celebrities.6 Although less fluent in the patois of “ethics” that Badiou, in his book of the same name, had analyzed so mordantly two years earlier, Rhubarb’s three fellow pupils—who, with Rhubarb and Ahmed, constitute the cast of the first, twenty-two-scene version of Ahmed the Philosopher—turn out also to have been influenced, in their different ways, by the “philosophy” of the day: that quintessentially journalistic pseudo-thinking that is indeed nothing if not à jour, up-to-date, au courant. Along with Rhubarb, in fact, these three characters form the four sides of the “social square” across which the real philosopher cuts his diagonal. Representing the eviscerated left, Rhubarb finds his political “opposite” in the corrupt right-wing députée (congresswoman or member of Parliament) named Madame Pompestan (a role performed by a male actor in the original production the play). And, while these “normal” or classic opposites describe two facing sides of the square, its other two sides are supplied by the play’s “unofficial” or rogue opposites: on one side the racist, xenophobic lout named Moustache (the kind of patriotic Frenchman likely to support France’s still-flourishing far-right National Front); on the other side the less farcically named, less caricatural, but still oversocialized and antiphilosophical character named Fenda, Ahmed’s African girlfriend—in whom, however, Ahmed glimpses some genuinely philosophical, some comically diagonal, possibilities. Ahmed’s own language quite vividly articulates philosophy as comedy. Here are his concluding remarks to the pupils in his philosophy class: As detestable as the world may be, and it is detestable, there’s always a point, in yourselves, a personal and obscure point, a point that’s unexpected, almost astounding even to you, which is the point of departure for thinking what is. Hold onto that point! Find it and hold onto it! Philosophy has no other goal. Let everyone find his point and hold onto it! The point in you that gives you your capacity for thinking and for its joy. The point that’s the point of view, the point that allows everyone to invent, and not to repeat. For repetition is the path of 4

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imposture and pain. Stop repeating, stop stewing in your own juices. Be irreplaceable, not because you are yourself, but because you have found, in yourself, the active point, the point that separates us from our fatigue and our private monotony. A diagonal line, Ahmed is also that point or a name for it: a name for a point that, in its hidden revolutionary potential, strongly resembles the concept of the event, with which Badiou’s philosophy is most closely associated.7 But this point may have another name as well. The scene ends with the following exchange: FENDA . So, Ahmed, it’s like when the sunshine splits open the clouds, or

when, after the winter, you hear the cry of the first bird. AHMED . You said it, light of my life! Philosophy is what helps us to interrupt repetition. Separate yourselves! Separate yourselves from yourselves. Then, with that real in you that splits you open, there’s thinking and joy. Hey, you dead people: get up! (“Debout, les morts!”) I have rendered as “that real in you that splits you open” Badiou’s phrase, “ce réel en vous qui vous fend.” Ahmed gets this image of the real from the luminous Fenda, who gets it from her own name: “it’s like when the sunshine splits open the clouds”; “c’est comme quand un soleil fend les nuages.” Ahmed, as I have said, has not found Fenda to be a brilliant pupil up until now. But here, at the end of the philosophy lesson, she begins to radiate promise. Finding in her very name the word for separation, she begins to find a way of separating herself from herself, of splitting herself open. The mediocre pupil may learn how to do philosophy as comedy after all. “Se fendre la gueule”: this is how you say “to split your sides” in French. And once you can split your sides—once you can cut a diagonal through yourself—there’s a good chance that you can get others cracking up too. In the world of capitalist savagery, at any rate, where they are already dead, they cannot even hope to die of laughter. Thanks to the comic philosophy that cuts across them, they might come alive with it.

“A BAS LA MORT!”

The play of Fenda/fendre gets lost, of course, in translation; the task of the translator is to recuperate this kind of verbal wit—in which the Ahmed 5

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comedies abound—elsewhere and otherwise. And yet, wordplay itself has an ambiguous status for Badiou. While it produces effects of levity that are consistent with a buoyant conception of philosophy as gai savoir—with the cloud-splitting clarity of that Platonic ascent toward the purity of the Idea that motivates Badiou’s philosophy no less than Plato’s—the resulting comic philosophy or philosophical comedy, bound up as it is with what Badiou rather aloofly refers to as “bodies and languages,” remains necessarily impure from a Badiousian as well as from a Platonic perspective.8 Yet theater’s “principled impurity,” as Badiou calls it, has been an object of enduring fascination for Badiou the philosopher and a richly generative matrix for Badiou the playwright.9 Indeed, Badiou has recently published his own more-than-translation of Plato’s Republic, in which Plato’s antitheatrical philosophy finds itself overtly and aggressively theatricalized.10 Much as Badiou may aspire to a paradoxically “pure” or even Platonic theater, he delights in and draws intellectual energy from the resources of theatrical impurity. Here, again, is Badiou from the preface to the Ahmed tetraology: Theater today is most often heavy. It is materially heavy (productions that show off the money they are spending, sets worthy of an opera, etc.), and it is spiritually heavy: morose feelings, moaning and groaning, sad nihilism, compassion. . . . This heaviness is in my opinion the consequence of a sort of general resignation, completely alien to the resources of thinking and force that I want, on the contrary, to typify on the stage. Hence the need for a theater that is, to be sure, “perfect” (virtuosity of the actors, infinite care in lighting, simple beauty of the scenic arrangement, carefully wrought language, at once rough and poetic), but light and pure, that is to say, directed toward the essential, frontal and energetic, demanding the support of the audience, through its laughter, through its presence, through its concentration. . . . I would like the theater not to be a mirror, or a double, of the simultaneously stagnant, frantic, and muddled world into which the somber dictatorship of profit drags us. I would like it to be a clearing, an elucidation, an incitement. (26) No wonder, given this aspiration to lightness, that the final words of the first version of Ahmed the Philosopher should be “Hey, you dead people: 6

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get up!” As an incitement, this command is addressed as much to the audience as to Ahmed’s pupils onstage. Obviously, Ahmed-Badiou is not just calling for a standing ovation—at least, not for the kind expected of the Broadway audience that, under the somber dictatorship of profit, rises, with the mechanical regularity of jack-in-the-boxes, to applaud the money the production has shown it is spending. Rather, the demand for the dead to rise is directed, by way of the audience and the characters alike, at that fabulous corpse, the theater itself. For the light and pure theater—the Platonic theater—that Badiou wants is nothing other, as he puts it, than “a wager for thinking against death” (27). Ahmed the philosopher ends the original version of the play by ordering the dead to rise; but he ends the play’s sixteenth sketch, titled “Death,” with these words: “Lots of people pretend to die, in the theater, they die every night, then they get up again and take a bow! All the better! For the theater is also a meditation on life and not on death. The life of Rhubarb, the life of Madame Pompestan, the life of Ahmed! Forever! And your own life, you who come here to see the simulation of death! Your life forever! Down with death! Say it with me: ‘Down with death!’” “A bas la mort!” Wanting the theater to make the dead get up, the philosopher-comedian equally wants it to put death down. And in this living theater, this theater that defeats death, what is constantly at stake is the life of the theater itself. As Badiou explains: “A bas la mort” also means: the theater, at each second of such a spectacle [as Ahmed the Philosopher], must establish and sustain its life. . . . The sketches of farce cut to the essential, the essential of the world here conjoined with the essential of the theater. What I have written does not protect the artists from the stage, but, rather, engages and exhausts them. In Ahmed Gets Angry, [the character named] Camille complains that thinking is fatiguing. It is to the joy of such fatigue, of such excellence, that the Ahmed cycle invites the spectators. (28) Ahmed, we have seen, has said that the goal of philosophy is to find, in ourselves, “the active point that separates us from our fatigue and our private monotony,” and he has figured this joyful separation as the rising of the dead. But here, it seems, the Ahmed plays, while prescribing and exemplifying a separation from fatigue, also cause fatigue—not, to be 7

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sure, a fatigue of misery but rather a fatigue of joy or a joy of fatigue. In this philosophical theater, thinking gives us joy by making us tired. It is as though we could escape from our fatigue not in a split second but only by working through it, with all the embeddedness that the term implies—as though a light and pure theater, a comic theater of cloud-splitting radiance, could arise only by taking on the very heaviness and impurity that it seeks to overcome, or as though, in order to be a clearing, an elucidation, an incitement, the theater had first to catch, to catch hold of, the stagnant, frantic, and muddled world that it would not be caught dead merely mirroring. In fact, this is not unlike what Badiou proposes in his Rhapsody for the Theater—a philosophical treatise that is also, as its title announces, a virtuosic performance, which dates from the interval between the first Ahmed comedy, Ahmed the Subtle, and the second, Ahmed the Philosopher.11 Bruno Bosteels has even suggested (183) that Rhapsody for the Theater reads like one of the Ahmed plays, and one could reinforce this point by noting that, just as a rhapsody is improvised, so the Ahmed plays, whose stage directions frequently call for an improvisation sur this or that theme, are themselves rhapsodic. Here, at any rate, between Ahmeds, in what we might think of as Ahmed ½, is Badiou, rehearsing the theory of the comic diagonal: The latent eternity of the text of comedy sketches a repertoire of functions, a fixed symbolic treasure from times immemorial: the old fogy of the Father, the Lover, the Parasite, the Shrew, the swaggering Soldier, the Pedant, the Miser, and so forth: the whole “there is” of generic social signification. The instant pins this onto the stage. The effect of temporal orientation results from the fact that the functions and occupations enter into a rapport with what we might call a diagonal character, who is less a function than the zero point in which all functions are reflected as such. It is a question of the subtle slave, of the treacherous servant, charged with dissolving before our eyes the fixed connection of meanings, by means of an infinite social knowledge. A modern comedy should tell us where we are in terms of what is socially serious and in terms of its dissolution. (232; I have slightly revised the translation.)

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One name, as we have seen, for the point that separates us from our fatigue, Ahmed is also, therefore, the zero point in which all fatiguing worldly functions are reflected as such. While this diagonal character remains “incommensurable with the laws of this world,” his incommensurability depends upon his talent for taking the measure of the whole “there is” of generic social signification. And this is precisely what makes the treacherous servant treacherous: he knows the social square far better than do its loyal servants. They cannot know him—he is, precisely, their unconscious—but he knows them, along with the whole serious world to which they so frantically attend.12 Charged with dissolving the fixed connection of meanings, he possesses a social knowledge that, indeed, is nothing less than infinite. But to say that this diagonal character is charged with dissolving the fixed connection of meanings is to say that his play is nonetheless work. The treacherous servant, in other words, is still a servant. To dissolve playfully the whole network of the social, he must laboriously encounter and even assume it, in all its deadening thickness and sadness and stupidity. “Philosophy,” according to Ahmed, “is what helps us to interrupt repetition,” which is “the path of imposture and pain.” But the very language in which he calls for interruption is itself marked by repetition: “Hold onto that point! Find it and hold onto it!”; “Down with death! Say it with me: ‘Down with death!’” Against the “reactionary novelties” of the nouveaux philosophes, the comic philosopher has to deploy an inventive repetitiveness: there where the “reactive subject” melancholically encrypts the “active subject” by imitating his newness, the active subject splits the crypt open, but from within, insistently and incessantly digging his diagonal route upward through its muddle and stagnation and frenzy.13 In evoking the playful work of the comic servant, to be sure, Badiou emphasizes his lightning-like speed: the diagonal character dissolves the fixed connection of meanings “before our eyes”; he produces a comic “instant” that “pins [the symbolic repertoire of social roles] onto the stage.” In the preface to the Ahmed cycle, Badiou, referring specifically to the sketches that constitute Ahmed the Philosopher, writes: “Each scenic situation shows us that thinking the situation, and thinking it quickly, in a dominated language, is an inexhaustible source of gaiety and power, even and especially when one finds oneself in crushing and dismal social conditions” (25). But if thinking quickly is an inexhaustible source of gaiety and power, it is also, as Badiou has acknowledged, exhausting. Although 9

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Ahmed the Philosopher has only once, at the time of this writing, been performed in its entirety, and even then for one evening only by a workshop for theater students in Brussels, what exhausts the actors, regardless of the play’s length, is the nature of the work that it imposes upon them. Even within the confines of a single sketch, the pressure on Ahmed to think on his feet registers on the actor’s body (if not on the spectator’s or reader’s) the weight and density and fixity of the social, the sheer resistance of the world that comedy is charged with dissolving. In its necessary brevity and rapidity, of course, the sketch, as shortcut, lends itself to the practice of “cut[ting] to the essential,” as Badiou has described the vital, vitalizing imperative of his philosophical farce. And yet, as the etymology of the word farce reminds us, the cutting can never be detached from the stuffing that it cuts through. Aspiring to comic lightness and purity, the becomingfarce of the world makes ever more palpable the world’s stuff. In order to dissolve what is socially serious, Badiou’s comedy, I am suggesting, must first thicken it: purity must emerge from a redoubled impurity, lightness from an exacerbated heaviness. Discussing the ways in which Ahmed the Philosopher seeks to become “pure” theater, Badiou writes: “A sort of colorful and rapid limpidity, which is the play of a second gravity [“le jeu d’une gravité seconde”], is related to the fact that nothing is forbidden, nothing is agreed upon in advance” (27). If the first gravity is that of the social square with all of its heavy machinery—its “ethics,” its somber dictatorship of profit, its nouveaux philosophes, its “morose feelings,” its “moaning and groaning,” its “sad nihilism,” its “compassion”— then this second gravity, or its play, works to lighten things up through a paradoxical comic process that we could call aggravation. The play of this gravité seconde gives rise to a colorful and rapid limpidity by taking what is socially serious—what is grave—and making it worse, by taking what is already heavy and making it even heavier. The only way to rise from the tomb of the social, it seems, is through more of the social. “In my conception of the comic,” Badiou affirms, “there is no question of renouncing either the clumsiest word-play [“les jeux de mots les plus lourds”], or triviality, or sexual references, or slapstick, or even scatology” (20). In Badiou’s world-become-farce, where “nothing is forbidden” and “nothing is agreed upon in advance,” there is no light or lightness without a certain lourdeur—without the maladroit heaviness of comic gravity. Like the “bad” puns with which the play is stuffed—from a purely Platonic point of view,

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can there be such a thing as a good pun?—Ahmed the Philosopher induces a groaning laughter that, in contrast with the mere moaning and groaning of theater as usual, gives rise to the highest forms of philosophical joy.

COMEDY IN A TIME OF BETRAYAL

In the chronology of Badiou’s theatrical oeuvre, the four Ahmed comedies come after The Red Scarf and The Incident at Antioch, modeled respectively on two plays by Paul Claudel, The Satin Slipper and The City. As a work of the seventies, and thus of the “red years” to which its title alludes, The Red Scarf (1979) at once expresses its era’s optimism about the revolutionary possibilities of the Party and places that optimism under dialectical pressure. By the time of The Incident at Antioch (1982), which Badiou calls a tragedy, the “red years” have given way to the “dark years” of the reactionary 1980s, epitomized by the regime of France’s “socialist” president, François Mitterrand. And yet, as Kenneth Reinhard argues in his introduction to the bilingual edition of The Incident at Antioch, this tragedy by no means resigns itself to melancholic fixation where emancipatory politics are concerned.14 While the play articulates a disenchantment with the Party, it also explores the question, as Badiou puts it, of “how to go from order to disorder, how to find a new disorder.”15 Imagining a politics of liberation outside the confines of the Party and the State, Badiou’s tragedy, one might say, has a comedy waiting in its wings. In 1984, two years after The Incident at Antioch, Badiou wrote that comedy, Ahmed le subtil—not because the situation in France had improved but, on the contrary, because it had worsened. Strikingly, these two plays coincide with the beginning of the great phase of Badiou’s philosophical work, inaugurated by Théorie du sujet (Theory of the Subject) in 1982 and continuing with the monumental L’Être et l’événement (Being and Event) in 1988. Obviously, the “dark years” of the 1980s had as stimulating an effect on Badiou’s more properly philosophical writing as on his theatrical writing. While the work for which he has become internationally known might well be described as philosophy in a time of betrayal, the Ahmed plays constitute a parallel response to the political and intellectual treachery that, for Badiou, defined Mitterrand’s France.16 Long before the well-publicized resurgence of leftist indignation and protest in the second decade of the current century, Badiou’s comedies express, in a different

11

Translator’s introduction

register from his philosophical books, the comic aggression that, I would argue, impels his work as a whole—work whose highly systematic and rigorously lucid character in no way negates the rage and the outrage that lie behind it. As Badiou explains in his preface to this translation, he created Ahmed in response to the indignation aroused in him not only by “Frenchmen” shooting at young Arab workers but also by the complicity of the Mitterrand regime, and of almost all French political parties, in this racist and xenophobic violence. For Badiou, it is such complicity with the forces of reaction—a complicity that extended to a large number of renegade leftist intellectuals or, as Badiou has called them, professional traitors, most notoriously the nouveaux philosophes—that made the Mitterrand period particularly odious.17 A time of epidemic betrayal, emblematically presided over by a head of state who, more than forty years after the German occupation of France (faithful at least in this), maintained his ties with René Bosquet, the Vichy official responsible for the round-up and arrest of Jews—Mitterrand in effect “redeclared Vichy”—the early 1980s were characterized by a ubiquitous “renunciation of revolutionary commitments and a rallying to the cause of parliamentary capitalism” (“Préface,” 10).18 By 1984, when Badiou wrote the first Ahmed play, the temptation of tragic melancholia, that is, had only grown stronger. But in place of this melancholia, which Badiou was already resisting even in the tragic Incident at Antioch, what we find in Ahmed the Subtle, and indeed throughout the Ahmed tetralogy, is a full-throated politics of comic anger. For, although the third play is entitled Ahmed Gets Angry, Ahmed is already angry from his first appearance on the stage. He is, in effect, born angry, born from anger, which is to say that his anger is indistinguishable from his author’s. Returning to the figure of Scapin whom he had impersonated decades earlier as a lycéen, Badiou the philosopher renews his connection with Badiou the actor and reinvents Molière’s valet as a subtle young Algerian whose subtlety is itself a mode of comic violence aimed at the deadly serious violence of immigrant-hating snipers and their distinguished apologists and collaborators across the political spectrum. In his preface to this translation, Badiou writes: “Sometimes, in order to express a revolt, laughter is a good method. . . . Comedy reveals the world of the rich and the powerful from the violent, ironic, and critical perspective of the oppressed and the poor.” The treachery of the treach-

12

Translator’s introduction

erous servant known as Ahmed indeed expresses a revolt against the masters—the rich and the powerful. Yet Ahmed’s violence does not stop at these classic targets. Written in a time of generalized treachery, indeed a time of normalized treachery, the Ahmed plays express, along with a revolt against the masters, a revulsion from those others servants who, instead of participating in the revolt, keep providing the masters with the most eloquent political and intellectual support. Ahmed’s comic treachery, that is, avenges the treachery of all those reactive subjects who, if not themselves poor and oppressed, once fought alongside the poor and the oppressed, but who have ended up betraying the revolutionary politics symbolized, in France, by the student- and worker-led uprisings of May 1968: reactive subjects typified by the nouveaux philosophes, of course, but numerous and heterogeneous enough to include a whole “leftist” network of communist mayors, union activists, and young bourgeois radicals, all of whom, it turns out, are quite happy to expel Ahmed and his kind from France if it enhances their power or their standing with the powerful. Ahmed the Subtle stays close to the plot of The Trickeries of Scapin, but, like The Red Scarf and Incident at Antioch, it reworks its source text—Kenneth Reinhard calls this Badiousian literary practice “hypertranslation”— so as to release the surprising pertinence (and impertinence) hidden within it.19 In this case, Badiou brings out and articulates in contemporary terms the political stakes of the comic servant’s assault on the older generation, turning the two old fogy fathers of Molière’s play into four figures of authority who compose the social square through which Ahmed cuts his treacherous diagonal. As in Ahmed the Philosopher, Madame Pompestan and Moustache are on hand to embody the right in its official and “popular” declensions respectively, while Rhubarb, the union activist, occupies the left side of the square with Lanterne, the communist mayor of Sarges-les-Corneilles, the fictional suburb where the play takes place. That Rhubarb (in French, Rhubarbe) indeed wears a barbe or beard here underscores his solidarity not with the Muslims he pretends to support but rather with his political “opposite,” the complementarily hirsute Moustache. In the perfidious age of Mitterrand, moreover the right and the left do not just have facial hair in common. (The socialist Rhubarb literally ends up in bed with the conservative Madame Pompestan.) All four of these characters prove willing to redeclare Vichy by joining forces against the “foreigner” (even though Ahmed, like so many of the Jews betrayed

13

Translator’s introduction

under the Vichy regime, has been in France for a long time and may even have been born there). No wonder Ahmed gets angry. But he also gets even: the stick that he inherits from Scapin will not blossom into its full slapstick glory until Ahmed the Philosopher, but Ahmed subjects all four representatives of the French political system to variously striking forms of retaliatory comic violence. At the end of Ahmed the Subtle they can “forgive” him and spare him expulsion from France because, internal alien that he is, he has provided a kind of foil for the triumphant reconciliation of subversive children and authoritarian parents, the reconstitution of the whole national “family.” What would a comedy be, after all, without a happy ending? And yet, after this rousing display of national unity, and after all the characters have exited, there is one thing left on the stage: a suitcase, thought to contain a terrorist’s bomb, that Ahmed now says contains time, and from which the audience can indeed hear an ominous ticking sound. The time bomb that is Ahmed the Subtle would tick away for ten years before the play would be performed, at the Théâtre de Reims and at the Festival d’Avignon, in 1994. Antoine Vitez gave a successful public reading of the play in 1987 and planned to stage it at the Comédie-Française, of which he was the general administrator. But Vitez’s unexpected death in 1990 put an end to that project and took Badiou away from the theater for several years, until the play came to the attention of the young director Christian Schiaretti of the Théâtre de Reims. Working closely with Badiou, Schiaretti—whose idea it was, according to Badiou, that Ahmed should wear a mask—helped to bring Ahmed to a theatrical life that would expand into four plays, first performed in Reims between 1994 and 1996.20 For Badiou, as we have seen, bringing Ahmed to theatrical life means revitalizing the theater itself—overcoming the morbid heaviness of theater under “the somber dictatorship of profit.” But what must also be overcome, in the theatricalizing of Ahmed, is that capitalist dictatorship’s “democratic” supplement: the depressing and isolating atmosphere of the Mitterrand, and indeed post-Mitterrand, era (Mitterrand was president of France from 1981 until 1995), during which the official left merely produces an illusion of political choice and a distraction from the continuing dominance of the right, not just in France but throughout the neoliberal, which is to say the neoconservative, West.21

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Translator’s introduction

In this time of betrayal there may be no revolutions, but there can still be revolts, to use Badiou’s word for what comedy expresses. Where the collaborationist or neo-Vichyist left by definition repudiates the radical transformation initiated by the Badiousian event, there can still, that is, be a series of local explosions that we might consider rehearsals for the event. And it is to revolt and sabotage that the sketch form of the second Ahmed play, Ahmed the Philosopher, is ideally suited. What better theatrical weapon, after all, than the sketch, with what Badiou calls its “violent singularity” (“Préface,” 29)? What better medium for putting into play a “violent, ironic, and critical perspective” on a world that would otherwise leave one frozen in loneliness and anxiety? (In the play’s subtitle these sketches are called petites pièces or “short plays.” If that designation emphasizes the self-contained character of each sketch, pièces reminds us that these miniature plays are at the same time pieces or fragments—violent in themselves, they are also perhaps effects of violence, jagged shards produced by some prior breaking or shattering.) In almost every one of the play’s sketches, Ahmed, now explicitly identified as a philosopher, enacts a farcical but no less ferocious aggression, either against a particular representative of this world (Moustache, Rhubarb, Madame Pompestan) or, most notably in those sketches where he is alone on stage and performs a monologue characterized by its seductive hostility toward the audience, against the whole immense sclerosis that makes this world look natural and inevitable.22 Ahmed is a philosopher insofar as he is illustrating, in each of these sketches, a different philosophical concept—either a concept closely linked with Badiou’s philosophy in particular (the event, the multiple, the subject) or a concept drawn from the philosophical tradition in general (truth, time, chance, contradiction). Yet he is also a philosopher in a more performative sense: the comic violence he mobilizes in the play’s series of brief and rapid scenes is itself philosophical since it exposes and dismantles the ostensibly necessary and thus apparently intractable world—the world “of markets, of elections, of human rights, of left and right, of globalization”; the world to which all mature and reasonable post-1976 progressives must adapt themselves in the name of realism—as so many “empty discourses” and as so much “obscene pomp” (“Préface,” 19).23 The comic violence with which Ahmed performs philosophy makes Ahmed the Philosopher the perfect play for children. According to Badiou,

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Translator’s introduction

the idea for the play, along with the idea for Ahmed Gets Angry, emerged in his conversations with Christian Schiaretti during the summer of 1994 in the wake of the obtusely cool critical reception of Ahmed the Subtle. “Why not address ourselves directly to children,” Badiou explains, “who, unlike the critics, supported us vigorously, understanding everything [and] laughing at everything? . . . And since I was a philosopher, why couldn’t Ahmed, whose science of languages is boundless, give them philosophy lessons?” (“Préface,” 16). Children would be the ideal avant-garde audience for the kind of antimelancholic theater of revolt that Badiou was working to create with Schiaretti and his troupe: they “would be charged with leading the way for all other audiences, with shaking up their inertia, with making them accept subtle laughter and distance from themselves” (“Préface,” 26–27). This joyously childlike disruption finds its match in the gai savoir of Ahmed’s boundless linguistic science, which produces the vertige des mots, the “dizziness of words” (“Préface,” 23) that characterizes each of the sketches in Ahmed the Philosopher. For, against the hardened, impoverished, and brutal languages of his adversaries and their whole oppressively necessary-seeming world, Ahmed ingeniously deploys a “diagonal language . . . that juggles with every resource and every ruse, that masters every situation: the language of voluble and anarchistic intelligence” (“Préface,” 15). Like the other Ahmed comedies, Ahmed the Philosopher therefore has a verbal playfulness, as I already noted, that may surprise readers who (erroneously) have come to associate Badiou with stylistic austerity or transparency. Even in his forbiddingly rigorous philosophical texts, or even in his concisely polemical ones, Badiou is a far more literary writer than most of his commentators have recognized. Nowhere in his vast oeuvre, however, do his punning, rhyming, parodic tendencies find more exuberant expression than in the four Ahmed comedies. Here, for example, is Ahmed, in the fifteenth sketch of Ahmed the Philosopher—the sketch dedicated to the concept of “the nation”—doing his verbal juggling in front of an increasingly bewildered and exasperated Madame Pompestan, who has most emphatically said “no” to Ahmed’s inclusive concept of French nationality: “In order to say ‘no,’ one must know what ‘yes’ one is talking about. Without a ‘yes,’ there’s no ‘no,’ you know? Tell me your ‘yes,’ and I’ll tell you how it goes with your ‘no.’ Say ‘yea,’ and, hey, I’ll say if your ‘no’ is a go. If your ‘yea’ is more like a ‘nay,’ hey, no way is your ‘no’

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Translator’s introduction

a go.” What Madame Pompestan is refusing, symptomatically, is Ahmed’s affirmation that “someone who’s here is from here”: an affirmation that is also a warning, since it tells French politicians (along with their journalistic and “intellectual” collaborators) to get over the compulsive immigrant bashing and racism, directed particularly against Arabs, Muslims, and blacks, that continue to play such a malignant role in what passes for French political discourse and in French everyday life. Even if he was born and raised in France, Ahmed, descended from Algerian ancestors, is himself the immediate object-cause of Madame Pompestan’s “no.” As the quotation above suggests, however, he is by far the linguistic superior of this exemplary Frenchwoman—far more linguistically cunning and resourceful, indeed, than any of the politicians, either inside or outside the play, who, without having to occupy the extreme right, promote a narrow and exclusionary notion of French national identity, based on the mystique and the alleged supremacy of “authentic”—which is to say, white, nonimmigrant—Frenchness. It is therefore by no means insignificant that, even though Ahmed lives in a banlieue, he quite pointedly does not speak the argot of the banlieue—the relentlessly mediatized jargon of youth and hipness—that, in the name of some ostensible demographic realism, or merely for the sake of pandering, another playwright might have been tempted to put into the mouth of a young Arab trickster-hero. Rather, it is essential, for comic, philosophical, and political reasons alike, that Ahmed’s French, even in its not infrequent vulgarity and scatology and lourdeur, be vastly more refined, more elegant, more learned, and more supple than the French spoken by the self-styled national paragons whose paths he repeatedly crosses. The servant who is a master of the French language, Ahmed treacherously undermines their claims of superiority. In scene after scene of Ahmed the Philosopher, he ties his supposed betters in linguistic knots, taking exquisite comic revenge, by turns, on the conservative Madame Pompestan, the reactionary Moustache, and the “socialist” Rhubarb, all of whom are reduced to mouthing the clichés, pieties, and received ideas that constitute political discourse in France since the 1980s. One of the challenges facing the translator, obviously, is to convey in English Ahmed’s tricky brilliance as a virtuoso of French. In the passage above on “yes” and “no,” for example, I have sought to produce an English equivalent of Ahmed’s dizzying punning on oui and non—in which oui

17

Translator’s introduction

pirouettes into the verb ouïr, meaning “to hear,” and in which non does a sly Lacanian pas de deux with its homonym nom, meaning “name.” Wordplay of this kind is at once a traditional element of comedy as a genre and an inherent difficulty (as well as a peculiar pleasure) of translation in general. But what equally risks getting lost in translation, and what is more specific to the challenge of rendering Badiou’s comedy in English, arises from Ahmed’s strategically diagonal relation to the languages of the other characters in the first twenty-two sketches of the play (with the exception of Fenda, whose linguistic difference I have touched on and to which I shall return). For these languages, while indeed stupidly reified and cliché ridden, share a quality that, if not uniquely French, nonetheless informs a great deal of French public discourse, across a wide range of partisan affiliations, social differences, and professional jargons. This quality—amounting almost to a basic ingredient of the French “character,” if not to a requirement for French citizenship—is what Badiou has exposed, in his Second Manifesto for Philosophy, as an apparently irresistible compulsion to play the philosopher: a compulsion that produces an interminable national masquerade in which, at every turn, one encounters the presumption, made implicitly or explicitly by everyone from talk show hosts and political journalists to soccer coaches and cruise directors and dietitians, to speak with the authority and prestige enjoyed (even in the France of Nicolas Sarkozy) by the figure of the intellectual.24 In contrast with, say, the United States, where, in order to be taken seriously, even the philosopher must impersonate a farmer or a cowboy, France is the country in which, in order to be taken seriously, even the farmer and the cowboy (or his equivalent) must impersonate a philosopher. In France, that is, even the far-right demagogue—to take the most egregious contemporary examples, Jean-Marie Le Pen, the founder of the Jew-, Arab-, black-, and immigrant-hating National Front, or his daughter and current political heir, Marine Le Pen—can be counted on to display an urbanity, an erudition, indeed a certain “literary” brio, that one almost never observes even in liberal American politicians, especially when they actually possess these qualities. (I will leave open the question of whether the pseudo-philosophical fluency of right-wing French politicians makes them less or more dangerous than their American counterparts.) As I suggested earlier, the hazy, noxious influence of the nouveaux philosophes already hangs over the world of Ahmed the Philosopher. But

18

Translator’s introduction

what further thickens the atmosphere is that all three of the overtly political characters in Ahmed the Philosopher—that is, all of Ahmed’s principal adversaries—patriotically pose as philosophers in their own right; even the boorish Moustache presumes to comment knowingly on the political condition of France. Ahmed philosophe, which I have translated as Ahmed the Philosopher, could also be translated as Ahmed Philosophizes, since philosopher, in French, is a verb of which philosophe is the third-person singular form in the present tense. Like contemporary France itself, this is a play in which almost everyone philosophizes—or, rather, in which almost everyone pretends to philosophize—and in which it is therefore the job of Ahmed, as the real philosopher, to cut a diagonal through the pompous (not to say Pompestanian) discourses that make up the play’s farcical world, taking the stuffing out of them and revealing them as what they are: vacuous and deadly travesties of philosophy. This is why, in the final scene of the first, shorter version of the play— the twenty-second sketch here, entitled “Philosophy”—Ahmed overtly assumes and exercises his philosophical mastery over the other characters, whose vain pretentions to philosophy, whose failures as philosophers, this masked philosopher ruthlessly unmasks. Throughout this translation I have tried to evoke both the typically (if not exclusively) French intellectual charlatanism of Ahmed’s rivals for the title of philosopher and Ahmed’s verbally dazzling effectiveness in cutting them down to size by cutting through their fatuities—an effectiveness that arises not from some putative philosophical profundity and gravitas, in the morosely “moral” style of the nouveaux philosophes, but from its sharp-tongued, irreverent opposite: from a violent joy that brings not self-consolidation and selfpromotion but self-disruption and self-separation. “Separate yourselves! Separate yourselves from yourselves. Then, with that real in you that splits you open, there’s thinking and joy. Hey, you dead people: get up!” As we have seen, these are the resonant final words of the first version of Ahmed the Philosopher, which, conceived as a whole, begins with the concept of Nothing and ends with Philosophy. But the play—at least, the play that you are about to read—in fact refuses to end with this supposedly conclusive scene.25 With its twenty-second sketch, Ahmed the Philosopher achieves an impressive geometric symmetry: the play has limited itself to a “social square” of four characters, through which the hero cuts his diagonal path, and now it has arrived at a show-stopping

19

Translator’s introduction

pedagogical climax that, unlike the previous sketches (which feature either Ahmed and one other character or just Ahmed), gathers all the characters for a final examination, a final evaluation, and a final exhortation. But the show apparently does not want to stop. After the twentytwo-sketch version of Ahmed the Philosopher, whose earliest scenes were presented by the Comédie de Reims in April of 1995, and after Ahmed Gets Angry, the counterattack on the critics that was staged by the same troupe in October of 1995, in the next few months Badiou wrote twelve more scenes of Ahmed the Philosopher, which was performed again in Reims in March of 1996, along with The Pumpkins, the fourth Ahmed play. These supplementary scenes are included here, and the reader can see how little Ahmed becomes big Ahmed. Badiou has explained that the additional sketches were motivated less by a desire for more concepts than by a desire for more characters—less by philosophical than by theatrical imperatives.26 Indeed, although the last twelve sketches of what now stands as the complete version of the play illustrate twelve new concepts, these concepts might be seen as pretexts— Ahmedian ruses—for introducing five new characters who displace their predecessors in the social square delineated by the previous sketches and who thus, in effect, “spoil” that square’s symmetry. From Ahmed the Subtle and Ahmed Gets Angry the surly slacker named Camille returns, replacing Fenda as the principal object of Ahmed’s erotic interest; from Ahmed Gets Angry, in which Ahmed also gets an understudy, Badiou draws the inspiration to create two understudies, who, forming a vaudevillian trio with Ahmed, take the play to deliriously anarchic heights of Marx-brothers-like zaniness; in this play, alone among the tetralogy, Ahmed’s mother, Fatima, appears, enjoying the privilege of being the only character who can put the cheeky philosopher in his place; and in three scenes of almost frightening audacity we meet a figure known as the Demon of the Cities, a monstrously sadistic and cowardly informer, who surpasses Moustache as a villain and who chillingly drives home the theme of a redeclared Vichy in that time of betrayal, which, although ingloriously epitomized by the Mitterrand presidency, has failed to end with it.27 Many of these additional scenes are among the funniest (and the most disturbing) in the play. Taken together, they present a striking “messiness,” which, after the apparent closure of the original finale, bespeaks a desire not just to cut through the social square but to do what the time-bomb at

20

Translator’s introduction

the end of Ahmed the Subtle promises: to explode it. It is as though, having exhorted its audience, both on the stage and in the auditorium, to separate themselves from themselves, to split themselves open, the play put its theory into practice and split itself open. In the final scene that is therefore not a final scene, Ahmed offers some praise for Fenda’s answer to his question, “What is philosophy?”: “Your answer drew on the real. It did not lack for grace or flavor.” As the pupil most capable of learning Ahmed’s lesson, and as the figure in the social square who has the greatest comic (which is to say, the greatest violently self-separating) potential—we have seen how Fenda’s name virtually means “splitting”—Fenda might stand for that real in the play itself that splits it open, producing an excess that is not, or not yet, philosophy, but that, in its impure theatricality, has the grace and flavor, indeed the punch and pungency, of comedy at its most radically sidesplitting. Ahmed the Philosopher, it seems, wants more of the real and cracks itself open in order to find it. Wanting more of the play itself, both “amateur” and “professional” readers have presented selections from it not only in France but also in Italy, in Germany, in Argentina, and, in a production including two scenes taken from this translation, in the United States.28 (Versions of the play have been translated into Italian, Spanish, and German.) I hope that, as readers crack open this translation of the play, they too will want more of it, and that their desire will lead them to stage it— let me be so impractical as to say “to stage all of it”—around the Englishspeaking world, which, having come to know Badiou the philosopher, now has a chance to encounter the figure who splits him open: Badiou the comedian.

21

Ahmed the philosopher

22

LIST OF SCENES 1. Nothing 2. The Event 3. Language 4. Place 5. Cause and Effect 6. Politics 7. The Multiple 8. Chance 9. Poetry 10. The Subject (1) 11. The Big and the Little 12. Infinity 13. Time 14. Truth (1) 15. The Nation 16. Death 17. The Subject (2) 18. Morality 19. Society 20. God 21. Truth (2) 22. Philosophy 23. Decision 24. The Same and the Other 25. The Family 26. Terror 27. Purposiveness 28. Mathematics 29. Nature 30. The Idea 31. The Absurd 32. Repetition 33. Origin 34. Contradiction

25

1. NOTHING

Ahmed, Moustache. Ahmed takes the stage and points his stick threateningly at the audience. AHMED . What are you looking at? There’s nothing here. Me, Ahmed, I’m absolutely nothing. Superlatively nothing. And, believe me, looking at nothing is exactly the same as not looking. Check out how I’m nothing.1 Ahmed’s improvisations on nothing. He tries to make himself look as narrow and as shrunken as possible, as if he were disappearing on stage. If one of you were clever, really a genius, better at straightening out the messes of the world than Ahmed and Einstein put together, you’d say this right into my nothing-face: “My little Ahmed-nothing, how do you know that you’re nothing? Huh? Because if you know you’re nothing, it’s because you’re something. Because nothing is nothing and nothing can’t know much. Especially not nothing. Nothing knowing nothing? That’ll be the day! To know nothing, you have to be something and not nothing.” And then, me, Ahmed, I’d look like a sucker. If nothing can be a sucker. Does nothing suck? There’s a lollipop, but is there a nothing-pop? The pop, the crackle, the snap . . . Ahmed’s improvisation on nothing and popping. Anyway, no doubt about it. Me, Ahmed, I didn’t know I was nothing and I would never have known it. If it hadn’t been for Moustache.

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Ahmed the philosopher

Albert Moustache. Moustache, he’s not nothing at all. He has a moustache. He’s a big hulk of a guy, Moustache. He carries weight in Sarges-les-Corneilles, Moustache does. He’s something, Moustache, not nothing. And then one day . . . But I’m not going to tell you. Me, Ahmed, I’m not going to make nothing speak. Nothing says nothing, that’s only natural. Moustache is going to tell you himself. He’s the something that says something. Naturally. Moustache! Moustache! Moustache makes his entrance. My dear Moustache, just tell them who I am, me, Ahmed. MOUSTACHE . There’s no “you.” There’s just “all of you.” You, you’re in the all of you. All of you immigrators from all over the world. The Orientals and them who come from Africa. Them who are gobbling up all the welfare money. Them on account of who we don’t have any more work, not even sweeping the street. All of you who bow and scrape before an Islamic God who looks like death warmed over and uppity to boot. Now if you were you and not all of you, you might be someone, who knows? But, fortunately, your you is in the all of you of the others. All one big block! That belongs in one big cell block! And that’s the end of that! AHMED. Take it easy, fatso. So, I’m not someone? MOUSTACHE. You’re all a bunch of less-than-nothings. AHMED. What did I tell you? Less than nothing! That’s not nothing, being less than nothing. Because less than nothing, well, that’s got to be something! Above nothing there’s something and below nothing there’s something too. MOUSTACHE. Are you trying to mess with my head again, towel head? Less than nothing is even more nothing than nothing. AHMED. And how can you assume that nothing can be more or less, fatso? In nothing there’s not a thing. More nothing is still nothing. It can’t change, nothing. Nothing is like zero Celsius. Above zero, it’s hot, below zero, it’s freezing. If I’m less than nothing, I’m freezing. It’s freezing, yeah, it’s freezing cold . . . Hey, Moustache, are you freezing? Can you feel how it’s below zero? Do you freeze up at thirty below nothing? It’s colder than a witch’s tit on account of less than nothing!

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Ahmed the philosopher

Moustache is frozen solid; he’s literally petrified. MOUSTACHE. Shiver me timbers! I get the feeling I’m a snowman. AHMED. Hey, it’s Moustache the snowman! Deep down, he looks to me as

though he’s a hell of a lot less than nothing! MOUSTACHE (in a sepulchral voice). The Arab has turned me into a coldstorage truck. AHMED. Let’s see if it sounds hollow. Ahmed smacks Moustache with his stick, and Moustache falls to pieces. No way! I just smashed my proof. My beloved proof, Moustache, that I was nothing. And even less than nothing! I don’t know nothing anymore. Whatever. It’s only nothing that knows nothing. Anyway, the stick isn’t nothing. When nothing has a stick, it’s something. When they tell you you’re nothing, smack the proof with your stick. That’ll cool him down for good. Well, anyway, I’ve got to warm myself up. Ahmed improvises on the theme of warming things up; he induces a heat wave. Moustache is reconstituted; he stands up straight again. MOUSTACHE. Where am I? Who am I? Where am I going? Who am I

going? Where was I heating? Who’s heating? Who? . . . AHMED (giving him another smack with his stick). Whoever says to nothing

“you’re nothing” is nothing. Moustache collapses again. (wiping his face). You think it’s nothing, being something? Believe me, it’s not nothing . . .

AHMED

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2. THE EVENT

Ahmed. Ahmed paces back and forth on the stage, very agitated. AHMED. Something’s definitely going to happen. Don’t you feel it? The

world is out of whack, it’s not in its right place. People are acting weird. I ran into the awful Moustache, and he forgot to tell me that I, Ahmed, am unwelcome in Sarges-les-Corneilles.2 And that the Arabs should go back where they came from on the next boat. He didn’t say anything. I even think he may have nodded at me. A nod from Moustache to Ahmed! It surpasses human understanding. I ran into my friend Rhubarb. He forgot to tell me that he respected my difference. That my culture isn’t his culture, but that all communities, whether cultural, religious, sexual, racial, cigarette smoking, or vituperating, should respect one another. That they ought to turn the right cheek when the other person kicks them in the left sternum. He even forgot to talk to me about human rights, Rhubarb did! Not a single word about ethics! Nothing about democracy! He was incredibly weird. I ran into my girlfriend Fenda, the black girl in the sky-blue and gold robe, who came from Africa to Sarges-les-Corneilles to put some real splendor and delight into all this bland whiteness. And she was weird! She forgot to tell me that we Arabs, as far as women are concerned, need to grow up someday. That if we think we’re going to get any peace or security by locking beauty up in the home and covering

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it with a veil when it goes out, this only shows what children we are. That, with just one eye and three stray hairs, any woman can express her desire to whomever she wants. And even more radiantly than when she’s naked. No, she didn’t say anything like that, Fenda didn’t. I even think she may have murmured, “Take care, Ahmed!” Incredible! Even me, I’m weird. I got up this morning, and I didn’t have any brilliant ideas. Stealing a meter maid’s hat? Who cares? Sabotaging the elections at the chamber of commerce by filling the ballot box with dishwater? Why bother? Emptying out the supermarket four times by phoning in bomb threats? Just thinking about it bores me. Sending around pictures of naked women during the city hall meeting? I’ve done it a hundred times already. A poster campaign with the police chief ’s photo, and “Wanted” written underneath it? What a drag. No, nothing tempts me; today, I’m happy, I’m exhausted. I’m waiting. Something’s definitely going to happen. You yourselves, down there, in front of me, you’re weird. What the hell are you doing, sitting there, lined up on chairs, looking at me? Huh? You’re saying to yourselves: something’s going to happen. Otherwise you’d just be doing your thing, like me. We’re here to wait together. So let’s wait. Improvisation on waiting. But where’s it going to happen? That’s what’s bugging me. It’s going to happen, I’d swear to it. But where? Up above? To the right? In back, all the way in back? It’s hard not knowing where. When you know where it’s going to happen, you get ready, you secure the place, you build a platform, or a barricade. Or a booby trap. But if you don’t have a clue where it’s going to happen, you’re nervous, you look around everywhere, you take big risks. ‘Cause there are big risks. I’m warning you. You’d better look around, you too. While we’re waiting. New improvisation on waiting. Hey! On the left, over there! Get ready! Protect your ears! No, that’s not it. It’s nothing. It’s a false alarm. I find false alarms worse than anything, when you know it’s going to happen. We’re all

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nervous enough already, we’re tired of waiting, and then there’s this false alarm, over on the left side, which really puts us on edge. If there’s going to be an alarm, at least it could be a true one! A false alarm is one of life’s biggest misfortunes. Anyway! Let’s wait. Improvisation on waiting. Mind you, sometimes a false alarm is a relief. It’s a relief from the waiting. Of course, nothing happens in a false alarm. You think it’s going to happen, but it doesn’t. But at least what happens is that you think it’s happening. There’s always that. Otherwise, you just wait, and the waiting wears down our belief. You could end up not even thinking it’s going to happen anymore. Fortunately, we’re sure about it. But even with something you’re sure about, if you wait for it too long, you believe in it less and less. And then a false alarm, which, granted, is exasperating, is a bit of a relief. But wrongly! Since nothing happened. But sometimes, you have to admit, being wrong is a relief. When being right means waiting forever, you end up wondering if it isn’t better to be wrong. A good false alarm, a true false alarm, it exasperates you, but it’s also a relief. At least for a minute or two. Because afterward, once you’ve seen that the true false alarm was absolutely false, that nothing happened, you have to go back to waiting for it to happen. And without knowing where it’s going to happen, besides. Improvisation on waiting. Something’s wrong. It should have happened. Or else maybe it happened someplace else? Did we have the wrong place? I’m really tired, today. Nothing’s going the way it was expected to. We’re just going to wait a little bit longer, but I don’t believe in it anymore. Waiting. OK, too bad. Sorry for making you wait. It’s still weird . . . Too bad. We’ll try to find out if it’s happened someplace else. Even though someplace else, that covers a fair amount of territory. Verifying it won’t be easy. But I’ll let you know. Sorry.

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Ahmed shuffles off the stage, looking behind himself often. Finally, he disappears. Brief silence. Then there is a huge explosion, which ought to startle everyone in the audience. After the explosion, a big red feather slowly comes down from the flies, floating as if carried along by the wind. The feather ends up landing on the stage. Ahmed reenters from the rear, looks around, then picks up the feather, and shows it to the audience. It’s no use. Even though we’d taken all precautions. We’d inspected the whole place. You saw, right? We took all the time we needed. But it’s always the same story. It always happens when you’re not waiting for it any more. Sometimes, even, it happens when you’re not waiting for it yet. That’s the worst. I’ve never seen it happen when anyone was waiting for it, the event. Before waiting, sure, it happens. After waiting, it often happens. But while you’re waiting, forget about it! At the end of the day, when you’re waiting for the event, you’re wasting your time. It’s better to be surprised. OK, it’s always a little hard, the surprise of the event, but since it’s inevitable . . . Let’s not wait anymore. Starting today, we won’t wait for anything anymore. At least we’ve learned that. OK, so, see ya next time. Next time it happens. By surprise.3

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3. LANGUAGE

Rhubarb, Ahmed. Rhubarb is on stage, and he seems anxious. RHUBARB . In two hours, and not one more, I have to register the new asso-

ciation. Rhubarb, in two hours, you have to register the name. Make the official declaration. And you don’t have the name yet. Ahmed enters, and listens to Rhubarb without letting himself be seen. It’s important, the name! It’s the rallying point! Everyone should be able to say: I, the person you see before you, am a dues-paying, active, hyperactive, or sedentary member of . . . of . . . well, you see, I don’t have the name for it. I have the thing completely clear in my head, an institution really really in the service of the new citizenship, incapable of corruption, ethical and dynamic.4 But I can’t come up with the name. The name, really, like the thing. AHMED . Can I help you, Rhubarb? RHUBARB (startled). Ahmed! You scared me! This isn’t a problem for you. It’s a question of language. AHMED. Exactly! I’m the master of the French language. You French, you learned the language naturally, so that often it’s gibberish, because French has nothing natural about it. It’s all about precision and syntax. You say: “Yeah, that’s cool.” But I, Ahmed, had to learn the language artificially, not naturally. So that I’m much better adapted to it. I’ll never

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say: “Yeah, that’s cool.” I’ll say: “Behold a truly momentous event.” Many French people will say: “So whadja do wid’ your wheels the other night?” Me, I’ll say: “To what use were you intending to put your vehicle when I saw you leave as the night descended?” You see? It’s like those women who say “I’m so bummed out! My boyfriend just dumped me for another chick.” It’s shameful to relate your despair in such terms! If I were a woman, may Allah the all-powerful forbid it, I would say: “Alas! He who was my beloved bore his flame elsewhere.” The genius of litotes, that’s French. And you get an alexandrine in the bargain: “He who was my beloved bore his flame elsewhere.” When everyone in Sarges-lesCorneilles speaks like that, life there will be delightful. OK, so, what name don’t you have, Rhubarb? I know all the names. RHUBARB I’m setting up an association. It’s gonna be totally awesome. AHMED . Ugh! What disgusting lingo! Say: “a breathtaking innovation” or, if you prefer, “an institutional creation that is unprecedented and unrivaled.” RHUBARB . Fine, fine, OK. How did you put it? A “breathtaking institution without innovation” . . . You’re getting me even more confused! The fact remains, it’s important to inject dynamism into citizens, so that, out of respect for ethics, and in a strong spirit of consensus, they can take control in a global way and find a means to oppose the market economy with an individual approach that’s both transparent and efficient. To put it more colloquially, because, after all, a citizen has to address himself to all communities, all the while preserving his own cultural roots, and not just the roots but also the seeds and the branches and even the flowers if possible, I mean the flowers that grow out of cultural roots; the goal is . . . Oh! You’ve really got me all mixed up! Damn! They have to cut the crap and get their act together, that’s what I’m trying to say. AHMED . Oh! Rhubarb! Don’t just give up like that! Say: “They must cease their drifting, and, with a morale steeped in collective creativity, they must rise to the challenges thrown at them by the harshness of life on the unrewarding soil of Sarges-les-Corneilles.” That way, while you’re at it, you’re also talking about roots. Arriving at the synthesis of thought by means of syntax, that’s what French is all about! RHUBARB . Yeah, yeah, whatever.

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Ahmed the philosopher AHMED. “I understood you very well, and I grant your objection.” RHUBARB. What are you going on about? AHMED. I was translating you into French. You said “whatever”; that’s

atrocious. I proposed: “I grant your objection.” RHUBARB. Give me a break! That’s not the problem! I have to register my

association at city hall in an hour, pal, and I haven’t found the right name for it. AHMED. It’s about making citizens dynamic? Call it “The Association for Civic Dynamite.” That’s a nice metaphor. RHUBARB. You think so? It’s a little rough, you’re forgetting the whole consensus aspect. AHMED. No problem. Call it “The Association for Harmonious Civic Dynamite.” “Consensus” is a little pedantic. The old word harmony is so much better! RHUBARB. You think so? It isn’t a little long? AHMED. You want to sacrifice precision for brevity? Bad call. RHUBARB. But you’re not taking the ethical aspect into account, the completely democratic internal struggle against corruption. AHMED (after having thought a bit). Call it “The Equitable and Transparent Association for Harmonious Civic Dynamite.” RHUBARB. Now that’s really long. And besides, you know, the whole taking control aspect, the whole global taking charge of the human aspect, the whole taking control of the humane aspect, that’s gotten lost. AHMED. You’re starting an association that has as many aspects as members, maybe even more, and you’re complaining about the length of the name? That’s absurd. The name has to capture all aspects of the thing! Let’s think about it . . . The problem is “managing the human” . . . You need a really powerful metaphor to pull it all together . . . or you could make a chiasmus out of the adjectives . . . Oh wait! I’ve got it! You can call it: “The Association for Taking Charge Equitably and for Transparent Globalization for Harmonious and Humane Civic Dynamite.” That’s pretty good. RHUBARB. What worries me is that you’re not getting the efficient aspect, the whole practical aspect. It seems a little too ideological. And now, of course, we’re in the postideological era. They were such a pain, those ideologies!

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Ahmed the philosopher AHMED. You’re absolutely right! This time, we need a striking image,

which makes it completely clear that you’re going right to action. I’m thinking . . . OK, how about: “The Association for Going Through Practical Storms Through the Immediate Effect on Taking Charge Equitably and on the Transparent Humane Globalization of a Harmonious Civic Dynamite”? That way, you’ve got all the aspects right there. RHUBARB. It’s precise and complete. It’s long, but the entire program is there in the name. The name isn’t false advertising, it isn’t an ideological lie. The name describes the thing, period. I’m happy! So what initials does that gives us? AHMED . “The Association for Going Through Practical Storms Through the Immediate Effect on Taking Charge Equitably and on the Transparent Humane Globalization of a Harmonious Civic Dynamite”? Well, if you leave out a few of the conjunctions, the acronym would be the AGTPSIETCETHGHCD. That sounds really great, the agtpsietcethghcd. RHUBARB. It’s true that language can say everything! I didn’t think we could get my plan into a few words so quickly and so clearly! Thanks, Ahmed. Of course, I would certainly have ended up finding something similar on my own, but when you work as a team you come up with a solution a lot faster. OK, I’ve got to get to city hall. AHMED. Don’t forget to write it down exactly. It’s a delicate device, this name! You mustn’t lose a single aspect! RHUBARB. No, no, I’ll remember. So long! AHMED. So long! (Ahmed remains alone, smiles, hums.) The staff member at city hall is going to need an extra piece of paper for the form! Rhubarb comes back, completely out of breath. RHUBARB. How did you say the acronym, again? AHMED. The Agtpsietcehghcd. RHUBARB. The agtiephedghtcd. AHMED. More or less, that should work. RHUBARB. Aghtapcdpcg. Aghtapcdpcp. Ate a pc deep sea pea! Now I’ve

got it! That’s even a mnemonic device: I ate a pc deep sea pea. AHMED. I ate a pc deep sea pea! That’s a very powerful ecological and vegetarian statement! With this acronym, you even get an extra aspect.

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Ahmed the philosopher RHUBARB (knowingly). Sometimes, it’s the word that creates the thing.

OK, I gotta run. We hear, from backstage, Rhubarb singing to himself, less and less distinctly, “I ate a pc deep sea pea,” “I ate a pc deep sea pea” . . . AHMED. Between the word and the thing, there’s nothing. When there’s

something, it’s a long-eared ass. I ate a pc deep sea pea! There’ll be neither word nor thing, that’s what I think. There’ll only be the ass!

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4. PLACE

Fenda, Ahmed. Ahmed is sitting in the audience. Fenda enters suddenly. FENDA. Ahmed, Ahmed! Where are you? AHMED (from his seat). Here. I’m here. FENDA. Where’s “here”?

In what follows, this is the setup: for Fenda, the universe is the stage, and “here,” “somewhere else,” can only refer to the stage (possibly also the backstage). For Ahmed, in contrast, the universe includes the audience in which he is sitting. AHMED. Here! Here is here! What else do you want me to tell you? FENDA (exploring the stage). But there’s nothing here! Are you pulling my

leg, you damn desert joker? AHMED. Here, I’m telling you! Not there! If you look there, you won’t see

me here! FENDA. You’re bugging me, like a cockroach. I’ve been doing nothing but

looking here! You’ve got to be somewhere else, I know you, always somewhere other than here! AHMED. You’re the one who’s looking somewhere else! I know you! Always looking somewhere else and never here! Here, here, I’m telling you! Not there where you are! Here! FENDA. And how, my little blue pig of the oasis, do you expect “here” to not be where I am? If it’s somewhere else, it’s not here, and if it’s here it’s here where here is and not there where here isn’t.

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Ahmed the philosopher AHMED. Just think a moment, my radiant beloved from the land of the

baobab trees. If I tell you I’m here, it’s because I’m not there, there where you are! My here is here, whereas your here is there. Come on! Not all heres are there! My here is here! FENDA. As a matter of fact, I’ve looked all over. Don’t think my eye isn’t as sharp as that of any hawk in the palm trees! I’ve inspected all the possible heres. You’ve up and gone somewhere else, lousy place changer AHMED (to the audience around him). Hey, tell her! Tell this gorgeous stubborn mule! Tell her I’m here! Maybe she’ll believe you! FENDA. And you think I’m going to believe your accomplices, my little Ali Baba of the forty thieves? They can shout “here, here!” till the cows come home, they’re still not going to throw off my inner compass. Let your troops try all the tricks they want: woman sees what she sees. I’ll find you somewhere else, Mister Make a Big Fuss About Here. Mister Here We Go Again! Mister Here Today Gone Tomorrow! Fenda turns toward the wings, and examines them. AHMED. Over here! Not over there! You’ve got your back turned to me!

Over this way! Not over that way! Boy, her inner ear is really messing with her! Here, I’m telling you! FENDA. It doesn’t seem like he’s somewhere else either. Where could he be hiding? AHMED (desperate). Here, I’m here! Everybody sees me except you! Stop looking around everywhere but here! FENDA. And you, stop jabbering, like a stork with a dirty beak, that you’re here, when here, as everybody can see, there’s nobody but me. I’ll find you eventually, here or somewhere else, really close or really far, and then you’ll get an earful! Fenda disappears backstage, from which we hear a whole racket of searching. AHMED. By Allah! This is worse than talking to a sleeping crocodile! I’m

going back there. I have to go back there. If I stay here, she’ll stay there, and we’ll both be somewhere else.

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Ahmed leaves his seat and walks onto the stage. Fenda returns, exhausted and covered in dust, as if she’d been rummaging around in someone’s attic. FENDA. Ah! You’ve finally come here! When you’re done playing cops and

robbers like a child, let me know! What a doofus! AHMED (pointing to the seat he’s just vacated). But I was right there! I was right there the whole time! Ask any of those people! I was there. I didn’t budge! FENDA. And if you were there, why were you shouting like a stuck pig that you were here? Little liar! AHMED (overwhelmed). I was there just now. It’s just now that I’ve come up here, because you were looking for me everywhere but there! FENDA. I don’t see why I would have looked for you there, when you were screaming like a lunatic, with all your sidekicks, that you were here! And besides, believe me, I checked and double-checked for you there (pointing backstage). I looked for you in every gross place you can think of! Looking for you, I was like a spider all wrapped up in its web! Here, there, everywhere . . . I inspected everything! You’ll pay for this! It’s not funny! AHMED. But there (pointing to the audience) and there (pointing backstage) aren’t the same theres! They’re in opposite directions! FENDA. Directions! You can really lead a woman astray with this business about directions. But me, I have my own personal sense of direction, a private one, like the camel that knows the stars! And let me point out to you that there (pointing backstage) and there (pointing to the audience) . . . neither one of them is here! Mr. Direct-from-Fakeville. AHMED. Kiss me here then. When you kiss me, I lose all sense of direction! FENDA. Some other day, Mr. Here We Go Again. A day when, if you tell me you’re here, it’s not because you’re somewhere else. Fenda exits into the audience and walks through it slowly. AHMED. Fenda! Fenda! You’re where I was. Do you understand? That’s

where I was just now! FENDA. Here? You were here? How come you didn’t tell me?

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Ahmed the philosopher AHMED (flustered). But I did nothing but tell you, in every possible way,

my pretty one from over there! FENDA. Mainly what I see is that when I come here you’re there! I’m

getting really tired of your not being where I am! You’re never here! When I’m here, you never are. Too bad for you, sweetiepie. Fenda exits. AHMED (raising his hands to the sky). Woman! Woman! Where is woman?

Never here, never there, never somewhere else. . . . She’s always out of sight!

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5. CAUSE AND EFFECT

Ahmed. Ahmed is sitting cross-legged on the ground, like a storyteller from the Far East. I’m going to tell you an extremely funny story. Once upon a time, in Sarges-les-Corneilles, there was this big ugly goon, this real pain in the ass, named Moustache. Albert Moustache. You know the type. He was always asking me: “You Arabs, born natives of Algeria, what are you doing here eating up all our French pastries?” He was always asking my girlfriend Fenda, who’s black and beautiful: “You Negroes, born natives of Timbuktu, why the hell do you have to drag your asses to Sarges-les-Corneilles?” He was dying to figure it all out. Because he’d been born in Sarges-les-Corneilles, he’d been the dunce of the school in Sarges-les-Corneilles, he’d done his military service in the Sarges-les-Corneilles fire station, he’d married a shrew who was a born native of Sarges-les-Corneilles, he’d lived in a housing project in Sarges-les-Corneilles, he had a German shepherd by the name of Pisspot, which was the son of a bitch from Sarges-les-Corneilles by the name of Shitbag and of a dog from Sarges-les-Corneilles by the name of Pukeface. And what’s more, he worked at Capito-Nuke, a factory in Sarges-les-Corneilles. A true blue Sarges-les-Corneillian like Moustache, I doubt if there were two of them under the sun. So, when he saw people from Africa coming here, people who’d spent their lives crossing oceans, who spoke three languages, who had several wives, and who, every Saturday morning, brightened the Sarges-lesCorneilles marketplace with color and beauty, he just couldn’t get

AHMED.

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over it. One day, I said to him: “My dear Moustache, what’s bothering you is that you don’t see the cause and the effect.” He was annoyed, he bellowed: “What is this Moslem mumbo-jumbo? Cause and effect! Cooze and fuck, you mean!” But I knew how to deal with him, old Moustache: “The problem,” I went on, “is that you see the effect: all sorts of people not like you, at least according to you, because they’re not any more not like you than you are yourself. Because with you, there are days, especially when you’ve been hitting the sauce, when you’re really not yourself. But let’s not dwell on that. The important thing is that you don’t see the cause. Yet an effect without a cause has the following effect: that you get all upset.” “So,” bellows Moustache, “are you going to tell me the cause of your damn effect?” “Take a good look at me,” I hurl at him. “I see all too much of you, you damn Muslim,” he hurls right back at me. “So I’m the effect, huh,” I catapult at him, “me here, I’m the effect that, without a cause, gets you all upset?” “You really look like an effect without a cause,” he jabbers at me. Then I let him have it: “Scrutinize me. Scrutinize the effect, and you’ll eventually see the cause. Because, necessarily, the cause is in the effect.” “If I screwtenize you, all I see is your shit-brown face,” he shrieks at me. “Screwtinize some more,” I zap back at him. “Because if the cause isn’t in the effect, it’s a miracle, the effect occurs all by itself.” “You’re not really trying to tell me that the presence of a bunch of Islamicists and sexed-up black chicks in Sarges-les-Corneilles is a miraculous gift from the good Lord?” “Go ahead,” I press on, with my face right in his moustache, “screwtenize hard!” And then I see Moustache’s eyes light up. He stares at me, he flexes all the soft muscles of his intellect, he rolls his eyes, he turns red as a rooster’s comb . . . By George, he’s got it! “You came here,” he declares, “because you decided to go where it was better.” “Moustache,” I retort, “you’ve put your finger on the cause. But,” I persist, “you, why do you stay in Sarges-les-Corneilles? There’s nothing in the world that’s better than Sarges-les-Corneilles?” “Goddam shithole of a hick town,” he declares. “So now,” I whisper to him, “we’re in a pickle. If the cause of being here is that people came for something better; and if you’re not here for the better, but for the worse . . . then there’s a diabolical conclusion: the effect without a cause, it’s you here, Albert Moustache, and not me.” Then I saw Moustache’s eyes narrow and become like a little pig’s eyes. “Even by

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screwtinizing me,” he started moaning, “you can’t see the cause of why I’m in Sarges-les-Corneilles?” And, scrutinizing him really hard, I said: “No, it’s impossible to see anything. You’re here because you’ve been here forever. But that’s not really a valid cause. You’ve got to get used to it, Albert, it’s you yourself, as an effect without a cause, who are getting yourself all upset.” Ever since then, he’s been crying, Albert Moustache has. I swear to you! He’s been crying nonstop. His dog Pisspot even sleeps next to him to try to understand. All in all, it’s actually a sad story. Sorry about that . . .

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6. POLITICS

Madame Pompestan, Ahmed. Madame Pompestan enters stealthily, as if she were in a disreputable place. Ahmed is sitting at the front of the stage, staring at the audience indifferently. MADAME POMPESTAN. What a nightmare! Keep your eye on your purse,

my girl! And keep in mind that the salvation of the Party for the Unification and Rehabilitation of France demands that you plunge your delicate hands into the slime of the housing projects. (Noting the presence of Ahmed.) Could this be the famous Ahmed, the one they call (bursting out laughing) the philosopher? How can you tell? (Staring intently at Ahmed, close up.) He has a weird mug, this Muslim. He looks like he’s made of wood! (She touches the mask, Ahmed remaining perfectly still.) Ah! He is made of wood! Could this whole place be full of wooden Arabs? AHMED (taking out his stick as if it were an enormous phallus). And this, madame deputay, it doesn’t give you a woody? MADAME POMPESTAN. Well really! For a philosopher, you’ve got a filthy mouth. Up, stud! I mean, up, steed! AHMED (bounding up, suddenly light and elegant). And to what do I owe this special visit on the part of a deputay of the PURF?5 What a surprise! What a burst of benevolence! I’m overwhelmed, ecstatic, I’m floating on a political flying carpet! Improvisation on the servile stupefaction of someone unexpectedly receiving a visit from a superior.

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Ahmed the philosopher MADAME POMPESTAN . OK, OK, fine. And don’t talk so loud about

carpets and flying. That’s the whole problem, my dear assimilated and republican Islamic fellow citizen, carpets and fleecing, I mean flying. Or, to speak seriously, because I’m a serious woman, a woman who doesn’t just throw words around, a woman’s woman with a man’s head, a head that’s all man . . . AHMED (examining her closely). That’s a little bit true, unfortunately!6 MADAME POMPESTAN. Excuse me?! (With a little giggle.) I don’t have a stick to wave at you! AHMED . But, I gather, you do have fleecing, I mean flying carpets. MADAME POMPESTAN . More like flying nuns! My dear Ahmed, I’m the president of the National Organization of Women of Action. Let me get right to the point, even if I have to use crooked means. They’re accusing me of having laundered the profits from my charitable work for the restoration of the Trappist convent of Sarges-les-Corneilles by depositing them in my party’s coffers, and even my own coffers. Money laundering: you can just imagine how I’m being hung out to dry! With a flying carpet like that, or with all those Trappist traps yapping at my behind, I’m trapped, the woman of action is going to be called on the carpet. AHMED . On the flying carpet. Or the lying carpet. Madame deputay, two questions are flitting around in my brain like hummingbirds in a cage. First, is it true? Second, what does all this stuff about traps and covers have to do with me, Ahmed, the secular Muslim and subtle philosopher? MADAME POMPESTAN. Covers! He said it! He pronounced the magic word! Covers! I need a cover! When facing the doddering old judges and the cannibalistic media, the female politician must be covered! From head to toe! AHMED (looking at Madame Pompestan’s legs). You do actually have certain female charms . . . You want me to get you an Islamic headscarf, a veil, a chador? Improvisation: Ahmed covering Madame Pompestan, who tries to fight him off, with a chador. By the end, Madame Pompestan’s skirt has hitched up quite a bit . . .

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Ahmed the philosopher MADAME POMPESTAN (tugging at her skirt). Really now! The Western

woman is neither naked nor veiled! What a way to behave! AHMED . So, what kind of covering can cover up your Trappist transgres-

sions and conventual cons? MADAME POMPESTAN . It’s Moustache. Moustache told me: “Madame

deputay, go see Ahmed the philosopher. He’s an Arab and less than nothing, but he’s king of the housing project. With all the Trappists and the traps and the convents and the covers, he’s the only one who can set things straight.” He said it reluctantly, but those were his exact words: you’re the only one who can set things straight. AHMED. Get down on all fours. MADAME POMPESTAN. On all fours? What are you, crazy? AHMED. I’m the one who’s going to set things straight, right? I’m the one who’s doing the thinking here, right? I’m the one who’s covering you up and covering for you, right? The idea that’ll cover you isn’t going to come to me unless the politics to be covered is on all fours. If it’s standing up, I can’t see a thing, I’m thin as a rail, I can’t cover anything . . . MADAME POMPESTAN. For a philosopher, you’re bizarre, very bizarre, extremely bizarre. AHMED. Philosophy transforms human animals into humans, right? It transforms politicians on all fours into politicians who are standing, right? On all fours you ate up the whole Trappist convent. That’s what we have to cover up! Later we’ll see if your career can stand up on its own two legs! So get down! MADAME POMPESTAN (getting down on all fours). The things you’ve got to do these days to cover yourself! Lousy judges! AHMED (in a very pedantic tone, and with the appropriate improvisations). Your politics leads you to steal left and right. Perfect. You’re caught red-handed with your hand in the cookie jar. Excellent. Here’s Doctor Ahmed’s prescription: no politics can be covered up. People, even children, discover cover-ups. You can’t even cover the table with a tablecloth without being discovered. So change politics, Madame Pompestan! There isn’t one politics, dammit, there are lots of different politics. Yours is boring. All you do is manage some wretched business deals, persecute the weakest: me, Ahmed, for starters, and God knows I stand up for myself. You end up with the Trappists and the traps and

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the convents and the covers. And then you’re discovered down on all fours in front of your friendly neighborhood Arab so you can get out of the stinking hole you’ve dug yourself into. Just think a little! Look at the world! There’s more than just the state and government and elections and prevarications in this little world of ours! There’s more than just the police and the lawyers! There are people who are actually thinking, and truths that are getting around, there are will and the freedom of unpredictable itineraries! Go where you’ve never been, Madame Pompestan, go learn what you as a free woman can demand of the state, instead of trying to set yourself up in it like a rat in a piece of cheese. And stop going on about all your necessities, be they economic, social, international, or monetary! Only to end up stealing three sous and voting for three horrible laws in the church of parliament! Travel, Madame Pompestan, swing your skirts around the legible surface of the earth! Make a politics out of the real and not out of the stillborn! Then you’ll be covered—covered by the exercise of your living thought as much as if by simple integrity and white linen. I have spoken. Ahmed sits down and looks at the audience. Pause. MADAME POMPESTAN (still on all fours). What the hell is this subversive

gibberish? I’ve been made a fool of! Moustache, you made a fool of me! AHMED. If you insist on staying down there grazing on the floorboards, fine, it’s your choice. I nobly offered you the real cover, the one that uncovers what your politics only covers up, until you yourself are discovered, by which point you’ll have nothing left but your eyes to cry with. MADAME POMPESTAN. You’ll see who cries, you Arab loser! You’ll see if this deputay lets herself be lectured to about politics by a nut like you! You’ve had it, buster, the whole police force will be breathing down your neck! You’ll be crawling on all fours to the slammer! Madame Pompestan makes desperate efforts to get up, but she fails, some kind of mysterious force compelling her to remain on all fours. Improvisation on this situation. Ahmed takes the liberty of helping her, to no avail.

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Ahmed the philosopher AHMED. In politics, once you’ve seen that you’ve been down on all fours,

it’s almost impossible to get back up on your feet. MADAME POMPESTAN. Help! Murder! AHMED. Ultimately, there are perhaps only two kinds of politics: politics

on all fours and politics standing up. Watch! I’m going to explain this to my friend Rhubarb. Maybe he’ll graze on the floorboards too! Between wooden Arabs and politics on all fours, we’re in great shape! Ahmed exits. After a great deal of struggling and shouting, Madame Pompestan finally gives up: she leaves the stage on all fours.

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7. THE MULTIPLE

Ahmed.7 Ahmed enters slowly, looking sad. AHMED. There are a lot of you! There’s a terrible lot of you! And me,

Ahmed, I’m just one! I could fancy that I’m the lone eagle soaring above a flock of sheep! Look at Ahmed soaring and watching the fattest one among you with his golden eye! I’m going to swoop down! The one is going to swoop down, with his beak of one surging forth, and attack the whole plump lot of you. Improvisation of the lone eagle. Damn, it isn’t working. My giant’s wings prevent me from eating. If I eat some of the plumpest of the lot that you are, I’ll only be making a mess of meat and feathers and beak for the one that I am, still one, still the lone one among the many survivors. Poor eagle Ahmed perched here alone, and you all, whether eaten or not, still so many! What a misfortune always to be one in the labyrinth of the numerous multiple! From this point on, Ahmed speaks faster and faster, while slowing down at the end of each paragraph, like a bird that takes off, alights, takes off again, etc. I’m one. The ultimate misfortune. But but but. But. But I’m one what? One Ahmed? Ahmed’s only a name. A name that a lot of others

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have, too. Many are the Ahmeds, and Moustache, the awful Moustache, often says in the reinforced concrete town square of Sargesles-Corneilles that there are too many Ahmeds in France. If there are too many, there are lots of them, not just one. Me, Ahmed, I’m numerous in my name, and not one! Perched here is the flock of the many Ahmed eagles above the many plump sheep! No lonely meal! A feast! A banquet! Hooray for the many with the name of everyone! . . . Uh-oh! Everyone! Every one. One of each. Every Ahmed with the name of several Ahmeds is one. Many are the everyones, but every everyone is one. But but but. But. But one what, if the name Ahmed doesn’t make one, since it’s the name of several, and even of many? Of numerous everyones. Let’s examine the thing. Let’s examine the one. I’m examining myself. It’s the exam. The examination of the one. The exam-oneation. Ahmed to the audience, looking ferocious. Examine yourselves too, you bunch of many ones! You’re only everyones! No kidding! One thinks one is many, and one is only a heap of ones, a lumping together of every one! Time for the examone-ation, my little many ones! The Ahmed one has a nose. There’s no doubt about it. Am I a nose? Ahmed-nose? Ahmed-schnoz? Get to know your noses, please! It’s time for “Know Your Nose.” What does the scientific examination of the nose tell you? Exactly: the nose has two nose-holes, not one. The nose is two, not one. Am I two holes? Ahmed-two-holes, Ahmed nose-nose? . . . Ahmed knows the two of the nose, you know what I’m saying? A tiny little many, the two, the smallest of all the many, comes out of my one. Its fragrance fills my nostrils. Two, frankly, isn’t so many. It’s two times one, two. It’s hardly more than one. It almost is one. If you were two, would I say that there were a lot of you? The force of the nostril isn’t that great. They take the air out of me, these nostrils. But but but. But inside each nostril, what is there? Examine the inside of your nostrils, please. With a little stick, because with the fingers it’s gross. Or even with a very clean big stick.

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Ahmed picks his nose with his stick. There’s a whole pile of wonderful little dried boogers in the right nostril. And I’m sure there are as many or almost as many in the left nostril! And, all the way at the back, there’s some snot! Some beautiful foamy snot, like the sea on the sand! And a forest of little hairs, soft as spring lambs! How big the population of each nostril is! How nicely they keep me company! How nice it is that I’m no longer alone or one. Ahmed picks his nose furiously. I’m almost sure that the dried boogers and the foamy snot and the amazing hairs are as plentiful in my nose of Ahmed-one as you are in this theater. Wait! Wait a minute! Another one! Another four in the left nostril! And if I cut the hairs with a pair of scissors, there’d be a mob! A demonstration in the streets! A gigantic parade of hairs! More, more! And in each hair, what is there, huh? I’d really like to know what there is in each hair! A mess of delicious shit, I’m just sure of it! Ah, for a microscope to study each hair of the hairy demonstration that comes out of my nostrils! My stick for a microscope! And in the foamy snot what is there, huh? Examine the snot, if you will! In the foamy sea on the sand there are crayfish and soles and oysters, knives, plastic bottles, tar, shrimps, seaweed, fleas, periwinkles, clam chowder and starfish, urchins in cream sauce and rotted sharks’ teeth! There’s a whole world inside the wave that carries you along. Just thinking about it exhausts me, this whole world washed up by the least little wavelet on the smallest patch of sand. Wow, I’m beat. But but but. But in the snot at the back of one of the nostrils of my single nose of the Ahmed-one that I am, it’s worse! An overwhelming calamity! Bacillae of every shape, little hairy beasts, scrawny microbes, sickly white globules, gluttonous macrophages, viruses, some of them inactive, some still active! A colossal mob! An entire electorate that votes in the snot for the stability of a single one of my nostrils! Listen, I give up. In the tiniest recess of this supposed one, there are the many and the many of the many. There are billions and billions of multicolored particles! Help! The one is being eaten up everywhere by the

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ravenous many! Ahmed all by himself is a billion times more numerous than you! You’re the ones, I’m the ever bigger multitude. But but. But, in each of the thousands of microbes borne along by the foamy snot, what is there? Loads and loads of cells and then molecules and then atoms . . . Enough, enough! Let’s not examine anymore, please. All sticks out of noses, please. It’s finally a little hard to be so many in one’s one. In one’s every one. It’s swarming! Hey, I gotta go to sleep. I don’t know if they’re going to sleep too, the multitude in my nostrils, but me, Ahmed-one, when I sleep, I sleep. Ahmed speaks very drowsily. But but. But when I sleep, I’m not even one. I’m no longer anything. Either nothing or too many! Whatever! That’s just how it is. One is never one. One is always too many. Everyone is too many. Every one is between zero and too many. That’s how it is. That’s how it is. Ahmed leaves as sad as when he entered.

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8. CHANCE

Ahmed, Moustache. Ahmed enters and looks up, toward the flies, in an interested way. AHMED. Moustache! Over here! The coast is clear. MOUSTACHE (from the wings). You can’t go anywhere anymore in this

lousy Sarges-les-Corneilles without running into a trash can or an Arab. AHMED. Fortunately there are trash cans that aren’t Arabs, absolutely French trash cans. And Arabs who aren’t trash cans. Come on, Moustache, come see all these people who are dying to hear you. Moustache appears onstage and no sooner has he done so than a flowerpot falls from the flies and hits him on the head. MOUSTACHE (tottering). What . . . what . . . what the hell is this, an ambush

by a bunch of thugs? AHMED. It’s chance, Moustache. MOUSTACHE . Chance! The hell with chance! We’re getting beaten up,

slaughtered, looted, robbed, blackmailed, blackfemaled, drugged, AIDS-infected, laid off, bankrupted, impaled, raped, terrorized, crescentized, Islamized, Judaized, intellectualocratized, mediatized, fraudulized, cosmopolitocapitalized, and it’s all the fault of chance! AHMED . About all the immense French misfortunes you’ve just cited, I know nothing. But, as for the falling of the flowerpot right on your wonderful head, no doubt about it!

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Consider a first series of facts: I call you, you take your precautions, and then you come onto this public stage in the center of Sarges-les-Corneilles. Now consider a second series of facts: a young black woman, wanting to adorn her window with a potted memory of lush Africa, leans over to water her flowers and, in a gesture that betrays her inimitable inner flame, inadvertently causes one of the pots to fall. Is there any relationship at all between these two series? None whatsoever. We have scientific proof that Moustache keeps a dignified distance from any woman . . . whose complexion is not that of a purebred Sarges-les-Corneilles sweetie pie. The flowerpot, deriving from the second series of facts, falls in conformity with the laws of universal gravity. Deriving from the first series of facts, Moustache moves forward, in conformity with the laws of French common sense. These two movements are indifferent to each other. But their encounter takes place on the exact peak of Moustache’s head. There is a shattering intersection. Such, my dear Moustache, is chance: the shattering intersection of two series of facts entirely independent of each other. MOUSTACHE . I’d rather win at the lottery, and that never happens. There’s no crash at that intersection, I’ll tell you that. AHMED. You’ll see: if we begin again, nothing will happen. That will prove that it’s chance. Because, if it had been necessity, it would all begin again. Same cause, same effect, that’s what necessity is. Wait. Let’s do an experiment. Ahmed and Moustache exit. The stage remains empty for a moment, then Ahmed returns. AHMED . Moustache! Moustache! Come back! Chance is gone! MOUSTACHE (from the wings). Are you sure? AHMED . Positive. Chance can’t repeat itself. If it repeats itself, that means

necessity is lurking somewhere. Moustache enters cautiously, looking up frequently into the flies. A second flowerpot hits him on the head. MOUSTACHE (almost knocked out). Murderer! Bitch! Pot of shit!

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Ahmed the philosopher AHMED . It’s chance! MOUSTACHE . Chan . . . chan . . . I’m gonna strangle you. It won’t be hard.

I’m gonna wring your neck by chance. I’m gonna break it into little tiny pieces by chance. AHMED (rubbing Moustache’s head). Calm down! Consider the first series of facts . . . MOUSTACHE . Goddam lousy stinking first series, you mean! Let me see this chance of yours! Let him come out here, this chance, if he’s a real man! AHMED (continuing to massage Moustache’s head). It isn’t a man, it’s an intersection. The first series of facts is even more independent of the second series of facts than last time. We thought about it, we staged an experiment. And what did she do up there, our supposed divine Black Lady of the watered flowers? Did she watch our experiment? Did she think about it? Of course not! All wrapped up in the joy of her morning, she once more stuck out her voluptuous arm too far and too absentmindedly. And bingo! The pot falls just as Newton predicted, Moustache comes forward slowly, more cautiously and more warily than a minute ago, and, bingo, there’s a new shattering chance intersection on the head of Moustache, who had nothing to do with it. Look, if we try a second experiment, nothing at all will happen. Except for two consecutive acts of chance, without any connection between them. MOUSTACHE . A second experiment! You must take me for a real dope, you Islamic douchebag! Moustache makes a threatening gesture at Ahmed, then stops, his eyes narrowing in an intense effort of thought. Improvisation on the theme of “Moustache thinking.” Or else, or else . . . ? Hey, we’re gonna try a really new experiment, OK, my little Ahmed? We’re gonna work for science, you and me. This time, I’ll come in first, then I’ll call you, and then you’ll come. AHMED . Terrific! Moustache has just rediscovered experimental science all by himself! He varies the circumstances, to keep chance separate from necessity. Moustache, you’re going to get the Nobel prize if you keep going at this rate.

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Ahmed the philosopher MOUSTACHE . Bell or no bell, I’m reaching for the brass ring! So let’s give

this new thing a whirl. Ahmed and Moustache exit. Then Moustache returns, very, very cautiously. Nothing happens. He is jubilant. Ahmed! My little Ahmed! Come out here! AHMED (from the wings). Is everything OK? Did chance take off? I’m coming. Just at the moment when Ahmed returns, a third flowerpot falls on Moustache’s head. MOUSTACHE (sitting there in shock). I’m being killed! I’m being extermi-

nated! Police! Police emergency squad! Paramedics! The fire department! AHMED . Still and always chance. MOUSTACHE (almost unable to respond). Damn towel head! Chancy Ayrab! I won’t fall for that one again! You’ll see! Watch, I’m gonna give you a nice fat chance right on your nice fat lip! AHMED . Think about it! You’re the one who cooked up this brilliant plan where you come in first. How can you expect the girl to follow you in such scientific ideas? The first series of facts is still and always even more independent of the second series of facts! You, Moustache, you’re thinking more and more, and the black woman up there, let’s call her Fenda, is increasingly absentminded. Things are separating, diverging. It’s total chance! MOUSTACHE (thinking anew, flushed with concentration). You know what you ought to do, science-wise, my little Ahmed? I’ll stay here, and you, you’ll leave, then come back, then leave, then come back. That’d be great! Maybe that way you’ll see chance up close, you know what I’m saying? AHMED . That’s an idea worthy of Newton and Einstein, all right. A totally scientific and experimental variation! Moustache hides on one side of the stage. Ahmed exits and returns several times. Improvisation between the two of them on a growing certainty: nothing is happening. Moustache is obviously a little disappointed, but also reassured. 62

Ahmed the philosopher AHMED . It’s conclusive! We’ve had chance three times and now we have

necessity. Necessity is when no series of facts encounters another series, just like that, by chance. It’s when everything goes its own separate way, when I go and come back, when the other one, up there, closes her window, and when we’re completely indifferent to each other. No shattering encounter. MOUSTACHE (returning to stage center). OK, things have gone far enough . . . A fourth flowerpot hits Moustache on the head, and this time he’s out for the count. AHMED . It’s true that when chance insists it ends up looking like necessity.

Ahmed walks all over the stage, stepping over Moustache several times, looking quite pleased with himself. Suddenly, a fifth flowerpot falls, just barely missing Ahmed. In the direction of the flies: Hey! The physics lesson is over!

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9. POETRY

Ahmed. Ahmed is sitting reading a book, with his back to the audience. He turns around from time to time, staring at the audience with an angry look and blurting out the following lines in a simultaneously aggressive and gloomy tone of voice. AHMED . Don’t rattle my chains, OK!

Don’t push my buttons, if you don’t mind! Don’t get on my nerves! I mean it. And, once and for all, don’t rain on my parade! And again, just for emphasis: don’t rub me the wrong way! Or there’s going to be big trouble around here. I’m reading poetry. And when you’re reading poetry you need complete silence! Silence such that the sound of the poem should be like the feet of seagulls on the sand. When I read poetry I taste the French language in my eloquent mouth, like a wine. A great wine. The oldest and most delectable of wines flows by way of the French tongue into my mouth. Until I’m drunk with words and sentences. You’ll say to me: “You, Ahmed the Muslim, what do you know about wine? You don’t drink any! Wine is forbidden by your religion!” What a bunch of smart-asses you are! Ahmed’s going to shut your mouths. First of all, is everyone named Ahmed a Muslim? Is everyone named Dubois a Catholic? Religion isn’t the name one has, and it’s even less how one looks; it’s a belief that resides in one’s innermost self, completely private. And, therefore, it can’t be seen from outside. So there, smart-asses. Second, is everyone who is a Muslim igno-

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rant about wine? Is everyone who is a Christian ignorant about the pleasure of sex? Give me a break! Religion, provided you have the kind of belief that can’t be seen from outside, doesn’t mean being ignorant about the forbidden. If you don’t know anything about the forbidden, how can you understand why it’s forbidden? And obeying without knowing why turns you into an ass with very considerable ears. So there, smart-asses. And, third, is everyone who doesn’t drink ignorant about what wine is? Is everyone who’s never been to America ignorant about what America is? If we knew only what we see, we wouldn’t know much, in view of the limitations of our eyes. So there, again, smart-asses. I mean, even the word wine all by itself already tells you quite a bit about wine. And when the word wine enters into poetry, it’s almost as though one were drinking, by virtue of the incomparable power of words. Listen to this: “One evening the soul of wine sang in the bottles.” That’s by Charles Baudelaire. He knew a thing or two, Charles Baudelaire, about the transmission of wine through the incomparable power of words. I never get tired of him, Charles Baudelaire. So quiet down, smart-asses. Stop flapping your jaws at me! I’m reading poetry. I’m reading wine, the words of wine on my tongue. Definitively. So Ahmed reads out loud the last two stanzas of the poem “The Ragpickers’ Wine.” It’s an improvised reading, with all sorts of repetitions, variations, modulations, unexpected inflections, etc. And so it is, throughout man’s foolish fold, When wine, with Midas touch, turns all to gold; Through human throats its own bravado sings And by its gifts rules like the best of kings To drown the bitter aftertaste of rage And smooth the way to what comes after age, God, in remorse, made sleep; Man added wine— The Sun’s sweet son, immortal and divine!8 The improvisation over, Ahmed takes his stick and turns toward the audience.

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Anyone who claims that that isn’t beautiful, watch out! I know some people, here and there, who say that there’s no disputing tastes and colors, everyone’s got his own opinion, everything’s relative in this world of ours . . . Stop right there! What’s beautiful is beautiful. You don’t dispute it. You taste it. You taste wine on your tongue, the poetic language of wine on your tongue. Got it? Ahmed exits. Just before disappearing, brandishing his stick: And here’s my final warning: no tintinnabulation on my kneecaps. I’m keeping an eye on you.

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10. THE SUBJECT (1)

Ahmed. Ahmed makes his entrance with a noble bearing, as in a tragedy played in a grandly classical style. AHMED . I come forward masked. There’s a great philosopher, a very great

philosopher, a tremendous philosopher, who said that three centuries before I, Ahmed, did. I come forward masked. He said it in Latin. Larvatus prodeo. That’s a resounding utterance, to theatrical ears it sounds like a tragic pronouncement. Larvatus prodeo. Improvisation on larvatus prodeo. Note that I am doing you the courtesy of not saying it in Arabic. Certain smart-asses will say that, having been born at Aulnay-sousBois, it’s not clear that I’d know how to say, in Arabic, “I come forward masked.” Translating into Arabic something like larvatus prodeo, that’s beyond the reach of somebody born and raised in Aulnay-sous-Bois. But I, Ahmed, am not just any old native son of Aulnay-sous-Bois. And the best proof of it is that I’m perfectly capable of translating into Arabic “I come forward masked.” One would say: Ataquadamu mutinaquirân. So how do you like that? Leaves you speechless, doesn’t it? Ataquadamu mutinaquirân. Larvatus prodeo. And this is because I, the Arab, come forward in front of you truly masked. It’s not like the tremendous philosopher who said it in Latin. And who would have been up a creek if you’d asked him to say it in Arabic. By the way, he

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wasn’t born and raised in Aulnay-sous-Bois. He was born and raised in some hick town in the Creuse, which is pathetic. As far as the mask is concerned, he said pompously—I quote for you—“Like an actor making his entrance on the stage of the world, I come forward masked.” “Like an actor”: easier said than done. I’d be quite surprised if he wore a mask, this great philosopher. A wig, sure, they did that back then, they wore these stupid-ass wigs, and underneath they were as bald as billiard balls! He must have been bald, the tremendous philosopher, but a mask, no, I don’t see him with a mask. It’s a joke, his “I come forward masked”; it’s a rhetorical figure. That’s why he said it in Latin, larvatus prodeo. Latin was the mask of French; when he said larvatus prodeo, he meant: “I’m putting a mask on the fact that I come forward masked.” Which raises a real question: can a mask be masked? I who am truly masked, unlike this tremendous joker-philosopher, can I, right here, in front of you, mask the fact I’m wearing a mask? Improvisation on the mask of the mask. It’s conclusive! In order to mask the mask, the best thing to do is to take it off. My bare face isn’t what’s under the mask, it’s the mask that’s been masked from the outset. You can imagine the complication! I come forward toward you masked by my face, and when I put on the mask, in reality I’m unmasking myself! OK, let’s forget about it. At the end of the day, you can’t tell the differences between the mask, the mask of the mask, and the unmasked. And the philosopher, the larvatus joker, the prodeo clown, what was underneath his false mask? That is, assuming that we can figure out what a false mask is. Because, if the mask is a false face, we deduce from this that a false mask, being a false false face, is a true face! I’m telling you, it’s too complicated, this whole “I come forward masked” business. Me, Ahmed, every day I come forward masked on this stage, but, as for saying what that means, I’m showing you that I can’t. Nonetheless, at this juncture, we ought to know what was under the philosopher’s mask. Ultimately. There was him, you’ll tell me, but him who? His name was Descartes. Not Daycare, or Daydream, or Daytrip. Day-cartes. Bald underneath his stupid-ass wig. Descartes, the greatest bald philosopher of all time.

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Descartes, it must be admitted, uttered several famous maxims. Even as he came forward masked, like me, he stubbornly made quite a name for himself with his sayings, like me. He said, in particular, “I think, therefore I am.” He said it in Latin; with him saying things in Latin was a real obsession. It was his mask, or his false mask, or his true face, you know? He was bald and Latin. He said cogito ergo sum, “I think, therefore I am.” That reminds me of a joke . . . a joke . . . not a terrific one, but still . . . The whole telling of the joke is accompanied by Ahmed’s uncontrollable giggling. There’s this worker in a stable . . . another bald guy . . . (Laughter). Every night he takes care of the horses, he brushes them . . . he cleans them (Laughter). And he rubs them and he wipes them down and he grooms them and, by the time he’s done cleaning the animals, he smells really bad, this bald groom, and he wants to go home and clean himself, so he says (Laughter), “I stink, therefore I scram”!9 Ahmed stares at the audience, suddenly very serious. OK. Is this true, “I think, therefore I am”? Suppose that, masked in front of you, I think that I am not. And I have all sorts of reasons to believe that I’m not! Or, at any rate, that I’m not me. I’m wearing a mask, I’m playing the character of Ahmed, and what becomes of this me in all this—the me that I am? I’m not who I am and, at the same time, I’m who I’m not! Since I play at being what I’m not, I have the right to think that I’m not. Are you with me? Being with the one who isn’t with himself, that’s the theater for you. So if I think that I’m not, how can I think that if I think, I am? Just think! I think that I’m not, therefore I am! Such confusion! Improvisation on confused thought. Aha! A glimmer of light amid the confusion. I think I see things clearly now. I’m seeing things clearly and distinctly. When I play

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Ahmed, when I come forward masked in front of you, who is therefore thinking? Who is therefore being? Ahmed, he is. I’m doing everything, behind my mask, so that he can be here in front of you. But he doesn’t think! How could Ahmed think, since he doesn’t exist? He’s a creature of paper, Ahmed, a figment of the author’s imagination, an ectoplasm! But, with me carefully masked, he is, here, in front of you. Therefore, first of all, Ahmed can say: “I am and I don’t think.” And me, behind my mask? Am I? No! It’s Ahmed who’s here, in front of you, and me, I’m not, I’m Ahmed. But as far as thinking is concerned, I don’t stop! So that Ahmed can be here in front of you, I have to think every second about doing this and that, to invent, to remember the damn text of the author that I’m in the process of reciting for you! I think, I think, I’m covered in sweat, underneath my mask, from all this thinking. So that Ahmed can be here and so that I, who think, can’t be here. Therefore, I could say: “I think, and I am not.” A guy who thinks and who isn’t, so that there can be standing in front of you a guy who is and who doesn’t think, that’s the theater for you! So I think therefore I am, even when it’s masked in Latin, as cogito ergo sum, doesn’t work. He really blew it, Descartes! Which doesn’t surprise me, because his mask, that larvatus of his, it’s fake. Not like this one, the real mask, the false face, the true false face, the real false mask! Improvisation of love for the mask. What you have to say, if you want to be precise in philosophy, is this, write it down in your little notebooks. It’ll make a big impression in the middle of all the chitchat. Bring it out over dessert and, you’ll see, everyone’ll be blown away: “Where I think, I am not. And where I am, I don’t think.” There’s a snazzy maxim! Unfortunately, it isn’t mine. Ahmed, be honest underneath your mask where you think and aren’t, it’s snazzy, but it isn’t yours. It’s a modern larvatus prodeo who came up with it. His name is Lacan. Not Lock-on or Lock-off or Log-in or Log-out. Lacan.10 Another masked man who gets unmasked! This is because, today, the mask was the subject. The subject of the play.

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We’ve pretty much covered the question. I’m bowing out now. I’m taking my final bow wows. Sweating like a dog in order to think and not be, so that Ahmed can be and not think, that’s fine for a little while. But you ultimately want to be! You want to not think! I’m going to go where I am and don’t think. Backstage. If you saw me backstage, you wouldn’t recognize me. Nor would you recognize Ahmed, for that matter. By virtue of not thinking, backstage, I look like an idiot. But I am! I am an idiot! And Ahmed, by virtue of not being, looks like a sheet of paper. But he thinks! He does nothing else. Pure thought, he becomes. In other words, so much steam. I withdraw beneath the mask. Beneath the subject. And you, think a little! Be a little! Sometimes one, sometimes the other. You’re unmasked!

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11. THE BIG AND THE LITTLE

Rhubarb, Ahmed. Rhubarb enters sobbing. Ahmed enters behind him without Rhubarb’s noticing and overhears everything that follows. RHUBARB . They said it to me. At the meeting, they said it to me. They

were all in agreement, the bastards. They said to me: “Rhubarb, allow us to speak plainly, since we’re just chewing the fat together, having a friendly meal, among friends, chowing down all informally and everything. So we can tell you: You’re putting on airs.” Well, actually, what they said was: “You’re farting higher than your ass.” Even the secretary repeated it, laughing: “Rhubarb, you’re farting higher than your ass.”11 Just like that. AHMED . Not that your ass is so high . . . RHUBARB (startled). Who goes there? . . . Oh, it’s you, Ahmed, you were spying on me! AHMED . I was thinking about your sorrow. I was searching for the means to bring you a brighter tomorrow. To do justice to your rage, even if I have to beg, steal, or borrow. So that, before the entire meeting of slanderers, before the stupid secretaro, you might soon return as the star-o. RHUBARB . When the secretory and the whole Arab communitory and even the head of the union laboratory—I mean, the labor union—all tell you you’re farting higher than your ass, well, that’s a story that doesn’t exactly make you feel hunky-dory. AHMED . Measurement.

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Ahmed the philosopher RHUBARB . What are you talking about, measurement? AHMED . You explained your plans to them, right? You told them it was

time for a large vision, time to plant in Sarges-les-Corneilles the seeds of a whole multiracial culture of communities that can find their roots there? You told them about the need for a vision that would be at once ethical, aesthetical, and elastical? You told them that human rights needed to discover, in associative, municipal, familial, and colonial activism, a fresh new wind, one that can sweep away the fetid clouds of the sargeoise-corneilloise bureaucracy in all of its forms? RHUBARB . It sounds like you were at the meeting! That’s exactly what I said, in a style at once ripe and pungent. AHMED . Your famous camembert style! And they said that your vision was too grand, they called you Ethical Ethel, they said you and ethics were as thick as a couple of ticks. And, finally, that you were farting higher than your ass. And then you left in tears. RHUBARB . It’s hard, it’s very hard. To be accused of grandiosity, of excess, it’s hard. Me, I’m for modesty. Democracy should be down-to-earth, very close to the people, with extremely concrete ideas, tiny ideas, nothing out of the ordinary. That’s what ethics is: never going beyond the masses, not even by a hair. Thinking like the modest neighborhood imbecile, thinking small, really small, teeny-weeny. Because if you think outside the box, or too far, or too big, bam! You’re a totalitarian. When they said to me, “Rhubarb, you’re farting higher than your ass,” I said to myself, kiddo, they’re telling you you’re a totalitarian.12 That’s what brought tears to my eyes on the spot. AHMED . I’m telling you. Measurement. Exact measurement. Have you seen this ass they were talking about? RHUBARB (twisting himself around). It isn’t so easy to see your own behind. AHMED (taking his stick). We’re going to measure. A whole improvised game in which Ahmed measures with his stick the exact height of Rhubarb’s ass. Just as I thought. It’s not much above sea level. RHUBARB . They said: “higher. You’re farting higher than your ass.”

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Ahmed the philosopher AHMED . OK. But what’s bigger than what’s little can still be little. Right? RHUBARB (tempted by this solution).

A little higher than my ass, that’s still not much above sea level? That’s still modest, that’s still ethical and democratic? Don’t you think? AHMED . No doubt about it! Even if you take a tiny corpuscle, an electron, or even an atom, and multiply it by ten thousand, it’ll still be little! It’s like if you took a gigantic pile, a galaxy or even the sun, and divided it by ten thousand, it’ll still be very big. The big divided into little pieces will still be big. And, if it’s very big, even divided by a big number, it’ll still be big. And, similarly, the little divided by a little number will still be little. But if it’s really little, even multiplied by a big number, it’ll still be little. RHUBARB (still worried). But do you think my ass is low enough, compared with sea level, so that even if I fart quite a bit higher it will still be low? AHMED . I’m going to measure again. Variations on the preceding improvisation. No doubt about it. No matter how high you fart, even way above your ass, it’ll never be very high compared with sea level. The risk of high achievement, my dear Rhubarb, is nil. RHUBARB . Wonderful! I’ve got them now, those bastards! Totalitarian, Rhubarb? Never! As pedestrian as they come! Right next to the masses! The itty-bitty, nitty-gritty practical idea! AHMED . You fart almost at level zero. Altitude inconsequential. Mont Blanc is big, but everything you say is little. They proved it to you themselves, with their vulgar comparison. RHUBARB . You’re right. You’ve got to measure everything, everything, everything, everything! AHMED . Even every ding-a-ling. Measurement, moderation, that’s what ethics and aesthetics and elastics are all about. RHUBARB . I’m going back to the meeting. I’m going to fart them up but good, you’ll see! AHMED . Go for it. Rhubarb exits . . . Ahmed contemplates his stick.

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Oh thou! Standard measure! Are you big? Are you little? Neither one nor the other, if it’s thou who measurest the big and the little. Neither one nor the other, or both. Huge is the stick, if it’s an atom that measures it. Minuscule is the stick, if it’s compared to the sun. Anyway! Dear Rhubarb! The true little Rhubarb has dried the tears of the false big one. With his stick, Ahmed measures the height of his own ass. It’s even littler. But, actually, the stick is big! The stick is very big! The stick is immense! Ahmed, you fart higher than the stars.

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12. INFINITY

Ahmed. Ahmed is standing squarely on stage, like a professor. He addresses the audience in a didactic tone. AHMED . How many of you are there, looking at what happens on these

boards? Let’s say a hundred. I only like round numbers. I like a nice neat sum. A number like one thousand seven hundred eighty seven point three thousand nine hundred two, what’s that like? Badly made couscous. A round number, it’s beautiful, it’s clear. It’s like a beautiful woman, if you see what I mean. Improvisation on round figures and feminine forms. This isn’t to say that you, the hundred of you who are here, are like a beautiful woman. Far from it. But you work with the material you’ve got. There aren’t just beautiful women in this world of ours. In heaven it seems that’s all there is. Maybe that’s a little too much. A million beautiful women is too many for one man. If you see what I mean. Improvisation: Ahmed at the mercy of a million beautiful women. OK, enough about paradise. Let’s say that a zero walks into the theater. It’s not easy to imagine, a zero walking into the theater, but you’ve got to do some work! You have to imagine the unimaginable!

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Come on! Concentrate! A magnificent zero walks into the theater. A perfectly round zero. Ahmed enacts onstage the zero coming in. And so, what happens then? The zero sits down at the very end of the one hundred. And just like that, you have a thousand. A zero at the end of a hundred, that’s a thousand, no doubt about it. Because of a beautiful zero, there are a thousand of you now. I’ve got stage fright! Acting in front of a thousand people, I have terrible stage fright. And what do I see? Another zero entering. He’s a little skinnier, this zero, but he’s not bad. He’s still plump. He’s eaten a fair number of ones, two, threes. He even devoured a seventy-eight. Because, to be a zero, you’ve got to eat everything that isn’t zero. That’s why they’re round, zeros. They’re well nourished; they stuff their faces with numbers all day long. Just so they can stay zeros. Having said this, I don’t see why these zeros are arriving late. You know, uh, you zero there, this started a while ago already. They’re already a thousand! Sit down all the way in back and don’t chitchat with the five. I’ve got stage fright like you wouldn’t believe! Because a second zero at the end of the thousand, that makes ten thousand! It’s the Roman circus! It’s a concert by the rock group Majestic Brown Egg!13 It’s no longer just a cozy little community playhouse! But . . . watch out! Yet another enormous zero! He’s eaten a seven-hundred fortytwo, that one! And another one! And another one, there, there . . . Stop them! Guards! Where are the police? Improvisation of a desperate struggle against the invasion of the zeros. At the end, Ahmed succumbs; he remains lying on the stage, exhausted. They’re coming, they’re still coming . . . Millions, billions, trillions, quadrillions, quintillions, sextillions, septillions, octillions . . . Countless masses of zeros adding themselves incessantly to the ends of each other . . . All the living are there, and all the dead and all the not yet born. A total audience, totalized by the infinite roundness of all the zeros that show up! All of humanity in my theater, humanity past, present, to come . . .

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Ahmed sits down and looks attentively toward the back of the auditorium. What do I see back there? There’s one that looks funny . . . It’s like a double zero . . . Twins? Twin zeros? They look more like Siamese brothers . . . two zeros stuck together . . . it looks like an eight, if you see what I mean, one zero on top of another . . . but not standing up, no. An eight lying down. Lazy good-for-nothing of an eight! There’s no sleeping, in the theater! Get up! But no, it’s not an eight. So what could it be? Well, I’ll be a monkey’s uncle! It’s infinity! It’s infinity that came after the multitudes of chubby zeros! And now there are no longer any zeros at all! They’ve all run off! A grade of zero for the zeros, when there’s infinity. That’s what’s happened. So many zeros showed up, that it was necessary to go further, further than all the quintillions of sextillions of millions! There where one is beyond number, there where one can no longer count. And infinity arrived, calmly, at his appointed time. He said, “My dear Mister Zeros, with me here, for all that you add yourselves together, get behind each other, form a long line, it’s as if nothing happened.” Disgusted, the zeros walked out. It’s as if they all got a big grade of zero minus and fell into it. I’m deeply honored, Mr. Infinity. Thank you infinitely. For locking up the theater, for expelling the zeros, I could only count on you. May I begin? Thank you. How many of you are there, looking at what happens on these boards? There are one hundred of you. One hundred, plus infinity, of course. But one hundred plus infinity, that’s infinity. For one hundred, next to infinity, that’s like saying zero. So, there’s an infinite number of you. I thank you, ladies and gentlemen, for having come here in such great numbers. Such great numbers that even if some oaf of a zero sneaks in here, it wouldn’t make any difference. No difference at all. What peace! The peace of infinity. Quiet! I see that infinity’s asleep, back there in the last row. Infinity is often asleep. Let’s wait for him to wake up. When infinity sleeps, the finite shuts up. Shsh!

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13. TIME

Fenda, Ahmed. Ahmed and Fenda enter engaged in flirtatious joking. AHMED . No. No and no. My radiant Black Woman, my hyperbole of a

palm tree, my hip-swinger of the concrete plaza, my tease of the highrise and the even higher rise, my ravager of the muscle heads of Sargesles-Corneilles . . . A man, in these situations, needs time for reflection. FENDA . And what is time, my lovable little scamp of an Arab stringbean? Isn’t it what spreads out like a stinking swamp between two sunny islands? There’s the present, and then more of the present, and can you tell me the point of what lies between the two of them? A woman like me decides in the present, and you, you males, you have to rent space between two decisions like a bunch of low-life tenants. AHMED (taking his stick). Imagine that the end of this stick is your present, my flaming hot pot. The rest of the stick is what? And the air in front of the stick, what’s that? And if I touch the tip of your breast, that round refuge of the sensual pleasures that you offer (which he does, as Fenda sighs), is it not true that the stick is the quite hard past of my gesture and that your breast is its future? Man moves gravely from the past toward the future, according to a subtle calculation that takes its time in time. FENDA . And he dodges the present, where the solid woman stands offered. Under the pretext that there’s time, you always take time. There are some who say that you jump on top of women like a bunch of rapacious desert birds. From what I can see, anyway, all you do is look in

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back of you and in front of you and on both sides, sticking a leg out once night has already fallen on the present that was ready for action. I want it now, my smart-ass of the in-between! The long stick of the past isn’t going to go limp as a wet noodle waiting for a future that’s slower and spottier than a giraffe’s neck. Fenda throws herself on Ahmed kissing and hugging him, knocks him down on the ground, and straddles him like a horse. Now I’ve got you nicely bedded down in the present, my honeybunny of the past . . . AHMED . Bedded down, man remains motionless and measures time. What are you getting at, my little pony of the pure present? FENDA . At our matrimonial delights. What a woman decides in the present, her man can’t oppose with either the past or the future. AHMED . Matrimonial! Now there’s a concept! Isn’t it my past that made me this man whom you’re knocking over and climbing on in the present? And isn’t it conjugal fidelity to this present that you want for our future? Ahmed knocks Fenda down brutally and stands up. Let me figure something out. Anyone who yields to the temptation of the present gives up his true desire. That desire that comes from the past and calls for the future. FENDA (standing again herself). Man squanders his life. He waits, he calculates, he grinds time into a fine powder, and nothing worthwhile happens. You’ll be old, toothless, a featherless marabou, standing on one foot in the rain, and you’ll tell me in your old nanny goat voice that you need time. AHMED . But I’ll be wise and erudite! I’ll know all the ins and outs. I’ll be a solitary and pensive walker in all the avenues of narrative and time! I’ll be at peace with my desire, at peace with the hostility or the ecstasy of all the sinister presents! FENDA . In other words, you’ll be like an old box filled with compressed air! They’ll make a hole in it and there’ll be a hissing noise, pssschhhuit . . . Once the whole in-between of time has rushed out, all that will be left is rust and dust. 84

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They are silent, and a bit sulky. Hey, let’s walk over by the square. The weather’s beautiful. We’ll see the evening come like a blue canvas spread out over a meadow. AHMED . I don’t know. We’ve got plenty of time! FENDA (furious). Oh, stick it where the sun doesn’t shine, your time! Time killer! Time bomb! Time-bum! Mr. Waste of Time! Mr. Doesn’t Know What Time It Is! Fenda rushes out . . . AHMED . Oh, time! Suspend your flight! I may have done something

stupid. With women, you always have to answer, “present, ma’am!” Not that that prevents you from grilling the past and walking on the eggshells of the future. Ahmed exits running and shouting: Fenda! Fenda! At the present time, I’m present!

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14. TRUTH (1)

Ahmed. Ahmed enters, using his stick like a cane, looking old and in pain. AHMED . Suddenly I’ve gotten a lot older. And why? You’ll never guess

in a million years. Because of Rhubarb! My friend Rhubarb, the man of all the dynamic and ethical associations! The defender of all the rights of man, of woman, of the handicapped, of the Jew, of the Negro, of the Arab, of the dog, of the island parrot, of the sexual and adolescent minorities, of the overworked and the underprivileged, of the youngest children and the oldest mammoths. Do you know him, Rhubarb? Improvisation on Rhubarb. I run into him yesterday on the square in front of the Sarges-lesCorneilles city hall, and I notice that he looks sad. “Rhubarb,” I say to him, “you don’t have that airy air you had ere we met. Your earlier air and your air today make me think you’re in error. You have the air of one who’s erring.” “I have been erring since yesterday,” he says to me in a frankly funereal tone, “that’s why I have this air.” “And why are you erring, Rhubarb?” I murmur to him tenderly. “I have encountered the truth,” he blurts out to me. I’m struck. You can just imagine! The truth! It’s terrifying! Rhubarb and the truth! A shock to knock your block off! A rude barb from a barbed rube! Rhubarb meets the true barb: now I understand only too well why he has that eerie air of someone

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in error. So I say to myself: “Ahmed, step very lightly, my boy. This is serious stuff. This calls for the utmost tact, for extremely precise philosophy.” I begin very gently: “And in what circumstances did you encounter the truth, my dear Rhubarb?” He gives me this depressing look, with the air of one who’s been erring forever. “I was presiding at a meeting that was completely convivial and democratic, lively, concrete, and we were discussing all sorts of sincere and genuine things,” he says to me, with an empty, hangdog look in his eye. “In front of me, at the back of the room, there was this great big strapping guy, with a really dark moustache, a Turk, I think. He had his arms crossed, and he was staring at me. I was speaking, and speaking, and moderating the discussion, and we had just gotten to the subject of business practices. Fascinating! A very nice lady, Madame Pompestan, was explaining that, if we set a minimum wage for workers, then we’re violating human rights because we’re preventing the boss from freely proposing a contract to the worker who freely accepts it. Her point was debatable, no doubt about it, but it was interesting! It was the whole issue of the ethics of wages! And one can’t emphasize enough that wages aren’t completely ethical unless they’re completely free! And therefore free to be low, very low, almost right down in the dirt. But the Turk kept staring at me, and, besides, he kept stroking the ends of his moustache in a ferocious way. I tell myself: Rhubarb, the Turk at the back of the room isn’t happy. He isn’t participating, the Turk, he isn’t contributing to the discussion. He kept staring me down and looking more and more somber, the Turk. And I start to get tongue-tied. Already, as a rule, whenever I see a human person not participating in the discussion, I’m uncomfortable. But here he was staring at me like it was my fault. So I get tongue-tied, I start getting all mixed up. I begin a sentence, something like, ‘The ethics of the minimum mustn’t lead us to forget the ethics of the maximum’—pretty clever, huh, the whole moderate rhetorical balance and all?—and then I can’t go on. Really, I just get stuck. Everybody’s looking at me. There’s a deadly silence, like when in a debate there’s no more democratic dynamism. And suddenly, the Turk, still staring me right in the eyes, says very calmly, like this: ‘Monsieur Rhubarb, not only have you been saying nothing but bullshit for years now, but, what’s more, you’re going to end up saying disastrous bullshit.’ You can imagine the effect! Everyone looks at me,

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looks at each other, looks at me . . . And then, at that precise moment, a sentence invades my poor troubled head. It forces itself on me, this sentence! It takes up, in spite of myself, the entire surface of my brain. It’s the sentence ‘The Turk is nothing other than the truth.’ And I can’t get it out of my cerebral circumvolutions. ‘The Turk is nothing other than the truth.’ I pull what’s left of myself together, I pretend I need to go take a leak and I exit through the back door. And since then I’ve been wandering around with this errant air at which you stare.” That’s what he told me, Rhubarb. I think about it. I tell him: “You’re mixing up what comes after and what comes before.” “What?” he whines feebly. “OK,” I continue, “so the Turk has arrived in your democratic life. But he, the Turk, isn’t the truth in person! It’s not a person, the truth! The truth is afterward, a long time afterward, after you’ve been putting the Turk to work for a very long time! After you’ve spent your life thinking about the Turk! After you’ve drawn the conclusions from the Turk! After you’ve grown old with the Turk in your brain! After you’ve changed everything about yourself because of the Turk! After what the Turk has said has suffused your actions, your thoughts, your very way of being Rhubarb! After Rhubarb has become as strong as the Turk! You haven’t encountered the truth, Rhubarb! You’ve encountered what happens so that there might be a little bit of truth! What’s happened to you in the form of a Turk is the chance for a little truth! You’ve encountered yourself, Rhubarb, capable of making truth out of what happens in the form of a Turk. The truth comes after the Turk, in your life, which will be entirely haunted by the Turk! Just think! Watch how you’re going to grow old with the Turk inside of you, with the trace, the impact of what the Turk said, that utterance thus becoming, in the name of Rhubarb, a piece of truth!” And I performed for him the blow of the truth that comes in time, the blow of the old truth! Just like this, I performed it for him. Improvisation: the aging of Ahmed under the effect of the becoming inside of him of his own truth. And, as I grew older, Rhubarb grew younger! He lost his air of one who errs up in the air! He had a gleam in his eye, a bounce in his step, and the gift of the gab. Me, I had practically one foot in the grave and

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getting truer by the minute. And he—horrors—he was a young man and more and more false! To the point where he ended up saying to me: “Ah, I understand everything! It’s that Turk who says nothing but bullshit! He doesn’t even know what a real democratic discussion is, that Turk! It’s a problem, all these illiterates who come to France with their frankly backward culture! Wait a minute! I’m going to suggest to my association that we have meetings to integrate the Turks! Integration! That’s the only truth there is! And for those who can’t be integrated, expulsion! We’re not letting ourselves be called bullshitters and disasters by antidemocratic cultures! Now that’s the truth! So long, Ahmed!” That’s how I cured him, my friend Rhubarb! The most unsuccessful philosophy lesson of my entire career! Not to mention that it’s aged me ten years! I’m the one who has to absorb the Turk’s truth, and Rhubarb, nothing! I purged him! I purged him of his Turk! Ahmed, old pal, you’ve sacrificed yourself on the altar of the truth of alterity. Bloody Turk! It seems like I’m carrying him on my back. Ahmed exits the stage painfully, as if he were carrying an enormous burden on his bent back. Just before exiting: Each of you is on your own with the truths you encounter! Don’t put them on me! If you come face to face with your Turk some day, don’t go out to take a leak! And don’t come fobbing him off on me! Don’t plan on pulling the Turk trick on me! To each his trick! To each his Turk! And good luck.

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15. THE NATION

Madame Pompestan, Ahmed. Madame Pompestan and Ahmed come rushing in. MADAME POMPESTAN . Over my dead body! Absolutely out of the ques-

tion! I say this to you as the deputay for Sarges-les-Corneilles, as a member of the Decisional and Central Consortium of the Party for the Unification and Rehabilitation of France, as President and Secretary of the Parliamentary Club of High-Powered Women, as wife and adviser of Edouard Pompestan, CEO of Grand Nuclear Grid, which represents two-thirds of the global market in the chromium-carbon turbine industry, as an enlightened citizen, as a regular, well-rounded, well-adjusted woman who hasn’t stopped trying to be attractive, nor, for that matter, to be unattractive when necessary. We will not accept it. The answer is nyet, forget about it. AHMED . Madame Pompestan! Permit me to lay out my case before you, as Ahmed, who neither is nor ever will be a deputay. But who exists, here, with his hidden resources. As Ahmed who neither is nor ever will be a woman of action. Although . . . Improvisation on Ahmed as a woman of action. Never mind. As Ahmed who neither is nor ever will be married to the boss of Grand Nuclear Grid. Who’s more likely to be stuck in the grimy daily grind. As Ahmed the earthworm, or just about, in love with a star, or almost.14 As Ahmed the intellect underneath his own swarthy complexion. 91

Ahmed the philosopher MADAME POMPESTAN . Now wait just a minute! To the issue we’re deal-

ing with, my dear Ahmed, skin color is completely irrelevant. There are black skins that are perfectly French, white skins that are foreign, mysterious yellow ones that we keep an eye on, Redskins with their scalps, and some greenish people whose papers are in order. My cleaning woman is from the Philippines, and she’s a lovely woman, very well behaved, who wouldn’t steal a single egg from the refrigerator. AHMED . Or a single leg from the prestidigitator. MADAME POMPESTAN (nonplussed). What is this nonsense about shanks and pranks? You’ve lost your common sense! You’ve plunged back into your old fanatical background! I’ve said no, no, and triple no. End of story. AHMED . In order to say “no,” one must know what “yes” one is talking about. Without a “yes,” there’s no “no,” you know? Tell me your “yes,” and I’ll tell you how it goes with your “no.” Say “yea,” and, hey, I’ll say if your “no” is a go. If your “yea” is more like a “nay,” hey, no way is your “no” a go. Ahmed’s improvisation on “yes” and “no.” Anyway. To what, Madame deputay Madame Pompestan, you who are so well-adjusted, so nuclear-powered, such a take-charge dynamo, to what, I say, do you say “yea,” on the issue that concerns us? If I may, pray, say “yea.” MADAME POMPESTAN . I say “yea” to French law. The people, through my representative mediation, vote for the sovereign law that says who is who, who is entitled to what, who isn’t entitled to what, and who’s entitled to nothing, or even to less than nothing. The law that separates, on the one hand, the official and legal and the lawful worker whom Edouard Pompestan welcomes with open arms onto his factory floor. And, on the other hand, the illegal, the undocumented immigrant, the surplus worker, the shady character, the guy who’s been smuggled in from who knows where. AHMED . Whom the police welcome with open clubs into their detention centers. The law . . . your yes, I guess, means that someone from here isn’t from here unless the law from here tells him he’s here? But, if he’s here, the law can’t say that he isn’t here! Or else your yes, I guess, isn’t

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a yes but a no. You say “yes” to no. You say “yes” to someone from here being told that he isn’t from here. The “no” comes before the “yes,” in your “yes” to the law from here. Since this law and all the damn cops behind it run like a pack of dogs after people from here, yapping that they aren’t from here! MADAME POMPESTAN (somewhat bewildered). It’s necessary to separate those who are from here and those who, although they’ve come here for some shady reason, aren’t from here. AHMED . But they are here. The fact is that they’re here. And you, you say “yes” to their not being here just because they’re not from here. But who is from here, then, if people who are here according to your yes, I guess, aren’t here? MADAME POMPESTAN . Frenchmen, my dear Ahmed. And Frenchwomen, of course. Frenchwomen and Frenchmen are from here and are here. AHMED . But who is French at the end of the day? MADAME POMPESTAN . Those whom the law says are French, like me and Edouard, French since the Middle Ages and even before then. AHMED . French before the Middle Ages? And by law? Gadzooks! The Pompestans invented both France and the law! But wait a minute! Wait a minute! I sense a circle here! A vicious circle! MADAME POMPESTAN (slightly lewd). Edouard always says: “Caress a circle, it’ll get vicious.”15 AHMED . That one must have been caressed for a long time. ’Cause it’s vicious with a vengeance. Improvisation, throughout what follows, on the idea of a vicious circle. The law comes along and says, one day: “Those who are here are from here, they’re French.” And then the law says: “I see some people who are here, but who aren’t from here. Not French.” But “not French” has never meant anything other than “not here.” Or else, it’s about skin, race, smell . . . But when you say no, I hear the “yes” in this “no” from your sweet lips, on the subject of the Philippina who steals pegs from the defibrillator! Not skin, not race, not smell! Just the law! Which says that here are the French, that the French are here, and that if one is here, one is from here, necessarily, whenever and forever. Eventually, the law, however worn-out and senile it becomes, still can’t say,

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caressed and vicious as it is, that here isn’t here or that being from here isn’t here or that somewhere else has come here! MADAME POMPESTAN (stupefied). But what are you proposing, when you get right down to it? AHMED . A very simple “yes” whose “no” is a no-show. Someone who’s here is from here.16 Someone who lives here, leave him in peace, for crying out loud. A country, this one or any other, is made up of the people who live there. That’s all. MADAME POMPESTAN . Never! Never this “yes”! No and double no! With a platform like yours, I’d get clobbered in the elections! Just think! Everybody from somewhere else whom we’re going to say is from here! It’s a nightmare! It’s the end of the French race! AHMED . Oops! Race! You said it! Race! I thought there was only the law! MADAME POMPESTAN . Get lost! You swarthy little motherfucker! AHMED . Whose mother, may I ask? MADAME POMPESTAN (lunging at him). You’ll see! Give me that “Someone who’s here is from here” crap! AHMED (taking out his stick). Here, my little stick! I’m from here! I’m here and I’m staying here! Ah! The law gets caressed! It’s made vicious like a circle! I’ll give it a good caress right in the ribs! I’ll straighten it out, the law from here! Here! Here! Madame Pompestan flees, pursued by Ahmed smacking her with his stick. AHMED (returning breathless). Score a victory for the grimy daily grind

in its epic struggle against the Grand Nuclear Grid. It’s really complicated, the whole national question. It’s like, in order to be from here, truly from here, you have to have this (he points to his forehead) and this (he shows his stick). Thought and force. Just to be from here, when you are here. A perpetual battle just to be where you are! And without even knowing if it’s worth it, when you get right down to it. It would seem that we’re determined, we others, philosophers born somewhere else or from here, to stay here. And why are we so determined, I ask you? Because we’re here. By sheer hard work, we’re here. And with considerable help from subtle thought and complicated existence. Here we are. And will stay. The vicious and circular law can’t do anything about it either. Thought keeps watch. And the stick too. The

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thinking stick. There’s a great philosopher, Pascal, who said that man is a thinking reed. Me, Ahmed, so that I can be from here, and so that everybody, here, can be here like me, I’m turning into a thinking stick! The strongest kind there is. OK, people from here! Stay here! Have no fear! I’ve got your back.

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16. DEATH

Ahmed. Ahmed is sitting in the audience. The stage is clear, but empty. AHMED . You see, the stage is still empty. Nobody is showing up. So, I

think to myself: they’re all dead. Behind, back there, in the wings, they’re all dead. Someone released a deadly gas on them, some Japanese sarin, for example. They were chatting, they had their makeup on, they had stage fright, they were waiting for the moment when they would come on stage before you, and then, just like that, a sneaky, lethal, stinging, creeping gas, left by a Japanese with a plastic watering can, right at the foot of the stage, in back, the Japanese leaves through the john, he gets out through the window of said john, he’s a skinny little Japanese, he very courteously put down his watering can next to the fireman on duty, he said to him, this way there’s always a little water in case of a fire, the fireman on duty said, it’s nice of you to think about the water, but that won’t go far, the Japanese said, it’s for a very little fire, a cigar fire or a sparkler fire, the fireman laughed, and the acrobatic Japanese slipped out through the window of the john, sight unseen, and took off to catch a plane. The gas spread around, and now they’re all dead, my actor friends. That’s why the stage is empty. Rhubarb is dead, Moustache is dead, Madame Pompestan is dead, Fenda . . . No, not Fenda. You can say all sorts of nasty, weird things to yourself, but Fenda dead, no way. Fenda was late. She saw the Japanese leaving through the window of the john, and, since she likes to daydream, Fenda, she stayed beneath a tree, wondering what

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a Japanese could be doing at that hour leaving like a contortionist through the window of the john of a theater. She was daydreaming and joyous, my radiant Black Fenda, because she’d seen—you only see this once in a lifetime, if at all—a Japanese leaving the john at night and through the window. She thought to herself that this was Japanese politeness: leaving by the door is vulgar, you risk bumping into those who are waiting for their turn in the john, you get seen right after having fulfilled a very animal need, it’s not proper, for a Japanese, thinks Fenda, to piss or even worse. The discretion, the solitude of the standing pisser! The civilized Japanese leaves the john through the window. Fenda thinks to herself. Which saves her life, for while she’s having this daydream, the sarin gas is killing off everyone else. And the stage remains empty. They’re dead. But what does that mean? Aside from the empty stage? Aside from the supposed horrible pain that I experience because of their supposed death? Death makes someone disappear between an empty stage and a pain? Is that it? And death, as far as the dead person is concerned, what is it? There are philosophers who have said: before death, we’re alive. And after death, there’s nothing. Ergo, death is nothing. It’s like a cigarette paper between life and nothing. They called them stoics, these philosophers. What’s strange is that they also said: philosophy is learning how to die. Learning nothing, in other words, learning that we’re afraid of what’s nothing more than an invisible hair between life and nothing . . . This is worthless as far as I’m concerned, this idea of spending your whole life learning how to die in nothingness. For there’s nevertheless this: pain. The person who was there, in the spotlight, I’ll never see him again. Never again. And he’ll never see himself again either. There’s still what would have been on stage without him. Just imagining Fenda never again being in the spotlight . . . No. Between pain and the empty stage, there’s room, and not nothing, for death. But I can’t think about it. There’s nothing to think. My pain is thinking for me. For ever. And death, as far as the dead person is concerned? Let’s see. Let’s try an experiment. In the theater you can experiment with anything. Ahmed walks up onto the stage.

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I’m dying. I’m dying. Improvisation on death. No, definitely, there’s nothing to think. Except for the pain that thinks by itself, that thinks “never again,” and that’s not a thought. It’s the capturing of everything by the empty black thing that ties the body in knots, that empties the soul. To be visited by “never again” and the body and the soul tied in knots. Ah! Fortunately, they’re not dead! Fenda is daydreaming beneath her tree, beauty crowned by a starry heaven . . . No sarin, no Japanese, no fireman . . . Even the john doesn’t have a window, to tell you the truth. It’s a hermetically sealed john, a john without a window or a mirror. A good French john where there’s no paper and you can’t flush the toilet! Good old national john! And everyone uses it! Rhubarb! Moustache! Madame Pompestan! Improvisation on these three characters, alive and well, going to the john. As another philosopher, by no means a stoic, said: Philosophy is a meditation on life, not on death.17 All it takes is for death to strike us, for there to be pain and the twisted soul. There’s nothing to think about, thank God, in that baleful interruption of everything that has meaning! And the theater, the theater too! Many people pretend to die, in the theater, they die every night, then they get up and take their bow! All the better! For the theater is also a meditation on life and not on death. The life of Rhubarb, the life of Madame Pompestan, the life of Ahmed! Forever! And your life, you who come here to see a representation of death! Your life forever! Down with death! Say it with me: “Down with death!”

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17. THE SUBJECT (2)

Moustache, Ahmed. Ahmed and Moustache enter running, out of breath. MOUSTACHE . Are you sure we ditched it? AHMED (looking around everywhere). I don’t see anything anymore. MOUSTACHE . I’d never have thought a thing like that could happen in

Sarges-les-Corneilles. To me, no less. AHMED . To you? It’s me it happened to. MOUSTACHE . You? Look at yourself! You can’t tell me that a thingamajig like that could have it in for a simple worker! It’s me, Moustache, it was after, no two ways about it. When I saw it, I said to myself, in my deep-down inside, Moustache, it’s after you. And you saw how I ran! I took off like a shot. AHMED . You’ve perhaps made a fatal error of judgment in—what did you call it?—your deep-down inside. Because when that happens, that extreme form of the terrible thingamajig, I’m its target nine times out of ten. But, tell me, what is it exactly, this deep-down inside of yours? MOUSTACHE (squirming). I need to take a piss really bad. AHMED . Don’t take a piss! Do not under any circumstances take a piss! If you do, the thing will come back, and by the time you’ve zipped up, it’ll get the better of you. Tell me all about your inside. I’d really like to know what it is, the inside of Moustache. MOUSTACHE . Well, you know . . . my inside, it’s sort of like me. AHMED . So wait a minute . . . Your outside, your beautiful moustache and all that, that’s not you?

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deep down inside, the real you, the one who says “I,” the one who says “me, Moustache, the terrible thingamajig that happened was after me and not Ahmed,” that guy, in short, doesn’t piss. MOUSTACHE (squirming more and more). But it’s certainly me, Moustache, who needs to take a piss, that’s all I’m telling you! AHMED . Your true self that stays in your deep-down inside, he needs to take a piss. But what pisses is on the outside, it’s not your true self. You can say, “I, Moustache, I need to take a piss,” sure, that’s definitely you, in your private mental inside. But if you piss, the way anybody pisses, that’s no longer you, it’s just the physiological function of the animal you are. It’s no longer the true subject Moustache considered in his inside. MOUSTACHE . But I can still say “I’m pissing”! And besides, right now, I’d rather do it than say it! AHMED . Absolutely not! The whatchamacallit could show up at any moment. And then it’ll take advantage of your pissing outside to grab your inside! If indeed it’s you it’s after and not me. But “you,” “me,” it’s not so clear, after all! . . . The thing that happened, just now, how could it tell it was you, your true inner you, if it was after you? You and me, seen from the outside, we’re not really you and me, if you and me are on the inside! I wonder how it managed to tell us apart, just now, the doohickey that set us running. MOUSTACHE . Still, right now, all it has to do is grab the guy who needs to take a piss. That much is clear! AHMED . But how can it know that you need to take a piss, and not me? MOUSTACHE . Can’t you see? Can’t you see the gymnastics I’m going through to hold it in! Is your head screwed on backward today? AHMED . My dear Moustache, your gymnastics are completely exterior. How is the thingy that shows up supposed to know that they have to do, in your deep-down inside, with your need to piss? Especially since this damned what’s-its-name doesn’t have eyes or a head or a screwdriver to put its head on with! Every single time it’s going to confuse you with me! . . . Watch out, I think it’s about to descend on us!

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Ahmed goes and looks into the wings and brandishes his stick. MOUSTACHE . Bloody hell! Come on, just let me take a piss! If we have to

run, I’m going to end up wetting my pants! Ahmed whirls his arms around combatively with his stick. AHMED (while fencing). Fine, piss away! It will take you for an animal with

nothing but an outside! It’s your need to piss that’s your inside! If it doesn’t see your inside, it won’t recognize you anymore: you, the real you! So to hell with your need! Piss, piss, immediately! Moustache pisses loudly. Ahmed suddenly stops fighting, looking surprised. It’s gone! So that’s how it is! It really was mad at you! As soon as you started pissing, it no longer saw anything in your deep-down inside and it disappeared. It really was your need to piss that guided it here! Your real inner you! MOUSTACHE (zipping up his pants with an important air). What did I tell you? A thing like that only happens to people like me. AHMED . I wonder how it recognizes you. How it recognizes your inside. MOUSTACHE . Isn’t it because, with a guy like me, the inside can be seen from the outside? AHMED . Aha! That’s quite possible. Except for when you’re pissing, it seems. MOUSTACHE . We’ve figured out how to get rid of it: as soon as it shows up, I start pissing. I piss in its face, and it no longer knows where I am! AHMED . Because at that moment, your inside need flows to the outside so that your real you is no longer anywhere. MOUSTACHE . Well, whatever, but for now we better hide. AHMED . But why on earth should we? It left, it didn’t even recognize you! MOUSTACHE . But what if it came back all of a sudden? We’d look like total fools. AHMED . Whatever. As you said, we’ve figured out how to get rid of it! You’ll piss on its sneakers. MOUSTACHE . You’re forgetting something, my little Ahmed. AHMED . And what would that be?

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absence of a need to piss, it’ll recognize you in your inside! And an absence of a need to piss, there’s no chance of letting it flow to the outside. The what’s-its-name will get the drop on you. MOUSTACHE (laughing boisterously). Get the drop on me! You can say that again! I don’t have a drop left! AHMED . It’s coming! It’s coming! It’s spotted the absence of all need to piss in your inside, in your real you of the inside! MOUSTACHE. Jesus H. Christ! Listen up! Meeting at the Spotted Stag! That’ll be one beer for me! AHMED. I’ll drink to that! With this thingamajig showing up everywhere, you better need to piss! It recognizes your need in your deep-down inside, it recognizes you yourself, but you know the way to get rid of it! You’ve got it in your bladder, good old Moustache! Exeunt Ahmed and Moustache, running.

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18. MORALITY

Rhubarb, Ahmed. Ahmed and Rhubarb are sitting on two chairs. At first they remain silent. RHUBARB . Say what you will, it isn’t moral. Here I am, sitting on this chair,

playing a role in front of all these people, all these children. And all this time, what? What’s happening in the world? Famine, dictatorships, the rise of fundamentalism, women forced to wear veils, civil wars, ethnic massacres, the ozone layer, the disappearance of the blue whales, Rwanda, Bosnia, Chernobyl, Algeria, discrimination, homeless people, unemployment among the young, unemployment among executives, unemployment among women, insecticides, pesticides, the greenhouse effect, genital mutilation, genital piercing, polygamy, child prostitution, the Chechens, AIDS, nonrenewable energy sources, social inequality, the refusal of homosexual marriage for priests by the reactionaries of the Vatican, drugs, the inner cities, the refusal of the rank of colonel for lesbians and gays by the half-wits in Washington, the putrefaction of the Mediterranean by viscous algae, the pollution of the Arctic and the Antarctic, oil spills, the Khmer Rouge, the Shining Path, no friendliness anywhere . . . And me with my ass in a chair, yakking away to make some kids laugh! Where is morality, I ask you! Or ethics! AHMED . Now that’s the right question! Ethics, morality, one can, if it comes to that, know what it is. But where it is, or where it’s hiding, that’s a real puzzle. You’ve spoken very well of everything that’s wrong with the world. Your list was poignant. My heart felt heavy, the further you went with your calamities, the more I could sense anxiety squeezing my solar plexus. Solar energy, by the way, you could add to the list. 105

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What are the powers that be doing about solar energy? The answer is terrible: nothing. And all this time morality is intangible, wandering, vagabond . . . Ahmed improvises on the vagabondage of morality, if possible without getting up from his chair. But to conclude from this that you’re immoral, there, on your chair! No, Rhubarb, you’re here to proclaim the reign of Evil on earth, on our global village, as you do so well, so admirably! You are the voice of the public consciousness! Without you, all these people would be asleep! You wake them up, Rhubarb, you say to them: “Hear, see, read, understand.” No friendliness anywhere, it’s frightful. Thanks to you, they’re frightened! They too, look at them, they’re in their chairs. But now, they’re afraid of everything that’s happening. They came here courageous, they’re going to leave scared stiff. What tremendous progress! They know that everything is wrong and that they’re doing nothing about it. RHUBARB . That’s the problem. AHMED . What problem? RHUBARB . It’s that I don’t do anything either. I’m looking for a friendly and democratic proposal to combat all that, a true morality for our global village, an intensely civilized ethics, but I don’t know where to find it. I’m afraid, Ahmed. AHMED . Come on, Rhubarb! Edmond Rhubarb! No moping! We’re going to figure out where it is, this morality! You’re afraid: that’s a good start for morality, fear. Buck up! Don’t give up the ship! Listen, we’re going to go back to your wonderful list and we’re going to go through and identify each consensual and effective moral principle point by point. Let’s begin at the beginning. The blue whales, let’s see, the ethics of blue whales, is what? RHUBARB . An international committee to save the whales, something media savvy with slides. I’ve thought up the perfect slogan: “Don’t let the whales get the blues.” AHMED . There, you see? We’re off and running! We’re on its tail, this morality! Onto homeless people. Go for it! RHUBARB . A television show, in prime time, with the bishop of Sarges-lesCorneilles having a friendly chat with two bums. No, with a male bum 106

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and a female bum. Don’t forget the quota for women, everywhere, always, anywhere, and even anyplace else. AHMED . Magnificent! In one fell swoop, you’ve dealt with the morality of homelessness and the ethics of sexual difference. We’re making progress, Rhubarb, we’re definitely making progress. OK, so what about massacres and famine in Africa? What is to be done? RHUBARB . Ask every Frenchman and Frenchwoman to wrap up in cellophane all their unused medications. That’s got to amount to tons! You go around collecting everything, aspirin, tablet by tablet, what’s left in bottles of cough syrup, vitamin C tablets, tubes of Vaseline, even the ones that are already squeezed out and all rolled up, there’s still stuff left in the bottom! And then there you go! The ad hoc committee distributes it among the underprivileged populations. AHMED . Now, you leave me speechless. You even thought about the cellophane. Wow! No hazy ethics for us! We’re doing ethics at its most concrete! And what about the religious, racial, and ethnic civil wars, where’s the ethics there? RHUBARB (very serious). That’s hard, it’s difficult. For that, we have to become profoundly responsible. We have to form a committee for universal consciousness, which will draw up a global petition, supported by sponsors, who will pay for television clips where you see every kind of horror, and with these clips we’ll alert the governments to their responsibilities, and then the governments and the international community, with the United Nations in on the deal, will launch completely surgical air strikes against war criminals, strikes directed by laser and infrared photography, strikes that will strike one by one those who’ve committed the atrocities we’ll have seen in the clips, so that they’ll know that the universal consciousness isn’t going to take any assault on human rights lying down. And so, in this spirit of calm determination, and with the communications technology that goes with it, the problem is solved. AHMED . It’s clear. It’s obvious. It’s striking. It’s a striking morality. Do you know why nobody’s done it up until now? RHUBARB . In my opinion the weak link is the sponsors for the clips. We have to make potential sponsors more responsible. It’s a matter of social commitment. AHMED . You’re on top of it. The solution is in the bag. So, you see? Right here, sitting on our chairs, we’ve managed to get to the very bottom of 107

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where morality is. One final experiment. The ozone layer, the unacceptable warming of the atmosphere of our global village by unregulated industrial polluters. That’s serious stuff. What will our children say if, ten thousand years from now, it’s a hundred and two degrees beneath the Eiffel Tower? Your morality of pollution and the ozone hole, where do you see that? RHUBARB . The bicycle. The backpack. Shaving cream in biodegradable aluminum tubes and not in aerosol cans. Good old-fashioned mosquito nets and not dangerous and stinging insecticides. Natural goat cheese, instead of disgusting whipped cream squirting out of all sorts of polluting dispensers. Cow droppings in the meadows instead of poisonous fertilizers. We need a committee for global responsibility, with an adequate representation of women and earthy peasants: the committee against the hole. Just picture it! A gigantic multicultural demonstration with a big banner: “United, we’ll plug up the hole!” That’s the strongest moral image I can think of. AHMED . You’ve succeeded in plugging up the whole hole of morality. You want me to tell you what you’ve just come up with, the name it has, this brilliant discovery you’ve made tonight? RHUBARB . Yes, what’s it called, when you’ve transcended abstract principles, when you’re dealing with the concrete, when you’ve figured out where it is, morality, in everyone who’s totally responsibilized himself and knows what he has to do, and when you’ve done that through friendly discussion, in your chair, without troublemaking or bureaucratizing, with moderate thinking, very moderate, as mild as holistic medicine, what name does it have, this morality of global friendliness confronted with the technological orgy of Evil? AHMED . It has a beautiful name, Edmond Rhubarb, and you’ve said it yourself. It’s called: plug-hole morality. RHUBARB (thoughtful). Plug-hole morality . . . plug-hole morality . . . You’re right, it sounds good! AHMED . And it sums up the whole solution. We had morality, but we didn’t know where it was, where it lived. Now we know. RHUBARB . So where is it? Where art thou, morality? AHMED . All you have to do is find the hole. Where there’s a hole, there’s morality. Because it’s a hole plugger.

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Ahmed the philosopher RHUBARB . So sitting in our chairs, all we have to do is look way into the

distance, all the way at the back of the auditorium, perhaps, to perceive the hole. That’s where the opening for morality is. AHMED . Better yet! If our chairs have holes . . . if they’re pierced chairs . . . then . . . then, Rhubarb . . . RHUBARB . Then it’s our ass that’s moral. AHMED . Because it plugs the hole. RHUBARB . How easy it is! How clear it is! AHMED . And what a pleasure it is, what a true moral pleasure, to plug up all holes! Ahmed and Rhubarb lean back in their chairs and enjoy themselves silently.

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19. SOCIETY

Madame Pompestan, Ahmed. Madame Pompestan is seated behind her deputay’s desk, with an enormous telephone that rings frequently. Ahmed enters, holding a sort of endless official form, a scroll like the legal documents in classic comedy. He looks extremely serious. Madame Pompestan is in the middle of a telephone call. MADAME POMPESTAN (into the telephone). Well, then, just tell him to go

to hell in a washing machine . . . What? He doesn’t have a washingmachine? . . . Oh, that’s a good one. What? . . . I don’t like people who are all washed up? Tell him that the Party for the Unification and Rehabilitation of France will wash his socks when they’re blue, white, and red. All right, enough. (She hangs up.) Ahmed, Ahmed the philosopher! You again! AHMED (hitching up his pants). For this interview I’ve put on my best pair of patriotic socks. MADAME POMPESTAN . That’s good, my friend, that’s great. Come to the point. AHMED . The association of Algerians born in France for forty-seven years now has assigned me to conduct a survey of the nation’s elites. So, naturally . . . The telephone rings. MADAME POMPESTAN (answering). Excuse me. Hello? . . . What, the

tax bonus again? You’re really starting to get on my nerves. Talk

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to Edouard about that . . . What? He doesn’t understand anything about it? So explain to him, darling. My husband catches on quickly, if you explain things to him for a long time. I’m busy with a survey right now, so the tax bonus . . . Thirty million! Listen now, Robert darling, if they start looking into the books of the loansharks, I’ll kill you. You’re on your own. So long. (She hangs up.) The tax bonus! It’s obscene, that expression. AHMED . It’s true that it sounds like “tax boner.” MADAME POMPESTAN . Really now! This is the survey you’re conducting? AHMED . Forgive me. No, what I have here is a questionnaire drawn up for our association by the best sociologists. The sociologists who grab society right between the polls. There are one hundred fourteen questions. MADAME POMPESTAN . One hundred fourteen? My word, you must think all I do is worry about the Algerians born in France! You know, there are a few other voters out there too! If every lobby asked me one hundred fourteen questions, I might as well just pack it in! (The telephone rings.) Hello? . . . I told you to get me out of that pain-in-the-ass photo op by saying I was sick! . . . No, but shaking hands with seventy pétanque players and having to drink their disgusting pastis, thanks, but no thanks… During all of Madame Pompestan’s telephone calls, Ahmed improvises a minute inspection of the premises, like a police search.  . . . I’ve already told you: the subsidy for the dog toilets has to be tripled for the entire district. This is a crucial political point . . . No and no. Look, if it’s about the budgetary hanky-panky and the shady deals with Casimir, you go through Robert. And don’t put anything in writing . . . What’s that? You’re such a dope! The judges are collecting even cigar butts to see if we’re trafficking with Cuba, so you’ll go see Casimir in Robert’s car. See you later. (She hangs up.) Pick your questions. Take the two or three most important ones. I maximize my workplace productivity by cutting down on wasted time. AHMED . I’m still going to ask my first question. (Reading from his vast scroll.) Here. Question number one from the first subsection of the capital A area of the preamble to the questionnaire for the elites on

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their view on the social complexity of postindustrial macrosystems. Here’s the question: “If three qualified people, let’s call them Bernard, Lucie, and Ibrahim, meet, do they form a triangle?” MADAME POMPESTAN . I’ve lived through some stinkers of interviews, but rarely have I heard such a stupid question. Of course they form a triangle! AHMED . I’ll mark that as a negative. MADAME POMPESTAN . Good grief! A negative! And why, pray tell, Mr. Part-time Sociologist? AHMED . Because Bernard, Lucie, and Ibrahim don’t form a triangle if they’re in a row, for example, if they’re standing in line one behind the other for a private interview for an executive position. The telephone rings. MADAME POMPESTAN . Hello? . . . Oh, what a pain in the ass! What

bullshit! . . . Where? . . . Well, as far as that’s concerned, Robert darling, it’s your job to come up with a cover . . . What? Casimir spilled the beans? But how many beans, exactly? . . . That’s a lot of beans, all right . . . If you take those beans away from the rest of the beans, all you’ve got left is crumbs . . . Leave him the crumbs? . . . Some bean crumbs, that’s not a helluva lot . . . Call me back later, I’m working on legal immigration. Talk to you soon. (She hangs up.) To get back to your stupid questionnaire, I must tell you, Monsieur Ahmed, that it isn’t with geometry that the elites of this country are selected. AHMED . Not so sure, not so sure! The Greek philosopher Plato said that to educate the kings of the city, good kings, they should study geometry for many years. And even solid geometry. So put that in your pipe and smoke it. Anyway, I’ll mark that as a negative and I’ll pick, I’ll pick . . . the ninety-fifth question, yes. A question from subsection eighteen of part four of the segment entitled “Factorial Analysis of Cultural Superiorities and Distinctions in the Median Zones.” The question is: The telephone rings. MADAME POMPESTAN (nervous). Hello? . . . But of course, my dear . . . and

so how . . . the stereoscopic scanner is accounted for in the budget, I

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assure you . . . In your villa? But with pleasure, with infinite pleasure . . . Without Edouard, of course, he wouldn’t be comfortable…Of course, of course, our refined, subtle style of conversation . . . Don’t forget the blurb in the magazine for surgeons in private practice . . . The pleasure is all mine. She hangs up. AHMED . The question is as follows (he reads as if with difficulty): “If you see

a dog get run over in the street, do you think you’d prefer that it were a cat?” It’s a difficult question, in my opinion. MADAME POMPESTAN . And these are your so-called questions for the elites! I’d hate to see the questions for the lower classes! My dear Ahmed, if I see a dog get run over, I don’t think about cats or parrots. I think about the voter who’s the owner of the dog and who’s going to write to me saying that the streets of Sarges-les-Corneilles are filled with danger and insecurity and that it’s my fault. That’s what one thinks about when a dog goes under a bus, if one is a deputay who knows her turf. AHMED . I’ll mark that as a negative. MADAME POMPESTAN . What is this obsession of yours? As if I gave a damn about sociology, anyway! Triangles, cats, nothing makes sense in this mishmash of yours! AHMED . Someone who’s truly distinguished prefers cats, especially Siamese cats and angoras, to German shepherds like Pisspot, the dog that belongs to my friend Moustache who’s from the lower classes, as you put it. Perhaps your political career has undermined your original distinction? Anyway, so I’ll write down . . . The telephone rings. MADAME POMPESTAN . Hello? . . . (very upset) Not him too! Casimir

spilled all the beans? . . . Just imagining Robert in the slammer, it’s incredible . . . What? Say it again . . . So he obviously spilled the beans too . . . You said it: there are no more beans to spill . . . Look, burn all the bridges, blow them up with dynamite if necessary . . . The judge is Gaston Guillotine? Great! Our heads are going to

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roll . . . If Robert spilled the last beans, it’s heads they win, tails we lose . . . OK, OK, no dynamite, fine, but what about the bridges? . . . There are no bridges left? . . . But how are we going to get out of this, then? . . . You’re really starting to make me crazy, you know that? . . . Casimir testified against Robert? Egad! I smell trouble . . . I’m surrounded by squealers. AHMED . And by the pigs. May I still ask you one last question? Let’s take question one hundred forty . . . MADAME POMPESTAN (still on the telephone). You’re getting on my tit! . . . No, not you, Stéphane-Louis, I’m answering a questionnaire on immigration and social insecurity . . . What? “You’re getting on my tit” is a strange answer? But . . . Yes, yes, we’re not secure ourselves. Get in touch with my lawyer, Jean-Claude Pâté de Foie Gras. I’ll call you back. (She hangs up.) OK, let’s get this over with. They think they can nail me just like that, do they? Well, they picked the wrong dame to try to push around. By the time I get through with them, they’ll be picking up their teeth from the sidewalk! AHMED . Question one hundred forty, end of part five of the additional protocol concerning extreme situations, let’s see. Question. This is a long question: “You’re at home, on the ground floor, your window open onto the summer night. It’s July 14. Suddenly, a kid comes running by in front of the luminous square of your casements glowing in the night. He tosses a firecracker, which blows up right in front of you. Do you think that it’s normal to celebrate the Republic? Or do you jump out the window yelling at the author of this attack?” That’s really a tricky psychosociological question. MADAME POMPESTAN (distracted, drumming her fingers on her desk). The Republic . . . the laws of the Republic . . . I’ve sacrificed myself, thrown myself into republican abnegation. I don’t know these gentlemen named Casimir and Robert . . . The firecracker leaves me cold, sir, day and night all I think of is the Republic. If I acted as . . . AHMED . I’ll mark that as a negative. MADAME POMPESTAN (more dejected than furious). Again . . . All this sacrifice, only to be marked down as a negative . . . The Republic is calling me . . . what did I do, again? AHMED . It says right here: a person who belongs to the elite must think about the respect owed to it before wallowing—wallowing is their

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word—in an abstraction. And they’re quite specific: Republic is an abstraction. MADAME POMPESTAN . What a bunch of sweethearts your sociologists are! . . . But tell me, while we’re at it: are they saying anything in the housing project about these two gentlemen, Robert de Roquefort and Casimir de Brie? Violent knocking at the door, shouts of “Police! Open up!” My God! What is it? AHMED . It’s a search by the special anticorruption unit. I saw them coming

from a distance, just now. MADAME POMPESTAN . And you couldn’t warn me, you jackass of a Mus-

lim philosopher, instead of boring me to tears with dogs and firecrackers? AHMED . Come on! You’ve got to entertain yourself, when you’re from the lower classes! You know, sociology, I couldn’t care less about it. Its only use is to justify the way things are. Thanks, but no thanks.18 MADAME POMPESTAN . But what about your questionnaire? . . . AHMED . This? It’s a complete list of the great French wines and cheeses. Actually, I stole it from Casimir de Brie’s restaurant just the day before yesterday! Just before he got into trouble, your old pal Casimir. In my opinion, you’re in hot water. I inspected the office, on the sly. There’s enough for a whopper of a case in the court of Judge Gaston Guillotine. The racket becomes louder, the telephone rings, Madame Pompestan doesn’t dare answer it. MADAME POMPESTAN . The bastards! They’re not gonna screw me! The

grubby hands of the government tax auditors won’t sully the feminine shoulders of the deputay of the PURF, the Party for the Unification and Rehabilitation of France. But what can I do, for crying out loud, what can I do? With those cowards who all spilled the beans . . . AHMED . The window. MADAME POMPESTAN . Exactly, the window! I’ll flee to South America if I have to. After all, I’m a free and liberated woman.

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Ahmed the philosopher AHMED . Ahmed is neutral, in this matter. An entity unto myself, I’m neu-

tral like Switzerland in this dog-eat-dog society. But, if you’re choosing the window, you’d better go now. MADAME POMPESTAN (struggling to squeeze through the window and getting ready to jump). And to think that you’re the last human being I’ll have set eyes on in this shithole of a town! The racket becomes louder still; the door is about to open. AHMED (assuming a very thick North African accent). Ish gone, mama

Pompeshtan! Shkip town just like that! Only me in office! Maybe she go to Cashimir place? (Running to the window and leaning out.) Madame Pompestan! Madame Pompestan! I’m marking your last question as a positive! There were fireworks, and you chose the window! Not the Republic! The window! Positive!

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20. GOD

Ahmed. AHMED . Last Sunday, for the pleasure of bells and organs, to see incense

burning and little Vietnamese choirboys getting tangled up in their white robes, I head to the cathedral of Sarges-les-Corneilles. No kidding! There’s a cathedral in Sarges-les-Corneilles! A little cathedral. Tiny. It looks like a mobile home with a pointed roof. But it’s a cathedral. Madame Pompestan inaugurated it in person. It’s the cathedral of Saint-Mary-Magdalene-Pompestan. Our deputay’s name is Mathilde Pompestan, wife of Edouard Pompestan. But the cathedral is called Mary Magdalene Pompestan. This is how our deputay, of the Party for the Unification and Rehabilitation of France, the PURF, displays her sinful nature. As for the question of whether she washes the feet of Edouard Pompestan, on her knees in front of him, and whether she then dries them, his feet, with her long sinner’s hair, our deputay, I can’t tell you, although I know the answer. I have no intention of telling you everything I know. Ahmed knows so many things that if he revealed all of them the planetary and social world would be headed for its final explosion. Improvisation on the theme of Ahmed’s omniscience and its devastating effects. Nevertheless, I insinuate myself into the cathedral of Sarges-lesCorneilles by way of the narrow tunnel that serves as its entrance. I take the holy water and I have a nice swig. Ahmed loves everything

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that’s holy, the water in cathedrals, the seven-branch candelabras in synagogues, the beards of mullahs, imams, and ayatollahs, pastors’ bibles with their polished bindings . . . Everything that’s holy does me a world of good. I drink it, I eat it, I put it in my pipe and smoke it . . . I’m holier than thou, holy moly. Things were really cooking in that cathedral, the kids in the choir were running around, the priest was thundering, the organs were bellowing, the believers were genuflecting, the infidels like me were insinuating themselves . . . If he exists, I say to myself, God is happy. And if he doesn’t exist, Ahmed’s happy, which isn’t too bad either. In fact, it’s even better. Because God, if he exists, is always happy, given that he’s perfect, solemn, full of himself, and enjoying his omnipotence every blessed minute of his eternal holy day. One holiday more or less, a believer on his knees here or there, an infidel who insinuates himself through the tunnel of the cathedral, doesn’t really make God any more or any less happy. Just try picturing God unhappy! What would that even look like? His all-powerful all-perfect all-holy infinite all-knowingness having a fit of unhappiness like any old husband cuckolded by the infidel! Even in the theater, playing God unhappy is an impossible role. Ahmed attempts an improvisation on God unhappy. No, you look like a solemn cuckolded husband. One might say, like Edouard Pompestan when our deputay doesn’t want to wash his feet. Damn! Not another word about that. So, I was listening to the organ billing and cooing so that Ahmed the infidel might be happy, when I suddenly see Mathilde Pompestan flying toward the exit tunnel with her veil setting sail before her. Having just downed a hefty gulp of holy water, I felt sacred and immortal down to the very pit of my stomach. Everything is possible when you’ve got God in your guts. So I go up to Mathilde, just like that, and I accost her right away on the subject of God. “Madame Pompestan,” I say to her, “you’ve made a beautiful cathedral, but do you believe in God?” She can’t believe her ears. She gets away from me, she goes out, I run after her, still under the unseemly influence of the holy water. “If you don’t answer me,” I yell at her, “I’m going to tell everyone that

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you’re a hypocrite and a miscreant.” Just like that. “My dear Ahmed,” she says, suddenly worried about the electoral influence of my snare, “I believe in a superior Providence.” “With everything that’s going on in the world,” I reply, “you believe in Providence? But that’s insanity. This God is either nuts or indifferent or a monster. And, besides,” I murmur to her—this had become my obsession under the influence of the holy stomach water—“isn’t God sometimes unhappy about what’s going on?” “How should I know,” she says to me, furious, because she wasn’t used to interviews like this one. “We’re not exactly bosom buddies. And besides”—now I could see she was getting her old spunk back— “besides, God’s intentions are impenetrable.” “But,” I persisted, “in this case, if his intentions are impenetrable, his existence is unpenetrated. How can you penetrate his existence and not penetrate all his intentions? Either God is penetrated through some window of his infinite existence, in which case you glimpse his intentions. Or else nothing of his intentions, which, by the way, seem absurd, is penetrable by you, in which case it’s because God must remain forever unpenetrated, including in his existence.” At that point, Milady Pompestan stares at me with her penetrating black eyes. In my holiest of tummies I’m now topsy-turvy. She takes advantage of the situation. She hammers away at me: “My dear and stupid Ahmed, do you really believe that a deputay of the PURF could declare herself a nonbeliever? My base is Catholic. Since those who vote for me vote for God, I vote for God so that they’ll vote for me. Therefore, God exists.” “Touché,” I say to myself. And since I’m holy from the bottom of my heart, I feel ready to make a concession. “That’s the proof of God by means of voting booths,” I grant her. “And it’s not such a bad proof! It’s as good as ontological proof, teleological proof, moral proof, gut proof . . . But you’ll grant me that God is never unhappy or negative or contradictory or penetrated and that his desires are as violent and eternal as they are unknown.” “Sure, sure,” Madame Pompestan says, “I’m in a hurry, God is all well and good, but Edouard is waiting to join me for the annual visit to the home for the blind. So what’s your point?” “Are you going with Edouard to see those who can’t see with your hair down like that?” I insinuate to her.” “The nerve!,” she blushes, “and what does my hair have to do with God?” “Mary Magdalene Pompestan,” I yap at

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her, at the height of the intoxication that the holy water induces in my innards, “this God whose desire is so obscure, this God, well, here’s the thing, this God is unconscious.” Well, then she takes off. She literally takes off. With her veil setting sail before her. Holy Mathilde! She has God in her body. Saint Mary Magdalene Pompestan! Bodyguard of an unconscious God!

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21. TRUTH (2)

Fenda, Ahmed. FENDA . My chicken little who’s wise to everything, except for the fact that

no Gallic sky is going to fall down on your head: once and for all, tell me the truth. AHMED . The truth! Forsooth! The tooth of Ruth! The trust of our youth! The tattler on the roof! Tell me, truth, what’s true, what T R U, you who are the object of the question posed by the radiant beauty or byoo-THé, spelled T H e, on whom my soul, penetrated by my body, is completely hung up. The truth! What’s the truth? Is it in your soul, that golden capsule made brilliant by the tears in your black eye? Is it in your body, matter and sudden shield, before which I must surrender beneath the empty skies? Or is it, as the poet Rimbaud says, in a soul and a body where beauty is truth and truth is beauty, like the miraculous Fenda who wants the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth? FENDA . Ah! They’re never short on words, men, when in her exactitude a woman puts to them the mother of all questions. And behold them raising, before their very eyes, as if in the middle of a sand storm, terrifying and pontificating smoke clouds of rhetoric! The truth is never in the cunning running of your words, my little Ahmed. It isn’t a fox. The truth initially happens, and then you have to follow its trace, like this. Fenda’s improvisation: to which Ahmed is invited as the appearance of a truth, while Fenda manipulates him in the role of the one who makes this truth last.

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Ahmed the philosopher AHMED (completely dazed). Oh, wow! Take pity on me, please! We’ll never

get there like this! It’s too much! Too much truth all at once! In little doses, truth should come! In little flasks! Listen, we’re going to play the game of truth. We’re going to create a theater of truth. FENDA . Oh! Filthy little desert fox hiding under the rocks! The theater! Can the truth have anything to do with the theater? It’s in the innermost depths of the heart, truth is, it isn’t in the lie of the mask! You’re always concocting parables out of perfectly obvious things, and then no one can tell anymore if they’re the truth or the mask of witchcraft that repels the truth. The truth that struts like a peacock is a bird without feelings! AHMED . But isn’t it through thousands of errors, thousands of lies, that, from century to century, the truth has emerged? And my acting sums up these centuries of fiction! It’s very simple! I perform something for you in total silence, and you tell me what it is. Thus, through words you’ll see right through what my masked body both shows and hides. FENDA (a bit sulky). The one fine day when you might just come out and say things plainly is not marked in the calendar of my soul. AHMED . But it is in the wood of my mask. Here, check this out, for example. Ahmed’s improvisation, dictated by Fenda’s subsequent hypotheses. FENDA . You’re proclaiming that love is very difficult. AHMED . Isn’t that a truth? And now this.

More improvisation of the kind described above. FENDA . I have the impression that you’re saying, you horrible fathead, that

if a man loves a woman, the way things should work is that she should be the one to declare herself first, or else he’ll be cooked in the casserole of love like a bunch of parsnips. AHMED . The part she snips? The snips that she parses? Is that not an excellent truth? And this. More of this improvisation.

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Ahmed the philosopher FENDA . Oh! Abominable monkey of the palm trees! Cheating cashier in

the supermarkets of love! Now you’re saying that if the ardent desire for a beautiful woman’s body gets mixed with love, the situation is so irrevocable as to warrant the precaution of another woman to help one keep one’s distance. Evil pig! Polygamous zebra! AHMED . Ah! My splendid sexed justice! The writer Tolstoy, prose king of all the Russias, said that he wouldn’t write the truth about women until just before he closed his coffin lid. The last lid. You see? Improvisation on “closing the lid.” Me, Ahmed, I’m braver than Tolstoy. Before the most torrid of female justices, I proclaim my idea. The truth, crude, nude, and rude. FENDA . Crudenuderude! It’s all crudenuderude, your truth! Especially nude, though, as far as I can tell, far from new. And who is she, this other nude who makes you keep your distance? Would you go crawling under the skirts of la Pompestan? The man who’s afraid of all love seeks refuge in the most unlikely of puppet theaters! La Pompestan would suit you just fine, you frightened rogue, you licentious deadbeat; she’d offer you plenty of shelter from the prosecution of your truths where the sun doesn’t shine! AHMED . And now this. More of the above improvisation. FENDA . OK, now, you’ve reached the very summit of truth! The supe-

rior artifice of the pathetic male! You’re saying that your love for me renders you mute in regard to anything related to the living life of this love itself? Is that right? The more it’s tall and strong like a tree that stretches to the stars, the more you need to seal it shut beneath an aura of mysterious life? Ahmed keeps improvising. And you’re insisting on it, you delightful acrobat of amorous cowardice! You’re saying that the power of love, in its acts and words, ought to be coupled with evasion and dereliction? Who’d have imag-

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ined one could indulge in such baseness behind a mask? Your truth, cutie-pie, is as beautiful as the hairy snout of a warthog! AHMED . Who said the truth has to be beautiful, anyway? Or good? A few classical philosophers who definitely weren’t in love with a radiant and judicial black woman! Who never appeared in court! So, from afar, just like that, they said that the True is also the Beautiful and the Good! But in front of you, my twinkling summer night! What would they have said then, those insulated optimists? FENDA . They would have said this. Fenda improvises, in the same style as Ahmed just now. Ahmed looks on with increasing uneasiness. AHMED . Heavens to Betsy! You’re saying that a woman is always the one

for whom love engenders the truth? FENDA . That’s not exactly what I’m saying. Fenda improvises some more. AHMED . Good golly, Miss Molly! You’re saying that if a woman loves in

truth she’ll make the truth with the man without truth? FENDA . You’re not quite getting it, my Ahmed, since with you the cunning idea is always stronger than true intellect. Fenda improvises some more. AHMED . Well I’ll be a wooden puppet! So you’re saying that no matter

what a man does, no matter how cunning his evasion and his wariness, a woman in love is the guardian of his truth? Of the man’s truth? Do you really think you can demonstrate this horrific point? My man’s truth, even if I keep it in the dark day after day, you’re its guardian? FENDA . You’re not too far off, but you still haven’t hit the jackpot. Fenda improvises one last time. AHMED (getting down on one knee in front of Fenda). Now I get it! Bravo! I

lay down my arms! I guess I’ll have to eat humble pie! Naked, with a hair shirt, and a rope around my neck. 126

Ahmed the philosopher FENDA . Yuck! With a hair shirt! That’s a real turn-on! Naked, OK, maybe.

The rope, if worse comes to worst, alright, let’s see what we can do with it. But have you understood the truth this time? Do you see where it’s still at work, like the churning of the streets in which men and women are constantly running into and connecting with each other? AHMED . How did you manage to figure out my most private thought, which I’ve been spending most of my time keeping as far away from you as possible? FENDA (kissing him). It’s not for nothing that they’ve said it many times. And even no-good philosophers like you, wise guys who know how to seduce with the charm of words, have suspected as much. AHMED . What have they suspected? FENDA . That the truth is a woman. AHMED . Oh, right! The truth is a naked woman emerging from a well! FENDA . I wouldn’t mind going back there. AHMED . Back where? FENDA . Back naked into the wellspring. With you. AHMED . With you naked on the bedsprings! Certainly, my radiant justice beneath truth recumbent! Naked in the wellspring of the bedsprings! FENDA . But remember! However tightly you embrace it, a truth grows and spreads out, like a lake after the long sweet rains! Fenda exits coquettishly. Ahmed, before following her, winking at the audience: AHMED . A lot of good it’ll do her to brag and swagger around like the

conqueror. Even conquered, even brought to my knees, and nonetheless, and regardless. As far as the true truth is concerned, I’m not going to say it until I close the lid! He exits.

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22. PHILOSOPHY

Ahmed, Fenda, Moustache, Madame Pompestan, Rhubarb. The stage is like a classroom, in which Ahmed is the teacher—he paces on the dais with his stick—and in which the four pupils are Moustache, Rhubarb, Madame Pompestan, and Fenda. AHMED . After everything I’ve told you, after everything I haven’t told

you, and which is at least as important, after everything you’ve said to yourselves, in your bed, last night, after the evening prayer to Allah the God of camels and throat cutters; or to Buddha who doesn’t drink water, even in times of famine, on account of the holy frogs that might be living in there; or to Yahweh who has his chosen people, the advantage for other peoples being that he hasn’t chosen them; or to Jesus who turns his left cheek when you kick him in the rear, and who lights a few stakes to barbecue those who turned the right cheek; or no prayer at all, here we’re secular whether we like it or not; after all that and quite a few other things besides, you’re going to take an oral comprehensive examination that will count for one-eighth of the intermediate grade on the qualifying examination for the upper-level class. Out of respect for the fundamental principle of republicanism in the schools, the principle of equality in testing, it will be the same question for everyone. Out of respect for the fundamental principle of participatory and democratic pedagogy, the principle “if I’m the one who says it, it’s more authentic than if somebody else does,” each of you may speak when someone else has finished answering. So this is the day of reckoning. You must give it your all and let burst forth from your brains the creative spark 129

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forged by two trimesters of devotion to the disciplined awakening of your critical spirit. The question is: “What is philosophy?” Pupil Rhubarb, you have the floor. RHUBARB . Philosophy is the love of wisdom. Wisdom means being humane in all human relationships. Humane relationships means respecting the difference of the other. The difference of the other is that he isn’t like me. And me is what’s at the basis of all existence. Therefore, philosophy is the love of what’s different from what’s at the basis of all existence.19 AHMED (threateningly). Does any of you want to make a comment before I rip into that eminently Rhubarbesque answer? MOUSTACHE (spitting on the ground). And what if I don’t love what’s different from my basis? What if I shit on its face? What’s philosophy gonna say about that? FENDA . The best thing you can do, pal, is to stick yourself on a spit like a suckling pig and philosophically shut your nasty trap. AHMED . Silence in the ranks! Rhubarb, I’m giving you a grade of three out of twenty. No doubt about it, you’ve learned your philosophy from the newspapers! Pupil Pompestan, what is philosophy? MADAME POMPESTAN . Edouard always says: “Philosophy is the art of using up leftovers.” And I’ve taken to answering: “Those are some meaty-looking leftovers on you, Edouard, I wouldn’t mind using them up.” She laughs; the others look at her and sneer. RHUBARB . Leftovers from what? Can you tell me what leftovers philoso-

phy uses up? Nuclear waste? Food for soup kitchens? I’ve got you there, huh? MADAME POMPESTAN . Half-wit! Culture’s what’s left over when you’ve forgotten everything. Therefore, philosophy is what uses up the leftovers of culture, the leftovers from what’s left when you’ve forgotten everything. So there! MOUSTACHE (spitting on the ground). And what if I don’t give a rat’s ass about your culture? What if I think it’s a load of crap? What with all these intellectuals who everybody knows are a bunch of Arabs or fag-

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gots or Arab faggots, something you wouldn’t have thought could have existed in Sarges-les-Corneilles? Yeah, right, the philosophy of the French nation is in great shape. FENDA . If somebody doesn’t make this fat pig shut up, I’m going to rip his head off! Not that there’s anything in it. AHMED . Could we calm down, please? Madame Pompestan, three out of twenty. The word culture is the emptiest and most insidious of modern times. Say art, say science, say politics, say love, even say desire if that’s your thing, and obviously it is, say thought, say whatever you want, but I absolutely forbid this lazy flinging around of the word culture. This word is already a predigested leftover, so you can just imagine what the leftover of that leftover is going to taste like! And you, Fenda, since you’re so talkative, tell us what philosophy is. FENDA . Philosophy is a subtle invention on the part of some delicate men, intended first of all to please women, thus analogous to the billing and cooing of the wood pigeon or the strutting of the peacock. And, second of all, as for the rest of it, philosophy is a just an ingenious technique for making a piece of cow leather look like some glittering fabric. MADAME POMPESTAN (malevolently). I know of a girl who, for lack of education, flies into the trap the minute the philosopher–wood pigeon starts whistling at her. The dynamic, modern woman has been wise to this game for some time now! FENDA . You said it, honey! Swing your deputay’s skirts in front of the young male executives in your Edouard’s office, Madame Pompestan! The philosopher sure won’t be singing his melody of glittering concepts for you! MOUSTACHE . And what if I don’t give a shit about making like a wood pigeon for a bunch of little tramps! Hey! I’d rather show them my walnuts, if you know what I mean! Ladies! You want to see my walnuts? RHUBARB . Monsieur Ahmed! Stop this ignominious flow of misogyny! Let us conduct this discussion with a respect for the other and with an understanding of all the cultures that are necessary for the conviviality of our global village. FENDA . Including the agriculture of walnuts? She kicks Moustache in the testicles, and he doubles over in pain.

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Ahmed the philosopher AHMED . The discussion is coming along nicely. The arguments are becom-

ing more and more refined. Pupil Fenda! On the one hand, your answer drew on the real. It did not lack for grace or flavor. If these were the only criteria, it would have earned a solid sixteen out of twenty points. But, on the other hand, it was informed by a detestable antiphilosophical attitude, against which I might have been inclined to put up the barrier of a pure and simple zero. I therefore grant you an extension for further study. FENDA . You grant me study extensions a lot more than you grant me studly extensions. AHMED . Don’t change the subject. Pupil Moustache, what is philosophy? MOUSTACHE . It’s when you’ve got a cushy foreman’s job, security, France for the French, the AIDS carriers in the AIDS-atoriums, like in the old days before all this decadence, when they kept all the unsanitary types in sanatoriums. It’s when it’s like when you didn’t get clobbered in soccer by a bunch of fanatical Ay-rabs from the Middle East and the Middle Ages. The philosophy from before things started going downhill, when there weren’t any drugs or homos or Ay-rabs or hep-hop or Chinks or complications or abortions or eggheads or nothing, you know what I mean? Real philosophy is when it’s like when there was nothing. But French people and the French army. FENDA . Nitwit nation! The philosophy of the nitwit who knows nothing but nitwits! RHUBARB . Madame Fenda, I disagree with all this violence that I’m sensing in you here. We must listen to what Monsieur Moustache is saying; we must understand the anguish that lies behind it! The anguish of a world without roots! MADAME POMPESTAN (filing her nails and whistling insolently). Forget about it, Rhubarb, it is what it is. That’s called the principle of identity, right, Monsieur Ahmed? A is identical to A. FENDA . One thing’s as sure as the rising of the sun over the camel-backed hills: a bitch is a bitch! AHMED (dejectedly). Ladies! Gentlemen! We are far, very far, from philosophy . . . Pupil Moustache, I’m giving you a grade of zero. Your attempt at a nihilistic barroom philosophy has totally failed. It sank into what I could call existential caca. If you see what I mean. MOUSTACHE . No, I don’t see at all. MADAME POMPESTAN . He said you were goat shit. 132

Ahmed the philosopher RHUBARB . Professor! You’re not following the party line on the right of

free speech! FENDA . Ahmed, you’re not going to argue until sunset with these plastic

specimens, are you? AHMED . Philosophy, my dear pupils, is exactly this: a thinking whose

real content is thinking itself. Or, rather, thinkings. For there are very different kinds of thinking. There’s thinking in mathematics, thinking in poetry, thinking in love, thinking in politics, when politics exists, which isn’t very often. And philosophy is when thinking agrees to confront all of these different thinkings. Thinking confronting the various thinkings. That’s philosophy. And philosophy sees that, in thinking, there’s what happens suddenly, there’s what lasts, there’s what needs to be worked on. There are the different finite moments of a sort of infinite construction. And in thinking there’s joy, there’s enthusiasm, there’s happiness, there’s pleasure. Which means that philosophy is also confronting and giving way to the joy of thinking. You haven’t been very good in this oral comprehensive examination. And the main reason seems to me to be the following: not enough joy. Not enough confidence in the joy of thinking. Too much bickering, too much bitterness, too much resentment, too much rivalry. As detestable as the world may be, and it is detestable, there’s always a point, in yourselves, a personal and obscure point, a point that’s unexpected, almost astounding even to you, which is the point of departure for thinking what is. Hold onto that point! Find it and hold onto it! Philosophy has no other goal. Let everyone find his point and hold onto it! The point in you that gives you your capacity for thinking and for its joy. The point that’s the point of view, the point that allows everyone to invent and not to repeat. For repetition is the path of imposture and pain. Stop repeating, stop stewing in your own juices. Be irreplaceable, not because you are yourself, but because you have found, in yourself, the active point, the point that separates us from our fatigue and our private monotony. FENDA . So, Ahmed, it’s like when the sunshine splits open the clouds or when, after the winter, you hear the cry of the first bird. AHMED . You said it, light of my life! Philosophy is what helps us to interrupt repetition. Separate yourselves! Separate yourselves from yourselves. Then, with that real in you that splits you open, there’s thinking and joy. Hey, you dead people: get up!20 133

23. DECISION

Ahmed, Camille. Camille is sitting at the edge of the stage smoking a cigarette. She is listening to a syrupy ballad on her portable radio. Ahmed enters, looks at her for a moment, then: AHMED . Camille! When are you going to decide? CAMILLE . Decide? Give me a break. What’s the use of deciding? AHMED . What do you mean, “what’s the use of deciding?” What’s the use

of anything, except a firm decision that there be a use? If you don’t make use of your decision-making faculty, even things that could be useful to you are of no use. Use it or lose it, Camille! And if you lose it, you’re lost. Decide! Decide something! Make a choice, Joyce! Don’t be the dunce of indecision! Think about it: when you decide, it’s a delight; when you don’t decide it’s like you’re deceased. To decide or to commit suicide! That is the question. Improvisation on “deciding” and “being deceased.” CAMILLE . You need to chill out, dude. Decide? Decide what? What’s so

great about this famous decision of yours? Let me smoke in peace, OK? AHMED . Oh, decisions gone up in smoke! Holy smoke, Camille! Do you

just want a lot of smoke and mirrors? For Ahmed the clock has struck at last. CAMILLE . The clock is always striking for you. It strikes so much, it’s ready to go on strike! But nothing ever strikes me one way or the other. So who cares what time it is? Just let me listen to Blue Eye of the Red Tiger, OK? 135

Ahmed the philosopher AHMED . No, no! Decide! Decide! Decision is to thought what lunar

attraction is to the sea, it’s the force of movement, the breath of the thinking tide! Are you just going to let your thought be a stagnant pond, a dead sea? CAMILLE . Yeah, absolutely. Ab-solutely. AHMED . You’ll see! You’re going to decide, right here, in front of me, I guarantee it. CAMILLE . There you go! You decide that I’m going to decide! Your decision’s going to be the boss of me! Wow, that’s some freedom, I’m telling you. AHMED . Any decision that’s of use to you depends on somebody else’s decision about what you use. What’s the use of deciding, if not to loosen up what, coming from someone else, puts you in a tight spot if you refuse to choose to use it? And the decision of the other depends in turn on the decision of some other other, and so on and so forth, everyone who doesn’t want to choke at the decisive moment having to decide that the stranger isn’t a strangler. CAMILLE . Enough already! All this poppycock you’re shoving down my throat makes me want to gag! So how far back does this go, all these decisions jammed together like a bunch of sardines in the tin can of the world? AHMED . It goes all the way back to the first one who, in order to serve himself, decided. Back to the first one served, at the first service. Back to God, who, in order to put an end to his boredom, decided to create the universe. So there’s what you call a pure decision, which wasn’t predicated on any other decision. Improvisation on the creation of the world. CAMILLE . The giant sardine who created the sardine can! It would have

been better if he had just stayed asleep, this God of yours, given the shitty state of the world in general. AHMED . And you, you’re going to decide like him. You’re going to start without having to respond to anything, without having to shake yourself loose from the grip of the other. Because I, for one, am going to be sleeping, I’m going to be absent. Camille, you’re going to hypnotize me.

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Ahmed the philosopher CAMILLE . Hypnotize you? He’s completely nuts. AHMED . Someone who’s hypnotized can no longer decide anything; he’s

gotten unhooked from the whole chain of decisions in this world. He floats in absence. And you, you’re going to make a momentous decision in the face of my own decisionlessness. Thus will you have decided in divine purity. Here! Take my stick. Good. Now point it at my face and say distinctly: “Butcher, baker, sheepdog shagger.” CAMILLE . What? Do you think I’m some kind of whack job or something? “Shaggy dog that got baked with the butcher?” “Sheep that got shagged doggy-style by the butch baker?” Camille starts laughing uncontrollably. AHMED . This is serious business, young lady! What’s at issue is the dem-

onstration of your free will! What’s at issue is a decision that doesn’t respond to any other! What’s at issue is deciding to decide! Come on! Hypnotize me! With the stick right in my face, you say three times: “Butcher, baker, sheepdog shagger.” Improvised business on the following theme: Camille, still laughing uncontrollably, attempts the maneuver suggested by Ahmed, gets a gesture or a word wrong, starts over, etc., while Ahmed is imperturbable and finally quite stern. Enough! Hypnotize me, or I’m going to hypnotize you, and, furthermore, I’ll take advantage of your indecisive hypnotized sleep by raping you every which way. CAMILLE . Son of a bitch! Every which way? AHMED . Without exception. CAMILLE (pointing the stick at Ahmed’s face). In that case . . . “Butcher, baker, sheepdog shagger. Butcher, baker, sheepdog shagger. Butcher, baker, sheepdog shagger.” Ahmed stiffens, his eyes glazed over, and remains standing, his arms dangling at his side, just as if he were asleep on his feet. Camille walks around him, inspects him, touches him, nudges him a bit, but gets no reaction. Ahmed! Ahmed! Stop screwing around! You’re scaring me, Ahmed!

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More of the same business. OK! The hell with it. If you want to play dead, it’s no skin off my back. Camille sits down again. She lights a cigarette and feigns indifference. You know, you look completely hideous like that. You look like you swallowed a broomstick. More simulation of indifference. Then Camille gets up again, walks around statuelike Ahmed, touches him, sits down again. She pretends not to look at him any more, but cannot help glancing at him now and then. Ahmed, when he is sure that she is not looking at him, makes various funny faces for the audience, then resumes his pose once he senses that Camille is going to look at him again. Improvisations on this situation. It’s not all that funny, you know? More of the same business. Maybe he’s really hypnotized! Camille points the stick at Ahmed. “Butcher, baker, sheepdog shagger.” Camille repeats the formula several times while walking around Ahmed and pointing the stick at him at various angles. No reaction—at least none that Camille can see—from Ahmed. Ahmed! Ahmed! You’re no longer hypnotized! What a blockhead! Camille resumes her feigned indifference. Obviously, she is increasingly worried. Maybe I should try the Sleeping Beauty trick. Not that he looks like a beauty. Or even like a cutie. Sleeping Doody is more like it. Ahmed! Wake up! Come on! Here I am, your prince charming! 138

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Camille approaches Ahmed, begins giving him a few pecks on the cheek, then kisses him romantically. AHMED . You see? You’ve decided! Timeless example of a pure decision! CAMILLE . I’ve decided? What did I decide? AHMED . You decided to kiss me! Without my having anything to do with

it, me, hypnotized, undecided substance, withdrawn into an intangible existence. Your kiss was as purely decisive as the creation of the world! It was a kiss over the abyss! CAMILLE (furious). You think you can fuck with me by pulling lousy little stunts like that! Here! Take that! Camille strikes him with the stick. AHMED . Wonderful! Another decision! Camille’s decisions are coming fast

and furious! A kiss, a whack with a stick, a kiss, a whack with a stick, a kiss . . . You’ve got every imaginable feminine decision right there! Love and hate, rolled into one! CAMILLE . Ahmed the philosopher, huh? More like Ahmed the con man!

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24. THE SAME AND THE OTHER

Ahmed, his first understudy, and his second understudy. Ahmed enters, acting important, like a master, followed by his two understudies, dressed exactly like him. AHMED . Gentlemen, it’s the big day. After months of practice and intel-

lectual preparation, you’re going to attempt, for the first time, to play Ahmed. Keep telling yourselves that, obviously impossible though it may be, you are Ahmed, you walk like Ahmed, you talk like Ahmed. Obviously, you don’t think like Ahmed, but in the theater that doesn’t matter. You understand my explanations very well. SECOND UNDERSTUDY . Yes, master. I understand everything. FIRST UNDERSTUDY . No, dear master. I understand nothing. SECOND UNDERSTUDY . Yes, my colleague. I understand nothing. AHMED . How can you say that you understand everything, and that you understand nothing? FIRST UNDERSTUDY . Because he never understands anything. SECOND UNDERSTUDY . That’s right, master. I never understand anything. AHMED . But you just said that you understood everything. SECOND UNDERSTUDY . You said I had to understand everything. So, since I’m Ahmed, since I’m the same as you, I understood everything. But then he said that he understood nothing. And he’s also Ahmed, the same as you, therefore the same as me. He’s the other guy who’s the same. So, being the same as this other guy who’s the same, I didn’t understand anything either.

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Ahmed the philosopher AHMED (to the first understudy). But then, why didn’t you understand

anything? FIRST UNDERSTUDY . Because your explanations are stupid. Your Ahmed

isn’t really the same as the Ahmeds one sees in the rotting housing projects. They’re completely other. They’re miserable, bullied, pathetic. And you tell us to be like you, upbeat, lively, sublime with a joyous ferocity. They’re illiterate, and you tell us to be philosophers and masters of the French language. So being the same as you basically means being other than all the others. It’s stupid. AHMED (to the second understudy). And you, what do you think of my theatrical explanations? SECOND UNDERSTUDY . What do I think of them? AHMED . That’s right, what do you think of them, imbecile? SECOND UNDERSTUDY . I think they’re stupid. AHMED (furious). And why are they stupid, my explanations? SECOND UNDERSTUDY . Because I’m an imbecile. FIRST UNDERSTUDY . The understudy for an understudy who’s a lot more the same as all the other Ahmeds than the real Ahmed ever will be is necessarily an imbecile. SECOND UNDERSTUDY . And if the one who’s the same as me says I’m an imbecile, it’s because he knows it, necessarily. If he didn’t know that he himself is an imbecile, he couldn’t know that I, who am an other, but the same as him, am also an imbecile. FIRST UNDERSTUDY . Are you insinuating that I’m a cretin? SECOND UNDERSTUDY . A cretin, I don’t know. An imbecile, definitely. Since you just told me you were. FIRST UNDERSTUDY . I just told you that you were an imbecile, not me, you cretin. SECOND UNDERSTUDY . Therefore you’re a cretin too, in addition to being an imbecile. AHMED . Calm down, you two! I’d like to understand why, because you (to the second understudy) are an imbecile, or even a cretin, it follows that my explanations are stupid. SECOND UNDERSTUDY . It’s because they’re brilliant, magnificent, because they make us completely understand what Ahmed is. FIRST UNDERSTUDY . Get a load of this caveman who thinks he’s an Ahmed! The gentleman’s explanations are stupid because they’re brilliant! He could drive us crazy! 142

Ahmed the philosopher AHMED . No, not at all! He’s absolutely right! If my explanations are bril-

liant, since he’s an imbecile, he thinks they’re stupid. Because imbecility is taking something not for what it is, but for something other than what it is. Conversely (to the first understudy), if you find my brilliant explanations stupid, it’s because you’re an imbecile. FIRST UNDERSTUDY . But they’re not brilliant, they’re stupid! To the second understudy: And you, you’re stupid too, because you think that the Ahmed of your master is the same as all the other Ahmeds, while he’s at best the same as you, and while the one who’s the same as the others is me. SECOND UNDERSTUDY . Yes, of course. I understand everything. AHMED . What do you understand? SECOND UNDERSTUDY . There’s the Ahmed who’s the same as the other Ahmeds, the Ahmed who’s other than the other Ahmeds, the Ahmed who’s other than the same Ahmeds, and the Ahmed who’s the same as the same Ahmeds. FIRST UNDERSTUDY . And, above all, there’s me, who am the same as myself in the role of Ahmed, and then you two, who can’t hold a candle to the others. AHMED . All right, listen! We’re going to conduct a very simple test. Each of us is going to cross the stage while being Ahmed to the maximum. Each of us is really going to walk like Ahmed and talk like Ahmed. And, while walking, each of us is going to say: “I am Ahmed the philosopher and I am capable of distinguishing between the one who’s the same as Ahmed and the one who’s other than him.” Then, having seen this, we’ll designate the best Ahmed. FIRST UNDERSTUDY . And how will we manage to designate the best Ahmed? Can you tell me that, sir? AHMED . We’ll do it as it has to be done in a democracy. We’ll vote. After the test, all three of us will form a jury, and we’ll vote. SECOND UNDERSTUDY . I understand everything! We’ll vote for the one who is the same as Ahmed. FIRST UNDERSTUDY . The same as which Ahmed, you imbecile? SECOND UNDERSTUDY . According to the latest reports, cretin, not imbecile. AHMED . Stupid, not an imbecile or a cretin. Are you going to question the holiness of democracy? The sovereignty of universal suffrage? 143

Ahmed the philosopher SECOND UNDERSTUDY . Not in a million years. We’re going to vote for the

same, and the one who’s a little bit too much the other, we’re going to throw him in the crapper. FIRST UNDERSTUDY (having an idea and telling it to the second understudy). Come here for a second. As Ahmed, you’re the same as me, right? SECOND UNDERSTUDY . I’m the other Ahmed who’s the same as the Ahmed who’s the same as you. FIRST UNDERSTUDY . As you wish. When we’re on the jury, I’m going to vote for myself. Since you’re the same as me, you’re going to vote the same as me. If you don’t vote the same as me, it’s because you’re an other, you’re not Ahmed, and we’re going to throw you . . . SECOND UNDERSTUDY . . . . in the crapper. I understand everything. FIRST UNDERSTUDY . Can you repeat it to me? SECOND UNDERSTUDY . Repeat what, dear Ahmed? FIRST UNDERSTUDY . What you understand. SECOND UNDERSTUDY . When we’re on the jury, you’re going to vote for yourself. Since I’m the same as you, I’m going to vote for myself. FIRST UNDERSTUDY . You cretin! If you vote like me, you’ve got to vote for me! SECOND UNDERSTUDY . You imbecile! Why, if I’m the same as you, would I vote for someone other than me, while you vote for your me? If I voted for you, I’d be someone other than you, and I’d go right into the crapper. AHMED . Enough with your conspiracies, my loathsome pupils! The test is beginning. All three cross the stage trying to “be Ahmed” as well as possible and pronouncing the sentence: “I am Ahmed the philosopher and I am capable of distinguishing between the one who’s the same as Ahmed and the one who’s other than him.” Since the acting style of the first understudy is extremely overdone, his crossing takes the longest time, making it possible to insert the following aside. AHMED . Come here for a second. SECOND UNDERSTUDY . Yes, dear master, what may I do for you? AHMED . When we’re on the jury, I’m going to vote for you. And since

you’re my best pupil, really the same as Ahmed your master, you’re going to do the same thing, you’re going to vote for me.

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Ahmed the philosopher SECOND UNDERSTUDY . I understand everything, master. AHMED . Repeat what I said. SECOND UNDERSTUDY . Since each of us is the same as the other, each of

us will vote for the other. AHMED . Perfect! Excellent!

The first understudy has positioned himself so as to spy on the conversation. FIRST UNDERSTUDY (aside). This test is going to be a flop. I’m voting for

myself, the imbecile’s voting for Ahmed, and Ahmed for the imbecile. One vote each. The teacher will look ridiculous, which isn’t such a bad thing. AHMED . Jury meeting! First understudy, for whom do you vote? FIRST UNDERSTUDY . I vote for myself. My realist art surpasses you, you and your stupid explanations. AHMED . Second understudy, what is your choice? SECOND UNDERSTUDY . I understand everything, master! You explained it to me! I vote for you. AHMED . And me, I vote for myself too! I’m designated the sole authentic Ahmed by two votes to one! FIRST UNDERSTUDY (furious, to the second understudy). You cretin! You stupid imbecile! You got fucked by your master! SECOND UNDERSTUDY . I understand everything! FIRST UNDERSTUDY . Can you tell me what you understand, cheap knockoff of an Ahmed? SECOND UNDERSTUDY . The one who’s really Ahmed, the one who’s the same as Ahmed, is the one who fucks all the others! AHMED . With the most honorable of intentions, of course!

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25. THE FAMILY

Ahmed, Fatima. Fatima is peeling potatoes and onions into a big bowl. FATIMA . So now everyone in Sarges-les-Corneilles calls him the philoso-

pher. A sort of doctor. What if I ask you a little question about the philosophy of peeling? Are you going to tell me to consult Ahmed as the doctor of all potatoes that almighty Lord Allah brings to fruition in the dry earth, thanks be to him? I’ve seen this philosopher stark naked in the wooden bathtub, and he didn’t look like a philosopher or a doctor, as Heaven is my witness, especially when he had the measles and he could have been the doctor of tomatoes, this charming louse of an oldest son beneath his poultice of pustules, thanks be to God for giving him back to me with clear skin one fine morning. And please don’t tell me that a “philosopher” has what it takes to fill the bag with potatoes and onions for all the days that God has made, and there are many of them, because we others, we mothers and daughters, we see days all in a row, while boys only see one day, the one that’s passing, which is fine with them, seeing as how they do nothing nowadays but flex their biceps and zoom around on their motor scooters going nowhere, talking that big talk like it’s nobody’s business. What a shame that when his father was alive he was off to the factory while it was still dark and tiptoeing out so as not to wake up the rotten little philosopher who was busy sucking his philosophical thumb so as to forget that he’d philosophically pissed in his bed. And my husband, may God protect him, who at the end of a day on the factory floor only said

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what was absolutely necessary and not a word more, while his son is the biggest rotten chatterbox in the whole neighborhood and everywhere else to boot. And I, Fatima, accustomed to being the wife of one who holds his tongue and isn’t afraid of hard work, now I’m stuck being the mother of philosophy’s endless yakking, which as far as I can tell is nothing but a useless trick for taking anyone and everyone for a hayride. So that everybody around here, big and little, is complaining. Monsieur Rhubarb, who, I must say, looks like an underbaked pie; and Madame Pompestan, our politics lady from around here, and it’s a shame to see women amusing themselves by politicking, with a purple suit that looks like it was custom-made by the flea market; and that good citizen Moustache, a nightmare, let’s face it, of a little boss who’d shoot Arabs full of lead if he had the balls for it, which he doesn’t; and even pretty Fenda, who if she were less black and had her papers more in order I’d be happy for him to tie the knot with, ’cause around her the philosopher Ahmed reminds me of a hummingbird in heat; and even that little Camille who’s basically a lazy slugabed, and who’s definitely not the kind of girl to tie the knot with, ’cause with her the casserole would stay empty, and, living with a swizzle stick like that, my darling son would end up in no time doing the philosophy of the skeleton; they all complain at the top of their lungs about Ahmed’s philosophy, which from what I hear has brought them the reward of being ridiculous, like a bunch of chickens running around with their heads cut off. The world as it is is so dissatisfied with the world that I think a philosopher, a cunning and foxy chatterbox like my dear son, can only find a place to live in it by driving every single authority, male and female, up the wall. AHMED (entering). Hello, Mother. FATIMA . Ah! The philosopher! Come over here so I can have a look at your face. What has your philosophy done for the poor world that works itself to the bone no matter whether it’s working or unemployed, which are becoming hard to tell apart? AHMED . Mother! Dearest Mother! As soon as I walk through your door, there’s no more philosophy. The family is impervious to philosophy. Or else philosophy abhors the family. I’ve brought you a chicken. He produces the fowl from his coat.

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Ahmed the philosopher FATIMA . You couldn’t have plucked it? That’s men for you! They’d bring

you an ostrich, and the poor mother would have to call all of her daughters to have them come help pluck the gigantic beast until the holy nightfall that Allah has made, while the whole housing project is filling up with enough ostrich feathers to make down comforters for a whole barrack! Maybe, according to philosophy, chicken feathers fall off all by themselves, as long as they’re autumn chickens, like trees? AHMED . Philosophers have caused something quite different from ostrich feathers to fall. FATIMA . What, for example? What can your devilish philosophy really make fall, except for Messieurs Rhubarb and Moustache into the hole of the toilet, so that one day they’ll get together with Madame Pompestan and set up a tribunal in Sarges-les-Corneilles to judge and execute you? AHMED . The philosophers have caused the curtain of appearances to fall, dear Mother. FATIMA . And what was there to see, behind this curtain? What hoodlums always see behind all curtains: a scandalously undressed woman, may God condemn her! AHMED . Not at all! I’ve already told you that nothing familial, conjugal, or libidinal interests philosophy. Behind the curtain, they saw that there was another curtain. FATIMA . How convenient for never seeing the plain light of day! Your philosophers are a bunch of shady good-for-nothings. And you, you’d be better off worrying about having a family. You’ve explained to me very nicely that that’s the permanent cure for philosophy, and then you wouldn’t have every male and female authority in town chasing after you. AHMED . Dear Mother! I’m thinking about it seriously. I do believe I’m going to give up philosophy to start a big family, with a really solid series of offshoots of my greatness. The difficulty of any family is that you need a wife. Only the familial authority of the wife, sustained by the subsequent authority of the mother, wipes out philosophy once and for all. What would you say about Fenda? FATIMA . I was just thinking about her. If I were your father with the true authority to arrange in silence . . .

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Ahmed the philosopher AHMED . Mother, mother . . . You know very well that Mustafa, my honor-

able and magnificently silent proletarian of a father, had only the ornaments of omnipotence. As far as family affairs were concerned, you were always in charge of everything without his even noticing. Speak frankly to your son Ahmed. FATIMA . I find her too black, too flirty, and too philosophical in her way. AHMED . And what do you think of Camille? FATIMA . I’ve chewed that one over too. She’ll drive you crazy, seeing as how her way of behaving is to show off her assets to beat the band, and besides she has the nerve to smoke in front of everyone. And besides besides, I’d rather her name were Aïcha or Djamila. AHMED . You see how hard a family is for a philosopher. FATIMA . Philosophy! Philosophy! Pluck the chicken, Ahmed of my joy and my long-lasting fatigue! Take it as an exercise against philosophy. AHMED . Horrors! In existence the family is the chicken. Philosophy is nothing but the feather . . .

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26. TERROR

Ahmed, the Demon of the Cities. THE DEMON . You know what I love more than anything else? Informing.

Denouncing an innocent person with a nice anonymous letter; seeing him getting arrested at the crack of dawn, crying, pleading, down on his knees before the snickering cops or militia men; or, even better, seeing him getting kicked in the stomach or getting his hands or knees bludgeoned, you know, where it really hurts; and then they drag him in front of a wall, still pleading and not understanding anything that’s happening to him; and they shoot him! What joy! I like to imagine that I’m hidden behind a curtain. I salivate! No one knows it’s me who blew the whistle! What I’d love even more is if, when they shoot him, they bungle it. He’s wounded, he’s bleeding everywhere, he’s groaning and screaming. And then the militia man walks over to him, grabs his head by the ears, and shakes him! Then he throws him back on the ground and rams his gun into his temple while insulting him. The other guy, whose legs are broken because he has a bullet in the knee, is squirming and begging, but nothing doing! The huge gun makes his brains come squirting out. And all because one evening, putting my mind to it, sucking on my penholder, I wrote the authorities a little missive full of plausible lies. Here, let me read you one of them, my latest: “To the underprefect for homeland security affairs. I must bring to your attention the fact that one Ahmed Ben Malhouf, as he calls himself, residing at number 5 Dog-breath Street in Sarges-les-Corneilles, in an attic room on the seventh floor, on the one hand according to my observations

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does not at all have his Arab papers in order, seeing as how he looks around him all shifty-eyed whenever he leaves his building.21 On the other hand, he’s definitely illegal in terms of the law on temporary work permits that was passed thanks to Senator Jacasse. The fact is that the butcher told me that this Ahmed Ben Malhouf had done some odd jobs in his shop, like putting the carcasses of mad cows in sealed bags so no one could distinguish them from the carcasses of sane cows. And the said butcher confirmed my suspicions, seeing as how Ahmed Ben Malhouf was unable to present him with either a residence permit or a work permit. He said by way of excuse to the butcher, who reported it to me in just these words, that he’d been in our country for thirty-three years and eight months, but that Senator Jacasse’s law made it impossible for him to renew his papers. Which, by the way, proves how effective and patriotic the Jacasse law is. I must insist that I have nothing personal against the aforementioned Ahmed Ben Malhouf, to whom I have never said a word. But, as a Frenchman, I believe I am doing my duty in bringing these offenses to your attention. I will add that the aforementioned Ahmed Ben Malhouf is regarded by almost everyone on the block as a decent, quiet man who is helpful and works as hard as he can. Even the butcher for whom he transported the mad cow carcasses didn’t see any reason to alert the authorities, because, so he said to me, and laughing to boot, what’s the point of harassing someone who busts his carcass hauling carcasses around for twenty-five Euros a day. With a great reputation like that, it’s quite possible that this Ahmed Ben Malhouf could become an agitator in the streets. This is why I am informing you that he has been leaving his building at four o’clock in the morning, going, or so claims the concierge of the building next door, to peel vegetables in a Chinese restaurant in Paris. If you draw the proper conclusions from everything that I have been able to observe, it will certainly be advisable to do a stake-out nearby, and to put an end to his career as a clandestine and illegal immigrant, threatening our national unity, at an hour when real Frenchmen are asleep in the bosom of their law-abiding families.” Not bad, huh? Of course, it’s not going to make them shoot him at the crack of dawn. Not yet. The Jacasse law only means you get locked up for a while in some detention center, then deported, by military goons, back to the fleabag country you never should have left. I think

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that in time they’ll be able to improve the Jacasse law. I have a very old friend who wrote letters during the Pétain period and the German occupation. Then you could really get somewhere! You’d sniff out a Jew, you’d write a few lines, and, bam! The guy would fall right into the trap. Mind you, whether they’re Jews or Arabs or Senegalese, or even Levantine, I don’t give a damn. What I like is to act. To act in the shadows, obviously. I never show my face. Showing your face is very dangerous. Look at Ahmed Ben Malhouf: this guy showed his face to the butcher, to the concierge, to me . . . And what’s going to happen to him, you know what I mean? You can never be too scared, that’s what I tell myself every night. No, you have to write as night is falling and put the letter in a mailbox far from where you live. And then, slowly but surely, it makes its way. The asshole postal workers don’t even know what kind of a bomb they’re transporting, and then, pow! one fine morning it comes along and blows up in the face of some Ahmed Ben Malhouf or other. Serves him right! That’s what you get for showing your face! Do I show mine? It would just be too much if all these illegal immigrants could show their faces, and even enjoy a good reputation in their neighborhood, while I, wise to the ways of the world, never show my face. It’s not just that they’d be living here, even though they’re not French, but, on top of that, they wouldn’t be afraid, even though I, a good Frenchman, am scared shitless all day long! And because of them, to boot! Because, let’s face it, there’s no way a Frenchman who believes in the proper philosophy of being afraid of his shadow is going to put up with seeing Arabs and Negroes running around not afraid of anything! Just you wait, Ben Malhouf! You’re going to be afraid, like me! AHMED (knocking at the door). Hey! Hey! Open up! In the name of the law! THE DEMON (completely terrified). Who is it? AHMED . It’s your neighbor, Ahmed Ben Malhouf. THE DEMON . My God! It’s the guy I denounced! He faints. AHMED (forcing the door open and entering). How do you like that? The

scumbag has passed out. Wake up, my little legal Frenchman!

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He tickles him with his stick. THE DEMON . But, but . . . how did you know? I never show my face, I take

every precaution . . . AHMED . Way too many. Don’t you understand, you scumbag? The shad-

ows are the sign of abjection. To isolate it, all you need to do is let in the light. Violent daytime lighting. But you still have to have access to its source. Ultimately, evil is always inferior to thought. THE DEMON . What are you going to do to me? AHMED . Hang you. But you’re not worth the rope. Let’s see . . . We should really make use of your talents . . . I know! Denounce yourself! Write to the prefect that you’ve committed some nasty crime or other . . . furnish the evidence . . . whip up a whole story about it, get busy! THE DEMON (terrified). But dreadful things will happen to me! The police will arrest me! AHMED (brandishing his stick). Write, cockroach! In what follows, the demon writes at first under duress, then starts to enjoy himself, and ends up, overtaken by his passion, denouncing himself enthusiastically. THE DEMON . I . . . I have the honor . . . no . . . I believe it to be my duty . . .

no . . . It seems to me important to . . . to bring to your attention the machinations . . . no, the illegal activities . . . no, machinations is better. I believe it necessary to call your attention to the machinations of . . . of . . . Do I really have to name myself? AHMED . Like you can denounce someone without naming them? You didn’t have any trouble naming me! THE DEMON . But if I name myself, it’s me they’re going to arrest! AHMED . How do you like that? It sure won’t be me, anyway. Write! THE DEMON . The machinations of Maurice Labouche. AHMED . Labouche . . . Labouche! Your name is Labouche? It’s too good to be true! The informer Labouche! . . . Go for it, denounce yourself zealously, Labouche. Try hiding in the booshes when the cops come to nab you. Be extremely convincing. 154

Ahmed the philosopher THE DEMON . The aforementioned Labouche has . . . but what could I have

done? AHMED . Well, here, the possibilities are endless. THE DEMON . Could I say that I denounced you by mistake? That’s all I

know how to do, denounce people. AHMED . You need to come up with something juicier than that, you sleazebag. THE DEMON . Maybe I could say . . . I’ve got it! And besides, it’s true! Could I say that, when my grandfather died from falling down the stairs, it’s because I convinced my wife to push him? AHMED (incredulous and disgusted). You had your wife kill your grandfather? Could you be a bigger ball of slime? You didn’t even kill him yourself? THE DEMON . This is really a good theme. It could make for a great letter; it’s solid as a rock. Listen. OK, so, the machinations of the aforementioned Maurice Labouche. It has come to my attention via his neighbor, then in a state of inebriation, that being on vacation in ConflansSainte-Honorine, the individual named Labouche, normally residing in Dog-breath Street in Sarges-les-Corneilles, wrote several letters to his wife to persuade her that his own father, an invalid needing to be taken out for a walk every day like an animal, was planning in his will to leave what little fortune he still possessed to the Association for Friendship with the Arab Peoples. The presence of this decrepit and incontinent old man in the conjugal abode was already exasperating the Labouche couple. The diversion of the family money was the straw that broke the camel’s back, Madame Labouche having declared time and again, especially in the presence of the neighborhood butcher and the concierge of the building across the street, that she was sick and tired of “wiping the old man’s ass every night,” quote unquote. Given the national opinions of Maurice Labouche and his wife, the former Bernadette Crapaud, the Arab destination of the old man’s will was the other straw conducive to the breaking of the camel’s back. Due to this, harassed by her spouse’s letters, Madame Labouche one day pushed the old man down the stairs while she was taking him out for his walk, resulting in his tumbling head over heels until death ensued. The death was ruled accidental, but I have been able to arrive at the certainty that, hatched in Conflans-Sainte-Honorine, a crime has indeed been committed in Sarges-les-Corneilles. I have at my disposal several 155

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pieces of evidence, including one of Maurice Labouche’s letters, which sheds a harsh light on what deserves to be called the Dog-breath Street Case. I will make this document available to you, provided that you don’t ask me how I got it. How do you like it? It’s amazing, isn’t it? It’s one of my masterpieces! It’s subtle and captivating! Labouche is screwed! AHMED . You’re screwed. It’s absolutely disgusting. You’re going to mail that letter for me as soon as night falls, you worm! And don’t think I won’t be keeping a lookout to see what happens! Ahmed exits, but the audience sees him reappear, invisible to the demon, in an elevated position from which he scrutinizes his victim. THE DEMON . What a beautiful letter! What a juicy denunciation! And

besides, guess what? He laughs, louder and louder. Guess what? I really saved my ass that time! It’s the best! I’ve outdone myself! Maurice Labouche isn’t me! It’s my upstairs neighbor! Wouldn’t I love to see the look on his face when the cops show up to investigate! Especially since his grandfather really did fall down the stairs when he was on vacation! Yes! He’s in such deep shit! Too bad for him. He’s a guy who hangs out with shady characters. Just one more example of someone who shows his face instead of staying at home. Just one more example of someone who isn’t scared enough of the world we live in. I saw him joking in the café with Ahmed ben Malhouf, see what I mean? Hanging out with that crazy Arab, can you imagine? That’s practically an illegal infraction right there. If Frenchmen aren’t even scared of Arabs anymore, what’s happening to society? A violent knocking at the door. Who is it? There’s nobody home! AHMED . Open up! In the name of the law! It’s Maurice Labouche! THE DEMON . Jesus Christ! They’ve all found me out!

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The demon attempts to block the door, Ahmed forces his way in and knocks the demon down with a violent blow from his stick. The demon lies on the floor. AHMED (meditative). When Evil, in other words fear, is too deep, too

ingrown, pure thought can’t really reach it. Cunning itself can fail. That’s why the stick is necessary. Yes, you need the stick. Terror, in short. A little Terror. As little Terror as possible. But never no Terror at all. That’s just how it is. Alas, that’s just how it is.

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27. PURPOSIVENESS

Ahmed, Camille. Camille, as usual, is smoking a cigarette and sitting at the edge of the stage. Ahmed is in the audience. At first all we hear is the faint sound of Camille’s transistor radio. AHMED . Tell me, Camille. What are you doing there? What’s your goal?

To the audience: I ask you, ladies and gentlemen: what could possibly be the goal of a chick who sits here smoking in public and doesn’t say a word? What’s up with that? CAMILLE . Hey, give me a break! Stop busting my chops, OK? I can do whatever I want! AHMED . Sure, whatever you want. But what’s the goal of whatever you want? Philosophers call that purposiveness. It’s a pretty great word, purposiveness. It can be interpreted in a number of ways. Improvisations on the word purposiveness: porpoise-iveness, purple sieve nuts, percussive nose, etc. Philosophers, for their part, construe it as follows (pedantically): the purposiveness of something is the end pursued by that thing, the goal toward which it tends according to the laws of its own nature. For example, the purposiveness of a fox like me is to get into the chicken

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coop; the purposiveness of language is to communicate with other people; the purposiveness of elections is to decide who’s going to run the government. It’s a purposiveness where in the end you’re not too sure about what your end was or which end is up. In elections, when your purpose is to run for office with the end of running the country, you end up running things into the ground and, in the end, giving yourself and everyone else the runs. Fundamentally, when you get right down to it, this half-assed imitation of politics is nothing but a big pain in the ass. If you see what I mean. The purposiveness of the Jacasse law concerning those whose papers aren’t in order is to kiss the asses of the stupidest and most frightened among those who do have their papers in order. It says: show me your papers and I’ll show you what you’re worth. The general idea being that people’s brains should turn into confetti. That’s the purposiveness of the Jacasse law on the Frenchman and the foreigner. It’s an idiot’s purposiveness, but a purposiveness nonetheless. So then, what’s the purposiveness of Camille smoking her cigarette in front of us? Huh? To the audience. Ask her, you guys: “Camille! What’s your purposiveness?” CAMILLE . You know, you’re really starting to piss me off, with your purposiveness! What’s wrong with just sitting here passing the time? Why should I have a purposiveness? No, seriously, look at me! Do I look like someone with a purposiveness? AHMED (climbing onto the stage). Let’s try an experiment here, in front of everybody. To figure out your purposiveness. Go stand in the corner of the platform. CAMILLE . Why not? But I promise you that standing isn’t a purposiveness. Especially not when a dog like you is asking me to do it. AHMED . Fine, whatever! Since my purposiveness would be more like having you lie down. CAMILLE . Some philosopher! The only purposiveness he knows is getting chicks in the sack! AHMED . Wonderful! She’s found the purposiveness of all purposiveness! Because, for all intents and purposes, sex is what it’s really all about at the end of the day. So that’s Camille’s doctrine!

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Ahmed the philosopher CAMILLE . No, that’s guy-doctrine! A slight difference! What you’re talking

about is the purposiveness of the purposiveness of dudes! That’s not my purposiveness, bub. AHMED . Fine, so let’s continue with the experiment. I’ll go over to the other end of the platform, like so. And you walk quietly toward me at a diagonal. Go ahead. CAMILLE . Don’t make me laugh! Crossing a stage at a diagonal, yeah, that’s really gonna have purposiveness! If that’s purposiveness, a bear turning around in its cage has more purposiveness than anybody! AHMED . The question of what the bear’s goal is when it turns around in its cage is one of the most important problems in philosophy. Figuring out the goal of anything that turns around, generally speaking, is an extremely difficult problem. What’s the goal of planets, what’s the goal of galaxies, what’s the purposiveness of everything turning in the universe? It’s a tough nut to crack. But for now, let’s focus on Camille, who doesn’t turn. CAMILLE (walking forward very slowly, at a diagonal). Yeah, but there are plenty of guys who’ve made my head spin. AHMED . I’m sorry not to have been one of them. Come to me, little Camille, come closer . . . See! The purposiveness of your movement is me. CAMILLE (stopping suddenly). Uh-uh, no tricks! OK, maybe I’m walking toward you, since you asked me to, and I’ve got nothing else to do right now. But if you’re trying to insinuate in front of all these people that my purposiveness in life is you, let me make one thing perfectly clear: cut the crap! You better not take me for a bimbo. AHMED . No, not in the least! These are just preliminary exercises on purposiveness! Now turn around and go back in your corner, still slowly. CAMILLE . I feel like I’m modeling nightgowns in public. AHMED . Hey, not a bad idea! You wear nightgowns? What are they like? CAMILLE . Fat chance you’ll ever find out. AHMED . Alas! In that case, let’s put this lecherous purposiveness aside. The current goal of your walking is to return to where you were. CAMILLE . That’s a purposiveness I know all too well: ending up exactly where I started out. In life, most of the time, I think: here you are, Camille, back where you started. AHMED . But, if you’re complaining about it, that means it’s not your purposiveness. When you’re following your purposiveness, you’re happy!

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That much is certain. Camille’s purposiveness is not always to be ending up back where she started. OK. Now come back to me. CAMILLE . How long is this going to last, this stupid-ass exercise? AHMED . Until it’s fulfilled its own purpose, which is to discover your purposiveness. CAMILLE . Well, then, there’s a hidden agenda: my purposiveness turns out to be the purposiveness of a stupid-ass exercise. AHMED . Now go back to your corner. CAMILLE . Thanks for giving me permission! The play of goings and comings continues for a bit. Improvisations on its variation, its acceleration, etc. Suddenly: I’m sick of this! Why are you getting on my tits like this again? Can’t you just leave me alone? There I was, listening to my music, spacing out, forgetting everything, and then this shitty Arab has to descend on me with his purposiveness! Who do you think you are, after all? Is your purposiveness to muck up the world with words, or what? Can’t you shut up for one second? You couldn’t just leave your purposiveness bullshit nestled in the folds of your brain? People won’t put up forever with being made canon fodder for your words. For a second it’s fine, they go back and forth in your speeches like they were in the middle of a swarm of mosquitoes, but in the end it’s just crap! It’s mega-crap! Stick it up your ass, your purposiveness! And don’t come bugging me again, or I’ll kick your ass. She exits, furious. AHMED . What a tornado! . . . Well, finally, we know what Camille’s purpo-

siveness is. We’ve seen it in the flesh. We’ve seen her desire, her true desire. Her goal, her true goal. Her terrible goal. Which is to not have a goal. Camille’s purposiveness is just this: to be struggling constantly to preserve the right to not have any goal. The purposiveness of nonpurposiveness. . . . This reminds me of a German philosopher, a guy from the eastern front, all the way at the edge of the Polish pampas, at least almost. Immanuel Kant was his name. He said that what’s beautiful is what seems to have a purpose, but doesn’t. A sunset, for example. It’s

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as beautiful as if it were created on purpose, but in fact it wasn’t created on purpose at all. There’s no point to it. This guy Kant said: that which is beautiful is like a purposiveness without purpose. Like Camille. That’s why Camille is beautiful. Purposiveness without purpose. A sunset. I’d like to become her end. I’d like to be Camille’s purposiveness. But, since her goal is not to have one, I’d have to look like the absence of a goal. It isn’t so easy to look like a total absence of a goal. To embody the end of the end. Improvisation on this theme: looking insignificant, embodying the absence of all goals. I’m going to start practicing! Ah! What a lot of problems we’ve solved today! Camille’s purposiveness and, as a result, my purposiveness too: which is that Camille should desire in me the supreme embodiment of the total absence of any purpose in existence. This is going to require really serious training. And thanks for helping! If you see Camille, you can lay the groundwork. Tell her that, since she chewed me out, I’m so aimless I don’t even know which end is up. Tell her that I’m totally on board with being the ultimate in purposiveness without purpose. Tell her that Ahmed is the goal of a beauty that has no goal. Camille’s goal. Because one of my particular purposivenesses is never to get discouraged. Ever. Whatever the end may be. Even if achieving my end means ending it all. Well, see you later!

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28. MATHEMATICS

Ahmed, his first understudy, and his second understudy. The two understudies make their entrance, in the middle of a lively discussion that began backstage. FIRST UNDERSTUDY . I am the one and only Ahmed. SECOND UNDERSTUDY . I understand everything. I am the one and only

Ahmed. FIRST UNDERSTUDY . Imbecile! If I say, “I am the one and only Ahmed,”

you’re supposed to say, “You are the one and only Ahmed.” SECOND UNDERSTUDY . Of course I know that! You are the one and only imbecile. FIRST UNDERSTUDY . What a cretin! You don’t even know basic arithmetic. You never passed kindergarten! Ahmed has entered and listens to them without being seen. Look carefully. We are two. Yes or no? SECOND UNDERSTUDY . We are two. FIRST UNDERSTUDY . And two is one plus one. SECOND UNDERSTUDY . I understand everything. Since we’re two, we’re two times one. Two times one Ahmed. And since you’re an Ahmed, it’s because the Ahmed that you are is one. Now everything that’s one is unique. Therefore I am the only Ahmed. FIRST UNDERSTUDY . Not you, me! You said, “Since you are an Ahmed one and because everything that’s one is unique.” You ought to conclude, “Therefore, you are the only Ahmed.” 165

Ahmed the philosopher SECOND UNDERSTUDY . I understand everything very well. But! But! I

used silent reasoning. FIRST UNDERSTUDY . What the hell does that mean? Reasoning should

always be audible. SECOND UNDERSTUDY . I understand you perfectly. Reasoning should

always resonate! Oh, resonate, silent reasoning! FIRST UNDERSTUDY . Are you completely hammered or something? SECOND UNDERSTUDY . Indeed, isn’t it precisely on an anvil that one

makes reasonings resonate? Get an earful of this: Improvisation: as if the second understudy were forging his reasoning on an anvil. We were two Ahmeds, each of us being one Ahmed. Therefore, I am one and, one being unique, I am the only Ahmed. FIRST UNDERSTUDY . And what about me, what am I? Any ideas? AHMED (intervening suddenly). That’s the whole problem right there. It relates to higher mathematics. SECOND UNDERSTUDY . It must be very high. I understand our master perfectly. FIRST UNDERSTUDY . You don’t understand anything at all, you pretentious cretin! How does it change what we’re talking about that this gentleman here, who claims to be Ahmed, shows up once again and sticks his nose into our business? SECOND UNDERSTUDY . Because there were two of us being a single one, and now we’re three. Now three is much more than two. Three is transcendent. FIRST UNDERSTUDY . Transcendent! What the hell is this jargon? AHMED . He’s right! Three is enormously more than two. Because in three there’s eight. FIRST UNDERSTUDY . In three there’s eight? Well, in that case, in me there’s what I ate. Oysters on a plate. Plus their pearls. This gentleman is dishonoring Ahmed with his ridiculous song and dance. SECOND UNDERSTUDY . I understand everything! He’s an imbecile too. In what follows, Ahmed organizes the reconfigurations on the stage in such a way that all the subsets become visible.

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Ahmed the philosopher AHMED . You’ll see if there isn’t eight in three. Let’s say that my name is A1,

like Ahmed one, that he (pointing to the first understudy) is named A2, like Ahmed two, and that he’s A3. Do you agree that A1, A2, and A3 are all three in the three? Since there are in fact three Ahmeds. SECOND UNDERSTUDY . I understand everything! Each Ahmed, who is one, is in the three, because one plus one plus one makes three. AHMED . So we already have three in the three. Now I’m going to join Ahmed two, I’m going to stick with him, I’m going to drop Ahmed three. It’s A1 and A2 together. That makes something else that’s in the three. FIRST UNDERSTUDY . What are you talking about, in the three? AHMED . Where else do you think we should be? We’re two Ahmeds inside the three, if you put them together. They’re still inside the three. How could they get out? SECOND UNDERSTUDY . How true! The two of A1 and A2 is made up of pieces of the three, so it’s necessarily stuck inside the three. AHMED . So we’ve already found four things in the three. But if now I stick with A3, this guy, the one who always understands everything, that makes yet another thing that’s in the three. Because it’s made up of what’s in the three and of nothing else. So now we have five things in the three. FIRST UNDERSTUDY . I’m starting to feel like I’m being had, with this three that fabricates five. SECOND UNDERSTUDY . Yes, we’re being had big time. I completely get that. And I even get it big time, because there’s at least a sixth thing in the three. FIRST UNDERSTUDY . You, the imbecile, you see a sixth thing? And where exactly would it be? SECOND UNDERSTUDY . If we stick together, you and me, while dropping our revered master, that makes one more thing that’s in the three, since it’s now two Ahmeds out of three. AHMED . He’s not bad, this kid! And now let’s all three of us stick together, nice and tight. That makes one more group that’s in the three. FIRST UNDERSTUDY . That’s it! I’ve figured out how you keep duping us! You’ve already counted this last group! From the beginning! When you said there’s A1 and A2 and A3, and that makes three things in the three.

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Ahmed the philosopher AHMED . No, that’s so wrong! What a dope you are! At the beginning, I

counted us separately, and the proof is that that made three things. Now I’m counting us as a whole, and that makes one thing completely different from the three others. SECOND UNDERSTUDY . I understand everything. Each Ahmed makes one, but the three Ahmeds taken together makes one too, which isn’t one bit like the other one, since, instead of there being one Ahmed, there are three stuck together. FIRST UNDERSTUDY . I’m being had! I’m being duped! What the hell is this three that’s in the three? AHMED . Where should this three be, if not in the three? If it were supposed to be somewhere else, it would be at least a four! FIRST UNDERSTUDY . I’m being duped up the wazoo. AHMED . In any case, we’ve found seven things in the three. FIRST UNDERSTUDY . Seven, and not eight! Maybe there are seven in the three, but you’d said eight! So where is thing eight? Can you show it to us, this famous eighth thing? AHMED (acting confused). Can I show it, can I show it . . . It exists, but showing it is another kettle of fish. SECOND UNDERSTUDY . It’s true that I don’t see where the eighth thing can be. Where are you, thing eight? He looks everywhere. I don’t see anything. FIRST UNDERSTUDY . OK, imbecile, let’s start all over, and this time let’s count carefully. SECOND UNDERSTUDY . At your service, Ahmed. The two understudies redo all the possible arrangements of the three bodies onstage, counting noisily each time. FIRST UNDERSTUDY . Seven. No two ways about it. Seven. The gentleman

here doesn’t know transcendental arithmetic. AHMED . Sarcastic understudy! Ahmed number 2! Get up on the platform.

Good. You’re there, one of the things in the three. Right? OK, now come back down. What operation have we performed? There was one

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Ahmed on the platform, and we’ve removed one Ahmed from the platform . . . SECOND UNDERSTUDY . I know, master, I know! We performed a subtraction! We did one Ahmed minus one Ahmed. AHMED . And one Ahmed minus one Ahmed makes . . . SECOND UNDERSTUDY . Zero Ahmeds. AHMED . And zero Ahmeds, since it’s produced from the Ahmeds of the three, since it’s A2 minus A2, well, it’s also in the three. It’s the eighth thing in the three. SECOND UNDERSTUDY . It’s luminous. Zero Ahmeds being produced with things from the three Ahmeds is itself a thing in this three. FIRST UNDERSTUDY . We’re being duped! “A thing, a thing”! Look at the platform: there’s nothing there at all! Zero isn’t a thing. AHMED . Careful! Not just any old zero! Zero Ahmeds! If it’s zero Ahmeds, it comes from the three Ahmeds. And, as for the fact that the stage is empty, I warned you: you can’t show the eighth thing, you can only think it. SECOND UNDERSTUDY . I completely understand how this reasoning resonates on the anvil of our master. I think! I think Zero Ahmeds! Boy, is this good! FIRST UNDERSTUDY . Now we’re being taken for another ride! Look! I put this stick on the platform, then I remove it. Stick minus stick makes zero sticks, right? And can you tell me how, looking at the empty platform, I can tell the difference between zero Ahmeds and zero sticks? Zero is always zero, whether it comes from three Ahmeds or from a rabbit cage. Zero isn’t in three. AHMED . All you’ve proven is that zero sticks is also a thing that’s in the one of the stick, just as zero Ahmeds is in three Ahmeds. As for rabbit cage zero, it’s in the rabbit cage. SECOND UNDERSTUDY . Therefore, zero is a rabbit. FIRST UNDERSTUDY . Sure looks like it. A rabbit pulled out of a hat. AHMED . It remains the case that in three there’s eight, which means that three is vastly greater than two. SECOND UNDERSTUDY . And in four what is there? AHMED . In four there’s sixteen. Yes, sixteen. But it would take too long to show, and, besides, there are only three of us. What if we did some geometry instead?

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Ahmed the philosopher FIRST UNDERSTUDY . Good idea. I’m great at geometry, I won’t let myself

be had like in arithmetic. SECOND UNDERSTUDY . I’m a complete dope when it comes to geometry.

But I won’t let myself be had either. AHMED . And how’s that? SECOND UNDERSTUDY . Because nobody wants to have me. Even my

mother used to say to me: we would rather not have had you. Being had happens only to people that people want to have, so being had is still what I don’t have and won’t have. FIRST UNDERSTUDY (pointing to Ahmed). Haven’t we just been watching him having you? AHMED . Let’s move on to geometry. The three of us together, on this square platform, form a triangle. A triangle whose apexes are A1, A2, and A3. Question: can the triangle that we form be bigger than a square? The first understudy takes charge of operations, arranging the three bodies in different key points. FIRST UNDERSTUDY . The triangle is by definition smaller than the square.

I can even show that it’s never greater than half the square. It’s equal to half the square when, for example, we occupy three of the angles of the square. It’s the maximum. SECOND UNDERSTUDY . I understand everything. It’s the maximum. AHMED . Is that what you think? Go stand at the two corners of the platform toward the front. Good. Ahmed disappears and then suddenly reappears at the top of the rear of the stage, standing up, towering over the two other characters. And now? If you route the triangle through my head and your feet, what’s it like? SECOND UNDERSTUDY . It’s about as big as the square. I understand everything: it wasn’t the maximum at all, just now. FIRST UNDERSTUDY . Miserable imbecile! He’s had us again! His triangle isn’t on the same plane as the square! AHMED . And when did I ever say that it was supposed to be?

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Ahmed the philosopher SECOND UNDERSTUDY (to the first understudy). And when did he ever say

that it was supposed to be? AHMED . You’ve always got to read statements precisely. Don’t leave out

anything of what’s said and don’t add anything. That’s what makes the Ahmed! And you too (to the audience), take a leaf from my book. In mathematics, of course, but in everything else too, especially in politics: listen to statements, listen to what gets said, without taking anything away and without adding anything of your own whims or hopes. What gets said as it gets said. And never forget anything! Life is a lot more mathematical than you think.

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29. NATURE

Ahmed, Fatima. Fatima enters. On the ground a great mass of bags and packages filled with various provisions. FATIMA . Ahmed! Ahmed! Where on earth is he, that damn philosopher!

Ah! If only Allah would explain to me once and for all and for ever what I did to him in the innermost depths of time to make him make me drop into this world as my firstborn and favorite such a spinner of words that only get him condemned, he and all succeeding generations, by every male and female authority in Sarges-les-Corneilles. Ahmed! Come over here and help your mother unload the weight of food necessary to fatten up your bagful of tricks of philosophical blah blah blah! No one in the city or even in the desert could have imagined it would take so much lamb, chicken, couscous, and peppers to give you enough nourishment to run around everywhere pouring out on the heads of poor idiots of every stripe your poisonous potion of philosophical verbs and adjectives! It seems like you have to eat more to speak than to cross the oasis like a camel. This Ahmed must have a big, strong tongue muscle, since you’ve got to put so many pounds of food on that tongue just to keep it moving around in his mouth all the livelong day. Ahmed! Ahmed! AHMED (walks onto the stage yawning and stretching, completely groggy). Yes, Mother. I’m here. FATIMA (looking at him). You don’t look too much like you’re here. Don’t tell me you were still napping this late in the day. That, at the time

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when your father Malhouf, may the almighty Lord keep him with him in Paradise, was in the factory cutting up his hands with scrap metal, his son Ahmed should be curled up like a mouse in its sleep-hole? Very nice! AHMED . Dear Mother! Sleep is a natural function. It’s factory work that was never in accord with nature. FATIMA . Nature, nature! Blame it on nature! Is this another one of your philosophical stunts, nature? Well, in that case, philosophically according to nature, it’s OK to be off in dreamland while your poor mother, who unfortunately loves you more than anything, carries a hundred thousand packages like a beast of burden? Put this in the front closet. Ahmed takes a small package, carries it very slowly backstage, and returns. AHMED . What’s in accord with nature, dear Mother, is that you and I

should easily be able to carry a package of, let’s say, four pounds. If it’s twenty pounds, the sweat starts to flow if you try to lift it with one hand. If it’s sixty pounds, then you have to put it on your back, and if it’s a lot more, you have to go find the next-door neighbor, and if it’s even more than that, you have to go find a truck. In all this, which is about what one can and can’t do, we have the experience of nature. You sense nature when you’ve reached its limit. FATIMA . Well, in that case, I have the feeling you must be very natural! You must know your nature down to its tiniest detail! Because you reach your natural limit a lot more than most people. Tell you what: so we can figure out your true nature, pick up a bigger package. Ahmed takes a package and carries it very laboriously backstage. Must we believe that it’s in the nature of the maternal woman to carry pounds of beans and couscous and damp laundry, seeing as how the drier is on the blink and that it’s in the nature of the paternal worker to carry scrap metal in the factory and, finally, that it’s in the nature of the son to work only with his tongue muscle? Seems to me this nature of yours has a funny way of handing out parts!

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Ahmed the philosopher AHMED (coming back, apparently exhausted). That’s exactly how nature is.

She hands out parts according to everyone’s abilities, depending either on their favorite muscle or their dominant tendency. There are those, like you, Mother, call them the natural forces of nature. Then there are others, like my late beloved proletarian father, who stand out as naturally upright, decent, irreproachable men. Call them moral forces of nature. And then there are those, like your very respectful son Ahmed, whose talents are more for matching wits with nature, call them the intellectual forces of nature. So you see how the casting works? Improvisation on the three forces of nature, natural, moral, and intellectual. FATIMA . You bet I see! Except, I’d say that nature is, first of all, the sheer

weight of all these packages and, second of all, the appetite of this Ahmed whose intellectual nature needs to gobble up quantities of meat that the moral nature of my dear departed husband would never have dreamed of! And that, if this Ahmed doesn’t think the meat is cooked exactly the way he wants it, he uses his tongue to come up with a thousand very intellectual arguments against the nature of his mother who cooked it! And just for that, you can come over here by my natural nature and keep putting these packages away for me, without making a big philosophical speech to justify taking the smallest one. Ahmed takes a package very grudgingly, as if he were about to collapse at any moment. Look at how sly he is, the rascal! This is how he manages to shirk the humiliations of life with all the dupes who get taken in by his silver tongue! I know just how it works. He explains to the dupes that it’s in their nature to do all the drudgery and that it’s in his nature to explain to them what’s going on and that, if he gives them a nice big barrelful of well-turned phrases, then their only choice is to give him in return a nice big chunk of work that he should have done himself. I’ll tell you, this Ahmed I gave birth to, he’s one smart philosophical cookie. He’s not a thing of nature. It’s more like he sidestepped nature.

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Ahmed the philosopher AHMED (returning as if he were half-dead from fatigue). Exactly, Mother. I’m

not natural, I’m supernatural. Because language is supernatural. FATIMA . But of course, and the proof is that I, who am up to my ears in

nature, and whose job, I guess, is to be the whole natural road crew that makes your supernaturalness possible, I don’t know how to talk? Is that what you just said to your own mother, right to her face? AHMED . No, not at all! I’d be completely ashamed to say such a thing! You speak the language of nature in an absolutely supernatural way. FATIMA . Well, then, why don’t you just put the physics of your supernature to work in an absolutely natural way! Bring me that bag over there and get your personal philosophy to help you. Just keep saying to yourself, “I’m carrying a supernatural bag in a very natural way,” and God, who distributes the parts of nature, will help you as long as you help yourself just a little bit. Ahmed hoists the bag painfully onto his shoulders, takes a few steps, then collapses under the bag and lies motionless on the ground. Dear Lord, Ahmed’s been crushed beneath the supernatural bag! Quick, quick, water, help! My precious boy, the slyest, the cleverest, the most loving son! The light of my life! My pride and joy! My great big sweetheart of a philosopher! Fatima fusses over Ahmed, sponging him, etc. Improvisation on this situation. Then, to the bag, she says: Lousy sack of beans heavy enough to squash the best of sons! Natural disaster more oppressive than scrap metal! Couldn’t you see that my Ahmed, whom I brought up with couscous and the back of my hand until he had the philosophical mind, couldn’t you see that he doesn’t have the same physical distribution of nature as you? She kicks the bag, then lifts it. Great expression of surprise. But this bag doesn’t weigh anything! These aren’t beans! What’s in here?

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Fatima opens the bag and rummages through it. Down feathers fly out of it. Fatima, to Ahmed. FATIMA . So, Mr. Philosopher! You got crushed by a bunch of feathers?

Well then, let me tell you what you are. I’m going to tell you, ’cause I’m the one who made you and who knows you down to the folds between your toes, which the doctor told me were good for nothing, and I should have been leery about what you’d be good for altogether. You’re a natural born pipsqueak! AHMED (bounding up, cheerfully). Exactly, dear Mother. The littler the nature, the bigger the mind!

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30. THE IDEA

Ahmed, the Demon of the Cities. The Demon, alone, is down on all fours on the stage. He shows his ass to the audience. He turns around, grimaces, walks on all fours like a dog sniffing the ground. A bit of play with this theme. THE DEMON . Are you wondering what I’m doing, you bunch of yokels?

I’m doing what you don’t do very often. I’m looking for an idea. There are people who think ideas are found way up high, almost in the sky. I know of a philosopher, a guy called Plato, a Greek, in other words a sort of Middle Eastern trafficker, who said that ideas floated in the air, next to the stars. What an ass, that Plato! Real ideas are the ones you find right on the ground, in the middle of the garbage and the dog shit. Once, I found a great idea. You know where? In a garbage can, between a diaper filled with shit and some rotten-smelling eggshells. An idea like you don’t find very often in life, even by sticking your nose in the trash like me. OK! You’re dying to find out what this idea was, huh? Usually, I don’t tell my ideas to anyone. You can’t trust anyone; you’ve got to stay barricaded in your house and keep your ideas in your wallet, the one you put under your pillow when you go to sleep. But this particular idea is an old one; I’ve completely used it up. I can give it to you. It’s a dog collar, with the tag, the name, the address . . . Yeah, I’ve got to tell you, the good ideas aren’t at all like that Middle Eastern guy I was just telling you about, the too famous Plato, claimed. They’re not invisible, celestial, and all that jazz. Like all Middle Easterners, this Plato was a stinking intellectual. Let’s face

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it: an idea has nothing ideal about it. It presents itself like a nice little piece of filth or a crumpled piece of paper or an apple core . . . So in this case we’re talking about a dog collar, and it says: “Rover, Property of Maurice Labouche, 5 Dog-breath Street, Sarges-les-Corneilles.” And the telephone number to call. This idea smelled good! Because just calling your dog “Rover” nowadays is about as dumb as you can get. Second of all, being a dog and living on Dog-breath Street is grotesque. Third of all, belonging to a guy who calls himself Maurice Labouche when you’re named Rover is appalling. But the best part of the idea, what made it really an idea, is that Maurice Labouche is my upstairs neighbor! Because I live on Dog-breath Street too, but I’m not a dog, I have the right! Mr. Four-eyes, this Labouche is—you know the lousy kind of liberal I mean. He even lets illegal Negroes into his house; it’s unbelievable! So I noticed that he got a new dog recently, this shithead Labouche. He had a horrible mutt, with long red ears, it must have been the Rover in question. And now he had a new awful mutt, the kind with little short white hair and a sad little mug, so sweet it made you want to throw up. I’m guessing you’re starting to get my idea, almost like it was you who found it rummaging through garbage cans. No? You don’t get it yet, my idea? Well then, I guess you all just aren’t idealists! Me, I’m a professional idealist, so I saw in a flash that the dog collar was an idea. You keep an eye out for Labouche’s new dog. Then one day he comes wandering around the stairwell and you lure him with some sugar. He’s so nice and dumb, this mutt, that he follows you into your apartment wagging his tail like the moron of a dog he is. Then you haul off and smash him over the head with a hammer. That right there, that’s the hardest part of the idea. But every good idea has some hard parts. A professional idealist like me isn’t going to be satisfied with simplistic ideas. Killing a mutt by bashing his head in with a hammer is a fairly complex idea, but it works out OK. You just have to pursue it to the end, because a dog isn’t going to drop dead just like that, after only one blow. That would make the idea too easy. No, he has a tendency to run all over the place, to get blood on the carpet, he moans, he quivers, he looks at you like he wants to ask you something . . . Anyway, you have to put your mind to it. Finally, he’s lying on the ground, with his noggin all smashed in and everything and his tongue sticking out like vomit. But

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the idea must prevail. So now you take his collar off. And you know what it says on the collar of this new mutt, with its owner’s ridiculous name, Labouche, and the address, and the phone number? It says: “Blackie.” Can you believe it? He’d called his first mutt “Rover” like some yokel from two hundred years ago, and his second mutt, who was all white, he calls “Blackie”! I should have smashed this Labouche guy’s head in. Which’ll happen once we’ve got a new mental order in this country. When idealists will get the reward we deserve. Anyway. Once I’ve ripped off the smoking collar of this Blackie, I replace it with Rover’s collar! I put the idea I found in the garbage can around his neck! And I leave the dead body of Blackie with Rover’s collar on Labouche’s doormat. Behold the brilliance of my idea! Imagine Labouche! When he discovers his mutt all smashed in and covered in blood! He bends down! He kneels over the body! He cries! He wants to make sure! He looks at the collar! And before his very eyes he sees the ghost of Rover! He goes crazy, this Labouche! He’s barely buried his last dog, he’s barely taken his new one for a piss four times, and lo and behold the mashed mug of the second one shows up with the first one’s name! Brilliant, I tell you. That’s why you see me looking for an idea right now. One as good as the last one. The Demon resumes his hunt on all fours. AHMED (entering suddenly). I have one, an idea. THE DEMON . What is it? What do you want? AHMED (taking a big bone out of his jacket). So Demon, how does this idea

strike you? I didn’t find it in a garbage can, though. I didn’t find it in the sky either, this pretty lily-white idea. No, it’s an intermediate idea, in short, an Ahmed-level idea. So? THE DEMON (trembling). That’s not an idea. That’s a bone. AHMED . It’s an idea. And, boy, you love your ideas the way a dog loves a bone! Everyone can see how you love your ideas, the ideas you find between garbage and dog shit; so now you’re going to take this idea right in the chops. Come on! Bite down on that idea, you rat! Bite down hard! The Demon, still down on all fours, takes the bone in his mouth.

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And so what do you do to dogs who love their bones? Tell me. Tell me your great ideas about dogs, Mr. Labouche’s dog, for example . . . I’d like to imitate you, I’d like to become a professional idealist, like you. Speak up! The Demon, unable to speak with the bone in his mouth, mumbles and belches. Gee, your idea isn’t quite as beautiful as it was a little while ago, is it? But I get it! The idea must prevail! And the intermediate idea, the Ahmed-level idea, prevails over the idea that’s been picked out of the stench of the gutter! Here’s how it ought to be done! Ahmed attacks the Demon by striking him violently with his stick. So there! The clash of one idea with another. A battle of idealists, in short . . . Plato would love this sort of thing!

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31. THE ABSURD

Ahmed, Camille. Camille is perched atop a wall, holding a transistor radio that dangles from a string. AHMED . Oh, come on! Camille! This is completely absurd! CAMILLE . What’s so absurd? This radio’s too loud. It’s busting my ear-

drums. With the string, I can hold it away from me, and I can hear it just the way I want to. It’s awesome! AHMED . It looks like you just reeled in some old piece of crap! Like those guys who catch shoes in the river. And standing with a fishing pole on the banks of the Seine is already just about the most absurd thing there is! Ahmed’s improvisation on fishing, obviously designed to make Camille laugh, which she indeed does readily. But fishing for a radio! That’s the limit! It’s the absurdest of the absurd. CAMILLE . What if I like picking up radio waves from the bitter waves of the river? Get off my back. I’m holding my radio on a leash, like a dog. It’s my dog, and I don’t want it barking in my ears. Got it, pooch? The radio barks. What did I tell you?

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Ahmed the philosopher AHMED . A barking radio! We’re swimming in the absurd! A minute ago it

was a fish, now it’s a dog. CAMILLE . That’s life for you, things come and things go, radio, dog, fish . . .

Why do we always have to be the same thing? AHMED . Because of the identity principle! A thing is what it is! Whatever

object A may be, it’s identical to object A! A fish is a fish, a transistor is a transistor. I am who I am. Otherwise the world goes to hell in a handbasket . . . The identity principle is the rock that saves us from general absurdity. Improvisation on the identity principle as a rock against the flood of the absurd. CAMILLE . Worrying about identity is for the cops. They have registration

cards for identity, like with hookers. My transistor doesn’t have a card. It’s card free and carefree. Right, Rover? The radio says in a resonant voice: “I’d like to see them try to card me. I’m the freest of radios. How cool is that?” AHMED . And it talks too! We’re completely drowning in the absurd. CAMILLE . You think I’m going to settle for a mute dog? Then you don’t

know me very well. I like a little chatter. AHMED . Liar! I chatter to you nonstop, and you give me the cold shoulder. CAMILLE . Yeah, but you’re not a dog. A talking guy is nothing special. A

talking dog is fantastic. AHMED . It’s absurd! Absurd! Besides, when you’re fishing for it, then the radio’s a fish. You’re not going to tell me it’s a talking fish, are you? After all, remember the expression, “silent as a carp.” CAMILLE . But why should we have to say “silent as a carp”? Why can’t we say “chatty as a carp”? AHMED . Because that would be absurd! Carps don’t talk. If you make language say any nonsense you want, if you don’t ground it in reality, it also goes to hell in a handbasket, along with all the wreckage of the world, carps, Rovers, and radios in one big verbal mush. CAMILLE . Nevertheless, my own private carp is a talking carp. Right, Rover?

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The transistor yaps: “The carp talks if it’s a metacarpal.” AHMED . There you go! You’re holding on a leash a talking carp who’s

named Rover who announces that he’s a bone! You’re the princess of total absurdity. CAMILLE . The solid world where you’re bored shitless for eighty cents an hour is a lot more absurd than that. AHMED . Bring it a little closer to me, this transistor-dog-metacarpal. CAMILLE . There’s nothing extraordinary about it. The following action: Camille lowers the transistor dangling from the string and raises it each time Ahmed tries to grab it. Ahmed jumps, wriggles, like a fish after bait. You’re the one who looks like a fish. AHMED . Right! And your transistor is a worm! The transistor croons: “I’m just a little worm on a string, a singing worm of words, a singing, stringing word-worm . . . ” Just watch what I do to singing worms! Ahmed ends up catching the radio. He throws it onto the ground and takes the end of the string between his teeth. Camille pulls on the string as if she were reeling in a fish. CAMILLE . Let go of this leash, Ahmed, and give me back my radio! Let me

have my music, you stinking old carp! AHMED (holding the string in his hand each time he talks, then putting it back

between his teeth). I’ve reestablished the order of the world! If it’s me you’re fishing for, fine! And if you want to keep me on a leash, perfect! Nothing absurd in any of that! Pull me, Camille! Pull me toward your tender absurdity! A man hooked on feminine absurdity: there’s nothing more rational in the entire universe! CAMILLE . I hope you drown! I’d rather fish up an old shoe than a leech of a philosopher like you!

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Ahmed the philosopher AHMED . Hook me, Camille, hook me! Pull! Reel me in, full of sense,

toward nonsense! CAMILLE . If the string breaks and you get crushed like a cow turd, it’ll serve

you right. Camille pulls, and ends up reeling in Ahmed until he joins her on the wall atop which she is perched. AHMED (sitting next to Camille). Nice catch, my foxy fisherwoman. CAMILLE . Now that’s the height of the absurd: going through all that rig-

marole just to wind up sitting next to me. AHMED . It’s pure reason, my dear Camille. In what happens between men and women, which is always strange, the means are more important than the end. Because the end, after all, is always the same. CAMILLE . You’ve hardly ended up at your end. AHMED . Given the means employed, it would be absurd if I didn’t get there one of these days. Now, nothing is really absurd in this world of ours. Night falls gently. Ahmed and Camille are daydreaming, perched atop their wall. Suddenly, we hear the radio, which is lying on the ground, saying: “And what about me all this time, me, a truly free radio, left lying on the ground? They treat me like a dog.” CAMILLE . That machine’s really starting to get on my nerves. Shut up,

Rover! AHMED . As a radio, it sounds a little absurd to me. CAMILLE . Mr. Philosopher! You’re always contradicting yourself, like a pair

of flip-flops. You said nothing was really absurd. AHMED . If there weren’t any exceptions, we’d be bored. Boy, would we be bored! The curtain closes very slowly.

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32. REPETITION

Ahmed, his first understudy, and his second understudy. Fairly lengthy silent opening. The three Ahmeds enter one by one, and, under the direction of the “real” Ahmed, begin performing various imitative exercises. Ahmed demonstrates what must be done, and the understudies do it. The first understudy is constantly upstaging the second one, trying to do more and better, introducing little flourishes, etc. The second understudy, who is always nodding in agreement and indicating that he has understood everything, either reduces the exercise to its skeletal form, to almost nothing, or does something else. Improvisations on this theme, everything needing to happen rather quickly. A sense of comic gymnastics. AHMED . You guys haven’t exactly been brilliant today. You’re quite far from

being able to play an acceptable Ahmed. I think you don’t understand very much about rehearsing. FIRST UNDERSTUDY . There’s nothing mysterious about it. A rehearsal is when you repeat.22 SECOND UNDERSTUDY . That’s exactly what I’d understood. A rehearsal is when you repeat. FIRST UNDERSTUDY . I just said that, imbecile! You don’t need to repeat me! SECOND UNDERSTUDY . And why shouldn’t I repeat you, since we’re working on repetition? FIRST UNDERSTUDY . We’re not repeating! We’re asking what it means to repeat! And all you can do is repeat what I say about repetition! SECOND UNDERSTUDY . But I’d understood very well! You said: “Rehearsal is when you repeat.” And since I agree with you, so that our master 187

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should understand your thinking, I repeated what you’d said. So he clearly saw that when I repeat what you say about rehearsal, it’s a repetition. FIRST UNDERSTUDY . But you repeated it like a cretin, whereas I’d said it intelligently. Therefore you repeated nothing at all. You produced a piece of cretinhood where there had been true thinking. AHMED . That’s the whole problem right there! That’s the difficulty in a nutshell! If you repeat what someone has said, it’s by definition no longer the same thing. Because he didn’t repeat it, he said it quite simply. If you resay it, it’s a repetition, but since what’s resaid has a different meaning from what’s said, finally, repetition doesn’t repeat, it changes. It’s like me. Me, I’m Ahmed. If I do such and such thing as Ahmed, and if you, my understudies, repeat it, it’s no longer the same thing at all, because you’re not Ahmed, just his understudies. For example, I hit this gentleman with my stick. He strikes the first understudy. FIRST UNDERSTUDY . Hey, easy! We’re just rehearsing! AHMED . Now, I ask you (to the second understudy) to repeat the gesture

that I’ve just performed. Go ahead! The second understudy strikes the first understudy. FIRST UNDERSTUDY . Ouch! Hey! You bastard! You better watch out! AHMED (to the audience). Did you see that? Did you observe it? He didn’t

hit him Ahmed-style. It was too spiteful, it wasn’t free and elegant, like my own hits. SECOND UNDERSTUDY . I understand impeccably. Repetition is impossible. The second understudy starts to leave. FIRST UNDERSTUDY . Where are you going, imbecile? SECOND UNDERSTUDY . I’m going home. Seeing as how our master has

shown that we can’t repeat him. It’s no longer worth the trouble to rehearse, repeating things over and over.

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Ahmed the philosopher AHMED . Ah, dear understudy! Wait! How did I show you that every repeti-

tion changes what it repeats? SECOND UNDERSTUDY . You showed it to me by making me repeat. FIRST UNDERSTUDY . Yeah, he showed it to you on my back! Numbskull!

Can’t you see that he’s pulling the wool over your eyes? He’s telling you that repetition serves to show that repetition doesn’t exist! You’re not out of the woods yet. SECOND UNDERSTUDY (returning to the stage). That’s convincing. I no longer have any good reason for getting out of the woods. FIRST UNDERSTUDY . You dodo bird! We’re not in the woods here! AHMED . And why not? Why can’t we be in the woods here? We can repeat here everything that happens in the woods! Check this out! Ahmed’s elaborate improvisation on the woods, woodchoppers, woodchucks, woodpeckers, etc. In the process he can make use of the understudies. This all has a Harlequinesque aspect. AHMED . Repeat that for me, both of you! And remember, while repeat-

ing it, that you can’t repeat it. It’s in nonrepetition that you have to conduct the maximum repetition. That’s where repetition goes, not someplace else! The better it’s repeated, the more it changes! SECOND UNDERSTUDY . Ain’t that the truth! That’s just what my grandmother used to say, with her voice trembling: the more things change, the more they stay the same. Taking it to its logical conclusion, anything is the repetition of anything else. FIRST UNDERSTUDY . You’re saying the opposite of your revered master, bonehead! He said: the more it’s the same thing, the more it changes. The more artfully you repeat, the more original you are. SECOND UNDERSTUDY . You’re repeating me perfectly. Finally, the more things change, the more things change. And the more things stay the same, the more they change too. And the more you change what’s changed, the more you do the same thing. Repetition doesn’t succeed in repeating, and nonrepetition doesn’t succeed in changing things. AHMED . But still, try repeating the little pantomime in the woods! FIRST UNDERSTUDY . We’re going to teach this pretentious Ahmed character a lesson. Because all he did was repeat some old Harlequin shtick.

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We’re going to repeat his repetition and so we’re going to change everything. SECOND UNDERSTUDY (enthusiastically). Exactly! As my grandmother used to say! We’re going to change everything, everything, everything, and everything! FIRST UNDERSTUDY . He can’t even manage to repeat twice in a row what his grandmother used to say! You just said she used to say that nothing changed, that it was always the same thing! What an airhead this understudy is! SECOND UNDERSTUDY . But I completely agree with you! Since nothing ever repeats anything, when my grandmother says, “It’s the same thing,” she means, “It’s completely different.” FIRST UNDERSTUDY . So try to do something different from your master, because his walk in the woods was old news. AHMED . Be careful! When one doesn’t want to repeat someone repeating something, it’s quite possible that all one ends up doing is to make no changes whatsoever in the thing that he, at least, was repeating. FIRST UNDERSTUDY . Don’t worry, sir. I have no intention of repeating your repetition of Harlequin. Are you with me, monkey-ass? You’re going to be Little Red Riding Hood in the woods, and I’m going to be the wolf. An elaborate improvisation by the two understudies, the principle of which should be that, little by little, between the overacting of the first understudy and the hapless inertia of the second understudy, we can no longer tell what is happening and we completely lose the theme of the woods. The scene more and more clearly turns into a story of a grotesque visitor to a brothel. At the end, exhausted, the two understudies lie down on the ground, panting. AHMED . But what have you just repeated? What is this clown show? FIRST UNDERSTUDY . It’s this imbecile’s fault! He plays Little Red Riding

Hood like a grandmother who runs a whorehouse! SECOND UNDERSTUDY . Exactly! As my grandmother, who ran a restaurant in Conflans-Sainte-Honorine, used to say, keep an eye on the waitresses or, before you know it, they’ll be turning tricks instead of tables! FIRST UNDERSTUDY . It’s unbelievable! This illiterate here can’t talk about anything except his grandmother!

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Ahmed the philosopher AHMED . And what about you? You played the wolf like a bumbling cus-

tomer in a provincial whorehouse. Could it be that you had a grandfather who frequented that type of establishment? FIRST UNDERSTUDY . A great-grandfather. Everybody used to snicker and call him Horace. Let me tell you, the memory of that snickering isn’t easy for me to shake. But my art is far above the family’s dirty laundry! AHMED . I’m not so sure about that! Indeed, perhaps one really repeats none other than one’s parents, grandparents, great-grandparents, greatgreat-grandparents . . . SECOND UNDERSTUDY . And ultimately, we all repeat the first man, Adam! FIRST UNDERSTUDY . Adam! What a nincompoop this understudy is! We’re descended from apes, not from Adam! Your grandmother must have looked like this when she was running her shitty restaurant. The first understudy imitates an ape. SECOND UNDERSTUDY . Oh, and here’s your great-grandfather Horace

when he used to go visit the whores! The second understudy imitates an ape. AHMED . Those are the worst apes I’ve ever seen! Watch carefully! Repeat

what I do! Now Ahmed imitates an ape. The two others look at him, then repeat what he does. All three of them exit, one by one, acting like apes.

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33. ORIGIN

Ahmed, Fatima. FATIMA . I don’t remember any more. No matter how much I twist my

brain like a washrag, it’s as dark as the night that falls suddenly on the casbah, not a thing! AHMED . Keep trying, dear Mother . . . It’s important to me. If I don’t manage to relate it properly, they’re going to make fun of your son. FATIMA . There are lots of reasons to make fun of you, my little philosopher of the housing project! But if anybody makes fun of you, just show him to me, so he can have fun getting his ears tickled by my broom! The only one who’s entitled to make fun of her Ahmed, who’s in her hair every day, is his mother, God console her for having a good-fornothing as her favorite, who’s too fond of flapping his gums, so that one day he’ll end up flapping in the wind once all the female and male authorities of Sarges-les-Corneilles get done stringing him up. But I just don’t remember at all, that’s all there is to it. AHMED . The one time I ask you something, I’m out of luck. FATIMA . What are you talking about, the one time? This Ahmed always has a bee in his bonnet! For months now you’ve constantly been asking me to nourish your life as a good-for-nothing-but-mooching-all-overSarges-les-Corneilles-with-your-philosophical-shaggy-dog-stories! Even if most of the time I know so well what you’re going to ask me that it’s just like if it’s me who’d asked you to ask me! But as for the thing that’s the nub of what you’re asking, sorry, it’s no longer in my memory.

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Ahmed the philosopher AHMED . But it is! It’s there! Everything stays in the memory, everything!

It’s just that you’re not managing to find it. Because memory is total, the problem is sometimes how to recover what’s in it. The entire past accompanies the present, the past of the entire universe accompanies the smallest present. There’s a philosopher who demonstrated this brilliantly. Bergson was his name. FATIMA . A Jew, I’m sure. AHMED . Mother! I’ve forbidden you to mention that someone is Jewish. What does that mean, “Jewish”? You yourself hate it when someone says you’re an Arab. FATIMA . Fine. As soon as no one says that I’m an Arab, I won’t say that anyone is a Jew. AHMED . And then you’ll be as stupid as those who insult you by calling you an Arab. FATIMA . And you, Ahmed, have the nerve to say right to the face of your mother, who brought you into the world and brought you up as far as your damn philosophy, that she’s as stupid as a fascist? AHMED . Oh, Mother! I wouldn’t dream of it! But don’t you see, this is also about memory. Because in the minuscule present of each of us, there’s the whole past universe, which means that it’s a serious stupidity to say things today like “Arab” or “Jew,” since any Arab has in his past all the Jews of the earth, and all the Jews any Arab, and so on. Ahmed’s improvisation on the universal content of memory. Therefore, also, what we’re talking about is in your immense universal memory. Here, I’m going to help you. Was it there (he points to the audience) or was it here (he points to the stage)? FATIMA (making a great effort). Neither one nor the other, for all that I remember, but I don’t remember at all. Is it so important that you’ve got to keep battering my eardrums about this? AHMED . It’s essential. Otherwise, your son is going to be the laughingstock of the whole town. OK. So, it was back there (he points to the wings), since it was neither here, nor out in front. Was it a long time before you and my beloved father the worker, may he be happy wherever he is, if he’s anywhere, conceived me? Or was it a long time after? FATIMA . Neither one nor the other, at least in my recollection, which is almost as dark and as confused as the brain of that poor Moustache. 194

Ahmed the philosopher AHMED . So then it was around the time of my conception, since it was nei-

ther clearly after nor clearly before. Did it happen closer to the evening or closer to the morning? FATIMA . Neither one nor the other, somewhere in between, it seems to me, if I’m not confusing this story with another one, in my unfortunate memory, which is as tidy as a package of spaghetti spilled all over the floor. AHMED . Good! Now we’re getting somewhere! It was nighttime, then, because it was between the evening and the morning. And was it neutral, or was it unpleasant? FATIMA . Neither one nor the other. I’m almost sure of it. Wait for me to look around at all the packages stored in the shop inside my head from the beginning in the casbah of my too long life, may God make it last as long as he wants. Yes, yes! It’s in the jumble of all the folds of all the packages of existence, but as for neutral or unpleasant, it was neither one. AHMED . Fantastic! Thank you, Mother! We’re moving through universal memory with the compass of your friendship! Therefore, it was pleasant, since it was neither neutral nor unpleasant. And was it very, very short, or just kind of brief? FATIMA . Wait for me to pull things together . . . very, very short, or kind of brief . . . I see it in the mist, this story, it was a long time ago . . . I’ve got it! Or else it’s just that your old mother can go from one thing to another in her memory without the error light going on brightly enough. I’d say it was neither one nor the other, neither very, very short, nor kind of brief. AHMED . Then it was long, necessarily! FATIMA . Yes! Yes! It was long! It was wonderfully long! AHMED . I sense that we’re close! Let me just remind you of all that you’ve found in your memory of everything: it was back there; it was around the time of my conception; it was at night; it was pleasant; and it was long . . . Come, Mother, make one last effort! Was it motionless, or did it move a lot? FATIMA . Let me see! Between the two, maybe? AHMED . So, neither really motionless, nor really moving a lot . . . A sort of very calm movement or a just a slightly agitated rest? FATIMA . No, not at all. That’s not it at all. In fact, I’m remembering all of this better and better. I feel it stirring somewhere in the immense 195

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circumlocutions of memory, my dear son! It’s like when you don’t come home at night, and I keep tossing and turning thinking of all the possible ways for the philosopher to spend the time between evening and morning, and then there’s one way that I know is the right one, and if it’s good for you I fall asleep immediately. No, it’s not between very motionless and moving a lot. It’s both at once. AHMED . Whatever you do, just don’t fall asleep! We’re approaching the goal! It was a mixture of great movement and motionlessness, night, back there, around the time of my conception, and it was as long as it was pleasant . . . FATIMA . By almighty Lord Allah! I’ve got it! I’ve got it! As if it were before my very eyes! I see the whole story! AHMED . You see! You see that with the compass of Bergson and the help of one who loves you, you can go anywhere in memory! So then! Tell it to me, this memory! FATIMA . In front of all these people? Who gave you permission to be so shameless in your chattering with your own mother who completely nourished you from the muscle of your buttocks to the philosophical glottis that dangles behind your teeth? AHMED . All right, then, whisper it into my ear. Fatima whispers at length into Ahmed’s ear. So there it is! It’s wonderful! Your son no longer runs the risk of being made fun of! And I’m sure you enjoyed remembering this whole story. FATIMA . You rascal! I can’t deny it. AHMED . Memory is a beautiful thing . . . FATIMA . It’s like a whole country whose map you have hanging on the wall of your head. They hug each other.

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34. CONTRADICTION

Ahmed. AHMED . I’m going to tell you a horrifying story. A story that’ll make your

hair stand on end. A story next to which slasher movies filled with gore and chain saws and zombies whose skin is falling off in ragged strips filled with stinking pustules are like delicious little cherry tarts. I promise you. Next to my story if you were watching television and you saw a baby-monster with teeth like needles, covered with hair the color of rotten peaches, who’s just been born devouring its mother’s breasts, from which the blood is splattering all over the place, and then gouging out the eyes of its cute little older sister with a screwdriver, you’d laugh your head off because of the contrast. Once upon a time, in Sarges-les-Corneilles, there was a demon. This demon lived on Dog-breath Street, appropriately enough. He was a demon of the cities, not like the demon in the tales priests tell, who lives in hell with a pitchfork and a tail. No, your everyday, familiar kind of demon. He was afraid, because the mother of all vices is fear. Someone who’s always afraid loves crushing the weak, if he ever encounters any of them, preferably by arranging for them to be unexpectedly afflicted by all the suffering that the anonymous and obscene activity of the forces of order can produce. He was lazy, because the lazy have an abject hatred of anyone who’s doing something with their life. He would shout everywhere that he was French, along the lines of “I, sir, am French”; because those who, to feel like they exist, need to hide behind an adjective of this type become informers and torturers at the drop of a hat. He secretly hated himself, because someone who doesn’t

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find anything to like in himself finds everything in others despicable. He trembled in front of his wife, a demonic shrew in her own way, as mean and bitter as they come, because men who swagger around in the neighborhood bar telling stories about how they punched some towel head’s lights out and who think they’ve got to keep showing off everywhere—this is their favorite metaphor—how big their balls are, go back to their houses terrorized, if only because their shrews know that these famous balls aren’t exactly all they’re cracked up to be—far from it. Because since the days when they started pickling them in all the gallons of pastis they’ve drunk, they’ve shrunk enormously. Assuming, of course, that they’d been big to begin with, which nobody can verify. In short, he was a red-blooded patriotic monster. I’d often had occasion to beat him with my stick, just to avenge the shining world for all the disgusting filth he’d infected it with. But I was getting a little tired of always having to beat him. Terror eventually wearies the people’s avenger. I was trying to figure out how to destroy him once and for all. Kill him? No way! That’s not my style. I would have liked to have broken him down from inside, so that he’d be eaten up by his own mental acid. One day, not far from the exit of the school, I see him talking in his unctuous way to little Aïcha. I should explain that Aïcha is Ibrahim Boubakar’s kid; he’s totally crazy about her. Ibrahim’s a street cleaner in Sarges-les-Corneilles, a terrific guy, really, the kind of guy you’re lucky if you meet once or twice in your life. A very meditative and serious thinker, with a calm experience of life and an inner certainty that revives you when you talk with him. The girl’s mother died two years ago, and my friend Ibrahim Boubakar is raising his daughter all by himself. Of course, when I see the demon offering candy to Aïcha, I think what you’re thinking. And then I think, no! The demon isn’t one of those small-time playground lechers! He’s not your friendly neighborhood child molester! So what’s he up to? I’ll spare you the details: Ahmed is equal to any challenge. Anyway, I manage to overhear the conversation of the demon and little Aïcha. Several times, in fact. And this is when all the hair on my head stands on end and when we enter into the realm of horror. Because I understand that the demon had no intention of touching Aïcha, none whatsoever! No, instead, he was explaining to her, calmly, that it would be very funny if she told her

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father that a man had been coming to pick her up at the school for quite some time, and that he’d strip naked and then take her into his bed, and that she too would strip naked, and that he’d do this and that to her, and that she’d learned all sorts of new things about men and ladies, and so forth. With a highly seductive voice and lots of candy, he succeeded in teaching her her lesson. And I realized that the kid bought it! I saw that she was very tempted to tell her father such an extraordinary story! Her father whom she really wanted to amaze for once in her life. Because she knew that her father loved her more than anyone, but she wasn’t sure if he was amazed enough by her. And the demon would score more points every day, since she was becoming more and more tempted. He’d explain to her that maybe her father would be really angry, but that she absolutely mustn’t tell him that these were just made-up stories, because then she’d look ridiculous. And Aïcha was afraid of only one thing in the world, namely, looking ridiculous, especially in front of her father. And then the demon would go back to filling her head with juicy and plausible details, which were increasingly precise, and she’d listen to him like he was telling her the tales of Hans Christian Andersen that had somehow been hidden from her up until this point. And I sensed that very soon, to amaze her father, she was going to tell him all of these dreadful stories. And that they’d be so precise and so dreadful that no one would be able to imagine that she’d made it all up. And I imagined Aïcha’s father, my friend Ibrahim Boubakar, who didn’t really believe in the existence of Evil, going mad, between the utter desolation of his universe and the murderous desire that would contaminate his great wise man’s soul. Obviously, I wasn’t going to let that happen. But I was worried about the method. Beatings with the stick didn’t do much good. Should I go tell Ibrahim? Just knowing what had happened, even though his daughter hadn’t been touched, would have spoiled his life for the rest of his days. Denouncing people to the police is something I absolutely forbid myself. Anyway, if I were to go to the police, it’s me they’d arrest, no matter what I told them. To cut to the chase, I raced to the school, where I found Aïcha and the demon, who, sensing that success was near, was licking his chops over his final lessons. The demon, thinking I’m about to beat him again, tries to flee. I hold him firmly, very firmly, by his tie. And I say: “Aïcha! You’re not going to

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breathe a word of anything this awful fellow has told you! If you say anything about it to your father, even just once, even just a little bit, I’ll explain to him that you’re just repeating lies this awful fellow has taught you while giving you candy, and you’ll look ridiculous! Do you understand? Everybody in Sarges-les-Corneilles will make fun of you. So now, run home!” Which she did, no questions asked, and I realized that, with her fear of ridicule, she was going to keep her lips doublesealed. “As for you, Demon, it’s just you and me now. I ought to throw you into the river with your pockets full of lead. But I’ve come up with something worse: if you don’t bury all this in the deepest silence, I’m going to tell your wife and I’ll furnish proof, that you chase after little girls, and, what’s more, after little African girls. Plus, I’ll warn Ibrahim Boubakar, who’ll kill you like the rat that you are.” The idea of the wife had come to me during the night, after I’d gotten over the horror that had paralyzed me at first, because I too, taught by Ibrahim Boubakar, sometimes stop thinking that Evil exists. You see, the demon’s wife is the demon’s contradiction. His inner, intimate contradiction, the one that constitutes him as a demon. On the one hand, he’s really a demon only because what’s closest to him, what shares his demonic existence, is made of nothing more than hatred, avarice, and terror. If he had a nice little wife that he loved, how could he be a demon? But, on the other hand, he’s so weak in the face of his wife, who has a wellestablished right to hate him every day, that his demonic resources fail him whenever she spits her venom at him. His shrew is indispensable if he’s going to be a true demon of the cities, yet, at the same time, she thwarts his demonic zeal by demoralizing him and reflecting back to him the image of a wretched coward who trembles from head to toe beneath a woman’s insults. There’s a very great philosopher, a true German professor, who knew everything, and even the whole of the Whole, who said: Each thing develops according to its inner contradiction. The demon, too, develops according to his inner contradiction, I thought during the night, and his contradiction is his wife. Once I’d spoken with him, the demon, whom I was still holding tight with his tie, was giving me this funny look, his little blue albino pig eyes completely shrunken to pinpoints sitting right next to each other. He said to me: “I know you! You’re not going to see Boubakar, because you don’t want to disturb that Negro’s life. And you’re not

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going to see my wife, because you know she’ll never believe an Arab.” That disconcerted me a little, right there. I’d forgotten that a demon, a real one, necessarily has flashes of psychological lucidity. Completely disgusted by the mere physical contact with him, I let him go, and he took off like a bat out of hell. A few days later, what do I see? The demon chatting up Aïcha again. It’s only fair to say that the kid looked mistrustful; she looked wary. Meanwhile, I don’t waste any time. I run to Dog-breath Street, I race up the stairs, and I ring the demon’s doorbell. The shrew opens the door, I stick my foot in the door, and I blurt out to her that her husband is busy seducing little African girls with candy as they’re leaving school. As she starts to open her mouth, I immediately add: “I know, I know, you can’t believe an Arab, but you don’t have to believe, all you have to do is look. Follow me!” Her wickedness getting the better of her, because, being the opposite of Boubakar, she believes only in Evil, she’s running behind me all the way down Dog-breath Street. We hide behind a tree and we clearly see the demon offering Aïcha an assortment of orange lollipops, which, thanks to her fear of ridicule, the little girl is eyeing with suspicion. “So,” I say to the shrew, “is your husband doing this out of charity to the poor?” Now she too gives me a funny look, with the same blue albino pig eyes as the demon, but metallic to boot, like coins in the cash register of her round head. And then she hightails it out of there. I also had the pleasure of seeing that Aïcha hadn’t taken any of the orange lollipops and suddenly ditched the demon. And you know what happened next? A few days later? Well, the shrew fed the demon rat poison. And, since he really was a rat, all it took was one little dose of rat poison to kill him just like that. And she, the shrew, got twenty years in prison. And since they shut her up in a cell with some tough cookies who made her life absolutely miserable, she couldn’t take it anymore and so one fine day she hanged herself. Here, then, is the triumph of the tremendous German professor I was just chatting with you about, Hegel. This Hegel not only explained that each thing developed according to its inner contradiction but also showed that this development led each thing to its death. By virtue of drawing on its contradiction, the thing dies. This is why he used to say: everything that comes into being deserves to perish. You see how

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it works! The demon’s contradiction is his wife. He lived off of her, as a demon, and he died from her. It makes sense. And as for deserving to perish, well, he was a real champion in that category. But it gets even better! This same Hegel used to say that contradiction itself, that which leads the thing to its death, must also die. Ultimately, contradiction is itself contradicted. As the shrew had clearly understood! As the contradiction of the demon, she made him die, but she had to die too. The shrew hanging from the bars of her cell is the contradiction of contradiction! And do you know what Hegel called that, the contradiction of contradiction? He called it Absolute Knowledge. Because it’s the death of death. If you see a repulsive shrew hanging from the bars of a prison cell, rejoice! You’ve at least seen a little piece of the Absolute. In conclusion, all’s well that ends well. It’s not as horrible a story as I’d thought. It won’t keep you awake at night. Sorry about that!

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