Second paragraph of “Erostratus”/”Erostrate”, third story in my edition (it has been published under two different titles, so I give both above):
| On a seventh floor balcony: that’s where I should have spent my whole life. You have to prop up moral superiorities with material symbols or else they’ll tumble. But exactly what is my superiority over men? Superiority of position, nothing more: I have placed myself above the human within me and I study it. That’s why I always liked the towers of Notre-Dame, the platforms of the Eiffel Tower, the Sacré-Coeur, my seventh floor on the Rue Delambre. These are excellent symbols. | Au balcon d’un sixième : c’est là que j’aurais du passer toute ma vie. Il faut étayer les supériorités morales par des symboles matériels, sans quoi elles retombent. Or, précisément, quelle est ma supériorité sur les hommes ? Une supériorité de position, rien d’autre : je me suis placé au-dessus de l’humain qui est en moi et que je contemple. Voilà pourquoi j’aimais les tours de Notre-Dame, les plates-formes de la tour Eiffel, le Sacré-cœur, mon sixième de la rue Delambre. Ce sont d’excellents symboles. |
A collection of five short stories by the famous philosopher, two of which, the first and the last, are really good; “The Wall” is the story of a man condemned to death in the Spanish Civil War awaiting his execution, and “Childhood of a Leader” is the story of an authoritarian politician’s rise to power and abandonment of his emotional connections. I was not as overwhelmed by the others; “Intimacy” is a rather dull story about sex, and portrayal of a serial killer in “Erostratus” is not really in tune with today’s Zeitgeist. But the two good ones are very good. You can get it here.
This was my top book acquired last year and my top non-genre fiction book. Next on those piles respectively are Death of a Naturalist, by Seamus Heaney, and The Light Years, by Elizabeth Jane Howard.
