Such a constant fall's companion

my classmate

I should say .. that blame for what

happened to me cannot be laid to the

war. On the contrary, the war, I am

certain, might still save me .. All

the war did was to remove my last

scruple about keeping to myself, a-

bout consuming the years and my heart

alone .. The war had made it legiti-

mate to turn in on oneself and live

from day to day without regretting

lost opportunities. It was as if I

had been waiting for the war a long

time and had been counting on it, a

war so vast and unprecedented that

one could easily go home to the hills,

crouch down, and let it rage in the

skies above the cities .. That species

of dull rancor that hemmed in my youth

found a refuge and a horizon in the war.

It almost doesn't mat-
ter if Leon Trotsky ev-
er said, You may not be 
be interested in war,
but war is interested in
you. He's not running.

The war's propagation of
self-calumny has failed,
and now that its objects
and techniques have been
exposed, we are told the
nation has a more urgent,
a higher calling than jus-
tice for her people.

The election in the United
States is about this large
and constant lie. War re-
mains very much interested
in us, and it has a name,
which is not ours.

        Imagine being so
        discouraged, Auguste.

        Imagine wanting
        people to be, Hercule.

Alexander Johansson

Cesare Pavese
The Selected Works
  of Cesare Pavese;
  The House on the Hill
1949
R.W. Flint, translation
Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 1968©
New York Review Books, 2001©