I quite worship Proust, Kafka and Montaigne; and Nabokov when my mind-body is calm and a little sedate. It is a strange thing with one’s writers; the utterly natural but paradoxically so aberrant forces amassing in one’s mind look for them while writing a poem, a story, a novel, for structural and mindful elements and parts to grasp at and to put to immediate use. I cannot say more of the importance of one’s writers; they gel the jewels which, if one is on a roll, are already there and just waiting for the almost pyrrhic treatment. This, of course, is the only way. Give the student his corner. Wait and see for signs. His face will tell you everything. Is his brilliance alive? Can you take him to the circus? Oh sure, all of these things are alright. How long will he live? He must finish six hundred more books. He will lose his youthful eyesight. He will lose his youth. But he must read six hundred books. Then you can take him to the circus and see if his brilliance is alive and how long he will live. But first the six hundred books. Naturlich.
Anatol Cordua © 2017
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