[1553] Worm, be Worm, you'll see, it's im
[p. 68r]possible, what a velvet glove, a little worn at the knuckles with
all the hard hitting. [1554] Bah, let's turn the black eye. [1555] And the starching begin at last, of this old clout so patiently pawed in vain,
as limp and drooping still as the first day. [1556] But it is solely
a question of voices, no other image is appropriate. [1557] Let it go
through me at last, the right one, the last one, his who has none,
by his own confession. [1558] Do they think they'll lull me, with all
this hemming and hawing? [1559] What can it matter to me, that I succeed
or fail? [1560] The undertaking is none of mine. [1561] If they want me to
succeed I'll fail, so as not to be rid of my persecutors. [1562]
Is there a single word of mine in all I say? [1563] No, I have
no voice, in this matter I have no voice. [1564] That's one of the reasons
why I confused myself with Worm. [1565] But I have no reasons either, no
reason, I'm like Worm, without voice or reason, I'm Worm, no, if
I were Worm I wouldn't know it, I wouldn't say it, I wouldn't
say anything, I'd be Worm. [1566] But I don't say anything, I don't know
anything, these voices are not mine, nor these thoughts, but the
voices and the thoughts of the enemies who beset me. [1567] Who make me say that I can't be Worm, the inexpugnable. [1568] Who make
me say that I am he perhaps, as they are. [1569] Who make me say that
since I can't be he I must be he. [1570] That since I couldn't be Mahood,
as I might have been, I must be Worm, as I cannot be. [1571] But is it
still they who say that when I have failed to be Worm I'll be
Mahood, automatically, on the rebound. [1572] As if, and a little silence,
as if I were big enough now to take a hint and understand, certain
things, but they're wrong, I need explanations, of everything, and
even then, I don't understand, that's how I'll sicken them in the
end, by my stupidity, so they say, to lull me, to make me think
I am stupider than I am. [1573] And is it still they who say that when I
surprise them all and am Worm at last, then at last I'll be
Mahood, Worm proving to be Mahood the moment one is he? [1574] Ah if they
could only begin, and do what they want with me, and suceed 
at last,
in doing what they want with me, I'm ready to be whatever they
[p. 69r] want, I'm tired of being matter, matter, pawed and pummelled
endlessly in vain. [1575] Or give up and leave me lying there in a heap, in
such a heap that none would ever be found again, to try and
fashion it. [1576] But they are not of the same mind, they are all of
the same kidney and yet they don't know what they want to do with
me, they don't know where I am, or what I'm like, I'm like dust, they
want to make a man out of dust. [1577] Listen to them, losing heart! [1578] That's to lull me, till I imagine I hear myself saying, myself at
last, to myself at last, that it can't be they, speaking thus, that
it can only be I, speaking thus. [1579] Ah if I could find a voice of
my own, in all this clamour, it would be the end of their troubles, and
of mine. [1581] That's why there are all these little silences, to make
me break them. [1582] They think I can't bear silence, that [⁁] some day, somehow, my horror of
silence will force to break. [1583] That's
why they are always breaking off, to try and drive me to that extremity. [1584] But they don't dare be silent for long, the whole fabric might
collapse. [1585] It's true I hate these chasms they all bend over, on
the alert for the murmur of a man. [1586] It isn't silence, it's pitfalls,
into which nothing would please me better than to fall, with the
little cry that might be taken for human, like a wounded ouistiti,
the first and last, and vanish for good and all, having sqeaked . [1587] Well, if they ever succeed in getting me to give a voice to
Worm, in a moment of euphoria, who knows, perhaps I'll make it
mine, in a moment of confusion. [1588] There we have the stake. [1589] But they
won't. [1590] Were they able to get Mahood to speak? [1591] It seems to
me not. [1592] I think Murphy spoke now and then, the others
too perhaps, I don't remember, but it was clumsily done, I could
see the ventriloquist. [1593] I feel it's about to begin. [1594] They must consider me sufficiently stupefied, with all their balls about being
and existing. [1595] Yes, now that I've forgotten who Worm is, where
he is, what he's like, I'll begin to be he. [1596] Anything rather than these
college quips. [1597] Quick, a place. [1598] With no way in, no way out,
a safe place. [1599] Not like Eden. [1600] And Worm inside. [1601] Feeling nothing,
knowing nothing, capable of nothing, wanting nothing. [1602] Until the
instant he hears the sound that will never stop. [1603] Then it's the
[p. 70r]DOODLE 8 end, Worm no longer is. [1604] We know it, but we don't say it, we
say it's the awakening, the beginning of Worm, for now we must
speak, and speak of Worm. [1605] It's no longer he, but let us proceed
as if it were still he, he at last, who hears, and trembles, and is delivered
over, to affliction, and the struggle to withstand it, the
starting eye, the labouring mind. [1606] Yes, let us call that thing
Worm, so as to exclaim, the sleight of hand accomplished, Oh
look, life again, life evrywhere and always, the life that is
on every tongue, the only possible! [1607] Poor Worm, who thought he
was different, there he is in the madhouse for life. [1608] Where am I? [1609] That is my first question, after [⁁] an age of listening. [1610] From it,
when it hasn't be answered, I'll rebound towards others, of a
more personal nature, much later. [1611] Perhaps I'll end up, before
returning to regaining my coma, by thinking of myself as living, technically
speaking. [1612] But let us proceed with method. [1613] I shall do my best, as
always, since I cannot do otherwise. [1614] I shall submit, more corpse-obliging than ever. [1615] I shall transmit the words as received, by the ear, or roared through a trumpet into the arsehole,
in all their purity, and in the same order, as far as possible. [1616] This infinitesimal hesitation, between the arrival and the departure, this slight delay in evacuation, is all
I have to worry about. [1617] The truth about me will boil forth at
last, and scald me, provided they don't start stuttering again. [1618] I listen. [1619] Enough procrastination. [1620] I'm Worm, that is to say I am no longer
he, since suddenly I hear. [1621] But I'll forget that in the heat of
misery, I'll forget I am no longer Worm, but a kind of tenth-rate
Toussaint Louverture, that's what they counting on. [1622] Worm then
I catch this sound that will never stop, monotonous beyond
words, and yet not altogether devoid of a certain variety. DOODLE 9 [1623] At the end of I know not what eternity, they don't say, this has
sufficiently exasperated my intelligence for it to grasp that
the nuisance is a voice and that the realm of nature, in which I may
flatter myself already I have a foot has other noises to
[⁁] offer which are even more unpleasant, and will not fail to make themselves heard before
[p. 71r] long. [1624] Don't tell me after that I had no predispositions for
man's estate. [1625] What a weary road since that first misfortune, [1626] what nerves torn alive from the heart of insentience,
with the appertaining terror and the cerebellum on fire. [1627] It took
him a long time to adapt himself to this excoriation. [1628] To realize
pooh it's nothing. [1629] A trifle. [1630] The common lot. [1631] A joke. DOODLE 10 [1632] That will not last for ever. [1633] made the most of while it For me to gather while I may.
[1634] They mentioned roses. [1635] I'll smell them before I'm finished. [1636] Then they'll put the accent on the thorns. [1637] What prodigious
variety. [1638] The thorns they'll have to come and stick into me, as
into their unfortunate Jesus. [1639] No, I need nobody, they'll start
srpouting under my arse, unaided, some day I feel myself soaring
above my condition. [1640] A billybowl of thorns and the air
perfume laden. [1641] But not so fast. [1642] I still leave much to be desired,
I have no technique, none. [1643] For example, in case you don't believe
me, I don't yet know how to move, either locally, in relation
to myself, or bodily, in relation to the shit. [1644] I don't know how
to want to, I want to in vain. [1645] What doesn't come to me from me has
come to the wrong address. [1646] Similarly my understanding is not
yet sufficiently well oiled to function without the pressure of
some critical circumstance, such as a violent pain felt for the
first time. [1647] Some nice point in semantics, for example, of a
nature to accelerate the march of the hours, could not retain
my attention. [1648] For others the time-abolishing joys of impersonal
and disinterested speculation. [1649] I only think, if that is the
name for this vertiginous panic as of hornets smoked out
of their nest, once a certain degree of terror has been exceeded. [1650] Does this mean that I am less exposed to it, by the grace of inurement? [1651] To think so would be to underestimate the extent of the
repertory in which I am plunged and which, it appears, is nothing
compared to what is waiting for me at the conclusion of the
novitiate. [1652] These lights gleaming low afar, then rearing up in
a blaze and sweeping down upon me, blinding, to devour me, are
merely one example. DOODLE 11 [1653] My familiarity with them avails me nothing,
they invariably give me to reflect. [1654] Each time up to now at the
[p. 72r] last moment, just as I am beginning to sizzle, they go out,
smoking and hissing, and nevertheless each time my phlegm is
shattered. [1655] And in my head, which I am beginning to locate to
my satisfaction, above and a little to the right, the sparks spurt
and dash themselves out against the walls. [1656] Sometimes I say to
myself that I am in a head, it's terror makes me say it, and
the longing to be in safety, surrounded on all sides by massive
bone. [1657] And I add that I am foolish to let myself be frightened
by another's thoughts, lacerating my sky with harmless
gleams fires and assailing me with noises signifying nothing. [1658] But one
thing at a time. [1659] And often all sleeps, as
when I was really Worm, except this voice which has denatured
me, which never stops, but often grows confused and hesitant,
as if it were going to abandon me. [1660] But it is merely a passing
weakness, unless it is done on purpose, to teach me hope. [1661] Strange
thing, ruined as I am and still young in this abjection they
have brought me to, I sometimes seem to remember what I was like
when I was Worm, and not yet delivered into their hands. [1662] That's
to tempt me into saying, I am indeed Worm after all, and into
thinking that after all he may have become the thing that I
have become. [1663] But it doesn't come off. [1664] But they'll devise another
means, less childish, of getting me to admit, or pretend to admit, that I am he whose name they call me by, and no other. [1665] Or they'll wait, counting on my weariness, as they press me ever
harder, to wipe him from my memory who cannot be brought
to the pass they have brought me to, not to mention yesterday,
not to mention tomorrow.[Stet] [1666] And yet it seems to me I remember, and shall never forget, what I was like when I was
he, before all became confused. [1667] But that is of course impossible,
since Worm could not know what he was like, or who he was, that's
how they want me to reason. [1668] And it seems to me too, which is
even more deplorable, that I could become Worm again, if only
I were left in peace. [1669] This transmission is really excellent. [1670] I
wonder if it's going to get us somewhere. [1671] If only they
[p. 73r] would stop talking for nothing, pending their stopping everything.