And if
you would like to ask for asylum, don't ask, don't even try, don't
even want to.
What
could you get if you asked? Let's assume you told your story. Let's
assume you wrote your story quite nicely and it's a good, witty
story. Or let's assume somebody else transformed your story into a
tale, or into a novel, or a play, or a poem ...... or maybe it's just
a thread, one thread in a huge carpet made of thousands of such
threads, one strand in a huge novel composed of thousands of such
strands and titled Refugees – your name could be changed,
you face could be changed, your biography could be changed so
thoroughly you would hardly recognize yourself, you would not even
suspect you had been somebody else, you would be surprised you could
have been somebody like this very character, you would found it a
fable about former incarnations ...... Of course, we could change
nothing – nothing in you, but everything around you – you would
live long and happily: And finally he asked for asylum in
Liberland. He got it and he was living there very long and very
happily. Well, it means, in such case you would live but one
short sentence. With no doubt you would prefer an epic much longer
than Mahabharata. Yes. Surely. And with no doubt as well,
behind the notion happily would stand your idea of happiness,
how you imagine it, how you think it is to be happy. That is why I
asked you not to ask, not to try to ask, because your life would be
transformed into one short phrase and you would be disappointed, you
would cry, swear, get furious, and could do nothing against it ......
But maybe the past tense could be replaced with the present tense? He
asked for asylum in Liberland. He got it. Now he lives there and is
very happy. Well, sounds better, no doubt, because it doesn't
indicate an end. He lives and lives and lives. He keeps on living,
will be living nobody knows how long. Somebody will read the text in
two hundred years and you will be still alive. In the case of the
past tense it sounds quite mournfully – somebody is reading it now,
and you are already dead. Happily dead. Or happy dead.
So,
has it any sense to ask, when you can ask for nothing? Isn't reading
enough? Just think about it – you are reading these phrases, so you
are already in here. You are a Reader. You can't get better status.
But
maybe it is possible? It can happen I'm just running away from a
second-rate crime story. Or I am persecuted by a poor style,
tasteless phrases, lack of reflection . . . . . . . and I'd like to
be in a beautiful stanza . . . . . .
And
even if you got the asylum here, just think: have you found a right
place for yourself? This is something absolutely boring – zigzags,
windings, labyrinths, ceaseless and constant what-is-the-point?
what-is-this-mess-about? this-can't-be-a-novel-can-it? so-what-is-it?
. . . . . . . Is this really what you were thinking and dreaming
about? Remember, you are a Reader. You will never get the right to
write anything in. However you will keep for ever your right to read
and interpret. What can simple things be complicated for? Simple
things are complex enough, is there any good reason to make them more
complex?
