#*karakterisasi

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The Fall by Albert Camus (translated by Justin O’Brien)

I have never been able to believe that human affairs were serious matters. I have no idea where the serious might lie, except that it was not in all this I saw around me—which seemed to me merely an amusing game, or tiresome. There are really efforts and convictions I have never been able to understand. I always looked with amazement, and a certain suspicion, on those strange creatures who died for money, fell into despair over the loss of a “position”, or sacrificed themselves with a high and mighty manner for the prosperity of their family ... To be sure, I occasionally pretended to take life seriously. But very soon the frivolity of seriousness struck me and I merely went on playing my role as well as I could. I played at being efficient, intelligent, virtuous, civic-minded, shocked, indulgent, fellow-spirited, edifying ... I was absent at the moment when I took up the most space.

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The Fall by Albert Camus (translated by Justin O’Brien)

The more I accuse myself, the more I have a right to judge you. Even better, I provoke you into judging yourself, and this relieves me of that much of the burden.  Ah, mon cher, we are odd, wretched creatures, and if we merely look back over our lives, there’s no lack of occassions to amaze and horrify ourselves. Just try. I shall listen, you maybe sure, to your own confession with a great feeling of fraternity

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At My Least and Most Aware by Durga Chew-Bose, from Too Much and Not The Mood.

I’m still a difficult woman who startles easy. I still forget to wash the apple before I eat it. I’m still oddly thankful for the rush of hot air let off from the sides of buses. Like things could be hotter, grosser. I’m still doubtful my stories possess a clear point. The sound of men gulping water still bothers me. I still interrupt. I’m still unprepared for how unusual it feels to receive a postcard; the traveled touch of card stock; of tapered handwriting chasing vertically up the side, allowing for a squished, tender sign-off. Thinking of you. Miss you. An unforeseen Yours. Even the faint sound of a postcard falling through my mail slot and landing on my floor is, somehow, still enchanted. 

I still prefer counting to fourteen instead of ten. I still don’t mind, perhaps I even like, ice cream’s cold swallow rising up my throat so I can swallow it back down again. I still only have nightmares when I take naps. I still wonder what stops me, what version of me would exist had I let someone take my picture when I was younger, wearing a bikini with my hair up, while in the background an out-of-focus lake contrives to mislay the mood. Because hanging over pictures of lakes and girls and summer is the impression, often, of a missing person.

I still have trouble discerning between loneliness and solitude, and Sundays, and Schubert’s sonatas. I’m still dismally unfunny; restless when I sit on grass; too much of a daughter to forget about the dead. Even though I own none, I still love the size of LP records. Their square, tactile bigness. And I still believe that people who buy them and collect them aren’t snobs at all, but true blues. A record sleeve is unwieldy. To hold one is to sometimes appear like you’re hugging one.

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The Ill-Made Knight (The Once and the Future King #3) by T.H. White

All my life I have wanted to do miracles. I have wanted to be holy. I suppose it was ambition or pride or some other unworthy thing.  It was not enough for me to conquer the world — I wanted to conquer heaven too. I was so grasping that it was not enough to be the strongest knight — I had to be the best as well. That is the worst of making day-dreams. It is why I tried to keep away from you. I knew that if I was not pure, I could never do miracles. 

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Immortality by Milan Kundera (translated by Peter Kussi)

Ever since she had seen him retreat from those twelve-year-old boys she often imagined him in this situation: he is on a sinking ship; there are only a few lifeboats and there isn't room for everyone; there is a furious stampede on deck. At first Father rushes along with the others, but when he sees how they all push and shove, ready to trample each other underfoot, and a wild-eyed woman strikes him with her fist because he is in her way, he suddenly stops and steps aside. And in the end he merely watches the overloaded lifeboats as they are slowly lowered amid shouts and curses, toward the raging waves.

What name to give this attitude? Cowardice? No. Cowards are afraid of dying and will fight to survive. Nobility? Undoubtedly, if he had acted out of regard for his fellows. But Agnes did not believe this was his motive. What was it then? She couldn't say. Only one thing seemed certain: on a sinking ship where it was necessary to fight in order to board a lifeboat, Father would have been condemned in advance.

Yes, that much was certain. The question that arises is this: had Father hated the people on the ship ... ? No ... hate traps us by binding us too tightly to our adversary. This is the obscenity of war: the intimacy of mutually shed blood, the lascivious proximity of two soldiers who, eye to eye, bayonet each other. Agnes was sure: it was precisely this kind of intimacy that Father found repugnant. The melee on the ship filled him with such disgust that he preferred to drown. The physical contact with people who struck and trampled and killed one another seemed far worse to him than a solitary death in the purity of the waters.

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The Book of Queens by Joumana Haddad

Beds. Two-by-two meters of heaven and hell, where so many promises are made and broken. A tumultuous ocean of ups and downs, yeses and nos. Fouad was our bed's iceberg and I was its Titanic. Which one of us sank the other? ... Don't say sex. Sex is just a cover up. A cover up for that desperate search of oneness, that longing to forget our intrinsic loneliness. If Fouad was a thoughtful lover, would I have still cheated on him?

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Cala Ibi oleh Nukila Amal

...berkali-kali aku menatap wajah seorang pria dengan bekas luka di wajah, di meja sebelah. Bekas lukanya membujur turun dari pelipis ke rahang, biru ungu. Aku menatap sinar kuning yang melintas turun dari atas kepalanya, jatuh di sepanjang pipi kanan dan bahu, berpikir, akhirnya, inilah seorang pria yang bisa kucinta. Akhirnya, inilah seorang pria yang pernah berdekatan dengan kematian, menatap gelap raut maut, segelap wajahnya segelap Bacardi Cola dalam gelas. Akhirnya, inilah pria dengan luka, manusia, yang tak coba menyembunyikan duka di wajahnya. Hampir mati, hampir marti, selamanya martir, untuk sesuatu sebab yang diyakininya begitu rupa hingga bertaruh nyawa ...

Ia berdiri, martirku berdiri, aku melihat punggungnya menjauh. Punggungnya seluas sabana, mungkin ada bekas luka lain di sana, panjang seperti ilalang (aku ingin menyusuri garis ungu itu dengan jariku, dengan bibirku). Pria terluka kembali. Ia berjalan dengan langkah pelan di antara umat manusia, seakan waktu telah dibuangnya, tak ada lagi, tanpa benam matahari bulan purnama. Ia duduk bersandar (seperti lelah), menyulut sebatang rokok. Pemantik menyala sejenak memperlihatkan pipinya biru ungu, rerumputan tundra di rahang dan dagunya, kerut gelombang laut di dahinya. Helai-helai rambut jatuh di gelombang laut dahinya, bagai layar-layar tipis hitam, ia tanpa angin tanpa kapal tanpa pelabuhan tanpa utara tanpa lentera (seperti lelah, ia ingin menepi). 

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Fresh Water for Flowers by Valérie Perrin (translated by Hildegarde Serle)

Throughout my childhood, I’d had this obsession with having lovely white teeth like the girls in the magazines. When child-welfare workers visited my foster homes and asked me if I needed anything, I always requested an appointment with the dentist, as if my future, my whole life, would depend on the smile I had.