Humboldt's Gift (1976 Pulitzer Prize) - Saul Bellow [56]
“Terrific,” I said. The thing filled me with despair. “What do you two want of me?”
“Answers. Information. We want you to write out the answers. What’s your opinion of her project?”
“I think the dead owe us a living.”
“Don’t horse around with me, Charlie. I didn’t like that crack.”
“I couldn’t care less,” I said. “This poor Humboldt, my friend, was a big spirit who was destroyed ... never mind that. The PhD racket is a very fine racket but I want no part of it. Besides, I never answer questionnaires. Idiots impose on you with their documents. I can’t bear that kind of thing.”
“Are you calling my wife an idiot?”
“I haven’t had the pleasure of meeting her.”
“I’ll make allowances for you. You got hit in the guts by the Mercedes and then I ran you ragged. But don’t be unpleasant about my wife.”
“There are things I don’t do. This is one of them. I’m not going to write answers. It would take weeks.”
“Listen!”
“I draw the line.”
“Just a minute!”
“Bump me off. Go to hell.”
“All right, easy does it. Some things are sacred. I understand. But we can work everything out. I listened at the poker game and I know that you’re in plenty of trouble. You need somebody tough and practical to handle things for you. I’ve given this a lot of thought, and I have all kinds of ideas for you. We’ll trade off.”
“No, I don’t want to trade anything. I’ve had it. My heart is breaking and I want to go home.”
“Let’s have a steak and finish the wine. You need red meat. You’re just tired. You’ll do it.”
“I won’t.”
“Take the order, Giulio,” he said.
eleven
I wish I knew why I feel such loyalty to the deceased, Hearing of their deaths I often said to myself that I must carry on for them and do their job, finish their work. And that of course I couldn’t do. Instead I found that certain of their characteristics were beginning to stick to me. As time went on, for instance, I found myself becoming absurd in the manner of Von Humboldt Fleisher. By and by it became apparent that he had acted as my agent. I myself, a nicely composed person, had had Humboldt expressing himself wildly on my behalf, satisfying some of my longings. This explained my liking for certain individuals— Humboldt, or George Swiebel, or even someone like Cantabile. This type of psychological delegation may have its origins in representative government. However, when an expressive friend died the delegated tasks returned to me. And as I was also the expressive delegate of other people, this eventually became pure hell.
Carry on for Humboldt? Humboldt wanted to drape the world in radiance, but he didn’t have enough material. His attempt ended at the belly. Below hung the shaggy nudity we know so well. He was a lovely man, and generous, with a heart of gold. Still his goodness was the sort of goodness people now consider out of date. The radiance he dealt in was the old radiance and it was in short supply. What we needed was a new radiance altogether.
And now Cantabile and his PhD wife were after me to recall the dear dead days of the Village, and its intellectuals, poets, crack-ups, its suicides and love affairs. I didn’t care much for that. I had no clear view of Mrs. Cantabile as yet, but I saw Rinaldo as one of the new mental rabble of the wised-up world and anyway I didn’t feel just now like having my arm twisted. It wasn’t that I minded giving information to honest scholars, or even to young people on the make, but I just then was busy, fiercely, painfully busy—personally and impersonally busy: personally, with Renata and Denise, and Murra the accountant, and the lawyers and the judge, and a multitude of emotional vexations; impersonally, participating in the life of my country and of Western Civilization and global society (a mixture of reality and figment). As editor of an important magazine, The Ark, which would probabl never come