The Invention of Morel

The sea is endless when you are in a rowboat.

And the reason I am so nervous is that everything I do now is leading me to one of three possible futures... Which one will it be? Time alone will tell. But still I know that writing this diary can perhaps provide the answer; it may even help produce the right future.

The habits of our lives makes us presume that things will happen in a certain foreseeable way, that there will be a vague coherence in the world.

To be on an island inhabited by artificial ghosts was the most unbearable of nightmares,- to be in love with one of those images was worse than being in love with a ghost (perhaps we always want the person we love to have the existence of a ghost).

No espero nada. Esto no es horrible. Después de resolverlo, he ganado tranquilidad. Pero esa mujer me ha dado una esperanza. Debo temer las esperanzas. Tal vez toda esa higiene de no esperar sea un poco ridícula. No esperar de la vida, para no arriesgarla; darse por muerto, para no morir. Ya no estoy muerto: estoy enamorado.

No fue como si no me hubiera oído, como si no me hubiera visto; fue como si los oídos que tenía no sirvieran para oír, como si los ojos no sirvieran para ver.

I do not believe that a dream should necessarily be taken for reality, or reality for madness.

His work seems to confirm my old axiom: it is useless to try to keep the whole body alive.

...when one is alone it is impossible to be dead.

Spontaneity is the mother of crudity.

Creo que perdemos la inmortalidad porque la resistencia a la muerte no ha evolucionado; sus perfeccionamientos insisten en la primera idea, rudimentaria: retener vivo todo el cuerpo. Sólo habría que buscar la conservación de lo que interesa a la conciencia.

I thought I had made this discovery: that there are unexpected, constant repetitions in our behavior. The right combination of circumstances had enabled me to observe them. One seldom has the chance to be a clandestine witness of several talks between the same people. But scenes are repeated in life, just as they are in the theatre.

Tal vez toda esa higiene de no esperar sea un poco ridícula. No esperar de la vida, para no arriesgarla; darse por muerto, para no morir.

The case of the inventor who is duped by his own invention emphasizes our need for circumspection.

The influence of the future on the past," said Morel enthusiastically, almost inaudibly.

Creio que perdemos a imortalidade porque a resistência à morte não evoluiu; seus aperfeiçoamentos insistem na ideia primitiva, rudimentar, de manter vivo todo o corpo. Só se deveria procurar conservar o que interessa para a consciência.

... to his efforts to perpetuate man: but he has preserved nothing but sensations; and, although his invention was incomplete, he at least foreshadowed the truth: man will one day create human life.

I dreaded an invasion of ghosts or, less likely, an invasion of the police.

Es ya costumbre de mis teorías más lúcidas deshacerse al día siguiente, quedar como pruebas de una combinación asombrosa de ineptitud y entusiasmo (o desesperación). Tal vez mi idea, una vez escrita, pierda la fuerza.

Al hombre que, basándose en este informe, invente una máquina capaz de reunir las presencias disgregadas, haré una súplica: Búsquenos a Faustine y a mí, hágame entrar en el cielo de la conciencia de Faustine. Será un acto piadoso.

Ahora la mujer del pañuelo me resulta imprescindible. Tal vez toda esa higiene de no esperar sea un poco ridícula. No esperar de la vida, para no arriesgarla; darse por muerto, para no morir.