Waiting: stories

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The present volume contains a selection of my “youthful” writings (1958–1968), dating from before I embarked upon my first novel (Vain Art of the Fugue). I have selected and ordered them in such a way as to correspond to the different stages of life. We spend our entire lives waiting for something, though we never know what. We don’t dare tell ourselves that what we are waiting for is death. Read in order, from beginning to end, I would like to think that these texts might hint at a kind of biography. Not mine, but anyone’s.

I lost patience and went out first. As I waited for the car to arrive, I stamped my feet on the pavement in front of the building. Then Father came out, looking very serious, hands behind his back, in that new navy-blue pinstriped suit. He told me to calm down, to stop bucking around like a baby lamb, but there was nothing reproachful in his voice and he didn’t even look at me as he said it. He straightened his hat, checked his tie, and looked again at the street door. He began to walk up and down, hands still behind him, his head slightly bowed, while I, feeling bored, looked at the tram stop and thought that it wasn’t so far to the photographer’s: just a few meters past the grocery, in an old house that had escaped demolition, across from the place with those nice shiny boxes that people called coffins. It was quite possible to go on foot, but, no, the Princess didn’t like the idea of that. “I’ll get my train dirty,” she said, lifting herself up on tiptoe, so that Father called a taxi. Gigi had a smile on his face and seemed to be looking out the window all the time; he was even taller than usual, and that annoyed me, so I didn’t wait for the elevator. When the car arrived there was no sign of Father: he’d gone back up to make them get a move on.

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