1958 - Exile and the Kingdom by Albert Camus & Prefers to remain anonymous

Author:Albert Camus & Prefers to remain anonymous
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Prefers to remain anonymous

5: THE ARTIST AT WORK

Exile and the Kingdom

Take me up and cast me forth

into the sea…for I know

that for my sake this great

tempest is upon you.

— JONAH 1, 12

GILBERT JONAS, the painter, believed in his star. Indeed, he believed solely in it, although he felt respect, and even a sort of admiration, for other people’s religion. His own faith, however, was not lacking in virtues since it consisted in acknowledging obscurely that he would be granted much without ever deserving anything. Consequently when, around his thirty-fifth year, a dozen critics suddenly disputed as to which had discovered his talent, he showed no surprise. But his serenity, attributed by some to smugness, resulted, on the contrary, from a trusting modesty. Jonas credited everything to his star rather than to his own merits.

He was somewhat more astonished when a picture dealer offered him a monthly remittance that freed him from all care. The architect Rateau, who had loved Jonas and his star since their school days, vainly pointed out to him that the remittance would provide only a bare living and that the dealer was taking no risk. “All the same…” Jonas said. Rateau — who succeeded, but by dint of hard work, in everything he did — chided his friend. “What do you mean by ‘all the same’? You must bargain.” But nothing availed. In his heart Jonas thanked his star. “Just as you say,” he told the dealer. And he gave up his job in the paternal publishing-house to devote himself altogether to painting. “What luck!” he said.

In reality he thought: “It’s the same old luck.” As far back as he could remember, he found the same luck at work. He felt, for instance, an affectionate gratitude toward his parents, first because they had brought him up carelessly and this had given free rein to his daydreaming, secondly because they had separated, on grounds of adultery. At least that was the pretext given by his father, who forgot to specify that it was a rather peculiar adultery: he could not endure the good works indulged in by his wife, who, a veritable lay saint, had, without seeing any wrong in it, given herself body and soul to suffering humanity. But the husband intended to be the master of his wife’s virtues. “I’m sick and tired,” that Othello used to say, “of sharing her with the poor.”

This misunderstanding was profitable to Jonas. His parents, having read or heard about the many cases of sadistic murderers who were children of divorced parents, vied with each other in pampering him with a view to stamping out the spark of such an unfortunate evolution. The less obvious were the effects of the trauma experienced, according to them, by the child’s psyche, the more worried they were, for invisible havoc must be deepest. Jonas had merely to announce that he was pleased with himself or his day for his parents’ ordinary anxiety to become panic. Their attentions multiplied and the child wanted for nothing.

His alleged misfortune finally won Jonas a devoted brother in the person of his friend Rateau.

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