The Elegance of the Hedgehog by Muriel Barbery

Author:Muriel Barbery
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub, pdf
Publisher: Penguin USA-CA
Published: 2008-09-01T19:30:00+00:00

5. A Pleasant Impression

But Manuela, not terribly sensitive to the little steps of Japanese women, is already steering us toward another territory.

“That Rosen woman is in a regular state because Monsieur Ozu hasn’t got two lamps that are the same.”

“Really?” I say, taken aback.

“Yes, really. And why is that? The Rosens have two of everything, because they’re afraid they’ll end up missing something. You know Madame Rosen’s favorite story?”

“No,” I reply, already enthralled to think where this conversation might lead.

“During the war her grandfather, who had tons of stuff stored in his cellar, saved his family by doing a favor for a German who was looking for a spool of thread to sew a button back onto his uniform. If her grandfather hadn’t had the thread, he would have been toast, and everyone else along with him. So believe it or not, in her cupboards and in the cellar she has two of everything. And does that make her any happier? And can you see any better in a room just because you have two lamps exactly the same?”

“I’ve never thought about it. But it’s true that we tend to decorate our interiors with superfluous things.”

“Super what things?”

“Things we don’t really need, like at the Arthens’. The same lamps and two identical vases on the mantelpiece, the same identical armchairs on either side of the sofa, two matching night tables, rows of identical jars in the kitchen … ”

“Now you make me think, it’s not just about the lamps. In fact, there aren’t two of anything in Monsieur Ozu’s apartment. Well, I must say it makes a pleasant impression.”

“Pleasant in what way?”

She thinks for a moment, wrinkling her brow.

“Pleasant like after the Christmas holidays, when you’ve had too much to eat. I think about the way it feels when everyone has left … My husband and I, we go to the kitchen, I make up a little bouillon with fresh vegetables, I slice some mushrooms real thin and we have our bouillon with those mushrooms in it. You get the feeling you’ve just come through a storm, and it’s all calm again.”

“No more fear of being short of anything. You’re happy with the present moment.”

“You feel it’s natural—and that’s the way it should be, when you eat.”

“You enjoy what you have, there’s no competition. One sensation after the other.”

“Yes, you have less but you enjoy it more.”

“Who can manage to eat several things at once?”

“Not even poor Monsieur Arthens.”

“I have two matching night tables with two identical lamps,” I say, suddenly remembering.

“Me too,” replies Manuela.

She nods.

“Maybe we’re all sick, with this too much of everything.”

She gets up, kisses me on the cheek and heads back to her toil as a modern-day slave at the Pallières’. After she has left I sit on with my empty tea cup. There is one chocolate Florentine left, which I nibble out of greediness, with my front teeth, like a mouse. If you change the way you crunch into something, it is like trying something new.

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