by Comte de Lautréamont
translated by Samuel Lees
I was searching for a soul like my own, but could not find one. I scoured the earth, I searched every corner of the globe, but my efforts were in vain. And yet I could not remain alone. There had to be someone who could approve my character. There had to be someone who shared my ideas.
It was morning. The sun appeared, in his russet mantle, at the horizon, and in his company I beheld a young man whose presence caused flowers to spring up along his path. He came up to me, and, offering me his hand, said:
― You have been searching for me all this time, and now, I have found you. Bless this happy occasion!
― Go away, I replied. I did not send for you. I have no need of your friendship…
It was evening. The night had begun to cast its black veil over nature. A beautiful woman, whom I could barely distinguish, cast her enchanting influence over me. She looked at me with compassion, but dared not speak.
― Come closer, I said, that I may see your face clearly, as it was impossible at that distance to observe her features in the pale light of the stars.
And so, with a modest gait she approached, her eyes fixed upon the ground, and placed herself by my side. The instant I laid eyes on her, I said:
― I see that honesty and kindness have made their home in your heart: we cannot live together. Now you may admire my beauty, which has devastated many before you, but sooner or later you will regret ever giving me your heart, as you know nothing of my soul. Not that I would ever be unfaithful to you: she who surrenders herself to me with such abandon and confidence, with so much confidence and abandon, to her I surrender myself. But get this into your head, and never forget: wolves and sheep do not look on each other with the eyes of love.
What could fill the gaping void in my soul, which had rejected, with such loathing and abhorrence, everything that was most beautiful in humanity! What it was, I could not then have said. I was not yet in the habit of giving a rigorous account of the phenomena of my soul, according to the methods recommended by philosophy.
I sat down on a rock by the sea.
A ship had just raised it sails ready to leave the bay. An imperceptible point had appeared on the horizon, and was approaching gradually, driven by the gale, growing rapidly. The storm was going to begin its attacks. The sky was already getting dark, turning as black and hideous as the human heart. The ship, which was a large war vessel, cast its anchors, so as not to be swept onto the rocks. The wind blasted the ship from every direction and tore the sails to shreds. Peals of thunder rippled through the heavens and flickered in the sky, but the celestial organ could not match the cries of lamentation coming from the house without foundations, the moving tomb. The heavy swaying of the molten masses could not break the chains that anchored the ship, but the convulsions had opened a vein in the side of the vessel. A gaping wound: the pumps cannot repel the serried ranks of sea that advance towards them, crashing down onto the decks, like mountains.
The ship fires its cannons in distress. But it continues to sink slowly… majestically.
Those who have not seen a ship sink in the middle of a hurricane, illuminated by flashes of lightning and then plunged into the most profound darkness, while those on board are overcome with the despair that you know so well, know nothing of life’s accidents.
A universal cry of immeasurable pain escapes from the ship’s flanks as the sea increases its terrible attacks. It is the cry that comes from the desertion of the human spirit. Every man swathes himself in the cloak of resignation and places his fate into the hands of God. They huddle together like a flock of sheep.
The ship fires its cannons in distress. But it continues to sink slowly… majestically.
They worked the pumps all day. Useless efforts. The night came, thick and implacable, to put the final touch to this graceful spectacle.
Each man tells himself that once he is in the water he will no longer be able to breath, since, casting about in the annals of his memory, he cannot recall any ancestor who was also a fish. Nevertheless he persuades himself to hold his breath for as long as possible, in order to prolong his life by two or three seconds. That is the vengeful irony he wishes to offer death…
The ship fires its cannons in distress. But it continues to sink slowly… majestically.
He does not know that as the ships sinks it creates a powerful vortex, that the muddy silt has invaded the troubled waters, and that a force from below, the result of the storm that is wreaking havoc above, creates sporadic and nervous movements in the element. Thus, despite the store of courage he has built up, the man who is to drown, upon further reflection, ought to feel happy if, in the coils of the abyss, he manages to prolong his life by half an ordinary breath. Thus it will be impossible for him to laugh in the face of death, his life’s ambition.
The ship fires its cannons in distress. But it continues to sink slowly… majestically.
My mistake. The ship is no longer firing its cannons, it is not sinking. The wooden shell has sunk beneath the waves. O heavens! how can one live after having known such bliss! I have just witnessed the mortal agonies of several of my kind. Minute by minute I followed their trials and travails. At times, the wails of an old crone, distracted with fear, drowned out everything else. At others, the solitary cries of a suckling babe prevented one from hearing the orders being issued in the chaos. The ship was too far for me to make out the confused cries that the wind carried to shore. But, by an exertion of the will, I brought it closer, and the optical illusion was complete. Every quarter of an hour, when a gust of wind, stronger than the others, conveying its bitter laments above the dismayed cries of the petrels, cracked the side of the ship, and increased the plaints of those about to be offered up to death in expiatory holocaust, I sank the point of my blade into my cheek, and thought secretly: “They suffer more!” In this way, I had, at least, a point of comparison.
From the shore I addressed them, hurling threats and abuse their way. They seemed to hear me! It seemed that my voice and my hatred, spanning the distance, annihilated the physical laws of sound, and reached their ears, deafened by the roar of the raging ocean. They must have thought of me, and exhaled their vengeance in impotent rage!
Every now and then, I cast an eye towards the towns, sleeping on firm ground, and, seeing that no one suspected that a few miles from the shore a ship was going to sink, with a crown of ravenous birds circling above their heads and a hoard of aquatic giants with empty stomachs below their feet, I took heart, and my hope returned: their deaths were certain! There could be no escape!
As an added precaution, I had gone to get my rifle, so that, if one of them had tried to escape his imminent death by swimming to shore, a bullet in the shoulder would fracture his arm, and prevent him from achieving his goal.
At the height of the storm’s violence, amidst the waves I spotted an energetic head, with dishevelled hair, making desperate efforts to stay afloat. He was being tossed around like a cork, swallowing gallons of water, and sinking into the abyss. But he soon reappeared, his hair glistening and, as he fixed his eye upon the shore, seemed to defy death. His self-possession was admirable. A large bloody wound, produced by a hidden spike on the reef, made a gash in his noble intrepid face. He could not have been more than sixteen years old, as, in the flickering light that illuminated the night, his upper lip was as smooth as a peach.
And now he was only two hundred metres from the cliffs. What pluck! What indomitable courage! His head seemed to scorn destiny, as his arms cleaved the waves, and their trenches opened reluctantly before him!
It had already been decided: I knew my course. I owed it to myself to keep my promise: the final hour had come for all, and none should escape. Such was my resolution and nothing could change it…
There was a sharp sound, and the head promptly sank beneath the waves, never to emerge again.
I did not take as much pleasure in this murder as one might imagine, and it was precisely because I was fed up of killing all the time, that since then I did it purely out of habit, which one cannot avoid, but in which there is only a vague pleasure. My senses had grown dull and unresponsive. What pleasure was there to be gained from the death of this one human being, when there were over a hundred who were going to offer themselves up for my entertainment, in their final battle against the flood, once the ship had sunk beneath the waves? In this death, there was not even the thrill of danger, as the forces of justice, lulled by the storm on this terrible night, slept safely in the houses a few feet away.
Now that the years weigh upon my body ― I say this in all sincerity, like a great and solemn truth ― I was not as cruel as people made out afterwards; but, sometimes, man’s wickedness exercised its ravages for years on end. So my fury no longer knew any limit; I had surges of cruelty, and I became terrible to those who presented themselves to my weary gaze, if they happened to be members of my race. If it were a dog or a horse, I let them pass. Did you hear what I just said?
Unfortunately, on the night of the storm, I was in one of these dark humours. My reason had deserted me ― as, normally, I was just as cruel, but more prudent ― and this time, all those who fell into my hands had to perish. I do not pretend to make excuses for these crimes. The fault does not lie entirely with my kind. I am but noting what, awaiting the final judgement that makes me scratch the back of my neck…
Oh! what do I care for the final judgement! My reason never leaves me: I lied. When I commit a crime, I know exactly what I am doing: I have no other intention!
Standing on the rock, while the wind blasted my hair and coat, I observed with bliss the rage of the storm, bearing down on the ship beneath a starless sky. With a triumphant attitude, I followed every development of this drama, from the moment the ship cast anchor to the moment it capsized. It was the mortal cloth that dragged into the depths those who had wrapped themselves in it like a cloak.
But, the moment was fast approaching when I myself would become an actor in these scenes of devastated nature. When the battle was over, and it was clear that the ship had gone to spend the rest of its days at the bottom of the ocean, some of those who had been dragged down with the waves reappeared at the surface. They held onto each other, in groups of two or three. It was the surest way to seal their fate, as their movements became laboured and they plummeted like a colander…
But what’s this? An army of sea monsters that cleave the water with speed. There are six of them; their fins are strong, and open a path through the crested waves. From these human beings, struggling in this unstable continent, the sharks quickly make one large omelette without eggs, which is divided according to the law of the strongest. The blood combines with the water, the water with the blood. Their fierce gleaming eyes light up the scene of carnage…
There is something moving in the water, over there, by the horizon. It looks like a tornado approaching. What fine oar strokes! I see now what it is. An enormous female shark comes to partake in the duck liver pâté and eat the cold meat. A fight breaks out between her and the other sharks. Without a word they argue over the various palpitating limbs floating here and there on the surface of the red cream. To the right and to the left she snaps her jaws, dealing mortal wounds. But there are still three sharks circling her, and she has to keep turning to foil their maneuvers.
With growing emotion, hitherto unknown, the spectator, located on the shore, observes this new kind of naval battle. His eyes are fixed upon the brave female shark with her mighty jaws. He does not falter: he takes up his gun, and with his usual skill, lodges a bullet in the other shark’s gills at the moment when it appeared above the waves. There remain only two sharks who display an even greater zeal.
From the top of the rock, the man with the brackish saliva dives into the sea and swims towards the finely coloured carpet, clutching the steel knife that is his constant companion. Until now, each shark has only had to deal with one enemy. He advances towards his weary adversary, and, taking his time, sinks the point of his blade into the shark’s stomach. The moving citadel dispatches his final adversary with ease…
The swimmer finds himself face to face with the female shark he has saved. They look into each other’s eyes for several minutes. Both are surprised to find such cruelty in the other. They circle in the water, without losing sight of the other, each telling themselves: “I have been wrong all this time: I am not the cruellest of them all.”
Then, by a common accord, they glide towards each other below the surface, the female shark diffusing the water with her fins, Maldoror cleaving the waves with his arms. They hold their breath in profound veneration, wishing, for the first time, to contemplate their living portrait. At three metres distance, without any effort, they fall into each other’s arms, like two lovers, clasping each other with dignity and respect, in an embrace as tender as between brother and sister.
Carnal desires followed close behind this demonstration of friendship. Two nervous thighs fastened onto the slimy skin of the monster like a pair of leeches. Arms and fins entwined lovingly around the object of their affection. Their throats and breasts became one glaucous mass with seaweed breath. With the storm still raging around them; illuminated by flashes of lightning; with the foamy waves for a wedding bed; carried in a cradle by an undercurrent, and rolling, over each other, into the obscure depths of the abyss, their bodies conjoined in a long, chaste and hideous union!
At last I had found someone like me! … From that day on I would not be alone in life! … She had the same ideas as me! … I had met my first love!
Samuel Lees 