Christian Molenaar

Category: Nothings

  • Ever in Good Stead

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    April 26. I go to encounter for the millionth time the reality of experience and to forge in the smithy of my soul the uncreated conscience of my race. Read more

  • April 24, 18—

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    Have I already mentioned that I had a myopic relative who worked as an eye doctor and who fished with a tall reed, looking through opera glasses? His near-sightedness imposed a necessary punctiliousness to his movements and even intentions. As a result, he was meticulous in all things. I inherited his enormous delight in neatness.… Read more

  • Natural Light

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    He thought a photographer was nothing, that he should blend into the surroundings and become invisible, the better to work and capture — as he said — natural light. One shouldn’t even hear the click of the Rolleiflex. He would have liked to conceal his camera. The death of his friend Robert Capa could in… Read more

  • Formalities

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    …on April 21 I submitted to the governor of Kumamoto a detailed protest, in much the same terms as below, and also requested that he promptly relieve me of every main and subsidiary duty pertaining to my office. On June 7, however, this memorial was sent back to me on the grounds that a prefectural… Read more

  • Easter, 2025

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    I have met them at close of dayComing with vivid facesFrom counter or desk among greyEighteenth-century houses.I have passed with a nod of the headOr polite meaningless words,Or have lingered awhile and saidPolite meaningless words,And thought before I had doneOf a mocking tale or a gibeTo please a companionAround the fire at the club,Being certain… Read more

  • No Relation to His Earlier Work

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    “…he showed little interest in the work Madame Curie was doing at the time. His attention was focused on the other side of the marital bed, so to speak. He was interested in Pierre Curie and his last project. Do you know how Pierre Curie died?” Read more

  • The Sundered Realms

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    Here let thy clemency, Persephone, hold firm,Do thou, Pluto, bring here no greater harshness.So many thousand beauties are gone down to AvernusYe might let one remain above with us. Read more

  • Sunny Day of a Green Spring

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    RIP Amparo Dávila, who died on this day five years ago. Read more

  • April 15

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    Met her today point-blank in Grafton Street. The crowd brought us together. We both stopped. She asked me why I never came, said she had heard all sorts of stories about me. This was only to gain time. Asked me, was I writing poems? About whom? I asked her. This confused her more and I… Read more

  • The Facts of Life

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    As a wedding present for his sister Suzanne and his close friend Jean Crotti, who were married in Paris on April 14, 1919, Duchamp instructed the couple by letter to hang a geometry book by strings on the balcony of their apartment so that the wind could “go through the book, choose its own problems,… Read more

Thought:

“Some day historians will demonstrate that I made mistakes, but that day has not come so far.”

Michel Butor