Almost No Memory (16 page)

The finish is always a photo finish. The winner is often a veteran, not only of races for the slow but also of races for the swift. It seems simple to him, now, to build a powerful motor, gauge the condition and lie of the track, size up his competitors, and harden himself to win a race for the swift. Far more difficult to train himself to patience, steel his nerves to the pace of the slug, the snail, so slow that by comparison the crab moves as a galloping horse and the butterfly a bolt of lightning. To inure himself to look about at the visible world with a wonderful potential for speed between his legs, and yet to advance so slowly that any change in position is almost imperceptible, and the world, too, is unchanging but for the light cast by the traveling sun, which itself seems, by the end of the slow day, to have been shot from a swift bow.

AFFINITY

We feel an affinity with a certain thinker because we agree with him; or because he shows us what we were already thinking; or because he shows us in a more articulate form what we were already thinking; or because he shows us what we were on the point of thinking; or what we would sooner or later have thought; or what we would have thought much later if we hadn't read it now; or what we would have been likely to think but never would have thought if we hadn't read it now; or what we would have liked to think but never would have thought if we hadn't read it now.

Acknowledgments

Grateful acknowledgment is made to the editors of the following publications, in which these stories first appeared: “Meat, My Husband” in
TriQuarterly
© 1993; “Jack in the Country” in
Infolio
(London) as “E.'s Mistake” © 1986, in
Ottotole
1987; “Foucault and Pencil” in
City Lights Review
© 1987; “The Mice” in
Conjunctions
© 1995; “The Professor” in
Harper's
© 1992; “The Cedar Trees” in
Conjunctions
© 1992; “The Cats in the Prison Recreation Hall” in
Conjunctions
© 1992; “Wife One in Country” in
City Lights Review
© 1987; “The Fish Tank” in
Hodos
© 1990; “The Center of the Story” in
Grand Street
© 1989; “Love” in
Conjunctions
© 1992; “Our Kindness” in
New American Writing
© 1992; “A Natural Disaster” in
Conjunctions
© 1992; “Odd Behavior” in
Conjunctions
© 1995; “St. Martin” in
Grand Street
© 1996; “Agreement” in
Indiana Review
© 1988; “In the Garment District” in
New American Writing
© 1992; “Disagreement” in
Indiana Review
© 1988; “The Actors” in
Conjunctions
© 1991; “What Was Interesting” in
Parnassus
© 1989; “In the Everglades” in
SUN
as “Tourist in the Everglades” © 1983; “The Family” in
The World
© 1996; “Trying to Learn” in
Conjunctions
© 1991; “To Reiterate” in
Pequod
© 1986; “Lord Royston's Tour” in
Conjunctions
© 1990; “The Other” in
Annandale
© 1993; “A Friend of Mine” in
Avec
as “My Friend” © 1989; “This Condition” in
Salt Hill Journal
© 1997; “Go Away” in
Conjunctions
© 1989; “Pastor Elaine's Newsletter” in
Pequod
as “Pastor Arlene's Newsletter” © 1991; “A Second Chance” in
New American Writing
© 1992; “Fear” in
Conjunctions
© 1995; “Almost No Memory” in
Conjunctions
© 1988; “Mr. Knockly” in
Living Hand
© 1975; “How He Is Often Right” in
Conjunctions
© 1989; “The Rape of the Tanuk Women” in
Conjunctions
© 1992; “What I Feel” in
Conjunctions
© 1991; “Lost Things” in
Conjunctions
© 1995; “Glenn Gould” in
Doubletake
© 1997; “From Below, as a Neighbor” in
Indiana Review
© 1988; “The Great-grandmothers” in
New American Writing
© 1992; “The House Behind” in
Antaeus
© 1991; “The Outing” in
Conjunctions
© 1995; “A Position at the University” in
The World
© 1996; “Examples of Confusion” in
Conjunctions
as “Confusions” © 1988; “The Race of the Patient Motorcyclists” in
Conjunctions
© 1988; “Affinity” in
The Quarterly
© 1992. “The Thirteenth Woman,” “A Man in Our Town” (under the title “The Dog Man”), “Mr. Knockly,” and “Smoke” previously appeared in the collection
The Thirteenth Woman and Other Stories,
Living Hand Editions, 1976. “In the Everglades” previously appeared in the collection
Story and Other Stories,
The Figures, 1983. “Lord Royston's Tour” was adapted from
The Remains of Viscount Royston: A Memoir of His Life
by the Rev. Henry Pepys, London, 1838.

The author would also like to thank the following for support during the period in which these stories were written: the Fund for Poetry, the Ingram Merrill Foundation, the National Endowment for the Arts, and the Mrs. Giles Whiting Foundation.

Also by Lydia Davis

The Thirteenth Woman and Other Stories

Sketches for a Life of Wassilly

Story and Other Stories

Break It Down

The End of the Story

Samuel Johnson Is Indignant

 

ALMOST NO MEMORY
. Copyright © 1997 by Lydia Davis. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews. For information, address Picador, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10010.

www.picadorusa.com

Picador
®
is a U.S. registered trademark and is used by St. Martin's Press under license from Pan Books Limited.

For information on Picador Reading Group Guides, as well as ordering, please contact the Trade Marketing department at St. Martin's Press.

Phone: 1-800-221-7945 extension 763

Fax: 212-677-7456

E-mail: [email protected]

Acknowledgments appear
here
.

First published in the United States by Farrar, Straus and Giroux

eISBN 9781466869240

First eBook edition: March 2014