Library of Unrequited Love (3 page)

were
bad guys that you're sitting there, you ungrateful cockroach, clodhopper, or whatever you are. No, don't get cross, it's just that when people talk about the guillotine, it gets up my nose. I'm sorry, do sit down. What I mean is, most people don't realize the
extent to which the Revolution is the cradle of all ideas in our society. Actually, modern history can be summed up in three major events that altered our view of the world for good: the French Revolution, the bloodbath of the Great War, and the invention of the contraceptive pill. The whole of French history, you've got it there, but I can't explain it all now, it would take too long and I'm not sure you'd be able to appreciate it. But there was one thing they didn't manage to do, in the Revolution. Oh, I don't blame them, they didn't have any computers in those days, but it's the Big Catalogue. In 1789, they confiscated twelve million books from the aristocrats and the clergy, and they thought they'd distribute them to public libraries. That's a terrific idea. You have to give them that. Admit it. Thank you, I'm glad you agree. But alas, if you want to know the rest, they never got round to it. Too much going on, a crisis, not enough money. Then the morons under the Directory couldn't be bothered. Too much trouble. And what really annoys me is, Napoleon could have started the project going again, but that show-off was too busy bringing total mayhem
to the whole of Europe. That's another reason I don't go travelling. Napoleon's always been there first. I can't stand it. And when I say total mayhem, I'm being polite. In fact, he destroyed everything: looted, burned, pillaged. Who was the real gravedigger of the Revolution? Napoleon. A barbarian and a tyrant. Encouraging the people to read wasn't what he was about, he preferred to get a whole generation of young men massacred marching through the snow. Did you know that the Napoleonic wars killed more Frenchmen than the First World War? No, of course not. You don't learn stuff like that on T.V., you learn it here, by reading the history periodicals we subscribe to. A barbarian, that's what he was, a dictator. When I see the number of books that come out every year about that uncivilized little runt, I can't understand the fascination with Napoleon, it's appalling, I just don't get it. And we have this nice periodicals room, very comfortable. But I'm probably talking too much. I wouldn't dare go on like this to Martin. That's where I'm contradictory: I like men who are more intelligent than me, but the idea that they might think me stupid
paralyses me. And I might have read a hundred or more books on the Revolution, I still don't know everything about it either. So where was I? Oh yes, after that, came Louis-Philippe, who was a lot more democratic than he gets credit for, and he would have liked every region to have a library. But it didn't happen. That's no reason to be unfair about Louis-Philippe, he wasn't that bad. And I like a man with sideburns. I think Martin would be even better-looking if he had sideburns. Although it was his intelligence that first attracted me, I still allow myself to imagine: ah, Martin with sideburns. Well. Anyway. Now the Third Republic
did
try to make books available to everyone, but the First World War didn't help. It was total chaos. The filth, the trenches, the mud, the blood, the barbed wire. What a nightmare, you have to say. The guillotine was much more civilized. A heart-breaker, the Great War, what a step backwards for humanity, shelfmark 944.855. Durkheim lost his son to it and his young disciples, a terrible disaster for science. That's the way it is: wars always kill the sons, never the fathers who took the decisions. And once we got ourselves out of
that mess, the libraries were in a terrible state. completely underdeveloped: hardly any books on loan, no heating, not enough places to sit. If you were a toff, they'd allow you to enter these shrines to knowledge, but no way were they going to let
hoi polloi
in. They “segmented” the public, as they would say today. Cemeteries full of books, that's what the librarians were in charge of, not living places. And even here, even now, it's no good my putting out comfortable chairs or trying to make the lighting more attractive, it's not really a welcoming environment. Not to mention the people upstairs, who do all they can to stop my little initiatives. Even today, two hundred years after Robespierre, a library is still a bit of a gloomy place. Oh, don't try and tell me different. Listen, you might meet someone on the way to the cinema, or the restaurant, or the swimming pool, or a café, looking happy, that's normal. But have you ever heard people in the street saying things like: “I'm going to spend the day in the library, yippee!” “Oh, fantastic, you lucky thing!” And we might have stayed for ever in that lamentable condition, if there
hadn't been this one man who got up one morning and said No! And that was Eugène Morel. You won't have heard of him, of course. Eugène Morel's entirely forgotten today. If any of us human primates can go and educate ourselves in nice, friendly, light-filled libraries, it's because of him. This young man did a survey of libraries in Europe and the United States and published it in 1908. Absolute bolt of lightning. The old librarians who trained at the École des Chartes didn't like his book. Not at all. Well, he didn't beat about the bush, Morel, he had a clear set of demands: make it easier to borrow books, have longer opening hours, keep the collections up to date, have comfortable seats, special areas for children, and the underpinning of the whole thing, the ideal, the supreme aim, was that
the people
should be able to read. What do you mean, there's no need to shout? I'm not shouting, I'm being enthusiastic, it's not the same thing. It's true, I'm a big fan of Eugène Morel. Know why? Because he used to say: “Libraries have one enemy worse than the archivist, and that's the architect.” Oh, I really like that, pithy, to the point,
brilliant, that's my boy, Eugène. But it wasn't until after the Liberation in '44 that things really changed. From then on, they started to take some notice of the people. The Americans, who looked down on us while they were showering us with money, wanted to tell us all about public libraries. But at that point we said: “Stop! We've read Eugène Morel, we know exactly what to do, thanks.” You'll have to forgive me. I come from a very ordinary background, so I know exactly what I owe and who I owe it to, I was the first person in my family to get as far as the
baccalauréat
. So you can't fool me. In the 1970s, when I started work, it was all still going full blast. People had the ideal of public service in those days. Not like now, with the youth who go straight to the comic book shelves, they don't see me, they don't even bother to reply when I say good morning. Then we had the socialists in power in 1981, and all that. But, excuse me, we didn't have to wait for them to roll up either, before getting the library at Beaubourg, the Pompidou Centre. Open every night till 10.00 p.m. So people
could
have read books. If they could be bothered. Because, if I'm
allowed a personal view, even though librarians are supposed to be politically neutral and welcome everyone, whatever their views, I've lost my illusions about “the people” and the socialists. And I don't even believe in the State much these days. Yes, I'm a public servant, but I ask you, do revolutions ever start with public employees? In any case, it was our ancestors who did everything, before us. Our job now is to do all we can to live up to the standard they set us. With all their books around us. Don't you ever tell yourself that? How are we ever going to live up to the people who went before us, how will we not let them down? Well, I do. And it distresses me. Terribly. Don't tell me you never feel distress. Everyone does, it's part of life. Even great writers feel it, in fact especially them. Take Simone de Beauvoir, she had terrible bouts of depression. Poor thing, I can sympathize. And Durkheim, the sociologist. Completely neurotic. At the end of his life he had insomnia, nervous spasms, anguish. He died of a broken heart after the Great War. I get anxiety attacks too. It doesn't always show, I can control myself, you know, but, oh
yes, I do suffer. The worst thing is getting these compulsive obsessions. They're always at me. I just have to see a book shoved in the wrong way on a shelf, sticking out, or drawing attention to itself, a bit too attractive perhaps, like that one over there, for me to … I'm afraid it's going to fall out, I'm afraid it's too noticeable, I can't concentrate now … or speak … until … Excuse me. I must just put it back in the right place. There. It doesn't stand out now. It
was
going to fall, wasn't it? Well, maybe I'm exaggerating. I get a bit stressed out with all these books to keep in order, and at the same time it calms me down being here. I'll tell you, I'm not ashamed, the library works like an anaesthetic for my hang-ups. Because when I first arrived in his town, I was in a terrible state. I'd just left Paris. I get here, in the depths of the provinces, I settle in. Or rather
we
settle in. Because I didn't come alone, you see. I wouldn't have dreamed of coming on my own to a town like this. I agreed to the move, because I made the mistake of falling in love. Big mistake. I can't understand the perennial fascination people nowadays have with love. It's a waste of time, it's a childish, tiring,
stupid way of upsetting yourself. Have you ever noticed what people look like when they're in love? They look either ill or stupid. Some of them are so far gone they come out in spots or they develop tics. Well, let me tell you, I won't ever fall for it again. Because the man I came here with, the man for whom I'd given up the top-class cultural, social and professional life I had in Paris, this man, who I thought was intelligent, don't tell my colleagues, this man went off one fine day with a woman who's an engineer at the nuclear power station. I've never fallen that low. No, don't try to cheer me up. Anyway, life on earth is all down to a genetic accident, plus the obscene determination of our ancestors to reproduce themselves in the worst conditions. Take the Black Death, 1348: bang, a third of the European population wiped out. After that, for decades, people went on drawing death's heads on walls, so traumatized they were. But they went on reproducing just the same, primates that we are. Arthur (that was his name, Arthur) was my version of the Black Death, he ruined my life. So then I got a job here. At first they sent me to Life Sciences. Not
that I was interested in it. I just got, pardon my language, the shitty job nobody else wanted. A very downmarket section, if you like. I stayed there three years. Then they moved me to Geography. And ever since, I've been hoping to get to my favourite section, History. But I don't think I'll ever make it. Too bad, I'll just have to be philosophical about it. All that by way of saying that after the Black Death, I was in a terrible state. Books were what saved me. I was so ashamed: fancy having been in love with a man who could find a nuclear bureaucrat charming, how uncivilized is that? Since that episode, I've given up for good any thoughts of romance or even fancy. Because if a fancy takes hold of you, it's dangerous, very dangerous. Watch out. I don't know what
you
do to keep going every day, but what I do is recharge my batteries here in my basement. Even though it isn't a very interesting job. If indeed there are any interesting jobs in this profession. Still, some people have better perches than me. Because a library works according to a strict hierarchy. Readers may not realize it, but we're all subject to a pitiless ranking. At the top, in his office, the Head
Librarian. He comes from a top university, he decides about major acquisitions, he has his own parking space, he gets to meet writers. Then come the state-appointed librarians, category one civil servants: they're all snobs, married women with families, they're the ones who've got it all, work–life balance, tra la la, you know the type. Then come the category two civil servants, the women who work the hardest, they ride bikes to work, they're not married, people like me. I say women, because nine out of ten of the staff in libraries are women. Apart from the Head Librarian at the top of the pyramid, the only men who work here are doing inferior jobs, like shifting books, or they're technicians, or security. I have dealings with some of them, but only to give them instructions. Anyway the women who see the most of the men in the library are the lowest-grade workers. I'm just above them, but lower down than the qualified staff. I'm in between, middle of the scale. Well, in the basement actually. Obviously, as you can see, I'm a victim of this hierarchy. But what can I do? I don't dare start a rebellion all on my own, and I don't get on with my colleagues.
What could I talk about with women who go to karaoke bars in winter and museums in summer? Not for me. And anyway, to make any impression on this longstanding hierarchy, you'd have to start by making a fuss and there you go, that would stress me. So I stay in my basement, being humiliated. Because it works between sections as well. Not all the classifications are equal. On paper, of course they are, but oh no, not in real life. French Literature and History: they're the blue-blood aristocracy, the nobles at the royal court. And on the same level you have the high society of Philosophy and Religion. Then come the minor gentry in Foreign Languages; with perhaps a bit ahead of them Economics and Social Science: they're the law lords, the legal aristocracy. Just below them, you get the bourgeoisie of periodicals and magazines: all mouth and no action. Alongside that, there's the impregnable citadel of the Children's section – let's call it the lower clergy. Not to mention, because I won't, the open shelves with C.D.s and D.V.D.s, they're the
nouveaux riches
. But
even
lower down, comes the proletariat: Science, Geography, I.T.,
practical books, dictionaries, travel guides. Yes. Because without their wretched user manuals on how to do Excel spreadsheets, without their thrillers and handbooks on “Writing your C.V.”, do you think they'd ever get any readers into the library? Never. But it's always the same, the lower classes, who make it possible for the upper classes to hang on to their privileges, never get any consideration from the nobles. Just taxes and more taxes. Because the ranking in people's heads gets reflected on the bookshelves. Budgets for buying new books are limited, and the aristos get first pick. Us, the little folk, we come last. Crumbs from their table. It drives me mad. Archaic, irrational … someone like me … In a basement like this … what was the point of guillotining Louis XVI if you still end up with everyone looking down on you? Yes, they do, they look down on me, they don't appreciate me at my true value. Upstairs, they know I didn't get to be a teacher, and they laugh at me. Even the storemen laugh, I know it. My colleague on History, she's always late in, she leaves all the worst jobs to me, she doesn't like me, and the bosses won't even let me give an opinion.