Library of Unrequited Love (5 page)

with someone. With that lovely neck of his. It would disappoint me if a man as clever as Martin were to be in love. But you have to be prepared for anything. Sometimes I see him chatting to girls. With that beautiful neck … But I don't have time to mope, because in summer, the library is full to bursting. Different readers, people on holiday passing through, research students, and lots of little old men. I like summer. I talk to the regulars, people like you, nice people, a bit shy but nice. They all have their favourite subjects. There's this one reader, Monsieur Billot, I'm sure you know him, he always wears a red waistcoat, and he's obsessive. He cuts up photocopies of newspaper articles and puts them in huge scrapbooks, all about dog bites, or fairground accidents. Actually we've got plenty of people with obsessions, not to mention half a dozen people fixated on Ancient Egypt. Yes, you're right, it is striking. Ancient Egypt exerts a fascination over the weak-minded, I've seen it several times in my career. You wouldn't believe the number of unemployed, or pensioners, handicapped people or benefits claimants that you get in the library
in summer. They come here as a sort of exercise, it's kind of like jogging or walking the dog. They need something to do. Some of them ring the changes: they go to the law courts on Tuesdays and Thursdays, when the preliminary hearings are held, and on Wednesdays and Fridays they come to the municipal library. Ah, it's the other way round, is it? If you say so. Well, you get your entertainment where you can. People can be lonely, terribly lonely. Reading's an excuse. A pretext. What they're looking for here is something to hang on to. If you don't believe me, how come you don't even want to go home at night? Who would come and shut themselves up in this basement if they were of sound mind? Yes, go on, admit it, you're a bit borderline yourself. Well, anyway, libraries do attract mad people. Especially in summer. Of course, if you closed the libraries during the summer holidays, you wouldn't see them. No more lunatics, poor people, children on their own, students who've failed their exams, no more little old chaps, no more culture and no more humanity. When I think that some mayors dare to close their libraries in August. Just to cut down
on costs. Barbaric. Think of it: when the town's sweltering in the heat, the shops are all shut, the swimming baths are full, people's purses are empty, their pay's too low, and they're brooding over their problems in the shade, with the tar melting on the road, the house of culture could be opening its arms to all those children lost in an ocean of urban idiocy, but no, his nibs the Mayor has closed the library. The bastard. What's the little old pensioner going to do in August? I'll tell you: he gets up on Tuesday morning, he takes the only bus of the day, and he toddles along slowly to the entrance of the library, because for twenty-four hours he's been looking forward to a nice long day spent in an air-conditioned reading room, leafing through his favourite newspapers, and then like a stab in the back, or Napoleon's
coup d'etat
, my poor little pensioner sees the criminal notice on the door:
Closed until September
. And then Durkheim is surprised there are more suicides in summer. It's so sad. Nothing is sadder than an empty library. I mean a library that's open, but with no readers. It can happen, though, in any season. And there we sit, like Uncle Scrooge
McDuck on his hoard of gold. Because for all that I'm being a bit hard on you, what would we actually do if there weren't any readers? Some of my colleagues upstairs, in their huge ground floor space, with their big windows and perfectly ordered shelves, they're so comfortable sitting there alongside their coffee machines, that they actually talk out loud about how nice it would be in a library without readers. Like some teachers dream of a school with no pupils. But what would be the point of us then? Oh, yes, it would be in perfect order. A mathematical masterpiece, really shipshape, our library. But what would be the point if nobody came along to disturb it? I like it when a new reader comes down the stairs into my cellar, it makes a change. I always look up to see who it is. Every time I hear someone coming down the stairs, I get palpitations. Sort of a funny turn. Not just for Martin, because it happens when he's already down here, but every time I hear a reader's footsteps it's as if I'm waiting, hoping, how shall I put it? Well, yes, for something to happen. It's stupid, I know, but I can't help it. Every reader
that appears starts it up again, I get palpitations. Then afterwards, I always feel cross with myself. Because, obviously, the reader arrives, sits down, reads a book, and goes away. That's all. So what's the big deal? Nobody's asked me anything, nothing's happened. But really that's all I
do
want, to be asked a question, to be disturbed, just a bit. Even you, for instance, you come here every other day, but you've never done that. Why not? You know, in my job, there's nothing more exciting, to make you feel more wanted, than to be able to size up the person in front of you, guess what they're after, find the book they need on the shelves and bring the two together. Book and reader, if they meet up at the right moment in a person's life, it can make sparks fly, set you alight, change your life. It can, I promise you. I don't know if you can understand that, perhaps it's beyond you. Well of course, in the Geography section, my ambitions are very limited. I only occasionally have that happen here. I just adapt. But I'm a limited person myself, modest and humble. Any human being who has even a smidgeon of culture must one day take stock
of their total impotence. In my case, the older I get, the more aware I become of my limits. The older I get, the chances of Martin ever looking at me are shrinking all the time. I know it. Every day spent here takes me a step nearer the grave. Soon it will be over. Not very nice for a man, but for a woman it's even worse. That depresses me. The only thing that consoles me is to be surrounded by people as depressed as I am. The readers down here, they're
seriously
depressed and that cheers me up. You yourself for instance, if I can put this politely, you don't exactly look like a bundle of laughs. No, don't pretend, I can see right through you. You're sad, and lonely. But if you didn't come in here, it'd be worse. No, don't argue, you're absolutely right to come here. You should never just sit around moping at home. When your family's abandoned you, you haven't got any friends, you think you're rubbish, worthless, nothing, books are a great help. Just think about it: what can make human beings suffer more than awareness of their limits? I don't mean fear of death, I mean our suffering at realizing our intelligence is limited. But when we go into a library and look
at all those bookcases stretching into the distance, what descends on our soul, if not grace? Spiritually, we can at last fill the terrible emptiness that makes us just worms creeping on this earth. Those endless bookshelves reflect back to us an ideal image, the image of the full range of the human mind. Then all the paths are made plain, everything's newly created once more, and we move closer to a mystical vision of Abundance. The inexhaustible milk of human culture, right here, within our reach. Help yourself, it's free. Borrow, because as much as accumulation of material things impoverishes the soul, cultural abundance enriches it. My culture doesn't stop where someone else's begins. In fact, the library is the place where the greatest solidarity between humans takes place. Humanity, in its most depressing and suffering state, the most beautiful humanity there is, actually, the sinners, the unemployed, the cold weather refugees, they're all around me here. Knock and it shall be opened to you, ask and you shall be served … What? You're laughing? Oh good grief, for once I was being serious, and I got carried away again. But you're right, let me
put it more clearly. So you can understand, I'll tell you who typically never sets foot here: a rich white man between the ages of thirty-five and fifty. Why? Because in that age group, he's part of the barbaric ruling class. Monsieur doesn't make use of public services. You'll never see Monsieur on a bus. Monsieur doesn't need to share with other people, because Monsieur owns things. It's a long time now since Monsieur's madame went to borrow some eggs from the neighbour. Because for Mother's Day, she got a three-speed mixer, and if Monsieur cares to read a book, he buys it. But in any case, reading is already an act of weakness. Monsieur has purchasing power. A house. Two cars. Monsieur doesn't have the time. He has a subscription to a sports club. Does he ever think about the facilities provided by his local council? No, he thinks he's all-powerful, a self-made man, what an ass. Life isn't pre-programmed like a washing machine. Just wait till he gets a tumour in some corner of his brain, or loses his job, or his wife cheats on him, or his tax returns get inspected. Or all four at once. Then you'll see him turning up, tail between
his legs. Who's sorry now? His telephone's stopped ringing. Suddenly, he has all the time in the world. So he'll come and start flipping through the pages of the newspapers and realize he doesn't know anything about public affairs – he'll be amazed at our new system that lets you borrow books for six weeks at a time, renewable once. His wife will leave him, he'll become obsessive or depressed, he'll start playing boules, and even become a pedestrian. He'll be one of us. But it will have taken all those body-blows from life for him to understand that the library, that building he used to go past with utter indifference, doesn't hold a lot of dead books, no, it's the beating heart of the Great Consolation. I'd go further. What do you think all this represents, the welcoming arms of the bookshelves, the soft carpets underfoot, the restful semi-silence, the warm temperature, the discreet and benevolent supervision? You can't guess? Don't be afraid to say what you think. Let me remind you, I'm completely neutral towards you, and anything we say in this room won't go beyond these four walls. You still don't get it? But it's obvious. Going into the library
is nothing more or less than getting back onto your mummy's lap. Yes, like Mummy, the library gives you a magic kiss and everything's better. Love life in ruins? Hate everyone? Despair over the state of the planet? Headache? Insomnia? Indigestion? Corns? I can tell you, there's nothing the library can't cure. In fact, the therapists send us agoraphobics because they know that here their patients will meet a crowd of people who are peaceful, at one with the rest of humanity: the students revising round tables they share without any fuss, the grandfathers quietly reading, the well-behaved children, a constant mixture of cerebral essences, floating around in the rational stratification of ideas provided by the Dewey decimal system. Yes, this vision of humanity raises us onto a higher plane. Ah, Martin … Oh, what are you doing now? No, don't sit there, that's my desk. I didn't go to all the trouble of doing the internal exams at the age of forty to end up without a desk of my own. This is my place. This is where I sit to select, classify, answer queries, catalogue, listen and occasionally – as I told you – give advice. If people ask me nicely. Now, where's
my watch gone? Here's something else. My jewellery. Some earrings. I hide them in a drawer and I put them on discreetly when I see Martin arrive. You don't catch flies with vinegar, as my mother would say. Poor woman: she's never read a book in her life, but on that subject she's a walking encyclopedia. And if I'd listened to her, I would have kept a closer eye on the Black Death and the radioactive fallout from the nuclear power station. She did warn me, my mother. Watch out, she said. One never does watch out enough. You trust people, you go with the flow, you drop off to sleep, and oops, there you are in a basement all night. I'm teasing you. You're lucky it was a week night, or you might have spent the whole weekend in here, starving to death. Oh, here's my watch. Excuse me, I have to do a few things, we'll be opening soon. It's not all set up yet. The trolleys have to be emptied, it all has to look neat and tidy. Even if, between ourselves, most people have no idea of all I've been telling you, what goes on here. Most readers don't come for the good of their souls. Some of them don't come to borrow books, or to work, not even to read …
No, don't pretend you don't know, it happens at any age: I mean picking people up. No, don't look so surprised, you hypocrite. I'm not criticizing you. It's a game two can play, women are just as likely to be doing it as men. I don't know what your method is. But I've seen all sorts of tactics. I've seen people collect a pile of books and leave them all over a table to give an idea of their taste and their personality, and wait to see what kind of fish will bite. I've seen others who are more daring – they make a point of ostentatiously reading sex manuals. Shelfmark 306.7, sure-fire magnet for boys, and the people who work here aren't made of stone. I know colleagues who've found notes on the desk, like: “I'm sitting in the third row down, and I'll buy you a coffee if you can get a break.” Then there are the real prima donnas, who turn up in skimpy tops and short skirts even when the air conditioning is on, they jump up every ten minutes, they walk between the bookshelves, click-clack with their heels, wiggling their bottoms, the boys opposite are beside themselves, they try to concentrate, but no, it's just impossible. So they shoot glances
from one table to another, they get up, go out for a smoke and there you are. Well, people have to have a bit of fun. Because books in themselves aren't sexy, they're silent, cold, off-putting. At night, when the library's empty, it's really scary. Last night you were scared, weren't you, and cold, well of course, that's normal. Be honest, these dreaded books impress us, don't they? Even me, do you think I've got things under control here? Not at all, I'm their slave. If they're in the wrong order, they start shouting at me, and I have to hurry along, like a servant, to put them right, get them into the proper shelf. But I'm free, aren't I, to do what I like? If I wanted to push a pile of books over, there's nothing to stop me. Look here we go … just let me get a life, why don't you? … O.K., O.K., it wasn't such a great idea, sorry. I can't stand it. Just seeing them all over the floor … Help me pick them up, I don't know what came over me then. I get these funny impulses sometimes. One day for instance, in the lavatories, I saw this graffiti: