Read The Brooke-Rose Omnibus Online
Authors: Christine Brooke-Rose
or the latterway?
Those for: Peter Brandt Barbara Darcy Francesca
Newman Robert Galliard Myra Kaplan Kathleen
O’Shaunessy Ali Nourennin Renata Polanska Lin Su Fu.
Those against: Vittoria Charib Marie Faber Salvatore
Tancredi Michael Mandel Jean-Marie Fèvre Eliza Jones.
Abstention: Paul Stradiver Julia Weintraub Neil Alder.
? Refusal of Vote: Saroja Chaitwantee.
a show of hands within a secret ballot
which is one way of introducing a cast-list.
unless Armel inventing Larissa
| | or Larissa | " | | Armel |
| | " Armel | " | | Veronica |
| | " Veronica | " | | Armel |
| | " Armel | " | | Larissa |
| | " Larissa | " | | Marco (or is it Oscar?) |
| | " Marco (?) | " | | Larissa |
| | " Larissa | " | | Armel |
The other possible permutations do not occur for logical reasons: Larissa could invent Veronica but in a limited subjective way in any case Veronica and she are contradictories not contraries as Socrates explained to Protagoras and Structural Semantics has just reinvented. While Armel could invent Marco or is it Tariel and vice versa but due to the double standard in practice would not stoop or merely would not have the curiosity. Clearly Marco does not invent Veronica nor she even utter Marco (or is it Stavro?) they’ve never met besides Stavro has no imagination.
On the other hand the hypotheses could have been posed anticlockwise:
| | | Larissa | inventing | Oscar |
| | | Oscar | " | Larissa |
| | | Larissa | " | Armel |
| | | Armel | " | Veronica |
| | | Veronica | " | Armel |
| | | Armel | " | Larissa |
| | | Larissa | " | Armel |
| | | Armel | " | ? |
er something’s gone wrong here there seems to be room for some extra who why the mistress of the moment since the man any man must be if not many at least one up who will fairly soon be dropped for she does not see by day the four lies in the retrovizor when shifted to her forward gaze nor dancing hoops by night
But it needs adjusting.
Well then I found myself with a magician on a
helluva stage as his stooge you know in tights
and a sequin bodice and my bust like it was busting
tight out of it and I was handing him coloured scarves
i think and suddenly a prop was missing I forget his
stick I mean his wand anyway it was my fault he couldn’t
Lift the white rabbit out of the hat and the crowd murmured
and even shouted as he signalled frantically like mad
right into the wings but they didn’t get the message and
in the end he walked off leaving me alone on stage to cope
somehow in the glare of lights that hits the mirror and
swings left out of it beaming ahead rewritten now
as two small red eyes in a hunched black shape which is
delineated against forward floodlight the retrovizor re-
opening to the hoops dancing up and down and aside
in the rear distance luminous horizontal ovals oh
no, vertical ovals as if at quarter angle amber red
green white swiftly changing shape and juggled by the
night or by the tall dark house with blue eyes
or maybe by the black recumbent street who
was very short and fat for a magician more than
obese you’ve never seen anything so fat he tried to
reach the switches to calm the audience but he was so
Very fat and short so he lifted me in my tights and bodice
ever so firm under the breasts with them busting
right out of the sequins and I managed to switch them
off and as he brought me down we kissed half
naked ever so sexy and then we started wanting
it like crazy but I said no later we have to
calm the crowd so he got wild and dragged me
after him out of the theatre but I wrenched free
saying the show must go on can you interpret
?
The show within the show
What?
of hands juggling
within a secret ballet of the I
hell honey I guess I just fill the air for you sure that’s what
i like about you oh I thought it was my big beautiful
true blue tits they’re fine too with a show of hands
entering under silk with a secret ballet of fingers on
tiptoe upon soft globed flesh the nipple now rising
hard between the lights the foot pressed gently purring
into a stop the is it sacred belly tensed to the show of
green fingers into the left thigh that jerks open to the
hot human humidity of a sexual humour secreted un-secretly go on then
Doing what?
Oh filling the air. You do
it so much more convincingly
than the others (tit for
tat)
what others?
others who fill the air. Oh
You’re mythologising me.
Oh any time. And then you came with your car and said come
unto me I’ll light the way and well
drove off
did you?
No I didn’t
Dopey relations you have with your magician men.
Yeah but he wasn’t you Stavro that was the first dream
but he was short well you’re short too but he was
immensely fat and couldn’t have strangled an eagle in
the water for anything he’d have sunk you turn left at the
corner
Hey I know.
Yes you should by now but you always forget.
Okay can you see a spot?
Usually there’s one further up on the right. Here.
Too small.
It isn’t. You’ll have to back into it.
True. But it’s still too small.
But Marco of course you can get in.
I’ll say, if you light the way.
Tooshay! You kill me have you no male pride it’s your car.
Come come honey it’s your street.
Hang on I’ll lower the window. Turn full right
yes now left stop straighten oh lordy no you’re
on the pavement all crooked forward a bit straighten her
up no You’ll have to take her out and start again.
Who sez? Some tale-bearer (off) or Other who has got it all wrong
Is it Marco or Stavro? (or Armel?)
There has occurred however the foreshortening of
Armel into Marco
Laretino or is it Tarie
L? of the accurate boymouth (removed?)
whose legs : his body : : his brow : his nose relations in proportion quaternary conjunction or disjunction with the possibility also of non-relations non-conjunction and even non-conjunction a game
Whereas well | Armel |
Armel | however |
is not like | equates |
that at all but tall | rarity |
with hair quite dark | of |
and swept back grey over | mind with |
splendid brow as stark | unusual |
as Beethoven’s | spirit and |
making the nose (turned up) | the looks of a |
seem small between the burned up | hero with a brow |
eyes and blurred | as high as Beetho |
evasive | ven’s a small nose an |
mouth | evasive mouth |
it occurred in South | and hair swept back |
Carolina | dark but silver |
oh but | over temples |
not muscular | retaliating eyes |
indeed though | and the |
masculine | troubled |
and slim for | identity |
grace and | of the |
elegance | narrator. |
| |
(Portrait by Veronica) | (Portrait by his reflection)* |
*
Jacques,
après
avoir
dit
entre
ses
dents
:
“Tu
me
le
paieras
ce
maudit
portrait
”,
ajouta.
– Vous avez été fou de cette femme-là?
L
e
Maitre
-Et pourquoi haïssez-vous les portraits?