“Memory is the least attractive of the muses. And although she always changes her appearance, I only ever remember the least appealing. But why should this be if imagination dresses herself like a bawd in her rouge and seamed stockings — surely gaudiness is worse than ugliness …? It had been some years since my divorce from memory, but only a few months ago, there was a reconciliation.” (…) “There’s no better example of this than Dámaso Alonso, a man capable of discerning the significance of every syllable in a poem, and yet incapable of writing a poem with a single discerning syllable …” And he repeated Barnet Newman’s maxim, “Aesthetic is to the artist as ornithology is to the bird.” But he thought he was quoting Wallace Stevens.
Nicasio Urlihrt, A Toast with Death at Night / Nocturnal Toast with …
Cheers, [Cheerio]
*The plagiarist laboratory is absolutely beyond the scope of the word-for-word copyist drudging away at his desk. Let’s not forget about Mallarmé, who, according to Valéry, restored syntax to its proper place on the summit of mount Helicon. And so we all continue to aspire — as Duchamp, as Leonardo — to achieve the draft, the final draft.
2.
Elena Siesta was obstinate; Nicasio Urlihrt a pedant, who brayed solemnly about succession and inheritance. Lester was, and then he was no more. Felipe Luini never was: although he tried to be. Belisario Tregua faded away years before he died. The Scacchi brothers faded away before they could even be. Inés Maspero, alias Eloísa Betelgeuse, killed herself; many others tried the same, without consummating the act. Because of love, despair. (The key year 1979?)
#3 LITURGIES
Annick Bérrichon was one of the most prestigious literary critics; (which is the only reason why) Nicasio had been greatly interested in her. Besides this, she was also a professor of Balkan literature, although no one knew how she obtained the title or to what institution she was affiliated. But this last mystery is what piqued Belisario’s interest. Annick’s friendship with Elena soon led to her being introduced to the most prominent committee members of Agraphia, including Nicasio. One afternoon in June, almost seven months after Eloísa’s death, they met with a medium in the house on calle de las Posadas (not the one on calle de las Piedras).
Miss Bérczely’s face was a grotesquery of warts and other excrescences, an especially nasty case of what Elena termed — post-laforgian, post-lugonian—“lunarism.” She spoke with what sounded like an imitation German accent with a hint of French in the guttural. Everyone pretended to understand what she was saying.
Those present were Dos, Oliverio Lester, and someone else who came with them; Elena had dragged along her best friend, Sofía Sarracén, who was even more superstitious than she — a pianist with certain mediumistic talents, who brought along her fiancé [Eloy Armesto: Lupanal …] — a student of Bérrichon’s — to introduce him to the rest of the group.
At last, Nicasio arrived. His system of responses resembled those adopted by Elena to translate Blevgad: quibbling, nibbling, double negatives — disagreeable in any language — delivered in the passive, reflexive, voice …
As it was a commemorative date — June 23, launch of Oxyrhynchus—the committee was hoping Hilarión Curtis would attend (who not only owed the journal but also his fellow Argentine citizens answers).
According to the more or less reliable testimony of those present — particularly Sofía’s fiancé—the first to induce a fit of histrionics and table tapping was a confused little girl who was communicating with the medium on the subject of writing. Suddenly, the medium began coughing and choking, perhaps because there was a change of … “visitant,” or because someone had taken off their shoes … [???] A high pitched voice then spoke in impeccable Castilian: “I am Zelda Bove, grandmother of Benkes, and the legitimate proprietor of his falsehoods …”
Annick Bérrichon’s spiritual ancestry has been discussed in an essay by Lupanal. Suffice it to say the literary critic’s grandfather — whose nom de plume, Belén Mathiessen, is better known to the uninitiated — [was a partner] of Dunglas Home, who had duped many nineteenth century positivists. Today, we can conclude that Annick Bérrichon and all her pseudonyms — so suited to Agraphia—was born, as Blevgad prophesied, to unpack this piece of history, although her activities would succeed only in blurring the chronology. Her grandfather died in a pitiful way, although not as Luini described — nobody will ever know if her account precedes his — in both “Lemurids, Cheiroptera, et Cie” and Sherbet Aria.
2.
Hilarión Curtis — illustrious ancestor of Nicasio Urlihrt — took a seat in the second row. From there, he could espy, without anyone noticing, everything that was happening backstage. The theater had little to offer. Managed by a board and a consortium, it received financial contributions from Doctor Yturri Ipuche and Hilarión himself, although their efforts would cost them dearly. All to bring culture to those [so-called] forgotten lands.
The function began with a recitation by Iris Oratoria of a work of Doctor Yturri Ipuche’s // [an adaptation of Andrés Bello’s then out-of-print “Silva a la Agricultura de la Zona Tórrida”]. Afterwards, what looked like a bunch of school kids enacted part of Juan de Miramontos y Zuazola’s Armas Antárcticas. Then Culcuchina and Curycollor appeared, two Inca princes.
Finally, Atanor Lupino was on the stage, a porteño actor with a yellow beard who performed musical improvisations and imitations of other artists. He sang a ballad in denigration of Washington Barbot. After this, he said that, with the exception of imitations of anyone present, he was going to do his “classics.” He started with Don Julián Acosta …
With his imitation of Don Lucio Mansilla, the act became a farce, because some poor mulattos and a midget were playing the part of Ranquel Indians, wriggling in obeisance on the ground, while the plump and pompous Don was running up and down the stage with his prop sword hanging from his belt.