De Amerikaanse schrijver Don DeLillo werd op 20 november 1936 geboren in New York City als zoon van Italiaanse immigranten. Zie ook alle tags voor Don DeLillo op dit blog.
Uit: The Silence
“They sat waiting in front of the superscreen TV. Diane Lucas and Max Stenner. The man had a history of big bets on sporting events and this was the final game of the football season, American football, two teams, eleven players each team, rectangular field one hundred yards long, goal lines and goal posts at either end, the national anthem sung by a semi-celebrity, six U.S. Air Force Thunderbirds streaking over the stadium.
Max was accustomed to being sedentary, attached to a surface, his armchair, sitting, watching, cursing silently when the field goal fails or the fumble occurs. The curse was visible in his slit eyes, right eye nearly shut, but depending on the game situation and the size of the wager, it might become a full-face profanity, a life regret, lips tight, chin quivering slightly, the wrinkle near the nose tending to lengthen. Not a single word, just this tension, and the right hand moving to the left forearm to scratch anthropoidally, primate style, fingers digging into flesh.
On this day, Super Bowl LVI in the year 2022, Diane was seated in the rocker five feet from Max, and between and behind them was her former student Martin, early thirties, bent slightly forward in a kitchen chair.
Commercials, station breaks, pregame babble.
Max, speaking over his shoulder, “The money is always there, the point spread, the bet itself. But consciously I recognize a split. Whatever happens on the field I have the point spread secured in mind but not the bet itself.”
“Big dollars. But the actual amount,” Diane said, “is a number he keeps to himself. It is sacred territory. I am waiting for him to die first so he can tell me in his final breath how much money he has pissed away in the years of our something-or-other partnership.”
“Ask her how many years.” The young man said nothing.
“Thirty-seven years,” Diane said. “Not unhappily but in states of dire routine, two people so clutched together that the day is coming when each of us will forget the other’s name.”
A stream of commercials appeared and Diane looked at Max. Beer, whiskey, peanuts, soap and soda. She turned toward the young man.
She said, “Max doesn’t stop watching. He becomes a consumer who had no intention of buying something. One hundred commercials in the next three or four hours.”
“I watch them.”
“He doesn’t laugh or cry. But he watches.”
Two other chairs, flanking the couple, ready for the latecomers.”
De Amerikaanse dichter, librettist en essayist Scott Cairns werd geboren op 19 november 1954 in Tacoma, Washington. Zie ook alle tags voor Scott Cairns op dit blog.
Imperatief
Het is zaak om te onthouden hoe
Voorlopig dit allemaal echt is.
Je zou dood wakker kunnen worden.
Of de vrouw van wie je houdt
Zou kunnen besluiten dat je lelijk bent.
Misschien geeft ze het eindelijk op te
Proberen de manier te negeren
Waarop je je tanden flost als je
Televisie kijkt. Alles wat ik zeg
Is dat er hier niets zeker is.
Ik bedoel, je wordt waarschijnlijk levend wakker,
En zij zal waarschijnlijk elke daadwerkelijke
Beslissing over je uiterlijk blijven uitstellen .
Misschien is ze blij dat je tanden
Zo schoon zijn. De ochtend zou
Vol van alle liefde en vriendelijkheid kunnen zijn
Die jij nodig hebt. Ga gewoon niet denken
Dat je er iets van verdient.
Vertaald door Frans Roumen
Zie voor nog meer schrijvers van de 20e november ook mijn blog van 20 november 2018 en eveneens mijn blog van 20 november 2017.