by Ketty Rouf
Anyway, I don’t know if I’m making any sense. I just wanted to tell you that, right now, I don’t feel like philosophy helps you live your life better. You said that, too, I remember it clearly: “Philosophy helps you live your life better.”
Thank you for thinking about my questions.
Yours truly,
Hadrien
I rummage in my bag, my mind a tangle of confused, guilty thoughts. I know Hadrien is here, but I don’t look up at him. I search. No key. I mutter some vague excuses—“Just don’t go anywhere.”—and run back toward the teachers’ lounge, going fast enough to lose my breath, fast enough to risk falling. We—teachers—we can’t leave them unattended. We can’t take our eyes off them, ever. The last time that happened was during Madame Louis’s math class. Five minutes left unsupervised was enough for one girl to claim she’d been groped, for a window to be broken, and for a backpack to disappear with all its contents. You can’t let them go to the bathroom, you can’t ever give them permission to leave the classroom, and you can’t ever have any physical contact with them. The students are untouchable. No hand on their shoulder to encourage them, or to hold them back. No touching, ever. Superintendent’s orders.
Returning with the key, I realize just how total their lethargy is. No one has moved a muscle, paralyzed by exhaustion, or maybe boredom. I open the door. They drag their carcasses, weighed down by backpacks, to their seats. Some of them thud noisily down into their chairs, others are already rocking back and forth in seats that sound like they’re about to crack, staring vacantly into the distance. I keep my mouth shut, thinking of the instructions we’ve been given: don’t ask students to sit up straight; it disturbs their concentration. Superintendent’s orders. From my desk at the front of the room, I watch them fidget, catching glimpses beneath their restless movements of the violence that is always there, ready to explode, shoving a classmate, scraping their chair legs on the floor, once, twice, for no reason except to be a pain in the ass: the low rasping sound of the chair legs is like some kind of sinister music. I stand in front of them silently, my heart lurching with every rasp. I watch them drum and pull and fiddle and toss, and it’s my flesh they’re abusing. It paralyzes me. The few that aren’t sprawled almost horizontally in their chairs, heads low, stare at me with disapproval. I take a swallow of water to get my voice back. Hadrien is silent. He’s sitting straight-backed in his chair. I meet his eyes, finally, and the words I need to say, the right words, suddenly come out:
“I don’t like getting up at six o’clock either . . . but there are things to do that are more important than sleeping. This morning, we’re going to do an essay model for the problematic you had for your homework: “Can a person be happy without being free?”
I write the phrase on the board as a babble of protest rises up behind me.
“What about our papers, Madame?”
“After the essay model.”
“But that won’t help us; we won’t ever be able to write it like that; we just want our grades!” Little Wallen is whining, refusing to let it go. “Essay models are for rich kids’ schools.”
“Yeah, she’s right,” puts in Leïla. “And anyway, we have the right to get our papers back.”
The standoff with the students is exhausting me. I’ve got a migraine coming on, I can feel it. I pretend not to hear them; I can be stubborn, too. I write out a possible problematic for a typical essay: Are happiness and freedom incompatible? Part one: Freedom is an obstacle to happiness. Part two . . .
Behind me, the muttering hasn’t stopped. Stifled giggles. A chair falls over. Is that the sound of someone vomiting? I turn around. Leïla is on her feet, her cheeks bright with fuchsia blush, her pink tracksuit skintight, hair unkempt.
“Madame, Lény farted! I’m so sick of guys! Why can’t we have girls-only classes?”
“Oh yeah, right, your words are farts! You’re farting with your mouth! That’s Diogenes, Teach! Like girls’ farts don’t stink . . .”
The class is in total disarray. The words burst out of me: “Zip it, Lény!”
“Why should I zip it, Madame? I didn’t do nothing wrong. You’re not supposed to hold farts in. They’re made to come out; otherwise you get sick.”
I don’t reply. How can I argue with such wisdom?
So, happiness. And freedom. No notebooks on the tables, pens scattered everywhere. Whenever I’m given a few minutes, I try a little reflection, a little exploration. It’s intermittent philosophy, a tiny seed here, a tiny seed there. You can’t stop sowing the seeds and hoping for a harvest. It’s the fundamental purpose of the job.
“Being happy requires learning to choose . . .”
“Choose what, Madame? Tomorrow’s pill? That one’s not red . . .”
“Happiness is the only goal we have that’s just for ourselves.”
“Yeah, but I also want my brothers and sisters to be happy!”
“You can’t be happy without being free . . .”
“Cool, yeah, that is so fucking true!”
“What about you, Madame? Are you happy?”
Hadrien, who hasn’t spoken until now, repeats the question:
“Madame? What about you? Are you happy?”
Stop pestering me, Hadrien. Stop asking me to care about you. I have nothing but philosophers to give you, concepts and quotes so well formulated that you’ll feel like you understand the world, life, yourself. Listen to me, just listen to me and study; do what I ask you to do. This isn’t for the bac. Screw the bac. This is for you, a gift for life, a spark to guide you in the dark. I blush. I want to run away. Or cry. Again. Always crying, that’s what powerlessness is. At this precise moment in time, Hadrien, seventeen years old, and all his scruffy, youthful glory, are stronger than I am.
“Yes, Hadrien. I am. It makes me very happy when you understand the lesson, when you react like you’ve done today and we try to have a discussion. I’m happy to give you back the first essays of the year. I wanted to encourage you, even though we still have a lot of work to do.”
Nothing but idiotic words. I don’t believe them myself. No one believes them; no one gives a damn. I look down at the stack of papers. I hand them to Wallen so she can distribute them. Hadrien leaps out of his chair like a sprinter at the sound of the gun, to help her pass them out. I’ve run out of words. It actually feels like I’ve lost my voice. They don’t care what I say anyway, and at any rate, they’re the ones calling the shots. A few minutes later, Hadrien hands me back an absent student’s essay and murmurs, almost inaudibly: “I’m waiting for your answer.” I look up, look him straight in the eye, without meaning to, like a reflex, an action too urgent, too necessary to try to fight. I like this boy. I’ve taped my letter to the last page of his essay, just like he did.
Paris, November 25, 2005
Dear Hadrien,
First of all, I want to thank you for the attention you’re paying to philosophy, and to my classes. I don’t think you’re “against philosophy.” On the contrary, I think you’re very much “for philosophy”; you’ve already taken the first step toward what I would call a philosophical attitude, which is a reflective attitude. You might remember the definition of “reflection” we talked about in class: “an act of thought turning inward on itself to gain an understanding of its own workings.” If it took twisting your ankle and spending the weekend in bed, staring at the ceiling without even listening to music, for you to reach this point, then I must admit I’m thankful for your temporary handicap. The images that those cracks and mildew inspired in your mind were none other than your thoughts. Your questions, and your letter, are wonderful examples of reflective consciousness. You are the subject, making your thoughts the very object of your thoughts. That dialogue of thought with itself—that is philosophy, my dear Hadrien. But I understand your doubts, and I want to try to answer your questions. You’re wondering if philosophy can spare us
the pain of existing, soothe our worries, and give meaning to everything in our lives that feels meaningless. I understand, and I share your anxiety. You don’t need to be a philosopher to sense the absurdity of existence. Often it’s the questioning itself that makes us anxious.
Yes, Hadrien, philosophy can help us to live our lives better, because it teaches us to work on our perception of the world and of ourselves, our desires and our anxieties.
Yes, Hadrien, it’s true that philosophy itself doesn’t bring happiness. While philosophizing can be a pleasurable thing, it’s not because we philosophize that we are happy.
You’ve understood correctly that at the root of all philosophy is some original disappointment, an unhappiness. Stuck in bed with a bum ankle, you start thinking. It’s when you can’t stand up—Is it really life that can’t stand up, or maybe you? Or all of us?—that you start to reflect. Strange, isn’t it? Maybe the mind and the body are limping, but life, far less so.
Dear Hadrien, I want to tell you that life is exciting, irresistible, that you have to fling yourself headlong into it, savor it, love it every day, every minute, more and more deeply. But I owe it to myself to remind you that it’s sad and repetitive, too, and not without its share of vulgarity and ugliness and mediocrity. And there’s always the threat of illness, and the final defeat of death.
It was philosophy that taught me that there are ideas that can save us, and others that can ruin us. Knowing how to live means choosing the ideas that won’t ruin us. That’s how philosophy can rescue us from the unhappiness of existing.
Don’t forget: Seneca said, in On the Shortness of Life, “It takes the whole of life to learn how to live.”
Thank you, Hadrien, for sharing your ideas and your insights with me.
Sincerely,
Joséphine
PART TWO
THOU SHALT NOT TEMPT
1
I’m a fantasy.
For ten days I’ve worn nudity like a mask. I’ve called myself Rose Lee, and I feel like Rose Lee is me. My new figure, made svelte by depression, has been providential.
I look over the pile of homework on the table. Dead tired, I’ve never been so alive. I hardly sleep at all anymore; my nights now are full of daylight. I’m joyful in a way I didn’t know it was possible to be. I can feel my body turning liquid, almost melting into the chair where my venerated ass feels again, shamelessly, the sensations of last night’s gyrations. This is what it means to be a sexual fantasy: sinking into your own pleasure.
I gaze at the thirty-three students in front of me without seeing them. They have ceased to exist. I hide my awe-struck eyes with their dark circles behind a pair of glasses. I am totally dazzled, completely blown away. I’ve never felt beautiful. Not even pretty. Every woman deserves to feel this giddy, this dizzy with power. I had no idea how life-changing men’s gaze on a woman’s body could be. I didn’t know, because I was scared. Scared of men, yes. Scared of their hard-ons and their uncontrollable libidos. How do I admit, now, that I want to be the woman who gives every man on the planet an erection? The handsome ones and the ugly ones, the old and the young, the good men and the assholes? The ones I desire, and the ones I don’t?
At night, I am that woman. I am Rose Lee. I dance completely naked for anyone willing to pay for the show. I always touch myself a little, and a little more every time, to make sure I’m doing the job right. I watch the other girls a lot. I want to learn. It reminds me of the ballet classes I took when I was young; the sideways glances at each other’s battements and ports de bras. The girls always used to stay naked in the dressing room, before and after the shower, sitting together, gossiping. I envied their serene nakedness, their natural femininity. They were beautiful without artifice, striking without provocation. Women exposed without being stripped bare, unassailable in their womanhood. I always tried to hide myself around them, concealing my body behind a bath towel. I got dressed fast, as fast as I could. But now I want to be like my colleagues; I want their knowledge, so I can be the queen of hard-ons.
Narcissistic satisfaction. Yes, and so what? It’s about men admiring my tits now, rather than assessing my lesson plans, and goddamn, it feels good! Have I lost it completely, feeling more like a philosopher onstage than I do in front of my students? I wonder, but for me it’s only onstage that my life is neither sad nor tragic. Living is easy there, and freedom is an emotion, not just an idea. Not to mention the money. That wasn’t the reason I started doing this—I hadn’t even thought about it. But when you earn your entire monthly teacher’s salary in just a few nights of dancing, you suddenly forget all those books you’ve read and reread and summarized. Who said money can’t buy happiness?
I know, now, what’s expected of Rose Lee. Poppy explained it perfectly. Men want me to play the game. First, Rose Lee has to stare at the customer, to face him head-on, but from a distance at first, while he gets comfortable in his seat. Make him wait a minute or two. Search his eyes for that spark of desire. Then she has to come closer, soft and swaying. That’s how it has to start, with a kind of dizziness, where he doesn’t know what’s happening to him, where he stares at his ideal woman like a deer caught in the headlights, stunned. He needs to want to feed from her open mouth, to suckle, to talk, all at once. But the only expression on his face will be one of impatience, as the minutes tick by without him getting what he wants, while Rose Lee’s eyes flick callously to the time-counter on the wall of the private room. But she’ll be able to make him feel like time is standing still. She’ll make him hope for a kiss, her mouth hovering close to his, trailing a finger down the side of his dumbstruck face. And then she’ll clutch him to herself, watch as he lets his head fall back on the bench and closes his eyes, to shut out the sight of her. He can’t touch Rose Lee. He knows it. A lot of the time, he doesn’t even dare. Or he will just graze her very carefully, very slowly, his hand brushing her wrist, or his fingers closing around the heel of her shoe. If he gets pushy, Rose Lee might pretend to strangle him—Poppy told her about that little trick—or grab a fistful of his hair, shaking her head gently. If he’s too calm, she undoes the top button or two of his shirt and acts like she wants to caress his chest, to get him excited, so he’ll ask to extend the dance.
Another man might be crude, watch her with lust in his eyes, say dirty words to her. He’s like an animal in heat, rubbing his erection through his pants and ordering her to rub herself against him. Then she has to smile, but without doing anything he says, without betraying her contempt for him. When she’s naked, he wants to see her pussy, he asks her to spread her legs: “I can pay more for it.” He takes advantage of that second when she’s moving away to try to touch her with his dirty fingers. She turns and slaps him. He stops twisting his hand inside his underpants and humiliating her with his words and ejaculates in his pants, quickly dropping his gaze, looking away.
When that happens, Rose Lee has to handle herself elegantly, smile, make light of what has just happened. It’s written in her contract: “The artist acknowledges that she may be exposed to nudity and sexually explicit talk, and may witness explicit sexual actions and behavior, and declares that she does not find such situations offensive.” Everything calms down and fades. She gets dressed silently, waiting impatiently for him to open his eyes and pay her for his indecencies. She keeps an eye on the hand rummaging in his pocket and holding out more tickets. And then she walks away from him, maybe forever.
He’s a stranger.
The forgettable man.
He and all the others are a multitude and no one, all at once.
Rose Lee is a nude dancer. Her world is made up of two large rooms, three stages with three poles, and ten private rooms. Five hundred square meters of dimly lit happiness.
2
Be smart, not beautiful. Beautiful women aren’t good for anything except as an extra jewel on a rich man’s arm. Don’t be seductive; be invisible. No makeup, no dresses, no high heel
s. Never spread your legs for a man. Men only know violence; all they care about is satisfying the animal inside them. Don’t daydream. There are no princes, and no princesses.
I’m four years old, my hair in a crew cut, my room full of encyclopedias and children’s literature, even though I can’t read yet. But not a single doll. My mother has decided that my ugliness will be my salvation, that being cultured is the way to true happiness. Every month she buys a few new books for my library. I envy the bedrooms of my classmates, with their candy-pink walls and ceilings decorated with stars that glow when you turn out the lights. Clustered on shelves by their beds are boy and girl baby dolls, tiny pacifiers atop stacks of doll clothes, Barbies in stiletto heels with their miniature kitchens. I only had one doll during my childhood, a Barbie given to me by Delphine, a girl in my class. Its hair was totally destroyed, but I decided the wild strands gave my Barbie a fierce look. She was an adventurer, the heroine of all the outlandish stories I made up for her. I loved her that way and hid her in the doghouse that belonged to Mac, the philosophy-teaching neighbor’s Great Dane.
One day, my Barbie disappeared. I looked for her everywhere.
