The Tender Hour of Twilight

by Richard Seaver

  * * *

  Awake, I vaguely recalled that I had a mission. Ah, yes, to forewarn one Samuel Beckett that his life was in danger. Behan was, if sonority was any clue, still fast asleep. First thought: bicycle over to rue des Favorites and leave a message. No, Christopher had borrowed my bike and never returned it. Take the metro? A possibility. But wait! Minuit was right around the corner. Forewarn Lindon, who could then forewarn Beckett. Brilliant: the greatest reward for the least effort. I put one foot on the floor, a Herculean effort—or was it an Herculean? I must check—my head, though crystal clear, beset with pain as never before—well, seldom—as I brought the second foot to the floor. Quietly, I pulled on trousers, only to find a pair was already there, more than enough. Shirt too, wrinkled but serviceable. Shoes, socks, the works. I edged toward the door, unlatched it, cracked it open, nary a sound. I was in luck, till the morning light struck me full force and I staggered back. Looking around—stealth my motto—still no movement on the Irish front. I tiptoed out, literally, down along my familiar corridor, still cobblestoned as before, my own little universe, the inner button found and pushed, the solid street door clicked open, out into the rue du Sabot, swarming with life.

  At Minuit, up the endlessly winding stairs to the landing, then left and up again to the reception. I smiled. She smiled back. She knew me by now. Was Monsieur Lindon in? Yes, but occupé. Was it important? Very. She looked worried, reached for the phone, checked it in midair. The hand that held it, I mean. Could she ask me a question? Of course.

  Was I feeling all right? Fine, just fine. Thank you for asking, very kind of you. Because, Monsieur Seaver, you look a bit pale. I nodded, I assumed the proper gesture, and finally blurted out that I had an important message for Monsieur Beckett. Urgent. Could I leave a note for Monsieur Lindon? Would she make sure it reached him at the earliest possible moment?

  With as steady a hand as I could muster, I related in writing the previous night’s story, that young Mr. Behan of Dublin was intent on seeing him, come hell or high water. I tried to encapsulate his curriculum vitae, as much as I had gleaned or could recall, starting with his Borstal youth, but remembering suddenly that he had also claimed in the wee hours to be, like Mr. Beckett, a budding playwright, a nugget that had escaped me till then. Therefore with much to discuss. But beware: he seemed to have a slight propensity to drink. For the moment, I added, he was lodged at the rue du Sabot, though my intent was to end that situation in the immediate future, if not sooner. (Mother’s expression; credit where credit is due.) He had tried to worm Mr. Beckett’s address from me, I underlined, and though I had drunk far too much last night, I believed that sacred information inviolate …

  Rereading my note, I thought it seemed gibberish, so, apologizing to the motherly receptionist, I tore it up and wrote another, shorter and surely more cogent. Folding it, I marked it URGENT, thanked her, and repaired to the Royal, where I had a double café crème. Then another. At which point, almost human, I gathered my wits, girded my loins, and headed home to rid myself of the Gaelic invader.

  * * *

  Even as I turned the corner from the rue Bernard Palissy into the rue du Sabot, I knew I was in trouble. Deep trouble. I could hear the voice as loud and clear as if it were right next to me, singing, in what I took to be perfect pitch, an Irish song of some renown. The sound swelled with every step I took until, the door open, it almost swept me off my feet. As peaked as I must have looked, Behan looked the picture of health, his cheeks ruddy, his eyes clear, his hands steady. The smell of coffee filled the room.

  “Where have you been, Seaver?” he boomed. “Coffee’s brewing. Have yourself a seat. And make yourself perfectly at home.”

  Make myself at home? From gate-crasher to king of the roost in a mere half day. This was not going to be as easy as I had hoped. Over coffee, Behan pressed his case. He would be going by to see Beckett’s publisher, who, he was sure, would provide him with the desired address. I could only hope my message had been passed in time.

  I told him I’d be needing his bed tonight, for a friend passing through. “That’s all right,” he said, “I can sleep in the chair, as I did last night.” “No, no,” I responded, “the bed is for a lady friend.” “Then you won’t be needing two beds at all, will you?” He winked, and again I thought of the gun I didn’t have. “You know I haven’t a penny to me name,” he went on. “Deported from me own country without so much as a farthing or thank-you. You wouldn’t want me sleeping on park benches, would you? Anyway, I rarely get to bed before three or four in the morning, so I won’t be any bother. Just leave the door unlatched when you turn in … So I’ll be off.”

  He was back in half an hour, unenlightened but also undeterred. Lindon had refused to see him, but he swore he’d go back the next day, and the day after that, until he wormed the information out of him. Much as I loathed him at this point, I had to admire his persistence.

  “It’s not as though Beckett wouldn’t want to see me,” he reasoned. “He’ll receive me the same way Joyce received him.”

  For a moment I thought I might have been dead wrong: Who was I to judge whom Beckett would see and whom not? But Behan had already formulated his next obsessive step.

  “I know he hangs out at Montparnasse,” he said, “so I’ll spend me day there, asking around till I find him.” And he was out the door as spry and serene as if a drop had never touched his lips the night before.

  As for me, I flopped on the bed and slept a good three hours before, awake once again, I felt human. Well, almost human.

  * * *

  True to his word, Brendan spent all day—and night—roaming Montparnasse, asking hither and yon if anyone had seen Samuel Beckett, his old friend. Given his obvious Irishness, both of word and of drink, more than one local imparted information willingly. No, he hasn’t been around, at least not recently, but have you tried the Closerie des Lilas, he’s often there? Also the Dôme or the Coupole. At each of these spots Behan would pause to refresh, so by late afternoon, early evening at most, he would be roaring drunk, singing at the top of his lusty lungs until he would either fall asleep or be ungraciously ushered out onto the unwelcoming sidewalk.

  The second night, in stark defiance, I had bolted the rue du Sabot door. I’d not come home myself until after two, warily checking to see if my boarder had somehow snuck in. Great! A good night’s sleep in the offing. Wrong! At what turned out to be four a.m., first the Voice and then the insistent pounding. “OPEN UP, SEAVER! I’M HOME!”

  “Home indeed!” But unlatch the door I did, however reluctantly. This time no bottle was unearthed, yet I was obliged to hear how he was still waiting for Beckett, despite several promising leads. The Rotonde and, especially, a pub called the Falstaff were places to which Beckett now repaired, Behan had learned, and on the morrow he would reconnoiter both. Would I mind if we had just one song before turning in? Just one? Fine, but not too loud … “I know, I know, the working people upstairs. I’ve no use for working people. You know the old Irish saying: ‘Work is the curse of the drinking classes’!” and he roared with laughter, as though he had made it up.

  * * *

  Next day, in much better shape, I hied myself around the corner and scaled the now-familiar stairs two at a jaunty time, only to meet head-on, on the first-floor landing, Sindbad Vail. “Nice piece about Samuel Beckett in Merlin,” he said, either smiling or scowling, I wasn’t sure which. “I thought you promised Points your next offering.” It’s true, I had, but it was Trocchi who’d suggested the Beckett, so I had no choice. “I have something for your next issue,” I said, “I think you’ll like.” “Fiction or nonfiction?” he asked. “I’ll give you one of each, and you pick,” I offered, and he seemed happy.

  At reception, the motherly lady looked pleased at my improved appearance. She confirmed that my note to Monsieur Lindon had reached him. He was grateful, and she was quite sure he had alerted Monsieur Beckett to the problem. As I took my leave, she said, “I’m glad you’re feeling
better today.” I nodded, gracefully, I hoped, and scooted downstairs and back around the corner to prepare for the next episode in my Irish saga. Gingerly, I opened the door, so as not to awake my honored guest, only to find the room empty. A note, penned in large and generally readable script, informed me that he was off to seek his prey, but assured me he would return sometime early morning. “DON’T FORGET TO LEAVE THE DOOR UNLATCHED!”

  * * *

  Three days’ further sleuthing were, as Behan put it, “a washout.” He had to conclude that Beckett was not around, for surely he would have heard in these past few days that Brendan Behan, a fellow Irishman, a fellow playwright, a friend-waiting-to-happen, was in Paris and eager to meet. “I actually got his street address,” he said. “Rue des Favorites, though nobody could give me the number. I stopped in several pubs in the neighborhood, but no luck. But I can tell you, most of the pubs in the area have decent whiskey. A good sign, no?” He paused. “Or rather, they did. I fear I may have forced most of them to replenish their supply …

  “Anyway, on the fourth day—I sound like the fuckin’ Bible, don’t I?—one pub finally did have the street number—15, by the way—so I went up and pounded on the door till himself answered. Had a lovely conversation. Three hours at least. At nine or so, however, he said he had to leave for a rehearsal of his play Waiting for Godot, which is apparently going on the boards shortly—do you know anything about it?—but he was most grateful for me visit. Most grateful. Not sure his wife agreed. Suzanne. She scarcely said a word…”

  “Nine o’clock?” I said. “You left him at nine o’clock after three hours? Which means you went there at 6:00 a.m.?”

  He frowned, all cogs working, then nodded. “Must have been,” he said. “I don’t watch the clock the way most people do. Anyway, I didn’t leave him of me own accord. At one point he said he had to go to a rehearsal of his play and escorted me out. He asked where I was stayin’. ‘Rue du Sabot,’ I told him, at which point he hailed me a cab and paid for it. God bless! I told you we Irish always stick together!”

  Shit! Behan’s revelation of my address as his Paris hospice meant Beckett would quickly put two and two together and think I had sicced Behan upon him. This only weeks after I had sought his collaboration for the magazine. Now I was sure I would never hear from him, about Watt or any other matter.

  So all my efforts had been in vain. Months later, one afternoon at the Dôme when I was having a drink with Beckett, I brought up the subject, recounting my side of the Behan saga. He shook his head. “Don’t worry,” he said. “Lindon told me the efforts you made on my behalf. Poor lad,” he said, shaking his head, “at the rate he’s drinking, he won’t last another decade.”

  Beckett was almost right. Behan died twelve years after that initial 1952 encounter, at age forty-one. Beckett was to see him only once thereafter. When he was in London in the fall of 1961 attending rehearsals of Happy Days, his cousin John Beckett, one of his uncle Gerald’s three children, who was a longtime friend of Behan’s, persuaded Sam to go along with him to visit Brendan, then confined to a nursing home in a vain attempt to cure his alcoholism. Though he had predicted this end, Beckett was profoundly shocked at what he found: “a hulking carcass lumped under the wrinkled bedsheets” which “signified a terrible waste of spirit and talent.”1

  I, on the other hand, was to meet my uninvited boarder several times later, in my role as his editor at Grove Press in the 1960s. But that is a whole other story, on a continent far away.2

  16

  Thief, Pederast … and Genius

  BACK TO OUR STORY, with number 3 of Merlin hot off the press. We had delivered two copies to Sartre, courtesy again of the ubiquitous and always-accommodating Jean Cau. Two days later, Cau called and asked if Trocchi and I could meet with Monsieur Sartre the following afternoon. “He is impressed with what you are doing,” he said. “I think he has an idea or two for you.”

  My immediate reaction was “Oh, shit!” because in that issue I had written a piece on Sartre, summing up the long-running political feud between him and Camus. Still, since I had given the clear nod to Sartre, I thought there was little with which he could take exception.

  What’s more, I reasoned, even if he saw the piece, he wouldn’t bother to read it, for one thing I had learned is that the French in general have a penchant to ignore any foreigners’ attempts to understand, much less explain, the finer details of their history, culture, and politics.

  * * *

  As Cau ushered us again, promptly at four, into the sanctum sanctorum, Sartre rose to greet us. Copies of the magazine were on his desk.

  “I am glad you did the Nyiszli,” he said. “It is such an important document, and now at least English readers will have an insight into that death camp. Too little is still known.” Then he turned his oblique gaze on me. “Your piece ‘Revolt and Revolution,’” he said. “You doubtless sense how painful my rupture with Camus has been. During the war he was exemplary. Combat was the most important clandestine newspaper, and as the editor he showed rare courage and great intelligence. And Meursault is one of the major characters of contemporary fiction. But I always suspected that Camus was more interested in heaven than in our mere earthly matters. The Germans actually brought us together in a common cause. But when that pressure was removed, we went different ways, which is perfectly acceptable and normal. My suspicion, though, is that Camus looked upon the German occupation years as an unwanted intrusion, which forced him into a daily servitude he was all too happy to end so that he could turn to matters more transcendental, more—” He broke off, saying he had gone on too long, though I demurred. I wanted to hear more, for Sartre spoke with an intensity and intelligence that, despite the obvious emotional involvement, did not become bellicose.

  “I would like to suggest another French writer for your consideration,” he said. “You may find you’re veering too much from your basic mission as an English-language magazine, but I wonder, do you know the work of Jean Genet?”

  I nodded, for though it was carefully not in Jeanne Theis’s canon, I had read not only his Journal du voleur but the even more daring Notre-Dame-des-Fleurs.

  “He is very important,” Sartre went on. “Unlike any other writer in France today. Or maybe ever. In fact, he has so fascinated me that I have written a book on him.” He reached down and pulled out an enormous tome with the intriguing title Saint Genet. “I meant only to write an introduction to one of his books, but the more I learned, the fatter this became.” He sounded almost apologetic. “Here,” he thrust the tome across the desk, “use whatever you want from it, if indeed you publish something by Genet himself. There is, by the way, an English translation under way, perhaps done, of at least one work, I’m not sure which.”

  “Journal du voleur,” Jean Cau said.

  “How do we get in touch with Monsieur Genet?” Alex asked.

  “He is very reclusive,” Sartre said, “and will be difficult to contact, though I will have a word with him and see if you can meet.”

  We thanked him and prepared to leave.

  “One more thing,” he said, standing. “I notice you have published”—I think he looked in my direction, but his walleye made that uncertain; at least he turned in my direction—“a piece in your second issue on Samuel Beckett. I did not read it all, but I gather you think very highly of him…”

  “Of his work,” I interjected. “I don’t know the man.”

  “And in your current issue I gather you have an extract of one of his novels, Watt, the last work he wrote in English. Now he writes in French. Some years ago, we published a story of his in Les temps modernes. I don’t remember the title—I think it was called ‘Suite’—but I recall he became very upset, claiming we had published only half the work, whereas what appeared was the entire manuscript his agent Tony Clerx1 had sent Simone. It turns out it was indeed but half the story, but that we learned only later, and Beckett became quite incensed with us when we told him we did not publish sequels. ‘
It is not a sequel,’ he said. ‘It is the second half of the story. The crucial half, for without it you allow me to speak only to cut me off before my voice has had time to become meaningful.’ Or words to that effect. He wrote Simone a stinging letter, using, if I recall, such terms as ‘nightmare’ and ‘mutilation.’ ‘Then why did you not send us the entire piece?’ Simone asked. ‘Because,’ responded Beckett, ‘when it was first submitted we were told it was too long to be published as such. But we were assured by Madame Allard2 that the second part would be published in the autumn issue.’” Sartre shook his head, doubtless wondering if any editor could ever satisfy any author. “Still,” he went on, “he has since published two novels with Minuit, Molloy and Malone, both of which are fine, and a year ago we published a long extract—some fifteen thousand words, I believe—of the latter in the magazine, under the title ‘Quel malheur.’ So while I wouldn’t say that fences are fully mended, I think it proves we hold no grudge against him. On the contrary. But I suspect he still does against us. Certainly against Simone. So I thought you should know that, however talented, he can be difficult. Very difficult.”

  We thanked him for the warning, shook hands, and were again escorted to the door by Jean Cau.

  “I’ll make sure to put you in contact with Genet,” Cau said. “Sartre is right. To publish him would be a real coup for your magazine.”

  * * *

  Early in the new year I received a pneumatique from a man named Bernard Frechtman, who announced himself Jean Genet’s friend, agent, and translator. Once again Jean Cau had been as good as his word. Frechtman had heard we were interested in publishing Genet’s work in the magazine. Could we meet? Possibly next Friday at three? We suggested the Old Navy, a popular bar on the boulevard St. Germain that, along with the Royal and later the Café Tournon, was a place where one could spend the better part of the afternoon reading, writing, or just talking without the management batting an eye, even if all we had ordered over the hours was a couple of coffees or, if suddenly felled by hunger, a sandwich and a glass of wine. Promptly at three, Frechtman arrived, tall and bespectacled, shrouded against the cold in an army jacket that had clearly seen better days, perhaps even battle. His were no ordinary glasses, the lenses so thick he had to peer at everyone and everything that met his gaze, his head thrust slightly forward as if to help the magnification. I wondered how, with that eyesight, he had ever been accepted in the army. Looking past him, I was hoping to see the saint himself, but there was no one. Frechtman was an American GI who had stayed on after the war and was firmly ensconced here. He was carrying a package, wrapped in brown paper. There were five of us at that first meeting: Alex, Jane, Austryn, Patrick, and I. We were all drinking coffee, but Frechtman, good Frenchman that he had become, ordered a glass of red wine. We had three or four copies of Merlin’s latest issue on the table, one of which we pushed toward him, but he shook his head. “Thanks, but I’ve already read it,” he said. “And I’ve talked to Jean about you and the magazine. He’d be pleased if you published an extract from The Thief’s Journal. I’ve brought the manuscript with me. Have any of you read him in French by the way?” Both Austryn and I had. “He’s a genius,” Frechtman said, “pure and simple. If you haven’t, you should read Sartre’s Saint Genet. That says it all.” I wasn’t sure about “genius,” but it was true I had never read anything quite like Genet, a mixture of lyricism and lower depths, of grit and soaring imagination, all in a prose so personal and complex it defied a simple reading. Damn hard to translate. I was intrigued to see how well Frechtman had done. “Read it and pick a passage,” he said, sliding the manuscript across the table. “When you’ve decided, I’d like to see it.” We chatted for half an hour or so, about Genet, about Merlin and the other little magazines in Paris—all of which, Frechtman confessed, had turned down Genet as “too daring,” “too dangerous,” “too obscure.” “Maybe you will, too,” he added, “but I don’t think so.” I mentioned to Frechtman that Sartre had asked to meet him.