196
NATHALIE
SARRAUTE
Here no risks are taken. There is no question of charging blindly
ahead. There are no sudden breakthroughs, no violent shocks, no
explosions, as in Saint-Simon, for example. Never any impetuosity or
disorder, not the slightest casualness.
The fictional substance is first isolated, then immobilized, care–
fully contained. We advance prudently, only after making certain of
already conquered ground; there's plenty of time. Slowly the sentence
is deployed, but the reader, forewarned, knows already that no danger
threatens it. It
will
neither demur, stammer, tremble, come apart nor
leap up; no plunge into the void
is
possible. Gently it takes fresh
breath, then the
and
that appears with such surprising monotony
announces that it is about to start again, on its way to the inevitable
end that awaits it on this last lap. The
and,
which the reader senses
as though fascinated, and which never fails to appear,
is
there, reassur–
ing and comfortable, like the seats placed on stair-landings to allow
us to rest for a moment before climbing the last flights.
This
and,
which surprised Proust because it did not correspond
to its usual function,
is
the pivot on which most of these sentences
turn whenever they reach a certain length. The
and
appears and
from then on we wend our way peacefully towards the end.
Again I shall read at random:
When he rose his entire attitude was one of serene fearlessness,
impervious to mercy,
to
dismay, ...
For a moment the sentence remains suspended in air, we might even
be apprehensive, despite the fact that its swaying foreshadows an ap–
proaching cadence. But now comes the
and:
and
because he was suffocating he went up to the top of the
tower that overlooked Carthage.
Here we can rest, catch our breath. Something definitive has been
achieved. We've looped the loop. Then the immense, laborious ef–
fort is resumed, we start again:
The town sank downwards in a long hollow curve of cupolas
and temples, of golden roofs and houses, of clusters of palm trees
here and there, . . .
