V

Every so often, Antonym tried to digest some late-afternoon melancholy with a packet of cornstarch biscuits. He used these moments to make more or less free associations. Any old fact could spark a run. One of the sequences he’d been most chuffed with was inspired by a stumble:

I tripped and almost fell. If I’d fallen, I would have hurt myself. If I’d hurt myself, I’d be resting in bed. A doctor would come to examine me and give me medicine. Many ancient medicines were made with Eastern drugs. According to Aristotle, the winds are born in the East. Aristotle was the teacher of Alexander the Great. Alexander the Great was lord of the world. The Greeks believed the world was held up by Atlas. Atlas was strong. Strength is symbolised by columns. Columns hold up buildings. Buildings are made by labourers. Labourers are directed by engineers. Engineers work from architects’ sketches. Sketching is part of painting. Painting is an art. There are seven liberal arts. Seven is the number of sages who studied eloquence. The goddess of eloquence is Minerva.

A week after his meeting with Farfarello, Antonym was munching on cornstarch biscuits while making a series of associations that, having started with scouring powder, had already reached superconductors. But he didn’t get to what might have been the end of this chain of thoughts.

‘I’m so useless. Bernadette was right to leave me.’

Antonym left the packet of biscuits in the kitchen and went to the bedroom. The text Farfarello had given him had been lying on the nightstand for a week — and he hadn’t read it.

‘Would Hegel have made associations as banal as mine?’

Antonym decided to take the priest’s advice to read Hegel’s text. It was a compilation of phrases by Hegel that summed up the notion that all great men in history were propelled by the World Spirit, despite the fact that their actions appeared to stem, even in their own eyes, from personal ambitions alone. Such great men — who could be called heroes — were capable of perceiving what needed to be done in their era and, consequently, of revealing the Truth that inhabited all human beings, but to which the majority did not aspire. They had often been warned to proceed with caution along the way, but had pushed on regardless. And, thus, these great men had ended up being followed by those who saw them as the incarnation of their own desires and their own souls.

Of all the quotes, one stuck in Antonym’s head: ‘The courage of truth, faith in the power of Spirit, are the first conditions of philosophy. Man, because he is Spirit, can and must consider himself worthy of everything that is most sublime. He can never overestimate the greatness and power of his Spirit. And if he has this faith, nothing will be so hard and unyielding as not to reveal itself to him.’

It was already after 9.00 p.m. when Antonym went to meet Hemistich.