an Episode in the Life of a Landscape Painter by César Aira Read Free Book Online Page B

effect of rotation and orbital movement is to keep certain sides of certain planets permanently hidden. To use a modern term, which does not appear in the letters, we might call this a problem of "discursive form." As if he had been aware of it from the start, Rugendas had prudently built up a range of correspondents scattered around the globe. So now he resumed the task of writing to other addresses; among his interlocutors he counted physiognomic painters and naturalists, ranchers, farmers, journalists, housewives, rich collectors, ascetics and even national heroes. Each set the tone for a different version, but all the versions were his. The variations revolved around a curious impossibility: how could he communicate the proposition "I am a monster"? It was easy enough to set it down on paper. But transmitting its significance was far more difficult. In the case of his Chilean friends the problem was pressing, and he took particular care over his letters to them, especially the Guttikers, who had already written inviting him to stay at their house in Santiago, as he had before setting out on his journey a few months before. Since they would be seeing him shortly, he felt he had to warn them. The obvious thing to do in this case would have been to exaggerate, in order to diminish the surprise. But it was not easy to exaggerate, given the state of his face. He ran the risk of falling short, especially if they were allowing for obvious exaggeration. Which would make the surprise even worse.
    In any case, he certainly did not shut himself away. His body's natural regimen required a good deal of fresh air and exercise. And even in his semi-invalid state, in spite of the frequent migraines, the nervous attacks and the constant medication, it became imperative for him to dedicate the hours of good daylight to riding and painting the natural world. The faithful Krause never left his side, because the attacks could occur far from the house, in which case he would hoist Rugendas onto his own horse and gallop back, undaunted by the cries of pain. Those spectacular crises were not, however, the most remarkable aspect of their outings. Rugendas attracted a great deal of attention even when he was behaving with perfect calm and propriety. People gathered to look at him, and in half-civilized places like the picturesque environs of Mendoza, one could hardly expect discretion to be the rule. The children were not the worst, because the adults behaved like children too. They watched him intently drawing the large hydraulic devices used for irrigation (his latest enthusiasm), and they were consumed by the desire to see his papers. What did they imagine? As for Rugendas, each time he took up his pencil he had to resist the temptation to sketch himself.
    At summer's end the weather had attained ultimate perfection. The landscapes took on an infinite plasticity; the shifting light of the Cordillera enveloped them hour by hour, made them transparent, endless cascades of detail. The afternoon light, filtered by the imposing stone ramparts of the Andes, was a ghost of its morning self, an optics of the mind, inhabited by the untimely pinks of mid-afternoon.
    Twilight went on for ten or twelve hours. And during the friends' night walks, gusts of wind rearranged stars and mountains. If it was true, as the Buddhists said, that everything, even a stone, a dead leaf or a blowfly, had already existed and would exist again, that everything was part of a great cycle of rebirths, then everything was a man, a single man on the scale of time. Any man, Buddha or a beggar, a god or a slave. Given sufficient time, all the elements of the universe would combine to form a man. This had major consequences for the procedure: for a start, it could not operate automatically like a transcendent mechanics, with each fragment being slotted into its predetermined place; each fragment could become any other, and the transformation would be accomplished not in the