The Anti-Novel
It's a safe bet that Giorgio de Chirico's novel “Hebdemeros” has never been read in its entirety, start-to-finish, by anyone -before falling asleep. A transcription from the first four pages of the 1964 edition, published by Flammarion, U.K., follows:
And then began the tour of that strange building situated in a street that looked forbidding, although it was distinguished and not gloomy. As seen from the street the building was reminiscent of a German consulate in Melbourne. Its ground floor was entirely taken up with large stores. Although it was neither Sunday nor a holiday, the stores were closed, endowing this part of the street with an air of tedium and melancholy, a certain desolation, that particular atmosphere which pervades Anglo-Saxon towns on Sundays. A slight smell of docks hung in the air; the indefinable and highly suggestive smell that emanates from dockside warehouses in ports. The German-consulate-at-Melbourne look was a purely personal association on the part of Hebdomeros and when he mentioned it to his friends they smiled and found the comparison amusing, but they didn't dwell on the point, and immediately spoke of something else, which led Hebdomeros to decide that they had probably not grasped the meaning of what he had said. And he reflected on the difficulty of making yourself understood once you begin to develop at a certain height or depth. It's odd, Hebdomeros repeated to himself, the idea that something had escaped me would keep me awake, but most people can see, hear or read things which are totally obscure to them without feeling upset.
They began to climb the staircase which was very broad and built entirely of polished wood; in the centre was a carpet; at the foot of the staircase was a little Doric column carved in oak, which incorporated the end of the stair rail, and on it stood a polychrome statue, also made of wood, representing a Californian negro with his arms raised above his head, holding a gas lamp, its jet covered with an asbestos handle. Hebdomeros felt he was going up to see a dentist or a specialist in venereal diseases; and he felt he was developing stomach-ache; he tried to overcome these feelings by remembering that he was not alone, that two friends were with him, strong, athletic young men, carrying automatics with spare ammunition in the gun-pockets of their trousers. When they realised that they were approaching the floor that was said to produce the greatest number of strange apparitions they began to go up more slowly and on tiptoe; their gaze became more attentive. They moved slightly farther apart, while remaining on the same level, so that they could go down the stairs again freely and as quickly as possible, if some apparition of a special kind forced them to do so.
At this moment Hebdomeros thought of his childhood dreams, when he would go anxiously up wide and dimly lit staircases of polished wood where the carpet in the centre muffled the sound of his footsteps (his shoes, moreover, even outside dreams, rarely squeaked because he had his shoes made to measure by a shoemaker called Perpignani who was known all over the town for his good quality leather; Hebdomeros's father, however, had no talent for buying himself shoes; the ones he wore made horrible noises as though he were crushing sackfuls of hazelnuts at every step).
Then the bear appeared, the disturbing, obstinate bear who followed you up and down the stairs and across corridors, with his head down and apparently thinking of other things; the desperate flight across bedrooms with complicated exits, the leap through the window into the void (suicide while dreaming) and the descent in hovering flight, reminiscent of those condormen whom Leonardo enjoyed drawing among the catapults and anatomical fragments. It was a dream which always predicted unpleasantness and above all illness.
'Here we are!' said Hebdomeros, stretching out his arms in front of his companions in the classic gesture made by temporising captains arresting the onward rush of their soldiers. They reached the threshold of a vast room with a high ceiling, decorated in the style of 1880; the lighting and general atmosphere of the room, which was totally devoid of furniture, were reminiscent of the gaming rooms at Monte Carlo. In a corner, two gladiators wearing diving helmets were exercising without conviction under the bored gaze of a master, a pensioned ex-gladiator with a vulturelike eye and a scarred body.
'Gladiators! This word contains an enigma,' said Hebdomeros in a low voice to the younger of his two companions. And he thought of the music halls with illuminated ceilings evoking visions of Dante's paradise; he thought also of those afternoons in Rome, as the show came to an end and the huge velarium increased the shade over the arena with its smell of sawdust and blood-soaked sand.
Vision of Rome, coolness of antiquity
Anxiety of twilight, song of the sea.
More padded doors and short, deserted corridors, and then all at once: Society! Go into the fashionable world. Lead a fashionable life. The rules of society. Savoir vivre. Invitation TTYL (to take your leave). DP (deliver personally). PTO (please turn over).
In a corner of the drawing-room was a huge grand piano, open; without standing on tiptoe you could see its complicated entrails and the clear anatomy of its interior. But it was easy to imagine what a catastrophe it would have been if one of those chandeliers laden with pink and blue wax candles had fallen into the piano with all its candles alight. What a tragedy within the melogenic gulf! Wax running along the metallic wires, as taut as the bow of Ulysses, hindering the precise action of the little felt-covered hammers.