Meeting Gilberte, pt. 2

I loved her; I was sorry not to have had the time and the inspiration to insult her, to hurt her, to force her to keep some memory of me.


Our intrepid narrator, as yet unnamed, is a bit of a neurotic. To say the least. What becomes almost touching over time, however, is how little he makes an effort to hide his neuroses from his readers. And it's not because he is unaware of his audience. He writes rather directly to the audience most of the time. But he pulls no punches on himself. When he has thoughts or feelings that most of us might keep carefully to ourselves, he carefully exposes them. Think what you will of him, he is himself enough not to worry about that, or, simply, not to be able to be any other way.