Table for Two

by Amor Towles

“Dismissed!” shouted Irina that night in their little apartment. “How does one get fired from Communism!”

For what had caused Timothy to delay the start of his novel was not a desire to investigate methodologies, but a fear so dark and disturbing it could barely be acknowledged—the fear that he had no story to tell.

How could one expect to craft a novel of grace and significance when one’s greatest inconveniences had included the mowing of lawns in spring, the raking of leaves in autumn, and the shoveling of snow in winter?

Timothy understood perfectly well that a position at a bookstore wasn’t likely to make him rich; but the notion of having such a job appealed to him on artistic grounds.

—For the viewer, Evelyn—whether salesgirl or senator, rogue or Rothschild—the cinema is the ultimate entertainment. It is an overflowing font of romance and danger. But for the performer, the romance and danger reside on the stage.

—But onstage, my dear, onstage it is in the very interstice between the full-blooded physical forms of the actors that the spark is struck. It is in that space between two gazes that search each other out, between two fingertips that nearly touch…. And danger? For the actor, every dram of it is in the theater. Not because of crocodiles and sabers, you understand, but because the edge of the stage is a precipice! For there are no takes in the theater, Evelyn; no second chances.