Waiting for the Barbarians

by J.M. Coetzee

I am like an incompetent schoolmaster, fishing about with my maieutic forceps when I ought to be filling her with the truth.

When I wake it is with a mind washed so blank that terror rises in me. Only with a deliberate effort can I reinsert myself into time and space: into a bed, a tent, a night, a world, a body pointing west and east.

I am aware of the source of my elation: my alliance with the guardians of the Empire is over, I have set myself in opposition, the bond is broken, I am a free man. Who would not smile?

To people who do not operate under statute, legal process is simply one instrument among many.

How can I accept that disaster has overtaken my life when the world continues to move so tranquilly through its cycles?