Babel

by R.F. Kuang

The word loss was inadequate. Loss just meant a lack, meant something was missing, but it did not encompass the totality of this severance, this terrifying un-anchoring from all that he’d ever known.

‘I want to live,’ she repeated, ‘and live, and thrive, and survive them. I want a future. I don’t think death is a reprieve. I think it’s – it’s just the end. It forecloses everything – a future where I might be happy, and free. And it’s not about being brave. It’s about wanting another chance. Even if all I did was run away, even if I never lifted a finger to help anyone else as long as I lived – at least I would get to be happy. At least the world might be all right, just for a day, just for me. Is that selfish?’

‘That’s just what translation is, I think. That’s all speaking is. Listening to the other and trying to see past your own biases to glimpse what they’re trying to say. Showing yourself to the world, and hoping someone else understands.’