Eco: Foucalt's Pendulum eco foucault (highly illogical behavior txt) 📖

remainedmotionless; the crowd was intent on a kind of circular movement,like bees hunting for a hidden flower. Though I wasn't looking foranything myself, I stood up and moved, shifted in response to theimpulses transmitted to me by the group, and not far from me I sawLorenza. She was wandering, miming the impassioned recognition ofthis man, of that: head high, eyes deliberately myopic-wide, backstraight, breasts steady, and her steps haphazard, like agiraffe's.

At a certain point thehuman flow trapped me in a corner behind a table, where Lorenza andBelbo had their backs to me, having finally met, perhaps by chance,and they were also trapped. I don't know if they were aware of mypresence, but the noise was so great that nobody could hear whatothers were saying at any distance. Lorenza and Belbo thereforeconsidered themselves isolated, and I was forced to hear theirconversation.

"Well," Belbo said,"where did you meet your Aglie?"

"My Aglie? Yours, too,from what I saw. You can know Simon, but I can't.Fine.''

"Why do you call himSimon? Why does he call you Sophia?"

"Oh, it's a game. I methim at a friend's place¡Xall right? And I find him fascinating. Hekisses my hand as if I were a princess. He could be myfather."

"He could be the fatherof your son, if you aren't careful."

It sounded like me, inBahia, talking to Amparo. Lorenza was right. Aglie knew how to kissthe hand of a young lady unfamiliar with that ritual.

"Why Simon and Sophia?"Belbo insisted. "Is his name Simon? ¡¥¡¥

"It's a wonderful story.Did you know that our universe is the result of an error and thatit's partly my fault? Sophia was the female part of God, becauseGod then was more female than male; it was you men who later put abeard on him and started calling him He. I was his good half. Simonsays I tried to create the world without asking permission¡XI, theSophia, who is also called¡Xwait a minute¡Xthe Ennoia. But my malepart didn't want to create; maybe he lacked the courage or wasimpotent. So instead of uniting with him, I decided to make theworld by myself. I couldn't resist; it was through an excess oflove. Which is true; I adore this whole mixed-up universe. Andthat's why I'm the soul of this world, according toSimon."

"How nice! Does he givethat line to all the girls?"

"No, stupid, just to me,because he understands me better than you do. He doesn't try tocreate me in his image. He understands I have to be allowed to livemy life in my own way. And that's what Sophia did; she flungherself into making the world. She came up against primordialmatter, which was disgusting, probably because it didn't use adeodorant. And then, I think, she accidentally created theDemi¡Xhow do you say it?"

"You mean theDemiurge?"

"That's him, yes. Ormaybe it wasn't Sophia who made this Demiurge; maybe he was alreadyaround and she egged him on: Get moving, silly, make the world, andthen we'll have real fun. The Demiurge must have been a realscrewup, because he didn't know how to make the world properly. Infact, he shouldn't even have tried it, because matter is bad, andhe wasn't authorized to touch the stuff. Anyway, he made this awfulmess, and Sophia was caught inside. Prisoner of theworld."

Lorenza was drinking alot. A number of people had started dancing sleepily in the centerof the room, their eyes closed, and Riccardo came by every fewminutes and filled her cup. Belbo tried to stop him, saying she hadalready had too much to drink, but Riccardo laughed and shook hishead, and she said indignantly that she could hold her alcoholbetter than Jacopo because she was younger.

"All right," Belbo said,"don't listen to Granddad, listen to Simon. What else did he tellyou?"

"What I said: I'mprisoner of the world, or, rather, of the bad angels...because inthis story the angels are bad and they helped the Demiurge make allthis mess...The bad angels, anyhow, are holding me; they don't wantme to get away, and they make me suffer. But every now and then inthe world of men there is someone who recognizes me. Like Simon. Hesays it happened to him once before, a thousand years ago¡XI forgotto tell you Simon's practically immortal; you can't imagine all thethings he's seen..."

"Of course...but don'tdrink anymore now."

"Sssh...Simon found meonce when I was a prostitute in a brothel in Tyre and my name wasHelen..."

"He tells you that? Andyou're overjoyed. Pray let me kiss your hand, wAore of myscrewed-op universe...Satne gea-tleman."

"If anything, that Helenwas the whore. And besides, in those days, when they saidprostitute, they meant a woman who was free, without ties, anintellectual who didn't want to be a housewife. She might hold asalon. Today she'd be in public relations. Would you call a PRwoman a whore or a hooker, who lights bonfires along the highwayfor truck drivers?''

At that point Riccardocame and took her by the arm. "Come and dance," he said.

In the middle of theroom, they made faint, dreamy movements, as if beating a drum. Butfrom time to time Riccardo drew her to him, put a hand possessivelyon the back of her neck, and she would follow him with closed eyes,her face flushed, head thrown back, hair hanging free, vertically.Belbo lit one cigarette after another.

Then Lorenza grabbedRiccardo by the waist and slowly pulled him until they were only astep from Belbo. Still dancing, she took the paper cup from Belbo'shand. Holding Riccardo with her left hand, the cup with her right,she turned her moist eyes on Belbo. It was almost as if she hadbeen crying, but she smiled and said: "It wasn't the only time,either." "The only time, what?" Belbo asked.

"That he met Sophia.Centuries after that, Simon was also Guillaume Postel." "A lettercarrier?"

"Idiot. He was aRenaissance scholar who read Jewish¡X" "Hebrew."

"Same difference. Heread it the way kids read Superman. Without a dictionary. Anyhow,in a hospital in Venice he meets an old illiterate maidservant,Joanna. He looks at her and says, ¡¥You are the new incarnation ofSophia, the Ennoia, the Great Mother descended into our midst toredeem the whole world, which has a female soul.' And so Posteltakes Joanna with him; everybody says he's crazy, but he