Your Face Tomorrow. Fever And Spear - Plot & Excerpts
I had travelled a fair way along the path typically followed by all audacities (if it wasn't, in fact, mere insolence). You begin by prefacing everything with 'I don't know', 'I'm not sure'; or by qualifying and modifying as much as possible: 'It could be,' 'I would say that. . .', 'I can't be sure, but . . .', 'It seems likely to me that . . .', 'Possibly,' 'Possibly not,' 'This may be going too far, but. . .', 'This is pure supposition, but nevertheless . . .', 'Perhaps,' 'It might well be,' the archaic 'Methinks,' the American 'I daresay,' there are all kinds of shadings in both languages. Yes, you avoid affirmations in your speech and banish certainties from your mind, knowing full well that the former brings with it the latter just as the latter brings with it the former, almost simultaneously, with no noticeable difference, it's alarming how easily thought and speech contaminate each other. That is how it is at the beginning. But you soon grow more confident: you sense a commendation or a reproach in an oblique look or a chance remark, directed apparently at no one in particular and uttered in a neutral tone which you know, none the less, is intended for you, that it applies to you.
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