Hygiene and the Assassin by Amélie Nothomb

the characteristics of our species is that our brain feels obliged to work continuously, even when it serves no purpose: this deplorable technical disadvantage is at the origin of all human misery. Rather than allowing her to indulge in noble inactivity or elegant repose, like a snake sleeping in the sun, the housewife’s brain, furious that it is not being useful, begins to secrete idiotic, pretentious screenplays—and the baser the housewife perceives her activities to be, the more pretentious her scenarios become. And all the more stupid in that there is nothing base about running the vacuum cleaner or scrubbing the toilet: these are things that need to be done, that’s all. But women always imagine that they have been placed here on earth for some aristocratic mission. Most men do, too, less stubbornly however, because their brains are kept busy with the help of bookkeeping, professional promotion, informing on their peers, and tax returns, which leave less time for wild imaginings.”
    â€œI think you’re a bit behind the times. Women work now, too, and they have the same worries as men do.”
    â€œHow naïve can you get! They’re pretending. Their desk drawers are full of nail polish and women’s magazines. Contemporary women are even worse than the housewives of old, who served some purpose at least. Nowadays, they spend their time chatting with their colleagues about subjects as substantial as relationships and calories, which amounts to the same thing. When they get too bored, they get laid by their bosses, which gives them a deliciously intoxicated feeling, knowing they are messing with other people’s lives. What better professional promotion for a woman! When a woman destroys another person’s life, she views her exploit as the supreme proof of her spirituality. ‘I cause trouble, therefore I have a soul,’ is how she reasons.”
    â€œTo listen to you, anyone would think you have a score to settle with women.”
    â€œIndeed I do! One of them brought me into this world, although I certainly never asked her to.”
    â€œYou sound just like a rebellious teenager.”
    â€œA bilious one would be more like it.”
    â€œVery funny. But a man had something to do with your birth, too.”
    â€œI don’t like men, either, you know.”
    â€œBut you do despise women more than men. Why?”
    â€œFor all the reasons I already gave you.”
    â€œYes. But you see, I have difficulty believing you don’t have another motive. Your misogyny stinks of a desire for revenge.”
    â€œRevenge? Whatever for? I’ve always been a bachelor.”
    â€œIt’s not just about marriage. Besides, maybe you yourself don’t even know where your desire for revenge comes from.”
    â€œI can see where you’re headed, and I refuse to be psychoanalyzed.”
    â€œWithout going that far, you might spend some time thinking about it.”
    â€œThinking about what, for God’s sake?”
    â€œYour relationships with women.”
    â€œWhat relationships? What women?”
    â€œDon’t tell me that you . . . No!”
    â€œWhat, ‘no’?”
    â€œYou’re not a . . . ?”
    â€œWhat, out with it!”
    â€œ . . . virgin?”
    â€œOf course I am.”
    â€œImpossible.”
    â€œAbsolutely possible.”
    â€œNeither with a woman, nor a man?”
    â€œYou think I look like a fag?”
    â€œDon’t take it badly, there have been some brilliant homosexuals.”
    â€œYou make me laugh. You say that the way you would say, ‘There have even been some honest pimps,’ as if there were some contradiction between the words ‘homosexual’ and ‘brilliant.’ Still, I must protest against your refusal to accept that I might be a virgin.”
    â€œPut yourself in my shoes.”
    â€œHow do you expect someone like me to put myself in your