Metroland

Metroland by Julian Barnes

Book: Metroland by Julian Barnes Read Free Book Online
Authors: Julian Barnes
‘And what about the Trojan wars?’
‘On the lav.’

1 • Karezza
    At twenty-one, I used to say I believed in the deferment of pleasure; I was usually misunderstood. Deferment was the word, not rejection or repression or abandonment or all the other terms it automatically got translated into. I’m less sure now, though I do believe in the balanced, delicate leading-in of the individual to experience. This isn’t prescriptive; just sensible. How many kids of twenty-one today are sentiently burnt out; or worse, find it chic to believe they are? Isn’t a diet of extremity senseless and, finally, comic? Isn’t the whole structure of experience built on contrast?
    What I’m leading up to is that when I arrived in Paris, with almost two decades of education behind me, plus an enthralled reading in the classics of passion – Racine, Marivaux, Laclos were trusted guides – I was still a virgin. Now, don’t jump to all those conclusions (puritanism lurking behind stance of worldly knowledge; fear of sex disguised as austerity; sneaky jealousy of today’s kids) because I know them already. The fact that pubescents nowadays are getting stuck in before their testicles are fully descended doesn’t bother me in itself. Not really. Not very often.
    ‘Maybe you just don’t like sex?’ Toni would whisper at me, after what we called the Common Pursuit had led, in his case, to joining the Great Tradition. ‘Time to Revalue, kid,’ he commanded.
    ‘I know I like it – that’s why I can refuse it.’ I liked this argument.
    ‘You can’t mean you know you like it; you mean you think you will like it.’
    ‘All right.’ If he wanted to put it that way. ‘Anyway, De Rougemont says passion thrives on obstacles.’
    ‘That doesn’t mean you have to build your own. Do It Yourself artist. Why don’t you want to get in there and root? Root de toot. I mean, Christ, I want to root everyone.’ Toni made a few rolling, nasal pig-noises. ‘I can barely think of a woman I don’t want to fuck. Think of all that pussy out there, Chris; all that dripping fur. You’re not exactly a warpie. It’s true you don’t seem to have the tremendous drive that I’ve got’ (Toni, admittedly, did look older, more rabbit-hungry) ‘but I should think most women, given the opportunity, would go down on you like a ton of bricks. I mean, knock out those over seventy, no fifty, and those under fifteen, nuns, religious screw-ups, most newly marrieds but not all, a few million with malnutrition whom you probably wouldn’t want to touch, your mother, your sister, no on second thoughts we may as well leave her in you never know, your gran, plus June Ritchie and anyone I happen to be going around with at the time – and what have we got? Hundreds of millions of women all of whom mightn’t be averse to breaking in the old dick. French, Italians, Swedes ,’ (he cocked an eyebrow) ‘Americans, Persians …?’ (he put his head on one side) ‘Japanese – the inscrutable yoni? Malaysians ? Creoles? Eskimos? Burmese?’ (an impatient shrug) ‘Red Indians? Latvians? Irish ?’ (then, crossly) ‘Zulus?’ He paused, a shopkeeper who has spread out his best stuff and knows that if you only address your mind to the matter, you’ll find something you like.
    ‘I didn’t realise you wanked over the atlas.’
    ‘Graduated from the National Geographic .’
    ‘Well, who didn’t?’
    ‘But you could have by now, couldn’t you?’ (Toni, like a dutiful air-traffic controller, was always monitoring what he called my ‘near misses’) ‘There was that nurse, wasn’t there, who said if you were good, the next time you could have chocolates?’
    ‘Yes.’
    ‘And that girl who wasn’t Jewish, wasn’t Catholic and had been to X-films?’
    ‘Yes.’
    ‘And that woman when you were on the Christmas post?’
    ‘I might have lost my bonus.’
    ‘That’s what it’s all about, kid, losing your bonus. And Rusty, for fuck’s sake, Rusty …’
    Rusty

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