Monsterous and Sad
[Compay Segundo and Joseito Fernandez are sitting on a bench in the public gardens.]
Compay Segundo: You look sad.
Joseito Fernandez: I am thoughtful. Compay, why are doing these reviews? Why are we being - you know - we are being - critics! Why doesn't this seem monsterous to us?
Compay: I do not understand. I give my opinion; why should my opinion be a monsterous thing? It is not a bomb. It has not threatened anyone yet, and if this zine stays so very small and unknown then it never will. Will people not buy 'Yol Bolsin' merely because I do not like it? Psht! No. They will listen to the advertising of Real World and they will listen to other critics who have had more friendly words to say about the album. "Why should I heed a poor imitation of a dead man?" they will say. "Why should I pay attention to something so small and so very subjective?"
Joseito: No, you do not understand. I mean, why are we not using our time to create wonderful things of our own? Why are we not writing songs instead of telling other people that their songs are bad?
C: Or good. Or good. Sometimes we are kind.
J: But do you see what I am saying?
C: No. Go on.
J: Think! Don't real imaginitive people create from nothing? All we do is make comments. We - we are being parasites. We are being reflections of what stands forward boldly and is its own thing.
C: Show me any creation that is entirely its own thing. Don't we all have our inspiration somewhere? Doesn't Jorge Luis Borges turn his criticism of Dante into a fine piece of its own thing?
J: You are putting us in too-illustrious company Compay. Don't scare me with Borges. In any case, we are different. We have not made any majestic castles of our own thing out of the material we have been mining. All we do is, I say it again, we make comments. We could choose to spend our time being characters in a fine play instead of critics. We could make comments on the human condition instead of on men who go ay ay ay ay ay ee ee ee ee ee.
C: You are never going to let that poor flamenco singer go, are you Joseito?
J: How will we understand the fountain of creation if we do not ourselves create? Yet what are we doing - we are judging creation! If we become too used to criticising and having control, like a stern father saying This is good, and This is bad, will we ever be able to create again? If we are squashing other musicians, are we also squashing the musician that is us?
[there is a pause while this sinks in. Joseito Fernandez smooths his hair which has become fluffy with sweat]
C: This is a serious charge, my friend. You are saying that as critics we are putting ourselves too far apart from what we are criticising.
J: Something like that.
C: Perhaps you are right. Perhaps we are killing ourselves, so to speak. But I know that I do not have any comment to make on the human condition at this time. Do you?
J: No, but I might think of one if I tried.
C: Not I. And yet, I think that if I teach myself to listen to things carefully and describe them truthfully, I might find something.
J: I think that is far-fetched. Silent contemplation and effort is the way to create, not scolding other people in public.
C: We should try both, and then we will know.
J: Or else we will be caught in a trap, always criticising, for all eternity, and never creating again.
C: You paint such a black picture.
J: I feel like a black picture.
[Compay Segundo watches an ant move across the cloth of his trouser knee in puzzled fits and starts. For a short while he does not speak.]
C: You know, you do not have to do this. I will let you go free.
J: I know.
C: For myself, I have nothing else to do right now. Death is long.
J: I know it is.
C: Perhaps we will never create anything again. But I must do something and here, I am doing something.
J: It is such a small ambition though, to just create. Why can't we follow it? What is holding us back, in this critics' world?
C: I don't know, my friend, I don't know. Come. Let me remove this ant from my trousers and give it back to its nest. It won't be a prodigious deed, but I believe it is not one that will go unappreciated.
