Ποιος γράφει; // What about the writer?

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Πάντα (θα) θυμάμαι την παρομοίωση της Virginia Woolf στον Κεκλιμένο Πύργο (1940), όσο κι αν η ίδια την απορρίπτει μετέπειτα στο κείμενό της:

“[...] ο συγγραφέας είναι ένα ουράνιο στοιχειό που γλιστρά στον ουρανό, γδέρνει τη γη και χάνεται” (σς. 160).

Χάνεται όπως και οι σκέψεις του, αν δεν χαραχτούν σε ένα χαρτί, ή αν δεν χτυπήσουν τα πλήκτρα ενός υπολογιστή. Από τον συγγραφέα εντέλει μένει μόνο η σκέψη, τυπωμένη ή αιωρούμενη, και στέκεται στον ορίζοντα του χρόνου ως έχει, άλλοτε σαν σκοτεινή τρύπα κι άλλοτε σαν ήλιος.

Και συγγραφέας είναι όποιος και όποια μάθει τις σκέψεις του να γραπώνονται από ένα κομμάτι χαρτί, να ανοίγονται στους άλλους, να συζητούν και να κατανοούν.

Ο συγγραφέας μαθαίνει πρώτα να αφουγκράζεται και μετά να γράφει· να γράφει και μετά να σκέφτεται· να σκέφτεται και μετά να διορθώνει· και να ξαναγράφει, να ξαναγράφει...

Ο συγγραφέας δεν ξέρει τον εαυτό του. Ξέρει τη γραφή του, και μέσα από αυτή μαθαίνει και τον ίδιο. Είναι πολλά πρόσωπα μαζί, και κανένα. Μεταδίδει τις σκέψεις των άλλων, αφού η δική του σκέψη αναζητά πάντα την ύπαρξή τους.

Αλλά ο συγγραφέας, σταυροδρόμι σκέψεων και λέξεων, διαμεσολαβητής του αύριο, είναι και μοναχικός. Αναγνωρίζει την σιωπή στην φασαρία της στιγμής και την έκσταση στην σιγή της νύχτας. Αποκοιμάται με όνειρα ξένα, κείμενα που περιμένουν να γραφτούν, και αφήνει τον εαυτό του για λίγο στα αστέρια, ίσα να τους κλέψει λίγη έμπνευση.

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I (will) always recall Virginia Woolf’s simile in The Leaning Tower (1940), nonetheless she goes on to deconstruct it later in her text:

“[…] a writer is a heavenly apparition that slides across the sky, grazes the earth and vanishes” (p. 160).

The writer vanishes just like his/her thoughts, unless they are carved on paper or typed on keyboard. What is left of the writer is eventually the thought, printed or floating, standing on the horizon of time as it is, alike a dark hole or resembling a sun.

The writer is the one who teaches the thoughts to hold on to a piece of paper, to be open to others, to discuss and to comprehend.

The writer learns to harken and then to write; to write and then to think; to think and then to edit; and to rewrite, to rewrite…

The writers are not knowers of the their self. They know of their writings, and through them learn of their own being. The writers are several people, and no one. They impart thoughts of the others’, since their own thought is always looking for the existence of the former.

But the writer, crossroad of thoughts and words, the mediator of tomorrow, is also lonely. Acknowledging the silence in the fuss of the moment and the ecstasy in the quietness of the night. Falling asleep on foreign dreams, scripts awaiting to be written, and leaving the self to the stars for just a little while, enough to steal some of their inspiration.

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Photograph: Samothraki, 23.01.2018.

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