The Wicked Pavilion

Is contained in

Canonical title*

Café Julien

First words

Poco después de las dos, un caballero de mediana edad, de cabello rojizo, entró apresuradamente en el Café Julien, se sentó a la mesa de Alexander como tenía por costumbre, pidió café y coñac como tenía por costumbre... (show all), rogó que le trajeran papel de carta como tenía por costumbre, agitó una estilográfica y se dispuso a escribir.

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Shortly after two a sandy-haired gentleman in the middle years hurried into the Cafe Julien, sat down at Alexander’s table as he always did, ordered coffee and cognac as he always did, asked for stationery as he always did,... (show all) shook out a fountain pen and proceeded to write.

Quotations

En las grandes bibliotecas, los profesores estudiaban la manera de hacer desaparecer los libros; los políticos proclamaban que leer y escribir era innecesario, además de ilegal, ya quela acción de la palabra escrita en el ... (show all)cerebro humano puede inducir a pensar; un proceso subversivo que a todas luces incita a la rebelión contra el liderazgo robótico. Todos los conocimientos necesarios para la generación de soldados podían difundirse a través de altavoces; era indispensable conservar la vista para practicar la puntería y las manos para empuñar las bayonetas. ¿Por qué habría de tolerarse que una bomba enemiga aniquilara nuestra cultura acumulada cuando éramos capaces de hacerlo nosostros mismos por decisión gubernamental? [p. 14]

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“If I hadn’t known it before I would have known I was dead when I read some of that bilge!” he said, and then shrugged. “What am I talking about? It was what I believed about myself. It was what made life worth living... (show all) until—well, all of a sudden it—whatever it is—was gone. I was dead, all right. I couldn’t figure it out. I couldn’t paint. Me! Thought at first the damn harpies had killed it.”
“Maybe too much liquor,” Ben said.
Marius looked at him, astonished, and poured himself a new drink.
“There can’t be too much liquor!” he said. “I decided maybe I was just under-drunk. And under-womanned. You know how a new dame can give you a fresh start. As soon as I’m well enough to light out I’ll get a new one. Maybe that’ll do it.”

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In the great libraries professors studied ways of doing away with books; politicians proclaimed reading and writing unnecessary and therefore illegal, for the action of written words on the human brain might induce thought, a... (show all) subversive process certain to incite rebellion at robot leadership.

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There were people, and Dalzell was one of them, who were born café people, claustrophobes unable to endure a definite place or plan. The café was a sort of union station where they might loiter, missing trains and boats as ... (show all)they liked, postponing the final decision to go anyplace or do anything until there was no longer need for decision. One came here because one couldn’t decide where to dine, whom to telephone, what to do. At least one had not yet committed oneself to one parlor or one group for the evening; the door of freedom was still open.

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You couldn’t trust women, Wharton thought, sipping his brandy, moderately soothed to see fellow diners taking out watches and hastily paying their checks to get back to their wretched desks while he, one of the master men, ... (show all)could dawdle all day if he liked without losing a penny.

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Dalzell was having a mazagran in the Julien. There was small reason for him to be feeling content but he was, and he thought it was probably due to some basic masochism in his character that made surrender a relief if not a p... (show all)leasure. He was down to his last twenty dollars, he had no idea where the next was coming from, but this was a state of affairs that seemed home to him.

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Ah, what a stroke of genius it had been for him to have found Nita! How happy he had been on his honeymoon and for years afterward basking in the safety of Nita's childish innocence where his intellectual shortcomings, sexual... (show all) coldness and caprices-indeed his basic ignorance-would not be discovered.... He was well aware that many men of his quixotic moods preferred young boys, but he dreaded to expose his inexperience to one of his own sex, and after certain cautious experiments realized that his anemic lusts were canceled by his over-powering fear of gossip.... Against the flattering background of Nita's delectable purity, he blossomed forth as the all-round He-man, the Husband who knows everything.... He soon taught her that snuggling, hand-holding, and similar affectionate demonstrations were kittenish and vulgar. He had read somewhere, however, that breathing into a woman's ear or scratching her at the nape of the neck drove her into complete ecstasy.... In due course Nita bore him four daughters, a sort of door prize for each time he attended.

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We get sick of our clinging vines, he thought, but the day comes when we suspect that the vines are all that hold our rotting branches together.

Last words

(Click to show. Warning: May contain spoilers.)Aquellos a los que había amarrado han salido disparados como la paja cuando se corta la cuerda de la bala, y recuerdan los nombres y los rostros de los demás como parte de un sueño que jamás volverá.

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(Click to show. Warning: May contain spoilers.)The Café Julien was gone and a reign was over. Those who had been bound by it fell apart like straws when the baling cord is cut and remembered each other’s name and face as part of a dream that would never come back.