Wednesday, January 31, 2018

Complete coherence between the things he said and the turmoil of his thoughts

It's hard to explain, especially since, in the Meneses family, Timóteo was far from being its dullest or its least unusual member, on the contrary, but to describe his personality, I would have speak not so much about what he did or felt and more about the dense, unstable, electrically charged atmosphere that surrounded him — like the atmosphere you might find in certain smoky bars. Were I to describe his actions and feelings, they would be like mere supports propping up the foggy world he inhabited. He navigated his room like some splendid, deep-sea fish in the small maritime stronghold of his aquarium. What he said could seem abrupt and disconnected to those who merely heard him speak, but for anyone who understood him, there was a complete coherence between the things he said and the turmoil of his thoughts.
—from Chronicle of the Murdered House, by Lúcio Cardoso.

For the rest of the book I will picture Timóteo as a tormented anglerfish.

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