Time,
the bugger. Oh how the phrase "Too late!" has haunted the length of my waking
days: Born too late; too late to change; too late in the day; it's too late, baby, it's always,
invariably, a bit too late. I never seem to get the drift until the drift is gone, the bandwagon
I'd jump is ever on the egress and I don't appear capable of figuring out a situation before a
new one has come to take its place.
This is how I felt the first time I came across Lydia Davis' short-short story "This
Condition." A dear friend read it to me over the phone, and I was livid. "Damn! Damn!
Damn! That would have been perfect for Nerve! I can't believe we didn't get it," I ranted.
"Jack," she responded soothingly, "it was published in 1997, a few months before Nerve
launched." Alas, too true. The same old condition: born too late.
So even though I'd argue that "This Condition" is Nerve fiction par
excellence, it was not published here first. But I did get permission to reprint it in its
entirety and I'm glad. For here is one of the most beautiful, rhythmic, elegant, sexy, Freud
thumb-nosing bits of writing you'll ever find. Read it out loud; read it to a friend, a lover, a
partner. Davis does more to demarcate desire in 60% choice words than most people do in
volumes. She's got an itch; she's got it bad, and we have it right along with her.
* * *
"This Condition" by Lydia Davis
In this condition: stirred not only by men but by women, fat and thin, naked and clothed,
by teenagers and children in latency; by animals such as horses and dogs; by certain
vegetables such as carrots, zucchinis and cucumbers; by certain fruits such as melons,
grapefruits and kiwis; by certain plant parts such as petals, sepals, stamens and pistils, by
the bare arm of a wooden chair, a round vase holding flowers, a little hot sunlight, a plate
of pudding, a person entering a tunnel in the distance, a puddle of water, a hand alighting
on a smooth stone, a hand alighting on a bare shoulder, a naked tree limb; by anything
curved, bare and shining, as the limb or bole of a tree; by any touch, as the touch of a
stranger handling money; by anything round and freely hanging, as tassels on a curtain,
chestnut burrs on a twig in spring, a wet tea bag on its string; by anything glowing, as a
hot coal; anything soft or slow, as a cat rising from a chair, anything smooth and dry, as a
stone, or warm and glistening; anything sliding, anything sliding back and forth; anything
sliding in and out with an oiled surface, as certain machine parts; anything of a certain
shape, like the state of Florida; anything pounding, anything stroking, anything bolt
upright, anything horizontal and gaping, as a certain sea anemone; anything warm,
anything wet, anything wet and red, anything turned red, as the sun at evening; anything
wet and pink; anything long and straight with a blunt end, as a pestle; anything coming out
of anything else, as a snail from its shell, as a snail's horns from its head; anything
opening; any stream of water running, any stream running, any stream spurting, any
stream spouting, any cry, any soft cry, any grunt; anything going into anything else, as a
hand searching in a purse; anything clutching, anything grasping; anything rising, anything
tightening or filling, as a sail; anything dripping, anything hardening, anything softening.
©1997 Lydia Davis, from the collection Almost No Memory (Farrar, Straus, &
Giroux, 1997; Ecco Press, 1998)
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| ABOUT THE AUTHOR: |
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Jack Murnighan's stories appeared in the Best American Erotica editions of 1999, 2000 and 2001. His weekly column for Nerve, Jack's Naughty Bits, was collected and released as two books. He was the editor-in-chief of Nerve from 1999 to 2001, before retiring to write full time and take seriously the quest for love. |
Introduction ©1998
Jack Murnighan and Nerve.com, Inc.
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