But the observer turns to his task: he sees what his gaze chooses to include, he does more than observe — he measures distances, counts objects, specifies the structure of the house, the shape and orientation of the veranda, the garden, the courtyard, the green mass of the banana groves, he lists the trees and the plants and, turning to regard the people, seems to film their movements, to record their remarks. And then, as though to account for an unexpressed doubt, begins all over again, trains this invisible mechanism — his gaze — and records once again, scrutinizes, enumerates, collects. Thus there reappear at different times, in skillful rhythm of repetitions: on the bank of the stream, the crouching native, “leaning over the liquid surface of the muddy river,” A's tapering fingers brushing her black curls or offering Franck, on the veranda, a glass filled to the brim. By a kind of enchantment, the reader gradually identifies himself with this gaze and breathlessly follows the slow, tormenting progress of jealousy. Is this a kind of justifying evidence? We reach the paroxysm, we lie in wait for the criminal, but nothing happens except the return to the miniscule details and their undecipherable mystery From the position of A and of Franck, from their fugitive smiles, from the description of the hallway, of the office whose doors open onto the terrace, the reader reconstructs the scenes, the characters.
Thus without knowing how, and despite the irritation provoked by a deliberately systematic, supposedly objective description in which distances, depths, shadows are defined in the terms of a geometrician, an architect, an engineer, or an agronomist, we share in fear, in the obsessive need to know. As in Van Gogh's last paintings, the images turn, circling in the reader's head as in the narrator's. The centipede, the extended hands, the motor breakdown, Christiane's absence, A's swaying gait in the courtyard, the morning of the return . . . the centipede . . . the hands . . .
We close the book, we know that after this anything can happen, that the narrator can kill Franck, or perhaps it is Franck who will kill him, or else nothing will happen — the protagonists will remain the same, they will keep on sitting in their armchairs, arms and hands outstretched: the houseboy will serve the iced drinks; the banana groves will extend in front of the veranda with its trees planted in quincunxes; we will see the stream with its muddy water, the natives crouching near the logs. . . .
We wondered at the beginning of these lines what we were to think of the very special form a Robbe-Grillet novel assumes. There has been talk of a new realism, and Robbe-Grillet himself has discussed the necessity of allowing the object its own identity, of avoiding any humanization. But other reasons which relate more closely to the content of the work explain perhaps why the writer chooses to measure, to situate, to define with a rigor that seems to exceed the context of a literary work. It is because, in fact, the narrator seeks to convince himself of his own objectivity. If he uses technical and specific terms in the description of objects, trees, or characters, this is perhaps chiefly to assure himself of his own sang-froid, to be able to convince himself: “I am not mad, I am not suffering from an idée fixe, I have no prejudices; I am sane, calm, merely observing, I only say what I see, I only see what exists.”
But perhaps, too, he is merely trying to divert himself, to exorcise an idée fixe, to give himself something to do, like someone tired of waiting and counting his steps as he paces back and forth on the road. And then, finally, is he not, by means of this exercise, about to discover a flaw in the supposed certainty of the figures or facts observed? Then doubt would give way to hope.
Thus the style of this novel which has been characterized as “icy and poignant” corresponds to the author's enterprise. At every moment, it translates the double level on which the work functions: the observation which has all the appearances of objectivity; the torment which reaches the point of obsession. A wager, certainly, but the fact is there: the author brings off his impossible demonstration: we have lived his anguish with him; we do not know, when we close this book, if the crime has been committed, or if each person is to return to his place, to act as if nothing had happened, while the narrator endlessly pursues his futile investigation.
— Translated by Richard Howard
JEALOUSY
CONTENTS
Now the shadow of the southwest column
In the hollow of the valley
Now the voice of the second driver
Now the house is empty
The whole house is empty
Between the remaining gray paint
Now the shadow of the column
LEGEND
I.Southwest pillar and its shadow at the beginning of the novel. II. Veranda: 1) Franck's chair. 2) A . . .’s chair. 3) Empty chair. 5) Cocktail table.
III.A. . .’s room: 1) Bed. 2) Chest. 3) Dressing table. 4) Writing table. 5) Wardrobe.
IV.Office: 1) Desk. 2) Photograph of A . . .
V.Hallway
VI.Bathroom
VII.Small bedroom: 1) Bed.
VIII.Living room — dining room: 1) Sideboard. 2) Table. 3) Mark of centipede on wall.
IX.Pantry.
X.Storage room or other (not described).
Now the shadow of the column—the column which supports the southwest corner of the roof—divides the corresponding corner of the veranda into two equal parts. This veranda is a wide, covered gallery surrounding the house on three sides. Since its width is the same for the central portion as for the sides, the line of shadow cast by the column extends precisely to the corner of the house; but it stops there, for only the veranda flagstones are reached by the sun, which is still too high in the sky. The wooden walls of the house—that is, its front and west gable-end—are still protected from the sun by the roof (common to the house proper and the terrace). So at this moment the shadow of the outer edge of the roof coincides exactly with the right angle formed by the terrace and the two vertical surfaces of the corner of the house.
Now A . . . has come into the bedroom by the inside door opening onto the central hallway. She does not look at the wide open window through which—from the door—she would see this corner of the terrace. Now she has turned back toward the door to close it behind her. She still has on the light-colored, close-fitting dress with the high collar that she was wearing at lunch when Christiane reminded her again that loose-fitting clothes make the heat easier to bear. But A . . . merely smiled: she never suffered from the heat, she had known much worse climates than this—in Africa, for instance—and had always felt fine there. Besides, she doesn't feel the cold either. Wherever she is, she keeps quite comfortable. The black curls of her hair shift with a supple movement and brush her shoulders as she turns her head.
The heavy hand-rail of the balustrade has almost no paint left on top. The gray of the wood shows through, streaked with tiny longitudinal cracks. On the other side of this rail, a good six feet below the level of the veranda, the garden begins.
But from the far side of the bedroom the eye carries over the balustrade and touches ground only