title:Mother ver.1.1e
by Taro Kimura
1997


A RAW YOUTH
BY DOSTEVSKY
TRANSLATED BY CONSTANCE GARNET

Most of all I worried my mother; I was irritable with her.
I developed a terrific appetite and grumbled very much that
the meals were late (and they never were late). Mother did
not know how to satisfy me. Once she brought some soup, and
began, as usual, feeding me with it herself, and I kept grumbling
as I ate it. And suddenly I felt vexed that I was grumbling:
"She is perhaps the only one I live, and I am tormenting her."
But I was none the less ill-humoured, and I suddenly began to
cry from ill-humour; and she, poor darling, thought I was
crying from tenderness, stooped down and began kissing me.
I restrained myself and endured it, but at that instant I posi-
tively hated her. But I always loved my mother, and at that
very time I loved her and did not hate her at all, but it happened
as it always does-that the one you love best you treat worst.


UNE VIE OR THE HISTORY OF A HEART
BY GUY DE MAUPASSANT
TRANSLATED BY M. WALTER DUNNE

One morning, Jeanne took Paul in her arms and
walked through the fields, looking one minute at her
son and the other minute at the flowers. She began
to dream of her son's future. What would he be?
She wished he would become a great man; then,
again, she preferred him to remain humble and ob-
scure, so that he would always be near her, always
full of tenderness and love for her. She loved him
with her selfish mother's heart, she wished he would
remain her son, nothing more; but at times she rea-
soned with herself and wished he would become a
great man.


THE SOUL ENCHANTED
BY ROMAIN ROLLAND
TRANSLATED BY
ELEANOR STIMSON &VAN WYCK BROOKS

A vigorous, healthy nature like Annette's must create,
perpetually create, create with its whole being, body and
spirit. Create, or else brood over the creation that is to
be. It is a necessity, and happiness comes only through
satisfying it. Every creative period has its own limited
field, and its rising force follows a trajectory that de-
scends again sharply. Annette had passed the summit of
the curve. Nevertheless, the transport of creation per-
sists in the mother for a very long time after childbirth.
Suckling prolongs the transfusion of the blood, and in-
visible bonds keep the two bodies in communication. The
creative abundance of the spirit of the infant compensates
for the impoverishment of the spirit of the mother. The
river that is running out tries to replenish itself from the
stream that is flowing over. It becomes a torrent so as to
merge with the little torrent. But strive as it may, the
little one outruns it. The child was already withdraw-
ing into the distance. Annette had difficulty in follow-
ing him.


THE NEEDLE'S EYE
BY MARGARET DRABBLE

-he, for instance, had never been permitted by his mother,
while a student, to take a vacation job, as the majority of his
much more affluent friends had done, because such an action
would have smelt, to her, of defeat. He hadn't been allowed to
work for the price of eating his dinners-she had done it, more
easily it is true as she became more successful. She had insisted
on an expensive profession, because it had been the most difficult
thing.


THE OLD WIVES TALE
BY ARNOLD BENNETT

He had now reached the age of thirty-three. His habits
were as industrious as ever, his preoccupation with his art
as keen. But he had achieved no fame, no success. He
earned nothing, living in comfort on an allowance from
his mother. He seldom spoke of his plans and never of
his hopes. He had in fact settled down into a dilettante,
having learnt gently to scorn the triumphs which he lacked
the force to win. He imagined that industry and a regular
existence were sufficient justification in themselves for
any man's life. Constance had dropped the habit of ex-
pecting him to astound the world. He was rather grave
and precise in manner, courteous and tepid, with a touch of
condescension towards his environment; as though he were
continually permitting the perspicacious to discern that
he had nothing to learn-if the truth were known! His
humour had assumed a modified form. He often smiled
to himself. He was unexceptionable.


EMILE
BY JEAN JACQUES ROUSSEAU
TRANSLATED BY BARBARA FOXLEY

Good mother, be on your guard against the deceptions prepared
for you. If your son knows many things, distrust his knowledge;
if he is unlucky enough to be rich and educated in Paris he is ruined.
As long as there are clever artists he will have every talent, but
apart from his masters he will have none. In Paris a rich man
knows everything, it is the poor who are ignorant. Our capital is
full of amateurs, especially women, who do their work as M.
Gillaume invents his colours. Among the men I know three striking
exceptions, among the women I know no exceptions, and I doubt
if there are any. In a general way a man becomes an artist and a
judge of art as he becomes a Doctor of Laws and a magistrate.


OLD GRIOT
BY BALZAC
TRASLATED BY ELLEN MARIAGE

'Well, then, M. de Rastignac, deal with the world as it deserves.
You are determined to succeed? I will help you. You shall
sound the depths of corruption in woman; you shall measure the
extent of man's wretched vanity. Deeply as I am versed in such
learning, there were pages in the book of life that I had not read.
Now I know all. The more cold-blooded your calculations, the
further you will go. Strike ruthlessly; you will be feared. Men
and women for you must be nothing more than post-horses; take
a fresh relay, and leave the last to drop by the roadside; in this way
you will reach the goal of your ambition. You will be nothing
here, you see, unless a woman interests herself in you; and she
must be young and wealthy, and a woman of the world. Yet,
if you have a heart, lock it carefully away like a treasure; do not
let any one suspect it, or you will be lost; you would cease to be
the executioner, you would take the victim's place. And if ever
you should love, never let your secret escape you! trust no one
until you are very sure of the heart to which you open your heart.
Learn to mistrust every one; take every precaution for the sake of
the love which does not exist as yet.


FAMILY AND FRIENDS
BY ANITA BROOKNER

Clearly, Evie is her papa's girl, to judge from the
number of times she mentions him. She has the sort of
exotic bad manners, the complete conviction of her own
uniqueness, that bespeak the adoration of a father rather
than of a mother. To Sofka, so much her own mother's
daughter, this is alien. She remembers her mother's whis-
pering encouragement when she was on the verge of
marriage, her mother's insistence on fine manners and
fine lines and fine food...But this noisy girl is talking
about shares and capital investments and foreign taxes
and the advisability of acquiring property in several coun-
tries. It is quite clear, from the way this conversation is
going, that Evie is the man in this arrangement and
Frederick the woman. Evie is laying down favourable
terms for taking Sofka's son off her hands. She has the
money to do it and the power to make of Frederick what
she will.