Читать книгу We - Yevgeny Zamyatin - Страница 9

LOG 1

BRIEF:

Announcement. The Wisest Line. An Epic.

I am simply copying down the announcement that appeared in today’s One State Gazette word for word:

IN 120 DAYS, CONSTRUCTION OF THE INTEGRAL WILL BE COMPLETE. THE GLORIOUS, HISTORIC HOUR WHEN THE FIRST-EVER INTEGRAL WILL BLAST OFF INTO OUTER SPACE IS NIGH. SOME THOUSAND YEARS AGO, YOUR HERO ANCESTORS VICTORIOUSLY SUBJUGATED ALL OF EARTH TO THE ONE STATE. YOUR CONQUEST WILL BE EVEN GREATER, FOR YOU WILL INTEGRATE THE INFINITE EQUATION OF THE UNIVERSE WITH THE ELECTRIC, FIRE-BREATHING POWER OF OUR GLASS INTEGRAL. YOU WILL ENCOUNTER UNFAMILIAR BEINGS ON ALIEN PLANETS WHO MAY YET LIVE IN SAVAGE STATES OF FREEDOM, AND YOU WILL SUBJUGATE THEM TO THE BENEFICENT YOKE OF REASON. IF THEY DON’T UNDERSTAND THAT WHAT WE BRING THEM IS MATHEMATICALLY INFALLIBLE HAPPINESS, WE WILL BE IMPELLED TO FORCE THEM TO BE HAPPY. BUT WE WILL TRY WORDS BEFORE RESORTING TO WEAPONS.

IN THE NAME OF THE BENEFACTOR, LET IT BE KNOWN TO EVERY NUMBER OF THE ONE STATE:

ALL THOSE CAPABLE OF DOING SO ARE HEREBY REQUIRED TO PRODUCE TREATISES, EPIC POEMS, MANIFESTOS, ODES OR ANY AND ALL OTHER WRITINGS CELEBRATING THE BEAUTY AND MAGNIFICENCE OF THE ONE STATE.

THESE WILL BE THE INTEGRAL’S FIRST CARGO.

ALL HAIL THE ONE STATE, ALL HAIL THE NUMBERS, ALL HAIL THE BENEFACTOR!

I write this and feel: my cheeks are burning. Yes: to integrating the profound equation of the Universe. Yes: to uncurving the coil of savagery, towards the asymptote, along the tangent – setting it straight: for the line of the One State is straight. Ours is the supreme, divine, exact and wise straight line – the wisest of all lines . . .

I am D-503, Builder of the INTEGRAL. Just one of the One State’s mathematicians. Accustomed to numbers, it is beyond the powers of my pen to fabricate the music of assonance and rhyme. I will simply try to record what I see and think – or, more precisely, what we think (yes, we – and in fact, WE will be the title of my contribution). But if these texts are to be derived from our life, from the mathematically perfected life of the One State, won’t they, in spite of me, be, of themselves, an epic poem? Yes: I believe and know this.

I write this and feel: my cheeks are burning. This must be what a woman feels when she first senses the pulse of a new little being inside her, tiny and blind. What I’m writing is me and, at the same time, it’s not me. For the many months ahead, this little being will feed on my vital juices, my blood – then, I will tear it away from myself in agony and lay it at the feet of the One State.

But I am ready – just like every, or almost every, one of us. Yes, I am ready.