Enoch Soames on Projection

Posterity! What use is it to me? A dead man doesn’t know that people are visiting his grave, visiting his birthplace, putting up tablets to him, unveiling statues of him. A dead man can’t read the books that are written about him. A hundred years hence! Think of it! If I could come back to life then–just for a few hours–and go to the reading-room and read! Or, better still, if I could be projected now, at this moment, into that future, into that reading-room, just for this one afternoon! I’d sell myself body and soul to the devil for that! Think of the pages and pages in the catalogue: ‘Soames, Enoch’ endlessly–endless editions, commentaries, prolegomena, biographies…

From the private correspondence of the famous poet.

~ by Mia Chen on February 7, 2009.