The Book of Illusions

by Paul Auster

  I promise to be very quiet, Claire says. I’ll move my things into another bedroom, and you won’t even know I’m here.

  Martin has run out of arguments. All right, he says, reluctantly giving in to her, I’ll stay out of your way, and you’ll stay out of mine. Do we have a deal?

  They do. They even shake hands on it, and as Martin clomps out of the room to begin working on his story, the camera swings around and slowly pushes in on Claire’s face. It is a simple but compelling shot, our first serious look at her in repose, and because it is accomplished with such patience and fluidity, we sense that the camera isn’t trying to reveal Claire to us so much as to get inside her and read her thoughts, to caress her. She follows Martin with her eyes, watching him as he leaves the room, and an instant after the camera comes to rest in front of her, we hear the latch of the door click shut. The expression on Claire’s face doesn’t change. Good-bye, Martin, she says. Her voice is low, barely more than a whisper.

  For the rest of the day, Martin and Claire work in their separate rooms. Martin sits at the desk in the study, typing, looking out the window, typing again, muttering to himself as he reads back the words he has written. Claire, looking like a college student in her blue jeans and sweatshirt, is sprawled out on the bed with The Principles of Human Knowledge, by George Berkeley. At some point, we notice that the philosopher’s name is written out in block letters across the front of the sweatshirt: berkeley—which also happens to be the name of her school. Is this supposed to mean something, or is it simply a kind of visual pun? As the camera cuts back and forth from one room to the other, we hear Claire reading out loud to herself: And it seems no less evident that the various sensations or ideas imprinted on the sense, however blended or combined together, cannot exist otherwise than in a mind perceiving them. And again: Secondly, it will be objected that there is a great difference betwixt real fire and the idea of fire, between dreaming or imagining oneself burnt, and actually being so.

  Late in the afternoon, a knock is heard at the door. Claire goes on reading, but when a second, louder knock follows the first, she puts down her book and tells Martin to come in. The door opens a few inches, and Martin pokes his head into the room. I’m sorry, he says. I wasn’t very nice to you this morning. I shouldn’t have acted that way. It is a stiff and bumbling apology, but delivered with such awkwardness and hesitation that Claire can’t help smiling with amusement, perhaps even a trace of pity. She has one more chapter to go, she says. Why don’t they meet in the living room in half an hour and have a drink? Good idea, Martin says. As long as they’re stuck with each other, they might as well act like civilized people.

  The action cuts to the living room. Martin and Claire have opened a bottle of wine, but Martin still seems nervous, not quite sure what to make of this strange and attractive reader of philosophy. In a clumsy stab at humor, he points to her sweatshirt and says, Does it say Berkeley because you’re reading Berkeley? When you start reading Hume, will you wear one that says Hume?

  Claire laughs. No, no, she says, the words are pronounced differently. Berk-ley and Bark-ley. The first one is a college, the other is a man. You know that. Everyone knows that.

  It’s the same spelling, Martin says. Therefore, it’s the same word.

  It’s the same spelling, Claire says, but it’s two different words.

  Claire is about to go on, but then she stops, suddenly realizing that Martin is pulling her leg. She breaks into a broad smile. Holding out her glass, she asks Martin to pour her another drink. You wrote a short story about two characters with the same name, she says, and here I am lecturing you on the principles of nominalism. It must be the wine. I’m not thinking clearly anymore.

  So you read that story, Martin says. You must be one of six people in the universe who knows about it.

  I’ve read all your work, Claire answers. Both novels and the collection of stories.

  But I’ve published only one novel.

  You’ve just finished your second, haven’t you? You gave a copy of the manuscript to Hector and Frieda. Frieda lent it to me, and I read it last week. Travels in the Scriptorium. I think it’s the best thing you’ve done.

  By now, whatever reservations Martin might have felt toward her have all but crumbled away. Not only is Claire a spirited and intelligent person, not only is she pleasant to look at, but she knows and understands his work. He pours himself another glass of wine. Claire discourses on the structure of his latest novel, and as Martin listens to her incisive but flattering comments, he leans back in his chair and smiles. It is the first time since the opening of the film that the brooding, ever-serious Martin Frost has let down his guard. In other words, he says, Miss Martin approves. Oh yes, Claire says, most definitely. Miss Martin approves of Martin. This play on their names leads them back to the Berk-ley/Bark-ley conundrum, and once again Martin asks Claire to explain the word on the sweatshirt. Which one is it? he says. The man or the college? It’s both, Claire answers. It says whatever you want it to say.

  At that moment, a small glint of mischief flashes in her eyes. Something has occurred to her—a thought, an impulse, a sudden inspiration. Or, Claire says, putting her glass on the table and standing up from the couch, it doesn’t mean anything at all.

  By way of demonstration, she peels off the sweatshirt and calmly tosses it onto the floor. She has nothing on underneath but a lacy black bra—hardly the kind of garment one would expect to discover on such an earnest student of ideas. But this is an idea, too, of course, and now that she has put it into action with such a bold and decisive gesture, Martin can only gape. Not in his wildest dreams could he have imagined that things would happen so fast.

  Well, he finally says, that’s one way of eliminating the confusion.

  Simple logic, Claire replies. A philosophical proof.

  And yet, Martin continues, speaking after another long pause, by eliminating one kind of confusion, you only create another.

  Oh Martin, Claire says. Don’t be confused. I’m trying to be as clear as I can.

  There is a fine line between charm and aggression, between throwing yourself at someone and letting nature take its course. In this scene, which ends with the words just spoken (I’m trying to be as clear as I can), Claire manages to straddle both sides of the argument at once. She seduces Martin, but she goes about it in such a clever, lighthearted way that it never occurs to us to question her motives. She wants him because she wants him. That is the tautology of desire, and rather than go on discussing the endless nuances of such a proposition, she cuts directly to the chase. Removing the sweatshirt is not a vulgar announcement of her intentions. It is a moment of sublimely achieved wit, and from that moment on, Martin knows that he has met his match.

  They wind up in bed. It is the same bed where they encountered each other that morning, but this time they are in no rush to separate, to fly apart on contact and scramble into their clothes. They come crashing through the door, walking and embracing at the same time, and as they fall to the bed in an awkward tangle of arms and legs and mouths, we have no doubt where all this groping and heavy breathing is going to take them. In 1946, the conventions of moviemaking would have required the scene to end there. Once the man and the woman started to kiss, the director was supposed to cut away from the bedroom to a shot of sparrows taking flight, to surf pounding against the shore, to a train speeding through a tunnel—any of several stock images to stand in for carnal passion, the fulfillment of lust—but New Mexico wasn’t Hollywood, and Hector could let the camera go on rolling for as long as he liked. Clothes come off, bare flesh is seen, and Martin and Claire begin to make love. Alma had been right to warn me about the erotic moments in Hector’s films, but she had been wrong to think that I would be shocked by them. I found the scene to be rather subdued, almost poignant in the banality of its intentions. The lighting is dim, the bodies are flecked with shadows, and the whole thing lasts no more than ninety or a hundred seconds. Hector doesn’t want to arouse or titillate s
o much as to make us forget that we are watching a film, and by the time Martin starts running his mouth down Claire’s body (over her breasts and along the curve of her right hip, across her pubic hair and into the soft inner part of her leg), we want to believe that we have. Again, not a note of music is played. The only sounds we hear are the sounds of breath, of rustling sheets and blankets, of bedsprings, of wind gusting through the branches of the trees in the unseen darkness outside.

  The next morning, Martin begins talking to us again. Over a montage that denotes the passage of five or six days, he tells us about the progress of his story and his growing love for Claire. We see him alone at his typewriter, see Claire alone with her books, see them together in a number of different places around the house. They cook dinner in the kitchen, kiss on the living room sofa, walk in the garden. At one point, Martin is crouching on the floor beside his desk, dipping a brush into a bucket of paint and slowly writing out the letters H-U-M-E on a white T-shirt. Later on, Claire is dressed in that T-shirt, sitting Indian-style on the bed and reading a book by the next philosopher on her list, David Hume. These small vignettes are interspersed with random close-ups of objects, abstract details that have no apparent connection to what Martin is saying: a pot of boiling water, a puff of cigarette smoke, a pair of white curtains fluttering in the embrasure of a half-open window. Steam, smoke, and wind—a catalogue of formless, insubstantial things. Martin is describing an idyll, a moment of sustained and perfect happiness, and yet as this procession of dreamlike images continues to march across the screen, the camera is telling us not to trust in the surfaces of things, to doubt the evidence of our own eyes.

  One afternoon, Martin and Claire are eating lunch in the kitchen. Martin is in the middle of telling her a story (And then I said to him, If you don’t believe me, I’ll show you. And then I reached into my pocket and—) when the telephone rings. Martin gets up to answer it, and as soon as he exits the frame, the camera reverses angle and dollies in on Claire. We see her expression change from one of joyful camaraderie to concern, perhaps even alarm. It is Hector, calling long-distance from Cuernavaca, and although we can’t hear his end of the conversation, Martin’s comments are clear enough for us to understand what Hector is saying. It seems that a cold front is headed toward the desert. The furnace has been on the blink, and if the temperatures drop as low as they are expected to, then Martin will need to have it checked out. If anything goes wrong, the man to call is Jim, Jim Fortunato of Fortunato Plumbing and Heat.

  It’s no more than a mundane point of business, but Claire grows increasingly upset as she listens to the exchange. When Martin finally mentions her name to Hector (I was just telling Claire about that bet we made the last time I was here), Claire stands up and rushes out of the room. Martin is surprised by her sudden departure, but that surprise is nothing compared to the one that follows an instant later. What do you mean, Who’s Claire? he says to Hector. Claire Martin, Frieda’s niece. We don’t have to listen to Hector’s answer to know what he says. One look at Martin’s face and we understand that Hector has just told him that he’s never heard of her, that he has no idea who Claire is.

  By then, Claire is already outside, running away from the house. In a series of rapid, pinpoint cuts, we see Martin burst through the door and chase after her. He calls out to Claire, but Claire keeps on running, and another ten seconds go by before he manages to catch up with her. Reaching out and grabbing her elbow from behind, he spins her around and forces her to stop. They are both out of breath. Chests heaving, lungs gasping for air, neither one of them able to talk.

  At last Martin says: What’s going on, Claire? Tell me, what’s going on? When Claire doesn’t answer him, he leans forward and shouts in her face: You have to tell me!

  I can hear you, Claire says, speaking in a calm voice. You don’t have to shout, Martin.

  I’ve just been told that Frieda has one brother, Martin says. He has two children, and both of them happen to be boys. That makes two nephews, Claire, but no niece.

  I didn’t know what else to do, Claire says. I had to find a way to make you trust me. After a day or two, I thought you’d figure it out on your own—and then it wouldn’t matter anymore.

  Figure out what?

  Until now, Claire has looked embarrassed, more or less contrite, not so much ashamed of her deception as disappointed that she’s been found out. Once Martin confesses to his ignorance, however, the look changes. She seems genuinely astonished. Don’t you get it, Martin? she says. We’ve been together for a week, and you’re telling me you still don’t get it?

  It goes without saying that he doesn’t—and neither do we. The bright and beautiful Claire has turned into an enigma, and the more she says, the less we are able to follow her.

  Who are you? Martin asks. What the hell are you doing here?

  Oh Martin, Claire says, suddenly on the verge of tears. It doesn’t matter who I am.

  Of course it does. It matters very much.

  No, my darling, it doesn’t.

  How can you say that?

  It doesn’t matter because you love me. Because you want me. That’s what matters. All the rest is nothing.

  The picture fades out on a close-up of Claire, and before another image succeeds it, we hear the faint sounds of Martin’s typewriter clicking away in the distance. A slow fade-in begins, and as the screen gradually brightens, the sounds of the typewriter seem to draw closer to us, as if we were moving from the outside to the inside of the house, walking up the stairs, and approaching the door of Martin’s room. When the new image settles into focus, the entire screen is filled with an immense, tightly framed shot of Martin’s eyes. The camera holds in that position for a couple of beats, and then, as the voice-over narration continues, it starts to pull back, revealing Martin’s face, Martin’s shoulders, Martin’s hands on the keys of the typewriter, and finally Martin sitting at his desk. With no halt in its backward progress, the camera leaves the room and begins traveling down the corridor. Unfortunately, Martin says, Claire was right. I did love her, and I did want her. But how can you love someone you don’t trust? The camera stops in front of Claire’s door. As if by telepathic command, the door swings open—and then we are inside, moving in on Claire as she sits in front of a dressing-table mirror applying makeup to her face. Her body is sheathed in a black satin slip, her hair is swept up in a loosely knotted chignon, the back of her neck is exposed. Claire was like no other woman, Martin says. She was stronger than everyone else, wilder than everyone else, smarter than everyone else. I had been waiting to meet her all my life, and yet now that we were together, I was scared. What was she hiding from me? What terrible secret was she refusing to tell? A part of me thought I should get out of there—just pack up my things and leave before it was too late. And another part of me thought: she’s testing me. If I fail the test, I’ll lose her.

  Eyebrow pencil, mascara, cheek rouge, powder, lipstick. As Martin delivers his confused, soul-searching monologue, Claire goes on working in front of the mirror, transforming herself from one kind of woman into another. The impulsive tomboy disappears, and in her place emerges a glamorous, sophisticated, movie-star temptress. Claire stands up from the table and wriggles into a narrow black cocktail dress, slips her feet into a pair of three-inch heels, and we scarcely recognize her anymore. She cuts a ravishing figure: self-possessed, confident, the very picture of feminine power. With a faint smile on her lips, she checks herself in the mirror one last time and then walks out of the room.

  Cut to the hallway. Claire knocks on Martin’s door and says: Dinner’s ready, Martin. I’ll be waiting for you downstairs.

  Cut to the dining room. Claire is sitting at the table, waiting for Martin. She has already set out the appetizers; the wine has been uncorked; the candles have been lit. Martin enters the room in silence. Claire greets him with a warm, friendly smile, but Martin pays no attention to it. He seems wary, out of sorts, not at all sure of how he should act.

  Eyeing Cl
aire with suspicion, he walks over to the place that has been set for him, pulls out the chair, and begins to sit down. The chair appears to be solid, but no sooner does he lower his weight onto it than it splinters into a dozen pieces. Martin goes tumbling to the floor.

  It is a hilarious, wholly unexpected turn of events. Claire bursts out laughing, but Martin is not at all amused. Sprawled out on his rear end, he smolders in a funk of injured pride and resentment, and the longer Claire goes on laughing at him (she can’t help herself; it’s simply too funny), the more ridiculous he is made to look. Without saying a word, Martin slowly climbs to his feet, kicks aside the bits of broken chair, and puts another chair in its place. He sits down cautiously this time, and when he is at last assured that the seat is strong enough to hold him, he turns his attention to the food. Looks good, he says. It is a desperate attempt to maintain his dignity, to swallow his embarrassment.

  Claire seems inordinately pleased by his comment. With another smile brightening her face, she leans toward him and asks: How’s your story going, Martin?

  By now, Martin is holding a lemon wedge in his left hand, about to squeeze it onto his asparagus. Instead of answering Claire’s question right away, he presses the lemon between his thumb and middle finger—and the juice squirts into his eye. Martin yelps in pain. Once again, Claire bursts out laughing, and once again our grumpy hero is not the least bit amused. He dips his napkin into his water glass and begins patting his eye, trying to get rid of the sting. He looks defeated, utterly humiliated by this fresh display of clumsiness. When he finally puts down the napkin, Claire repeats the question.