bang, sigh, or whine depending on their trajectory, machine guns, grenades, flamethrowers: danger is everywhere, overhead from the planes and incoming shells, facing you from the enemy artillery, and even from below when, thinking to take advantage of a quiet moment down in the trench, you try to sleep but hear the enemy digging secretly away beneath that very trench, underneath you, carving out tunnels in which to place mines to blow the trench to bits, and you with it.
You cling to your rifle, to your knife with its blade rusted, tarnished, darkened by poison gases, barely shining at all in the chilly brightness of the flares, in the air reeking of rotting horses, the putrefaction of fallen men and, from those still more or less on their feet in the mud, the stench of their sweat and piss and shit, oftheir filth and vomit, not to mention that pervasive stink of dank, rancid mustiness, when in theory youâre out in the open air at the front. But no: you even smell of mold yourself, outside and in, inside yourself, you, dug in behind those networks of barbed wire littered with putrefying and disintegrating cadavers to which sappers sometimes attach telephone cables, because sappers donât have it easy. They sweat from fatigue and fear, take off their greatcoats to work more freely, and might hang them on an arm sticking out of the tumbled soil, using it as a coat tree.
All this has been described a thousand times, so perhaps itâs not worthwhile to linger any longer over that sordid, stinking opera. And perhaps thereâs not much point either in comparing the war to an opera, especially since no one cares a lot about opera, even if war is operatically grandiose, exaggerated, excessive, full of longueurs, makes a great deal of noise and is often, in the end, rather boring.
11
O NE FOLLOWING MORNING , much like the others, snow decided to fall along with the shellsâat a different rhythm, naturally, for the shells had been less plentiful than usual, only three so far that dayâwhereas Padioleau decided to complain.
Iâm hungry, Padioleau was moaning, Iâm cold, Iâm thirsty and also Iâm tired. Well sure, said Arcenel, just like the rest of us. But I feel very low, too, continued Padioleau, plus Iâve got a stomachache. Itâll pass, your stomachache, predicted Anthime, weâve all got one, more or less. Yes but the worst part, insisted Padioleau, itâs that I canât figure out if I feel low because of the stomachache (Youâre beginning to piss us off, observed Bossis) or if Iâve a stomachache because I feel low, if you see what I mean. Fuck off, announced Arcenel.
Thatâs when the first three shells that had flown too far, exploding uselessly behind the lines, were followed by a fourth and more carefully aimed 105-millimeter percussion-fuse shell that produced better results in the trench: after blowing the captainâs orderly into six pieces, it spun off a mess of shrapnel that decapitated a liaison officer, pinned Bossis through his solar plexus to a tunnel prop, hacked up various soldiers from various angles, and bisected the body of an infantry scout lengthwise. Stationed not far from the man, Anthime was for an instant able to see all the scoutâs organsâ sliced in two from his brain to his pelvis, as in an anatomical drawingâbefore hunkering down automatically and half off balance to protect himself, deafened by the god-awful din, blinded by the torrent of rocks and dirt, the clouds of ash and fine debris, vomiting meanwhile from fear and revulsion all over his lower legs and onto his feet, sunk up to the ankles in mud.
After that everything seemed just about over. As the smoke and dust gradually cleared from the trench, a kind of quiet returned, even though other massive detonations still sounded solemnly all around but at a distance, as if in an echo. Those whoâd been spared stoodup fairly spattered with bits of military
You cling to your rifle, to your knife with its blade rusted, tarnished, darkened by poison gases, barely shining at all in the chilly brightness of the flares, in the air reeking of rotting horses, the putrefaction of fallen men and, from those still more or less on their feet in the mud, the stench of their sweat and piss and shit, oftheir filth and vomit, not to mention that pervasive stink of dank, rancid mustiness, when in theory youâre out in the open air at the front. But no: you even smell of mold yourself, outside and in, inside yourself, you, dug in behind those networks of barbed wire littered with putrefying and disintegrating cadavers to which sappers sometimes attach telephone cables, because sappers donât have it easy. They sweat from fatigue and fear, take off their greatcoats to work more freely, and might hang them on an arm sticking out of the tumbled soil, using it as a coat tree.
All this has been described a thousand times, so perhaps itâs not worthwhile to linger any longer over that sordid, stinking opera. And perhaps thereâs not much point either in comparing the war to an opera, especially since no one cares a lot about opera, even if war is operatically grandiose, exaggerated, excessive, full of longueurs, makes a great deal of noise and is often, in the end, rather boring.
11
O NE FOLLOWING MORNING , much like the others, snow decided to fall along with the shellsâat a different rhythm, naturally, for the shells had been less plentiful than usual, only three so far that dayâwhereas Padioleau decided to complain.
Iâm hungry, Padioleau was moaning, Iâm cold, Iâm thirsty and also Iâm tired. Well sure, said Arcenel, just like the rest of us. But I feel very low, too, continued Padioleau, plus Iâve got a stomachache. Itâll pass, your stomachache, predicted Anthime, weâve all got one, more or less. Yes but the worst part, insisted Padioleau, itâs that I canât figure out if I feel low because of the stomachache (Youâre beginning to piss us off, observed Bossis) or if Iâve a stomachache because I feel low, if you see what I mean. Fuck off, announced Arcenel.
Thatâs when the first three shells that had flown too far, exploding uselessly behind the lines, were followed by a fourth and more carefully aimed 105-millimeter percussion-fuse shell that produced better results in the trench: after blowing the captainâs orderly into six pieces, it spun off a mess of shrapnel that decapitated a liaison officer, pinned Bossis through his solar plexus to a tunnel prop, hacked up various soldiers from various angles, and bisected the body of an infantry scout lengthwise. Stationed not far from the man, Anthime was for an instant able to see all the scoutâs organsâ sliced in two from his brain to his pelvis, as in an anatomical drawingâbefore hunkering down automatically and half off balance to protect himself, deafened by the god-awful din, blinded by the torrent of rocks and dirt, the clouds of ash and fine debris, vomiting meanwhile from fear and revulsion all over his lower legs and onto his feet, sunk up to the ankles in mud.
After that everything seemed just about over. As the smoke and dust gradually cleared from the trench, a kind of quiet returned, even though other massive detonations still sounded solemnly all around but at a distance, as if in an echo. Those whoâd been spared stoodup fairly spattered with bits of military
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