“You stay in your room, not eating, not reading, hardly moving. You watch the basin. The bookcase. Your knees. Your eyes in the cracked mirror. The cup. The light switch.
You listen to street sounds. To the dripping faucet on the landing. To the noises your neighbor makes; clearing his throat, having a coughing fit, his kettle whistling. You follow on the ceiling the winding line of a thin crack. A flies pointless wanderings. The perhaps calculable progression of shadows.
You’re 25 years old, you have 29 teeth, three shirts and eight socks, 500 francs a month to live on, a few books you no longer read, a few records you no longer listen to. You don’t want to remember anything else. You sit, and all you want is to wait; just wait until there’s nothing more to wait for.”
— The man who sleeps; Un homme qui dort (1974)