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I mean? In five years she’ll look like Aunt Jemima. You’ll make a swell couple walking down the avenue with a string of pickaninnies trailing behind you. Jesus, I’d rather see you marry a Jewish girl. You wouldn’t appreciate her, of course, but she’d be good for you. You need something to steady yourself. You’re scattering your energies. Listen, why do you run around with all these dumb bastards you pick up? You seem to have a genius for picking up the wrong people. Why don’t you throw yourself into something useful? You don’t belong in that job—you could be a big guy somewhere. Maybe a labor leader . . . I don’t know what exactly. But first you’ve got to get rid of that hatchet-faced wife of yours. Ugh! when I look at her I could spit in her face. I don’t see how a guy like you could ever have married a bitch like that. What was it—just a pair of steaming ovaries? Listen, that’s what’s the matter with you—you’ve got nothing but sex on the brain. . . . No, I don’t mean that either. You’ve got a mind and you’ve got passion and enthusiasm . . . but you don’t seem to give a damn what you do or what happens to you. If you weren’t such a romantic bastard I’d almost swear that you were a Jew. It’s different with me—I never had anything to look forward to. But you’ve got something in you—only you’re too damned lazy to bring it out. Listen, when I hear you talk sometimes I think to myself—if only that guy would put it down on paper! Why you could write a book that would make a guy like Dreiser hang his head. You’re different from the Americans I know; somehow you don’t belong, and it’s a damned good thing you don’t. You’re a little cracked, too—I suppose you know that. But in a good way. Listen, a little while ago, if it had been anybody else who talked to me that way I’d have murdered him. I think I like you better because you didn’t try to give me any sympathy. I know better than to expect sympathy from you. If you had said one false word tonight I’d have really gone mad. I know it. I was on the very edge. When you started in about General Ivolgin I thought for a minute it was all up with me. That’s what makes me think you’ve got something in you . . . that was real cunning! And now let me tell you something . . . if you don’t pull yourself together soon you’re going to be screwy. You’ve got something inside you that’s eating you up. I don’t know what it is, but you can’t put it over on me. I know you from the bottom up. I know there’s something griping you—and it’s not just your wife, nor your job, nor even that nigger wench whom you think you’re in love with. Sometimes I think you were born in the wrong time. Listen, I don’t want you to think I’m making an idol of you but there’s something to what I say . . . if you had just a little more confidence in yourself you could be the biggest man in the world today. You wouldn’t even have to be a writer. You might become another Jesus Christ for all I know. Don’t laugh—I mean it. You haven’t the slightest idea of your own possibilities . . . you’re absolutely blind to everything except your own desires. You don’t know what you want. You don’t know because you never stop to think. You’re letting people use you up. You’re a damned fool, an idiot. If I had a tenth of what you’ve got I could turn the world upside down. You think that’s crazy, eh? Well, listen to me . . . I was never more sane in my life. When I came to see you tonight I thought I was about ready to commit suicide. It doesn’t make much difference whether I do it or not. But anyway, I don’t see much point in doing it now. That won’t bring her back to me. I was born unlucky. Wherever I go I seem to bring disaster. But I don’t want to kick off yet . . . I want to do some good in the world first. That may sound silly to you, but it’s true. I’d like to do something for others. . . .”
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