A Clean Well-lighted Life - By Ciceronianus
All had left but an old man at the bar. The bartenders watched him drink. "He DIDN'T commit suicide last week," one bartender said. "Why not?" said the other. "He said he was busy" was the reply. The old man looked at them and said "Another armagnac." "Closing time" said the bartender. "Why didn't you commit suicide?" asked the other bartender. The old man stared. "Work," he said finally. "Family. Liquor. Cats. Music. Books." "Go home" said the second bartender. "Another armagnac," the old man repeated.
The old man drank, sighed, paid his tab and walked out of the bar. The drinks are good and cheap, he thought, but the tavern is kept dark; barely light enough to see one's drink. Seeing it is important, thought the old man. Dark out here as well, true, but no planned darkness. Its here already. Like the light. It's all here, thought the old man, who knew he was drunk and enjoyed being drunk, now and then.
Good and cheap drink is tolerable even in the dark, old man, he said aloud, if you can see it. But a clean well-lighted life is a very different thing.
The old man drank, sighed, paid his tab and walked out of the bar. The drinks are good and cheap, he thought, but the tavern is kept dark; barely light enough to see one's drink. Seeing it is important, thought the old man. Dark out here as well, true, but no planned darkness. Its here already. Like the light. It's all here, thought the old man, who knew he was drunk and enjoyed being drunk, now and then.
Good and cheap drink is tolerable even in the dark, old man, he said aloud, if you can see it. But a clean well-lighted life is a very different thing.
Comments (17)
@Hanover, could you please say something about this story?
So in the original Hemmingway version the old man was deaf. I think that's right. So I had thought this version should have had the old man saying "what?" every time he was asked a question.
In terms of what it reminds me of, which is the theme of all my reviews (or exploring an irrelevant detail), the clean well lighted place story reminded me of a Ruby Tuesdays me and Kurt would sometimes meet at. They had a salad bar there and I'd fill my bowl with a base of cold green peas instead of salad and I'd heap on crushed eggs and green olives and douse it with French dressing.
Remember French dressing? It was red and tangy. I think it was the same as Russian dressing.
But I guess that's not important; what's important is having enough light to see it.
After the second or third prediction of suicide, followed by his usual visit to the bar, I don't suppose anyone would take him seriously.
The drunkenness part was palatably good too. Drinking is another thing that creates high-frequency periodic reinforcing the mulling of thoughts over and over again, with or without some pleasant underlying feeling or with or without some bitter anger.
Some armagnac is quite reasonably priced. I've come to prefer it to brandy, the drink in the Hemingway story, and cognac. Difficult to find sometimes, though.
Back when I drank spirits, even the low-end stuff was more expensive than scotch and way more expensive rum, vodka, tequila or rye. For cheap, we went to schnapps - with juice, just about potable.
What story is that? (Unless i missed a joke... entirely possible)
This story was a play on a famous short-story.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Clean,_Well-Lighted_Place#:~:text=%22A%20Clean%2C%20Well%2DLighted,Winner%20Take%20Nothing%20(1933)
Let me comment on my comment.
I like to introduce characters without explanation, as if we all know the same people. Kids do that, and I thought I'd do it too in order to borrow their charm.
I feel I've succeeded.
Louis XIII Armanac (nothing to do with Louis XIV) can be had for $3,999. Add $100 if you want the fancy bottle in a fancy box. Might not be a good deal if you. just want to et buzzed.
A good bar should be reasonably dim. Darkness conceals the low standard of maintenance and sanitation to which a quality dive bar should adhere. Low light conceals the low standard of maintenance to which some customers have been reduced. Low light is a magic spell, sort of.
When the closing bartender turns on the bright lights after last call, the horror of clarity commences.
Yes. Also more robust.
The old man admires clarity, though, even when drinking or drunk. Thus, he thinks it's important to see one's drink, and finds the contrived darkness of the bar disagreeable.
I'd say instead that the old man acknowledges and accepts the darkness that is there as a part of the world, apart from the darkness we create ourselves: "Dark out here as well, true, but no planned darkness. It's here already. Like the light."