:30:05
- What is it, Abbe ?
- The marquis has embarrassed us.
:30:09
- From Napoleon himself.
- Why ? What's he done ?
:30:13
He's been slipping manuscripts
to a publisher.
:30:16
- He has ?
:30:20
I placed my trust
too carelessly, Madeleine.
:30:32
- This is a complete and utter...
- Oh.
:30:36
disappointment.
:30:38
Yes, it is.
:30:40
The paper's cheap.
The type's too small.
:30:42
What did you do,
bribe one of the guards ?
:30:45
But you implored me to write
for curative purposes,
to stave off my madness.
:30:50
But you've no right
to publish...
:30:52
behind my back
without my sanction.
:30:55
Have you truly read it,
or did you run straightaway
to the dog-eared pages ?
:30:59
Oh, enough to discern
its tenor.
:31:02
And ?
:31:05
It's not even a proper novel.
:31:08
It's nothing but an encyclopedia
of perversions.
:31:12
Frankly, it even fails
as an exercise in craft.
:31:14
Characters are wooden.
The dialogue is inane.
:31:18
Not to mention the endless repetition
of words like "nipple" and "pikestaff."
:31:23
There I was taxed,
it's true.
:31:25
And such puny scope.
:31:27
Nothing but the very worst
in man's nature.
:31:30
I write of the great
eternal truths...
:31:32
that bind together all mankind
the whole world over.
:31:36
We eat, we shit, we fuck,
we kill and we die.
:31:40
But we also fall in love.
:31:42
We build cities,
we compose symphonies
and we endure.
:31:45
Why not put that
in your books as well ?
:31:47
It's a fiction,
not a moral treatise.
:31:50
But isn't the duty of art
to elevate us above the beasts ?
:31:53
I'd have thought that was
your duty, Abbe, not mine.
:31:56
One more trick like this...