- published: 02 Jun 2010
- views: 681
Jacques the Fatalist and his Master (French: Jacques le fataliste et son maître) is a novel by Denis Diderot, written during the period 1765-1780. The first French edition was published posthumously in 1796. But prior to this it was known in Germany, thanks to Schiller's partial translation of the work in 1785 (which was retranslated into French in 1793) and Mylius's complete version in 1792.
The main subject of the book is the relationship between the valet Jacques and his master (who is never named). The two are traveling to a destination the narrator leaves insistently vague, and to dispel the boredom of the trip Jacques is compelled by his master to recount the story of his loves. However, Jacques's story is continuously interrupted by other characters and various comic mishaps. Other characters in the book tell stories as well, and they, too, are continuously interrupted. There is even a "reader" character who periodically interrupts the narrator with questions, objections, and demands for more information or detail. The tales told are usually humorous, with romance or sex as their subject matter, and feature complex characters indulging in deception.
Eventually they'll come
Your name has been called
Out for aeons
To claim the blood
And salvage what remains
For once we've seen the fragile nature
Of things behind these windows
Where nothing lives
And nothing ends
And seen what drives the hopeless
In between their closing yellowed walls
The day has come
You are the fatalist
The day has come
You are the fatalist
You walk on soil that dreams of blood
How can we fight fatigue?
In pre-historic sorrow?
When all is preordained
The cycle never ends
What once had been an endless realm
Of possibility and dream
Now laid to waste and ruin
Laid to waste again
You wash your hands in blood
You squander time
We borrow from eternity
Is it another lame excuse?
The day has come
You are the fatalist
The day has come
You are the fatalist
You walk on soil that dreams of blood
You are the fatalist
If nothing changes
Then nothing ends
Your thoughts are broken
Your reasoning is flawed
The defense is just an act
And lies are all you've got
You are the fatalist
You are the fatalist
How easy we can see?
Defeat behind your argument
The fatalistic smile
The day has come
You are the fatalist
The day has come
You are the fatalist
You walk on soil that dreams of blood
The day has come
The day has come