Selected Cronicas

THE LEARNED MAN

He now manages a shoe-shop. Not because he likes the job, but it was all he could find. He was forever asking himself: where did I go wrong? He meant in planning his future. There is no great mystery about becoming the manager of a shoe-shop. But once he himself poses the question and shows customers shoes as if he were not of this world, there is a reason for asking. Why, in fact? After all, he had been the brightest student of history at school and taken a keen interest in archaeology. But what he appeared to lack was any genuine appreciation of history or archaeology. All he had was learning. But no real understanding of prehistoric times when the world was uninhabited and fish had not yet been transformed into amphibians to provide food for humans. And to this day he sells shoes with the air of a scholar, as if his feet never touched this rough earth which wears out the soles of shoes.