Contents

I The Artis t and His [ Sic] Work The Subject Field 15 The Crisis 16 Japanese Death Poem 17 April Dogs 18 Blake’s Rose 19 The Stranger 20 Self-Portrait in a Bad Year 21 The Curb 22 The Optician 23 Not Anna Akhmatova 24 The Actor 25 The Girls 26 The Rollercoaster Operator 27 Session Three: Public Appearances 28 Line Manager 29 The Sickness 30 Room Service 31 The Artist 32 The Pencil 33 Lines from Peer Gynt 34 Letter to Ibsen’s Translator 35 The Fabulist 36 Thirty-Eighth Maxim and Arrow 37 The Bite 38 Bankruptcy 39 The Trial 40 The Lie 41 The Wine Taster 42 The Courtroom 43