Short Translation: The Notebook by Agota Kristof Exercice de cécité et de surdité

From the chapter entitled "Exercice de cécité et de surdité" in Agota Kristof's Le Grand Cahier.

One of us plays blind; the other plays deaf. To train ourselves at the beginning the blind one ties one of Grandmother’s black scarves over his eyes, and the deaf one stuffs his ears with grass. The scarf smells bad like Grandmother.

We take each other by the hand, we go walking during the raids when everyone is hiding in basements, and the streets are deserted.

The deaf one describes what he sees:

- The street is straight and long. It’s bordered by low, one-story houses. The houses are white, gray, pink, yellow and blue. At the end of the street, you see a park with trees and a fountain. The sky is blue with some white clouds. You see the planes. Five bombers. They’re flying low.

The blind one speaks slowly so that the deaf one can read his lips:

- I hear the planes. They make a deep, staccato noise. Their engines are struggling. The planes are weighed down with bombs. Now, they’ve passed by. I hear the birds again. Everything else is quiet.

The deaf one reads the lips of the blind one and responds:

- Yes. The street is empty.

The blind one says:

- Not for long. I hear steps approaching from the side street to the left.

The deaf one says:

- You’re right. There’s a man.

The blind one says:

- What’s he like?

The deaf one says:

- Like they all are. Poor, old.

The blind one says:

- I know. I recognize the steps of an old man. I can hear that he is barefoot as well; he must be poor.

The deaf one says:

- He is bald. He has an old army jacket. He has pants that are too short. His feet are dirty.

- His eyes?

- I can’t see them. He’s look at the ground.

- His mouth?

- His lips are sucked in. He must not have any teeth.

- His hands?

- In his pockets. The pockets are huge and filled with something. Potatoes or nuts, there are little bumps. He lifts his head. He’s looking at us. But I can’t tell the color of his eyes.

- Can you see anything else?

- Wrinkles, deep wrinkles like scars on his face.

The blind one says:

- I hear sirens. It’s the end of the air raid. Let’s go back.

Later, with time, we no longer needed the scarf for our eyes nor the grass for our ears. The one who played blind simply turned his gaze inside; the deaf one closed his ears to all sound.