Beckett Drove a Deux Chevaux

A mantra for artists in this Golden Age of Things.

I live of late in Los Angeles, to use the term “live” loosely, where the breast are oddly round and the trees are oddly square.

Los Angeles is the hideous demon spawn that might result if the Statue of Liberty went to a bar, ordered a drink, looked away for a moment and woke up two hours later to find herself being raped by The Golden Calf. It is a place of Things, of objects, of possessions; it is the material raised to the level of the spiritual; it is as if while God was busy battling Satan, Mammon crept up from behind and slayed them both; in Los Angeles, the Object is the Meaning, the Thing is the Purpose. And so here’s the problem:

Today, Things are fucking amazing. I mean, ho lee shit amazing. Things today are waaayyyyy better than Things have ever been. Cavemen had sticks. In the Middle ages they had typhoid. We have iPhones and Hermann Miller chairs and shoes with air in the soles. Inside the soles! How do they get the air inside the soles??? We are living in the Golden Age of Things, in the Golden Empire of Things. And Los Angeles is Thing Rome.

And fuck me, I want those Things. Even as I don’t want to want those Things, I want those Things. I walk into an Apple store, and I think, “What a dark temple to consumerism, what a hideous display of shallow capitalism,” and meanwhile I want every Thing, and I mean every Thing in the store - not just one of each amazing Thing, but all the Things: all the shiny phone Things and all the sleek computer Things and all the pristine tablet Things. Good God Almighty, look at this fucking car:

LOOK AT THIS THING. I don’t even like cars, and I want this one. I want to touch it and hold it. I want to lick it. Has any Thing ever been so beautiful? I know, I know – it’s shallow, it’s meaningless, it’s materialistic, “your possessions posses you,” I know. But look at this fucking watch:

Have you ever seen any Thing like this? It’s an absolute miracle of design and engineering, a Thing to end all Things. If aliens landed on Earth tomorrow and decided to wipe out mankind because of our hideous, evil ways, you could show them this and say, “Yes, but look at this Thing we made,” and they would let us live. In captivity, sure, but live.

This isn’t news, of course. Artists and writers throughout history have had to deal with meager incomes, most of them much more meager than mine. But as far as dealing with Things - with their devious, shiny temptations, the way Things make us want to give up our art for good and just go into banking and have any amazing Thing we want - I’m fairly certain this is the worst it’s ever been. I know I’m supposed to be above it all, and that Things have never made anyone happy, and that what really matters in the final measure of one’s life are the expressions of one’s soul which are far more fulfilling than anything money can buy. But Jesus H. Christ, look at this motherfucking house:

A glass pools? How do they make glass pools? It’s amazing. What am I doing writing books, I should be trading futures (I don’t have any idea what “trading futures” means, but I know the people who do it have lots of awesome Things). Kafka didn’t have to deal with this level of Thingness, not even close. Sure there were some nice buildings in Prague, maybe a pretty sanitarium or two, but Franz wasn’t seeing this fly overhead:

That’s a PLANE, folks. It’s bigger than my apartment. And it flies. Why the hell did I become a writer?

I bring this up now because it’s been a rough couple of month here in Thingville, USA. Holiday parties at extraordinary homes, business lunches in extravagant hotels, friends flying off to exotic destinations. I’ll be honest, I wish those friends were snobs, I wish they were shallow and dull and unread and unaware, but they’re some of the nicest goddamned people I’ve ever met, so I can’t even hate them. It’s very aggravating.

All this came to a head last week, as I was sitting in my car at a stoplight and this Thing pulled up beside me:

It’s a Ducati Panigale V4R, and if you don’t want to have sex with it, there’s something very wrong with you. I’m not a car guy, as I mentioned earlier, but I’m a bike fanatic - so this Thing beside me hurt. This Thing made me wish I’d stayed in Advertising, a fate I wouldn’t wish on my worst enemy.

So I did what I usually do: I tried to turn my material envy into personal disdain. I told myself the rider was probably a dick, that he was probably full of himself, that he was probably arrogant.

He revved his engine, once, twice, then looked over at me in my dinged-up Toyota.

Seriously? I thought. You want to race me? I’m in a Prius, fuckwit, I’m on my way to TJ Maxx.

He nodded politely, gave me a thumbs up.

Nice guy.

Damn.

I tried another strategy: I told myself he was miserable. I told myself he was in a job he hated, and that this bike was all that he had, and that he probably had no idea how to ride it and was going to crash it dipping into the next corner anyway. He revved the Thing again (holy fuck, what a gorgeous growl that Thing had), my envy reached 16,500 RPMs… and then somehow, for some reason, through some desperate, primordial survival design of the mind, I recalled a weird tidbit, one of those immediately forgettable nuggets you read one evening and promptly forget, something I’d come across decades ago when I was just discovering the work of Samuel Beckett, a writer whose work would forever influence not just my writing but my approach to life itself, that heady time when I was reading everything I could find written by him and everything I could find written about him, a small, seemingly useless bit of knowledge that whispered itself to me at that traffic light in Los Angeles, a soft voice from the deepest dark of my mind:

Beckett drove a Deux Chevaux.

That was the thought that went through my mind, that exact thought:

Beckett drove a Deux Chevaux.

This is a Deux Chevaux:

And that’s a nice one.

The Citroen Deux Chevaux (French for “two horses,” which was not far off from the horsepower it had) was first built in 1948. Autocar Magazine at the time called it “the work of a designer who has kissed the lash of austerity with almost masochistic fervor.”

That is to say, it’s a hideous piece of shit.

Beckett was destitute in his Paris days, terribly so, and so when I first read that he drove a Deux Chevaux, I attributed his choice of this almost-a-car to his meager means.

But a few years ago, doing research on his life for a piece I was working on, I discovered that in fact he bought this car when he was in his fifties, when he already famous and well-off. In his younger Paris days, he was too broke to afford any type of car. Tiring of Paris, he eventually moved to the quieter and more affordable village of Ussy, a thirty minute drive away, which was when his novels were finally published, he began writing plays, and “Waiting for Godot” was produced to wide acclaim.

Sam could have purchased any car he wanted.

He bought this one:

It's tempting to turn artists we admire into saints, and to imagine that Beckett was above it all, that none of it mattered to this austere man of spirit and mind, a man with no pathetic want for material comforts (he was reportedly a terrible driver, which makes the image of him crammed into this tiny death trap, squealing the tires around French street corners even better; praise him, he didn’t even care about life!) And maybe that’s true. But maybe he did want Things, as we all do. There were many beautiful Things in the world then, too; not a Ducati Panigale V4R with full titanium racing exhaust and magnesium wheels, perhaps, but beautiful Things nonetheless.

Or maybe he was just wary of them, of their power, of their potential for harm, particularly to artists. Perhaps Sam knew that Things could lead him away from what he really needed in life. If Netflix turned Watt into a limited series and set Beckett up with an overall first-look deal, would he have written “Waiting for Godot?” I doubt it. He was a human being after all, and Things tempt us. They’re designed to. And maybe, just like you and me, he would have seen a Thing he wanted - a nice house overlooking the Pacific, something with a pool and a hot tub - and maybe he would have changed Godot into a mindless rom-com and asked his agent to get it to Paul Rudd.

There is a precept in Judaism, from “The Ethics of our Fathers,” in which we are advised to “build a fence around the Torah (Bible).” To protect it. To make sure it survives. As with most things religious, that basically sage advice led over the years to volumes of arcane rules, strict prohibitions and generally backwards thinking. But the heart of it is true.

Maybe we as artists and writers need to build a fence around the lives we want to lead. Maybe even if we can afford to buy these amazing, beautiful, incredible Things, we can’t afford to have them. They’re just too dangerous.

Or maybe I’m just materialistic and jealous and making up excuses. It could be. I’m pretty shitty.

But how many great writers and artists, capable of so much, have a modicum of success and then “go Hollywood?” They buy the house, the car, the pool - and their work dies.

This is what Beckett left behind when he passed away in 1989:

This is what Jeff Bezos will leave behind:

Sam for the win.

(I don’t know what those round ball things on yachts are, but there’s a part of me that really wants a yacht with round ball things on the top, and it worries me.)

The traffic light turned green, the rider shifted into gear and sped off. The fucker could ride, too, which made it even worse, and made me want that Thing he was riding even more.

Perhaps you’re a better person than I am. Let’s go with “probably” - less covetous, less shallow, more noble. If not, though, and if every once in a while you find yourself torn in this Golden Age of Things between what you want and what you need, between the life of art and the life of Things, try doing what I did as he sped off into the distance. I thought to myself these words, my new mantra:

Beckett drove a Deau Chaveax.

And as I pulled away in my dinged-up Prius, heading for TJ Maxx, I felt, momentarily, better.

Of course now I really, really want a Deau Chaveax.

Fuck.

Yours in the fetal position,

S.

artwork by Orli Auslander