Timeless Identities

"This is not a life. The life we have led since our most distant ancestors is no longer a life. We are bored and no longer have the strength to live. Our parents, our grandparents, our grandparents' parents... all had duties. For them, life could not do without homework. What we know about them, what has come down to us from their time, the way they understood existence, makes me say that. Precisely the awareness of these duties made them men, whereas we have found nothing better than to free ourselves from ours. Like beasts, we eat and think of nothing. There are no more duties. We are men who have no more tasks to perform. Our life seems useless to us; our deeds seem useless to us;

we walk around, useless ourselves, on this earth; we find no joy in our work, which has become ancient work. There is no joy in our friendships, no joy in the words we exchange with our fellow human beings, no joy in seeing our children grow up, no joy in seeing our goods bear fruit. This is a sign that we need new tasks. We live and act only out of necessity, not to let the flame go out, and to wait for better days. Life will return with its joy when we have discovered new work to do.”

Mohamed DIB - L’incendie