80 Avenue du Parc bus, Northbound
Caucasian female, mid 20s, with black-framed glasses and long black hair tied back in a ponytail, wearing jeans, black boots, black leather jacket, flowered scarf, and carrying a large brown leather purse.
Roland Barthes by Roland Barthes, Roland Barthes, trans. Richard Howard (University of California)
Page 61:
La Côtelette – The Rib Chop
At Leysin, in 1945, in order to perform an extrapleural pneumothorax operation, a piece of one of my ribs was removed, and subsequently given back to me, quite formally, wrapped up in a piece of medical gauze (the physicians, who were Swiss, as it happened, thereby professed that my body belongs to me, in whatever dismembered state they restored it to me: I am the owner of my bones, in life as in death).
Early light. Two lawn chairs. Sound of sprinklers.
Noveline: Did you know he kept his little rib bit for a while, and then he tossed it out the window?
Romana: Poor Barthes.
Noveline: He had that book all about reading and its pleasures. The jouissance, he called it, of losing oneself in a text. Oh darling, you would love it. We should see if we can get a copy.
Romana: (snapping her fingers) That reminds me I have a tremendous recipe for ribs, actually. Maple glaze with adobe sauce.
Noveline: Poor Barthes.
