Jolas' translation
>On hot July days, the wall opposite cast a brilliant, harsh light into the damp little courtyard.

>Underneath this heat there was a great void, silence, everything seemed in suspense: the only thing to be heard, aggressive, strident, was the creaking of a chair being dragged across the tiles, the slamming of a door. In this head, in this silence, it was a sudden coldness, a rending.

>And she remained motionless on th edge of her bed, occupying the least possible space, tense, as though waiting for something to burst, to crash down upon her in the threating silence.

>At times the shrill notes of locusts in a meadow petrified by the sun and as though dead, induce this sensation of cold, of solitude, of abandonment in a hostile universe in which something anguishing is impending

>In the silence, penetrating the length of the old blue-striped wallpaper in the hall, the length of the dingy paint, she heard the little click of the key in the front door. She heard the study door close.

>She remained there hunched up, waiting, doing nothing. The slightest act, such as going to the bathroom to wash her hand, letting the water run from the tap, seemed like a provocation, a sudden leap into the void, an extremely daring action. In the suspended silence, the sudden sound of water would be like a signal, like an appeal directed towards them; it would be like some horrible contact, like touching a jellyfish with the end of a stick and then waiting with loathing for it suddenly to shudder, rise up and fall back down again.

>She sensed them like that, spread out, motionless on the other side of the walls, and ready to shudder, to stir.

>She did not move. And about her the entire house, the street, seemed to encourage her, seemed to consider this motionless natural.

>It appeared certain, when you opened the door and saw the stairway filled with relentless, impersonal, colourless calm, a stairway that did not seem to have retained the slightest trace of the persons who had walked on it, not the slightest memory of their presence, when you stood behind the dining-room window and looked at the house-fronts, the shops, the old women and little children walking along the street, it seemed certain that, for as long as possible, she would have to wait, remain motionless like that, do nothing, not move, that the highest degree of comprehension, real intelligence, was that, to undertake nothing, keep as still as possible, do nothing.

>At the most, by being careful not to wake anybody, you could go down without looking at the dark, dead, stairway, and proceed unobtrusively along the pavements, along the walls, just to get a breath, to move about a bit, without knowing where you were going, without wanting to go anywhere, and then come back home, sit down on the edge of the bed and, once more, wait, curled up, motionless.

>>24943314
>french
>woman
I don't care about this

>>24943386
You should. She is better than Joyce.

Good thread anon

Damn, nobody even roasted me...or told me I'm shit or told me to quit...is this implicit encouragement from /lit/?

>>24943314
I like what you're up to anon. Tropisms is a great book -- I read it earlier this year and want to check out more Sarraute. I can't say I was dissatisfied with the existing translation but yours is a neat new angle.