Henry was at his desk in his cubicle but his mind was elsewhere.
Forgive this cliche of a modern man; I’ll not speak of fluorescents beating down upon him, straining his steaming eyes, as you’ve heard it all before. But one must set the scene of their story somehow. I’d rather avoid, however, that self-critical self-awareness just employed, and play it straight. Yet not in as stark and cynical a style as a modern writer would employ, with their sharp, snide statements; pretending to be an omniscient comedian smoking a cigarette; name dropping early twentieth century figures they wish they could call their peers; trying to be blasé but unable to prevent their overexcitable genius from plunging them into the entertainment of the absurd rather than reaching the nub of any point of human nature beyond what is found within the pages of self-help. Cool they are, surely, but warmth is more my speed, and one must travel far back in time to return to an age when such literary compassion was a quality still present within prose beyond the mawkishly romantic throwbacks, some of which the author of this work himself has been guilty of supplying.
I too wish to partake in modernity - to speak of the now with authority. However, when gazing upon the now, one immediately finds that the modern writer encounters an issue similar to the historical writer,...