“La solitude est sainte” — said, in the nineteenth century, the French romantic poet Alfred de Vigny. Today, I find it impossible to write a phrase like this; I mean, the stones would be the inevitable reception. In our time, everything is collective: men are hand in hand circling around the beautiful world they share. And if, for a moment, someone feels an impulse to seclusion, a need for loneliness, he should not make a fuss! Otherwise, he will be crushed as an insect, censored by anyone who has the displeasure of seeing his lack of social maturity. The loner is sick, not having in himself the sense of collectivity is to be inferior. Today, only the common good matters, and only to the common good should direct the efforts a sensible, modern and conscious human. Therefore, I consider myself to be a quadruped: I judge any kind of collective intelligence impossible and I have no sense of belonging in me. The human being, for me, only develops intellectually in silence and retreat. So I cannot be read, so I cannot even find a Vigny’s book in Portuguese on Amazon. This century is too spacious to provide accommodation for solitude..
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