télos is a tumblelog.

Waiting for the Barbarians struck me for two reasons. First, it was a fascinating fable of the abuses that an empire grown to large to fear anything truly frightening faces; and second, the nature of desire.

In the case of both the empire and the magistrate, desire was misplaced, or misunderstood. Both reached for ghosts that the did not understand, or understood too late to be of any use. In the end, what this novel conveyed to me is that there is a stark difference between inexplicable fascination and desire.