The to-and-fro movement between the written woman and the writing woman is an endless one. "The woman took a train / away away from herself, . . . and I / grow younger as I leave / my me behind," Dilys Laing wrote, "They said: You took her with you / and brought her back again. / You look sick. Welcome home." Yes, welcome home, for she has the impudence to disbelieve, to live before god. And after. She is "woman enough" to slip out of herself and go, then to return almost without self and without denying the going. Writing, in a way, is listening to the others' language and reading with the others' eyes. The more ears I am able to hear with, the farther I see the plurality of meaning and the less I lend myself to the illusion of a single message.
Trinh T. Minh-ha
