The Arcades Project - Operi

independent of the others-to summon up in every instance a thoroughly new,
original reaction from the gambler. 'This fact is mirrored in the tendency of
gamblers to place their bets, whenever possible, at the very last moment-the
moment, moreover, when only enough room remains for a purely reflexive
move. Such reflexive behavior on the part of the gambler rules out an "interpre­
tation" of chance. The gambler's reaction to chance is more like that of the knee
to the hanuner in the patellar reflex. (012a,2]
The superstitious man will be on the lookout for hints; the gambler will react to
them even before they can be recognized. To have foreseen a winning play
without having made the most of it will cause the uninitiated to think that he is
"in luck" and has only to act more quickly and courageously the next time
around. In reality, this occurrence signals the fact timt the sort of motor reflex
which chance releases in the lucky gambler failed to materialize. It is only when it
does not take place that "what is about to happen;' as such, comes clearly to
conscIOusness. (013,1]
Only the future that has not entered as such into his consciousness is parried by
the gambler. (013,2]
The proscription of gambling could have its deepest roots in the fact that a
natural gift of humanity, one which, directed toward the highest objects, elevates
the human being beyond himself, only drags him down when applied to one of
the meanest objects: money. The gift in question is presence of mind. Its highest
manifestation is the reading that in each case is divinatory. (013,3]
The peculiar feeling of happiness in the one who wins is marked by the fact that
money and riches, otherwise the most massive and burdensome things in the
world, come to him from the fates like a joyous embrace returned to ti,e full.
They can be compared to words oflove from a woman altogether satisfied by her
man. Gamblers are types to whom it is not given to satisfy the woman. Isn't Don
Juan a gambler? (013,4]
"During the period of facile optimism, such as radiated from the pen of an Alfred
Capus, it was customary on the boulevard to attribute everything to luck:'
Gaston Rageot, "Qy'est-ce qu'un evenement?;' Le Temps, April 16, 1939.-The
wager is a means of conferring shock value on events, of loosing them from the
contexts of experience.18 It is not by accident that people bet on the results of
elections, on the outbreak of war, and so on. For the bourgeoisie, in particular,
political affairs easily take the form of events on a ganring table. 'This is not so
much the case for the proletarian. He is better positioned to recognize constants
in the political process. (013,5]
The Cemetery of the Innocents as promenade. "Such was the place which the
Parisians of the fifteenth century frequented as a sort of lugubrious connterpart to