"Semiotics is in principle the discipline studying everything which can be used in order to lie. If something cannot be used to tell a lie, conversel… - Umberto Eco

The devil is not the prince of matter; the devil is the arrogance of spirit, faith without smile, truth that is never seized by doubt. The devil is grim because he knows where he is going, and, in moving, he always returns from whence he came.

"We were interrupted by a girl with a strawberry birthmark on her nose; she had some papers in her hand and asked if we had signed the petition for the imprisoned Argentinean comrades. Belbo signed without reading it. "They're even worse of than I am," he said to Diotallevi, who was regarding him with a bemused expression. "He can't sign," Belbo said to the girl. "He belongs to a small Indian sect that forbids its members to write their own names. Many of them are in jail because of government persecution." The girl looked sympathetically at Diotallevi and passed the petition to me.

"And who are they?" I asked.

"What do you mean, who are they? Argentinean comrades."

"But what group do they belong to?"

"The Tacuarus, I think."

"The Tacuarus are fascists," I said. As if I knew one group from the other.

"Fascist pig," the girl hissed at me. She left."

Yesterday's rose endures in its name, we hold empty names.