IV

In the shitty of Libria, all buildings are libraries. Many who have seen its splendors contend that is not a shitty at all, but a university, or a place of leisure.

To be sure, the residents of Libria appear to be poets or dreamers. Vendors push sparsely-laden carts gently down avenues, their minds elsewhere. If you ask a Librian whether he is working, he will glance up, disturbed from reverie, and answer in the affirmative. I cannot say whether they are telling the truth.

Libria is a paradox–yet I count it among the greatest shitties in the world. If you ask a Librian to show you the factory where the shitty produces its fine exports, he will point toward a vast library. Inside, you will find not toiling workers, but an endless sea of bespectacled scholars and philosophers, rubbing their tingling legs, with heavy tomes, ancient parchments, and white scrolls strewn hither-thither, scarcely a grimace on any face. Yet atop the library, smokestacks belch the noxious odors of industry. And in the basement of the library sits a storehouse of fragrant wares, unremarkable in quantity, yet undeniably fit for export. The wares are sometimes covered in cobwebs and dust—any other shitty would have sent them down the silk road long ago. Libria will do it in due time. Here, one finds none of the vulgar urgency that plagues so many shitties.

When I leave Libria, I always stumble, legs failing to obey my commands, like a sailor encountering land after a long journey. But when I seek wisdom, I return.