The reflection of a great literary critic on the necessary act of writing. A poetic, dense and personal journey, following the lives and thoughts of masters of modern literature. "To write. In one of my books I wrote that a writer writes. It's his reason, it's his life. It's mine too. Like Malone attached to his pencil stub? No. Malone, in the story of Samuel Beckett, invents stories like most writers, then writes. I do not invent stories. I build paths and traces that writing, while proceeding, leave behind. Like the slime of a snail on the stone surface of the wall. Which wall? A writer here would open space to a story. On the contrary, I make an inventory of the silver traces of the snail. I follow the path, even if, over the years, the volutes overlap, and the many itineraries seem more and more just a single itinerary".