László Krasznahorkai - Destruction and Sorrow beneath the Heavens - Reportage

This part of the atelier is like a kind of diamond-polisher’s workshop, where young boys sit in a row behind small tables, each bent over a piece of wood in the pale light pouring in through the tiny windows, and with the small chisel and small light hammers in their hands they try to complete — from the piece that has been given to them — a certain phase of the work until, relates the master, they can do it perfectly; but the workshop does not only consist of this room, he says, there are also huge hangars, but there’s no hurry for that, now they should watch him, he motions for Stein to come closer, and from the table he pulls onto his lap, from a huge disorderly pile, a Guanyin statue, roughly half a metre in height, seemingly nearly ready, and with a colour, more than anything else, reminiscent of the light of the full moon — he pulls it onto his lap, and with a hammer and a fine-pointed chisel in his hand, he bends over it, and from this point on does not talk, does not utter a single word, does not explain, but begins, with the chisel and hammer to form the countenance of the statue, for the most part otherwise largely finished, and for a while the guest has the feeling that he wants to show him that he’s doing it for him, that he wants to initiate him into the secrets of the creation of a Guanyin head, but as time passes this feeling fades away, and finally vanishes, because after about half an hour, during which the master is completely bent above the face of the Guanyin, Stein edges up to him from one side, so that he can watch even the smallest movements, he observes as one eye comes to life, then the other, as these two eyes now see, as the living forehead of the Guanyin slowly emerges from the bare wood, its nose, lips, chin, gaze, by that time it is completely obvious that the master has ceased doing this for him, to be completely accurate: Stein has stopped existing as far as the master is concerned, he has forgotten him , he looks up at Stein, surprised, and Stein is certain that this is the case, because when, after about an hour’s worth of work, he leans back for the first time, holding the statue away from himself and looking at it, examining it, turning it a little to the right and a little to the left, in order to determine, to measure in the incidentally falling light what the countenance of the statue now shows, he sees that the master needs time to apprehend that Stein is there beside him, for his consciousness to awaken to the fact that someone — Petőfi himself! — has been watching him the whole time, he needs just as much time as he needed an hour ago for all this to leave his head, to become immersed in his work of meticulous, breath-fine chiselling, the results of which he now displays proudly, a beautiful, otherworldly, godly gaze; it is not possible to know how he did it even though Stein was standing next him the whole time, he did not stop observing the point of the chisel, the edge of the hammer or the surface of the fragrant wood sanded down in advance, even for a moment, but he does not know how that sacrosanct, mournful beauty was conjured out of that wood, and he almost starts to cry because he does not know —until he observes, in the meantime, another reality, that of the interpreter who is suffering greatly, who in no way has spent this short hour in feverish immersion but paced up and down among the young workers of the workshop, because he has really begun to freeze again in the penetrating cold, as he now reveals, he must get out of this murderous, this bone-penetrating cold — endured until now so as not to be a disturbance — but right now, immediately, he is shivering desperately, he must get out, he cannot stand it any more, he looks at Stein in torment, so that, with the master at their side — who seems to be teasing them — they go back into the office, he seems to find it amusing that the interpreter is so cold, certainly, he nods roguishly, it is fairly cold considering that it’s May, as if the whole thing were just a good little joke, then everything is solved, because from somewhere in one of the little rooms behind the office a real huo tong — a local variation of the renowned bath heated with embers — turns up, and you can sit in it, then you can wrap yourself up while you sit in it, it’s as if the interpreter has ended up in the redeeming vaults of heaven, with indescribable happiness on his face, he allows himself to be sat down in the warm cauldron, to be wrapped in blankets up to the waist, and then a woman and two tiny waifs bring fresh tea, and everyone is filled with great cheerfulness: the interpreter is sitting in the huo tong, and nearly fainting from the beneficial effects of the heat, he closes his eyes, so the matter of the interpreter has had a happy end; as for Stein, however, who perhaps due to the spirit of the place is this time better able to withstand the difficulties, the master once again motions for him to follow, and then leads him across into two gigantic workrooms adjacent to the workshop, partially dug into the earth and connected to each other: because standing here are enormous blocks of wood, arranged next to one another according to the various phases of work: here looking like wood sawed down for sale, piled up, there already joined into one piece; or freed from the most important surpluses, so that from the rough contours showing the enormous form of a Buddha or bodhisattva[10] the workers, who seem to be older and more experienced than the ones in the workshop, peel away, with astoundingly skilful and confident blows of their hatchets, any unnecessary remaining material; the wood shavings fly in the wake of their movements, the master is very pleased that his guest is able to delight in their work with such passion, he stands behind him proudly, at times patting him on the shoulder and motioning for him to observe how things operate in his workshop, to study as much as he wishes what is going on with these amazing materials — then he tries to ask him, does he understand that the workers here are joining and pressing together and planing these huge blocks of wood, then they’ll saw them down, and finally they’ll carve off whatever is not necessary, all right, fine, Stein tries to convey his words with vigorous gesticulations, but how does a Buddha emerge from this ? — at which point the master, as if he has deduced this time what Stein wants to know, stands in front of the framework of a gigantic statue, he doesn’t even reach up to its knee, and with his tiny hands this tiny person points at the roughly carved head up there in the heights and, as if it were a question of some impish trick, winks at the guest and, with an indescribably expressive movement, signifies that, well, it’s like this, if everything is ready, then he comes along, he climbs up there and he just carves nicely with his chisel until, well. . there is a Buddha.

In the office, when they return, the atmosphere is good, and while the interpreter enjoys the benefits of the huo tong, Stein and the master look at a photograph album, bound in coloured fake leather, of his earlier works, which the master brings out like a treasure from one of the rooms in the back, then Stein begins to examine the statues scattered around the office, and asks if he could buy one like that one day, when he is rich — he points at a smaller Guanyin, the master suddenly looks very serious, he sits down in the armchair and points, next to himself, for his guest to sit down as well and he speaks to the interpreter, asking him to please be so kind as to translate what he is about to say, and he begins to speak animatedly, the interpreter is clearly concentrating very strongly in the tub, noting everything, but in the end he summarizes the master’s address in a single short sentence which goes like this: he, the master, has become very attached to comrade Petőfi, and he would like them to be friends.