Laszlo Krasznahorkai - War & War

The whole document, Korin said to the woman, seemed to be speaking of the Garden of Eden, every sentence of the manuscript that described the village and the shore, he said, dwelling on the unsurpassable beauty of the place, as though it were not some message it was conveying but more as if it were wanting to conduct itself back into paradise, for it not only mentioned this beauty, elaborated on it and proclaimed it, but lingered on it, in other words it established, in its own strange way, the fact that this peculiar beauty, Korin stressed the word “ beauty ” in English, was not simply an aspect of the landscape but all it contained, that calm, and, yes, delight, the calm and delight it radiated, suggesting that whatever was good was indisputably eternal, and in this way, Korin continued, embellishing the picture for her, it established the fact that, having been created good, everything continued very good, all of it, the brilliant red sunlight, the dazzling white of the cliffs, the subtle green of the valleys and the grace of the people inhabiting it, commuting as they did between the cliffs and the valleys, or, to put it another way, said Korin, everything — the red and white and green, the grace of the mule-drawn wagons as they trundled along, the octopus nets drying in the wind, the amulets around people’s necks, the ornamental hairpins, the workshops offering pots and pans, the fishing boats and the mountain shrines, in a word the earth itself, as well as the sea and the sky ( the sky , he said in English) — but really everything was calm and delightful, and, what was more, real, real in the full sense of the word, or that at least was how Korin described the state of affairs, when, having finished the morning’s work, he attempted to sketch the place out for her, though his efforts as usual were doomed since it was clearly pointless describing anything to her in whatever painterly detail, now or at any time, for she not only stood there as indifferent as ever, but, as he saw when she happened to turn a little, she had been thoroughly beaten up, in other words it was not just a matter of having no idea in what language to speak to her, that is if she was listening at all to the monologue Korin had been trying to deliver in Hungarian since about eleven that morning to about half-past twelve, going on to one, that afternoon — a monologue supplemented with the odd English word he had gleaned from the dictionary — but that the blown veins were clearly visible on her face, her eyes were swollen and there were abrasions on her brow, possibly because she had ventured out at night and had been attacked by someone on the way home, it was impossible to tell, though it was deeply disturbing to Korin, who, for that very reason, pretended not to have noticed anything and went on speaking, picking up his monologue in the evening until the interpreter finally appeared in the kitchen when, summoning his courage, he rushed over to him and asked him what had happened, and who was it who had dared assault the young lady: assaulted her! the interpreter expostulated, beside himself, to his lover, her! he bellowed at the figure crouched, wide-eyed with terror at the end of the bed, while he paced furiously up and down the room, for God’s sake, who does he think he is? what business was it of this dumb asshole what they did or didn’t do with their lives, for God’s sake, who does he think he is, does he think he can sniff around us like some damned dog and try to hold us to account about our lives! well, excuse me, but that’s not okay! he growled at his lover, yes, he sent him on his way all right, the sly pitiful asshole, let him rot up someone else’s ass, he told him all right, until there was hardly any breath left in him, left him gasping, saying he only meant to this or only meant to that, to which he, the interpreter, replied simply that if he wanted to avoid a busted nose like hers, he will shut the fuck up right now with questions, at which point, naturally, Korin slid off like some damn snake, into his own room and closed the door behind him so quietly it would not have disturbed a fly, the interpreter insisted, for that door made no noise, no sir, no noise whatsoever.

Night fell and the stars came out, but the four of them would not return to Kommos, for after carefully and repeatedly checking the security of the place they remained where the sunset found them, to the north of the village and a little above it in the olive grove where they leaned against an ancient tree trunk and sat for a long time, silent, in the deepening darkness, until Bengazza spoke in that low murmur of his and told them it might be as well to say something to the villagers, he had no idea what, but didn’t they think it would be proper to invent something assuring about what they were doing here, to which, for a long time, he received no answer, for it seemed no one wanted to break the silence, and when it was broken it was on a different subject, a remark of Kasser’s to be precise, to the effect that there was nothing lovelier than this sunset over the hill and the sea, to which Falke replied that nothing could be finer than these extraordinary colors in the deepening darkness, this wonderful spectacle of the interplay between transition and permanence, for all interplay between transition and permanence has a remarkable theatricality, being like an enormous performance involving a beautiful fresco of something that does not exist and yet suggests evanescence, mortality, that sense of dying away, perfectly encapsulating the idea of extinction; not forgetting the ceremonial entrance of color, added Kasser, the breathtaking glory of scarlet, lilac, yellow, brown, blue and white, the demonic aspect of the painted sky, all this, all this; and so much else, suggested Falke, since they had not yet mentioned the thousand significant tremors of the soul such a sunset occasions in the viewer, the deep trance-like state certain to be produced in the viewer by contemplation of the phenomenon, in other words, said Kasser, the sense of hope suffusing the moment of parting, the setting forth, the spellbinding image of the first step into darkness; yes, but also the sure promise of calm, rest and the approach of dreams, all this, all at once and so much more, added Falke; and how much more, echoed Kasser, though by that time the grove was cooling, and since the linen loincloths they had been lent by way of raiment were inadequate against the chill they started back toward the village, making their way down the narrow path between the tiny stone cottages to occupy the one that had stood empty at the time of their arrival and which they had been offered by their brave rescuers and the squid fishers of Kommos as a temporary shelter for as long as they needed it, they were told; and so they entered and lay down on the beds, on what, inside the shelter, felt like a pleasant evening at Kommos, their entering and lying down being followed, as usual, by a short uninterrupted sleep, by which time it was dawn already, the new day arriving rose-hemmed, the very first light of course finding them up and about, outside the hut, beside a fig tree on the dew-drenched grass, all four of them squatting and staring at the early veils of sunlight, watching the sun rise across the bay in the east, for they all agreed that the earth had nothing lovelier to offer than sunrise; dawn, in other words, said Kasser, that miraculous ascent, the breathtaking spectacle of the rebirth of light, the distinguishing of objects and outlines, the wild celebration of the return of clarity and vision; in fact the celebration of the return of everything, of the very idea of wholeness, said Falke, of order, of the rule of law, and of the security they both offer; of birth, and the primal ritual of the dawn of things in general, and nothing surely can be more beautiful, said Kasser; and they hadn’t yet spoken of what happens to a man who has seen all this, the silent observer of this entire miracle, said Falke, for even if all this meant the going down of the sun, dawn, with its own reason and clarity, would still signify a beginning and appear as the wellspring of some benevolent power; and of security too, added Kasser, for there was this sense of complete security about each and every morning; and so much more, put in Falke, though by that time it had grown bright as daylight and the morning had entered Kommos clad in its own splendor and magnificence, and was bidding it welcome, so one by one the castaways slowly stirred themselves, returning to the hut, for they all agreed with Toót when he quietly remarked that yes, indeed, it was all very well, and it was all true, but perhaps it was time to start on the food the people of Kommos had presented to them, the food — the dates, the figs and the grapes, time, in other words, to eat.