Nikos Kazantzakis - Zorba The Greek

The previous evening I had retired early, leaving him alone with the old siren.

"I'm going," I said. "Enjoy yourself, Zorba, and good luck to you!"

"Good night, boss," Zorba replied. "Let us settle our little affair. Good night, boss. Sleep tight."

Apparently they did settle their little affair, for in my sleep I seemed to hear muffled cooings, and for a time the neighboring room shook and trembled. Then sleep overcame me again. A long while after midnight, Zorba entered barefoot and stretched himself on his bed, very gently, so as not to wake me.

In the first light, there he was, gazing into the distance with his lackluster eyes. You could see he was still sunk in a sort of torpor, his temples were not yet freed from sleep. Calmly, fondly, he was letting himself drift on a shady current as thick as honey. The whole universe of earth, water, thoughts and men was slowly drifting towards a distant sea, and Zorba was drifting away with it, unresistingly, unquestioningly, and happy.

The village began to be roused-there was a confused murmur of cocks, pigs, asses and men. I wanted to leap from my bed and cry: "Heigh! Zorba! We've work to do today!" But I too felt a great happiness in delivering myself up, silently, to the rosy transformation of sunrise. In those magic minutes the whole of life seems as light as dawn. The earth constantly changes shape in the wind, like a soft and billowy cloud.

I stretched out my arm; I, too, felt like having a smoke. I took my pipe. I looked at it with emotion. It was a big and precious one, "Made in England." It was a present from my friend-the one who had greyish-green eyes and slender fingers. That was abroad, years ago. He had finished his studies and was leaving that evening for Greece. "Give up cigarettes," he said. "You light one, you smoke half of it and throw the rest away. Your love only lasts a minute. It's disgraceful. You'd better take up a pipe. It's like a faithful spouse. When you go home, it'll be there, quietly waiting for you. You'll light it, you'll watch the smoke rising in the air-and you'll think of me!"

It was noon. We were leaving the Berlin museum, where he had been to have one last look at his favorite painting-Rembrandt's Warrior, with his bronze helmet, emaciated cheeks and his dolorous and strong-willed expression. "If ever in my life I perform an action worthy of a man," he murmured, as he gazed at the implacable and desperate warrior, "it will be to him I shall owe it."

We were in the museum courtyard, leaning against a pillar. In front of us was a bronze statue of a naked Amazon, riding a wild horse with indescribable grace. A little grey bird, a wagtail, perched for a moment on the Amazon's head, turned towards us, jerking up its tail, uttered two or three times a mocking cry, and flew away.

I shuddered, looked at my friend and asked:

"Did you hear that bird? It seemed to say something to us, then it flew away."

My friend smiled. " 'It's a bird, let it sing; it's a bird let it speak,'" he said, quoting a line from one of our popular ballads.

How was it that at this moment, at daybreak, on this Cretan coast, such a memory should come into my head, together with that faithful verse, and fill my mind with bitterness?

I slowly worked some tobacco into my pipe and lit it. Everything in this world has a hidden meaning, I thought. Men, animals, trees, stars, they are all hieroglyphics; woe to anyone who begins to decipher them and guess what they mean… When you see them, you do not understand them. You think they are really men, animals, trees, stars. It is only years later, too late, that you understand…

The bronze-helmeted warrior, my friend leaning against the pillar, the wagtail and what it chirped to us, the verse from that melancholy ballad, all this, I thought today, may have a hidden meaning, but what can it be?

My eyes followed the smoke which curled and uncurled in the dappled light. And my mind mingled with the smoke and slowly vanished in blue wreaths. After a long interval, without having any recourse to logic, I could see with utter certainty the origin, the growth and the disappearance of the world. It was as if I had once more plunged into Buddha, but this time without the delusive words and insolent acrobatic tricks of the mind. This smoke is the essence of his teaching, these vanishing spirals are life coming impatiently to a happy end in blue nirvana…

I sighed softly. Às if this sigh had brought me back to the present minute, I looked round and saw the miserable wooden hut, and hanging on the wall a little mirror from which the first rays of the sun had just struck sparks. Opposite me, Zorba sat on his mattress, smoking, with his back to me.

The previous day, with its tragi-comic fortunes, suddenly flashed into my mind. The smell of stale violet perfume-violet eau-de-Cologne, musk and patchouli; a parrot, an almost human being transformed into a parrot and who beat his wings against the iron bars of his cage, calling the name of a former lover; and an old mahone, [8]only survivor of a whole fleet, who recounted ancient naval battles…

Zorba heard my sigh, shook his head and looked around.

"We've behaved badly," he murmured. "We've behaved badly, boss. You laughed, so did I, and she saw us. And the way you left, without any fine words, as if she was an old bag of a hundred. What a damn shame! It's not polite, boss. That's not the way for a man to behave, let me tell you. She's a woman, after all, isn't she? A weak, fretful creature. A good job I stayed behind to console her."

"But what do you mean, Zorba?" I replied. "Do you seriously think all women have nothing else but that in mind?"

"Yes, boss, they've nothing else in mind. Listen to me, now… I've seen all sorts, and I've done all kinds of things… A woman has nothing else in view. She's a sickly creature, I tell you, and fretful. If you don't tell her you love and want her, she starts crying. Maybe she doesn't want you at all, maybe you disgust her, maybe she says no. That's another story. But all men who see her must desire her. That's what she wants, the poor creature, so you might try and please her!

"I had a grandmother, she must have been eighty. What a tale that old soul's life would make! Never mind, that's another story, too… Well, she must have been eighty in the shade, and opposite our house lived a younger girl as fresh as a flower… Krystallo she was called. Every Saturday evening, raw young bloods of the village would meet for a drink, and the wine made us lively. We stuck a sprig of basil behind our ears, one of my cousins took his guitar, and we went serenading. What love! What passion! We bellowed like bulls! We all wanted her, and every Saturday we went in a herd for her to make her choice.

"Well, would you believe it, boss? It's a mystery! Women have a wound which never heals. Every wound heals but that one-don't you take any notice of your books-that one never heals. What, just because a woman's eighty? The wound's still open.

"So every Saturday the old girl pulled her mattress up to the window, took out her little mirror and combed away at the little bits of thatch she had left, and carefully made a parting. She'd look round slyly, for fear someone saw her. If anyone came near, she'd snuggle back and look as if butter wouldn't melt in her mouth, pretending she was dozing. But how could she sleep? She was waiting for the serenade. At eighty! You see what a mystery woman is, boss! Just now it makes me want to cry. But at that time I was just harum-scarum, I didn't understand and it made me laugh. One day I got annoyed with her. She was hauling me over the coals because I was running after the girls, so I told her straight out where to get off: 'Why do you rub walnut leaves over your lips every Saturday, and part your hair? I s'pose you think we come to serenade you? It's Krystallo we're after. You're just a stinking old corpse!'