Nikos Kazantzakis - Zorba The Greek

"A cigarette, master," he said. "It'll bring you good luck in love."

I gave him the cigarette. He held out a skinny, sunburnt hand.

"Give me a light, too!"

I gave him a light; he drew the smoke in to his lungs and, with eyes half-closed, blew it out through his nostrils.

"As happy as a pasha!" he murmured.

"Where are you going?"

"To the widow's garden. She said she'd give me some food if I spread the news about her ewe."

We walked quickly. There were rifts in the clouds. The whole village was freshly washed and smiling.

"Do you like the widow, Mimiko?" Zorba asked, with a sigh.

Mimiko chuckled.

"Friend, why shouldn't I like her? And haven't I come out of a sewer, like everyone else?"

"Of a sewer?" I said, astounded. "What d'you mean, Mimiko?"

"Well, from a mother's innards."

I was amazed. Only a Shakespeare in his most creative moments, I thought, could have found an expression of such crude realism to portray the dark and repugnant mystery of birth.

I looked at Mimiko. His eyes were large and ecstatic and they had a slight squint.

"How do you spend your days, Mimiko?"

"How d'you think? I live like a lord! I wake in the morning, I eat a crust. Then I do odd jobs for people, anywhere, anything, I run errands, cart manure, collect horse-dung, and I've got a fishing rod. I live with my aunt, mother Lenio, the professional mourner. You're bound to know her, everybody does. She's even been photographed. In the evening I go back home, drink a bowl of soup and a drop of wine, if there is any. If there isn't, I drink enough of God's water to make my belly swell like a drum. Then, good night!"

"And won't you get married, Mimiko?"

"What, me? I'm not a loony! Whatever are you asking now, friend? That I should saddle myself with trouble? A woman needs shoes! Where'd I find any? Look, I go barefoot!"

"Haven't you any boots?"

"What d'you take me for? Of course I have! A man died last year and my aunt Lenio pulled them off his feet. I wear them at Easter and when I go to church and stare at the priest. Tben I pull them off, hang them round my neck, and come home."

"What do you like best of all, Mimiko?"

"First, bread. Ah, how I like that! All crisp and hot, 'specially if it's wheat bread. Then, wine. Then, sleep."

"What about women?"

"Fff! Eat, drink, and go to bed, I say. All the rest's just trouble!"

"And the widow?"

"Oh, leave her to the devil, I tell you, if you know what's good for you! Get thee behind me, Satan!"

He spat three times and crossed himself.

"Can you read?"

"Now, look here, I'm not such a fool! When I was little I was dragged to school, but I was lucky. I caught typhus and became an idiot. That's how I managed to get out of that!"

Zorba had had enough of my questionings. He could not think of anything save the widow.

"Boss…" he said, taking me by the arm. Then he turned to Mimiko and ordered him to walk on ahead. "We've got something to talk about.

"Boss," he said, "this is where I count on you. Now, don't dishonor the male species! The god-devil sends you this choice morsel. You've got teeth. All right, get 'em into it. Stretch out your arm and take her! What did the Creator give us hands for? To take things! So, take 'em! I've seen loads of women in my time. But that damned widow makes the steeples rock!"

"I don't want any trouble!" I replied angrily.

I was irritated because in my heart of hearts I also had desired that all-powerful body which had passed by me like a wild animal in heat, distilling musk.

"You don't want any trouble!" Zorba exclaimed in stupefaction. "And pray, what do you want, then?"

I did not answer.

"Life is trouble," Zorba continued. "Death, no. To live-do you know what that means? To undo your belt and look for trouble!"

I still said nothing. I knew Zorba was right, I knew it, but I did not dare. My life had got on the wrong track, and my contact with men had become now a mere soliloquy. I had fallen so low that, if I had had to choose between falling in love with a woman and reading a book about love, I should have chosen the book.

"Don't calculate, boss," Zorba continued. "Leave your figures alone, smash the blasted scales, shut up your grocer's shop, I tell you. Now's the time you're going to save or to lose your soul. Listen, boss, take a handkerchief, tie two or three pounds in it, make them gold ones, because the paper ones don't dazzle; and send them to the widow by Mimiko. Teach him what he is to say: 'The master of the mine sends you his best wishes and this little handkerchief. It's only a small thing, he said, but his love is big. He said, too, you weren't to worry about the ewe; if it's lost, don't bother, I'm here, don't be afraid! He says he saw you going by the café and he's fallen sick and only you can cure him!'

"There now! Then the same evening you knock on the door. Must beat the iron while it's hot. You've lost your way, you tell her. It's dark, will she lend you a lantern. Or else you've suddenly come over dizzy and would like a glass of water. Or, better still, you buy another ewe and take it to her: 'Look, my lady,' you say, 'here's the ewe you lost. It was I who found it for you!' And the widow-listen to this, boss-the widow gives you the reward and you enter into… God Almighty, if only I could ride your mare behind you-I tell you, boss, you'll enter into Paradise on horseback. If you're looking for any other paradise than that, my poor fellow, there is none! Don't listen to what the priests tell you, there's no other!"

We must have been approaching the widow's garden, for Mimiko sighed and began in his stammering voice to sing his sorrow:

Wine for the chestnut, honey for the wálnut! A lass for the lad, and a lad for the lass!

Zorba stepped out on his long shanks, hís nostrils quivering. He stopped abruptly, drew in a long breath. He stared me straight in the eyes:

"Well?…" he said.

And he waited anxiously.

"That'll do!" I replied harshly.

And I quickened my pace.

Zorba shook his head and growled something I did not catch.

When we reached the hut, he sat on crossed legs, placed the santurí on his knees and lowered his head, lost in deep meditation. It was as if he were listening, with his head on his chest, to innumerable songs and trying to choose one, the most beautiful and most despairing of all. He at last made his choice and started a heart-rending air. From time to time he eyed me slantwise. I felt that what he could not or dare not tell me in words he was saying with the santurí. That I was wasting my life, that the widow and I were two insects who live but a second beneath the sun, then die for all eternity. Never more! Never more!

Zorba leapt up. He had suddenly realized that he was tiring himself in vain. He leaned against the wall, lit a cigarette, and, after a moment, spoke.

"I'm going to let you into a secret, boss, something a hodja [14]once told me in Salonica… I'm going to tell it to you, even if it doesn't do any good.

"At that time I was a pedlar in Macedonia. I went into the villages to sell reels of thread, needles, the lives of the saints, benjamin and pepper. I had a rare voice, then, a real nightingale I was. You must know women also succumb to a voice. And what won't they succumb to-the jades! God only knows what goes on inside them! You may be as ugly as sin, lame or a hunchback, but if you've a soft voice and can sing the women completely lose their heads.

"I was also peddling in Salonica and even went into the Turkish districts. And, it appears, my voice had so charmed a rich Muslim woman, the daughter of a pasha, that she could not sleep. She called an old hodja and filled his hands with mejidies. 'Aman!' [15]she said to him, 'go and tell the peddling Giaour to come. Aman! I must see him. I can't hold out any longer!'