Дэвид Митчелл - Utopia Avenue

Jasper’s nickname was De Jeugd , the Youth. He was Rijksdorp’s youngest resident. The Trappists were a group of manic depressives who spoke only in occasional short sentences. The Dramatists passed their days with gossip, intrigues and internecine struggles. The Conspirators fomented delusional theories about the Elders of Zion, Communist bees and a secret Nazi base in Antarctica. Jasper remained Non-aligned during his residency. Sexual liaisons in the clinic were forbidden in theory and difficult in practice, though not unknown. Two men on Jasper’s floor had sex now and then, but ten years in an English boarding school had accustomed him to furtive gay sex. His own libido was, perhaps conveniently, dimmed by Queludrin.

Days at Rijksdorp began with a seven a.m. gong, followed by an eight a.m. gong to announce breakfast. Jasper sat at a Non-aligned table and spoke little while he ate his rolls and cheese, and drank his coffee. Residents then reported to the pharmacy for their medication in alphabetical order. Jasper’s Z ensured last place. Mornings consisted of treatments appropriate to individual diagnoses: psychotherapy, behavioural therapy or just ‘community work’ for those willing and able to perform light chores in the kitchen or garden. Afternoons were the patients’ own. Jigsaw puzzles were popular, as were a table-tennis table and bar-football. Some patients memorised poems, songs or ‘turns’ for the Dramatists’ hotly debated Saturday revue. Grootvader Wim and Dr Galavazi were initially keen for Jasper to continue with the Bishop’s Ely curriculum, but when he opened the textbooks, he knew that he and school had parted ways for ever. An ex-classics teacher from Apeldoorn nicknamed the Professor enlisted Jasper as a chess opponent. He played slow, fierce games. A nun from Venlo ran a Scrabble League. She invented new words and rules to ensure victory, and cast religious curses if challenged.

Weeks became months. In August Jasper agreed to Dr Galavazi’s proposal that he venture outside the Rijksdorp grounds. Within a few yards, he felt his pulse elevate and gravity strengthen. His vision swam. He hurried back through the gate, convinced that it wasn’t only Queludrin but also Rijksdorp’s walls that kept Knock Knock at bay. He admitted that this was irrational, but so was an Oriental monk who appeared only in mirrors and sought to drive Jasper insane. Dr Galavazi, fearful that his young patient was too dependent on Queludrin, reduced his 10mg dose to 5mg. After a day, Jasper felt Knock Knock stir. After two, he felt a thud-thud, thud-thud, thud-thud on the wall of his skull. After three, he saw Knock Knock’s dim reflection in a soup spoon. On the fourth day, Jasper’s dosage was returned to 10mg.

All through the autumn, Grootvader Wim visited. If ‘enjoyed’ was the wrong word for these visits, Jasper valued the fact that one person, at least, came to see him. Three- or four-word sentences were Jasper’s upper limit, but Wim de Zoet had volunteered in the Great War and was used to men suffering from shell shock. He spoke for both of them, reporting on de Zoet family affairs, news, Domburg, books, and chapters of his own life. Jasper’s father Guus visited once. It did not go well. Guus de Zoet, unlike Wim, couldn’t hide his distress at Jasper’s fragility, or his nervy disgust at the more visibly mentally ill patients. Guus’s wife and Jasper’s half-siblings did not visit. Jasper did not mind. The fewer the pitying witnesses to his collapse, the better. Jasper’s only other connection with the world was Heinz Formaggio, who wrote every week from Ely, Geneva or wherever he happened to be. Some weeks he sent only a scribbled postcard; others it was a ten-page epic. Jasper tried to reply, staring at ‘Dear Formaggio’ for half a day, lost in the infinity of possible first lines until he gave up. The lack of a reply never discouraged Jasper’s former roommate.

In November, a protégé of Dr Galavazi’s from the University of Leuven named Claudette Dubois took up an eight-week work placement at Rijksdorp. Her thesis proposed that music might have positive effects on some psychiatric patients, and she was keen to test a few of these ideas. ‘Come in,’ she told Jasper, as he entered the consulting room. ‘You’re my very first guinea pig.’ Various wind, string and percussion instruments were arranged on a table. With a smile like a misbehaving child, Miss Dubois asked him to choose one. He picked the guitar, a Spanish-built Ramirez. He liked its feel on his thigh. He strummed, and had a sense that his future had just changed. His fingers remembered G, D, A and F from a couple of guitar lessons he had had after his encounter with Big Bill Broonzy in Domburg. Jasper told Miss Dubois about the encounter. He had not spoken so many sentences for months. He asked to borrow the guitar for the day. She lent him the instrument and a manual by Bert Weedon called Play in a Day.

Jasper didn’t realise the title wasn’t a literal command, and was angry with himself for having mastered only two-thirds of Bert Weedon’s methodology by the next session. Each of his fingertips required a sticking-plaster. Miss Dubois was impressed, but made the ongoing loan of the Ramirez conditional upon Jasper performing at the Saturday revue. Jasper had no choice. When he played, he forgot he was a scared dropout wasting away in a psychiatric facility in the Netherlands. When he played, he was a servant and a lord of Music. On Saturday, he played a simplified ‘Greensleeves’. In future years, Jasper would experience the live adoration of thousands, yet no applause would ever quite equal what he earned that Saturday from a motley group of schizophrenics, depressives, fantasists, doctors, nurses, kitchen staff and cleaners. He thought, I want to get better .

When Miss Dubois returned to Leuven she entrusted her Ramirez to Jasper, saying she expected further progress by the spring. Shortly before Christmas, Jasper played his grandfather ‘Yes Sir, That’s My Baby’ and Duane Eddy’s ‘Forty Miles Of Bad Road’. Grootvader Wim had missed a couple of visits due to illness and was joyful and shocked at Jasper’s rapid progress. He engaged a Brazilian guitarist married to a Dutchwoman in Den Haag to give Jasper weekly lessons at Rijksdorp. Jasper’s ‘turns’ at the Saturday revue grew in complexity and length. He slipped in a few of his own compositions, describing them, if asked, as ‘a traditional Argentinian folk song’. For Christmas, Jasper received a Philips record player – with earphones – from ‘The de Zoet Family’, which meant Grootvader Wim. Miss Dubois gave him Abel Carlevaro’s recordings of Bach and Manuel Ponce. His Brazilian teacher gave him Andrés Segovia’s Master of the Spanish Guitar and Odetta’s Odetta Sings Ballads and Blues . Jasper spent the whole day transcribing Odetta songs, note by chord by line. He didn’t consider himself a singer – but he needed to hum the vocal line, so why not sing the words? Jasper performed Odetta’s ‘Santy Anno’ at the first Saturday revue of 1963 and took an encore. He could have taken two, but his Brazilian teacher warned Jasper that a musician should leave an audience wanting a little more.

That winter was severe. Canals froze across the Netherlands but the Elfstedentocht race across Friesland was aborted as all but sixty-nine of ten thousand skaters succumbed to hypothermia and frostbite. Jasper worked on mastering guitar exercises by Francisco Tárrega. Jasper’s father visited Rijksdorp before his annual departure for South Africa. Jasper played ‘I’ve Got It Bad (And That Ain’t Good)’ and Tarréga’s ‘Étude in C’. This time, his father left Rijksdorp later than planned. The following week the nun from Venlo died in her sleep. Jasper composed ‘Requiem for the Scrabble Cheat’ in her honour. Some residents were moved to tears. Jasper enjoyed the power his music gave him over their emotions.