Yasmina Khadra: The Angels Die

But it’s over now.

My story ends in this dark room saved from hell only by the voice of Aït Menguellet. No friend by my bed, no woman at my side — maybe it’s better like this. This way, I can be sure of leaving nothing behind me.

At the age of ninety-three, what can we expect of the storm or its subsiding? I expect nothing, no redemption, no remission, no news, no reunions. I’ve drunk the cup to the dregs, suffered insults to the point of agony; I consider that I’ve been paid all that was owed to me. My breathing has grown weak, my veins no longer bleed, my pains no longer hurt …

Let no one talk of miracles; what’s a miracle in a hospital room with no light? I’ve drawn a line under my joys and made peace with my sorrows: I’m good and ready. When memory weighs on the present, replacing the daylight being born at our window every morning, it must mean that the clock has decided that our time has come. We learn then to close our eyes on the few reflexes we still have and be alone with ourselves; in other words, with someone who becomes elusive to us as we accustom ourselves to his silences, then to his distances, until the big sleep takes us away from the chaos of all things.

Yasmina Khadra is the pen name of award-winning Algerian author Mohammed Moulessehoul. His novels include The African Equation and The Dictator’s Last Night. In 2011 Yasmina Khadra was awarded the prestigious Grand prix de littérature Henri Gal by the Académie française.

Howard Curtis’s many translations from French and Italian include works by Balzac, Flaubert, Pirandello, Jean-Claude Izzo, Marek Halter and Gianrico Carofiglio. He previously translated The African Equation by Yasmina Khadra.