Vassilis Vassilikos - ...And Dreams Are Dreams

Maison Street. On the way be wondered, still influenced by the book he had been reading, who this Maison was. A man, a woman, or a house? The name sounded vaguely familiar from high school. But he had forgotten practically everything he had learned in high school. As for the taxi driver, not only did he also not know who Maison was (a man, a woman, or a house), he had no idea where the street was.

“It’s parallel to Fabvier Street,” the narrator enlightened him. “Does that mean anything to you?”

It didn’t mean a thing to the cab driver, because he came from a village and had not learned the streets of Athens. He was in the middle of dreaming about the fish his brother-in-law was going to bring him.

“Well, at least let’s get to Canning Square, and then we can ask.”

But even Canning Square was unknown to the driver. The narrator was indignant.

“But don’t you know the history of the place where you were born?”

“History knows me,” replied the driver cockily, in that way neo-Hellenes have of turning their ignorance into a virtue and throwing the ball back at you. “I make history in bed.”

The narrator, who was going into withdrawal and could hardly wait to get to Elpiniki’s house, began to lose his temper. Meanwhile, the cab driver continued his monologue.

“All these people in power are in it to amass wealth. Nobody’s in it for the masses, for the people.

That’s why I say: all these ministers can go stuff themselves.”

Finally, they asked another cab driver, an obliging old man, who solved their problem: they would take Eynard Street, behind the statue of Kolokotronis, go down Miaoulis Street, across Canning Square to Kassomoulis Street, and that’s where they’d find Maison Street.

And suddenly, inside the passenger/narrator’s mind, which was clouded from withdrawal, there was light. Kassomoulis! Of course! He mentions Marshall Maison, General Maison, Commander in Chief Maison, liberator of Greece. He cleaned up the Peloponnese of Ibrahim’s Turko-Egyptians, the ones who brought the plague. With a regular army of fourteen thousand, he brought the border of Greece up to the Isthmus of Corinth.

Yes, that was Maison, the great warrior. Maison of Maison Street.

At last they found it.

“What number did you say?”

“Number 11.”

The driver stopped at number 9.

“Never mind, I’ll get out here,” said the narrator and paid.

They were watering the plants on the balconies and the streets were soaking. Or maybe it was raining.

You could never tell in this city.

— 4-

The Captain, Suite: The Reception

“And so what happened to Kontostavlos,

Grandfather?”

“He came back to Greece, where a few years later he gave a reception at his home, ‘ the most beautiful in Athens ,’ at the foot of the Acropolis, ‘ to honor the departure of Commander Maison .’ In fact, he had invitations printed (the first to be printed in Greece, according to historians): ‘ Mr. and Mrs. Kontostavlos request … to attend a soiree at their home on the evening of April 27th, which the illustrious Marshall Maison will honor with his presence .’ Everybody came, from Capodistrias to the lowliest secretary. All the foreign powers. The only ones absent were the leaders of the rebel troops. They didn’t show up because they were tired of having to dance syrtaki for the foreigners. Given the way the revolution had developed, that’s all anyone wanted them for. They were tired of being objects of folklore. The foreigners had burst upon the scene; as early on as that, they would go to Kesariani every Sunday to watch the locals dance. Not that there was anything wrong with that. But what did these soldiers have to do with dancing?

“Said Grivas to Chief Hatzipetros: ‘ If Maison wants to see Greek dancing, we’ll prepare him a military dinner out in the countryside, and we’ll invite him to go there. The governor can go too. If you want to attend this reception, you are free to do so. I refuse to go and be laughed at .’ The man felt he was an evzone, a tourist attraction. But wasn’t Capodistrias also a foreigner? ‘ If the governor wishes to entertain the French commander by presenting us, that is to say by inviting us and our wives, he may do so, but we, the men, will not dance on one side, while the others are threatening our honor and laughing at us dancing bears. N’est-ce pas can take a walk .’ They called Capodistrias N’est-ce pas because up until the Fourth National Assembly he spoke in French. Even translated into official Greek, he was still incomprehensible to the soldiers. N’est-ce pas was buying the drinks and N’est-ce pas was drinking them.

Of course, Grivas was married to a young and attractive woman, and to see her surrounded by those foreign dandies while he was dancing zeibekiko made him furious. Vayas, Hatzipetros, and the other agreed with him. Nobody was going to go to Kontostavlos’s reception. N’est-ce pas wanted to show them off to his foreign friends like cattle at a county fair. The chiefs would dance to entertain the foreign guests. But who was this Capodistrias, after all? He would call the leaders of the revolution ‘chief brigands,’ the erudite Phanariots like Korais ‘sons of Satan,’ and the notables

‘Christian Turks.’ So who else lived in this country?”

“It’s the same nowadays,” thought the captain.

“When ship owners bring Greek dancing trios to London, to add an element of folklore to their dinner parties, nobody bothers to find out what’s behind these people. What broken dreams, what betrayed longings, what defeats — their own or their fathers’—led them to do this kind of work, to become syrtaki professionals, out of a deep-seated sorrow, in order to survive without being anybody’s employees, without slavishly bowing their heads to anyone. And they do not sell their manliness, because it is their very essence. It was the same with those brave men in the past….”

“And so, Grandfather?”

“And so, Kontostavlos was happy that so many people came to his party. But he was concerned when he saw that the chiefs weren’t coming. In his opinion, everyone who had shown up had taken advantage of the courage and the bravery of these fighters, had built on their blood. And now the blood was absent.

“The music began. Maison looked around for the chiefs of war promised by the governor, but he did not see them. Next came the waltzes, one, two, three. Then the cadrilles . Two hours had gone by. Maison asked the governor why the leaders hadn’t appeared. The governor, not knowing the reason, shrugged his shoulders and said, ‘Let us wait.’ Meanwhile, he sent somebody to find out why they hadn’t come. ‘They’re sleeping.’ So, in order to make excuses to his guest, he mentioned something about ‘uncouthness and ignorance.’ But Maison didn’t buy it. He had seen these men fight with him like lions, and they had always been civil and polite to him. Therefore, something else was going on, something they weren’t telling him, but which he could sense, military man that he was.

“And so, my boy, those soldiers gave one of the first lessons of national independence and pride. They refused to dance syrtaki and zeibekiko for the foreign locusts, for the Western Euro-trash. They demanded a constitution. Free elections and a constitution. A Parliament and a constitution. But the governor did not want to put a razor in an infant’s hands, as he said.

That’s how he viewed a people who had fought for liberty and won: as infants.

‘“I would give the razor to the infant,’ said the English admiral, Lyons, ‘and then I would take its right hand and guide it so it could shave without cutting itself.’