Fima

by Amos Oz

  ‘Try to understand, Effy. I know the way you’ve always thought of me. Yael Levin, the little girl from Yavne’el. A bit foolish, even if she is rather sweet. Nice, but limited. Yet our experts, as well as the Americans, believe that my project may develop into something. I matter to them. That’s why I’ve decided to go. I don’t matter to you, even if you are in love with me. Or in love with being in love with me. Or so absorbed in your own things that you can’t spare the time or effort to stop loving me.

  ‘If you like, you can come over. I’ll send you a ticket. Or your father can pay. And if you don’t like, we’ll see what time will tell. I deliberately haven’t mentioned my deepest pain. The thing that you think can be put right in a moment. I’m not saying anything about that, nor are you. Maybe it’s just as well we’ll be apart. Sometime I think that only a real blow, a disaster, could bring you back out of your fog: your newspapers, your arguments, your news bulletins. Once you were deep, now you seem to be living superficially most of the time. Don’t be offended, Effy. And don’t start looking for ways of contradicting everything I’ve written, of producing counter-claims, of dismantling it brick by brick, of defeating me. I’m not your enemy. Defeating me won’t help you. Maybe my trip to America will be the shock that will bring you back to yourself. OK, that’s a cliché. I knew you’d say that. Once I’ve gone, you’ll be free to fall in love. Or you can go on being in love with me without having to put up with my washing drying in front of the radiator in the bedroom in the winter. And something else: Try to concentrate. Try not to babble on all day long, fussing and correcting everyone and everything. Don’t become just a sore throat. Anyway, there’s nobody out there listening. Maybe you should go and look for Liat or Ilia? Go back to Greece? Sometimes when I happen to stay at work for a couple of days, working alone all night, grabbing a snack to save time, suddenly I have …’

  Fima refolded the truncated letter and replaced it in its envelope, then put the envelope back in the folder from the Ministry of the Interior, Department of Local Government. He replaced the folder in the bottom drawer. It was after half past three. A cock was crowing far away, a dog was barking persistently in the dark, and the blind man was still tapping with his stick in the empty street. For a moment Fima thought he heard the muezzin calling in the village of Beit Safafa. He got back into bed, switched out the light, and started composing in his mind the missing ending. After a moment he fell asleep. He had had a long day.

  19

  In the monastery

  IN his dream Uri appeared in the middle of a snowstorm to summon him to take his leave of Annette, who was dying of a complication of childbirth in a British naval hospital. They made their way on a sledge through a white forest until they reached a building that vaguely resembled the Monastery of the Cross in Jerusalem. Wounded and dying people with crushed limbs blocked their way, rolling on the floor in the corridors, groaning, bleeding. Uri said, They’re only Cossacks; you can tread on them. Eventually behind the monastery they discovered a pleasant little garden containing a Greek tavern with a vine-shaded terrace and tables laid for a meal. Among the tables stood a sort of litter. When Fima parted the velvet curtains, he saw his wife making love tearfully but eagerly with a dark, shrivelled man who was lying underneath her uttering feeble moans. Suddenly, in a flash of horror, it dawned on him that she was copulating with a corpse. The corpse was the Arab youth from the news bulletin, the one we murdered in Gaza with a bullet through the head.

  20

  Fima is lost in the forest

  AFTER writing in his notebook he dozed till seven o’clock. Rumpled, dishevelled, hating his body’s night smell, he forced himself to get up. He skipped the exercises in front of the mirror. He shaved without cutting himself. He drank two cups of coffee. The very thought of bread and jam or yogurt gave him heartburn. He vaguely remembered that he had to deal this morning with some matter that could not be put off, but for the life of him he could not remember what it was, or why it was so urgent. So he decided to go downstairs to his letter box to fetch the letter he had seen in it last night, and also to bring up the newspaper, but not to spend more than a quarter of an hour on it. Then he would sit down at once to work uncompromisingly on the article he had not managed to finish in the night.

  When he turned on the radio, he found that most of the news was over. Some bright spells were expected during the day. Along the coastal plain there was a possibility of scattered showers. Whereas in the northern valleys there was still a serious risk of frost. Drivers were warned of the danger of skidding on wet roads, were asked to reduce their speed and to avoid so far as possible applying their brakes abruptly or turning too sharply.

  What’s the matter with them, Fima grumbled. Why can’t they leave me alone? What do they take me for? A driver? A farmer from the northern valleys? A swimmer from the coastal plain? Why are we asked and warned, when somebody ought to assume the responsibility and say, I ask, I warn. It’s sheer madness: everything is falling apart in this country, and they are worried about a risk of frost. In fact, applying the brakes abruptly plus a very sharp turn might just save us from disaster. And even that is highly doubtful.

  Fima turned off the radio and called Annette Tadmor: he owed her an apology for his behaviour. At the very least he should show some interest in her welfare. For all he knew, her husband might have had enough of his Italian operetta and returned sheepishly in the middle of the night, lugging a couple of suitcases, falling to the ground and kissing her feet. Was it possible that she had confessed to him about what had happened between them? Was the husband liable to show up here with a loaded pistol? Out of habit or morning vagueness, Fima dialled Tsvi Kropotkin’s number by mistake. Tsvi chuckled and said that although he was actually in the middle of shaving he had already asked himself what had become of Fima this morning: had he forgotten us? Tsvi’s sarcasm eluded Fima.

  “What do you mean, Tsvika? Of course I haven’t forgotten you. I never would. I just thought for a change I shouldn’t ring you too early. You see, little by little I’m improving. There may be some hope for me yet.’

  Kropotkin promised to call back in five minutes, as soon as he had finished shaving.

  After half an hour Fima swallowed his pride and rang Tsvi again:

  ‘Well? So who’s forgotten who? Can you spare me a couple of minutes?’ And without waiting for an answer he said that he needed some advice about an article he’d started writing in the night, and now this morning he wasn’t certain he still agreed with himself. The question was this. Two days ago in Ha’arets there was a report of a speech by Günter Grass to a student audience in Berlin. It was a courageous, decent speech. Grass had denounced the Nazi period and gone on to denounce all trendy parallels between the atrocities of our own day and Hitler’s crimes, including the often-heard comparison with Israel and South Africa. So far so good.

  ‘Fima,’ said Tsvi, ‘I read it. We talked about it the day before yesterday. Get to the point. Explain your problem.’

  ‘I’m just coming to it,’ said Fima. ‘But first, just explain one thing to me, Tsvika. Why does this Grass insist on referring to the Nazis as “they”, whereas you and I, all these years, whenever we write about the occupation, the corruption of values, the oppression in the Territories, even about the Lebanon War, always and without exception use the pronoun “we”? And Grass was actually a soldier with the Nazi Wehrmacht! The same as the other one, Heinrich Böll. He had to give the Nazi salute every morning and shout “Heil Hitler” with the rest of them. And now he calls them “them”. Whereas I, who have never set foot in Lebanon, who have never served in the Territories, so that my hands are definitely cleaner than Günter Grass’s, regularly say and write “we”. “Our wrongdoings”. And even “the innocent blood we have shed”. What is it, that “we”? Something left over from the War of Independence: We are always at the ready, we are here, we’re the Palmach? Who is this “we”, anyway? Me and Rabbi Levinger? You and Rabbi Kahane? What does it mean, exactly? H
ave you ever thought about it, Professor? Perhaps the time has come when you and I and all of us should follow the example of Grass and Böll. Maybe we should all start saying, exclusively, consciously, and emphatically: “they”. What do you think?’

  ‘Look,’ Tsvi Kropotkin said wearily, ‘the thing is with them it’s all in the past, whereas with us it’s still going on, and that’s why.’

  ‘Are you out of your mind?’ Fima cut in with an explosion of rage. ‘Can you hear what you’re saying? What d’you mean, with them it’s in the past, whereas with us it’s still going on? What the hell do you mean by “it”? What precisely is it according to you that is over and done with in Berlin but still goes on in Jerusalem? Have you gone crazy, Professor? What you’re doing is putting them and us on the same level! Worse still, you’re implying that the Germans have a moral advantage over us, because they’ve finished and poor old us, we’re still at it. Who do you think you are? George Steiner? Radio Damascus? That’s exactly the tainted comparison that even Grass, the graduate of the Wehrmacht, decries and calls demagoguery!’

  Fima’s passion was spent. In its place came sadness. And he said in the tone one uses to speak to a child who has hurt himself with a screwdriver because he has obstinately refused to take heed of the grown-ups’ warnings:

  ‘You can see for yourself, Tsvika, how easy it is to fall into the trap. Look what a fine line we have to tread.’

  ‘Calm down, Fima,’ Tsvi Kropotkin pleaded, although Fima was already calm. ‘It’s just eight o’clock. Why are you leaping on me like this? Come round one evening; we’ll sit down and talk it over quietly. I’ve got some Napoleon brandy from France. Shula’s sister brought it back with her. But not this week. It’s the end of the semester and I’m up to my ears. They’re making me Head of Department. Can you come next week? You don’t sound well to me, Fima, and Nina was saying to Shula that you’re a bit depressed again.’

  ‘So what, for heaven’s sake, if it’s not eight o’clock yet. Does our responsibility for the language switch off outside office hours? Does it only operate from eight to four with a break for lunch, weekdays only? I mean it, seriously. Forget Shula and Nina and your brandy for a moment. A fine time for brandy. The only reason I’m depressed is because the rest of you don’t seem to be nearly depressed enough, considering what’s going on. Have you seen the paper this morning? I’d like you to take what I’ve said as a proposal for the agenda. Under the heading of the defence of the language against increasing pollution. I’m suggesting that from now on, at least as regards the atrocities in the Territories, we simply stop using the word “we”.’

  ‘Fima,’ said Tsvi, ‘hang on a minute. Just sort yourself out. Which is the first “we” and which is the second one? You’ve got yourself in a twist, pal. Why don’t we just drop it for the time being? We’ll talk about it next week. Face to face. We can’t settle a subject like this on the phone. And I’ve got to run along.’

  Fima would not give in or let go:

  ‘You remember that famous line in the poem by Amir Gilboa: “Suddenly a man gets up one morning and feels he is a nation and starts walking.” That’s precisely the absurdity I’m talking about. First of all, Professor, the truth, hand on your heart: Has it ever happened to you that you’ve got up in the morning and suddenly felt you were a nation? After lunch at the earliest. Who can get up in the morning and feel he’s a nation, anyway? And even start walking? Maybe Geula Cohen can. Who gets up in the morning and doesn’t just feel lousy?’

  Kropotkin laughed. Which encouraged Fima to a new outburst:

  ‘But listen. Seriously. The time has come to stop feeling like a nation. To stop starting to walk. Let’s cut that crap. A voice called to me and I went. Wherever we are sent – we’ll go. These are semi-fascist motifs. You’re not a nation. I’m not a nation. Nobody is a nation. Not in the morning and not in the evening. And by the way, we really aren’t a nation anyway. At most we’re a sort of tribe.’

  ‘There you go again with your “we”.’ Tsvi chuckled. ‘You’re a bit over the top, Fima. Just make up your mind: Are we “we” or aren’t we? In a hanged man’s house you shouldn’t throw the rope after the bucket. Never mind. I’m sorry, but now I really must hang up and run along. By the way, I heard that Uri will be back this weekend. Why don’t we fix something up for Saturday night? See you.’

  ‘Of course we’re not a nation,’ Fima insisted, deaf and aflame with self-righteousness. ‘We’re a primitive tribe. Scum, that’s what we are. But those Germans, and the French and the British too, have no right to talk down to us. Compared to them we’re saints. Not to mention the rest of them. Have you seen the paper today? The way Shamir went on yesterday in Netanya? And what they did to that old Arab at Ashdod Beach?’

  When Tsvi apologetically hung up, Fima continued to harangue the indifferent, bloated gargle emanating from the phone:

  ‘In any case, we’ve had it.’

  He was referring collectively to the state of Israel, the dovish left, himself, and his friend. But after putting the receiver down, he thought it over and changed his mind: we mustn’t get hysterical. He nearly called Tsvi again to warn him against the despair and hysteria lurking all around nowadays. He felt ashamed of his rudeness to his long-standing friend, such a learned and intelligent man, and one of the last voices to have stayed sane. Even though he was somewhat saddened by the thought that this mediocre scholar should now be head of the department and sit on the same chair as his illustrious predecessors, compared to whom he was a pygmy. At which point Fima suddenly remembered how, eighteen months ago, when he was admitted to Hadassah Hospital to have his appendix removed, Tsvika had enlisted the help of his brother the doctor. He had also enlisted himself and Shula; in fact the two of them had hardly left Fima’s bedside. When he was discharged, Tsvi, with the Gefens and Teddy, had organised round-the-clock shifts to take care of him, and he had run a high fever, behaved like a spoiled child, and pestered them endlessly. And now, here he was not only hurting Tsvi but also interrupting him in the middle of shaving and maybe making him late for his lecture at the university. And just when he was on the point of becoming head of the department too. This very evening, Fima decided, he would ring him again. He would apologise, but he would still try to explain his position all over again. But this time with restraint and cold, sharp logic. And he wouldn’t forget to send a kiss to Shula.

  Fima hurried to the kitchen, because he had the impression that before his conversation with Tsvika he had put the new electric kettle on to boil, and by now it had probably gone the way of its predecessor. Halfway there he was stopped by the ringing telephone and found himself drawn in two directions. After a moment’s hesitation he picked up the phone and said to his father:

  ‘Just a moment, Baruch. There’s something burning in the kitchen.’

  Rushing in, he found the kettle alive and well, shining happily on the marble worktop. So it was yet another false alarm. But in his haste he knocked the black transistor radio off the shelf and broke it. Returning, panting, to the phone he said:

  ‘Everything’s OK. I’m listening.’

  It turned out that the old man just wanted to tell him that he had found some workmen, who would be arriving the following week to replaster and paint the flat. ‘They’re Arabs from Abu Dis village, so from your point of view it’s strictly kosher, Efraim.’ Which reminded the old man of a charming Hasidic story. Why, according to Jewish tradition, are the righteous in Paradise permitted to choose between feasting on the leviathan or on the wild ox? The answer is that there may always be some ultra-fussy Jew who will insist on eating fish because he can’t rely on the kashrut of the Almighty himself.

  He went on to explain to Fima the ostensible point and the true point of this joke, until Fima had the impression that his father’s distinctive smell had managed to infiltrate the telephone wires: it was an East European cocktail, combining a faint whiff of scent with a lungful of unaired quilts, a smell of boiled fish and carrots, and th
e fragrance of sticky liqueurs. He was filled with revulsion, which he was ashamed of, and with the ancient urge to provoke his father, to challenge everything that was sacred to him until he lost his temper. And he said:

  ‘Listen, Dad. Listen carefully. First, about the Arabs. I’ve already explained to you a thousand times that I don’t think they’re great saints. Can’t you understand that the difference between us is not about kosher or non-kosher, or about Hell and Paradise; it’s simply a matter of common humanity – theirs and ours.’

  Baruch agreed at once:

  ‘Naturally,’ he intoned in a Talmudic singsong, ‘nobody would deny that the Arab too is created in the divine image. Except the Arabs themselves, Fimuchka: to our regret they do not comport themselves like human beings created in the image of God.’

  Fima instantly forgot his solemn vow to refrain at all cost from political arguments with his father. He set out to explain, once and for all, passionately, that we must not become like the drunken Ukrainian carter who beat his horse to death when the beast stopped submissively pulling his cart. Are the Arabs in the Territories our workhorses? What did you imagine, that they would go on hewing our wood and drawing our water for ever and ever, amen? That they would be content to play the part of our domestic servants to all eternity? Are they not human beings too? Every Zambia and Gambia is an independent state nowadays, so why should the Arabs in the Territories continue come hell or high water quietly scrubbing our shit-houses, sweeping our streets, washing dishes in our restaurants, wiping arses in our geriatric wards, and then saying thank you? How would you feel if the meanest Ukrainian antisemite planned a future like that for the Jews?’

  The phrase ‘domestic servants’, or maybe it was ‘the meanest Ukrainian antisemite’, reminded the old man of a story that was actually set in a small town in the Ukraine. As usual the narration dragged behind it a long train of explanations and morals.