by Elie Wiesel
“I haven't? What more do you want? I told you that she is no longer with us.”
“Tell me about your deep relationship with her.”
She really goes too far. After being obsessed by my little brother, now she's obsessed by my mother again. Not my uncle, aunts, or father. The conversation is turning into a debate, the debate into a confrontation. She needs remembered incidents in my relationship with my mother; she demands details, even minor, frivolous ones. Did I really love her? Always? Only out of duty? Did I ever have arguments with her? If I did, over what? Did I find her beautiful? Seductive? How did she dress? Did she wear makeup? Did I ever see her in the middle of the night? How did she kiss me, on the forehead or on the cheeks? Do I still see her in my dreams? And what effect does it have on me when I wake up? No hint of sensuality? I'm beside myself with anger. Who does she think I am? Does she think I'm suffering from perverse senility? I barely lived with my mother. We lived apart for more than three quarters of my childhood; she had other business, as they say, namely, chasing Germans from Polish territory. My flare-up has no effect on my therapist. Calm, as usual, she points out to me that if I become irate, it means she has touched an obscurely alive and sensitive area of my memory. I resent her; I resent her teachers in psychoanalysis for bringing all problems, enigmas, afflictions, and secrets of human nature back to sexuality. She explains that she is duty-bound to follow all trails, even those that are paved with badly healed scars. I tell her to go to the devil.
“Exactly,” she says. “I'll take you there.” And immediately she adds: “I noticed a touch of annoyance when you described your mother's activities in the Resistance. Am I wrong? Wrong to deduce that you would have preferred she remain with you and your father? And share your long winter nights, your dangers, and your fears? Be hungry like you. Be in pain like you. Is it so inconceivable to think that a child would want to keep his mother next to his crib and his bed no matter what?”
“I'll let you determine what a child wants or doesn't want. But what a Jewish child wanted or feared in occupied Poland is something you'll never know. Don't try to violate her right to silence, Doctor. Even by putting the blame on me.”
“You seem angrier and angrier.”
I feel my blood boiling. “Yes, I am; how could I not be? You're taking a path that leads to dishonor, but don't try to drag me onto it! I'm warning you: you'll do it without me!”
“You're using a new, strong word—dishonor,” Thérèse says. “I don't understand. What dishonor are we talking about, yours or your mother's? Do you reproach her for having abandoned you, you and your father? Or for something worse?”
I feel overcome with anger. “Now what are you driving at? I have no idea what you're alluding to, or what theory you're referring to. Why are you people so eager to make us feel guilty? Do you intend to repeat the lies of the Polish anti-Semites? How dare you?”
“In the Resistance, your mother didn't live alone. She had comrades, and not just women. Did you think about this later? Did it ever occur to you, even in a confused way, in your subconscious, that she might have met an exceptional man whose courage and strength she admired? And that maybe—”
In my indignation, I stand up to look directly in her face. “Stop! That's an order! My parents loved each other! They were a magnificent couple! If you dare pursue this angle, if you think you'll solve my personal problems by accusing my mother of I don't know what ugly, indecent thing, I'll leave you immediately—but not without having spit my contempt and rage in your face. Is that really your ultimate purpose?”
She shuts her notebook without saying a word.
As for me, I leave without even glancing at her, and with a bitter taste in my mouth.
Don't hold it against me if I divulge too many details to you about my “conversations” with my therapist. Some of these will seem unpleasant to you. I don't hold it against her. She's doing her work, whereas I'm not doing mine. She told me several times that her aim was to “puncture the abscess.” Whereas I'm trying to stop her. For her, it's like dealing with a boil. But we're dealing with something else, with an ailment for which no physician can give a precise diagnosis. What are we dealing with, then? I still don't know. But I know you have something to do with it—you, whom I love as much as my life. Perhaps one day, in a joint effort, we'll discover it, you and I. One day.
Unhinged, perturbed, terrified: that's how I feel since my last visit to Dr. Thérèse Goldschmidt's. Could she have succeeded in sowing doubts in my mind? I try to recall and relive the period of my family's reunion in the summer of 1944. I describe it for her, though halfheartedly.
Were we happy? Absolutely, I swear it. Well, as happy as parents could be with their son after a tragedy has taken away those close to them, dead without burial. Did my parents love each other? Absolutely, I swear to that too. They loved each other as is possible only with human beings who have waited too long, with every last bit of strength in their body, to assert their faith in each other. Admittedly, there were sometimes heavy sorrowful or tense silences between them. These occurred most often in the evening, at the dinner table, or when we listened to music, if one of us accidentally mentioned Jacob's name, or Dina's, or if my father quizzed my mother about life in the underground. Once I heard him whisper, as if to justify himself: “If it hadn't been for the child, I would have gone everywhere with you, always, you know that.” Later, when I remembered this, I realized that a child can be not just a source of joy but also an accumulation of obstacles. Had my mother been unfaithful during the war? I believe with all my heart that the reply can only be no. She loved me; she loved us too much; she had too much self-respect to jeopardize that love. However, an incident kept in the background, absurdly, resurfaces in my memory. And when I think about it, it makes me blush. It was in May 1946. A beautiful spring day. We were in our country house near Tomaszów. I was playing on the lawn. My father was resting under a blossoming locust tree, and my mother was reading, stretched out on a deck chair by his side, when the doorbell rang and gave them a start. Who could it be?
“Go open the door,” my father said to me.
A young, well-dressed man, holding a bouquet of flowers in one hand and a book in the other, smiled at me. “I know who you are; you're Leah's son.”
“How do you know?” I asked, stunned.
“Oh, I know a lot of things. It's my profession. I'm a journalist. Go and announce my presence to your parents, please.”
“But … what's your name?”
“Romek. Tell them that Romek would like to see them.”
“Do they know you?”
“Your mother knows me.”
With that, he followed me to the garden. My father saw him and put down his newspaper. My mother jumped up from her deck chair and walked toward him, holding out her hand. “What are you doing here, Romek?” she asked. And, turning toward my father, she said pompously: “Come and see, a friend from the Resistance has come to visit us. He's a journalist. I told you about him.”
My father stood up and shook hands with the visitor, with a courtesy that was not devoid of warmth. “All my wife's comrades are welcome in this house,” he said. And after a pause, he went on: “But I didn't know you knew our address.” Romek answered that Polish journalists have a reputation for being well-informed. My mother stammered a few words that I didn't grasp, but I saw that she was ill at ease. And my father too was embarrassed; that was unusual for him. I wasn't mature enough yet to know that adults are more secretive than children. We sat around the small table under the locust tree, and my mother went to fetch some cool drinks. It was very hot. The conversation began, a polite, almost banal conversation.
“I read your articles and editorials,” said my father. “I prefer those that aren't about politics.”
“Me too,” Romek replied, with an air of feigned seriousness. “Unfortunately, everything nowadays is political, even the weather.”
“Except for the fact that politics changes more quickly than
the weather.”
“Sometimes I wish I knew which of the two is most predictable.”
“If I had to wager, I'd bet on the weather,” said my father.
“And me on politics,” said Romek.
“And we would both lose,” my father said. “I wonder if we haven't already lost.”
Romek stiffened. “What are you referring to?”
“As a journalist, you must be aware of the bad winds blowing in our country these days. May I be frank with you? You seem to be close to the authorities. Too close. If I were you, I'd be careful.”
My mother returned with some lemonade. A brief silence settled in, interrupted by the chirping of birds too lazy to be flying. It was time to change the subject.
“If I understand correctly,” said my father, “you worked in the Resistance with Leah. In a way, you know things about her life that my son and I still don't know.”
“Of course not,” Romek protested. “We fought side by side, that's all. We confronted the same enemy, but not with the same temerity. When it came to daring, no one could equal Leah. Compared with her, even at the end, I felt like a beginner. In fact, that's what brings me here today.”
My mother, who hadn't yet uttered a word, looked up, intrigued. Romek focused his gaze on my father: “I had the idea of doing a story on your wife, for the radio and my newspaper. She deserves it and so does the nation.”
“And what would you tell?” asked my father.
“Her life story. What she fought for. Her patriotic idealism—”
“For example?”
Romek, who hadn't yet touched his drink, took a sip. Because he was thirsty? Or because he needed time to think? At random, he began to describe some dramatic episodes in which my mother had played a prominent role. The German officer she had lured into an ambush. The military pharmacy robbed in broad daylight (the Resistance was short of medicine). The speech given to her unit when it was preparing for the Warsaw insurrection.
“Oh, what a speech! What inspiration! What persuasiveness! You're too young, you probably don't realize it, but when your mother talks, she knows how to command obedience. She knew how to find the words that would inspire the fighters on the eve of the action. I remember some of the appeals she made in a calm and solemn voice: ‘You know as well as I do who our enemies are. Bloodthirsty barbarians, bent on occupying our lands, destroying our homes, murdering our children. You've seen them at work; now they'll see what we're capable of. You'll show them your anger and you'll be justified. You'll deny them the right to pity and to life just as they denied their victims. If, to restore our honor, we have to kill or be killed, will you accept the terms of our oath?’ And they all cried out at the top of their lungs: ‘Yes, we accept them! Yes, we'll fight! Yes, we'll kill those who killed our people and humiliated us! Yes, we'll save our honor!’ That's the story I feel like telling, but that's just one example among so many. The street fighting during the insurrection—she was there, on the front lines, under the machine-gun and heavy-artillery fire, intrepid, tireless, nursing the wounded, who blessed her as though she had the power to save their lives. So, what do you think of my project?”
My father quickly glanced at my mother. “What's your opinion?”
She stared straight ahead. Tense, lost in thought, she seemed to want to run away from the portrait Romek had just painted.
“Leah,” said my father.
She pulled herself together.
“It doesn't appeal to me at all,” she said finally. “War heroine? No, that's not a role for me.”
“Don't you think it's our duty to bear witness for the sake of history?” Romek asked in a low voice.
“I did my duty by fighting; let others do theirs by bearing witness.”
“But if we stay silent, others will speak in our place and say anything. They'll distort the truth—”
“They've already started,” said my mother, interrupting him.
“And they'll fabricate even more,” Romek went on. “The anti-Semites will call us liars, cowards—”
“Some already are,” my mother said, interrupting him again.
“All the more reason to speak up loud and clear, to shout, intervene, set the record straight, take action …”
“What's the point?” asked my mother, losing her temper. “They'll always outnumber us; they'll always be more virulent and powerful.”
The journalist lowered his voice again and went on in a near whisper: “Leah, I don't recognize you. You're Jewish; I'm Jewish. You are what you are, and me, I'm a journalist. You express in acts and I in words the loathsome, unspeakable things we lived through. We did so many things together in the name of truth, for the memory and honor of our people. And now, you refuse to fight, whereas I'm doing what I can. Who knows if tomorrow I'll still be able to. Are you in such deep despair?”
“Yes, I am,” said my mother in a very low voice.
And suddenly I had the painful feeling that they were alone, she and Romek, since they were conversing in a language that rose before us—my father and me—like a wall.
How can I possibly not talk about these events?
EXCERPT FROM DR. THéRèSE GOLDSCHMIDT'S NOTES
Last night, I didn't sleep. I wonder if I'm not on the wrong track. Yet I saw Doriel's angry outburst as an encouraging sign. And particularly in the garden scene. In his unconscious relationship to his mother, the little boy inside him had remained tormented. We'll have to dig even deeper. After all, that's what analysis is all about: reality gushes forth like blood.
That day, in the family garden, Doriel must have noticed something serious, even shocking, whose significance had remained buried if not hidden inside him for years. Why was his mother so reserved, indeed ill at ease, in front of her former comrade-inarms? Why had she stayed silent for so long and not taken part in the conversation between her husband and the journalist? Did that mean that, during the war, the two former Resistance fighters had been much closer—more intimate—and not just members of the same clandestine movement? At first sight, this was a plausible hypothesis. Two youths who are often living together, taking part in the same tragic events, initiating the same exploits, confronting the same dangers, and facing the possibility of prison, torture, or death, can easily abolish the boundaries that would separate them in normal times. Is an affair, even a brief one, unthinkable, inconceivable, and to be refuted with no further consideration? If so, war literature would find itself quite impoverished. When hatred wreaks havoc in the hearts of men, and death is busy filling up the cemeteries, faithfulness can attain its limits and frailties. Under these circumstances, in the eyes of the fighters, eternity is measured in days and hours; they might as well make the most of it.
This is probably the coded event that the analyst within me is looking for. At about four in the morning, I got up to go to my office and consult my notes. Martin joined me a short time later, bringing two cups of coffee.
“You're having trouble sleeping? Because of your privileged patient again?”
“Privileged but difficult, the most complex and resistant patient in my career. As soon as he gives me a key, he changes the lock.”
“This must appeal to you,” said Martin. “You hate things that are easy.”
“True enough, but the distance between too easy and too difficult can be enormous, which is the case here.”
As I was talking, I was leafing through my notes with one hand and stirring my coffee with the other.
“Here it is, the session when I gave him a bit of a rough time and drove him into a corner. I forced him to remember a painful episode: his mother's reunion with a possible or probable lover in his and his father's presence when he was a little boy. Of course, I expected him to react, but not so violently.”
I described to Martin Doriel's behavior when he had calmed down. When I questioned him as to what he presently thought of Romek, he shrugged and said, “Oh, nothing, nothing special.” And since I was insistent, he flew into a rage again. No
longer in control of his movements or his language, he jumped up, trembling all over, eyed me scornfully as though I was his mortal enemy, began beating his chest, and stuttered some incoherent words: “He's a bastard, a traitor, a swindler. As soon as I saw him, I hated him; I'll always hate him, to the end of my days. He showed up with his hands full of thorns and an empty heart. Guilty of rape, he isn't human. You don't steal the mother of a child who is in hiding and pursued by a thousand policemen. I repudiate him as a human being just as he repudiated my father. I despise him for the contempt he showed my entire family. I curse him, but curses don't scare him, and justice even less. Now I understand some things better. His attitude toward me later. His generosity. His bequest. To make amends, to atone, that's what he hoped. But he demeans everything he touches. He wounded my mother and humiliated my father. As soon as I think of him, I feel humiliated too. He should have been ashamed. And you too. You want me to feel unworthy. You want to bring me down on my knees, my head bowed. I never should have come!”
“I'd never seen him in such a state,” I said. “I tried in vain to calm him. The gentler I became, the more he unleashed his rage against the world and destiny.”
“Do you think,” Martin asked, “that he looked where he should not have? That he imagined the worst? That in his fantasies he saw his mother and her lover locked in an embrace, in the midst of—”
“I have no idea. Anything is possible. After all, he has a vivid imagination.”
“You should be pleased nevertheless,” Martin said. “You touched him on the spot that hurts him most. You just have to keep it up. At least now you know where you're going.”
“No, I don't! That's the problem. Ignorance. It's odd, but the more I proceed with this case, the more I feel I lack knowledge and experience. With every new session, I feel less confident and less successful at figuring him out. I don't even know what he's suffering from anymore. And in what way his illness might be concealing an act and project that so elude him that they make his life a living hell.”
