The Man Who Never Stopped Sleeping

by Aharon Appelfeld

  “Do you read what he writes?”

  “His writing now is beyond me. I understand the words and the sentences, but the contexts are not comprehensible to me. I’m afraid that publishers will return his manuscript again. I don’t understand why he’s been torturing himself all these years. There’s some hidden reason for his torments. What it is, I don’t know.”

  “Where’s our Miro?” I asked.

  “Of course you remember that time when we questioned whether dogs also have souls. Father wouldn’t take a position, but you and I believed—actually, we were certain—that dogs, especially our Miro, have souls. I had plenty of proof. I don’t remember them all now, but I do remember when you were six and they took out your tonsils. You were in bed sick in the hospital, and all that time, Miro lay mourning in his corner, not eating and not drinking. It wasn’t until you came home that Miro got up, came over to you, and ate from your hand. Do you remember?”

  “Certainly I remember.”

  “Only a creature with a soul can sense something that is at a distance and understand it.”

  “I’m reading the Bible and am becoming attached to the words,” I told her.

  “Are you religious?” She was alarmed.

  “Don’t worry. My faith is like yours and like Father’s.”

  “I’m glad,” she said, her eyes brightening. “But don’t torment yourself like Father. For Father, writing is a totally ascetic experience. He doesn’t move from his desk. He’s always tense, as though planning some miraculous escape. I hope you won’t take his path.”

  “I’m recovering from my fractures. The recuperation is slow and long. But in the meantime, I’m getting to know my body and my soul, if I may say so. By the way, do we have Siddhartha at home?”

  “A wonderful book. I’ll send it to you. But where? I don’t have your address.”

  “It’s very simple, Kibbutz Misgav Yitzhak, Palestine. That’s my home now. Any mail you send will get to me, but I need Siddhartha like I need air to breathe.”

  “I’ll send it right away,” she said and disappeared.

  43

  In about two months, on February sixteenth, I would turn eighteen. My years seemed long to me. Life before the war, in the ghetto, in the hiding place, wandering after the war, in Naples, sailing to Palestine, at Atlit, at work on the terrace and the orchards, at the advanced training—eighteen years couldn’t hold it all. Benno had a similar feeling. With him, the world was divided differently: the years when he played his music, practicing day and night and performing, and the years that followed, which stretched ahead like a yellow wasteland.

  I had read the Hebrew Bible that the hospital rabbi gave me when I was still in pain and half asleep. His untidy appearance and the way he muttered as he handed the book to me clouded my spirit. It appeared to be the way one gave this type of book to a dying man, so that he would say his confessions before he died.

  At the convalescent home, I read the Bible with my own eyes, and I was glad that I understood most of the words. The Binding of Isaac: the story was dreadful but was told with restraint, in a few words, perhaps so that we could hear the silence between them. I felt a closeness to those measured sentences, and it didn’t seem to be a story with a moral, because what was the moral? Rather, it was intended to seep into one’s cells, and there it would wait patiently until it was deciphered.

  Mother didn’t like to interpret stories. She would read softly and say, “Now let’s put down the book and close our eyes.” Father liked to read whole chapters of his books to Mother. Mother had various expressions of attention: bending her head or lowering it entirely or cradling it in her hand.

  —

  I found myself back at home almost every night. Father received a letter from a well-known publishing house, saying they were willing to publish his books. Mother’s face brightened. Her hair regained its blackness She spoke in her happy voice. Father sat in his study, his face expressionless. Mother stood alongside him, reading the letter over and over, but the good news didn’t make an impression on Father. Sadness spread across his face and covered it.

  “Dear, it’s wonderful news, believe me!” Mother implored as she knelt down beside him. Father turned to her but didn’t utter a word. With great sadness, Mother burst into tears. Father emerged from his silence.

  “I hope you’re right,” he said. “But why not allow me to keep a pinch of doubt for myself. Disappointment has always been my lot. It’s hard for me to believe that the world has changed.”

  —

  Robert came to visit me and brought a bundle of oranges. Misgav Yitzhak had been mobilized for the harvest. The fragrance of the oranges reminded me of the smell of our pantry at home, where apples and pears lay in big wicker baskets, and there were always a few oranges in a net bag for an emergency, if one of us got sick.

  Robert also brought some sketches. I saw right away that they were better than the earlier ones. This time I was careful and didn’t say they were excellent. Although the outlines remained unfinished, patches of light had been added around each of them, brightening the entire drawing.

  Unlike most of our friends, Robert hadn’t changed. The work and the training hadn’t altered him. His body was well formed, but not exaggeratedly so. There was a balance between his inner self and his outward appearance. Now his inner self would be expressed through fine lines and tints, and I was pleased for him.

  Robert asked me what I wanted to do. The question embarrassed me, and I was about to tell him, I don’t know, but instead I said something that I hadn’t even yet said to myself.

  “I want to be an author.”

  “When did that wish take shape?” he asked cautiously.

  “Apparently, it was inside me.”

  “I hope you’ll succeed.”

  “All his life, my father wanted to be an author,” I said, and immediately realized that I wasn’t allowed to reveal my father’s pain.

  “And what happened?”

  “He didn’t manage to fulfill his destiny in writing,” I said, but then quickly added, “His talent was actually expressed in speech.”

  “What language do you want to write in?” Robert’s question pained me without meaning to.

  “In Hebrew, I assume. I feel that this language, whose outer shell is all that I’m touching now, will bind me to what I brought with me.”

  “They say that you can express yourself well only in your mother tongue.”

  “For years, I haven’t been connected to my mother tongue. Now I expect that the Hebrew letters will link me to what’s hidden inside me.”

  “When did this become clear to you?”

  “Just recently.”

  Robert parted from me as though retreating, and I didn’t ask him to stay as I used to. I was ashamed of what had occurred to me about my father, and of the way I had given voice to it. I remembered that Mother used to say that the right things arrive unnoticed, when we don’t expect them. That idea amazed me, but I hadn’t understood it till now.

  How could I be an author, when it was hard for me even to read a daily paper, not to mention the Bible, the Mishnah, and the many other books I had to read?

  Benno came to visit me that evening.

  “If you see Robert,” I said, “tell him to forgive me. Everything I said was totally stupid.”

  —

  Winter came. The rain didn’t stop, and it evoked images of the forests where I had been. I would have liked to spend more time looking at them, but the nurses and the volunteer women didn’t leave me alone with their questions.

  I stopped asking the doctor at the convalescent home about my medical condition. When I asked him once, he gave me a look so full of pity that it shocked me. I was waiting for Dr. Winter to visit. He had operated on me, and he would rescue me from my pain.

  I would spend half of each day in bed. Lying there nourished my imagination. The days carried me along. Sometimes I was rushing on a train, and sometimes in a military truck. One night
I dreamed I was sailing with Mother on a raft that carried logs.

  “Where are we sailing?” I asked Mother.

  “Home, my dear,” she answered with a bright smile.

  “And where will we stop?”

  “That depends on the pilot of the raft. He knows the currents of the river and where to stop. He’ll stop at one of the nearby docks, and we’ll get off.” Her voice was quiet and full of comforting patience, as when we went on trips to the mountains together with Father.

  I tried to control my excitement. “Are we far from home?”

  “In my estimation, we’re very close. I hope the currents will allow us to stop at the next dock. I’m not worried.”

  But I was afraid. The pilot’s oars seemed weak and about to break. The water surged and licked at the beams of the raft.

  “Mother, is everything all right?”

  “One hundred percent.” This time she spoke colloquially. “What are you worried about?”

  “The currents.”

  “No need to worry, my dear. We’ve been through worse. These currents are child’s play in comparison. I’m sure we’ll reach home at the end of the journey,” she said, and hugged me.

  “And where’s Father?” I belatedly noticed his absence.

  “He’s waiting for us at home, my dear.” But that reply, which was meant to calm me, actually increased my dread.

  “He never left us alone before,” I said.

  “This time he allowed himself,” said Mother, laughing in an unfamiliar way.

  These frenzied dream journeys, during which I was tossed about, showed me clearly that many obstacles still stood in my path before I could reach my home. But what could be done? My lower body, in which I tried to inspire movement, refused to move, and I was stuck in place.

  —

  A new patient arrived, a boy my age whose right arm had been amputated. He raised a commotion right away. He had arrived from Hungary a few months earlier, was conscripted into the Palmach, and like me was wounded in his first battle. He blamed the army for sending him to the front without training. He was speaking volubly in Hungarian and spreading fear.

  The day after his arrival, two sturdy men came and spoke with him in Hungarian. The boy was demanding to be sent back to Hungary. This isn’t a country of decent people, he said. The Hungarians are better.

  The two men spoke to him earnestly, but he was boiling with rage, listing one after another all the injustices that had been done to him from the time he boarded the ship until he was sent to the front.

  “Now I’m stuck without an arm,” he said. “What can I do in life without an arm? Who’ll hire me? Let me get out of here. This isn’t a convalescent home, it’s a prison.”

  “It’s raining. Where will you go in the rain?” one of the men said, pointing at the window.

  “The rain won’t hurt me.” The boy spoke stubbornly.

  “You’ll catch cold.”

  “You don’t die from a cold.”

  In the end the boy stood up and headed toward the exit. The two men didn’t stop him. They followed him without touching him. Then he started to run. They ran after him until all three of them disappeared in the fog.

  —

  That night I read the end of the story of the Binding of Isaac again. I was amazed by the objectivity with which that dreadful trial ends. But, on the other hand, where was the morality of obedience to an inhuman command? What could Abraham say to himself? I’ve succeeded. I’ve obeyed the command of God. I stifled the compassion within me. I have served as an example to future generations. What could he say to his son? Thank you for standing with me. You did so with great daring. Your courage is greater than mine. The episode was a dark tangle that led to another tangle, so it was better for Abraham just to go to Beersheba with the donkeys and not say anything. Any talk about a test like that would be stupid. Abraham obeyed the command and did what he did. There was no doubt that he would be tormented by it all his life. And so the story falls silent there.

  44

  The fellow with the amputated arm didn’t come back.

  For several days I sat and copied from the Bible. Once, I heard Mother say that beginning artists copy the paintings of famous artists to learn from them. Father didn’t agree with that method. He claimed that imitation brought no benefit.

  I copied slowly and tried to form each letter clearly and separately. I felt the strength inherent in the Hebrew words and was glad to have close contact with them. Every day I copied out two or three passages.

  Benno saw my copies and was astounded by the precision. He asked what it meant. I didn’t know how to put what I was thinking into words. Finally, I said, “Hebrew letters have an ancient beauty that moves me.”

  Benno told me that a member of Misgav Yitzhak had lent him a violin, and he had played it for two hours.

  “How’s your playing?” I asked cautiously.

  “Far from what you could call playing. My fingers won’t do what they’re supposed to. They forgot they were once agile.”

  “Can’t you wake them up?”

  “I tried, and I’ll try again.”

  I wanted to tell Benno that my daily copying brought me close not only to the shape of the letters but also to the rhythm of the sentences.

  “Are you training yourself to be an author?”

  “Maybe. To tell the truth, I don’t know what I’m headed for.”

  I had already told Benno that my father wrote for many years without success. Now I added, “He didn’t manage to publish even a single book. But it turns out that the war didn’t weaken him. Prisoners who were with him in the camp told me that even under the darkest conditions, he continued to write complete sentences on slips of cardboard.”

  The moment those words left my mouth, the narrow cupboard in Father’s study, where his manuscripts were kept, appeared before my eyes. Mother saved every sheet of his writing, and after every rejection, she used to say, “I’m waiting for a wise publisher, who will reveal to the world the beauty hidden in Father’s writings.”

  “Did you read what he wrote?” Benno asked cautiously.

  “Not even a single line. Mother used to say, It’s not for someone your age. One day you’ll sit and read it. Everything is arranged in this cupboard. If Father doesn’t succeed in publishing the books, you’ll do it. I’m sure you’ll do it.”

  “Did your mother want you to follow in your father’s footsteps?”

  “I’m not sure. Father was very tormented by his writing. His torments brought him neither recognition nor joy.”

  “I have no idea how to write,” said Benno with a bashful smile. “Violinists are awkward speakers.”

  —

  That night I dreamed that the Hebrew letters were racing around on a blank sheet of paper. I tried to arrange them into sentences, but they slipped away from me. At first that amused me. Finally, I spoke to my fingers.

  “Fingers, fingers, you have to practice,” I said. “Without practice, there are no sentences.” At that moment, I saw Benno and his embarrassment, and I woke up soaked in sweat.

  45

  Patients came and went, but I remained in my room. Friends who came to visit me brought me the bits of my possessions that I had left in the training program. Memories of the days I had spent at Misgav Yitzhak secretly stirred within me. In my sleep I continued to fill the pit on the terrace with loose earth and to plant Santa Rosa plum seedlings.

  One day, Edward came to visit and told me he planned to leave Misgav Yitzhak and settle in Tel Aviv.

  “Why?” I carelessly asked.

  He hesitated for a moment and said, “Because I want to feel closer to my parents. In Tel Aviv the houses resemble the ones in the city of my birth.” He added bashfully, “My friends aren’t encouraging me.”

  “What do they say?”

  “They say that it’s good to stay together.”

  “And what have you decided?” I was drawn to his voice.

  “I’m leaving t
omorrow, and I came to say goodbye to you.”

  I held my breath. Edward was one of those people you like being with from the moment you meet them. His goodness of heart was visible on his face. He always volunteered to take the middle watch, the hardest one, but because of his naïveté, he didn’t gain the friendships he deserved. The wise and the clever ones outshined him.

  Edward’s right hand was wrapped in a brown bandage. The bandage called attention to the place where two of his fingers had been shorn off. His handsomeness hadn’t been damaged, but his face had become downcast, which made his wrinkled forehead more prominent. It was clear to me that leaving the kibbutz was full of risks, but who was I to advise him to stay? I turned my thoughts elsewhere.

  “In what city were you born?” I asked.

  “In Cracow,” he said, and his face shone. After a short pause, he added, “Some streets in Tel Aviv remind me of it.”

  What will you do in Tel Aviv? I wanted to ask him. Who will give you a place to live and feed you?

  Edward apparently read my mind.

  “Someone certainly needs a worker in a bakery,” he said, “or in a shoe-repair shop, or cleaning the stairs of their building. I’m not choosy. Whatever I’m offered, I’ll take.”

  I showed him some pages that I’d copied from the book of Genesis.

  “What’s that?” he wondered.

  “I’m copying from the Bible.”

  “Interesting,” he said, still looking surprised. I expected him to ask why I was doing it, but I forgot that it wasn’t Edward’s way to raise questions.

  “The letters are pretty,” he said. “You’ll surely hang the pages on the wall.”

  “Why?” I asked in turn.

  “It will decorate the room,” he said. The wonder didn’t leave his face.

  “I copy slowly,” I said.

  “I was never any good at penmanship,” Edward said. “I thought that in Hebrew my writing would be nicer. I was wrong: the Hebrew letters were misshapen, too. Now I’ll have to teach my left hand to write. I’m leaving soon. I’ll come back to visit you. Meanwhile, be strong and brave, the way Ephraim taught us.”