Best European Fiction 2010

by Aleksandar Hemon

  Father emerges from the cloud of geese; he closes the gate uncertainly. “It would have been so easy to avoid this place,” Marta thinks. “In fact, I’m not sure I had any real reason to stop here.” Father climbs into the back seat and finds it necessary to explain: “Wasn’t home.” “It would have been so easy to avoid this place,” Marta says once the bluish road is flashing past underneath them again. Father doesn’t say anything.

  Marta isn’t quite sure how they left Francisks. It’s something like an avalanche—time accelerates like a massive stone rolling down a cliff, and suddenly you realize you’re alone again. Everything that matters slips right through your hands. Marta remembers that Francisks hugged her; she sees his eyes up very close to her. She’s already gotten used to his black hair. “You’re smiling,” Francisks says. “Are you going to go cry your eyes out once you’re alone?” “Yes,” Marta replies. Francisks nods with satisfaction. “Don’t,” he says. “I’m not dead yet.”

  When they reach the seafront forests, Father coughs. “I want to have a smoke.” Marta stops the car, gets out, waits until he pulls himself out of his trench like a fragile, lopsided whale and lights up; then she confiscates a cigarette and his lighter. “Me too,” she says. “Are you sure you should?” Father asks. “You already quit once.”

  Marta walks into the woods and sees the daylight melting at the far end of a long path. This view is perfect. Father shouldn’t worry. Nothing else is necessary. If at one point it had seemed to Marta that she was always bound to feel two ways about her life, never quite knowing what it all meant, she now realizes that whatever it is she’s approaching has no meaning at all. Yes, it’s quite meaningless. Which could be good or bad, depending.

  TRANSLATED FROM LATVIAN BY LAURIS VANAGS

  [LIECHTENSTEIN]

  MATHIAS OSPELT

  Deep In the Snow

  “Is it still far?” Günther asked his friend, Wachter. Since he didn’t receive a response in what he considered ample time for such a response to be given, he yelled again to his companion, who was stamping in the snow in front of him under the still-dark blue of the icy night. Wachter mumbled something through his over-the-mouth scarf, which most probably meant “no.” Then again, perhaps the most likely interpretation would have been: “How should I know!”

  Wachter didn’t know anything at all. Nevertheless, he always came up with all the best ideas. An example: while he was busy insisting that the masked ball was supposed to be held up in Triesenberg, the others were positive that the Shrove Tuesday festivities were actually taking place in the Lowlands. Somehow or other, though—as usual—he’d got them all convinced, but when they finally arrived at the supposed venue after hitchhiking all the way there, after one of them read the piece of A4 paper stuck to the front door of the bar, which said that the place was “closed due to being closed,” Wachter just shrugged and told them that he couldn’t possibly have foreseen that. It’s not like they put that sort of thing in the news. And with this pronouncement, he absolved himself from all reprimands that might have followed. “What—you think I know everything?” he asked them. That was Wachter’s style.

  And yet, he was always ready to make suggestions. If the others came up with seven good ideas for having fun on a given weekend, Wachter would, like clockwork, immediately offer an eighth: “I’ve heard…” he would tell them. Or, “They say that…” Or, “In such-and-such town, it seems they’ve got…” And most of the time, he got his way: without further adieu, the entire evening, their entire valuable Saturday night, was risked on Wachter’s plan.

  This particular evening, Wachter and Günther had set off by themselves. They were heading for Ruggell. Deep into the Lowlands. At the northern end of the country. A new bar had opened in the “Ochsen,” Wachter announced. Topless. Practically bottomless too. Günther was easily convinced. The prospect of a topless-and-almostbottomless bar made him forget all his anxieties regarding Wachter’s brilliant ideas. Thus, the twosome began their bus journey from the Oberland to Ruggell with the highest expectations and enthusiasm. They paused in Schaan, one of the stopovers on the route, and drank a couple of beers; when they eventually arrived in Ruggell, however, the bartender had just locked the door. Eleven P.M. Closing time. That was it. Out! And, anyway: nobody in there was naked. Thus, they had to drag themselves to Nendeln. But weren’t they a bit too young for that sort of thing? Günther and Wachter laughed.

  Nendeln. How could the not-yet-eighteen-year-old twosome get to Nendeln from Ruggell, on a wintery Saturday night, after eleven P.M.? The typical route could well have been a simple walk along the highway, or else a little hitchhiking to cover the same distance. If they managed to get to Bendern, the worst part of the trip would be behind them—you could always find a way to reach Nendeln from Bendern. Wachter had a better idea, of course. His motto was: there has to be a shortcut. He wasn’t at all happy with the idea that, first of all, you had to take a long, roundabout route that involved covering a certain distance, making what amounted to a ninety-degree turn along with the highway, and then covering more or less the same distance again. There had to be a shortcut. A straight line is the shortest distance between two points. He had learned that at vocational school. That there happened to be a mountain range called Eschnerberg between the two points in question on this particular night carried no significance whatsoever, according to the geometry classes he’d taken.

  “We walk through the fields and then take the best first street, which goes to Gamprin, and from there we go through the wood to Eschen and abracadabra, we’re in Nendeln.” “Abracadabra.” It sounded good. Wachter liked talking like that—it helped him get his way. Yes: “Abracadabra” and they would be in Nendeln. They would be surrounded by women, and get to see all their “abras” and “cadabras” up close. And so, they set out. They left the main street, climbed over the fences, arrived at some snow-covered fields, and walked across. New snow started falling. They walked. It snowed harder. They walked. And walked. As it snowed. And snowed. And they walked. And walked.

  They had been en route for two hours now. Günther was sure of this, since he’d checked his watch at the time of departure. He’d been curious how long their march would take. He wanted to be able to give a precise account of the adventure to their friends later on. But the longer they walked, the less impressive the story became.

  “Shouldn’t we have arrived in Gamprin a while ago now?” shouted Günther. Wachter acted as though he hadn’t heard him. As if the question didn’t concern him. As if he, Wachter, was stamping through the snow only because of Günther. As if it weren’t entirely his doing that they were out there in the cold; as if he, Wachter, would—if it had been up to him—be happily at home watching TV. Thus, they stamped farther through the snow, ever-deeper, and straight into the ever-rising wind. It got more and more difficult, and they began to feel acutely uncomfortable. The booze they’d been drinking all evening had left their systems ages ago. Every difficult footstep made it clearer that they were not, in fact, enjoying themselves. Besides, all the bars would already have closed by the time they eventually arrived in Nendeln. All of Günther’s desires had long since abated. He just wanted to go home. To be in bed. Sleeping.

  “Hey! Wachter!” Günther shouted. “Let’s go back. We can’t keep going like this!” Yet neither changed course. The night had been inhospitable enough, but the raging snowstorm had made the situation impossible. Günther couldn’t see a thing—looking into the evening around him was like staring into a television tuned to a dead channel. There was nothing: no road, no light, no house. The snowflakes were like little fireworks—they glowed and popped in his eyes. He kept himself from feeling entirely blind by stubbornly focusing on the footprints of Wachter, who was getting further ahead of him. He had to move faster. The footprints were filling up almost as soon as they were made, now. Günther was trying hard not to lose contact.

  Then, suddenly, the wind and the snow stopped. Günther, who’d been fighting his way th
rough the night almost horizontal to the ground, stood upright again. His legs shook as he tried to get his bearings. Through a fissured hole in the clouds he saw the starry night sky and recognized what his father had once told him was the Kreuzberge mountain range. But now it was in entirely the wrong direction. It should be in the northwest. In Switzerland. But they were heading southeast.

  “Wachter! Look over here!” Wachter was no where to be seen, though. The hole in the clouds had already closed, the wind started up again, and the snow picked up where it had left off. Günther had lost his guide. “Shit!” he yelled. And: “Hey! Wachter! Where are you?” His friend remained mute and out of sight. Günther wanted to cry. But what if Wachter appeared just then and caught him losing his nerve?

  He fought through the snow for five hours, barely making any progress. With every other footstep he sank deeper into the snow, and it soon reached up to his knees. He sweated. He was wet all over. He was scared. It was the end. But no giving up, he said to himself. He forced himself on. And, in the meantime, he called up to all the saints he could remember from school. He begged them for help. No more, he promised, would he sleep through Sunday Mass, luxuriating in his bed, fantasizing about naked women and all their “abras” and “cadabras.” No more beer. No more cursing. No more stealing mopeds. He was going to lead a holy life. But none of this helped. Exhaustion and weakness covered him like a lead-lined cloak. His last conscious thought was, “Have I prayed to St. Martin?” Then he lay down on his side and fell asleep.

  As Günther woke up at noon, he was lying curled up under the porch of a barn in Gampriner Feld. He felt frozen but capable of moving. He was very thirsty, but beyond this seemed to be more or less healthy. No sign of Wachter. Günther got up, looked around, and walked to the nearby bus stop, swaying. He took the next bus home.

  When he met up with Wachter days later, all he asked was where the hell he had been. He had really missed out on something. Nendeln was brilliant.

  TRANSLATED FROM GERMAN BY SEVINC TURKKAN

  [LITHUANIA]

  GIEDRA RADVILAVIIT

  The Allure of the Text

  I have several criteria for determining the quality of any effective text. First, after the text has been read, the narrative must force its way back into memory involuntarily, and not necessarily because of its plot or its characters—perhaps only thanks to its details, similes, metaphors, or other unexpected aspects: “Her farm had been destroyed by a bomb during the war, and all her relatives had perished in the fire. Because of that, she temporarily lost her mind. A doctor had told her to walk against the wind, against a moderately cool wind, and that helped her” (Emil Tode). Secondly, the text cannot be far removed from experience. It should make it seem as though I’ve lived through its contents; that I’ve been in its landscape; that I’ve quaffed the mead or ale in question; that I’ve spoken the very same words: “Once, I recall, you asked me: ‘Do you know what’s there, there where Polocko Street ends?’ I cringed, even shivered a little, but you gazed stubbornly into my eyes: ‘Tell me, what’s there?’ And I answered, ‘A forest, of course. A forest, what else? And…’ No, you shook your head vigorously—it’s that head-shaking of yours I almost miss the most. ‘There’s only fog and sky there, understand?’” (Jurgis Kuninas). Thirdly, while reading the text, I must forget everything around me—sometimes just for a moment or two, but at other times, this state should last longer: “A tiny moth blew in from somewhere and fluttered about like a scrap of paper. The moth ended up on her breast and stayed there before flying off again. Once the moth had flown off, she looked the slightest bit older.” (Haruki Murakami). Fourth, when the narrative touches on things that are well-known, or perhaps even banal, it must reveal something new about them: “At that time it first occurred to me that there was nothing one could say about a woman; I noticed how they left her out whenever they talked about her, how they named and described the others, the surroundings, the localities, the objects, up to a certain point where all that ceased, gently and as it were cautiously creased with the casual, never retraced contour that enclosed them.” (Rainer Maria Rilke). Fifth, whenever I want to formulate something completely, in its totality, I panic. All the assertions I’ve voiced become arguable and ephemeral. The ultimate truth becomes a mystery that I can’t reveal without obvious hesitation. Not long ago, I watched a film that at first tells and later shows us how people in the countries of the ancient Far East, after hearing a thing that upset them, would go into the woods, find a tree with a hollow, go right up to it—lips almost touching the bark—and, having spoken their secret into that dark hollow, would then seal it up with earth, dried grass, or moss gathered from nearby. In the film, a man narrates the story of his love for a woman—he loves her so much that he can’t make love to her. Her silhouette is almost like a rosebud, and the zip of her silk dress, stretching from the small of her back to the nape of her neck, keeps her from releasing her blossom.

  I didn’t start thinking about what makes an effective text just off the top of my head. I don’t do anything without a reason. I had come to a small Lithuanian town to take part in a forum on contemporary literature. I had been forewarned that, before the readings that would be held in the evening, I would be expected to say a few words to some television journalists who hadn’t arrived yet. The forum was called: “Nordic Summer. The Allure of the Text.” In addition to writers from Lithuania, authors from neighboring Baltic and Nordic countries were taking part as well. At the previous year’s forum, a terrible cross-draft had risen in the old manor house during the readings. Framed photographs fell off the walls and sand plugged up one musician’s saxophone. A particularly strong gust of wind tore a sheaf of papers from the hands of an Icelandic writer and hurled them straight into the fireplace. The writer wasn’t upset, however, because in his country fire is seen as a miracle. He said it’s so cold in Iceland that only one species of insect is capable of surviving there—Phthirius pubis (the crab louse). There were two hours to go before the readings were supposed to begin, so I decided to use the time to track down a distant relative of mine in the town. I only knew her address, and a few details of how we were related—our places on the family tree: she was my grandfather’s brother’s granddaughter. Grandfather’s brother had had two daughters, but one had died in her teens. Šermukšnių Street wasn’t far away; it was just past the old and somewhat shabby manor-house park.

  The two brothers had been fighting almost until they died. After the war, my grandfather was sentenced to five years in prison. He had been working at a flour mill where he’d ostensibly (or actually) stolen some flour. He stole the flour for his family, skimming a few hundred grams from each sack. Several decades later, I was born into our family, whose offspring all seemed to have been made from this same flour: in the hospital, when I was brought over to be breastfed for the first time, my mother said there was still flour in the creases of my face. Grandfather would always swear to God that he was innocent and that he should never have had to serve time in prison. But his brother, when drunk, would tell him he had been a gang-leader, a crook, and a cheat from an early age. He used to reminisce about their brawls. My grandfather, who was five years older, would throw his brother to the dirt floor, pinning him down by his wrists crucifixion-style, leaning over his face, swearing at him and threatening to drool all over him. He used to harness toads to little carriages made from spools. And he would press his brother’s face into a bowl of flour to make death masks. After the war, he sprinkled two packages of saccharine into the village well. He would leap onto the table when it was set with a good holiday tablecloth. He also kept a gun around his entire life—sometimes legally, other times not. “You stole flour for Elena and your children so that you could live better,” his brother would say, caught up in his moment of audacity, and then, almost immediately, to soften his accusation, or perhaps simply because he was worried he’d get a punch in the nose, he would burst into song: “Step on a stone, mount your steed…” Grandfather was sh
ipped off to serve his sentence in Zagorsk, past Moscow. While he was being transported there, while his group was changing trains, another inmate sidled up to him from behind and suggested they have sex: “It’ll be good for you and good for me.” I don’t know what my grandfather told the man, but that was the last time anyone made that suggestion to him for the next three years of his incarceration (thanks to an amnesty, he wasn’t required to serve his full five years)—and he’d been put away with criminals who, at breakfast, would unbutton their pants under the table and display their genitals to all the new inmates. To this day, I don’t understand how my grandmother managed to visit him there in those Russian forests. She told me many times how she got lost in the marbled Moscow subway, carrying a cardboard suitcase packed with smoked bacon fat. “That was when your grandmother lost her mind…but she started walking against the wind, into a cool refreshing wind, and this helped her.” I can’t imagine her in a Russian blizzard, the same way I can’t imagine myself at the Frankfurt Book Fair, for instance. My mother would send photographs of herself to Grandfather while he was in the prison camp—until she received her first reply, also with photo. It wasn’t from Grandfather but from an inmate to whom he had shown the photographs. The man in the mustache wrote: “Even though you are far away, I am always with you in spirit.” When my grandfather returned, he told us how he’d had to live in that place—not only with that man, but also with the two murders the man had committed. Grandfather also enjoyed retelling the scene of his homecoming, in later years. He entered the house unexpectedly, causing Grandmother to drop the skillet she was holding, along with its freshly poured potato pancakes. My grandfather’s brother never sent a care package to his sibling while he was in the camp. But they made their peace before dying.