The Sacred Book of the Werewolf

by Victor Pelevin

  ‘No, why? Just leave it out. Remember who’s the super-werewolf around here. And never put your foot in it again. So there’s no confusion in anybody’s mind . . . Get it?’

  ‘I could take issue with you,’ I said, ‘over whose minds are filled with confusion. First of all -’

  ‘We’re not going to argue about it,’ Mikhalich interrupted again. ‘As Nagual Rinpoche says, if you meet the Buddha, don’t kill him, but don’t let him take you for a ride.’

  ‘Okay then, if we’re not going to argue, we’re not. Is that all?’

  ‘No, there’s one more question. A personal one.’

  ‘What is it?’

  ‘Marry me.’

  That was unexpected. I realized he wasn’t joking and looked him over carefully.

  The man sitting in front of me was in his fifties, still in robust health, braced for his final headlong rush at life, but he still had-n’t understood (fortunately for him) just how that rush ended. I’d seen off plenty like him. They always see me as their last chance. Grown men, and they don’t understand that they themselves are their last chance. But then, they aren’t even aware what kind of chance it is. Sasha had understood something at least. But this one . . . Hardly.

  Mikhalich was looking at me with insane hope in his eyes. I knew that look too. What a long time I have spent in this world, I thought sadly.

  ‘It would be like living on your own island,’ Mikhalich said in a husky voice. ‘Or you could really live on your own island if you like. Your very own coconut Bounty bar. I’ll do everything for you.’

  ‘And what’s this island called?’ I asked.

  ‘How do you mean?’

  ‘An island has to have a name. Ultima Thule, for instance. Or Atlantis.’

  ‘We can call it whatever you like,’ he said with a grin. ‘Is that really a problem?’

  It was time to wind up the conversation.

  ‘Okay, Mikhalich,’ I said. ‘This is a serious decision. I’ll think about it, okay? For a week or so.’

  ‘Do that,’ he said. ‘Only bear this in mind. In the first place, now I’m the big shot in the apparat when it comes to oil. That’s a fact. It’s my stopcock all those oligarchs suck their oil out of. And they’d suck the other thing too, if I so much as frowned. And in the second place, just remember this. You like wolves, don’t you? I know about that. I’m a wolf, a real wolf. But the comrade colonel general . . . Of course, he holds a superior post, with immense responsibility. The whole department idolizes him. But just between you and me, my thing is twice as big.’

  ‘Please don’t go into detail.’

  ‘Okay then, no detail. But you think about it anyway - maybe it’s better with a decent detail after all? You know all about the comrade colonel general anyway . . .’

  ‘I do,’ I said.

  ‘And bear in mind that he’s vowed never to turn back into a man as long as the country has any external or internal enemies. Like comrade Sharikov did before . . . The whole department was in tears. But to be honest, I don’t think the enemies have anything to do with it. He just gets bored now being a man.’

  ‘I understand, Mikhalich. I understand everything.’

  ‘I know.’ He said. ‘You’re a clever one.’

  ‘All right. You go now. I want to be alone for a while.’

  ‘Why don’t you teach me that thing,’ he said wistfully, ‘you know, the tailechery . . .’

  ‘He told you about that as well?’

  ‘Nah, he didn’t tell me anything. We’ve got no time to waste on you now. We’re up to our eyes in work, you ought to understand that.’

  ‘And what sort of work is it?’

  ‘The country needs purging. Until we catch all the offshore fat cats, there’s no time for yapping.’

  ‘How are you going to catch them, if they’re offshore?’

  ‘Nagual Rinpoche has a nose for them. He can smell them through the wall. And he really didn’t tell me anything about the tails. I heard it on the instrument. You were arguing about them, about ... e-egh ... the best way to twist them together.’

  ‘You heard it on the instrument, I see. Okay, go now, you shameless wolf.’

  ‘I’ll be waiting for your call. You be sure to keep in touch with us. Don’t forget what country you live in.’

  ‘As if I could.’

  ‘All right then. Call me.’

  He got up and walked towards the forest.

  ‘Listen, Mikhalich,’ I called to him when he was already a few metres away.

  ‘Eh?’ he asked, looking back.

  ‘Don’t wear that T-shirt. Andy Warhol died in nineteen eighty-seven. It makes it too obvious that you’re getting on a bit.’

  ‘I heard you have a few problems in that area yourself,’ he said imperturbably. ‘Only I still like you anyway. What difference does it make to me how old you are? Not going to shag your passport, am I? Especially since it’s a fake.’

  I smiled. I had to admit that he did have charm - a werewolf is a werewolf.

  ‘Right Mikhalich, not the passport. You’ll be shagging dead Andy Warhol.’

  He laughed.

  ‘Personally speaking, I’ve got nothing against it,’ I went on. ‘But it dismays me to think that you’re looking for him in me. Even though I like you so much as a human being.’

  I had hit him with the most terrible insult possible in our circles, but he simply roared with laughter. The dumb stud was probably totally impervious.

  ‘So don’t wear that T-shirt, Mikhalich, really. It positions you as a gay necrophile.’

  ‘Can you say that in Russian?’

  ‘Sure. A stiff-shagging faggot.’

  He chuckled, stuck his tongue out, waved the end about suggestively in the air and repeated:

  ‘Call, I’ll be waiting. Maybe we’ll get the entire department to think up an answer for you.’

  Then he swung round and set off towards the forest. I watched the black square of his back until it dissolved into the greenery. Malevich sold here . . . But then, who needed these allusions any more.

  I only have a very little left to say. I have lived in this country for a long time and I understand the significance of accidental meetings like this, of conversations ending with advice to keep in touch with the security services. I spent a few days sorting out my old manuscripts and burning them. In fact, the only sorting I did was to run my eye diagonally over the pages covered with writing before I threw them into the flames. I had accumulated an especially large number of poems:

  She’s not a wingless fly on someone’s Thule,

  He’s not a one who fears the night around.

  The two night prowlers are the fox A Hu-Li

  And her dark friend, the sudden Pizdets hound.

  It saddened me most of all to burn the poems: I never had a chance to read them to anyone. But what can I do - my dark friend is too busy. I have only one task left to carry out now, and that is already close to completion (which is why my narrative is shifting from the past tense into the present). It is the task of which the Yellow Master spoke to me twelve centuries ago. I must reveal to all foxes how they can attain freedom. In effect, I have almost done this already - it only remains to draw together everything that has been said into clear, precise instructions.

  I have already said that foxes use their tails to implant the illusion of this world in their own minds. This is expressed symbolically by the sign of the uroborus, round which my mind has been circling for so many centuries, sensing the great mystery that is concealed within it. A snake biting its own tail . . .

  The inviolable link between the tail and the mind - that is the foundation on which the world as we know it stands. There is nothing that can intervene in this circle of cause and effect and disrupt it. Except for one thing. Love.

  We werefoxes are significantly superior to people in all respects. But like them, we almost never know true love. And therefore the secret path leading out of this world is hidden from us. But it is so
simple that it is hard to believe: the circuit of self-hypnosis can be broken by a single movement of the mind.

  I shall now transmit this unsurpassed teaching in the hope that it may serve as the cause of the liberation of all those who possess a heart and a tail. This technique, lost since time immemorial, has been discovered anew by me, the fox A Hu-Li, for the good of all beings, under the circumstances described in this book. Here is a full and complete exposition of the secret method of ancient foxes known as ‘tail of the void’.

  1. First the werefox must comprehend what love is. The world that we create by inertia day after day is full of evil. But we cannot break out of the vicious circle because we do not know how to create anything else. The nature of love is entirely different, and that is precisely why there is so little of it in our lives. Or rather, our lives are like that because there is so little love in them. And in most cases what people take for love is physical attraction and parental instinct, multiplied by social conceit. Werefox, do not become like a tailless monkey. Remember who you are!

  2. When a werefox comprehends what love is, she can leave this dimension behind. But first she must settle all remaining accounts: thank those who have helped her on the way and help those who need help. Then the werefox must fast for ten days, pondering on the inscrutable mystery of the world and its infinite beauty. In addition, the werefox must recall her evil deeds and repent of them. She must remember at least the ten darkest deeds she has committed and repent of each of them. While the werefox does this, genuine tears must well up in her eyes at least three times. This is not a matter of banal sentimentality - crying purges the psychic channels that will be brought into play at the third stage.

  3. When the preliminary practice has been completed, the werefox must wait for the day after the full moon. On that day she must rise early in the morning, perform ablutions and withdraw to a remote spot out of sight of all people. There, having freed her tail, the werefox must sit in the lotus position. If the werefox cannot sit in the lotus position, it does not matter - she can sit on a chair or a tree stump. The important thing is that the back must be straight and erect and the tail must be relaxed and free of restraint. Then the werefox must breathe in and out several times, engender in her heart love of the greatest possible power and, shouting out her own name in a loud voice, direct the love as deeply as possible into her own tail.

  Any werefox will immediately understand what is meant by the words ‘direct the love into her own tail’. But this is such a bizarre and inconceivable thing to do, such a gross violation of all the conventions, that I might be regarded as insane. Nonetheless, this is exactly the way things are - this way lies the secret road to freedom. The result will be similar to what happens when an air bubble gets into a blood vessel leading to the heart. It will be enough to stall the engine of the self-reproducing nightmare in which we have been wandering since the beginning of time.

  If the love engendered was genuine, then following the shout, the tail will cease creating this world for a second. This second is the moment of freedom, which is more than enough to leave this realm of suffering behind for ever. When this second arrives, the werefox will know quite certainly what she should do next.

  The same technique can be used by werewolves and pizdets hounds while in their lupine form.

  I have also attained to comprehension of how tailless monkeys can escape from this world. At first I intended to leave detailed instructions for them too, but I do not have enough time. I will therefore briefly mention the most important elements. The key points of this teaching are the same as in the above. First the tailless monkey must engender love in his soul, beginning with its most simple forms and gradually ascending to the genuine love that knows no subject and no object. Then he must review his entire life and grasp the futility of his goals and the villainy of his ways. And since his repentance is usually false and short-lived, he must shed tears for his own dark deeds at least thirty times. And finally, the monkey must perform a magical action similar to the one described in point three, but amended to take account of the fact that he has no tail. The tailless monkey must therefore first grasp how he creates the world and in what way he imposes the illusion on himself. This is all rather simple, but I have absolutely no time left to dwell on it.

  Let me say something more important. If any werefox, walking the Way, should discover a new road to the truth, she should not disguise it in all sorts of confusing symbols and tangled rituals, as the tailless monkeys do, but must immediately share this discovery with other were-creatures in the simplest and clearest form possible. But she should remember that the only true answer to the question ‘what is truth’ is silence, and anyone who opens his mouth simply doesn’t know the score.

  Well then, I think that is all. Now Nat King Cole will sing and I shall go. It will happen like this: I shall finish typing this page, save it, throw my laptop into my rucksack and get on my bike. Early in the morning there is never anybody at the ramp on the edge of the Bitsevsky forest. I’ve been wanting to jump from it for a long time, only I didn’t think I’d be able to land. But now I’ve realized how to do it.

  I shall ride out into the very centre of the empty field, gather all my love into my heart, pick up speed and go flying up the slope. And as soon as the wheels of my bicycle leave the ground, I shall call out my own name in a loud voice and cease to create this world. There will be an astonishing second, unlike any other. Then this world will disappear. And then, at last, I shall discover who I really am.

  Born in 1962 in Moscow, Victor Pelevin has become recognized as the leading Russian novelist of his generation. His comic inventiveness and talent as a fabulist have won him comparisons to Kafka, Calvino, and Gogol, and Time magazine has described him as a “psychedelic Nabokov for the cyberage.” Pelevin is the author of four novels (Omon Ra, The Life of Insects, Buddha’s Little Finger, and Homo Zapiens), three collections of stories (The Blue Lantern, A Werewolf Problem in Central London, and 4 by Pelevin), a novella (The Yellow Arrow), and The Helmet of Horror: The Myth of Theseus and the Minotaur. In 1998, he was selected by The New Yorker as one of the best European writers under thirty-five, and in January of 2000 he was the subject of a New York Times Magazine profile entitled “Gogol a Go-Go.” His 2000 novel, Buddha’s Little Finger, was a finalist for the International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award. He is the winner of the Nonino Prize and the Richard-Schonfeld Prize for literary satire, and his novels have been published in thirty-three countries.

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  Chapter 1