History by Elsa Morante, Lily Tuck, William Weaver
Tags: Literary, Historical fiction, Historical, Literature & Fiction, Contemporary, Military, Genre Fiction, War, Contemporary Fiction, Literary Fiction, italian
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mothers! and the foot-balll and screw-ing and every-thing-everything! as if the war was on the moon or the plan-et Mars . . . grow-ing up is the worst luck . . . '\Vh am I any-way? '\Vh am I do-ing here? How did I get here? . . ." At this point, remem- bering he still hadn't introduced himself to his hostess, he went and stood squarely facing her; and wi even looking at her, his mouth cross, he declared :
"Mein Name ist Gunther!"
Then he remained there, in a discontented attitude, expecting this propitiatory introduction to produce an eff denied him in advance. The lady's huge eyes, hostile and dazed, merely blinked briefly, suspiciously at those German sounds, whose only meaning for her was a sibylline threat. Then the soldier's gaze darkened, though he allowed a hint of lively warmth to show in his eyes, as he felt an incurable aff . And remain ing there, half-seated on the edge of the cluttered table, with a kind of reluctance ( which betrayed a jealous privacy) he produced a little piece of pasteboard from his pocket and held it under Ida's eyes.
She took a frozen, sidelong glance at it, expecti an SS identity card with a swastika, or perhaps a Wanted photograph of Ninnuzzu Mancuso, with a yellow star. But instead it was a snapshot of a family group, in which she could vaguely discern, against a background of little houses and canebrakes, the heavy, radiant fi of a middle-aged Germa woman surrounded by fi or six half-grown boys. Among them, the soldier, with a
5 7
faint smile, pointed out one (himself), more grown than the others, dressed in a windbreaker and a cyclist's cap. Then, as the lady's eyes wandered over that anonymous group with dark apathy, he moved his fi to point out the landscape and sky in the background, informing her:
"Dachau."
His tone of voice, in uttering that name, was the same that a three month-old kitten might have, claiming its basket. And for that matter, the name meant nothing to Ida, who had never heard it before, unless by chance, without remembering it . . . However, at that innocuous and in diff name, the wild, transitory migrant, now identifi with her heart, leaped inside her. And fl horribly in the distorted space of the little room, it began to slam, in chirping tumult, against the walls that had no exit.
Ida's body had remained inert, like her consciousness, with no move ment but a throb of the muscles and a defenseless gaze of extreme repul sion, as if she were facing a monster. And at that same moment, the soldier's eyes, their dark-blue, sea color, approaching violet (an unusual color on the continent; it is more often encountered in the Mediterranean islands ) fi with an innocence almost frightening in its timeless antiq uity: contemporary with the Earthly Paradise! To those eyes her gaze seemed the defi tive insult. And instantaneously a tempest of anger clouded them. And yet through this clouding there fi a childish questioning, which no longer expected the sweetness of an answer, but wanted one all the same.
It was at this point that Ida, without thinking, began to shout: "No! No! No!" in the hysterical voice of an immature girl. In reality, with this no of hers, she was not addressing him or the outside world, but another secret threat she sensed from some interior point or nerve, suddenly rising within her from her childhood years, something of which she thought herself healed. As if returning to that age, backwards, through foreshort ened time, she promptly recognized the great dizziness, the strange echoes of voices and torrents which, when she was little, had announced her spells. Now her cry was against that snare, which would steal her from safeguarding the house, and Nino!!
However, this new, inexplicable reaction of hers (no, the only answer she had given this day) acted on the soldier's confused wrath like a signal of revolt against an immense transgression. Unexpectedly, the bitter tenderness that had humiliated him with its torture since that morn was
"Mein Name ist Gunther!"
Then he remained there, in a discontented attitude, expecting this propitiatory introduction to produce an eff denied him in advance. The lady's huge eyes, hostile and dazed, merely blinked briefly, suspiciously at those German sounds, whose only meaning for her was a sibylline threat. Then the soldier's gaze darkened, though he allowed a hint of lively warmth to show in his eyes, as he felt an incurable aff . And remain ing there, half-seated on the edge of the cluttered table, with a kind of reluctance ( which betrayed a jealous privacy) he produced a little piece of pasteboard from his pocket and held it under Ida's eyes.
She took a frozen, sidelong glance at it, expecti an SS identity card with a swastika, or perhaps a Wanted photograph of Ninnuzzu Mancuso, with a yellow star. But instead it was a snapshot of a family group, in which she could vaguely discern, against a background of little houses and canebrakes, the heavy, radiant fi of a middle-aged Germa woman surrounded by fi or six half-grown boys. Among them, the soldier, with a
5 7
faint smile, pointed out one (himself), more grown than the others, dressed in a windbreaker and a cyclist's cap. Then, as the lady's eyes wandered over that anonymous group with dark apathy, he moved his fi to point out the landscape and sky in the background, informing her:
"Dachau."
His tone of voice, in uttering that name, was the same that a three month-old kitten might have, claiming its basket. And for that matter, the name meant nothing to Ida, who had never heard it before, unless by chance, without remembering it . . . However, at that innocuous and in diff name, the wild, transitory migrant, now identifi with her heart, leaped inside her. And fl horribly in the distorted space of the little room, it began to slam, in chirping tumult, against the walls that had no exit.
Ida's body had remained inert, like her consciousness, with no move ment but a throb of the muscles and a defenseless gaze of extreme repul sion, as if she were facing a monster. And at that same moment, the soldier's eyes, their dark-blue, sea color, approaching violet (an unusual color on the continent; it is more often encountered in the Mediterranean islands ) fi with an innocence almost frightening in its timeless antiq uity: contemporary with the Earthly Paradise! To those eyes her gaze seemed the defi tive insult. And instantaneously a tempest of anger clouded them. And yet through this clouding there fi a childish questioning, which no longer expected the sweetness of an answer, but wanted one all the same.
It was at this point that Ida, without thinking, began to shout: "No! No! No!" in the hysterical voice of an immature girl. In reality, with this no of hers, she was not addressing him or the outside world, but another secret threat she sensed from some interior point or nerve, suddenly rising within her from her childhood years, something of which she thought herself healed. As if returning to that age, backwards, through foreshort ened time, she promptly recognized the great dizziness, the strange echoes of voices and torrents which, when she was little, had announced her spells. Now her cry was against that snare, which would steal her from safeguarding the house, and Nino!!
However, this new, inexplicable reaction of hers (no, the only answer she had given this day) acted on the soldier's confused wrath like a signal of revolt against an immense transgression. Unexpectedly, the bitter tenderness that had humiliated him with its torture since that morn was
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