See Under by David Grossman

Author:David Grossman [Grossman, David]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Published: 2011-11-07T06:00:00+00:00

“One moment!” screams Neigel and, forcing himself to be calm, repeats, “One moment! Maybe you can stop being clever for once and give me a straight answer. Why, damn it, does Otto have to start out being sick? What can he do in that condition? Think, Wasserman! Don’t ramble without a plan! Without planning and organization nothing is possible, not even a story, Wasserman!”

But it seems Wasserman has no intention of planning and organizing his story. That’s how it was many years ago when he insisted on bringing a baby into the story, and even though I was still a child, I knew a baby would ruin the plot; why bring in a baby at the wrong place in an action-packed story dealing mainly with war. I had noticed this tendency in Grandfather Anshel before, this dreamy vagueness, this impressionism. Maybe I’m being too hard on him, but it seems to me that for all his pedantry—and pettiness at times—with regard to material things, in spiritual matters he belongs to that category of people who rely on the existence of a kind of benevolent logic in the world to instantly repair any damage caused by their lack of forethought and organization. And with utter unconcern, bordering on insolence, in fact, Wasserman reiterates his request (“Scientific information about falling sickness”), and Neigel disappoints me somewhat by angrily but obediently jotting down the provocative request. (“Still, I saw through him to the little boy hoping a good fairy would suddenly appear, and for this reason precisely he is willing to let me aggrieve him, because the greater the grief, the greater the pleasure in the happy ending.”)

“Other than poor Otto, you will no doubt be happy to hear that all the others are in good health.”

“I am truly happy, Scheissemeister.”

“Except, of course, for those who have died.”

“What?” asks Neigel in a quiet voice extruding red-hot wires of rage.

“Ai,” says Wasserman sadly, “Paula has died. Our good Paula is no more …”

Now Neigel bursts into loud laughter, gushing over with all his contempt for the old Jew. “Paula?! But only a moment ago you said—how did it go?—that she cooked soup for us. That’s it! You said hot soup!”

“Hot and thick,” Wasserman agrees with him, sadly shaking his head. “What a wonderful memory you have, sir, and your words are very true. Good hot soup our Paula prepared for us, every evening she prepares it, thick as porridge; only, she died. Yes, I am afraid so. How sad it is. She is dead, yet still among us in her way. And not only she. All of us are. Living and dead. And one can no longer discern who among us are the living and who are the dead, ai …”

In a fury Neigel says, “Give me a simple story, Wasserman! Give me something straight out of life! My life! Something even a man like me who never went to a university can understand and feel! And don’t kill anyone!”

To which Wasserman replies, “What right have you to ask me that, Herr Neigel?”

A long silence ensues.

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