The Illiterate by Ágota Kristóf

Author:Ágota Kristóf
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: New Directions
Published: 2023-03-13T17:43:26+00:00

Memory

I learn from the newspapers and the television that a ten-year-old Turkish child has died of exhaustion and exposure while illegally crossing the Swiss border with his parents. The “smugglers” left them near the border. They had only to walk straight ahead until they reached the first Swiss village. They walked for hours through the mountains and the forest. It was very cold. Toward the end, the father carried the child on his back. But it was already too late. When they reached the village, the child was dead of fatigue, exposure and exhaustion.

My first reaction is that of any Swiss citizen: “How could people have embarked on such a risky adventure with children? Such irresponsibility is unacceptable.” The shock I receive in return is violent and immediate. A cold, end-of-November wind sweeps through my well-heated room, and the voice of memory rises up inside me with stupefaction: “What? Have you completely forgotten? You did the same thing, exactly the same thing. And your own child was practically a ­newborn.”

Yes, I remember.

I am twenty-one. I have been married for two years, and I have a little daughter who is four months old. We are crossing the border between Hungary and Austria on an evening in November, led by a smuggler. His name is Joseph and I know him well.

We are a group of about ten people, including several children. My little daughter is asleep in her father’s arms, and I am carrying two bags. One holds baby bottles, diapers, and clean clothes for the baby; the other holds dictionaries. We walk in silence behind Joseph for about an hour. It is almost completely dark. Now and then electric flares and floodlights illuminate everything. We hear the crackling and shots of rifles; then silence and darkness take over again.

At the edge of the forest Joseph stops and says to us:

— You are in Austria. All you have to do is walk straight ahead. The village is not far.

I embrace Joseph. All of us give him the money we have; in any case, this money will be of no value in ­Austria.

We walk through the forest. For a long time. Too long. Branches tear at our faces, we fall into holes, dead leaves wet our shoes, we twist our ankles on tree roots. A few flashlights have been switched on, but they only illuminate little circles of light, and trees — always more trees. Yet we should already have come out of the forest. We have the feeling that we are walking in circles.

A child says:

— I’m afraid. I want to go home. I want to go to sleep.

Another child cries. A woman says:

— We’re lost.

A young man says:

— Everyone, stop. If we continue like this, we’ll wind up back in Hungary, if it’s not already too late. Stay where you are. I’ll go see.

We all know what winding up back in Hungary means: prison for having illegally crossed the border, and maybe even being shot by drunken Russian border guards.

The young man climbs up a tree.

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