The Tablet of Destinies by Roberto Calasso

Author:Roberto Calasso
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux

VII

One morning, Sindbad spoke up first, as if he couldn’t help himself:

“When I opened my eyes in this room the first time and realized there was someone lying down near me, I was overcome by terror. You are the oldest of the old and the most alive of the living. But what did I know of that, then? I had met another old man once on my journeyings; again, it was after a shipwreck. And more than any monster, he had me living in fear and torment.

“He was a handsome man, wrapped from head to toe in a cloak of woven leaves. I thought he must have been shipwrecked too. He looked at me and tried to get to his feet, but couldn’t. He begged me to carry him on my back so that we could go looking for fruit. The island was full of it. I picked him up and sat him on my shoulders and began to walk. There was an exact moment when I realized his legs had fastened tightly, irretrievably, around my neck. A viselike grip I couldn’t loosen. No longer covered with leaves, they were bare, rough, and dark, like buffalo hooves.

“It was the first of many desperate days. I soon sensed that nothing was going to change. I followed the old man’s orders, but couldn’t sleep because his legs were choking me. He simply ignored me. He emptied his bowels down my back. I was caked in his excrement. He would kick me in the stomach when he wanted me to move. I had begun to think that life would go on like this until my dying breath. As though that awful burden had become part of my body.

“Then one day it was over. I had managed, with enormous effort, to get some juice to ferment in the shell of a gourd. I tasted it and felt it work on me, relaxing me. The old man was curious. He wanted to try the strange liquid himself. After some time I felt the grip of his legs, that iron collar that suffocated me all day long, slackening. The old man sank into drunkenness.

“As soon as I had freed myself, I started running and didn’t look back. I didn’t want to see the old man ever again. As on other occasions, I had the luck to find a ship that took me on board. I tried to explain what had happened to me. It was hard but I couldn’t help myself. Strangely, they barely bothered to listen, as if I were telling an old story everyone knew. I asked why. One of the sailors said: ‘That must have been the Old Man of the Sea. You were lucky. Those who meet him don’t usually come back to tell the tale.’ From time to time people have asked me: what is drunkenness for? Now I know: to free yourself from the grip of the Old Man of the Sea. But first you have to meet him.”

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