Journal 1935–1944

by Mihail Sebastian

  “You should make up your mind, Camil. Are they nationalists or are they Communists?”

  “Wow, you’re really something, you know? Here we are alone and you can still ask questions like that. What else is communism but the imperialism of the Jews?"

  That is Camil Petrescu speaking. Camil Petrescu is one of the finest minds in Romania. Camil Petrescu is one of the most sensitive creatures in Romania. How could Romania ever go through a revolution?

  I had lunch at Mircea’s. While waiting for him and Nina to come back from town, I read some twenty pages at random of Le côté des Guermantes. It was an episode I had completely forgotten (in fact, I have the impression that I’ve forgotten it all): a lunch that Marcel had with Saint-Loup and Rachel “quand du Seigneur.”

  Rachel bears a surprising resemblance to Leni. I felt that I was reading the story of my own love.

  Wednesday, 1 July

  I spent Sunday and Monday in Brăila, where my old class was celebrating the tenth anniversary of the baccalaureate. After fourteen months away, I found Brăila lacking in surprises—unchanged, admirably silent, and uncomplicated. It was a strange feeling to stay at the hotel there. My room—“Hotel Francez”—overlooked Strada Polonă. St. Peter’s Church was directly opposite my window, at the end of the street.

  At the school I felt more than I would have expected. I sat on the bench—the last bench in the 8th form—and found myself beset with memories. On my right, Ficu’s empty place.

  Goraş called out the register and we answered in turn—“Present.” Now and again we heard “Absent” and a few times “Dead.” Four are no longer alive.

  Then something amazing happened: Goras’s speech. It deserves to be written down in its entirety, word for word. But I don’t think I could do it. Still, I shall try to reconstitute it.

  “Gentlemen, there are always misunderstandings (some of them very painful) between form master and class, between teachers and pupils, but I should like you to believe that the traces and regrets they leave in the teacher’s heart are no fewer than those they leave in the pupils’. I, for example, have carried a memory for ten years that has caused me a lot of suffering and from which I am glad I can free myself today by telling you about it.

  “It concerns one of the most brilliant boys in your year. I am thinking of Hechter. He was in 7-A and had won a prize in Romanian language. At the end-of-year prizegiving—even today I cannot think how it happened—I forgot to call for him to come up. It was hot, I was tired and burdened with worries—so perhaps such a mistake was understandable. All I can say is that it was not deliberate. Once the ceremony was over, I remembered and went to look for Hechter. He said something that annoyed me, and I made a very sharp retort. I immediately regretted it. I realized at once that I was doing the wrong thing. But it was too late. I want to tell him today, in front of you all, how much I suffered for the injustice I did him on that occasion. I assure him that it didn’t take me all these years to remember it. It is not the brilliant career he has since made for himself, not those fine literary achievements of his, which make me speak as I now do. I have felt the pain right from the first moment. I should have liked to apologize to him before now. It was not possible. I was not able to do it. I tried once, but I realized it was very difficult. I am doing it today, and I tell you I am glad I can in the presence of his classmates. If possible, he will forgive and understand.”

  I was overwhelmed. It brought tears to my eyes, and I was trembling all over. I replied in a barely audible voice, saying a lot of things badly.

  “Headmaster, I have never met anyone before who was capable of doing what you have just done.”

  That was the truth. The gesture struck me as quite extraordinary, humanly speaking. Goras is an even more complex person than I thought.

  At the “banquet” that evening (we all dined at the Monument), I sat next to him all the time and we chatted quite comfortably. I’ll send him my books and perhaps write to him.

  The next day, on Monday, a long walk by the Danube, as far as the Cropina canal beyond Reni. A fish lunch was awaiting us there, as in a dream. The huge cast-iron kettle in which the fish soup was simmering, the spitted carp around the live coals; it was a sight straight out of Sadoveanu or Hogas. I had my clothes off all day, bathed in the Danube, went rowing, ate an enormous amount, drank. . .

  The return journey was magnificent. Mounted on the ship’s cabin, I had the whole Danube in front of me (a Danube wider than at Brăila, with a more orderly forest of willows, almost as in a well-kept park). It was bright sunlight when we left at six, and we caught the last flickers of twilight as we got off at Reni. After an hour in which the little town was alarmed by our invasion (delightful public gardens filled with girls, children, and young lovers!), I resumed my place on the cabin roof as we traveled “in the moonlight”3 to Galaţi. From there to Brăila, where we arrived at one in the morning. I was rather drowsy.

  A fine day, which took me out of Bucharest and allowed me to breathe. It made me aware again that the earth is bigger than the three square kilometers on which I live, fret, and talk.

  Visited Leni yesterday—very loving, very warm, not in the least coquettish. She told me some interesting things about Jeni Cruţescu’s love for her.

  “She loves me like a man. There hasn’t been anything physical between us—if there had been, I’d have told you—but I’m not sure there won’t be some day. She suffers a lot because of me, and I admit that I’m to blame; if she behaves with me like a man in love, I behave with her like a flighty woman.

  “Lots of people tell me that I’ll cause her nothing but unhappiness, that it will all end in tragedy. We have talked about that ourselves, and once we even decided to part—but it wasn’t possible. After a week, she came back feeling miserable.”

  It’s strange that I don’t feel at all jealous of Jeni. I listened calmly to Leni as she spoke, and I think it amused me more than it intrigued me. My love for her has never been more natural, more secure. But why, and for how long?

  Wednesday, 22 July

  My appointment to the Fundaţie came when I was no longer expecting it. For a few days I could not believe it; I thought that everything would turn sour at the last moment. But this morning I got 39,500 lei outstanding. Fantastic! And from now on I’ll get 6,000 lei a month (5,935, to be precise).

  So that’s my holiday taken care of. I’ll be able to work and, let’s hope, finish the play.

  This morning, when I left the Fundaţie and was walking down Calea Victoriei, I suddenly had the happy idea of entering the Columbia store to ask whether the Kleine nachtmusik that I ordered last May had arrived for me. It was there. I paid for it, and I am happy that that was my first purchase. Maybe it’s a good sign. And the records are magnificent.

  Otherwise I do not have the curiosity to write. Nor is there a lot to say.

  Had a long, confused dream last night, in which Leni passed through several times.

  On Sunday Lohengrin from Bayreuth, which I heard in equatorial heat. The voices were admirably clear, the chorus and orchestra blurred.

  “But tell me softly at dusk—am I happy?”

  Ghilcoş, 2 August. Sunday

  I have been here since Friday morning. Back again in the Wagner Villa. Some changes, different people—as always, I am awkward among unfamiliar people with whom I am forced to speak. But the landscape is the same, the air healthy, the firs close by Yesterday I went to the Bicaz Gorges. At night, by the lake beneath the full moon. Mornings in the sun, on a chaise longue. I am regaining without difficulty that calm sense of happiness that I had last year.

  I want to start writing tomorrow. I have no excuse not to, but nor do I feel any great enthusiasm. I have just reread the first act, this afternoon, and it seemed to me long and convoluted. The criticisms that Camil made when I read it to him still pursue me.

  Anyway, tomorrow I shall be doing my duty—with resignation if not with relish. That will come too, after I have written the first f
ew pages. “Le plus difficile, ” says Renard, “c’est de prendre la plume, de la tremper dans l'encre et de la tenir ferme au-dessus du papier. ”4

  Monday, 3 [August]

  I have written little, but written nevertheless. The main thing was to start on the “scheduled” day. It is true that, from the whole day (in which I sat for some five hours with writing paper in front of me), I shall select no more than four pages or so. I have written the first two scenes of Act Two. But I got stuck in the third scene, with Leni and Bogoiu, and I don’t think I should press it too hard. I shan’t touch it all evening. I’ll leave it until tomorrow morning.

  I finished the first scene (Bogoiu and the Major) by sacrificing the discovery of the diary—an incident which some time ago, when I was composing the scenario (or scenography, as Stendhal used to say), struck me as particularly funny. But now I have the impression that it is both facile in its effect and very difficult to write. Till tomorrow, then.

  A cool evening, but of a perfect purity. The moon right in front of my balcony, in a fir tree. And throughout the valley, a translucent stony blue.

  Tuesday, 4 [August]

  The mystery of the phone call in Act One will remain unresolved. I’ll never know with whom Leni was speaking, or what she said. I don’t want to pry open her secrets. Let her keep them.

  Evening

  I have finished the Leni-Bogoiu scene. I have started the fourth scene (Ştefan-Mme. Vintilă) and got halfway through it. I’d have finished it for sure if the young married couple on the balcony next to mine had not happened to fancy reading aloud all afternoon. They are reading a French book in turns: now she, now he. Then they comment on and explain it, passage by passage. Exasperating! An intellectual honeymoon: the most detestable kind.

  Without this misfortune it would have been a productive day. Even so, I am happy with it. Eight pages written. And a lot of things made clearer.

  I have allowed myself a short break tomorrow morning in order to go up Ghilcoş. But I shall try to make up for it tomorrow afternoon. Let’s hope.

  Friday, 7 [August]

  I didn’t “make up for it” Wednesday afternoon, as I had promised myself. The whole day was sacrificed because of the outing on Ghilcoş, where I got lost for nearly two hours (on the way back). But the view was marvelous.

  Yesterday it rained from morning till night. A rainy day, but also a day of work. Ten pages. I finished the scene with Ştefan and Mme. Vintilă. Began the Leni-Jef scene, which came to an abrupt halt, however. Impossible to take it any further for the moment. I have abandoned it— and moved on to the scene straight after it, where those two strangers come into the pensiune. I can feel that it will work. At the moment (lunch hour) I am at Scene IX-a, page 27. Today I wasted the whole morning on correspondence. But I shall work this afternoon. I have to.

  A letter from Jeni, who is at Sovata. Funny how she dates it: “So-vata, on the 3rd of August.” That “on” is an old tic of mine, from 1925-1926. She has kept it, doubtless without realizing. That too is a kind of loyalty.

  A man can never know what remnants from previous love affairs are in a woman’s gestures, habits, vocabulary, and idiosyncrasies.

  Sunday, 9 [August]

  The fourth rainy day. It’s starting to get on my nerves. I surprise myself feeling nostalgia for the city. I’d like there to be a film, a concert. . . . And yet, the thing I look forward to most is the sun.

  I think I have been working quite well. Yesterday evening I finished the scenes with the two strangers. There are things that amuse me. But I wonder whether I have not exaggerated here and there, whether I have not pushed too hard, whether I have not resorted to facile effects. I don’t know: we shall see. I’m at page 40. Let’s see what comes of today

  Yesterday I thought of Ionel Teodoreanu5 as I walked down the road. I don’t know why. I’d have liked to see him. This morning, who do I find in the pensiune trying to rent a room from Fräulein Wagner? Ionel Teodoreanu, with his wife. A real joy to see him. They’ll be staying in the pensiune from tomorrow evening. He’s writing a novel. I hope we won’t disturb each other.

  Monday, 10 [August]

  The fifth rainy day. We’re in the middle of November. No sign anywhere that it will get better. I have a feeling that it’s all over, that I’ll never see a clear sky again here in Ghilcoş.

  I’m on the final scene—the one about which I wrote in March (that night when I made a first outline of the play) that it was the “major scene, and hard to write.”

  I approach it with trepidation. How will it work out? If I finish it today or tomorrow, I’ll leave myself a free day before moving on to the third act.

  Is it possible that I shall return to Bucharest with the whole play written?

  I’m not very keen on the pages I wrote yesterday. But I don’t want to get held up on them now. I’ll have a go at revising them at the end. Right now they seem exaggerated to me. The transition is too abrupt, the effects too calculated.

  Evening

  I was right. It’s hard going. I am at my desk6

  Tuesday, 11 [August]

  Yesterday evening I had just started to write some lines in this notebook when Ionel Teodoreanu knocked on my door. I asked him in and we sat chatting for a couple of hours. When he left, I no longer knew what I had wanted to say in that sentence, and I abandoned it as it was, especially as we had to go to eat.

  In brief, I meant to say that the scene at which I had stopped was bothering me. It is the first real stumbling block since I have been at Ghilcoş. And I don’t feel like skipping over it to the third act. I want to finish Act Two so that I can put it aside as work completed. Yesterday I sat for some six hours with the paper in front of me—and I came away with just a couple of pages (not even two full pages) that can be kept.

  I’ll give it a try today. To be frank, if the sun were shining, I’d give myself a few hours off and go up Ghilcoş or Ţohard—that might clear my head. But the weather is still bad: the same November sky, a wind that is cold but not strong enough to chase away the clouds.

  Teodoreanu is the same fascinating conversationalist I knew in Galaţi. I listen to him with the most intense pleasure—even though he speaks to me only about himself, about literature, and about the novel he is writing. He read me a few passages, and some of them struck me as first class—especially a brief episode with two protagonists, Hans Müller and Mircea Ştefănescu.

  “I’m in an anti-lyrical phase,” he said. “It’s a novel that I’m writing in spite of myself: I think you’ll like it.”

  As for the rest, he is an enchanting companion. His sons, who are staying on my right and are sort of balcony mates, have been given orders to be quiet. Mrs. Teodoreanu makes an exceptional black coffee, and I receive a ration of two cups a day.

  His novel is called Noah's Ark. It takes place at Borsec, in Frau Blecher’s pensiune, also known as “the Blecher Fleet.”

  Since we had been talking about Cezar Petrescu—who, almost without realizing it, used in his books ideas from various conversations or literary confessions—I hastened to say as a precaution:

  “You know, there is also a pensiune in what I am writing at present, a Pensiune Weber run by a Fräulein Weber up in the mountains, which one of the characters compares to a boat. . . .”

  We both laughed at the coincidence, but it was not a bad thing for me to have mentioned it.

  “Anyway,” he said, “I don’t think we shall bump into each other. We’re probably moving along different tracks.”

  “Especially as what I’m writing is . . . a play.”

  He didn’t seem surprised, and he explained why.

  “My eldest son, Ştefănucă, told me at lunch today. . .”

  (Knocking at the door. I open it: Mrs. Teodoreanu. She has brought my morning coffee. We speak only with our eyes for fear of starting a new conversation. He continues:)

  . . surprised: ‘Papa, you know that Mr. Sebastian talks to himself when he writes.’ I didn’t believe it,
but now I understand. . .

  I explain to him that I do feel the need to speak each line before writing it down.

  Friday, 14 [August]

  No progress. I’m at a standstill—the last scene of Act Two is putting up stupid resistance.

  Act Three, to which I have been trying to draw closer, lacks any shape. For so many days, not a single new idea.

  And the sun never returns. I’m beginning to think that is why things are going so badly for me. Yesterday I didn’t even try to work. And yet I can’t be content with idling about. I keep having pangs of conscience— and each passing hour seems a reproof.

  Saturday, 15 [August]

  Well, in the end I did finish Act Two yesterday. I think it will need some major additions. I must have a scene with Leni and Ştefan, preceding and preparing the final scene. And I should also dwell a little more on Mme. Vintilă. Maybe the Leni-Jef scene can stay as it is. But I’ll have to add something to Leni’s “speech” in which she persuades the two intruders to leave.

  All these additions seem necessary not only for the internal economy of the act, but also to achieve the right dimensions. Clearly it should be shorter than the first act, but the disproportion seems to me too great. To have seventy-nine pages for the first and only forty-nine for the second: that’s a difference not only of thirty pages but, when it’s acted, of half an hour.

  The sun is back. This morning, two hours naked on a chaise longue on the terrace. I’m convinced that I shall recover my holiday form, which has always been excellent when I’ve had enough sun.

  Yesterday evening a very pleasant stroll with Teodoreanu toward Floarea Reginei.

  I’m almost afraid to raise the curtain on the third act. I know so little about what will happen in it.