by Elie Wiesel
“During that week of mourning, I also learned that my teacher and his wife had been in Auschwitz.
“ ‘Reb Yohanan,’ said one of the visitors, ‘do you remember? You had a crazy but brilliant idea. You went from one block to another begging the Jews not to forget what day of the week it was. On Saturday you wished us “Gut shabes” like before.’
“ ‘And our walks after the war, Reb Yohanan, do you remember?’ another person asked. ‘On our return home, the two of us wandered in the deserted streets and ruins looking for relatives and friends. Those were hard times, almost as harsh as the war itself: the houses, now uninhabited by Jews, were occupied by Ruthenians, Hungarians, Ukrainians. You were asked to perform miracles, and you replied that you were helpless, stripped of your powers. You used to tell me that our sacred books mention souls who return to wander on earth because they're not wanted in the heavens yet. So they're doomed to keep company with the living, who don't see them, don't feel their presence, who laugh, sing, and work, and deny them the right of sanctuary among them. Sometimes I wonder, you used to say, whether my soul isn't part of this group; I wonder whether I'm not already dead. And whether our survival here is nothing but the dream of our dead.’
“This shed a new light on my teacher. I never could have imagined that he influenced so many lives.
“But Lord of wars and mysteries, how had he managed not to sink into melancholy and insanity? And if I did succumb, is it my fault, my fault alone?
“Rivka and her husband were part of the last convoy to Auschwitz. I was told—yes, during that week of mourning, I was told of the miracles her husband had had to perform in order to save her. I couldn't understand how, as a mute, she managed to survive the daily hardships and the Birkenau selections, she who was physically unable to utter a single word in response to the questions to which all the prisoners were subjected.
“And yet.
“A very short woman wearing a wig and soberly dressed gave me an explanation in her shrill, high-pitched voice: ‘Oh, you want to know if I knew the Rivka for whom we grieve? Yes, I knew her. We were together. What would you like to know? Did she ever mention my name to you? Oh, excuse me, I forgot, she couldn't speak, the poor woman. But I can tell you, she was unique. A unique consoler. She suffered more than we did, endured more pain and humiliation than us, and yet it was she who helped us stand firm. She just had to look at us and smile. She made us laugh by gesturing like a Purim clown or a circus acrobat. I sometimes lost the very last spark of hope; it was she who succeeded in rekindling it. One day, I was frightened for her; we all were. It was during that terrible selection of October ‘44. We were lined up naked. At the door stood the team of our judges and executioners. Like all of us, I had wasted away and become weak. If they take my number, I'm lost, I thought; Rivka too. If they ask her a question, any question, her age, for example, she's lost. I was as distressed for her as for myself. I thought: Reb Yohanan, if you're still alive, and even if you're not, I implore you, you who perform miracles, save your wife. I prayed that we'd both become invisible. I passed. They didn't stop me. Rivka was stopped; the SS doctor asked her something. We all held our breath. She didn't lower her head in front of him. She replied by shrugging her shoulders. The SS doctor said something else to her, and I was petrified that he was going to notice her condition. But suddenly she moved her lips. I had to cover my mouth to stifle a cry. Perhaps my eyes had deceived me? Had she talked? So her saintly husband had succeeded in saving her? The important thing was that she had passed the selection. Later, I asked her what she had thought of at that moment. Of God? Her parents? The danger hanging over her? She began laughing, whereas I began crying.’
“Admit it, Doctor, they were both crazy. Yes, Doctor, there are times when you have to be abnormal if you want to live normally in the hell of men. But let's return to Reb Yohanan and his bereavement. On the last day of shiva he received the visit of a Hasidic rebbe. Tall, thick eyebrows, haughty bearing and confident gait, he stopped for a moment by the door as if he was inspecting the premises. Escorted by two vigilant young secretaries dressed in black, he walked in and addressed my teacher with the traditional benediction. He took a seat opposite him and, following custom, waited for Reb Yohanan to say a few words before speaking.
“ ‘I knew Rivka's father very well,’ he began. ‘We came from the same village. We were friends and partners. Yes, partners. We had made an agreement: he promised to support me so I could devote myself to studying and teaching, and in exchange he would get my share of paradise. The document was signed before two witnesses. We were young at the time, adolescents, but Rivka's father never forgot his commitment. Even during pogroms, he tried to help me. When I lost my strength, he gave me courage. When I felt my reason falter—my reason, mind you, not my faith, which remained intact—he spoke to me with kindness and set me straight. When he was stabbed by a hooligan and knew he was going to die, he summoned me to his bedside. He was ashen, drained. I had to lean down with my face close to his to catch his words: “In a little while, I'll be crossing the threshold and entering the world of truth. It's time for me to free you of your vow. I pronounce our agreement null and void.” I objected, but he silenced me and whispered in my ear: “I have one favor to ask of you. Promise me you'll watch over my daughter.” I promised him: “At the slightest danger, she'll have only to remember our agreement and my promise, and she'll be saved.” ‘
“Later on, Doctor, I recalled this visit. Did I hear correctly? Had the illustrious rabbi come just so my question about Riv-ka's survival would be answered? I also recall he waited for a minyan, ten men, so he could say the Minha prayer. Noah recited the Kaddish and the family sat on stools to listen to the ritual words of consolation for the last time. The shiva was coming to an end. The rabbi paused in the doorway and gazed at us with an inspired look. Reb Yohanan blew his nose, the other visitors stayed still, and I asked myself, and I ask you now, Doctor: Against a world invaded by madness, should we use the faith of our ancestors, or our own madness?
“Actually, Rivka wasn't mute. Reb Yohanan himself told me on the last day of shiva. Why did she make believe she was? There's a whole story behind that too. Many years earlier, when she was a young bride, some harsh words had escaped her, words that were too critical of a neighbor whose behavior had displeased her. The next day the neighbor fell and broke her leg. In expiation, Rivka took a vow of silence and kept it to the end of her life.”
9
At the beginning of the next session, the therapist asks me in a natural, quasi-indifferent, almost technical tone of voice, “For you who are so preoccupied by the suffering of men, isn't it the same suffering? Aren't the ancestral faith and your illness two sides of the same experience, the same trauma and the same memory, one the light and the other the shadow?”
Obviously, she has a knack for sending me back to my own questionings, and using those to drive me on further and further in my quest, demanding that I deepen it and dwelling on its failures more than its repercussions. Suddenly, for no reason, she reminds me of the woman on the bus and her solitude, of Leah and her elusive beauty, of Maya and her blue eyes with their dark shadows. Maya knew so many things. Where is she now?
“You're right,” I say. “As always. Apparently I need you so I can understand my own ideas better.”
Once again, my thoughts turn to Maya. For the time being, it's still Maya. You're different, Maya. I don't know why, do you? I only know that you are. Different, special. I love to be with you. I love your being here. When you're here, I love even the walls that separate me from the prison that is the world of men.
Maya, as usual, doesn't agree; too bad, but she refuses to talk. A voice within answers: The world is not a prison and the other person is not your jailer. Remember, Doriel, you like metaphysics more than psychology. The magic of the other is that he allows you to define yourself, though he doesn't limit you in your choices. Actually the other is your freedom more than your confinement.
The
therapist doesn't hear this voice. She asks me questions, but I'm talking to the young woman with blue eyes.
I feel close to you, Maya. I like your melodious Yiddish and the idea that your knowledge envelops mine and reassures me. This makes you smile? You know me mostly in my hazy madness, even when I have doubts about your power and the means that would enable me to resist it. But do you know who I am when I'm not myself?
Maya replies that she does know, but she would rather hear me say it. As for the therapist's impossible, inaudible questions, the mad storyteller within me answers.
“I am Doriel, the lookout. This has nothing to do with Maya or anyone, but in the past, in ancient Judea, my role was to wait on the mountaintop for the appearance of the new moon. When I saw it, I cried out in a voice that could be heard from one end of the country to the other: ‘Barkaï, Barkaï! The first moonbeam is here; it brings light and warmth!’ Nowadays, I feel like saying something completely different; I feel like being less confident and yelling through clenched teeth, ‘Lookout, where are you? Say, watchman, how far into the night is it?’ But the lookout is blind. And the watchman, mute. Yet the experience of their ordeals doesn't sway their judgment in any way. Do they at least know how far into the night it is, that night encumbered with the omens and warnings that we carry within ourselves, that night that welcomes us until it crushes us with the burden of its ghosts? Could I be one of them? And what if I am my own ghost, and as such immortal? But isn't being immortal no longer being? But then which one of us is mad, my ghost or me? And who will help me understand when I am truly ill: Is it when I know that I am or when I don't know? At least, Doctor, tell me whether you, thanks to your studies, your education, and your experience, whether you would be able to discern the dividing line. You nod; I can guess as much; I sense it. You're going to tell me that, to your great regret, mad thinking and thinking that isn't mad but that gallops at full speed and strays into lands that have no horizons are so close that they often meet, become superimposed, and end up merging. But then, where are we going? What will become of us? Who will protect us? Who will possess the truth, and how will it fit into our existence?”
I pull myself together; I'm losing my footing. I'm talking to the doctor, and it's Maya who answers me. And now, while writing, I'm talking about Maya, and it is no longer she who is listening.
I address a psychoanalyst, and it is a loved, departed woman who becomes my interlocutor. Is this madness? The obliteration of boundaries, the suppression of all ties? But, for the love of God, where are we? A terrifying thought occurs to me; I try to chase it away, but it keeps returning: Who will help me break the bark that is strangling me? And extinguish the black sun that blinds me? Who will tell me who I am? I know that I'm not you and you're not me. But careful, for the love of God, don't tell me, don't try to convince me that the other is my opponent, my enemy, and that this enemy is me.
10
The psychiatrist is very interested, probably much too interested, in my mother and my relationship with her. Naturally, she's gorged herself on the works of Freud and Freudian literature. For her, Freud remains the Moses of a people imagined and governed along her conceptions. In short, she's convinced that my “problem” lies in my conscious or unconscious conflicts with my mother, for she lived far away from me for too long and had an untimely death.
“You're on the wrong track, Doctor. You'll see. But, fine, I'll talk to you about my mother.”
Thus does the patient start to describe his childhood; and he notices that he is not short of words.
He remembers his mother; he remembers her lips, her breathing, her warmth, her tenderness, her laugh. Her courage too, of course. She was a heroine, his mother. Legends had been spread about her feats of arms during the German occupation.
“You'll never guess, Doctor, the name she had in the Resistance. ‘The Madwoman,’ that's how she's listed in the Polish annals. Blond, beautiful, and strong, with piercing gray eyes, she had an Aryan identity card, and her daring aroused her comrades’ admiration. A volunteer for the most dangerous missions, she eventually seemed to somehow guarantee their success. She relayed messages and plans of clandestine actions; occasionally she also delivered arms. On more than one occasion, she escaped the Gestapo traps and the prying eyes of the Polish informers. Didn't she fear death? Above all, she feared torture.
“I recall an evening at their house, after the liberation, when my mother's former comrades gathered to celebrate a decoration my mother had just received from the Polish army, whose envoy was a colonel in full uniform. The table, covered with a white tablecloth, paid tribute to the guests. A variety of dishes, numerous bottles; there was enough food for an entire battalion. Everyone drank a lot, laughed noisily, and my mother was not outdone. Glasses were raised to honor the fighters, dead and alive. None was forgotten or overlooked. ‘Remember the attack against the train filled with soldiers and ammunition?’ Glasses were emptied at one go. ‘And the execution of that traitor Franek, do you remember?’ Another glass was emptied. Two or three guests were collapsed on the rug; I never would have thought that my mother was capable of putting away that many drinks without passing out. My father didn't really participate in the celebration except in a minor way, and had the colonel not come up with the idea of entertaining the guests by getting me drunk, no one would have noticed my presence. The sole subject of conversation was my mother: her train trip from Warsaw to Kraków, from the Bialystok ghetto to the Lublin ghetto. Her walk with the emissary sent by General Bór-Komorowski, the leader of the insurrection in the capital; a secret meeting with another emissary sent by Mordecai Anielewicz, the commander of the Warsaw Ghetto uprising. A thousand and one nights of flight, challenge, combat.
“Suddenly, a solemn silence fell, and the colonel turned to me. ‘Do you know, child, that your mother was admired and loved by all the patriots, men and women, who fought under my command? Do you know that one day a bastard collaborator informed against her to the German police? When she was arrested, they found coded messages on her. She was tortured with inconceivable cruelty to get her to cough up names and addresses. But she kept her mouth shut. All those you see assembled here at the table took part in one of our most brilliant operations: we helped her escape. Drink up, child, drink to the glory of your mother!’ I could hardly stand on my feet, and my father got up to protect me: ‘He's too young, Colonel! One sip of our good vodka and he'll be rolling under the table! Don't turn him into a drunkard!’
“I looked away from my mother. The word tortured was stamped in my mind. In order to retain it, I imagined my mother as a ferocious and victorious warrior, and I felt better.”
After a pause, Thérèse returns to the attack. “Continue. What happened next?”
“What happened? The first signs of an insidious anti-Semitic groundswell were becoming apparent in the country. The new regime set about de-Judaizing, albeit surreptitiously, the politics and history of Poland. The same colonel who had glorified my mother was ordered to play down her past as a Resistance fighter, ‘rather nebulous’ now, according to him. A German document, discovered recently in the archives, mentioned her name and reported her courage, described as ‘criminal,’ of course, by the Communists. Odd, all of that. They even went so far as to insinuate that because she had managed to escape from prison she had probably disclosed to her torturers the names of the patriots who were arrested in a subsequent operation. A Zionist envoy came to see us one evening and advised us that these events should be a lesson: ‘You're no longer wanted here; it's time to go to Palestine.’ It was completely illegal, but the Brikha, the mythical clandestine Jewish organization, would take care of everything; it had efficient branches in central Europe as well as in occupied Germany and Austria. My father was hesitant but my mother was enthusiastic.
“Such is the irony of fate, Doctor. If we had stayed in Poland instead of going to France, my parents might still be alive. As for me, I was intrigued less by my mother's elation than by my father's hesitation
.”
“What about Jacob?”
“My little brother? I think I already told you. He was dead by then.”
“When? How?”
“You want me to repeat the story? One of my father's relatives knew Janusz Korczak. He got him to take Jacob into his house of children. Everyone knows that Korczak and all his little lodgers died in Treblinka.
“Do you miss your brother?”
“What kind of … indecent question is that? Of course I miss him.”
“Tell me about him.”
“No!”
“Why not?”
“Because it's none of your business.”
“Everything is my business—everything that concerns you. I have to know everything.”
“My little brother doesn't concern you.”
“But he's part of your life, isn't he?”
“Don't make me angry, Doctor. My little brother deserves to be left in peace.”
“But you think about it sometimes—”
“Be quiet, Doctor. Jacob is dead. He died far away from us, separated from me, an atrocious death. If you keep insisting, I'll get up and leave.”
A long silence sets in.
“And what about Dina?” the doctor finally asks. “What happened to her?”
“There too, I told you. The Resistance. The underground. She was arrested and tortured. Put in a train going east. Escaped. Came home to us, in the village. Murdered by a bastard. A bullet in the head. One week before the liberation.”
Thérèse turns the page of her notebook, then says, “You haven't said anything about your mother yet.”