The Hooligan's Return

by Norman Manea

  I had been born a Romanian citizen, of parents and grandparents who had been Romanian nationals themselves. The books from before my birth told of Hooligan Years. The horror could not, apparently, annul the charm. They seemed inseparable emblems of the times.

  Before the Initiation I knew nothing of these things, happy as I was in a happy, sunlit world. Only at the age of five did I myself become a public enemy, the impure product of an impure placenta. It was then, in October 1941, that the Initiation began. At the final count, after four years, the numbers of the fallen came to about half of those who had been delivered to the great void. I was among the lucky who survived, and in July 1945, I was safely back in Paradise, overwhelmed by the everyday miracles of a fairy-tale normality — narrow streets dripping with green foliage and festooned with flowers, ample, kindhearted aunts, who reintroduced me to the delicious taste of milk and pies. The name of this Eden was Fălticeni, the place where the bus of destiny had left from nine years before.

  It was a languid, deserted afternoon, in a shaded room. Alone in the universe, I was listening to a voice that at the same time was and was not my own. I was immersed in a book with thick green covers, a book of folktales that I had received as a gift a few days earlier, on the nineteenth of July.

  It was then, probably, that it began, the disease and the therapy of words. I had already experienced the need for something else, an urgent, all-consuming need, when, at the age of four, I had made my first attempt at escape into nowhere. Now literature opened a dialogue with invisible friends, rescuing me from the disfiguring grip of authority. The system was doing everything in its power to liberate us from the chains of hope, but we were still imperfect and prone to hope. Only those who took a romantic and fatalistic view of art and writing as being ill-fated activities could not be scandalized by the threats against writing under the dictatorship. What was indubitably scandalous, however, was the fact that all those deprivations and dangers had become common currency, as though all the citizens had to atone for some obscure guilt. In the society of institutionalized lies the individual self could survive only in those enclaves that protected privacy, however imperfectly.

  The evening of July 19, 1986, was one such enclave, perhaps our final one. But despair had already insinuated itself into each of us who was present that night. Our small isolation cell was no longer the ivory tower of olden times.

  In April 1945, the charm of places that had been reborn with my own rebirth seemed not only irresistible but also inexhaustible. Horror had receded into the past. I had banished it, not without irritation, shrugging it off as the “disease of the ghetto.” External adversity seemed to disappear, but the internal one, of which Sebastian had been so proud, remained as its residue. The decades that followed were filled with daily attempts to negotiate the strange compatibility between horror and charm, the inexhaustible combustion of confusion. By 1986, what should have been clear forty years earlier, when I had taken shelter between the green covers of the book of folktales, finally became obvious. Communist horror under the tyrant clown not only replaced the previous horror but coopted it.

  Must I remain in the place where, at the age of nine, the magic of words had enfolded me, moored in the language in which I was born again and again, day after day? I knew by now that the process of rebirth could be abruptly halted at any time, the following morning, or even that very evening.

  I had postponed the decision of departure to that limit of limits, the fiftieth anniversary of Bloomsday. Did departure actually mean a return to the “disease of the ghetto,” from which I had always tried to protect myself? Perhaps not, for no return is ever possible, not even a return to the ghetto.

  The evening of celebration had become one last exercise in separation. The relation between charm and horror had shifted again. Long after midnight, after the guests had left, I looked in bewilderment at my own hands — a child’s nails, a child’s fingers, a child’s hands. They did not seem tough enough for the birth to come.

  Maria

  One day, Mrs. Beraru offered me some potatoes and onions,” Mother was saying. “They had four grown-up sons who worked hard and brought food home. But one can only take if one can give back, I told her. She answered in German: Wenn die Not am gröβten, ist Gott am nãcbsten, when the need is greatest, God is closest. Well, it’s too late for that, I said. Then I saw Erika Heller standing in the doorway. Sie haben Gane, she said, You have guests. It was Maria.”

  The tape recording from the spring of 1986, the time of the Chernobyl explosion, tells the story: “This was how Maria reappeared, out of the blue. At the time of our deportation, she almost got shot, she was almost arrested, but she didn’t give up until she found us. One fine morning she appeared at the camp’s guardhouse. She asked for a certain Jewish man, an accountant, So-and-so by name, and they brought out Marcu. When she saw him, and when he saw her… She had brought everything — oranges, cake, chocolate.”

  The orphan Maria was like a member of the family, and had acquired absolute power over all household matters, including the newborn baby. She was the Good Fairy and I adored her. In October 1941, when we were sent to the labor camp in Transnistria, the guards had a hard time getting her off the train. She tried to squeeze herself into the cattle car — it was dirty, crammed with bodies and packages — in her determination to accompany those she considered her own family. She failed, but she didn’t give up and managed to reach us a few months later.

  “She had money,” Mother continued, “she wanted to open a tobacco shop next to the camp, to be nearby in order to help us. Of course, they wouldn’t let her. The Romanian administrator of the camp offered her a job as a housemaid in his own home. She was young and pretty. In Iţcani, officers and various functionaries were always swarming around her. Bartfeld the photographer even proposed to her, several times. The camp administrator was willing to pay her twenty liters of gasoline per day; even with only five liters you could buy huge amounts of food. Maria asked us what she should do. What could we tell her? To sell herself for our sakes? Finally, the administrator persuaded her to come work for him, but he didn’t keep his word. He was a mean, lying man and didn’t give her the promised gasoline. Maria went back to Romania. She promised she’d come back, and she did, loaded with suitcases. She’d been collecting money from our relatives back in Romania. She knew everyone who had not been deported, and contacted every one of them. She was well-known to them and considered them relatives. She’d bought all sorts of things, she knew what we needed. Of course, they confiscated her parcels, and then they court-martialed her for helping Jews.”

  When we returned from the camp, in 1945, we took a detour through Fălticeni and Rădăuti, for two years, before returning to Suceava, to our point of departure. In 1947, the circle finally closed in Suceava, where we had a reunion with Maria — Comrade Maria now, wife of the Communist Party Secretary and future first lady of the city.

  Long Live the King!

  A bitter winter, December 1947. I was temporarily back in Fălticeni, where I would be spending the Christmas holiday. The town was in an uproar. The sudden abdication of King Michael had just been made public. For the Communists, this was hardly a surprise. Presumably the local Stalinists had been alerted even before the news came over the radio. There was no other way to explain the “spontaneous” eruption of popular enthusiasm that greeted the announcement.

  Both our deportation in 1941 and our repatriation in 1945 had taken place during the reign of King Michael, who succeeded to the throne after his father, Carol II, the playboy king, had scandalized the Romanian political establishment with his dissolute behavior, to say nothing of his relationship with Elena Lupescu, his redheaded mistress, presumed to be Jewish. First crowned when he was three, Michael was crowned a second time as a teenager, in September 1941, following his father’s ouster at the hands of the Legionnaires in league with Marshal Antonescu. The young king had little opportunity to prove himself. During the war, he kept to his largely cere
monial role, in the shadow of his mother and under the thumb of the Conductor, the country’s dictator, Ion Antonescu.

  In August 1944, after Antonescu’s arrest and the armistice with the Allies, King Michael was decorated by Stalin. Now his portrait and that of the Queen Mother hung prominently, alongside that of Joseph Stalin, in all the country’s classrooms. He had a pleasant face with an open gaze, and preferred racing cars and airplanes to the machinations of power and government. The “King’s Anthem” would open all public ceremonies, while the “Internationale” would close them. The rather insipid sentiments of “Long live the King, in peace and splendor, long live the country’s father and defender” paled beside the thunder of “Arise, ye prisoners of starvation.”

  My cousins falic and Lonciu, both printers, and their father, coowner of the printing house Tipo along with his partner Tache, were among those cheering the crowds dancing in the city streets, stomping, chanting enthusiastically, “The Republic, the Republic, the People are now king, the People are now king.” The accordionist released the ample bellows of his instrument, and the dancing resumed, as did the chanting of “Long live the Republic and the People.” I stood and stared, frozen on the edge of the sidewalk. Then I made my way to the marketplace, where Uncle Aron had a small tavern.

  Many things had happened in the two years since I had left Fălticeni to go back to Suceava, but the event of December 30, 1947, capped them all — the King had abdicated! I was no monarchist, but I could sense danger in the air. The change celebrated by all the chanters and dancers in the town square heralded something new, good or bad — who could tell. The fairy tale can change from one perfidious disguise to another when you least expect it. The monarchy was gone; henceforth, we would be living in the People’s Republic of Romania.

  I arrived at Uncle Aron’s tavern out of breath, and told him the shocking news. He nodded without much interest, he had more urgent business to attend to. Without stopping to take off my overcoat, I went over to inform Aunt Rachel, who would surely appreciate the enormity of the event. She must also have heard about the group of Jews who not long before had left for the Holy Land, determined to break the British blockade, then in effect, that closed the gates of Palestine to Jewish immigration. They had to steal into the land, and if caught, risked detention in Cyprus. “They went on aliya, they emigrated to Palestine,” whispered the women watching from the sidewalk, as the masses continued to pour into the streets. But Aunt Rachel didn’t raise an eyebrow at the news and, with the kindness and calm that belonged to other times, only insisted that I take off my coat, warm myself, and have something to eat.

  Uncle Aron’s and Aunt Rachel’s indifference did not reassure me. On the contrary, I sensed that their seeming indifference masked a hidden fear. They seemed to be concealing something they could not entrust to the frightened child who had just rushed in, breathless, having witnessed a Communist demonstration. I told Uncle Aron that I wanted to return to Suceava. He gave me a long look and, to my amazement, agreed. “Fine, you can go back home,” he said. “I want to go immediately,” I said. Husband and wife exchanged glances, then looked with concern at their distressed nephew. A brief silence followed, while they were deciding how to deal with these hysterics. “Fine, Bernard will harness the horse,” my uncle said calmly. Aunt Rachel was silent, but her hands twisted nervously. Their son Bernard, who was deaf, was sent for. He was given to understand, through expressive mouthings and gestures, that he was to harness the sleigh horse. “In half an hour,” said Aron and Rachel, pointing to the clock on the wall, “everything must be ready.” Bernard was as deaf as a radish, but he understood the instructions.

  Only then did the unexpected guest take off his overcoat and sit down to eat as he was invited to do. He savored the meatballs, the fresh salad and bread. When he was done, Bernard, smiling, pointed to the clock. Hurriedly, he put on his overcoat again, pulled the cap well over his ears, and put on his gloves. He was ready to go. Uncle Aron embraced him, Aunt Rachel kissed him, Bernard took his hand, the sleigh was waiting in the courtyard. They swathed him in blankets, furs, and straw, and off he went on his Arctic expedition.

  They rode through hissing wind, swirling snow, furious gusts. The road was a glistening white, the sky was white, the horse white, an end less expanse of white desert through which the sleigh, driven by the mighty White Knight, glided effortlessly, to the sound of fairy-tale bells jingling on the horse’s strong, slender neck. It was freezing cold, the many blankets were soft, the sheepskin enormous, all covered by a heap of straw. Still, despite his thick woolen socks and solid boots, the passenger’s feet were turning to icicles. The sleigh driver, well insulated by his stocky physique, drove on, unheeding, deaf to the howling around him. The white road seemed without end. The biting cold, the swirling snow, the clip-clop of the horses’ hooves, their vapory snorts, the slithering of the sleigh’s runners, the insanely jingling bells, the desperate wailing of the wind — an endless terror.

  Home at last, the child of the snows was carefully unwrapped from his swaddling clothes and immediately set down by the hot stove. He was given a cup of hot tea sweetened with honey. He was babbling away, muttering nonsense; his mother and father couldn’t understand what it was he wanted. “Leaving, leave, leave, leaving,” he kept saying, with strength for only one syllable at a time. “Im-me-di-ate-ly, im-me-di-ate-ly,” was all they could make out from his mewing sounds. “Leaving? You’ve only just got here,” came Father’s voice through the distance. “Tomorrow. Morning. We’re leaving,” the little Eskimo repeated. “Who’s leaving? Where to?” Mother kept asking in complete bewilderment. “Tomorrow. Immediately. Tomorrow morning.” There were no protests, no laughter. “Fine, we’ll see about it tomorrow. For the time being, drink your tea. You’re frozen, drink your tea.”

  “No, no,” said the small voice again. “It’s over, over.” He kept staring into his cup. “You must promise me.” They did not contradict him, nor did they agree. “Promise! Now, now, you must promise,” he insisted, his wool-clad feet knocking furiously, rhythmically, against the wooden table leg. Someone had taken off my frozen boots and I sat there in my thick woolen socks, kicking angrily against the leg of the table where my refilled teacup had been placed. “Drink, just drink your tea for now. We’ll talk about it tomorrow.” I had heard it all before — the cautious, fearful message of the Old World, the archaic code, the compromises, the stagnant stasis of terrors. These things exasperated me, they suffocated me, as they always had. “All right, we promise, word of honor. Now drink your tea while it’s hot,” I heard their gentle, hypocritical voices, the delaying counsel of the ghetto, from which I longed to escape.

  Almost forty years had passed since that winter of 1947, when my desire to leave had exploded into hysterics. In the meantime, I had learned to sing a different song. The hesitations, the refusal to swap the exile at home for a real, inevitable exile, had become my ongoing lot.

  Utopia

  It was now the summer of 1948, and I found myself looking forward to attending the State Primary School No. I, a white one-story building located in the midst of the town park. Education reform had done away with private schools, and my new school meant new friends, new teachers, and perhaps a new me, immersed in geometry theorems, the laws of physics, and the history of the Middle Ages. Later in the term, the school principal solemnly informed me that I was eligible to join the Pioneers, an organization intended for only the best pupils between nine and fourteen years of age. My scholastic achievements entitled me to become the “commander” of our school’s Pioneers troop, and I expressed my feelings in a poetic report in the local newspaper, Lupta Poporului (The People’s Combat). On Sunday, May 29, 1949, a Party activist, a former railway worker, tied the sacred red scarf around my neck and ceremonially handed me the red flag with gold lettering. The Union of Working Youth was to be our older-brother organization, and the Party, our parent. The activist, speaking to the audience gathered in the park, spelled out the mission e
ntrusted to the youngest soldiers of the Party. “In the cause of Lenin and Stalin, onward!” he concluded. The infants’ infantry responded with one voice: “Forever onward!”

  Thus at age thirteen — the traditional Jewish coming-of-age — I became a partner in the task of righting the world’s wrongs. The occasion was celebrated with cakes and sweets at Wagner’s Confectionery. In 1949, in its narrow basement, the establishment still offered pastries and ices in the imperial tradition, of the kind that were available only in decadent, capitalist Vienna. This was the kind of “bourgeois” celebration that I would enjoy many times in my revolutionary career as a fervent partisan of the revolution.

  After meeting Comrade Victor Varasciuc, Maria’s husband and the leader of the local Communist organization, my father’s situation also changed in a decisive way. The former accountant’s cautious moderation had kept him away from politics. After the war, he avoided the Communists, the Liberals, and the Zionists alike. But this time, the suggestion for Mr. Marcu Manea to join the Party came from a most authoritative source. Mr. Manea was a man whose honesty and decency were vouched for by Comrade Varasciuc’s own wife. Mr. Manea, it was suggested, should take his rightful place among those engaged in building a society of equality and justice, with no exploitation or discrimination. After all, wasn’t it capitalist exploitation under which the employee of the sugar factory in Içcani had toiled? And should Mr. Manea not bear in mind the racial discrimination he had suffered as a deportee in the camps of Transnistria? Maria, Comrade Victor’s wife, had been like one of the family. More enterprising than our own relatives, she had tried during the war to help us, or even save us from the camp where we had been sent by Marshal Antonescu, Hitler’s ally. The Communists had executed the Marshal and were now gradually assuming power with the support of the Red Army, which had freed us from the camps, saving our lives.