by Dag Solstad
The next morning Professor Andersen and his colleague from Trondheim went skiing. His colleague drove out to a place called Bymarka, which was a popular skiing area. They took the skis and poles down from the roof rack and, standing next to the car, started to rub on wax. It was really miserable, chilly weather. Overcast, rather cold, and with snow and drizzle in the air. His colleague took the business of selecting ski wax very seriously. He had a thermometer with him, which he stuck in the snow to measure the temperature, then suggested to Professor Andersen that they should choose green wax as an under-coat, and blue wax on top of that, which Professor Andersen agreed with. He informed his colleague at the same time that, though it was true that he, like all Norwegians, was born with skis on his feet, nevertheless it was a long time ago, so he suggested they should go on a nice easy ski trip, something his colleague didn’t object to. With nice, easy strokes they set off through Bymarka in Trondheim. When they came to a downhill slope, his colleague set out boldly and confidently, while Professor Andersen stood a moment at the top and surveyed the situation, before he, too, set off. On the uphill slopes his colleague demonstrated his agility, and rushed upwards on light skis, while Professor Andersen again took it nice and easy and moved at his own pace. But over the flattish stretches they went side by side. After a while they arrived at a skiers’ cabin, where they went in and each had a hot blackcurrant drink. Professor Andersen took the opportunity, as he had done yesterday, to talk about something that was weighing on his mind. He was anxious about the future. His own future, as a professor of literature. Literature is not going to survive, not in the way we think of it. Its survival is just a matter of form, and that is no longer enough. All enthusiasm lies in the present, and in our day and age nothing can outdo the ability of commercialism to arouse enthusiasm and stir the hearts of the masses, and that is the spirit of the present time. He was afraid they had suffered a definitive defeat. They had to look this fact in the eye, if for no other reason than for their own peace of mind. He, for his part, couldn’t share the enthusiasm felt by the masses for the token forms of culture they were being offered; he didn’t understand how one could possibly feel enthusiastic about such things, but in practice it was quite evident that he erred, at any rate with regard to that. He didn’t want to comment on the quality of such culture, at least not to his colleague, who could see this too. He no longer wanted to conceal the fact that he thought the time he lived in was pathetic. He didn’t enjoy living in it at all, but at the same time he couldn’t present an alternative to it. ‘Because we aren’t timeless intellectuals, we are intellectuals in a commercial age, and deeply influenced by what stirs the hearts of the masses. What stirs the hearts of the masses are the consequences of our own inadequacy. Purely and simply. When were you last strongly stirred by watching or reading a Greek tragedy? I mean really stirred, shaken to the depths of your being. Not just nodding in recognition, quietly enjoying it, which we ought not to underestimate, that has to be said, quiet enjoyment has its significance, for the two of us. But stirred. As you can be when reading a novel from our own day and age? I think I’m on to something here. Our relationship to the past is marked by deep indifference, even if we do say something to the contrary, and even if we mean what we say when we say that it’s a matter of the greatest significance. Because it is a matter of the greatest significance, yet nevertheless we feel so bound to it by a sense of duty. It looks like our consciousness is insufficiently equipped to fulfil the body’s need for spiritual immortality. I can say that, being a professor of literature, and say it to you, my colleague. My nerves shriek in dread at the thought of no longer possessing a historical consciousness, because it means that our day and age will disappear along with us, so when we stage Ibsen at the National Theatre, my nerves relax, because if we can stage a play from the last century in one of the country’s finest buildings, with extensive publicity and often to a full house, then the coming generations may regard us in the same light. But it isn’t Ibsen’s work we perform, it’s Ibsen’s reputation. To the work as such, we are more or less indifferent, yes we are, now barely a hundred years after it was written. It’s the stage director’s work we see performed, Stein Winge’s or Kjetil Bang Hansen’s. It’s Winge’s work and Ibsen’s reputation. My stomach churns in protest at the thought of there being no reputation so great that it can’t survive a hundred years. We want to have immortal works, but do such things exist, for us? Ibsen’s best plays are just barely a hundred years old, we call them immortal already, but are they? Even now we can see how difficult it is to make them seem relevant to us. On stage they have to be modernised and made contemporary, so that we will experience something so-called great while watching them, and even then it doesn’t succeed, as a rule. And as drama to be read? Occasionally I think, after having read through and studied, for instance, Ghosts: well, was that all? Was there nothing else? Was this the most outstanding accomplishment of the 1880s, was this the most outstanding intellectual accomplishment in Europe in the nineteenth century? Certainly it’s good, but is it really the most outstanding achievement that can be accomplished? It will probably turn out that it is, but my question still remains: was that all? Is there nothing else? I have actually studied Ghosts for years, and know that it’s perfect. Yes I am and will continue to be impressed by what it is, perfect, but nonetheless I ask: was that all? Was that it? I am not stirred by it. I’m not shaken. Not like the audience when it was performed for the first time, as a contemporary event. In my case it has not survived as the actual revelation it once was, and so how can I carry out my duty to society, which is to pass this play down to new generations? I’m in doubt, I’m so terribly in doubt about my own function in this age, which I really cannot stand any longer. The ravages of time, that is what gnaws at me, destroying everything. The ravages of time gnaw at even the most outstanding intellectual accomplishments and destroy them, making them pale and faded.’ ‘But you must be able to accept the patina of time,’ his colleague said suddenly.
His colleague had been sitting, listening calmly to Professor Andersen’s outpourings, because he probably understood that they came from the heart, and therefore didn’t interrupt him. But now he could no longer hold his tongue, and a discussion arose between the two gentlemen about the patina of time. A discussion about the upheavals versus the quiet enjoyment afforded by art, and about whether it wasn’t their task as professors of literature to pass on this quiet enjoyment, and not the stirring aspects, to their students. His colleague strongly maintained that it was their task to convey a sense of quiet enjoyment, and not stirring emotions, which in any case, as Professor Andersen so rightly pointed out, had been lost long ago in the historic moments from which the work of art had once sprung. The essential thing to recognise, and enjoy, was the noble patina which rested on a work of art which had lasted beyond its own century. ‘That is also historical awareness. Nothing else is in our power, and that is enough,’ maintained his colleague. ‘That is answer enough with regard to our deep desire to have something that outlasts us.’ He wasn’t stirred by reading Dante’s The Divine Comedy, not even by its depictions of Hell, and it wasn’t something he missed. But he could quietly and genuinely enjoy reading this work written in Florence in the thirteenth century, both because it actually was accessible to him, a Norwegian at the end of the twentieth century, and because the conditions both he and Professor Andersen endured in life, when all was said and done, were such that it was possible for him, after painstaking study, to relate to the work itself, yes, even to understand it. That the freshness was gone wasn’t something he missed, the noble weight bestowed by the patina fully compensated for that. Professor Andersen maintained in reply that his colleague probably didn’t fully understand what he was attempting to say, nor to what extent it troubled him. He certainly didn’t underrate the noble patina, he merely wanted to point out the consequences of the fact that there is no great stir in the modern sense when studying and gaining insight into a canonical work, consequ
ences which Professor Andersen suspected might be approaching the dreadful consequences that spring out of breaking a taboo, or tampering with one. The silent despair of someone who does something like that. Indeed, he had to be allowed to express himself in this way, even if it didn’t sound sufficiently stringent to his colleague, because the thoughts he had were rather vague, but were no less troublesome on that account. He was obliged to question whether the quiet enjoyment his colleague talked about was an expression of perplexity with regard to history, and our true relationship to it. That there is an element of resignation involved, that he fully understood and respected, indeed, he dared also say, shared; even so it alleviated an unease he was no longer capable of alleviating. The suspicion that human consciousness was not sufficient to create works of art fit to survive their own period. The futile battle of consciousness against time. ‘The patina is necessary to cover up this horrifying state of affairs, that is what I am afraid of,’ said Professor Andersen. ‘We have such a burning desire for something we are incapable of achieving, and we can’t bear to face up to this lack of ability. We can’t, because that will drown our consciousness, and with it human dignity. One may find the meaninglessness great enough as it is, even in a world which believes in immortality through great intellectual accomplishments which survive the ravages of time. Which the ravages of time do not affect. Oh, what a marvellous thought, what a pleasing concept that expresses. Indeed, perhaps we can compare this to our own individual lives and the bright expectations we have about our experiences. All of us would like to become wiser individuals as the years pass, but is it true that we do? In my case it definitely isn’t. I’m not a wiser person now than when I was twenty-five years old, I’m just older. The experiences I’ve had aren’t worth much to anyone but myself. My experiences are of no value so they can be passed on to others, and younger individuals; they are a burden I have to bear alone. I have to relate to my experiences, mainly as impediments that make me mindful of my age, so I don’t continue to act “youthful”, “young in spirit”, something which is distasteful, if I may say so.’ ‘Now I’m beginning to understand a little of what you mean,’ his colleague interjected. ‘And everything is pretty black, really. You cast doubt on everything you can cast doubt on, and I must simply admit my situation in life is not such that there is any attraction in letting myself be tempted by your points of view. No, Pål, old chap, if we want to get down to the car before it gets dark, we’ll just have to get a move on.’
They stood up. They had been sitting in the crowded ski cabin for several hours. It had already begun to grow dark outside, the daylight hours are so short up here in the north in December. They had a place at a large table for six at first, but moved over to a table for two when it became vacant. Throughout the tirades and the discussion which arose, Professor Andersen had got up twice and stood in the queue to buy them coffee; on one occasion he had also brought a plate with two Danish pastries back to the table. New skiers kept coming into the ski cabin, bringing with them a whiff of fresh snow and wind into the packed, slightly clammy premises. There was the tramp of boots, the smell of ski wax, and of caps and mittens and scarfs. However, when Professor Andersen and his colleague got up and left, it was beginning to thin out.
They fastened their skis on and took hold of their ski poles. His colleague sped off down the slope, in the tracks between the silver-grey and gloomy fir trees, and came to a halt down there to wait for Professor Andersen, who was still standing at the top and taking his time. He calculated his own route down with as long and wide turns as possible, before setting off downhill and completing the downhill slopes in accordance with his calculations, wobbling down-wards without falling, and not without a certain inherited mastery over his skis, unfit though he was. At the bottom his colleague was still waiting, and they continued together across the open, gently sloping ground, his colleague first and Professor Andersen after him, a little out of breath, despite the fact that his colleague went at as slow a pace as possible. It got darker and darker before they could catch a glimpse of the lit car park in the distance. Then his colleague said that he would like to speed up a little on the last part, and set off, agilely, while Professor Andersen continued at the same pace, perhaps a little slower. When he reached the car, his colleague had already fastened his skis on to the roof rack and stood stretching out. He said that now it would be good to come home to dinner, in a tone which made Professor Andersen wonder if he didn’t expect Professor Andersen to join him. So he mentioned in passing that he intended to eat dinner alone at the hotel today. His colleague protested energetically. ‘But Mette has been making food all day!’ he exclaimed. ‘She has really been looking forward to serving you genuine Trøndelag sodd. You can’t turn that down now!’ Professor Andersen realised this, and sat in the passenger seat beside his colleague and went home with him for dinner.
His young wife, Mette, was sitting in the living room breast-feeding their child. She gave them a friendly smile. Afterwards, she carried the child into the bedroom so that it could sleep. They sat down at the table. His colleague opened a bottle of lager, which he poured out for Professor Andersen and himself. ‘Oh, there’s nothing like coming home to lovely hot sodd after a good long ski-trip!’ he exclaimed, with a sigh of satisfaction. Professor Andersen said he agreed. Mette smiled and said she thought she ought to make it, since he got ready-made fishcakes yesterday. She couldn’t put the cathedral city to shame, as she said. After the meal they had coffee, and Professor Andersen was obliged to have a drop of karsk in his cup again. The atmosphere was cosy, and Professor Andersen thought he had to do something in return. Therefore, he invited them out to dinner the next evening. At Palmehaven, the high-class restaurant at the Britannia Hotel. He saw that Mette was glad to be invited out, for she immediately began to discuss getting a babysitter with her husband. They sat talking about this, that and the other, until Professor Andersen stood up early in the evening and said that now he had to get back to the hotel. He asked his colleague to phone for a taxi. Back at the hotel he called room service for a double whisky and soda, and afterwards took a stroll around the town. He popped into a restaurant where there were a number of people and had a beer there, before he walked back to the hotel again and went to bed early, after a short visit to the bar.
In the morning he woke up very early, in the pitch-dark. ‘Henrik Nordstrøm.’ The name. It didn’t have to be him. The man in the window didn’t have to be Henrik Nordstrøm. Henrik Nordstrøm was just the name that was on the doorbell which belonged to the apartment where he had seen a murder being committed. It could have been rented out to another person, for a long or a short period of time, most likely short, since Henrik Nordstrøm’s name was still there on its own without anyone else’s taped over it. Or it could have been lent out to a friend at Christmas, either by Henrik Nordstrøm or by his possible tenants. Or even worse: the tenant was a woman, the woman he had seen standing at the window just before midnight on the night before Christmas Day. Professor Andersen turned cold inside. He got up straight away, turned on the light, looked at his watch. Half past six. He had to get back to Oslo immediately. He mustn’t lose him. What if he had disappeared already? He called reception to request them to make up the bill. Got ready to leave. He was in a daze. He felt that he might have made an irreversible blunder going off in the way he had done. Down at reception he asked the man behind the desk to phone the airport and book a seat on the first plane available. That was done, and soon after Professor Andersen was sitting in the back seat of a taxi on his way out to Værnes Airport.
At Værnes he managed to phone his colleague and apologise, saying that he unfortunately had to leave for Oslo, for he had received a message which meant that he had to return straight away. Where he came from, he added to himself. On the plane he ploughed through the newspapers. Nothing. There was nothing outside the windows either. Thick mist. Grey. White. His eyes smarted from looking out and down. The plane lurched due to air turbulence. Rough Norwegi
an weather. He couldn’t avoid having a guilty conscience. Towards his colleague and his young wife. He had, after all, invited them to dinner at Palmehaven tonight. They had been looking forward to it, and he had been looking forward to it himself because they, especially the young wife, Mette, so evidently and candidly had been looking forward to it. He recollected that he hadn’t even cancelled the table he had reserved yesterday evening, a table for three at Palmehaven. But he would have to do that when he arrived in Oslo. He felt a bit sorry for his colleague, who probably didn’t have much cash, starting a second family had its costs, even for a professor of literature, especially when the possessions of one’s former life were to be divided in two, and not a penny less, he reckoned, bearing in mind what he knew about his colleague’s ex-wife. It had therefore been something for them to look forward to, having dinner with the lavish colleague from Oslo (Professor Andersen). They had fixed up a babysitter, too, and then he, Professor Andersen, had just done a runner from the whole thing. It wasn’t on. No, it wasn’t on.
In the taxi from Fornebu Airport to Skillebekk he tried to calm himself down, but couldn’t. He was too tense. He hastily opened the main door of the building where he lived, and went quickly up the stairs and unlocked the door to his apartment. He went straight over to the window. The curtains were drawn back, but there was no sign of anyone in there. In other words he had to prepare himself for a wait. Waiting took a long time, remarkably long it seemed, although he tried, and partly succeeded, to do some routine work, such as washing up, putting a load of washing in the machine, reading a little in a book, Thomas Mann’s Joseph and His Brothers, which he held in high regard, but this idle waiting and unbearable tension, and almost panic-stricken fear that it would turn out that the suspicion he’d had, when he woke up in a daze in Trondheim earlier that day, had been justified, was followed by a tremendous feeling of relief when he caught a glimpse of a shadow that passed through early in the afternoon, in a room where the light still hadn’t been turned on. Then the light was turned on. He felt relieved, although he couldn’t be certain who was in there, but he thought it might be the youngish man who had been standing there on Boxing Day in the evening, though he couldn’t be absolutely certain before the man appeared at the window. He did so not long afterwards, and it turned out that it was him. He was still there, then, and Professor Andersen could breathe a sigh of relief. But just then he was gripped by anxiety. Professor Andersen’s reflexive consciousness surfaced suddenly and anxiety flowed through his body. For what was really about to happen to him? For the relief he felt now was actually frightening. Really it ought to have been quite the opposite. He was feeling relieved because he, the murderer, was still there. Imagine if Professor Andersen’s suspicion in Trondheim this morning had been right! That he had vanished, and wouldn’t turn up again, that he had just borrowed the apartment for Christmas and now had left it again, and quite simply disappeared out of Professor Andersen’s life, what a relief that ought to have been! When that wasn’t the case, but on the contrary quite the opposite, it made Professor Andersen extremely worried. He was concerned about himself, and more intensely than he could remember ever having been before. He was so concerned about himself that he noticed he was trembling and sweating from pure anxiety. ‘I’m damned,’ he thought. ‘Now it has happened. I’m not able to go through with this.’ But he couldn’t put a stop to it. With alert self-scrutiny he observed himself as if through a transparent membrane. He couldn’t reach himself through this film. He was, indeed, a damned soul. Behind this transparent membrane. He came home from Trondheim four days after Christmas Day, and up until after New Year’s Day his powers of observation and concentration were directed at the window on the other side of the street, and at the figure inside, whom he was afraid would disappear from sight, since it might still be the case that he had just borrowed the apartment for Christmas and would disappear unnoticed, for instance with a small suitcase, for instance on 2 January, more than likely in the early morning. In this way he was tied to this murderer, of whom he had failed to notify the authorities.