The Librarian

by Mikhail Elizarov

  I shall take the memory of earthly milestones,

  I shall swim through fields of ripe, dense flax.

  There in the distance, there beside the blue stars,

  The Sun of Earth will shine to me.

  I shall take this whole big world,

  Its every day and every hour.

  And if I should forget anything,

  I doubt the stars will welcome us…

  Something infinitely dear, woven out of poplar fluff and rays of June sunshine, touched my cheek and flooded my meagre saliva with the taste of pear drops and the viscous intoxication of Hematogen candy, then turned its youthful face towards me and waved its hand once in farewell.

  The warm, happy tears were cooling in my eyes. I knew that I would no longer need the rusks and the rusty water, wearing down the glass drop by drop…

  * * *

  What year is it outside now? If the Motherland is free and its borders are inviolate, then the librarian Alexei Vyazintsev is keeping his watch steadfastly in his underground bunker, tirelessly spinning the thread of the protective Veil extended above the country. To protect against enemies both visible and invisible.

  I would like to think that on a summer evening someone walks along the high road outside town, past cherry orchards and glittering tin-plate roofs. The sunset has spread along the horizon in a thick beetroot trickle. Mulberry trees beside the road rustle and drop berries into the dust. The shoulder of the road is covered in mulberry blots. A slow truck with a loose, rattling frame has daubed a stroke of warm petrol fumes through the air; a goods train has clattered by behind a distant embankment; the wind has pulled the tall grass erect by its topknots…

  This has not happened yet, but it will be so.

  I shall finish writing the final words. I shall place the notebooks—a black one, a grey one, a light-blue one and three brown ones—in the niche of the lift. I shall close the hatch.

  Then I shall sit down at the table. I shall pluck up my courage. I shall open the first Book. I shall start in chronological order, with the Book of Strength.

  * * *

  I shall never die. And the green lamp will never go out.

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  Copyright

  Pushkin Press

  71–75 Shelton Street, London WC2H 9JQ

  Original text © 2007 Mikhail Elizarov.

  First published in Russian by Ad Marginem Press LLC

  The publication of this book was negotiated through Banke,

  Goumen & Smirnova Literary Agency (www.bgs-agency.com)

  English translation © Andrew Bromfield 2015

  The Librarian first published in Russian as

  Библиотекарь in 2007

  This translation first published by Pushkin Press in 2015

  This ebook edition published in 2015

  Published with the support of the Institute for Literary Translation, Russia

  ISBN 978 1 782270 84 3

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without prior permission in writing from Pushkin Press

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