Ferdydurke (7 page)

Hey, lads and Falcons, give him vigor and brawn, Wake him up from the dead, make him rise and live on!

The song, which they took up instantly, grew and swelled, crested and rolled like a wave. They stood motionless, singing, and, with Syphon's lead, fixed their gaze on a distant star and also at the very noses of their assailants. Whereupon the assailants' clenched fists dropped helplessly to their sides. They no longer had any idea how to get at their opponents, how to provoke or taunt them—while the others sang with ever greater power, ardor, and fervor, aiming their star-inspired song straight at the noses of their assailants. One after another of Kneadus' followers whispered something under his breath, fidgeted in his place, shifted aimlessly this way and that, then stepped aside, until finally there was nothing left for Kneadus to do but clear his throat uneasily and walk away.

. . . Sometimes a morbid dream will take us to a land where everything chokes us, corrupts and inhibits us because it pertains to the time of our youth and is therefore young, yet it has now become outworn, old, and archaic, and there is no torment equal to the torment of such a dream, such a land. There is nothing more horrible than to delve into issues one has long outgrown, the old  issues of youth and immaturity that have long since been pushed into a corner and settled ... for example the question of innocence. Oh, threefold wise are they who live solely by today's concerns, the concerns of maturity and of the prime of life, leaving outdated problems to elderly aunts. Because making the choice as to the subject matter and the issues one will address is immensely important to the individual, just as it is to entire nations, and we so often see that a person who is mature and sagacious in his dealings with mature matters becomes, in the twinkling of an eye, painfully immature when confronted with matters that are too puerile or too far in the past—and incompatible with the spirit of the times and the rhythm of history. Truly, there is no easier way of inflicting naivete and infantilizing humanity than by presenting it with problems of this kind, and I must admit that Pimko, with a masterly skill worthy of the most eminent and consummate of all profs, embroiled me and my schoolmates in a dialectic and in a set of problems that were more infantilizing than one could ever imagine. I thus found myself in the epicenter of a tirelessly belittling and devaluing dream.

A flock of pigeons flew by in the autumn sun and air, then swept in over the roof, touched down on the oak, and flew off again. Kneadus, unable to stomach Syphon's triumphant song, dragged himself, along with Mizdral and Hopek, to the far corner of the school yard. After a while he recovered and regained his speech. He stared va-cantly at the ground, then finally exploded:

"Well—and what now?!"

"What now?" replied Mizdral, "nothing, except that we must redouble our energies, and go on using the choicest obscenities we know! Four-letter words, four-letter words—that's our only weapon. That's a guy's weapon!"

"What, again?" Kneadus asked. "Again? Till they're sick of it? Round and round in circles? Keep repeating our tune just because Syphon is humming his tune?"

He broke down. He opened his hands, retreated a couple of steps, and looked around. The heavens above drooped, light, pale, cool, and sneering, while the tree—that stalwart oak in the school yard-turned its back and the old janitor by the gate laughed up his sleeve and walked away.

"A farmhand," whispered Kneadus, "a farmhand ... think of it— what if some farmhand overheard our intellectual drivel. . ." And, suddenly terrified, he tried to escape, he wanted to make a run for it in the limpid air. "Enough, enough, I've had it with the lad and the guy, I've had enough..."

His friends caught up with him.

"Hey Kneadie, what's the matter with you?" they said, bathed in the limpid air, "you're our leader! We can't manage without you!"

Seized and held by his wrists, Kneadus bowed his head and said bitterly:

"Tough luck..."

Mizdral and Hopek were shocked and speechless. In his distraction Mizdral picked up a piece of wire and absentmindedly poked it through a hole in the fence, injuring the eye of one of the mothers. But he threw the wire away immediately. The mother groaned behind the fence. Finally Hopek asked timidly:

"Well, Kneadie, what next?"

Kneadus shook off his momentary dejection.

"There's no other way—we must fight!" he said, "fight till we drop!"

"Hooray!" they exclaimed. "That's what we want to hear! You're our man, our old Kneadus!"

But the leader again waved his hand with an air of hopelessness.

"Oh, save your breath! Your cries are no better than Syphon's song! However, what must be must be. You want to fight, do you? But fighting isn't the answer. Let's say we knock his teeth out, so what? That's playing right into his hands—we'll make him a martyr, and then you'll see what unshaken yet oppressed innocence he'll lord over us. Besides, even if we were to launch an attack, you saw what happened—they'll put on such a pretense of bravery that even the toughest in our group will turn tail and run. No, that won't do! And all the rest of it—curses, misdemeanors of all sorts, filth—it's all useless, useless! It's only grist for his mill, I tell you, it's just baby's milk for his 'lad.' I'm sure he's counting on it! No, no, but fortunately," and here Kneadus' voice became strangely rabid, "as luck would have it, there is another way... that's more effective ... we'll take away, once and for all, his inclination to sing."

"How?" they asked with a glimmer of hope.

"Gentlemen," he said, dryly and to the point, "since Syphon isn't willing, we'll have to initiate him by force. We'll capture him and tie him up. As luck would have it, there is a way to get inside him— through the ears. We'll tie him up, and we'll initiate him so that even his own mother won't recognize him! We'll destroy the little treasure once and for all! But be quiet! Get some ropes ready!"

I listened to this plot with bated breath, my heart pounding in my chest, but at that moment Pimko appeared in the door of the school building and beckoned me to come with him to Principal Piorkowski. The pigeons were back again. Flapping their wings, they settled on the fence behind which the mothers were peeking. I walked down the long corridor, frantically seeking a way to explain myself, to protest, but I couldn't do it because Pimko was spitting into every spittoon we passed along the way and told me to do the same... I just couldn't speak out... and so, spitting and walking, we reached Principal Piôrkowski's office. Piôrkowski, a giant among giants, sitting there with absolute power and authority, received us graciously, then promptly gave me a fatherly pinch on the cheek and, with an air of cordiality, stroked my chin, so I bowed instead of protesting while he, speaking above my head, addressed Pimko in a bass-baritone.

"Oh, the pupa, pupa, pupa! Thank you for remembering us here, dear Professor! And God bless you, dear colleague, for the new pupil! If everyone were as good at belittling as you are, our school would be twice as big! The pupa, pupa, pupa. Would you believe that when we artificially belittle and infantilize adults we get better results than we do with children in their natural state? Oh, the pupa, the pupa, there would be no school without pupils, and no life without school! I commend myself to you, my institution doubtless continues to deserve support, our methods of turning out the pupa have no equal, and the teaching body is meticulously selected with that in mind. Would you like to see the body?"

"But of course, my pleasure," Pimko replied, "as you well know-nothing influences the spirit as much as the body does." The principal half-opened the door to the staff room, both men peeked in, and I with them. I was appalled! In the large room teachers sat at a table drinking tea and munching on bread rolls. Never before had I seen a gathering of so many, so hopeless little old men. Most of them were sniveling, one was chomping on his food, a second one was smacking his lips, a third was sucking his tea, a fourth was slurping, a fifth was bald and sad, while the French teacher's eyes watered, and she kept wiping them with the corner of her handkerchief.

"Yes, Professor," the principal said proudly, "the body has been carefully chosen for their exceptionally disagreeable and annoying qualities, there is not one pleasant body here, all strictly pedagogical, as you can see for yourself, and, if once in a while circumstances force me to hire a younger teacher, I make sure that he has at least one repulsive trait. Take the history teacher, for instance—he is, regretfully, in the prime of his life and at first glance appears to be all right, but please note that he is cross-eyed."

"Yes, but the French teacher seems pleasant enough," Pimko said in an informal tone.

"She stutters, and her eyes are always watering."

"Ah yes! You're right, I didn't notice it at first. But isn't she rather interesting?"

"Not at all, I can't converse with her for more than a minute without yawning at least twice."

"Ah, well, I see your point! But do they have enough experience and tact to teach, are they sufficiently aware of the magnitude of their mission?"

"These are the soundest brains in the capital," replied the principal, "but not one of them has a single thought of his own in his head; if one of them should spawn a thought, I'd be sure to chase away either the thought or the thinker. They're actually a bunch of harmless duffers, they teach only what's in their worksheets, and, no, they don't entertain a single thought of their own."

"That's the pupa, the pupa," said Pimko, "I can see I'm placing my Joey in good hands. Because there is nothing worse than teachers who are personable, especially if they happen to have opinions of their own. Only a truly irksome pedagogue can inculcate the pupils with that adorable immaturity, that engaging helplessness and clumsiness, that lack of
savoir vivre
that should be the hallmark of our youth so they'll provide a target for us, the earnest and inspired pedagogues that we are. And we need the help of such well-chosen staff to infantilize the whole world."

"Tst, tst, tst," said Principal Piorkowski, pulling Pimko by the sleeve, "sure, that's the pupa, but be quiet, don't talk about it too loudly."

At that moment one body turned to another and asked:

"Ho, ho, hmm, well, what's up? What's up, my dear colleague?"

"What's up?" replied the other body, "I thought prices had gone down."

"Gone down?" said the first body, "I thought prices had gone up."

"Gone up?" asked the second body, "I thought they had gone down slightly."

"The price of bread rolls just isn't going down," muttered the first body, and tucked away the rest of his unfinished roll into his pocket.

"I keep them on a diet," whispered Principal Piorkowski, "this assures their anemic condition. Only with food conducive to anemia can the
age ingrat
warts, warts of graceless old age, flourish in full.

Suddenly the penmanship teacher noticed the principal standing with a strange and impressive-looking gentleman at the door, she choked on her tea and shrilled:

"School inspector!"

At this cry the bodies trembled, stood up, and flocked together like a covey of partridges, but the principal, not wanting to scare them further, gently closed the door, then Pimko kissed me on the forehead and said solemnly:

"Well, Joey, go to your classroom, the lessons are about to begin, in the meantime I'll look around for some lodgings for you, and I'll fetch you after school and take you home." I wanted to protest, but this despot of a prof had proffed me with his absolutist prof so suddenly that I could not, so I just bowed, and, full of unspoken protests and roars that drowned all protests, I went to class. And the class was roaring too. In the general ruckus the students were taking their places at their desks and shouting as if in a moment they would cease to speak forever.

And, seemingly from nowhere, a teacher appeared at the podium. It was the same sad and pallid body that had so gravely opined in the staff room that prices were going down. He sat and opened the attendance book, brushed a speck of dust off his waistcoat, rolled up his sleeves so they would not wear out at the elbows, tightened his lips, stifled something within himself, and crossed his legs. He then sighed and tried to speak. The rumpus redoubled in strength. Everyone yelled except for Syphon, who, with an air of self-assurance, pulled out his notes and books. The teacher looked at the class, straightened one of his cuffs, pursed his lips, then opened and closed them again. The students screamed. The teacher knit his brow and winced, checked his cuffs, drummed with his fingers, pondered something far away—pulled out his watch and placed it on his desk, sighed, again stifled something, or gulped, or maybe yawned and, having finally worked up enough energy, banged the attendance book on the desk and exploded:

"That's enough! Calm down, will you! The lesson is about to begin."

Whereupon the whole class, as one man (except for Syphon and his cohorts), voiced an urgent need to go to the bathroom.

The teacher, popularly known as Ashface for his sickly and ashen complexion, smiled sourly.

"That's enough!" he exclaimed mechanically. "So you want to be excused, do you? The soul hankers after paradise, eh? And why is it that nobody excuses me? Why do I have to stay put? Sit down, all of you, no one is excused, and I'm writing Kneadalski and Bobkowski into the class log, and if I hear so much as a peep from anyone, I'll call him to the blackboard!" Whereupon no fewer than seven students presented notes which said that, due to such and such an illness, they had not been able to do their homework. Four others claimed migraine headaches, one broke out in a rash, another threw himself into jerks and convulsions. "I see," said Ashface, "and why is it that no one writes a note for me saying that, for reasons beyond my control, I could not prepare the lesson? Why is it that I can't have convulsions? Why, I ask you, instead of having convulsions, do I have to sit here, day in and day out, Sundays excluded? Off with you, your notes are fake, your illnesses are fake, sit down, I know what you're up to!" But three of the most brazen and eloquent students approached the teacher's desk and proceeded to tell a funny story about the Jews and the birds. Ashface blocked his ears. "No, no," he moaned, "I can't stand this, have pity on me, stop tempting me, this is supposed to be a class, what would happen if the principal walked in on us."