Read The Corpse Washer (The Margellos World Republic of Letters) Online

Authors: Sinan Antoon

Tags: #Translated From the Arabic By the Author

The Corpse Washer (The Margellos World Republic of Letters) (6 page)

BOOK: The Corpse Washer (The Margellos World Republic of Letters)
4.35Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
ads

He asked me sarcastically: “So what will you be after you finish? An arts teacher?”

I answered: “Maybe. What’s wrong with that, anyway? Is teaching shameful? There are other types of work as well.”

He handed back the list and repeated a favorite sentence: “One has to look out for one’s livelihood, son!” And after a heavy silence: “Even if you don’t want to work with me, at least study something useful for yourself and others. Something good!”

I wasn’t surprised, but the episode saddened me. He never forgave me for straying from the path and favoring art over the useful profession he had inherited from his ancestors. I folded the sheet of paper without saying anything. Mother, who was sitting at the other end of the couch, tried, as usual, to lighten the mood: “Great things are awaiting Jawad and he deserves the best. Good luck, son.”

Father gave her a silent look and then went back to nursing his cup of tea.

ELEVEN

“Pythagoras says that there is music in stone.”

So began Professor Isam al-Janabi’s first lecture on the history of sculpture. I still remember the details clearly. He added that Goethe appropriated this idea and used it in a remark about architecture as frozen music. Professor Isam al-Janabi’s style in his lectures about art and life seemed like poetry to me. He was adept at using quotations to crystallize the subjects of his lectures or illustrate the ideas he was explaining to us. He once quoted Picasso: “Art is the lie that represents truth.” The images and slides he used gave his lectures an additional dimension and set them apart from the dry and boring styles of the other professors.

He was almost fifty. He’d been to Italy a few years before, after completing his graduate studies. He was a famous artist, well known throughout the Arab world, and had had numerous exhibitions. He also published occasional critical essays in newspapers and journals about art history. His style of dress was stereotypically bohemian. His long curly hair was the longest among students and professors. He had a bushy moustache and long beard whose white fringes he used to stroke a lot.

He asked for help closing the shades for the slide show. I was sitting in the back of the darkened lecture hall, one of thirty-some students. I took out my notebook and prepared to jot down notes. Speaking without notes, he took us on a panoramic journey through the history of sculpture.

He was collecting his papers and putting them in his bag after class when I approached him to ask about Giacometti. He had
showed us images of some of Giacometti’s works which fascinated me, especially one entitled
Man Walking.
He smiled as he put his bag over his shoulder and asked, “What in particular do you like about him?”

I was a bit flustered, because I’d never reflected on my reasons for loving certain works of art. Beauty would simply and suddenly hit me in the gut. I hesitated, then said, “I don’t know exactly, but I felt that the man he sculpted was sad and isolated.”

Professor Isam al-Janabi smiled, and his eyes glittered. “Bravo. Many critics say that his works express an existentialist attitude toward the emptiness and meaninglessness of life.” He said the last sentence in standard Arabic and in a different tone. Then he added: “Remind me of your name again?”

“Jawad,” I said.

“Of course you loved him, Jawad. How could you not?”

We left the lecture hall together and continued our conversation about Giacometti and abstract sculpture until we reached his office. He asked me to come in. Stacks of papers, books, and clippings were piled on his desk and chair. The shelves were piled to the ceiling with books. He put his bag on his desk, then gathered the pile of manuscripts and newspapers from a chair so I could sit. I looked at the books. Most of them were in Arabic and English, but there were some titles in Italian. A huge black-and-white poster of Giacometti covered what was left of the wall. In the picture, Giacometti was carrying one of his tiny statues and walking between two thin large ones. I was taken by the poster, and Professor Isam al-Janabi noticed my reaction.

He looked at it as if seeing it for the first time: “Ah, here is your friend Giacometti in his studio.” Then he asked me about my background and interests, listening intently to everything I had to say. He, too, had come from a poor family. His father worked at a paper mill and wanted him to be an engineer, not an artist.

I asked whether he’d met Giacometti. He said he hadn’t, because Giacometti died years before he had gone to Europe. He got out of his chair and looked for something on the shelves. After half a minute,
he reached up and plucked a book from one of the top shelves. It was a big book with Giacometti’s name written in a big font on the cover. He blew the dust away and gave it to me, saying it contained all of Giacometti’s works and I could borrow it, provided I took good care of it. I was very happy. He looked at his watch and said that he had a lecture in a few minutes. I apologized and thanked him for his time. We shook hands and said goodbye.

I left his office and headed to the library to use the dictionary to help me understand the English texts and captions accompanying the images. I sat leafing through the book fondly, reading all about Giacometti’s life. I was fascinated by his work and wanted to know its secrets, so I started looking at his family photos wanting to know everything about him as if he’d become a relative. I learned that he was born in 1901 in Switzerland and died in 1966 after living through two world wars. Perhaps that explained the sadness in his works. He had studied in Paris with Bourdelle, who had worked with Rodin, but his work was so distinct that it was difficult to categorize. His statues were conspicuously thin, as if they were threads or thin mummies exhumed out of tombs. The body was always naked and with minimal features. Some works were of a hand waving alone without a body. Humans, in Giacometti’s world, be they men or women, appeared sad and lonely, with no clear features, emerging from the unknown and striding toward it.

There was one page in the book that had quotations by Giacometti. One of them stayed with me. He said that what he’d wanted to sculpt was not man but the shadow he leaves behind.

TWELVE

The first week of my fourth year at the academy I saw Reem sitting on a bench near the theater department all in black and wearing sunglasses. I approached her and said hello. She greeted me amicably but apologized for not recognizing or remembering me. I reminded her of my name and my silly joke about trying to save her from drowning after that exercise and of our short conversation at the cafeteria. I asked her about the black she was wearing. She said that her ex-husband had died two months before. I offered my condolences. She thanked me and smiled, saying that he was an officer and had died on the front line. I mentioned that my brother was a martyr, too. I didn’t want to burden her so I didn’t ask why she’d been away for so long, but I asked whether she was back in school. She nodded with a smile. Death had brought her back to me.

THIRTEEN

One morning I surprised Reem with a question I’d been meaning to ask but had hesitated to pose: “Did you love him a lot?”

“Who?”

I found it strange that she didn’t realize I meant her ex-husband. “The deceased.”

She turned to me and looked at me with her magic eyes. We were sitting next to each other under the palm tree she loved. Then she looked straight ahead without saying a word. I feared that I’d hurt her feelings or reopened wounds that had yet to heal, so I said “I’m sorry. Didn’t mean to … ”

She smiled and said, “No, it’s not a problem. It’s a sensitive subject. I will answer you when I can trust you more.”

“And when will that be?”

“Don’t rush.”

After that day I was careful not to bring up her marriage again. Two months later we were sitting at the cafeteria of the British Council near the academy. She asked me about my relationship with my father. I told her about my clashes with him, that he was disappointed in me because I had decided not to follow in his footsteps and insisted on studying art, which he thought was a waste of time.

She said that her father never paid any attention to what she did or wanted to do. “I wish he’d insisted I study one thing or even objected to my studying at the academy. I would’ve interpreted that as a sign that he cared or loved me. But he was always busy with his business and I rarely saw him. Only his wife, who was another of his
profitable deals, could compete for the attention he usually devoted to his business. He married her after my mother passed away. After moving in with us, she turned my life into hell and fought me in every way possible. So marriage was my only escape.

“I didn’t love my husband, but I hoped that living with him would lead to another kind of love. I’d fallen in love with a young man who lived on our street when I was in high school, but I later realized that it wasn’t a serious or meaningful relationship. We were both young and spoke on the phone a great deal, whispering and whatnot. We met every now and then whenever it was possible. It withered away when he moved with his family to al-Sayyidiyya. It was quite far and he didn’t have a car. Our nocturnal chats became less frequent and the whole thing just died.

“During the summer vacation right before I entered the academy, one of my relatives asked for my hand. I’d seen him two or three times at weddings. He had studied engineering and then became a lieutenant in the Republican Guards. He got two medals for bravery during the war. He’d seen me once leaving high school and offered to drive me home. I thanked him politely but refused his offer. He later confessed that it wasn’t a coincidence at all and that he had approached me so as to test the waters. Although I never believed in traditional marriage, my only goal was to free myself from my stepmother, and I came to the conclusion that I had no choice but to compromise.

“Ayad was handsome. He was pleasant during the initial visits. Throughout our engagement he would come every three weeks during his leaves from the army. He was very gentle and understanding at first and promised that I could complete my studies and be independent. I liked his maturity, especially when I informed him that I didn’t want to have kids until after my studies. He agreed and said that he would want to be in Baghdad, not on the front, when his children were born so he could raise them himself. It seemed that the war would go on for another two or three years anyway.

“Since living alone was impossible financially and socially, I decided that marriage was the best choice among a set of bad options.
My father didn’t care that much. He said that Ayad was successful and established financially and that would guarantee me a secure future. I felt he was talking about one of those profitable deals he was so good at. As for my stepmother, she didn’t even bother to hide how happy she was to be getting rid of me.

“The wedding took place at the Sheraton, and our honeymoon was one week at the Habbaniyya Lake Resort. He went back to the front line afterward and I went to our little nest, which he’d bought in Zayyuna, next to the Fashion House. His salary was excellent, but he’d also inherited money from his father, who’d died two years before in a car accident.

“Our problems started during his second leave, when I realized that the polite Ayad was a mountain hiding a volcano. It was very easy for it to pour lava on everything and everyone around. It was never easy to predict what would set the volcano off. The first eruption was because my cooking failed to rise to his standards. I wasn’t a great cook, but I tried earnestly and enlisted the help of my maternal aunt. I hand-copied my grandmother’s famous recipes to secure his satisfaction. He said that even the army food was better than my cooking. I apologized and promised to improve with practice. I had warned him when we were engaged that I was not a good cook, but he’d said that he was used to army food and we’d cook together. His sweet talk during our engagement was like the courting of political parties before they assume power.

“He used to always apologize and shower me with kisses, especially on my hands, after hitting me. He used to buy me gifts and promise that he would never lift his hand against me again and that it was the last time. But every time was the last time. In one of his fits of rage, he broke my arm. The pain was so excruciating he took me to the Tawari’ Hospital at night and told them that I’d tripped and fallen down the stairs. I kept silent, but my tears were obvious. I sensed that the resident doctor suspected my husband’s story, but all he did was look at him suspiciously. I thought about screaming that he had hit me. But who was going to believe that a valiant officer
who had been awarded three medals by the president would harm his own wife?

“After that, I decided to move back to my father’s house. Ayad apologized and pleaded, but I’d heard it all before.

“I tried to feel some sadness when Ayad died, but I couldn’t. I was so relieved that I felt guilty for that. My tears at the funeral were genuine, but I was crying for myself and all the years of my life that had died. I visit Ayad’s mother sometimes. She’s a kind person. She knew how cruel he was and understood my suffering. But she still keeps a framed photo of him on her TV: Ayad accepting a medal from Saddam Hussein.”

FOURTEEN

She was cautious with me at the outset of our friendship. More than once she made me feel that I had to slow down. I learned to be patient, to crawl into her heart instead of storming it impulsively.

With time, friendship turned into something more intense. We didn’t talk about what we felt precisely, but our silent gazes meeting for a few seconds were eloquent. When we walked or sat together, I felt the air between us grow moist. Often I drew her and gave her my sketches. She would thank me shyly and say, “Is there no one else for you to draw? No other subject?” I would answer, “No, no one but you.”

I once told her that I would love to sculpt her.

“And the price?”

“For free. A gift. But, you have to … you know. For it to be exact.” Then I gestured with my hands that she would have to get naked.

BOOK: The Corpse Washer (The Margellos World Republic of Letters)
4.35Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
ads

Other books

Doctor Who: The Celestial Toymaker by Gerry Davis, Alison Bingeman
Unafraid by Cat Miller
Torn by Escamilla, Michelle
Death Day by Shaun Hutson
Behind The Wooden Door by Emily Godwin
Cinderella in the Surf by Syms, Carly
In My Arms by Taryn Plendl