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Imagining Home
 Imagining Home:
Exilic Reconstructions in Norma Manea
and Andrei Codrescu’s Diasporic Narratives

By

Anamaria Falaus
 Imagining Home:
Exilic Reconstructions in Norma Manea and Andrei Codrescu’s Diasporic Narratives,
by Anamaria Falaus

This book first published 2014

Cambridge Scholars Publishing

12 Back Chapman Street, Newcastle upon Tyne, NE6 2XX, UK

British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

Copyright © 2014 by Anamaria Falaus

All rights for this book reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system,
or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or
otherwise, without the prior permission of the copyright owner.

ISBN (10): 1-4438-6128-6, ISBN (13): 978-1-4438-6128-1

 TABLE OF CONTENTS

Argument ................................................................................................... vii

Chapter One ................................................................................................. 1

Introduction: Delimiting Concepts. Preliminary Reflections on Norman
Manea and Andrei Codrescu

Chapter Two .............................................................................................. 11

Homelessness and Exiled Identity

Chapter Three ............................................................................................ 47

The Hooligan’s Return, or the Poetics of a Diasporic Memoir

Chapter Four .............................................................................................. 81

Memory and Exile in the Dystopian Universe of Manea’s On Clowns:
the Dictator and the Artist

Chapter Five ............................................................................................ 115

Fantasy and Quest for Identity in Andrei Codrescu’s An Involuntary
Genius in America’s Shoes (And What Happened Afterwards)

Chapter Six .............................................................................................. 149

The Hole in the Flag, or Andrei Codrescu’s Manifesto for Hope

Chapter Seven.......................................................................................... 179

Conclusions

Bibliography ............................................................................................ 183

 ARGUMENT

Taking the notions of homelessness, exile, and search for identity as

reference points, this study aims to explore the ways in which two
Romanian exiled writers, Norman Manea and Andrei Codrescu, through
their work, engage in creating and representing the concepts of
Romanianness and Americanness, at the same time sketching out a portrait
of the countries and societies which used to, and still accommodate their
own identifications of the self, namely Romania and America.
The texts placed under close scrutiny in this research, namely The
Hooligan’s Return, and On Clowns: the Dictator and the Artist, belonging
to Norman Manea, and An Involuntary Genius in America’s Shoes (And
What Happened Afterwards), and The Hole in the Flag. A Romanian
Exile’s Story of Return and Revolution, written by Andrei Codrescu, not
only map the mobility of these two writers traversing vast geographical
and cultural territories, as testimonies of their nomadic existence, but also
supply an insight into these authors’ investigations of the self, with the
express purpose of registering the polymorphous development of their
identity, and their capacity to project two multi-faceted personalities.
Placing the accent on the still controversial problem of exile, the study
also engages with the concepts of infra-images and alo-images in an
attempt to enlarge the already existing imagistic context which has
generally had its area of interest divided in two main categories, namely
self-images and hetero-images, thus foregrounding the complex web of
representations and discourses delimitating the main pillars on which
imagology, as the science of images and stereotypes, is founded.
Through a continuous re-writing of the self, the past and history, and
also the present, Norman Manea and Andrei Codrescu re-create, re-define,
re-position and re-root themselves in a constant renewal of subjectivities,
their books re-shaping or re-inventing the position of the migrant figure
projected onto a background of cultural effusions.
 CHAPTER ONE

INTRODUCTION:
DELIMITING CONCEPTS.
PRELIMINARY REFLECTIONS
ON NORMAN MANEA AND ANDREI CODRESCU

The effect of mass migration has been

the creation of radically new types of
human being: people who root
themselves in ideas rather than places,
in memories as much as in material
things; people who have been obliged
to define themselves – because they
are so defined by others – by their
otherness; people in whose deepest
selves, strange fusions occur,
unprecedented unions between what
they were and where they find
themselves. The migrant suspects
reality: having experienced several
ways of being, he understands their
illusory nature. To see things plainly,
you have to cross a frontier (Rushdie
1991:124-125).

The purpose of this study is two-fold. Firstly, it aims to examine how

exile is experienced in relation to home and belonging and consequently
how home and belonging are re-shaped and re-defined in relation to the
individual’s migration and his or her position in the current age of mass
migration, multiculturalism, and globalization. For, “being grounded is not
necessarily about being fixed; being mobile is not necessarily about being
detached” (Ahmed et al. 2003:1).
2 Chapter One

The second aim of this research, however, is to identify and interpret

different stereotypes, or different images people create about other nations,
or their own nation, the texts chosen for analysis representing the perfect
material for a study of imagology.
The present material is structured in five major sections, besides the
introduction (chapter one), which delimitates the concepts, and offers
some preliminary reflections on Norman Manea and Andrei Codrescu, and
the conclusions (chapter seven). Thus, the second chapter of the research
provides an insight into the concept of exile, in an attempt to chart and at
the same time to highlight, some related areas of interest and conceptual
delimitations, analysing it in relation to notions such as displacement,
otherness, challenged identity, diaspora, migration and hybridity.
Generally interpreted as an incurable disease, exile can, however, be
perceived and analyzed from a double perspective. It makes reference to
an alienating experience, a testimony of a person’s impossibility of being
born again. This fact nevertheless proves that people keep on struggling in
their original, fundamental, existential placenta (Doinaú 1997:6), having
no possibility of escape. At the same time, it can be seen as a catalyst for
new imaginative effusions, a protean field constantly engaged in the
writer’s re-creation and re-invention of a new voice and destiny.
The second half of this chapter approaches the phenomenon of
Romanian exile in an attempt not only to identify some of its general
characteristics, controversies, dilemmas, perils, causes, and social and
historical conditions but also to situate the two writers, namely Norman
Manea and Andrei Codrescu, among the representatives of our literary
tradition.
The third and fourth chapters of the study focus on Norman Manea’s
books, The Hooligan’s Return (2003) and On Clowns: the Dictator and
the Artist (1992), while chapters five and six bring into discussion Andrei
Codrescu’s memoirs, An Involuntary Genius in America’s Shoes (And
What Happened Afterwards) (2001) and The Hole in the Flag: a
Romanian Exile’s Story of Return and Revolution (1991). These textual
analyses address issues of historicity, homelessness, exiled identity, alo-
images and infra-images, as they pertain to, and illuminate each text.
The conclusions attempt to sum up Norman Manea and Andrei
Codrescu’s portrayals of rootless or exilic conditions, from the perspective
of their own cultural displacements, at the same time touching upon the
effects of uprootment and dislocation, and their translation in the writers’
literary and existential attitudes. But they also outline the contribution of
my proposed reading paradigm to the study of imagology, and to the
 Introduction 3

reconsideration of a critical and theoretical interest in this field, with direct

reference to the literature of exile.
A relatively new interdisciplinary science, connecting comparative
literature, history, anthropology and psychology, imagology deals with the
study of images people create about themselves (self-images), or about
other people (hetero-images), but, as Iacob (2003:27) states, generally
speaking, any representation of reality can be the subject of a study of
imagology. In her book Corridors of Mirrors, Pia Brînzeu (1997:27)
enlarges the above mentioned double distinction, namely self-images and
hetero-images, placing two other types of representations at the same
level: infra-images (i.e. the images of the immigrants who are not yet
totally integrated in the new society which has become their adoptive
home), and alo-images (i.e. the images of the emigrants who have partially
lost contact with their native home, being actually outsiders now, and
analyzing everything from another perspective). This new double
orientation and perspective is extremely important when the works of the
exiled writers are under close scrutiny, and this is exactly the situation of
the present study which, in this way, intends to bring its contribution to
imagology.
In the process of constructing these images and national stereotypes, an
important position is occupied by social contextualization, this being
generated by different factors: historical contexts and events, cultural
patterns, political ideology, social influences and tendencies. In describing
all the implications triggered by this complex equation, Iacob (2003:107)
quotes the conclusions drawn by the French sociologist, M. Dion in the
research study “L’identité ethnique en Roumanie” (“Ethnic identity in
Romania”). Thus, there are a series of contextual elements which have all
contributed to the formation of the Romanian ethnic identity, i.e. the
position of the culture, constantly influenced by two different ideologies,
one coming from the Occident, the other one being the representative of
the Orient, different influences acting simultaneously on the Romanian
provinces (Moldavia – the Turkish model, Transylvania – the Austrian
model, Basarabia – the Soviet/Russian model). The constant feeling of
territorial insecurity and the continuous presence of ethnic minorities in
the country, the communist dictatorship, and many other factors have all
led to a huge discrepancy between the subjective dimension of Romanian
ethnic identity, and its objective counterpart.
According to Joep Leerssen (2003:1), this science of ‘image studies’
has a high degree of subjectivity. Thus, “in studying national stereotypes
and alleged ‘national characters’ or national reputations, an imagologist is
not concerned with the question whether that reputation is true, but how it
4 Chapter One

has become recognizable. That interest (not in ‘truthfulness’ but in

‘recognizability’) means that images are studied not as items of
information about reality, but as properties of their context”. The
representation of intercultural relations, of ethnic or national stereotypes
and commonplaces is, in a way, synonymous with a process of cultural
confrontation, the author’s own cultural values, presuppositions and points
of view being inevitably involved in this confrontation. As a consequence,
different personalities or individuals belonging to various social and
cultural backgrounds can produce different representations or projections.
“This unavoidable degree of subjectivity is one of the main differences
between an ‘image’ and objective information”, as Leerssen considers
(2003:3).
Ego-ecology (Iacob 2003:165), as a relatively new branch of study,
points out exactly the same thing, while underlining the fact that identity
represents the meeting point of psychology and sociology. By
incorporating all the characteristics derived from the idea of belonging to a
certain nation, and being part of a certain social context, identity realizes a
personal reconstruction of reality, this actually leading to the conclusion
that human beings, in general, use and live in a personalized reality. Thus,
the main purpose of ego-ecology is to identify the way in which the
objective reality is gradually becoming subjective, the accent being placed
not on the dimensions, or on the dynamics of various social relationships,
but on their perception and inner transformation. Everything seems to be
filtered through the individual’s emotional experience and the situation of
an emigrant/immigrant follows exactly this pattern. Thrown in the middle
of a totally different culture and society, the exile’s projection of reality is
influenced by his or her own personal reconstruction of it, this new
interpretation of reality offering fresh connotations to the entire complex
of images. The distance, either physical or spiritual, seems to dictate a new
evaluation and analysis. The physical distance separates the exile from his
or her birth place, giving them a new perspective (irrespective of its
orientation: present or past, the result being a good example of alo-image),
while the spiritual distance (i.e. cultural, social, ideological) places them in
the position of creating a personalized vision of the new, adoptive or
receiving society and culture – the result being an example of infra-image.
This is exactly what Joep Leerssen (1991:129) says when he claims that
“an image by its very nature signals an intercultural confrontation, an
encounter between the text’s domestic background and the foreign nature
of the ‘étranger’ which that text describes”.
The books taken into discussion in this study, i.e. The Hooligan’s
Return (2003) and On Clowns: the Dictator and the Artist (1992),
 Introduction 5

belonging to Norman Manea and An Involuntary Genius in America’s

Shoes (And What Happened Afterwards) (2001) and The Hole in the Flag:
a Romanian Exile’s Story of Return and Revolution (1991), written by
Andrei Codrescu, are actually three memoirs and a volume of essays. In
their analysis, however, one should also pay attention to the way in which
they all address the issue of documentation, because, although the authors’
express purpose is that of writing about the so-called ‘real world’, in an
attempt to convince the readers that the texts correspond to factual events,
their works actually obey the rules of novelistic discourse. So the clear-cut
distinction between fact and fiction is sometimes blurred. As Norman
Manea ( 1999:183) confesses: “I would hope that a large, complete
perspective on the past is not yet possible, that there is still place for
uncertainty, interrogation, discovery, place for literature, actually”
(translation mine).
In his book published in 1995, CărĠile crude. Jurnalul intim úi
sinuciderea (The Raw Books. The Internal Journal and the Suicide)
Mircea Mihăieú (1995:7) speaks about autobiographies and the noticeable
change of perspective which appeared in their interpretation especially in
the Central and Eastern European literary context. As a consequence, the
emphasis is no longer placed on the writers’ inner or even hidden life, their
own history being now brought in the forefront. What the readers want to
discover are the “adventures” of the individual in his or her confrontation
with the world around. The experience of communist jails, exile, and the
secrets of a totalitarian policy have become subjects of great interest not
only for the authors, but also for the readers who seem to find themselves
in the position of discovering, once again, a continent “sunk” right beneath
their feet.
Some of the most important features which characterize this genre are
sincerity and the accuracy of the recall (Mihăieú 1995:8), so what an
autobiography offers is

the illusion of ideological certitude, a historical, verifiable narrative that

coincides with or reinforces an image of a reality outside the text. The
narrative is all the more seductive because it ‘really happened,’ the reader
believes – how else could it be sold as autobiography? Thus,
autobiography, as a subgenre of history, comforts the reader by offering
illusory truth, both in terms of objective fact and in the promised profound
understanding of a human being’s inner life (Reaves 2001:12-13).

The relationship between the autobiographic material in itself and one’s

spatial or geographic existence is also worth taking into consideration.
Thus, according to Gerri Reaves (2001:15) place or geography is not
6 Chapter One

something neutral, discrete or invisible having no influence at all on

someone’s life and identity formation; on the contrary, “one’s places […]
are undeniably components of both identity and the autobiographical text.
[…] All writing, especially autobiography, involves placing the textual I in
a physical context, whether real or invented. The intersection of place and
identity is the obvious starting point for reconceiving the autobiographical
subject”. Under such circumstances, exile becomes the key-element of the
entire equation, because it undoubtedly brings about a new, totally
changed perspective which will, subsequently, trigger a new
reconsideration of positions and vision. And this brings the concepts of
alo-image and infra-image at the forefront of research, once again.

*
* *

Preliminary reflections on Norman Manea

and Andrei Codrescu
Norman Manea belongs to the last exiles who left the country during
Ceauúescu’s communist system and dictatorship. His destiny seems to
have been prone to various changes, the writer beginning his life odyssey
in an internment camp of Transnistria, at the tender age of five. But the
initiation does not stop here, the artist being then subjected to the
oppression, perversity and perfidy of a communist system, which offers
him no other possibility than the terrifying prospect of his leaving the
country. Manea’s encounter with exile, then, at the age of fifty, brings him
in the position of facing his own re-birth, this situation being now easily
translatable into a new traumatizing experience, a new initiation: taking
everything from the very beginning, learning the steps, the gestures, the
movements, the words, life itself. This strange amalgam of different
existential patterns, of different influences and ways of being offer the
writer the perfect raw material for his literary work.
The themes which can be considered prevalent in his creation are:
deportation, the experience of internment camps, the daily problems and
necessities of a totalitarian system, his becoming a writer under the
pressures of a communist dictatorship and his late exile (Behring
2001:170).
Romanian writer of Jewish origin, Norman Manea claims to have paid
little attention to the ethnic component of his life, at the beginning. As he
confesses (2008:261), the imperative to understand his own roots was
accentuated during the last years spent in the country, the surrounding
 Introduction 7

reality of the communist regime actually forcing him to question his own
identity and to acknowledge his special condition, that of a foreigner. It
has always seemed to me that “the writer defines himself through
language. You are the writer of a certain language. I considered myself a
Romanian writer and my ethnicity, I thought, was a personal problem, of
no concern to anyone. […] Today, after ten years of exile, and after all I
have been through, my answer is less clear” (Manea 2008:395-396 –
translation mine). Even if the distance in time and space had brought about
a certain change in the writer’s interpretation of his own roots and identity,
through his entire literary work he remains an important representative of
Romanian literature, which he has enriched by creating the portrait of a
nation; the very projection of Romanianness.
From the position of an artist determined to find his inspiration in
everything that surrounds him, in people’s everyday life and experiences,
Norman Manea has succeeded to arouse not only the interest and
appreciation of various national and international literary circles, but also
the former’s criticism and controversy. Nevertheless, his narrative
techniques and complex creative strategies have brought him closer to
names such as: Robert Musil, Bruno Schulz and Ernesto Sabato (Behring
2001:164), being often compared to Kafka or Joyce. Romanian literature
has usually placed him in Hortensia Papadat Bengescu and Camil
Petrescu’s tradition, his methods of introspection and psychological
analysis testifying his connections with another Romanian writer, namely
M. Blecher (NegoiĠescu 2000:307).
Poet, novelist and essayist, filmmaker, teacher and lecturer, magazine
editor and, sometimes a controversial, but always a refreshing radio
commentator, Andrei Codrescu, on the other hand, cannot be easily
included in a certain category of artists, his sinuous life initiation,
translated into an impressive bibliography, testifying to his capacity of
projecting a multi-faceted personality, which escapes the rigours of
classification. As he confesses in the preface to the Romanian edition of
his book The Hole in the Flag: a Romanian Exile’s Story of Return and
Revolution (2008a:7-8), he was born in Sibiu in 1946, became American
20 years later, in 1966 and experienced a new rebirth, a spiritual one, in
1989, as a Romanian citizen again, although an exiled one this time,
pleading for hope and trust in his native country’s future. The writer’s
words are essential in understanding his simultaneously situating himself,
and also proclaiming his belonging to two separate national identities:
Romanian and American. But the pieces which create the author’s life
puzzle become even more complicated, this fact being also triggered by
his belonging to a Jewish ethnic minority. Nevertheless, the writer had not
8 Chapter One

seemed to be aware of it at the beginning, or had not paid too much

attention to this side of his compound identity. He gained awareness of it
only later, from the very position of an American citizen, this time.

In Romania it would have been different; even if I hadn’t known, there

would have been others to attract my attention, to remind me. I would have
found my limits very quickly. Things are different here. The American
Jews are quite comfortable, they do not have any problems with their
identity, they do not understand the profundity of it. Here, for me, my
identity is more of an intellectual problem, but it can also be seen as a
spiritual problem, because I know it is interwoven with the way I talk and
reason (1993:13 – translation mine).

Leaving his country in 1966 to follow an illusion and dream of freedom

and literary and cultural effervescence, Andrei Codrescu did not
experience exile as something alienating, terrifying and inhibiting. When
faced with the prospect of choosing between the two attitudes defining for
an exile’s situation, i.e. Dante’s resignation and acceptance, his awareness
of the fact that in exile he could find his own means of expression and
source of inspiration, on the one hand, or Ovid’s lamentation, nostalgia
and deep regret at the forever lost country, on the other, the writer does not
hesitate in adopting the former’s position.

I felt like home. I did not meet an alienating environment, I did not
experience the feeling of an exile, the feeling that I was among strangers, a
feeling that the previous generations had experienced, and so had,
probably, the generations that came after me. I left home to find another
home. […] I came here without any money, without knowing a word of
English; I used gestures. I started talking with girls, I was eighteen, I had
great things to share. I immediately found friends in my generation,
because there was a certain openness, and curiosity for strange things, for
foreigners, in America, at the time, and I was pretty strange, being not only
a Romanian, but also a poet (1993:12 – translation mine).

Although his fame is largely the result of his literary and artistic activity in
America, his books being written in English, a language which he artfully
handles without any trace of difficulty, the author does not fail in resorting
to his Romanian life experience as often as possible.
Codrescu’s discontinuous identity, constantly transposed and engaged
in the process of writing brings forth various flashbacks of memory, these
representing the raw material out of which he re-creates not only his past,
but also his present. The process of remembering, intermingled with a
continuous confessional attitude constitute two of the constants of his
 Introduction 9

style. The autobiographic component and his sense of humour are

elements which the writer inserts in his literary discourse in order to reach
a certain quintessence of unrepeatable atmosphere, originality and
personality (Odăgescu 2009:21). His memoirs make use of the same
material, they use, reuse, and recycle the same sequences of events and
temporal reference points without repeating themselves, without sounding
monotonous, always assuming a certain freshness, each time as if
mentioned for the first time, the writer taking advantage of his double
identity (Romanian or, why not European, and American) in the most
natural way possible: “To the extent that my compatriots have changed”,
he says, “they have granted me a new identity” (2000:99).
Swinging between two cultures, two societies, and two identities,
Andrei Codrescu manages to reach the point where he can declare and
consider himself a transnational citizen and writer. He seems to be
somewhere in-between, neither inside, nor outside, or maybe
simultaneously inside and outside the American and Romanian literary
context, being a well-integrated immigrant who does not accept
assimilation.

I saw myself, and I still do, as the ambassador of Romanian poetry, or at

least a conveyor of certain Balkanic mysteries of great importance. I did
not stop being a Romanian poet when I became an American one. The
Romanian language became my covert dimension, a secret engine, like
childhood, while American English covered all the aspects of my lived life.
In the deep interior I maintained this core of crisis, prayer, high diction –
the phrases of drama – in the Romanian language. My daily language,
American English, received both fuel and poetry from this core. Eventually
they fused, but it took time (2001b:46).

In Codrescu’s case the normal distinction between outside and inside

appears to blur, the terms overlapping or having reverse connotations. As a
child, the writer perceived the outside as something positive, as a place of
complete freedom of action, whereas the inside engendered negative
feelings. Later on, this childhood perception was translated into the
author’s easiness of adopting and adapting to a new culture, society, way
of life. As the very equivalent of the outside, exile was no longer
threatening; it was more like a search for a tranquil “inside” (Pârvulescu
1995:5): “the story of my journey from womb to adolescence was one of
increasing delight in the outside and growing horror of interiors. Home,
school, society were interiors. The outside was outside: the mountains,
Mioritza, wandering, stories, the streets, wherever the wrong bus went”
(Codrescu 2001b:11).
 CHAPTER TWO

HOMELESSNESS AND EXILED IDENTITY

Exile is never the state of being

satisfied, placid, or secure. Exile, in
the words of Wallace Stevens, is “a
mind of winter” in which the pathos of
summer and autumn as much as the
potential of spring are nearby but
unobtainable. Perhaps this is another
way of saying that a life of exile
moves according to a different
calendar, and is less seasonal and
settled than life at home. Exile is life
led outside habitual order. It is
nomadic, decentered, contrapuntal; but
no sooner does one get accustomed to
it than its unsettling force erupts anew
(Said 2001: 186).

In the attempt to chart and, at the same time, highlight the implications
triggered by the concept of exile, namely its definition, tone, modulation,
position and expansion in time, one should, first of all, resort to its traits
and connections with other related terms, and also to its justification in the
larger context of globalization, multiculturalism, and pluralism. As a
political, economic and social phenomenon, it has mainly been defined
through notions such as displacement, abandonment, negation, otherness,
challenged identity, assimilation, integration, diaspora, migration,
hybridity, and only by understanding the entangled complex of values that
govern someone’s life and their mentality can we hope to reach an almost
complete projection of the entire structure.
The concept in itself has been approached by many authors, becoming
the subject matter of hundreds of scholarly books and critical essays and
articles that one might think its dilemmas and controversies have been,
once and for all, explained and clarified. And yet, this complex process is
12 Chapter Two

far from being complete, joining humanity along its long, continuous
journey, adding new layers, meanings and significances to the already
existing portrait. Analysing its Latin roots (exilium or banishment, and
saline/saltare, meaning ‘spring forth’) Christine Brooke-Rose (1998:9-11)
gives a dual interpretation to the term. Therefore, it not only means
someone’s suffering in banishment, but also a “spring forth into a new life,
beyond the boundaries of the familiar (beyond the boundaries of the
island-self, […], since no man is an island, even in no-man’s-land)”.
Trying to make her way through various instances of literary exilic
experiences, the writer distinguishes between two chief types, i.e.
involuntary exile, generally political or punitive (a long list of names being
given as example here, among them: “Isaiah”, Ovid, Dante, Byron,
Ionesco, Kundera, Solzhenitsyn, and some others), and voluntary exile,
also called expatriation (only a few names being chosen to exemplify this
category: Radclyffe Hall, or Ezra Pound). According to the same critic
(1998:20), exile has its positive side, being perceived as “an immense
force for liberation, for extra distance, for automatically developing
contrasting structures in one’s head, not just syntactic and lexical but
social and psychological”, but, at the same time, there is also a price to be
paid, and that is the burden of distance, loss of identity, and the encounter
of a new alien society, which inevitably brings forth a different language
and set of values, mentalities and traditions.
The way in which Edward W. Said begins his essay “Reflections on
Exile” is representative for his attitude, and also for that of the great
majority of writers who have not only written about, but also experienced
the harsh reality of the phenomenon taken under discussion.

Exile is strangely compelling to think about but terrible to experience. It is

the unhealable rift forced between a human being and a native place,
between the self and its true home: its essential sadness can never be
surmounted. And while it is true that literature and history contain heroic,
romantic, glorious, even triumphant episodes, in an exile’s life, these are
no more than efforts meant to overcome the crippling sorrow of
estrangement. The achievements of exile are permanently undermined by
the loss of something left behind forever (2001:173)

The term exile, according to the writer, is a generic one, an umbrella word
whose meaning includes many different types of the same, particular idea.
Thus, an exile is a banished person who perceives the entire process as
something terrifying and alienating, his or her future life bearing the
‘stigma’ of an outsider. The refugee, on the other hand, represents a
political category of exile, belonging to the twentieth-century state, and
 Homelessness and Exiled Identity 13

designating “large herds of innocent and bewildered people requiring

urgent international assistance” (2001:181). The expatriates, in
comparison with the two above mentioned types, are the ones who
voluntarily leave their home country, willingly embracing the constraints
of an alien society, whereas the émigrés are said to have an ambiguous
status, this category including, practically, all those who emigrate to a new
country.
However, the general tendency which seems to prevail in the attempt
of pinpointing the features of this complex phenomenon is that of relating
it to a terminus point, a traumatic experience, the direct result not only of a
physical displacement from the native land, but also of cultural and
linguistic deprivation (Lagos-Pope 1988:8), an uprooting synonymous
with a “translation from the center to the periphery, from organized space
invested with meaning to a boundary where the conditions of experience
are problematic” (Edwards 1988:16-17).
The main problem of an exiled person is that he or she usually finds
himself/herself stranded on rough waters, having no solid ground beneath
his or her feet, and contemplating the very prospect of a perspectiveless
destiny. These people have to re-invent, re-define, re-position, and re-root
themselves, if not in material, tangible things, then at least in memories.
According to Hamid Naficy (1999:6), “home is anyplace; it is temporary
and it is moveable; it can be built, rebuilt and carried in memory and by
acts of imagination”. So, exile allows writers to “construct sustained
fictive worlds” (Edwards 1988:20), and gives them the opportunity to re-
shape the once lost universe. These new ‘countries of memory’ are also
mentioned by Salman Rushdie in his volume of essays Imaginary
Homelands. Taking himself as an example, the author speaks about the
feeling of loss which triggers a certain urge to look back, to reclaim, and to
remember. Nevertheless, the result is no longer a minute, precise re-
creation, the position of physical alienation and distance, the actual
situation in which the exile finds himself or herself bringing about a
certain change of perspective, a distortion of the facts and realities that
were once thought to be unchangeable and sacred: “we will, in short,
create fictions, not actual cities or villages, but invisible ones, imaginary
homelands” (1991:7).
The exilic move, which in Homi K. Bhabha’s terms represents “the
delinking of present-being from the naturalistic and nationalistic topoi of
nativity – the move from organic temporality to disjunctive, displaced
acceleration” (1999: x) is usually placed in relation to certain concepts
such as nomadism, tourism, and diaspora, with which it shares some
common points, having also its distinct traits and characteristics. Thus, in
14 Chapter Two

the article “Exile, Nomadism, and Diaspora”, John Durham Peters

(1999:20) makes a clear-cut distinction between these complex processes.
As the author mentions, diaspora is similar to exile in the way that the
former also suggests displacement from a center, but at the same time, it
differentiates itself by placing the emphasis on constant relationships
among its members. Exile means longing for home, solitariness, whereas
diaspora supposes networks among the dispersed and a sense of
community. In contrast to the above mentioned concepts, nomadism no
longer focuses on the idea of roots, fixed home or center, the accent being
now placed on what we call “mobile home”, this phrase being easily
translated into the idea that home can be everywhere, as long as no fixed
ground is involved.

Exile locates the home in a homeland that is distant and for the time being
unapproachable. Home becomes an impossible object, always receding
with the horizon. In claiming a permanent residence on earth, to be away
from the homeland is always to be homeless. Nomadism, in contrast,
denies the dream of a homeland, with the result that home, being portable,
is available everywhere (Peters 1999:31)

In what concerns the distinction between tourism and exile, Caren

Kaplan’s book Questions of Travel. Postmodern Discourses of
Displacement might be of great help. According to her point of view
(1996:27-28), on the one hand there is exile, which implies coercion, the
estrangement of the individual from his or her original community,
solitude, singularity, alienation, all these elements being defining for what
we call modernism; on the other hand, there is tourism which heralds
postmodernism by celebrating choice, community on a global scale,
consumer culture, leisure and technological innovation.
Diaspora, however, is maybe the perfect setting for the projection of
the in-betweenness or interrelationship that characterizes today’s
globalization, pluralism and multiculturalism. Any discussion about
diaspora usually begins with the origin of the term, this being related
either to the Greek gardening tradition which simply refers to the activity
of scattering seeds, this fact consequently implying a certain dispersal (in
etymology the seeds and sperm are carriers of both culture and
reproductive capacity), or to the Jewish forced exile, this having become
“the prototype diasporic experience” (Kalra et al. 2005:9). Nevertheless,
the debates that focus on various diasporic issues, often bring forth Robert
Cohen’s name, and his research on this topic. Thus, according to his point
of view (qtd. in Coles and Timothy 2004:5), the list of conditions, or
features which have to be accomplished in order to allow for the diaspora
 Homelessness and Exiled Identity 15

label to be applied to a certain community of people, ideas or mentalities

includes the dispersal from an original homeland, often perceived as a
traumatic experience; the separation from a homeland in search of work or
trade; a collective memory and myth about the homeland left behind, and
also an idealization of it leading to a collective commitment to its
maintenance, restoration, safety and prosperity; an accent placed on the
desire of a return movement; a strong ethnic group consciousness based on
a sense of distinctiveness, common history and common fate; a
problematic relationship with host societies; a sense of empathy and
solidarity with co-ethnic members in other countries; and the possibility of
a distinctive creative and enriching life in host countries. Although they
are all important and defining for the concept of diaspora, these traits do
not necessarily act or become manifest simultaneously, the above
mentioned list of characteristics actually projecting an idealized diasporic
version. What also seems to be important at this stage is Cohen’s typology
of diasporas, which includes Victim Diasporas (the best example here
being the Jews, the African diaspora, the Armenians, and the Palestinians,
they actually having experienced some forced, traumatic displacements
from an initial territory), Labour Diasporas (the scattering of people all
over the world in pursuit of work), Imperial Diasporas (defining for this
category being the British, the Spanish, the Portuguese, Belgians, French
and Germans, these examples proving that one does not necessarily need
to migrate internationally in order to be described as a diaspora), Trade
Diasporas (including networks of merchants, traders and entrepreneurs),
and finally, Cultural Diasporas (qtd. in Coles and Timothy 2004:5-6).
There is also a strong relationship between the concept of home and
that of diaspora. On the one hand, for the diasporic citizen, home is a
mythic place of desire, constantly transposed into a feeling of longing for
the once lost place of origin, but, on the other hand, it can also be related
to the “lived experience of a locality” (Brah 1996:189), i.e. to the new,
receiving country which gradually becomes the cradle of a new beginning,
of a new life. For “making home is about creating both pasts and futures
through inhabiting the grounds of the present” (Ahmed et al. 2003:9).
Consequently, the word diaspora can be said to invoke a double
perspective, firstly the trauma of separation and dislocation, as an essential
element of the migratory experience, and secondly, the hope for a better
future. So, the concept in itself can be translated into a “complex global
social matrix built on interconnectedness and multiplicity of identity”
(Anyanwu 2005:2), the diasporic citizens being torn between their old and
new home, traversing the two worlds in various forms, ways and times:
physically, emotionally, economically, technologically, culturally,
16 Chapter Two

socially, politically, and even with “ambassadorial stereotypes”. The result

is a mixture of influences and constraints – cultural, social, political, and
economic – which leads to the creation of multi-faceted diasporic
identities “composed of complexly inter-woven strands of ethnicity,
religion and ancestry” (Coles and Timothy 2004:7).
A problem which deserves special attention in this context is that
referring to the representation of space, exile being inevitably projected on
a background which skillfully orchestrates a series of closely related
images, i.e. deterritorialization, borderlands, marginality. Traditionally,
when speaking about societies, nations or cultures, one usually had in
mind a certain place, having distinct boundaries, clearly delimitated, and
“predicated on a seemingly unproblematic division of space” (Gupta and
Ferguson 1997:33). Nevertheless, the scenario today seems to contradict
this image of fragmented national societies, because for those who cross
borders, namely exiles, immigrants, refugees, this initially “assumed
isomorphism of space, place and culture” (Gupta and Ferguson 1997:34)
has no meaning and relevance. For, “the exile knows that in a secular and
contingent world, homes are always provisional. Borders and barriers
which enclose us within the safety of familiar territory can also become
prisons, and are often defended beyond reason or necessity. Exiles cross
borders, break barriers of thought and experience” (Said 1992:365).
Inhabiting two or more cultures, societies and mentalities, they find
themselves somewhere in-between, neither inside, nor outside, or maybe
inside and outside, at the same time. As Martin Heidegger (1978:219)
professed, “homelessness is coming to be the destiny of the world”.
Globalism, multiculturalism and pluralism, transnationalism and
cyberspace, all these concepts have slowly blurred the limits on the world
map, placing at the forefront a certain cultural, social and political
effusion, which has consequently given rise to a series of mosaic-shaped
entities. And this fact brings us closer, again, to what we have previously
mentioned, the so-called ‘countries of memory’, those imaginary re-
creations of the already lost homeland which can offer the illusion of
stability and belonging. As Liisa H. Malkki states (1997:52),

there has emerged a new awareness of the global social fact that, now more
than perhaps ever before, people are chronically mobile and routinely
displaced, inventing homes and homelands in the absence of territorial,
national bases – not in situ but through memories of and claims on places
that they can or will no longer corporeally inhabit.

In addressing the problem of migration, Nikos Papastergiadis (2000:10-

11) does not hesitate in underlining the complexity of this phenomenon
 Homelessness and Exiled Identity 17

which is considered a metaphor in itself, capable of changing the world.

On this journey, the movement is not a simple shifting from place to place
without purpose, or finality. It is much more than that, being linked to
people’s ability to imagine and hope for an alternative. “The world
changes around us and we change with it, but in the modern period the
process of change has also altered fundamental perceptions of time and
space. Countless people are on the move and even those who have never
left their homeland are moved by this restless epoch” (Papastergiadis
2000:2). Ideas which used to have an air of stability, such as home or
shrine are no longer categories of fixity, everything around us seems to
undergo a continuous process of transformation, and space becomes “a
dynamic field in which identities are in a constant state of interaction”
(Papastergiadis 2000:4). Migrancy, according to Iain Chambers (1994:5)
represents a movement in which “neither the points of departure nor those
of arrival are immutable or certain. It calls for a dwelling in language, in
histories, in identities that are constantly subject to mutation. Always in
transit, the promise of a homecoming – completing the story,
domesticating the detour – becomes an impossibility”. Under such
circumstances, it is no wonder that ‘localism’, seen and understood as the
very desire of returning home (regardless of whether it is real or simply
imaginary) can be considered the perfect alternative to globalism, or to the
difficulty of handling the ‘chaos’ which governs the world around us
(Featherstone 1996:47).
Although it might seem inappropriate to make reference to the term
nationalism in the context of a global world, and to relate it to the
experience of exile, on closer analysis, one can easily understand the
reasons behind this choice. While exile is predicated on displacement,
rupture and separation, nationalism emphasizes the idea of belonging to a
place, a people, a culture, a heritage, a language. In this way, the latter
defends the person against the attacks of the former, fighting to prevent its
devastating effects (Said 2001:176). But this is actually only one aspect
(the positive one) of the entire equation. Referring to the same problem of
nationalism, Nikos Papastergiadis (2000:2-3) brings into discussion an
obvious paradox, namely the “fortification of national boundaries” in the
context of global movements’ proliferation. The reason behind this closing
of doors is the threat hovering above traditional nation-states, i.e. their
difficulty and impossibility of regulating the activities taking place on their
own territory, the direct result materializing in a certain aggressiveness
meant to defend their borders, tougher laws against gypsies and asylum-
seekers, and eviction of economic migrants.
18 Chapter Two

Another element worth mentioning in this context is the fact that

nationalist discourses have the tendency to see the members of the nation
as possessors of “special virtues, particular values and qualities which
those outside do not and cannot share. They may (at best) have other
virtues but these are always implicitly or explicitly of lesser worth or
weight” (Spencer and Wollman 2002:63). Consequently, the migrants, in
stead of exercising only a minor influence, still play a significant role in
the larger context of the receiving country, or as Caroline B. Brettell says,
they “act and are “acted upon” ” (2000:118), being the “marks of a shifting
boundary that alienates the frontiers of the modern nation” (Bhabha
1994:236). They bring their own traditions, values, mentalities and
language into the new, adoptive society, the result being twofold. On the
one hand, under the process of assimilation, they tend to lose their
familiarity with themselves and the things which used to be defining for
their own identity, but, on the other, the host country also undergoes a
process of change, slowly losing its national character whilst
simultaneously embracing a multicultural, pluralist aspect.
The problem of nationalism brings us closer to another important
aspect of this complex, multifaceted issue, i.e. the projection of the
migrant (the outsider, the stranger, or simply the other). Throughout
history, strangers have usually been perceived as threatening entities,
constantly challenging the natural, normal order of things. Their presence
has usually triggered off a certain novelty and difference, their customs,
traditions and language generally contrasting with those belonging to their
new, surrogate country. What is essential to mention now is the fact that
the feelings of caution, reticence and restraint which are inherent in the
usual relationship between the localised citizen and the outsider are
proportional to the level reached by that society’s valuation of its national
ground and heritage. According to Roger Bromley (2000:12), “the more
the ‘localised’ have invested in the ‘sovereign’ nation and drawn ‘power’
from it, the more densely mediated, or overcoded, their lives become and a
kind of territorial fundamentalism is produced”. The migrant brings the
‘localised’ face to face with some ontological anxieties, such as
temporariness, transience, instability, contingency, ‘not sameness’, in this
way menacing and destabilising the very idea of national identity.
The question or problem of otherness is also a question of position, the
idea of belonging or not to a certain place contributing greatly to the
shaping of social space (Brinker-Gabler 1995:5; Sibley 1995:3). This fact
also brings about the desire to re-establish the initial order, to distinguish
between here and there, inside and outside, order and disorder, “us” and
“them”, the result being a feeling of anxiety projected on a landscape of
 Homelessness and Exiled Identity 19

exclusion and separation. In his essay suggestively entitled “How Newness

Enters the World”, Homi K. Bhabha (1994:321) brings into discussion
exactly the same problem, i.e. the controversial position of migrant
experience, or its liminality (which is no longer interpreted as a
transitional phenomenon, but a translational one). Caught in-between their
‘nativist’ or nationalist set of values, and the metropolitan assimilation,
they become the discordant element, the odd one out, the untranslatable
component of this complex mechanism. They resist translation and, at the
same time, total, complete transformation, willingly renouncing their right
of being passive travelers, in order to become actively engaged in the
process of transforming the societies they have now become part of.
Displacement and migration have led to the creation of some
hinterlands, best described in terms of “shifting grounds” or “threshold
spaces” where identity finds itself under a continuous process of
construction and deconstruction (Bromley 2000:5). This new cultural,
social and political context has been given various names, such as “third
scenario”, according to Stuart Hall (1993:402), or “third space” in Homi
K. Bhabha’s phrase (1994:218), the reality described being, nevertheless,
the same, i.e. not a multicultural space in which different cultures live
together peacefully, at the same time maintaining their frontiers intact,
unaltered, but “diaspora identities […] which are constantly producing and
reproducing themselves anew, through transformation and difference”
(Hall 1993:402).
Returning to the immediate dilemma of the migrant or stranger, one
should also take into consideration another element which plays an
important role in this complicated puzzle, namely stereotypes. Making
direct reference to the behaviour of different social groups, and to their
acceptance, reception or representation in other nations’ mentality, they
(i.e. stereotypes) can dictate a migrant’s position in a new country. As
Nikos Papastergiadis (2000:14) mentions, the stereotypical images of the
stranger nowadays, such as asylum-seeker, gypsy or refugee, usually
precede the arrival of migrants, this fact having negative influences on the
stranger’s representation and his or her future life in a new culture and
society. For,

[W]hen people from various countries and cultures meet each other, real
experience and mental images compete. Earlier meetings with others shape
our pre-expectations – which in turn predetermine further meetings with
other Others. It is not possible to distinguish what, in our attitudes, is
primordial, pure experience, and what derives from the culturally
accumulated images. There is no such thing as pristine encounter (Beller
2007:7).
20 Chapter Two

Leaving your world, your universe, your entire life behind requires that
you put on the mask of exile, regardless of whether you do it voluntarily or
involuntarily, means engaging yourself in a complex process of
compromising both your identity and otherness (Brinker-Gabler 1995:12).
This means that the exile, the outsider, undergoes a double change or
influence. On the one hand, all the things which offered him the illusion of
stability, that feeling of belonging to a certain people and tradition are
altered on the very contact with the receiving society and at the same time,
his ‘not sameness’ also experiences a certain transformation under the
continuous pressure exerted by the process of assimilation. So, not only
does the individual begin to lose his or her familiarity with him or herself,
but also their alienation, their otherness gains new valences and
connotations.
The problem of identity has been the core of various debates and
interpretations during time, raising numerous controversies and changes of
opinion. Man has always been interested in decoding and demystifying
this subject, the ontological questions ‘Who am I?’, ‘Where do I come
from?’, ‘Where am I heading for?’ representing a constant in almost every
individual’s life. Consequently, philosophers, literary critics, writers or
scholars have all tried to bring their contribution to this field of
knowledge, one of the conclusions reached in their attempt to define
identity being that this very notion is predicated on a duality, requiring the
presence of ‘sameness’, i.e. identifying with those considered similar, on
the one hand, but also implying the necessity of ‘difference’, i.e.
distinguishing oneself from those who are dissimilar (Spencer and
Wollman 2002:58), on the other hand. A question which might also be
asked in this context is ‘Why should one take into discussion the problem
of identity if he or she wants to understand the complex phenomenon of
exile?’ The answer is, however, quite simple. Exile usually represents a
traumatic, alienating experience, a terminus point which brings about a
process of displacement, re-location, re-creation, at the same time
interrogating the exile’s position and situation within the boundaries of a
new society. The result is the migrant’s constant attempt to understand the
changes to which he or she has been subjected, while witnessing the
transformations and development of his or her self, or identity.
Identity is definitely not something that rests unchanged, a fixed entity
which accepts no alterations. On the contrary, it is a construction, a
process never completed. According to Stuart Hall (1996:4), identities are

never unified and, in late modern times, increasingly fragmented and

fractured; never singular but multiply constructed across different, often
intersecting and antagonistic, discourses, practices and positions. They are
 Homelessness and Exiled Identity 21

subject to a radical historicization, and are constantly in the process of

change and transformation.

Although they seem to be rooted in a historical past from where they

extract their energies and potentialities, identities do not simply focus on
the idea of being, but on that of becoming (people using their resources of
history, culture and language in the process of transforming and
developing), a person’s identity, thus, slowly acquiring new valences and
significances in time. As Kathryn Woodward (1997:304) mentions,
identity is the result of a combination of processes, both conscious and
unconscious, the ‘raw materials’ invested in its development being, on the
one hand, inherited from the past, but on the other hand, “worked on,
creatively or positively, reluctantly or bitterly, in the present”.
In his article “From Pilgrim to Tourist – or a Short History of Identity”
Zygmunt Bauman (1996:18) distinguishes between the problem of identity
during the modern period, and the analysis of the same dilemma during
postmodernism. According to his point of view, the former focuses on the
construction of identity, on preserving it stable and solid, the latter,
nevertheless, fighting to avoid fixation, while constantly keeping its
options open. But in today’s globalized, pluralist and multicultural world
the real problem no longer seems to be that of constructing identity, but
that of preserving it.

In the life-game of the postmodern consumers the rules of the game keep
changing in the course of playing. The sensible strategy is therefore to
keep each game short […] to beware long term commitments. To refuse to
be ‘fixed’ one way or the other. Not to get tied to the place. Not to wed
one’s life to one vocation only. Not to swear consistency and loyalty to
anything and anybody. Not to control the future, but to refuse to mortgage
it; to take care that the consequences of the game do not outlive the game
itself, and to renounce responsibility for such as do. To forbid the past to
bear on the present. In short, to cut the present off at both ends, to sever the
present from history, to abolish time in any other form but a flat collection
or an arbitrary sequence of present moments; a continuous present
(Bauman 1996:24).

If the image of the pilgrim is considered the best metaphor describing

modern life’s strategy of identity-building, postmodernism makes use of a
multifaceted metaphor which gathers under its shelter the image of the
stroller, the vagabond, the tourist and the player (Bauman 1996:26). What
is important to bear in mind is the fact that, although they have much in
common, these four types of postmodern life strategies also differ from
each other. The stroller, for example, is a man of leisure who does his
22 Chapter Two

strolling in a time of leisure, shopping malls being the perfect locations for
this kind of life. The seriousness which characterized all the actions of the
pilgrim has now been transformed into some playful mockery. The tourist
is best described in comparison with the vagabond. The former’s life is
structured by aesthetic criteria, whereas the latter’s tough and harsh
universe leaves no hope for any aesthetic pleasures. Unlike the vagabond
who does not own a house, a place of his or her own which might claim
the prerogative of fixity or stability, the tourist has a home which is “a part
of the safety package” (30), this ‘owned’ place offering him the possibility
of traveling without being bothered by the terrifying prospect of
‘homelessness’, which is defining for a vagabond’s life. The player is the
main pawn on the chessboard of today’s world-as-play universe, his life,
which is actually a succession of games having their own rules and
conventions, being ruled by risks, intuition, and precaution-taking. The
conclusion reached by Zygmunt Bauman (33) after analyzing all these four
life strategies is that they favour fragmentation and discontinuity,
militating against “the construction of lasting networks of mutual duties
and obligations”, and promoting distance between the individual and the
Other.
Under such circumstances, identity becomes “an infinite interplay of
possibilities” (Lavie and Swedenburg 1996:3) projected on the background
of a multicoloured, mosaic-like culture. This, however, is the one that has
irrevocably altered the traditional laws of spatiality and temporality which
used to analyse the world in opposing pairs: centre versus margin,
oppressing versus oppressed, everyone becoming now equally ‘different’,
irrespective of their initially occupied position. So the problem that both
individuals and communities have to face today is “no longer merely how
to handle the otherness of culturally Others, but also how to handle the
multiplicity of one’s own cultural Self” (Belay 1996:342). When speaking
about identity one should also take into consideration its five major
constitutive features which Getinet Belay (321-322) enumerates, that is
temporality, as cultural identity cannot be but historically emergent,
territoriality, because its construction inevitably extends in space, claiming
the presence of a territory, contrastivity, as identity does not exist in
isolation, being “co-created” in relationship to others, interactivity,
because it is the result of social interaction, being “stored” within
individuals, relationships, and groups, and multiplicity, if we do not ignore
the fact that in contemporary world identities emerge from a multitude of
sources, such as nationality, ethnicity, social class, community, gender,
and sexuality, sources which might find themselves in conflict during the
construction of one’s identity, thus leading to “contradictory fragmented
 Homelessness and Exiled Identity 23

identities” (Woodward 1997:1). Our sense or understanding of identity is

mainly related to the idea of space, this fact being also predicated on or
translated into another duality, i.e. here and there, or neither here, nor
there, the unanimous decision reached being that “to “be” in the
postmodern sense is somehow to be an Other: displaced” (Bammer
1994:xii), identity being, at times, “about what we are essentially not, but
are also not free to dispense with”, resulting in a constant “process of
negotiation” (xiv-xv).
In his book Who Are We? America’s Great Debate, Samuel P.
Huntington (2004:21) brings the problem of identity under discussion,
underlining the fact that it represents an individual’s or a group’s sense of
self, a product of self-consciousness, this fact being easily translatable into
the formula: I or we (the individual or the group) have distinct qualities
which differentiate me or us from you or them. So, if Benedict Anderson
(1991:15) describes nations as “imagined communities”, identities can
also be described as imagined selves, namely what we think we are, and
what we also want to be (Huntington 2004:22-23). Taking this idea as a
starting point in the debate about identity, one can conclude, without too
much difficulty, that there is not a singular, untouched self/identity, but
there are multiple identities, i.e. ascriptive, territorial, economic, cultural,
political, social, and national, their importance changing from time to time,
situation to situation, being intrinsically based on the nation’s, or the
people’s probability of conflicting with others. So, although they are
defined by, and focus on the self, identities are also the outcome of the
interaction between the self and the others.
Edward W. Said (2005:99) claims exactly the same thing when he
speaks about “the polyphony of many voices playing off against each
other” in an individual, more precisely in an exile, who either bears within,
or carries with him or herself a vivid memory of all the things left behind,
using them against his or her current experience. “What we live in, in a
way, is what Eliot called a wilderness of mirrors: endless multiplication,
without tremendous significance, but just a spinning on. And you just want
to say: enough” (Said 2005:102).
Returning to Samuel P. Huntington’s successful attempt at describing
the complex process of identity building, one should also pay attention to
the judgment he employs in order to prove how the other can easily
become the enemy. First, identity requires not only identification, but also
differentiation; differentiation necessitates comparison, which
subsequently generates evaluation; group egotism, however, comes with a
subjective, biased opinion, and since there are more groups engaged in a
similar process, conflict justification leads to competition; competition
24 Chapter Two

also brings about antagonism which consequently triggers off stereotypes,

i.e. labels of behaviour, the result being a demonic projection of the
opponent, the other being “transmogrified into the enemy” (2004:26), this
fact having a huge impact on the exile’s first reception, further perception,
and final acceptance into the new world.
Nevertheless, the endeavour of understanding and defining identity
cannot be detached from the world around us and the universe we live in.
Globalization seems to be the key-word in this complex equation, as it
transcends national cultures, at the same time creating a common
environment in which every single individual who is ‘connected’ has
access to the same messages, icons or products. So, culture is becoming
“deterritorialized, detached from the community, and commodified in the
global marketplace” (Cameron and Stein 2000:21), the traditional idea of
the state becoming increasingly “hollow”, the usual national borders no
longer delimitating clear-cut distinctions of social, economic, and cultural
spaces. This border related permeability and fluidity has, as its direct
consequence a multiplicity of transnational identities, people moving back
and forth between societies, this fact leading to the creation of a so-called
global culture. As far as Cameron and Stein are concerned, “we are just
beginning a new dialogue of place amidst newly opened and shifting
spaces” (2000:22).
It is also true that while there are voices which tend to emphasise the
benefits of this prefiguration of McLuhan’s global village, i.e. a generation
of people closely connected with the help of a common language and
culture, celebrating diversity in an increasingly interconnected world, there
are also pessimistic previsions which incline to the belief that the universe
we are now inhabiting is nothing but a “global dystopia where identity,
citizenship, and social agency are manipulated by industries of mass
persuasion that shape them into niche subcultural markets for a global and
soulless capitalism” (Kraidy 2005:15).
And yet, the current tendency nowadays seems to be willing to
contradict this pattern, the reality being much more complex than one
might think. The point is that, while there is a lot of evidence that can
testify to homogenization in global media, tourism and many other aspects
of consumption, there is also plenty of evidence of the opposite , i.e. a
constant, gradually increasing interest in “ethnic” products, the search for
local authenticity in tourism, or the rise of local radio and television, the
result being a complex “interplay between global and local”, something
that is nowadays called “glocalization” (Spencer and Wollman 2002:162).
Homi K. Bhabha seems to be even more categorical when stating the same
idea, the writer balancing the obvious prospect of a global culture and
 Homelessness and Exiled Identity 25

world against the struggle of countless local cultures to remain

uncontaminated, to preserve their purity and traditional, unchanged
character, or the endeavour of numerous peoples all over the world to
stress their independence, sovereignty and nationality.

The rise of religious ‘fundamentalisms’, the spread of nationalist

movements, the redefinitions of claims to race and ethnicity, […] have
returned us to an earlier historical movement, a resurgence or restaging of
what historians have called the long nineteenth century. Underlying this
claim is a deeper unease, a fear that the engine of social transformation is
no longer the aspiration to a democratic common culture. We have entered
an anxious age of identity, in which the attempt to memorialize lost time,
and to reclaim lost territories, creates a culture of disparate ‘interest
groups’ or social movements (1996:59).

The problems raised by the concept of language have always been related
to the phenomenon of exile, too. In the case of a writer, more than in any
other situation, language is not only a means of communication by which
one can satisfy and accomplish their everyday needs and necessities but
also the very raw material with the help of which the artist can make
himself or herself understood, can express his or her ideas, feelings and
thoughts, and can reach the readers’ sensitivity. Consequently, for this
privileged category of exiles, namely the writers, the endeavours of
changing their own language, and the difficulties encountered in adopting
the language of their new home, in order to preserve their gift of handling
words, are perceived as a terminus point heralding the projection of a
perspectiveless destiny.
Manifesting a constant interest in the problem of exile and its
reverberations in the exiled writers’ creative attitudes, Felicia Mihali
(March 2007) considers that it (i.e. exile) represents the “essence of
modernism”. As a result, her article “L’exil – l’essence de la modernité”,
attempts to divide the writers taken into discussion in three categories. The
first generation appears somewhere around the beginning of the 19th
century, and it is best represented by James Joyce who chose exile in order
to free himself from his country’s traditional colonial education and
Catholic oppression. The second generation is the result of the
decolonization of the Asian subcontinent (this being mainly India’s case).
The writers belonging to this category (for example V. S. Naipaul or
Salman Rushdie) have played an important part in what concerns the use
of English, adopting the language of their oppressor in order to express
their anguish of not knowing how to behave in an unfriendly environment,
or their fear of being totally assimilated into the new society. The third
26 Chapter Two

category is more heterogeneous, including the writers whose decision of

leaving their countries has been dictated by different totalitarian political
systems, and who, it is suggested, have borrowed the new language in
order to make themselves known and recognized. This is the case of
Kundera, Solzhenitsyn or Gao Xinjian. However, Felicia Mihali does not
bring her article to an end without mentioning the last generation of
writers looming on the horizon, namely those who do not recognize the
hegemony of the colonizer and the global dominance of English, for
example, attempting to use their own language, thus acknowledging the
importance of all minority groups in the world.
Language plays an essential role in the process of adaptation. It
represents the means through which one can make himself or herself
known and heard, this being the necessary condition to be accomplished
for it to trigger off the materialization of all the other dreams and desires a
person might have. If the process of transmutation from the mother tongue
into the adoptive language represents an almost impossible to surpass
obstacle even for an ordinary individual, this has become an unbearable
ordeal for a writer.
In his suggestively entitled article “Dog Words”, Abdelfattah Kilito
(1994:xxvii) tries to describe how the act of speaking a different language
threatens to strip the speaker of his or her self, transforming them into an
animal.

No matter what he does, he will be seen as an animal. When two languages

meet, one of them is necessarily linked to animality. Speak like me or you
are an animal. I would have to speak from a position of strength in order to
speak in this way, otherwise I would be considered an animal. There is no
way that we can speak of conflict in this case: for a conflict to arise the two
opponents must be on equal, or at least comparable, footing. Lions fight
tigers, but are quite content to simply devour rabbits or dogs. The state of
bilingualism does not evoke the image of two adversaries approaching one
another, armed with nets and tridents. In this case, one of the gladiators is
already on the ground and is getting ready to receive the death blow.

The difficulty seems paradoxical if we take into account, not necessarily

the language that Abdelfattah Kilito makes reference to, i.e. French, but
another language, namely English, which presently occupies the position
of lingua franca in the world. However, according to Phyllis Ghim-Lian
Chew (1999:37), “it should be noticed that we are talking about an
international auxiliary language and not about a language to replace all the
others”. As a consequence, the growth of English should be perceived
 Homelessness and Exiled Identity 27

“more as a result of globalism rather than linguistic or cultural

imperialism”.
Nevertheless, things are far from being as simple as they may seem.
The imposition of a new language, instead of being perceived as the best
way of interpersonal and international communication, for the majority of
writers had mainly the effect of creating a cultural other, a marginalized,
confined, and silenced individual, deprived of his or her self or identity.
The only possible solution left is the challenge of translation which, in its
turn, brings about a series of new problems and dilemmas.
In his book Despre traducere (About Translation), Paul Ricoeur (2005:
66-67) compares this complex term to a “relationship between two
partners”: the stranger – a concept which includes the literary work, the
author and his or her language and the target reader of the translated
work. The translator occupies the central position, being thus subjected to
two masters, serving the needs of the stranger in translating his or her
work and, at the same time, serving the needs of the reader in bringing
him or her closer to the final result. This condition seems paradoxical,
fulfilling two functions or roles: the first one consists in the translator’s
vow of devotion, while the second one is represented by the very suspicion
of betrayal. In the article “How to Read a Translation”, Lawrence Venuti
(July, 2004) refers to the same problem, stating that in the process of
translation the already mentioned vow of devotion is usually overtaken by
the interest manifested in satisfying the desires of the target audience. So,
the accusation of betrayal is generally justified, the translator being in the
position of a “resourceful imitator who rewrites the original to appeal to
another audience in a different language and culture, often in a different
period. This audience ultimately takes priority, ensuring that the verbal
clothing the translator cuts for the foreign work never fits exactly”, this
reflecting mainly the ideas, the meanings and the symbols in which the
receiving culture is likely to take interest.
Nevertheless, Paul Ricoeur (2005:67) identifies another problem
involved in the process of translation, i.e. the resistance coming from the
receiving culture, this, in its turn, also bringing about the pretension to
self-sufficiency and the refusal to encourage the stranger, all leading to a
so-called “linguistic ethnocentrism” and “cultural hegemony”. This
process brings us closer again to the marginalized position of the other, of
the exile forced to sacrifice his beliefs, set of values and moral precepts,
language, and why not, the entire life on the altar of a new country and
culture.
All the concepts and terms described so far are more or less connected,
or have mainly been at the forefront of the research or discussions arising
28 Chapter Two

from the problem of post-colonialism. The process of political and cultural

emancipation of the former colonies has been closely related to the former
oppressors’ acknowledgement of their historical ‘guilt’, and to the
postmodernist attempt to recover all diversities and marginalities. But this
attempt can also be interpreted from a double perspective. On the one
hand, there is the rightful reinstatement of the colonized countries, their
traditions and cultures, the historical and political conditioning to which
they were subjected gaining in popularity; yet, on the other hand, by
accepting the close scrutiny of an entire generation of writers, critics,
scholars, politicians, and economists, these countries, more or less
willingly have accepted their inclusion in a marginalized category
generically labeled ‘Third World’. And this is exactly the idea that Edward
W. Said (2005:175) tries to raise awareness about when he says: “You see,
these are my two worlds: the world of the West and the world of the Third
World”, the entire post-colonial discourse being actually based on a series
of opposing concepts, such as home and abroad, here and there, center and
margin, the West and the Orient, the First World and the Third World, the
self and the other.
The problem which, consequently, deserves our attention now is
whether all the above mentioned categories commonly employed by post-
colonial studies can also be applied in the specific case of post-
communism, more precisely in Romania’s case. In his article suggestively
entitled “Can post-communism be considered a kind of post-colonialism?”
Ion Bogdan Lefter (2004:24-26) addresses exactly this issue, in an attempt
to sketch out not only some similarities, but also the differences between
these two specific historical, cultural, and political concepts. Thus, from a
political point of view, neither Romania, nor the other countries in which
the Soviet Union “exported” its system after the Second World War were,
in fact, real colonies. Having been administered by their local communist
parties, and having their own government, these countries belonged to the
so-called “Soviet internment camp”, without being included, from an
administrative point of view, in the Soviet Empire. In what concerned the
problem of language and culture, the communist countries had the
possibility of maintaining them, no matter how greatly distorted they were,
whereas in the colonies, the empire imposed its own language, culture and
mentalities.
Returning now to similarities, one can easily notice that although they
were not formally included in the Soviet Union, Romania, and the other
Central European countries were not de facto independent, Moscow being
the centre that coordinated the entire activity. More than that, the
“colonial” dependence was also proved by the Red Army’s military
 Homelessness and Exiled Identity 29

occupation, which had the purpose of instating an atmosphere of pressure

and political coercion, immediately after the World War. Even people’s
mentality had been subjected to a process of transformation, which could
easily be translated into a certain kind of behaviour and attitude, i.e.
bewildered people unable to decide their own future, incapable of
understanding the real meaning of independence and private property.
The conclusions reached at the end of the article underline that in spite
of the obvious differences, there are still similarities which entitle ex-
communist states (Romania included) to sometimes adopt, or claim a
status similar to that of a post-colonial country, the most important
similarity being the one referring to the cultural and political control
imposed by a totalitarian regime.
Taking the same problem into discussion, Radu Surdulescu (2006:68)
focuses mainly on the differences, which nevertheless seem to prevail in
this complex equation, preferring the term semicolonialism to its usually
employed counterpart, postcolonialism. The arguments that he brings to
bear, in this respect, refer to the linguistic and cultural assimilation which
did not have the same impact as in the East-European communist countries
as in the real colonies, people here not having experienced that “double
consciousness” feeling characteristic of colonial subjects, nor the
“unhomeliness” crisis common among postcolonial identities.
Consequently, the “trauma of cultural displacement and of the split self”
(Surdulescu 2006:100) was missing in these regions. Another factor which
also serves to differentiate the two systems is the standard, or the degree of
economic, social and cultural development, which in some East-European
countries had been higher before the Soviet occupation, so the conclusion
drawn by Surdulescu (100) in this context rightly states that “the
assumption of the metropolitan culture’s superiority could not be generally
accepted”.
Following the trajectory issued by the same dilemmas and questions,
Adrian OĠoiu (2003:88) points out that postcommunism has been nothing
but a “feeble companion voice in the dialogue with the postcolonial”, thus
clearly distinguishing, from the very beginning, between postcommunist
and postcolonial theories. In the attempt to clarify the controversy
surrounding this subject the author tries to answer some inevitable
questions, one of them referring to the lack of a well-defined
postcommunist theory, the explanation being found in the diversity,
complexity, and variety characterizing Eastern Europe. Continuing the
debate, the writer embarks on an analysis of the term “post”, as it is used
in postcommunist and postcolonial discourses, starting, nevertheless, from
the differences which define the two systems. Thus, the ideologies on the
30 Chapter Two

basis of which they were both initially constructed are totally different,
colonialism finding its roots in capitalist ideology, producing a “rhetoric of
difference”, and consequently employing race and ethnicity in its
developmental project, whereas communism “claims to represent a final
transcendence of capitalism” (90), focusing on an ideal of equality and
prosperity for all its citizens. This fact, however, does not prevent
postcommunist theory from borrowing and using postcolonial
terminology, terms such as liminality, hybridity, double-codedness, and
ambiguity, which were a commonplace during communism, and even after
the fall of this totalitarian regime, being successfully employed in the
description of both contexts. “Just as in the case of postcolonial nations or
of diasporic groups, postcommunist identities are often painfully
dilemmatic, fragmented and inevitably hybrid” (OĠoiu 2003:94). The
notion of “identity in crisis” is also used by Kathryn Woodward (1997:17)
when she speaks about not only the postcolonial confusion and dispersal
of people across the globe, but also the “large-scale political upheavals”
following the collapse of communism in Eastern Europe and the USSR.
In contrast to the above mentioned points of view, Natasa Kovacevic
(2008:16) posits Eastern Europe as a postcolonial territory, analysing the
significance of communism in the shaping and creation of its identity and
history in postcolonial terms. According to Kovacevic, the impossibility of
dialogue between Eastern and Western Europe (the latter being best
represented by the European Union (EU), International Monetary Fund
(IMF), and World Bank), the unidirectional flow of directives, and their
imperative acceptance as a compulsory element in the former communist
countries’ economic and cultural emancipation are obvious signals of a
colonial or proto-colonial relationship (2008:2). If the term postcolonial
means fragmentation, disjunction, and the crossing of national, cultural,
and linguistic borders, then Eastern Europe meets all these requirements, if
we are to accept Natasa Kovacevic’s point of view. The author even
speaks about a new type of racism based on a simultaneous process of
inclusion and exclusion, a racism which, in fact, “orientalizes” (in Edward
Said’s terms) Eastern Europe.

[T]he barrier to one’s inclusion is no longer (on the surface, at least) one’s
ethnicity or race, but rather one’s cultural, political, and economic
behavior. In this sense, inclusion is always possible since it is always
possible to “tweak” one’s culture or politics to merit international
acceptance. On the other hand, exclusion (especially through fashionable
policies such as economic sanctions or military interventions) remains a
permanent feature of this still-conditional inclusion (13).
 Homelessness and Exiled Identity 31

Under such circumstances, one can note that, irrespective of the number of
differences between postcommunism and postcoloniaslism, there are also
many similarities which come to counterbalance this complex equation.
The best solution, however, seems to be the one suggested by Adrian
OĠoiu (2003:90) who considers that

postcommunist studies should emerge not as a subsidiary of postcolonial

studies – for their respective contexts are far too different – but as a
discipline capable of entertaining a fruitful exchange of ideas with
postcolonial theory. Therefore, postcolonial and postcommunist studies
should intersect not in order to produce reductionist approaches to their
object, but to enrich the effectiveness of their critical perceptions by
widening their respective contexts.

Glimpses of the phenomenon of Romanian exile

Restricting the area of interest to the problem of Romanian exile, one
should, firstly, start from the premise that the main condition of a nation’s
survival is the preservation of its own individual, social and cultural
identity. As we have already seen, there are many influences nowadays, all
of them aiming at the concept of globalization, aiming to create the so-
called “global citizen”. But in order to become part of this diversity, one
has to recover and assert his or her own identity, whether it is national,
cultural or even personal.
When speaking about concepts such as: nation, people, ethnicity it is
important to understand their meanings, their evolution in time, and their
relationship with the controversial issue of identity, these being essential
when analysing a certain country’s openness towards globalization and
multicultural integration.
In his book Neam, popor sau naĠiune. Despre identităĠile politice
europene (Kinship, People or Nation. On the European Political
Identities), Victor Neumann comments on different theories and different
interpretations of social and political concepts which, during time, have
led to a series of misunderstandings and misleading attitudes in what
concerns a country’s or a nation’s social, cultural and national reflection in
the world.
Centering his analysis on Europe, Victor Neumann (2005:103) defines
the concept of nation in relation to various factors, such as cultural
traditions, administrative and institutional evolution of society, economic
climate, intellectual activities, religious orientations, literary and
philosophical works, all having a certain influence in the evolution of this
term. The consequence of these catalysts results in a certain diversity
32 Chapter Two

worthy of consideration. Thus, the Western European concept of national

identity has a totally different interpretation in Central and Eastern
European cultures. This is obviously reflected in the new social and
political attitudes adopted by the Western half of the continent during the
last decades, namely: new laws concerning the protection of cultural and
religious minorities, a social-civic identity instead of the former traditional
ethno-cultural identity, the disappearance of borders as a substitute for the
usual territorial frustrations, an emphasis on tolerance towards different
individual cultures and respect for intellectual effort.
In comparison, Central and Eastern European realities still underline
the importance of an ethnic nation, thus promoting countless cultural
differences and a constant discrimination among linguistic groups.
Analysing various theses and points of view, Victor Neumann (114-115)
cites Vladimir Tismăneanu and his book Fantasies of Salvation.
According to the latter’s opinion, the end of communism was followed by
a collective anxiety and a state of disorientation, attitudes which created
the perfect context for the revival of a new ethno-nationalist myth. Its
immediate consequence was the worship of the past, this being considered
the only one capable of restoring the Nation’s hope, pride and dignity.
There are also other voices, such as: Ilya Prizel and Maria Todorova, who
consider that, in some Central and Eastern European countries (for
example: Poland, Romania and Bulgaria) the revival of Ethnic
Nationalism was the direct result of Russian domination. This acted as an
interdiction in the development of those nations’ cultural and historical
values, after the Second World War. This is exactly the situation that
characterises our country which has understood the concept of nation in
terms of ethnicity, evidently exaggerating the role of the ethnic group. The
communist ideology took advantage of this political and social orientation,
placing the emphasis on ethno-linguistic discrimination and monocultural
tendencies, adopting a discriminatory policy towards minorities, with
obvious and imminent consequences, for example the forced exodus of
Germans and Jews from Romania and other Eastern European countries.
Victor Neumann’s conclusion is essential in this context:

The meanings of Citoyenneté or Citizenship from Western European

political and legal languages were granted a very different interpretation in
Central and Eastern European Cultures on the grounds of ethno-
differentialism. Instead of the idea of equality of all inhabitants, Central
and Eastern European intellectuality preferred to promote the idea of
identity based on origin, continuity, blood (race), space and language
criteria. This clarifies why yesterday’s and today’s Central and Eastern
European nation is no more than a Kulturnation, that is, an Ethnic Nation,
 Homelessness and Exiled Identity 33

respectively, a nation of the majority ethnic group. Subsequently, the

nation is an equivalent to the state only to the extent it refers to a
traditional culture seen according to the romantic paradigm (226).

Having analysed the implications of this theory, it becomes much easier to

understand the concepts of exile, searching for identity and survival. It is,
of course, easier to explain why the Romanian nation still finds it difficult
to integrate into Europe (seen as an entity bringing countries and nations
together in an attempt to eliminate borders and extremist ideologies) or
into a multicultural society.
Within the European family of counties, Romania has always had an
'inferiority complex', often suffering feelings of exclusion or neglect'. The
reasons are mainly economic and political. Being situated in the Balkans,
bearing the Turkish and Soviet humiliations during years of domination,
having a language of restricted circulation which could not give them any
guarantee of an international recognition, the Romanians have always felt
underestimated. Their underdeveloped economy has never offered them
the opportunity of reaching the Western standards of welfare and
prosperity, and the communist dictatorship was always a barrier on their
way to freedom.
The ways in which Western and Eastern Europe address the same
problem or situation are different and the most obvious difficulty in the
attempt to draw them closer consists in changing their values and spiritual
beliefs. In their turn, the concepts of multiculturalism and transculturalism
have difficulty in imposing their features, especially in those countries
where the idea of democracy is not accurately understood and put into
practice. Firstly, the monocultural and totalitarian tradition has not been
totally forgotten, and secondly, non-government institutions are not
efficient enough in promoting the idea of cultural and political pluralism.
Instead of choosing an attitude oriented towards future, the current
tendency is that of rediscovering the origins, the once forgotten tradition
(Neumann 2005: 197).
One of the major problems encountered is the so called difference of
mentality between Western European realities, on the one hand and
Central and Eastern European tradition, on the other, which causes a
certain difficulty of adaptation. In this context, an exile's situation is even
more problematic and complex. The difficulty of mentality is still the same
but is exacerbated by a 'real' physical impossibility.
The problem of exile is a controversial one and has been widely
discussed of late. This subject has immediacy if we take into account the
constant interest and desire to reinstate a whole plethora of writers and that
of recovering the once lost cultural and literary values which give
34 Chapter Two

uniqueness and consistency to a nation. It is enough to mention some of

the critics who have analysed this phenomenon in Romania, in order to
understand its importance: Cornel Ungureanu, Mircea Popa, Laurentiu
Ulici, Adrian Niculescu, Nicolae Florescu, and many others.
The controversy surrounding this subject is the result of some more or
less openly manifested vanities concerning the problem of cultural,
political and social affiliation. To what extent does Romanian diaspora in
general identify itself with Romanian nation? Or, restricting the area of
interest to literature, to what extent does the literature of exile identify
itself with the national literature, or does it really belong to our national
cultural and literary values?
In the article “In Exile and at Home Literature Has Only One Country:
the Language”, Monica Lovinescu (1992: 7) refers to this controversy and
to the accusations that have been made against Romanian exile,
underlining the idea that, belonging to different social backgrounds and
being fuelled by different motifs (political, cultural, economic, existential)
the exiles of Central and Eastern Europe are characterised by their
differences and not by their similarities. Not every literary work written in
exile is valuable but, as the literary critic states: “in exile and at home
literature has only one country: the language”, so the exiled writers’
integration into Romanian literature “should happen naturally, without
priorities”, but also without being treated as if they were some “poor
relatives”.
The same controversy appears in Ileana Corbea and Nicolae Florescu’s
book: Resemnarea cavalerilor (The Knights’ Resignation). Having a
symbolic title, the book brings before the reader a series of interviews with
some of the representatives of Romanian exile: Constantin AmăriuĠei,
Theodor Cazaban, Monica Lovinescu, Virgil Ierunca, Nicu Caranica and
many others. Confirming the reality expressed in the title, the exiled
writers’ general attitude is that of resignation. Explaining his intention in
choosing the title, Nicolae Florescu (2002:5-6) identifies the ‘knights’ with
a spiritual aristocracy, with a symbolic fight against evil forces which
promote a wicked policy of oppression and terror, with the supreme
sacrifice in the name of an ideal. On the other hand, their resignation
might suggest a consciousness of their defeat, of their hopeless and useless
spiritual fight. Discussing the problem of Romanian literature in one of the
interviews gathered in the book, Monica Lovinescu (2002:118) confirms
the existence of a unique and singular literary context, this being
nevertheless conditioned on the acceptance of exile’s literature, the first
step towards unity requiring the publication of this literature in the
country, and its proper reception. Citing the same problem, Cornel
 Homelessness and Exiled Identity 35

Ungureanu (1995a: 9) draws attention to the risk involved in this process

of integration: the enthusiasm manifested in discovering and rediscovering
new values should not shadow the aesthetic criterion used in judging the
literary value of these books and their critical analysis.
Asserting his belief that the exiled writers represent a constituent part
of Romanian literature, Mircea Anghelescu (2000: 6) considers that their
work cannot be read or interpreted according to the principles used, and
applied to the writers who have never left the country and have never
experienced Heracles’s tragedy of being poisoned by Nessus’s shirt.
Transposing the Greek legend into the harsh reality of Romanian diaspora,
the writer sees the fate of an exile as a tragic exhaustion, a continuous
vacillation between the image of the lost country and the one of the
country he or she now lives in, but which will never become his or her
home. Everything is significant in this literature of exile, beginning with
the actual need of writing, the atmosphere in which they write, so
everything has to be known, discussed, analysed, because hardly anyone
can find another condition – and another era – in which a human being’s
normality might have been more severely damaged, and on such a great
scale. As a consequence, any answer, any fragment of an answer is
essential in understanding it (the literature), and in understanding
ourselves.
According to Mircea Eliade (1990: 84), the problem of exile in
Romanian culture is not something recent, it being rooted in the very
essence of our folk tradition, in the “tension” between the sedentary way
of life characterising the peasants working their land and, the active life of
shepherds moving their flocks according to some unwritten laws of nature.
Translating this tension in literature, Eliade makes a clear-cut distinction
between “sedentary” writers, who place the accent on traditional values,
folk wisdom and customs, and the so-called “universalists”, that is writers
adopting a more critical attitude and an interest in science. This point of
view leads to the conclusion that exile has never been an isolated event in
our history, so in order to get a better understanding of this complex
phenomenon, it is essential to take into consideration the causes that led to
it, its chronological delimitations, and its main features and traits.
Helpful in this respect is Eva Behring’s book: Scriitori români din exil
1945-1989. O perspectivă istorico-literară (Romanian Writers in Exile:
1945-1989. A Historical and Literary Perspective). As the writer
confesses (2001:13-15), the research has been mainly aimed at German
readers, so the author gives detailed explanations in order to simplify the
understanding of the phenomenon. Thus, she identifies the main causes of
exile, namely oppression, discrimination, prison, threatenings, interdiction
36 Chapter Two

of publication, and censorship. These political reasons are not singular, the
writer bringing some other examples which serve to emphasise, once
again, the complexity of this cultural and social process in our country.
Firstly, there were writers who chose to live in another country not
because they were forced by different political circumstances or
influences, but simply for personal reasons. Iulia Haúdeu, Elena Văcărescu
or Marta Bibescu are among the representative names worthy of note in
this respect, writers who contributed through their work to Romania’s
cultural and national recognition in the world.
Secondly, there were writers who totally opposed our country’s
traditional culture and literary style, feeling constricted and limited to a
language, and to a system of values almost unknown to other writers and
artists in the world. They were the representatives of the avant-garde
(Tristan Tzara, Gherasim Luca, Paul Păun) and their work found its best
expression outside the borders of our country. In comparison with the
group of political exiles, these avant-garde artists never felt the need of
returning home, never felt, or lived the experience of an outcast.
Trying to realise a chronological delimitation, Eva Behring (16-17)
begins her analysis with the 17th century Romanian nobility, mentioning
the names of Grigore Ureche, Miron Costin, Ion Neculce and Dimitrie
Cantemir, important historical chroniclers who lived their lives as exiles
due to the unfavourable political circumstances dominating our country at
the time. The second wave is situated somewhere around the year 1848
and the names of Nicolae Bălcescu and Cezar Bolliac are to be placed
among the most important representatives of Romanian cultural and
literary life during that period. They used exile as a pretext in presenting
and explaining the problems which the country was facing and, their
letters and memoirs, depicting their experiences are now considered
important sources and testimonies of Romanian literary history .
Dedicating a whole book (The Disappearance of the Outside. A
Manifesto for Escape) to this complex social, political, and economic
disease, i.e. exile, Andrei Codrescu realizes a detailed presentation of the
term, commenting upon its countless meanings and significances, relating
it to his own experience, to different foreign writers and to different local
or international events. Directing his attention towards the historical
context of the country which fuelled the development of exile here, or
more precisely offered the raw material for the attainment of its future
proportions, the writer (2001b:16-17) states that:

Romania was not a country until the mid-nineteenth century. After the
revolution of 1848, which ended hundreds of years of Turkish and Turco-
Greek domination, it hastened to join Europe. Its literature rose fiercely
 Homelessness and Exiled Identity 37

from historical chronicle and pamphlet into poetry. Between 1910 and
1948 Romanians absorbed books the way eggplant absorbs olive oil, and
produced them as well, a literary gush comparable to that of their
contemporaries, the oil wells of Ploieúti. When the communists came to
power after the war, the flow of books was stemmed, both from within and
from without. State policy at the time of my birth in 1946 was a Dracula-
like activity of cultural impalement. First, the authors were victimized
(prison, murder, silence), then their books (burning, banning, oblivion).

Bearing in mind the writers’ dramatic circumstances, during the

communist regime, it is easy to appreciate why the most important stage of
Romanian political exile begins around the year 1945 and lasts until 1989
(this date also marks the end of the Communist era). This period,
nevertheless, succeeded in gathering a well-defined body of features, a
valuable and authentic literature and a voice impossible to ignore
(Behring: 2001:20). However, the tragic situation of two categories of
emigrants seemed to be in disagreement with the general tendency,
namely: the cruel treatment of Romanian writers of Jewish origin, forced
to leave the country due to the communist policy of racial discrimination
and anti-Semitism, and that of Romanian writers from Basarabia (territory
that once used to be constituent part of the country) whose situation was
identical to that of exiles, if we take into account the USSR’s constant
attempts of assimilating Romanian language, culture and traditions.
Returning to the period under discussion, 1945-1989, this can be
divided into three major waves, each of them having their own traits,
characteristics and representatives. The best defined stage in terms of
ideology and common aims includes the 40s and the 50s, a historical
period dominated by the fall of the Iron Guard and that of Ion Antonescu’s
military dictatorship and the already obvious pressure exerted by the
communists in all the social and cultural areas of the country. The most
famous representative of this period is Mircea Eliade, his name being
surrounded by many other well-known figures of Romanian exile:
Constantin Virgil Gheorghiu, Vintilă Horia, Aron Cotruú, Pamfil ùeicaru,
Emil Cioran, Horia Stamatu, George Uscătescu, Monica Lovinescu, Virgil
Ierunca. Initially working in diplomacy as cultural attachés, after choosing
exile they were considered either collaborators (in the view of the adoptive
country), or traitors and war criminals (according to their own country’s
point of view). They chose France or Spain as their main destinations, the
latter being the only country in Europe, at the time, welcoming and
naturalizing exiles who openly manifested their fascist affinity.
The second stage of Romanian political exile groups around the 60s
and 70s, a period of time which, unlike the previously mentioned one,
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 "Nytpä sitä taitaa joutaa säveltämään. Ei ole juuri muitakaan töitä",
vastasin saadakseni tytön kimpustani.

Hänellä oli nähtävästi jotakin sydämellään, mutta hänen oli vaikea

saada sitä esiin. Lopulta hän aivan kuin ohimennen sanoi:

"Voiko eno hommata hiukan rahaa minulle? Tarvitsen Schubertin

laulut ja sitten… uuden… uuden…"

Syntyi raskas äänettömyys.

"Lauluihin ehkä saadaan rahoja, mutta uuden hatun ostaminen

täytyy lykätä parempiin aikoihin", sanoin.

"Niinkö!" huokasi tyttö ahdistuneesti. "Täytyy sitte jättää."

Tuntien syytöksen, minkä nuo sanat sisälsivät, sanoin liikutettuna:

"Kyllä minä olen huono holhooja. Mikään rangaistus ei olisi minulle

kyllin ankara. Jos äitivainajasi olisi tiennyt…"

Tyttö tuijotti mietteissään eteensä. Sen sijaan että olisi moittinut

minua hän sanoi:

"Mutta tiedättekös, mitä minä olen keksinyt? Rupean antamaan

soittotunteja, ja voin minä alotteleville lauluakin opettaa."

Ja tytön silmät säihkyivät aivan kuin hän jo puuhaisi oppilaittensa

kanssa.

"Tosiaankin, tee se! Oppilaita ei sinulta tule puuttumaan — ei

ainakaan miespuolisia", ihastui Katri tuumaan.
 "Sirkka-rukka!" pahoittelin minä. "On surkeata, että sinun, jolla
kerran oli omaisuutta, täytyy antautua leipätyöhön, vaikka opintosi
ovat kesken."

"Mitä surkeata siinä on! Päinvastoin on hyvä, että opin

ansaitsemaan.
Tähän asti olen vain tuhlannut rahoja."

Huomasin ihmeekseni, että Sirkassa oli tapahtumassa käänne.

Hänkin oli viime aikojen kokemuksissa muuttunut, kehittynyt. Hän
katseli ympärilleen ja sanoi:

"Täällä on kaikki ylösalasin. Entä jos tulisi vieraita!"

"Mitä? Vieraita! Ei, kyllä me tästäpuolin saamme olla omissa

oloissamme. Kun ihminen joutuu kurjuuteen, silloin kyllä ystävät
pysyvät piilossa."

Kun Sirkka oli mennyt, sanoi Katri:

"Hän on minusta viime aikoina tullut aivan toisenlaiseksi."

"Niin minustakin. Sen on kärsimys tehnyt. Antaisin polttaa käteni

hiljaisella tulella, jos vain voisin hankkia takaisin hänen
omaisuutensa."

Katri asetti lapsen sänkyyn ja alkoi siistitä huonetta. Minä sillaikaa

vein madonnankuvan ja muuta romua ullakolle. Saatuamme
huoneen näyttämään hiukan ihmisasunnolta ehdotin, että
menisimme johonkin ravintolaan syömään. Mutta Katri sanoi, että
siellä voisi kohdata jonkun tuttavan. Minä ymmärsin, että hän häpesi
pukuaan, joka oli kulunut ja kuosiltaan vanhettunut.
 "Vielä on meissä ylpeyttä. Miksi muutoin häpeäisimme
köyhyyttämme, ikäänkuin se olisi rikos?" sanoin hänelle.

Hän oli kauan vaiti.

"Niin, mistähän se johtuu, että tuntuu niin vaikealta tunnustaa

olevansa huonompi muita?"

"Ja kuitenkin vaihtuu ihmisen onni alinomaa. Köyhällä on toki se

lohdutus, ettei hänen tilansa enää huonommaksi tule, jotavastoin
rikas on alinomaa lankeamisen vaarassa."

Iltapäivällä tuli vieraita, niinkuin Sirkka oli ennustanut. Se oli hänen

sulhasensa! Kun nuorukainen näki, että entinen siisti kotimme oli
muuttunut viheliäiseksi kellarikopiksi, antoi hän meidän ymmärtää,
mikä suuri armo ja kunnia meille tapahtui, kun hän suvaitsi astua
köyhän kynnyksemme yli. Tämä alentuvaisuus lisäsi sitä
epäedullista vaikutusta, jonka hänestä olin ensi kerralla saanut.

Hän seisoi ovella eikä muistanut edes lakkiaan ottaa päästä, vaan
puhui:

"Morsiameni, neiti Vanamon toivomuksesta ilmoitan, että me

olemme kihloissa ja menemme naimisiin niin pian kuin mahdollista."

"Hyvä herra", sanoin minä, "jos asia osoittautuu välttämättömäksi,

ei ole minun vallassani sitä vastustaa. Sallikaa minun kuitenkin
kysyä, onko asemanne semmoinen, että voitte elättää vaimon?"

Nuori mies kohautti olkapäitään ylimielisesti.

"Se ei ole tarpeellistakaan. Neiti Vanamolla on talletuksia. Sen on

hän itse sanonut."
 Ja hän heilutti keppiään ja loi halveksivia silmäyksiä ympärilleen.

"Elkää antako pettää itseänne", sanoin minä. "Onnettomien

asianhaarojen johdosta on neiti Vanamo menettänyt kaiken
omaisuutensa."

"Mitä! Mahdotonta!" huusi sulhasmies.

"Ikävä, jos hän ei ole teille sitä ilmoittanut. Mutta niin on asia."

Ylkämiehen muoto oli äkkiä muuttunut. Hän kadotti viimeisenkin

kunnioituksensa ja huusi:

"Tästä seikasta aion ottaa selvän, ja jos asia on tosi, niin en

onnittele teitä!"

Ja hän lähti hyvästelemättä.

*****

Seuraavana aamuna sain pari kirjettä. Toinen oli sulhaselta. Hän

haukkui minua silmät, korvat täyteen ja sanoi nostavansa
oikeusjutun minua vastaan kavalluksesta ja uskottujen varojen
väärinkäytöstä. Pitkin matkaa hän puheli "vaimoni varoista" ja
"yhteisestä omaisuudestamme". Minä olin kumminkin kylliksi vanha
osatakseni oikein arvostella moisia purkauksia, ja hänen puheensa
kavalluksesta olisi herättänyt naurua, ellei se olisi ollut yhteydessä
niin vakavan asian kanssa kuin Sirkan omaisuuden menetys oli.

Enemmän huolta tuotti toinen kirje. Siinä asianajajani ilmoitti, että

tirehtöörin nostama kunnianloukkausjuttu oli tulossa uudestaan esille
ja että minun oli hankittava todisteita syytökseni tueksi, koska oikeus
tuskin enää myöntäisi lykkäystä. Rivien välistä saattoi lukea, että
juttu oli päättyvä minulle huonosti. Kirjelmän lopussa pyydettiin
minua samalla käymään suorittamassa asianajopalkkio.

Mutta kaikista pahinta oli, että Sirkka tuli illalla itkien ja valittaen,
silmät turvonneina ja sydän syttä mustempana, heittäytyi lattialle,
vieritteli itseänsä ja voihki, ettei hän tahdo elää.

Ymmärsin, että uuden hatun tähden ei toki nainenkaan noin

katkerasti itke.

"Sirkka rakas, mikä sinua vaivaa! Oletko sairas?"

"Hän ei enää rakasta minua! Hän on hyljännyt minut! Voi minua

onnetonta! Minä hukutan itseni!" vaikeroi tyttö-parka.

Aloin vähitellen oivaltaa. Otin häntä kädestä ja sanoin:

"Sulhosiko hyljännyt! Se mies ei todellakaan ole sinun surusi ja

kyyneleittesi arvoinen. Lurjus hän on, joka rakkautta teeskennellen
on yksinomaan tavoitellut omaisuuttasi."

Tyttö loi minuun vihamielisen, halveksuvan silmäyksen.

"Eno ei saa puhua noin hänestä! Minä en salli sitä, minä rakastan
häntä!"

"Mutta kuulehan toki, mitä minä sanon. Niin pian kuin kerroin
sulhasellesi, että olet menettänyt rahasi, oli hän heti valmis
hylkäämään sinut. Todistaako se rakkautta!"

Mutta yhä katkerampana hän vastasi:

"Miksi eno meni kertomaan sitä?"

 "Sen vuoksi että tahdoin paljastaa hänen oikean luonteensa. Ei,
Sirkka rakas, pyyhi sinä kyyneleesi ja kiitä Jumalaa, että pelastuit
vaarasta joutua huonon miehen vaimoksi."

"Hän…ei ole huono. Voi, voi, minua onnetonta! Mitä minusta nyt
tulee!"

Ja hän alkoi uudelleen itkeä. Jätin hänet, sillä olin varma, että hän
huomenna katselisi asioita toisessa valossa.

Vieläkin tuli Jobin posti. Kustantajani oli hyljännyt uuden teokseni

sen "raskaan tyylin ja pessimistisen maailmankatsomuksen" vuoksi.
Tämä pettymys löi minut aivan lamaan.

Pienokaisemme oli sairastunut nähtävästi vilustumisesta

muuttohommissa.
Katri oli kovin huolissaan ja valvoi yöt päivät sen vieressä.

*****

Olin pari viime päivää hautonut kolkkoa suunnitelmaa. Karkoitin

sen, mutta se palasi yhä itsepintaisempana. Minussa alkoi juurtua
ajatus, että koko elämäni oli hyödytön ja ilman tarkoitusta. Olinhan
saattanut itseni ja perheeni perikadon partaalle ja tuhonnut lisäksi
holhottini elämän.

Kun Katrin illalla piti viedä lapsemme sairaalaan, ryhdyin

panemaan päätöstäni täytäntöön. Menin ullakolle, otettuani mukaani
nuoranpätkän.

Oli myrskyinen kuutamoilta. Sysimustia repaleisia pilviä ajelehti

taivaalla, peittäen kuun milloin puoleksi, milloin kokonaan.
 Ajattelin vielä hetken, miltä tuntui kuolla, ja tulin siihen tulokseen,
ettei se ollut ainakaan pahempaa kuin se elämä, johon olin suistunut.
Sinä hetkenä unohdin itseni, Katrin, lapseni, Sirkan — kaikki, mitä
minulle oli ollut rakasta ja kallista elämässä. Ajattelin vain lepoa,
unhotusta, jonka kuolema tuottaisi. Olin suunniltani.

Otin köyden, viskasin toisen pään katon tukipuun yli ja aloin tehdä
silmukkaa. Mutta samassa vihlova ääni sai minut keskeyttämään
työni ja kuuntelemaan. Kenties se oli myrskyn kohina. Äkkiä
hajosivat pilvet, ja kuu sukelsi esiin täydessä kirkkaudessaan.
Silmäni sattuivat nurkkaan, jossa häämöitti jotakin: madonna
lapsineen! Pyhä neitsyt katseli minua surumielisenä, mutta samalla
lempeänä, lohduttavana. Silloin muistin Katrin ja lapsen. Jättääkö
heidät yksin jatkamaan toivotonta kamppailua kohtalon
leppymättömiä valtoja vastaani Pelkuri, kurja raukka silloin olisin!

Köysi oli pudonnut kädestäni. Kiiruhdin alas ja kävelin kauan

kadulla, antaen tuulen jäähdytellä sekavia, hourailevia aivojani.

Vihdoin menin sisään. Katri ei ollut palannut, mutta hän tuli pian ja
ilmoitti, että lääkäri oli antanut rauhoittavia tietoja lapsen tilasta.

Vasta aamulla rohkenin kertoa Katrille kamalan aikeeni. Hän tuli

hyvin liikutetuksi ja sanoi: "Kuinka hyvä olet, kun et jättänyt minua
yksin nälkäkuoleman kanssa taistelemaan!"

"Kiitä madonnaa!" sanoin minä. "Se toi mieleeni sinut ja lapseni."

KUUDESTOISTA LUKU.

Kun hätä on suurin, on apu lähinnä.

Mutta yhä vaikeammaksi kävi elämämme. Meidän piti myydä tai

pantata se vähä, mitä ryöstöherroilta oli jäänyt, saadaksemme
jotakin syötävää. Eräänä päivänä huomasin vihkisormuksen
hävinneen Katrin sormesta. Kun kysyin sitä, sanoi hän hymyillen:

"Voinhan rakastaa sinua ilman sormusta."

Sirkka ansaitsi tunneillaan sen verran, että sai vuokransa ja

ruokansa maksetuksi. Hän oli vähitellen tullut käsittäneeksi
sulhasensa petollisen rakkauden ja lausui ilonsa siitä, että oli
onnettomuuden välttänyt.

Kun suuremmat kirjalliset yritykseni olivat tehneet haaksirikon,

turvauduin pikkutuotantoon: sepustelin kertomuksia ja runoja, vaikka
palkkio oli perin niukka. Katri auttoi niin paljon kuin lapselta saattoi,
mutta kaikesta huolimatta kasvoi velkataakka yhä raskaammaksi.
Pienet talous- ja huonekalumme olivat vähin erin siirtyneet
panttikonttoriin. Meillä ei enää ollut omaa taloutta, ja Katri oli siitä
perin onneton. Söimme mitä milloinkin satuimme saamaan. Pahinta
oli, että kahden kuukauden vuokra oli maksamatta, ja meidät uhattiin
häätää minä päivänä hyvänsä.

Muistin sedän, mutta ylpeyteni esti minua turvautumasta enää

hänen apuunsa.

Kerran, kun hätä oli pahimmillaan, olimme pari päivää syömättä.

Harhailin kadulla tietämättä mitä tehdä. Nälkä ja epätoivo lamauttivat
tahtoni. Silloin tuli vastaani ystävä, joka kerran oli myynyt minulle
onnettoman lehtensä. Hän tarjosi päivällistä. Halveksien hylkäsin
ensin tarjouksen, mutta nälkä voitti. Söin kuin susi ja ajattelin, miten
voisin pistää jotakin taskuuni, viedäkseni Katri-raukalle.

Ulkona ravintolan oven takana seisoi repaleinen lapsi, jonka

kohmettuneessa kädessä oli jokunen kuparikolikko. Hänen rukoileva
katseensa puhui paremmin kuin sanat. Olin jo astunut ohitse, kun
samassa otin kukkarostani viimeisen kolikkoni ja annoin
pienokaiselle, joka kiitollisena otti almun. Ja minä sanoin itselleni:

"Mikä onkaan ihminen! Äsken olin itse tyhjin vatsoin, ja nyt kun
olen syönyt kyllikseni, aioin mennä tarvitsevan ohi ojentamatta
auttavaa kättä."

Katri oli käynyt niin heikoksi, että hädin jaksoi seistä.

"Ei, tästä täytyy tulla loppu! Parempi on pikainen kuolema kuin

tällainen kidutus", sanoin minä.

Hän katsoi minuun raukeasti, mutta katseessa oli vielä hiukan

toivoa.

"Emme saa kadottaa rohkeuttamme. Meidän täytyy elää — lapsen

vuoksi."
 Hän pukeutui ja lähti ulos, pyytäen minua katsomaan lasta. Vasta
illalla myöhään hän palasi tuoden jotakin paperiin käärittynä.

"Missä olet ollut?" kysyin. Mutta hän vastasi kiertäen: "Olinpahan

vain jossakin." Kamala aavistus lensi mieleeni. Kävin hänen
käsivarteensa, puristin sitä rajusti ja sanoin: "Vastaa, onneton!" Hän
istahti ja alotti:

"En aikonut sitä ilmaista. Menin työnvälitystoimistoon, ja minut

lähetettiin erään herrasväen ikkunoita pesemään. Huimasi kovin
päätäni seistessäni korkealla, mutta suljin silmäni ja ajattelin lasta."

Häpeän tunne valtasi minut. Tartuin hänen käteensä hellästi

hyväillen ja sanoin:

"Katri rakas, sinä helmi kaikkien vaimojen joukossa, voitko antaa

anteeksi, että ajattelin alentavasti sinusta?"

Vastaukseksi hän otti leivän ja antoi puolikkaan minulle.

"Ei, rakkaani, minulla ei ole oikeutta syödä, mitä sinä olet

ansainnut."

"Lain mukaan on aviopuolisoiden omaisuus yhteistä", sanoi hän, ja

pieni naurunväre leikki hänen silmänurkassaan.

"Ja sitte sinä vielä annoit isomman puolen minulle", sanoin

nuhtelevasti.

"Äiti opetti lapsena, että jakaja saa tyytyä pienempään. Mutta

miksi et syö? Eikö sinun ole nälkä?"

Leipä oli kovaa, mutta ainakin minun palani pehmeni kyynelistä.

 "Mistä saamme huomenna?" sanoin syödessäni.

"Huominen päivä on Jumalan kädessä!" vastasi Katri.

Kun olimme menneet levolle ja valo sammutettiin, huomasin Katrin

polvistuvan vuoteella ja rukoilevan niinkuin silloin kun Sirkka tuli
Helsinkiin. Ja minusta tuntui, että niin vähän kuin itse olinkin
ansainnut armoa, Jumalan täytyi kuulla Katria — niin hyvä, puhdas
ja jalo hän minun mielestäni oli. Ja minä nukuin rauhallisemmin kuin
milloinkaan onnen päivinä.

Mutta yhä synkemmäksi kävi tulevaisuus. Kuolema heilutti

uhkaavana viikatettaan meidän ylitsemme, varmana voitostaan.

Eräänä aamuna kysyi Katri:

"Eikö meillä enää ole mitään panttiin vietävää?" Me puhuimme

siitä apukeinosta jo ihan tyynesti.

"Ei mitään. Kaikki on lopussa…"

Hän ei virkkanut sanaakaan — raskas huokaus vain kohosi hänen

rinnastaan.

En voinut katsella tuota äänetöntä tuskaa, joka viilsi kuin

säilänterä ja samalla syytti minua.

Hain käsikirjoitusteni joukosta, lähdin erään lehden toimitukseen ja

tarjosin sepitelmiäni. Sanottiin, että heillä oli laatikot täynnä
käsikirjoituksia julkisuutta odottamassa, mutta luvattiin kuitenkin
ottaa minun tuotteeni niin pian kuin tila salli. Pyysin jonkun verran
etukäteen, mutta minulle vastattiin, että heillä oli periaatteena
maksaa vasta kun tuote oli ilmestynyt.
 Palasin kotiin ja kerroin, että olin tehnyt viimeisen ponnistukseni.
Katri lähti kaupungille ja ilmoittautui työnvälitystoimistoon, mutta
siellä oli satoja vuoroaan odottamassa. Ja hän palasi matkaltaan
yhtä toivottomana kuin minäkin.

"Kirottu elämä!" pääsi huuliltani.

"Elä kiroa elämää!" sanoi Katri lempeästi nuhdellen. "Elämä on

suuri, kaunis Jumalan lahja, mutta tunnottomat ihmiset ovat sen
turmelleet."

Minä etsin joka nurkan, mutta en löytänyt mitään kelvollista.

Lähdin ullakolle.

Madonnankuva oli siellä sopessaan… Ulosottomiehen potkusta

syntynyt tahra näkyi yhä Kristus-lapsen jumalaisella otsalla. Otin
taulun, käärin paperiin ja lähdin ulos.

Panttikonttori oli täynnä kurjannäköisiä, onnen hylkimiä olentoja,

jotka tarjosivat viimeisiä tavaroitaan voidakseen jatkaa elämäänsä
jollakulla päivällä tai kenties viikolla. Suunnattoman iso,
ihravatsainen mies seisoi tiskin takana, arvioi esineitä, hyväksyi ja
hylkäsi, ilman sydäntä, kylmästi, koneellisesti.

Kun takana olevat vihdoin tyrkkäsivät minut esiin, poistin nopeasti

kääreen ja käänsin madonnankuvan ulospäin. Panttiherra katsoi
minuun kysyvästi.

"Mikä se on?"

"Vanha taulu", sanoin punehtuen aivan kuin olisin sen varastanut.

 "Ei me huolita sitä. Meillä on sellaista rojua makasiinit täynnä",
sanoi mies ja sysäsi madonnan syrjään, ottaen sen sijaan eräältä
jätkältä vanhat housut.

Nolona ja häveten peitin kuvan ja poistuin. Kaikki katselivat minua,

toiset ivallisesti, toiset ehkä säälien.

Kävelin umpimähkään katua ylös, toista alas. Väsyttyäni istahdin

puistoon ja katselin onnellisempien kiirettä ja touhua.

Samassa sattui katseeni vastapäätä sijaitsevan rakennuksen

seinälle, jossa näkyi isoilla kirjaimilla:

KIRJAKAUPPA JA ANTIKVARIAATTI. VANHOJA KIRJOJA JA TAIDETEOKSIA

OSTETAAN.

Niinkuin olisi joku kutsunut minua hypähdin penkiltä. Astuin

suurehkoon saliin, missä oli hyllyt täynnä kirjoja lattiasta kattoon ja
seinät taulujen ja piirustusten peitossa. Alussa en nähnyt elävää
olentoa, mutta pian huomasin kaksi herrasmiestä hartaassa
keskustelussa erään taideteoksen edessä. He väittelivät niin
kiivaasti, etteivät lainkaan huomanneet minun tuloani; hosuivat
käsillään, puhuivat renessanssiajasta, alankomaalaisesta koulusta ja
muista viisaista asioista.

Nuorempi herroista, joka näytti olevan taidekauppias, huomasi

vihdoin minut ja tuli kysymään asiaani.

"Minulla olisi vanha taulu", sanoin hämilläni ja otin kuvan esiin

kääröstä.

Tuskin olin sen tehnyt, kun taidekauppiaan kasvot osoittivat mitä

vilkkainta mielenkiintoa. Hän sieppasi kuvan, piteli sitä päivää,
vasten ja alkoi kiireesti hakea sen kulmasta tekijän nimeä.

Vanhempi herrasmies, jolla oli pitkä valkoinen parta, mutta ei

hiuskarvaakaan päässä astahti myöskin esiin ja nähtyään kuvan
tarttui siihen innokkaasti, sanoen:

"Mitä ihmettä! Rubensinko? Ei, kaiketi jäljennös!"

"Tämä näyttää totisesti alkuperäiseltä", puheli taidekauppias

ihmeissään. Hän silmäili minua kuin pökertyneenä. Vanha
herrasmies, nähtävästi taiteentuntija, otti taulun hänen kädestään ja
tarkasteli sitä huolellisesti.

"Ainakin se on hänen kouluaan, ja varmasti vanha. — Kenties

jonkun oppilaan. Arvokas joka tapauksessa:"

Hän kääntyi minuun.

"Myykää se minulle!" sanoi hän. "Paljonko tahdotte siitä?"

Minäpä osasin olla vielä siksi ovela, että päätin käyttää hyväkseni
heidän innostustaan. Yritin tekeytyä rauhalliseksi liikemieheksi.

"Jos taulu miellyttää herroja, niin antakaa siitä minulle kymmenen

markkaa."

"Kymmenen markkaa!" huudahti taidekauppias, ja hän ei voinut

olla remahtamatta nauruun. "Sanokaa sentään kymmenen kertaa
kymmenen! Sen se sietää. Tehdään siis kauppa siitä hinnasta."

En voinut muuta kuin katsella häntä hölmistyneenä. Samassa

virkkoi vanha herrasmies vakavasti:
 "Jos voitte tyydyttävästi selittää taulun alkuperän ja
omistusoikeutenne, niin esitän, että myytte sen minulle
kolmestakymmenestätuhannesta markasta! Olen konsuli S.; olette
kenties kuullut, että minä päätän asioista pikaisesti enkä koskaan
korolta tarjoustani. Taulu voi olla paljoa enemmän arvoinen, — ja
luultavasti onkin, sen sanon suoraan. Mutta jos erehdyn, olkoon
vahinko minun."

Taidekauppias kumarsi ikäänkuin kieltäytyen sekaantumasta

hyvän liiketuttavan kilpailijaksi.

Kärsimysteni katkeroittamana luulin katselevani huonoa ilveilyä ja

vastasin tuskastuneesti:

"Hyvä herra! Kenties olette rikas, ja teidän kannattaa kerskua

rahoillanne. Mutta elkää sentähden pilkatko köyhää miestä, jolla ei
ole muuta kuin tämä vanha kuva. Minäkin omistin kerran jotakin,
mutta ihmisten petollisuuden tähden menetin kaikki. Luulin taululla
olevan jonkun markan arvon, ja olihan toki oikeus kysyä —"

Vanha herrasmies sai minut kuitenkin varsin pian vakuutetuksi

siitä, että hän oli tosissaan. Saatuaan kuulla, miten taulu oli tullut
haltuuni, ja ystävällisesti urkittuaan liikaakin oloistani, hän vei minut
kuin unessakävijänä kotiinsa, missä sain allekirjoittaa hänen
laatimansa kauppasopimuksen, samalla kun hän kirjoitti minulle
maksuosoituksen. En tiennyt, seisoinko päälläni vai jaloillani, kun
läksin hänen luotansa, korvissani hänen vielä toistamansa vakuutus,
ettei ollut aivan varmaa, kumpainen meistä oli tehnyt hyvät kaupat.

Luonnollisen vaiston kannustamana ryntäsin pankkiin. En

vieläkään voinut uskoa, että onnenpotkaus oli tosi. Mielenkuohuni
arvattavasti herätti epäilyksiä, mutta rahat luettiin eteeni! Nyt vasta
aloin olla varma. En kerinnyt tarkastamaan setelitukkoa, vaan
sieppasin sen ja lähdin vilistämään niin rajusti kuin olisi minun ollut
saavutettava maailmanennätys pikajuoksussa. Kaadoin
vastaantulijoita, ja onni oli, etten juossut automobiilin alle!

Kotiin tultuani viskasin setelit pöydälle ja aloin mielettömänä ilosta

huutaa:

"Katri, Katri! Madonna! Kolmekymmentätuhatta Rubensia

Harvinaisen arvokas taidekauppias! Vanha valkopartainen herra,
luultavasti jonkun alankomaalaisen mestarin tekemä!"

Katri vetäytyi kauhistuneena ovea kohti ja änkkäsi:

"Hyvä Jumala! Hän on menettänyt järkensä!"

"Vähät siitä, olenko hullu vai viisas, mutta nyt meillä on rahoja!"

Hän tuijotti setelitukkoon ja ravisti päätänsä.

"Ei, Kalle, vie pois rahat, mistä oletkin ne ottanut! Sinä et ole
tuollaista summaa rehellisellä tavalla hankkinut."

Minun piti kertoa koko historia moneen kertaan alusta loppuun,

ennenkuin sain hänet uskomaan, että todella olin madonnasta
saanut rahani.

Hän lensi kuin raketti ulos ja palasi hetken päästä vetäen Sirkkaa
perässään. Minä kouraisin setelitukkoa, siirsin siitä umpimähkään
Sirkan eteen aimo osuuden ja sanoin:

"Tuossa on sinun perintösi! Ja siinä on kärsimyksistä! Ja tässä

myötäjäisiksi, kun kerran joudut naimisiin!"
 "Nythän minä saan uuden hatunkin!" riemuitsi tyttö hyppien kuin
harakka.

"Saat tusinan hattuja — ettei ne aina lopussa ole", sanoin minä.

"Ja sullo nyt nuottisi ja lähde ulkomaille: Pietariin, Roomaan, Parisiin,
Tokioon, mihin tahansa!"

Olimme niin iloiset, ettemme muistaneet, mistä koko ilo alkunsa

sai.

"Siis oli kuitenkin totta, että madonna tuottaa onnea", sanoin

viimein.

Ilon kyyneleitä pyyhkien virkkoi Katri: "Ehkä se kuulee

rukouksenkin!
Kuka tietää!"
SEITSEMÄSTOISTA LUKU.

Kettu joutuu käpälälautaan.

Huijaritirehtööri oli menestyksensä rohkaisemana mennyt

riemukulussa voitosta voittoon. Hän pudisti uusia yhtiöitä kuin turkin
hihasta, ja joka siirrossa tuli voitto hänen taskuunsa, samalla kun
toiset menettivät, mitä olivat yritykseen sijoittaneet. Hän oli maneetti,
joka veti metallia puoleensa. Kaiken tämän ohella hän näytteli
ihmiskunnan hyväntekijää, jolla vähempiosaisten onni oli
sydämellään. Tämä korkea päämäärä silmäinsä edessä hän oli
päättänyt perustaa suurenmoisen kansankeittiön. "Soppa"-nimisen
osuuskunnan säännöt olivat jo vahvistetut, ja yrityksen luoja
katsasteli, mistä löytäisi niitä, jotka löisivät pöytään tarvittavan
pääoman. Ja mikseikös niitä löytyisi! Olihan paitsi hyvää tarkoitusta
odotettavissa varmat voitot ja osingot!

Niinpä kokoontui eräänä iltana tirehtöörin luo joukko lampaita,

kyllin yksinkertaisia antautuakseen kerittäviksi. Tutkittiin
sääntöehdotusta, tehtiin kannattavaisuuslaskelmia. Huijari levitteli
käsiään aivan kuin tahtoen sulkea syliinsä koko kärsivän
ihmiskunnan, jota hän niin rajattomasti rakasti, ja todisti suullisesti ja
kirjallisesti, että "Soppa"-yhtiö tulee lyömään laudalta kaikki muut
sensuuntaiset yritykset. Ja kuulijat uskoivat hurskaina — olihan
tirehtöörin nimi kaiken takeena.

Kokouksen alkajaisiksi tirehtööri piti pitkän puheen, missä hän

virallisesti ja kaunopuheisesti esitti mitä ennen oli nurkissa
kuiskannut osakkeiden korvaan.

Ensiksi otettiin esille kysymys uuden yhtiön toimitusjohtajasta.

Syntyi äänettömyys.

Vihdoin pyysi joku puheenvuoroa.

"Minä ehdottaisin tirehtööri Ansiota."

"Kannatetaan!" kuului joukosta.

Esa Ansio oli vaatimaton mies. Hän ei tuppautunut

vastuunalaiseen tehtävään, katseli alaspäin ja sanoi:

"Tässä on ehdotettu minua. Onko kellään sitä vastaan?"

Kellä olisi ollut sitä vastaan! Olihan hän kuin luotu sitä varten!

"Ellei kellään ole vastaan, niin pidetään asia päätettynä", sanoi

tirehtööri ja aikoi lyödä asian kiinni, kun samassa ovi aukeni ja kaksi
miestä astui sisään. He katselivat tutkivasti kokouksen jäseniä, ja
toinen kysyi:

"Onko joku herroista nimeltään Ansio?"

"Jahah, juu! Kyllä se olen minä!" sanoi huijari ja kumarsi

kohteliaasti, ehkä toivoen saavansa yhtiömiehiä lisää "Soppa"-
osuuskuntaansa.
 Mutta vieraat vetivät esiin etsivän poliisin merkit ja tirehtööri Esa
Ansioon kohdistuvan — vangitsemismääräyksen.

Kokous tyrmistyi, puheenjohtaja kalpeni, mutta tyyntyi pian. Hänen

kierot, sieluttomat silmänsä osoittivat viatonta hämmästystä, hän
kääntyi mahtipontisella liikkeellä jäseniin ja sanoi:

"Tässä on tapahtunut ennen kuulumaton erehdys. Herrat ovat

hyvät ja odottavat hetkisen. Minä palaan pian."

Hän meni eikä palannut. Kun jäsenet olivat turhaan odottaneet

tunnin ajan, sanoi eräs: "Meniköhän se sitä soppaa keittämään!"

"Kunhan ei vain joutunut kruunun lientä litkimään!" arveli toinen.

Kokous hajaantui. Soppa jäi keittämättä sillä kertaa, ja keittämättä

se on tänä päivänä.

*****

Me olimme vuokranneet vaatimattoman huoneuston ja kalustaneet

sen yksinkertaisesti, mutta hauskasti. Vaikka meillä nyt olikin varoja,
päätimme elää säästäväisesti. Sirkka oli matkustanut Parisiin
jatkamaan lauluopintojaan. Olin ostanut hänelle uuden soittokoneen,
joka nyt jäi minun haltuuni, joten saatoin taas antaa laulutunteja —
talletustilinä korkotulojen lisäksi. Sen ohessa jatkoin kirjallisia töitäni.
Katri oli nyt kotona, hääri keittiössä ja hoiti pienokaista. Hän oli
nuortunut ja voittanut entisen hilpeytensä takaisin. Kuitenkin jäi
häneen jotakin hiljaista, nöyrää, vakavaa muistona eletyistä
kärsimyksistä.

Eräänä aamuna istuimme sanomalehteä lueskellen. Katri kurkisteli

kihlattuja ja vihittyjä, minä ahmin päivän uutisia. Silloin sattuivat
silmiini seuraavat rivit:

"HUIJARI JOUTUNUT SATIMEEN. SUUNNATTOMIA VÄÄRENNYKSIÄ JA

KAVALLUKSIA SAATU ILMI.

Täkäläinen etsivä poliisi vangitsi eilen 'tirehtööri' Esa Ansion

syytettynä huijauksista, joihin sisältyy lukemattomia petoksia,
vekselinväärennyksiä ja kavalluksia. Mainittu veijari on
vuosikymmenen ajan toiminut täällä ja perustellut kaikennimisiä
yhtiöitä, joista useat ovat olleet olemassa vain paperilla. Monet
herkkäuskoiset, etupäässä vähempivaraiset, ovat joutuneet hänen
keinottelustaan kärsimään.

Kuulustelua varten on myöskin pidätetty muuan huijarin kanssa

suhteissa ollut nainen, jota epäillään osalliseksi rikoksiin.

Tutkimusta jatkuu. Poliisi ei toistaiseksi anna lähempiä tietoja."

"No, mitäs arvelet?" kysyin Katrilta.

"Paha saa pahan palkan", sanoi hän.

Odotimme jännityksellä enempää valaistusta asiaan ja koetimme

arvailla, mikä tuon ovelan keinottelijan oli satimeen saattanut.

Luonnollisesti kykeni vain toinen vielä viekkaampi kukistamaan

niin monipuolisesti harjaantuneen roiston. Vihollinen nousikin omasta
leiristä. Käärme, jota hän oli povellaan elättänyt, pisti häntä. Naisen
loukattu rakkaus, viha ja mustasukkaisuus hänet syöksi turmioon.

Nainen oli omaisuudellaan auttanut hänet satulaan. Avioliiton

toivossa oli hän uhrannut kaikkensa, vaiennut veijarin pahimmista
teoista, joista hänellä yksin oli tieto. Tästä kaikesta ei hän pyytänyt
muuta kuin uskollisuutta, etuoikeutettua asemaa miehen sydämessä.

Tirehtööri oli ottanut konttoriinsa nuoren, sievän tytön. Hän näet

rakasti kauniita naisia yhtä kiihkeästi kuin rahaa. Mutta kaksi
kuningasta ei sovi samaan valtakuntaan. Tyttö eroitettiin, ja rauha
vallitsi taas talossa. Mutta pian alkoi kuulua kuiskeita, että tirehtööri
oli vuokrannut rakastetulleen yksityisasunnon ja vietti hauskoja
hetkiä hänen seurassaan. Syntyi kohtaus, joka pani Onnelan
muutenkin heikolla pohjalla lepäävän rakennuksen vapisemaan.
Lemmenkateuden kiihdyttämänä alkoi loukattu puoli vaatia
tirehtööriä tekemään täyttä totta naimalupauksestaan. Siinä
selvittelyssä paljastui, että mies oli jo ennestään sidottu. Nainen
erosi liikkeestä ja vaati rahojansa takaisin korkojen kanssa. Mutta
koska liikemiehillä on periaatteena aina ottaa eikä koskaan antaa,
jätti huijari vaatimuksen silleen ja kirjoitti apulaiselleen passin
harmaalle paperille.

Ja apulainen lähti — lähti etsivään osastoon ilmiantamaan

sulhasensa ja isäntänsä.

Kauan kesti poliisitutkintoa, uusia rikoksia paljastui joka päivä,

asiakirjoja karttui kilokaupalla.

Mies, jonka mielilause oli "juttu jatkuu raastuvanoikeudessa", toivoi

nyt varmaan, ettei sellaista paikkaa olisi olemassakaan.

Kun juttu ensi kerran otettiin esille, menin Katrin kera asian
käsittelyä seuraamaan. Vaikka kavallusjutut olivatkin muodissa, oli
oikeussali täynnä uteliaita, ja lakimiehet väittelivät vilkkaasti
pykälistä.
 Syytetty pysyi oikeudessa tyynenä, kuten oikean liikemiehen tulee.
Hän väitti jyrkästi kaikki valheeksi, ja hänen asianajajansa Jutku ja
Metku panivat koko oveluutensa liikkeelle, pestäkseen miehen
puhtaaksi kuin pulmusen. Mutta lainopillinen saivartelu taittoi
kärkensä tosiasioiden musertavaa painoa vastaan.

Pari päivää tämän tapauksen jälkeen otettiin tirehtöörin

kunnianloukkausjuttu minua vastaan lopullisesti käsiteltäväksi. Mutta
tällä kertaa ei kantaja tullut kannettansa jatkamaan, joten koko juttu
raukesi. Tuntuvan loven se kuitenkin teki kukkarooni. Asianajajani oli
nylkyri, mutta minä maksoin mielihyvällä, koska olin voittanut.

Kavallusjuttu lykkäytyi istunnosta toiseen; näytti siltä, että se tulisi

jatkumaan monta vuotta. Jutku ja Metku yrittivät väärien todistajien
avulla tehdä valkeasta mustan ja päin vastoin. Kun yleinen syyttäjä
ja puolustusasianajaja olivat aikansa kiistelleet, kokoontui oikeus
päätöstä antamaan. Tuomio sisälsi kuritushuonetta ja
kansalaisluottamuksen menettämistä pitkiksi ajoiksi.

"Liian helpolla pääsi!" arveli eräs juttua seurannut.

"Laki on niinkuin se luetaan", sanoi toinen.

Kun istunnon loputtua vankilan keltaiset vaunut ajoivat pihalle,

sattui surullisenhauska kohtaus. Tuomittujen joukossa oli kuuluisa
rosvo. Kun tämä oli kömpinyt vaunuihin, katseli tirehtööri häntä
karsaasti, arvellen kait itsensä liian hyväksi hirtehisen seuraan.
Mutta voro sanoi ilkeästi nauraen:

"Astu sisään, virkaveljeni! Kruunun kyydillä on helppo kulkea."

 Vanginvartija auttoi tirehtöörin sisään ja lukitsi oven. Ja kuorma
lähti liikkeelle kahleiden kalistessa.

Kotimatkalla emme puhuneet monta sanaa. Vihdoin sanoi Katri:

"Hän on saanut palkkansa. Mutta miten on mahdollista, että

sivistymätön mies, entinen suutari, saattoi vetää viisaampia nenästä
— sinuakin?"

"Sitä minä olen itsekin ihmetellyt!"

"Vaan eipä sinua olekaan vaikea petkuttaa. Te hengenmiehet

liitelette aina yläilmoissa ja ja unohdatte sen, mitä maan päällä
tapahtuu", jatkoi hän.

"Se on totta, minä olen epäkäytännöllinen enkä ollenkaan

ymmärrä liikeasioita. Mutta vahingosta viisastuu. Uskallanpa
vakuuttaa, etten toista kertaa anna huijarin kyniä itseäni."

"Suokoon sen Jumala!" lopetti Katri.

KAHDEKSASTOISTA LUKU.

Elämä alkaa uudelleen hymyillä.

Pari vuotta oli Sirkka Vanamo opiskellut ulkomailla. Sieltä tuli tuon
tuostakin kirjeitä, joissa hän innostunein sanoin kertoi edistyksistään
tai kuvaili maailmankaupungin loistoa.

Viimeisessä kirjeessään hän kertoi palaavansa kotimaahan

syksyllä. Silloin hän antaisi ensi konserttinsa ja lähtisi sen jälkeen
kiertomatkalle maaseudulle.

Me aloimme uudelleen saada uskomme ihmisiin ja elämään sekä

luottamusta hyvän ja kauniin voittoon, joka murheen päivinä oli
tahtonut meissä sammua. Sanottakoon, että kärsimys jalostaa,
mutta asian laita on kuitenkin usein päinvastainen. Kovat
kokemukset tekevät ihmisen helposti katkeraksi, syyttäväksi,
tyytymättömäksi. Etenkin jos on joutunut syyttömästi, toisten
tunnottomuuden ja petollisuuden tähden kärsimään.

Edelleen lisäsi iloamme uuden perheenjäsenen ilmestyminen.

Tälläkin kerralla se oli poika — vastoin sedän selvästi lausuttua
toivomusta. Katri ennusti, että siitä oli tuleva onnen poika ja sen
nimikin piti olla Onni. Minä tyrkytin taaskin Mattiani, mutta ei
kelvannut tälläkään kerralla. Katri oli kysynyt Sirkan mielipidettä
Parisista asti. Hän oli kovin ihastunut ranskalaiseen Honoré-nimeen,
mutta kun se oli hiukan vaikea lausua, niin hänkin kannatti Katrin
ehdotusta.

Eräänä päivänä kysyin Katrilta:

"Kuule, vieläkö se madonnalaulusi on tallessa?"

"Mitäpä siitä! Eihän meillä madonnankuvaakaan enää ole.

Mitenkähän sen taulun lopulta kävi?"

En ollut rohjennut siitä tiedustaa. Hartaista pyynnöistäni hän

vihdoin toi runon. Aloin vaivata päätäni, luodakseni siihen sävelmän
ennenkuin Sirkka palaisi ulkomailta. Hän näet varusti joka kirjeensä
jälkikirjoituksella: "Joko eno on säveltänyt sen madonnalaulun?"

Syyskuun lopulla saapui Sirkka kotimaahan. Kun laiva hiljaa läheni

rantaa, näimme kaivatun vieraan seisovan yläkannella. Tyttö oli
kehittynyt naiseksi, jonka piirteet taide ja elämä olivat hienostaneet.

Muutaman päivän levon jälkeen aloimme suunnitella

konserttiohjelmaa.

Ennen julkista esiintymistään halusi Sirkka laulaa yksityisesti

entisen opettajansa ja parin arvostelijan kuullen. Nämä olivat erittäin
ihastuneita. Ääni olikin kaunis, jalokaikuinen, helkkyvä kuin hopea.
Mutta vieläkin enemmän kiinnitti mieltä sielukkuus, tunteen syvyys ja
herkkä antaumus, joka leimasi koko esityksen. Hänen laulunsa oli
kultaa, kärsimysten tulessa puhdistettua ja karaistua. Tästä kaikesta
johtui, että hänestä odotettiin jotakin erikoista.
 Juuri kun olin aikeissa lähettää ohjelman painoon, sanoi Sirkka:

"Ai, mutta puuttuu numero kotimaisesta osastosta. Se

madonnalaulu, eno!"

Sanoin kyllä sepustaneeni laulupahasen, mutta se oli aivan liian

mitätön julkisesti esitettäväksi. Töin tuskin se sopisi kodin piirissä
laulettavaksi. Mutta Sirkka väitti umpimähkään, että siitä tulee
ohjelman päänumero, ja ellei se mene yleisöön, ei hän tahdo toista
kertaa esiintyä Helsingissä.

Ja hän alkoi heti pianiinon ääressä tutkia laulua, piankin

vakuuttaen, että siitä tulee erinomainen ja että se se soveltuu
oivallisesti hänen äänelleen ja tempperamentilleen.

Konsertin edellä hän sairasti kovaa ramppikuumetta, ei syönyt

eikä juonut, käveli rauhattomana ja koetteli äänensä luistavuutta. Ja
lähtikin hänen kurkustaan mitä ihanimpia liverryksiä, niin että minä,
parantumaton haaveilija, näin unta kesästä ja laululinnuista keskellä
synkintä syksyä.

*****

Määräaikana oli konserttisaliin kokoontunut yleisöä "hyvä huone",

s.o. ei läheskään täyttä salia, mutta kuitenkin runsaasti siihen
nähden, että alottelijat usein saavat laulaa tyhjille seinille. Setä
Samuli oli tietysti saanut vapaalipun ja istui aivan lavan edessä
talvipalttoo yllä ja kalossit jalassa, sillä olihan taas se kirottu syksy ja
jäsen kolotuksen aika. Lakin hän kuitenkin oli ottanut päästään.

Kun Sirkka astui yleisön eteen, alkoi setä ankarasti paukuttaa

käsiään, saaden osan yleisöä tekemään samoin. Ensi numeroiden
jälkeen olivat suosionosoitukset hillittyjä; olipa huomattavissa
jonkunlaista kylmyyttäkin, mutta vähitellen tarttui esiintyjän lämpö ja
innostus vastustamattomasti kuulijoihin. Kotimaisessa osastossa
saivat suosionosoitukset myrskyisän luonteen. Joka numero oli
toistettava, madonnalaulu vaadittiin kolmasti. Lopussa ei yleisön
riemu asettunut ennenkuin laulajatar oli esittänyt monta ylimääräistä
numeroa ja vieläkin kerran madonnan.

Konsertin jälkeen piiritti joukko arvostelijoita ja laulunystäviä

Sirkan. Joku tahtoi haastatella häntä, toinen pyysi hänen kuvaansa
johonkin lehteen, kolmas halusi kiinnittää hänet oopperayritykseen.
Setä sanoi pöyhkeilevänsä siitä, että hänen suvustaan oli taiteen
taivaalle uusi tähti noussut, ja tarjosi illallisen. Hän oli jo tilannut
automobiilin ja tahtoi itse saattaa laulajatarta.

Ravintolassa esitteli Sirkka meille erään ystävänsä, tohtori

Valtimon. Kun setä sai kuulla, että tämä oli lääkäri, lyöttäytyi hän
juttusille ja otti puheenaineeksi nivelleininsä. Pelkäsimme, että hän
paljastaa jalkansa ja pakoittaa tohtorin tekemään tutkimuksen.

Innostuksen ollessa ylimmillään otti setä maljan, rykäisi ja alkoi

pitää puhetta. Se ei ollut mikään korkealentoinen eikä syvästi
runollinen puhe, mutta erittäin sopiva tilaisuuteen. Näin hän lausui:

"Hyvät naiset ja herrat! On hetkiä ihmiselämässä, jolloin sydän ei

tunne sitä, mitä kieli tahtoisi haastaa. Me olemme tänä iltana kuulleet
satakielen, joka jättää varikset ja muut vaakkujat kauas taaksensa.
En tahdo väittää olevani musiikin tuntija, päinvastoin, jos toden
sanon, olen epämusikaalisin mies tässä talossa, tampuurimajuria
lukuunottamatta. Mutta tästä huolimatta uskallan väittää, että joka
sellaisella kyydillä kuin neiti Sirkka laulaa niin mutkikkaan ja
monikoukeroisen laulun kuin Sevillan aarian Rosinan parturista, sitä,
sanon minä, sopii sydämensä pohjasta onnitella. Sellaisella
laulajattarella on loistava ura takanaan… ei kun edessään. Niinpä
tyhjennän illan maljan hänen menestyksekseen ja kehoitan muita
tekemään samoin. Eipä muuta kuin hei ja eläköön! Kippis!"

Ja setä tyhjensi maljansa yhdellä siemauksella ja sanoi, että jos

hän olisi nuorempi eikä häntä vaivaisi reumatismi, hän pistäisi
pienen polskan laulajattaren kanssa. Heti hän kuitenkin oikaisi
lausuntoansa sikäli, ettei ikä hänelle kyllä haittaa tehnyt, mutta
reumatismi oli viime aikoina osoittanut pahenemisen oireita.

Istuimme vielä kauan. Mieliala oli korkealla. Olihan Sirkka,

holhottimme, leikannut ensimäiset laakerinsa taiteen ohdakkeisella
tiellä ja kulki nyt kunniakasta tulevaisuutta kohti.

Aamulla lähti Sirkka kaupungille lukemaan päivän lehtiä. Hän oli

utelias näkemään, miten arvostelu häntä kohteli. Hän palasi iloisena,
josta näki, että hänellä oli syytä olla tyytyväinen. Hänen mukanaan
oli tohtori Valtimo. Päättelin eilisiltaisten huomioitteni perusteella, että
jotain erikoisempaa oli tekeillä.

Kun oli puheltu konsertista ja minä olin pyytänyt anteeksi setäni

hieman karkeata puhetapaa, esitti tohtori asiansa. Vaikka minulla ei
ollut vähintäkään syytä epäillä hänen tarkoitustensa rehellisyyttä,
katsoin kuitenkin holhoojana asianmukaiseksi tutkistella tulevaa
vävymiestä.

"Annan suuren arvon tunteillenne neiti Vanamoa kohtaan, mutta

pyydän teitä ottamaan huomioon, että hänen taiteellinen
kehityksensä on vielä kesken. Sitäpaitsi häntä painaa raskas
velkataakka sen jälkeen kun hän minun kokemattomuuteni johdosta
menetti koko omaisuutensa. Lyhyesti: neiti Vanamolla ei tätänykyä
ole muuta kuin äänensä ja laulunsa."

Tohtori istui hetken ääneti ja sanoi sitte rauhallisesti:

"Hänen kauneutensa, taiteelliset lahjansa ja ennen kaikkea jalo

tunteensa ovat herättäneet rakkauteni. Ellei teillä muuta ole minua
vastaan, rohkenen pyytää hänen kättänsä ja isällistä siunaustanne."

Sana "isällistä" pakoitti minut hymyilemään.

"Pyydän huomauttaa, että olen ainoastaan holhooja. Mutta te

näytätte olevan mies, joka ansaitsee luottamusta. Eikä se
mainitsemani velkaantuminenkaan sentään ihan sillä kannalla ole.
Niin ottakaa siis hänet, ja Jumala…"

Siinä paikassa lensi tyttö sisään ja sitä tietä kaulaani huutaen:

"Onko se totta! Kiitos, eno, kiitos!"

"Mistä sinä kiität!" sanoin hämmästyksissäni.

"Minä kuuntelin oven raosta ja tiedän kaikki."

Minä ravistin hänet kimpustani ja sanoin:

"Tietysti sinä kuuntelit, se on selvä. No, koska olette olleet niin

tyhmiä, että olette menneet rakastumaan toisiinne, niin täytyy teidän
tietysti saada toisenne, vaikka tuskin uusi tyhmyys edellistä
parantaa."

Ja minä otin nuorten kädet ja yhdistin ne ajatellen, että lopusta kai

Herra huolen pitää niinkuin oli pitänyt Katrista ja minustakin.