Stefan Bošković

Translated from Montenegrin by Will Firth

‘The contemporary is he who firmly holds his gaze on his own time so as to perceive not its light, but rather its darkness. All eras, for those who experience contemporariness, are obscure.’

Giorgio Agamben

DAY ONE

Am I to blame? That question dogged me all morning. Loony, lip-serving, laid-back, lascivious, languid, la-lo-lu – John Cage’s Landscape resounded in the hall between the bathroom and the bedroom. Everything was shaped like the letter L: the position of my arm on which I leaned my body in a diagonal plane; the slice of lemon in the cup of hot water; the beanbag and the emails. There were 139 I needed to answer. Bruno Cortone was the first and most important. The barking of the labrador came before the first yellow rays. The smell of lavender raised goosebumps on my rear. It was lovely. I practiced dispelling thoughts while the scalding water burned my shoulders. Am I to blame? Through the steam I could hardly see my nose and the shape of my lips. They looked black. Like the blood from her mouth. A little later I polished my shoes and saw a hint of my reflection on their silvery points. My advisers suggested I stay at home or go away to a seminar in Poland. I didn’t consider what my parents proposed. I had to make a decision. I am the one who decides. I am minister. 

***

The morning was wet, bright and lasted longer than usual. As he checked the pressure of the tyres, Saša trod on the glistening drops and crushed the light. I rested on the back seat with my eyes closed. Saša rubbed his hands and blew into them, then he started the motor with a mutter. We made our way through the thick tangle of streets in Podgorica’s Old Town, which was supposed to be a short-cut. I took two Valiums, but the agitation didn’t subside. The bouncing and sudden braking sent the tension off into elements that dis-solved in my tissues and capillaries. When I opened my eyes again, the tension was gone, but my empty insides jumped and brought on a bout of nausea.

“Slow down and try to avoid the potholes.”

Saša has been my driver for eight full years. Before I became minister, I was Dean of the Faculty of Drama. Saša was then as-signed to be my chauffeur. When I was promoted, Saša was too. He got a green Mercedes A-Class and fell in love with it like it was his own child. As he wrinkled his face and tried to think what to say, I slid about on the leather seat and hoped he wouldn’t say anything. He examined my sweat-beaded brow in the rear-view mirror.

“I’m tense too,” Saša said.

“I’m not,” I replied.

“The air conditioning’s been playing up for days.”

He raised and lowered the equalizers to muffle the unpleasant-ness. We both knew the air conditioning was perfectly OK. Saša was a loyal, rather insecure, well brought up creature. Like other drivers too, he knew people. When I didn’t want to talk, he’d look at me in the rear-view mirror, repeatedly, but not for so long as to offend me. In those quiet moments his eyes would take in everything we didn’t say.

When I leave the minister’s building, the habits of the small people become mine. That’s what the prime minister’s rules prescribe. There would be a lot of people, with phones and cameras poised. Her chapel was the third in the row. They’d have time to recognize and heckle me. Loony, lip-serving, laid-back, lascivious, la-lo-lu, I abandoned small habits and made my way to the third chapel. They recognized me and squirmed, hundreds of ghosts rustled their wings, a storm raged in my lungs, my kneecaps fell out. I traipsed with raised shoulders like Pinocchio in a Neil Barrett suit, smitten and naive, ready to plump down at the gate, kneel before the mob and whisper: “I am a king on his knees. Stab me now with horns and camera lenses, queue for a commentary and wrench out my spine, thrash my shoulders and incandescent head. Don’t forget to report the price of my suit.”

It was quiet and cold in the chapel. Gloomy figures on the smooth-worn surface changed their mood and order. When I stepped for-wards, the sobbing died down. Seven women in a column wiped away their tears and stared at me. I stopped in front of the open coffin and looked at her. Her face was rough, her skin grey, with a little blood on her dead lips. I observed that piece of meat, which had no spark of life – there was no reminder of her restless eyes, supple hands and the sounds that the large human mechanism once produced. My breathing was laboured and loud, and a crowd formed behind me. I didn’t dare to move until the tears began running down my especially sorrowful face. I took out my handkerchief, elegantly dabbed my cheekbones, bowed low and took a step towards the witches. The women, to whom I expressed my condolences, froze, one more icily than the other. I thought my tears would surprise them. And they did. Her tall mother was waiting at the end of the column. A dignified and beautiful person in her sixties. I stopped and raised my head for the first time. We discerned the yellow streaks in each other’s eyes. I said softly and distinctly that I was so sorry. She embraced me very briefly, and before she became aware of her ill-considered reaction, I was outside among the men. Shaking hands was the done thing. I tried to meet them with the force of my handshake. Men like the strength of other men. Even when they accept condolences from the one involved in killing their daughter. Sister. Granddaughter.

***

It was warm in the car, and my thoughts were usurped by the odours I had brought with me from the chapel. The air conditioning couldn’t erase them from my skin, so I opened the window and let the wind blast into them. I carefully read all of Bruno Cortone’s messages filed in my WhatsApp inbox for a third time. Bruno had heard of the incident and expressed concern about my ministership. He jotted out all the essential questions regarding the collaboration we cultivated in secret. I hadn’t prepared a reply yet. I needed to think over the situation and the circumstances. But who knew the upshot and the possible consequences, if there would be any at all? Only the prime minister did, whom I couldn’t reach before he rang me. I had no choice but to wait – and as I waited, I watched the young trees flitting past. Saša was driving me to Cetinje, a town that the locals pretentiously used to call the Valley of the Gods, although it was green, fragrant and tucked away among limestone outcrops. The people of Cetinje had the inexplicable idea of their own grandeur, and at one point they even equated themselves with a deity. I liked Cetinje for its intensive linden aroma and deep shade, but spring was always slow in coming, and on several occasions I proposed that the Ministry of Culture move to the capital. Cetinje was too isolated, with a lot of rain and a lot of talk about nothing. The building of the Ministry stood out at the end of the street. A former patrician residence, spacious and quiet. The moment I stepped inside I’d feel I belonged to a kingdom, not of Montenegro, but one considerably greater, unquestionably older, perhaps semi-celestial. Then I’d get a call from my father that brought me back to earth with a crash. He called me every day at 11am sharp and reeled off his daily routine. The first few sentences were always about my mother and her health; then he’d enquire how I was, if my lungs hurt and if I drank the teas he sent me. After that, he’d ask a series of short, “disinterested” questions about particular people in the party, which led me to warn him several times that we shouldn’t talk about things like that on the phone. Snubbed, he’d finish off with a gentle remark about a newspaper article dealing with me, which he claimed to have just stumbled across and read perfunctorily. Then I’d usually hang up with the flimsy excuse that someone had come into the office. I ended all verbal outpourings of love for my parents when I was twelve. I stopped loving them when I was thirty. Now I’m forty-two. My life had been carefully arranged and everything went according to plan... except for her death. I was obsessed by the idea of guilt, although the situation was obviously clear and resolved. Honestly, I was much more consumed by worry that her death could impinge on my ministerial career. Two other people were also concerned about the possibility of me being replaced: Bruno Cortone and Ranko Prediš.

#memoirs #writer #literature

I am Valentino Kovačević, Minister of Culture of Montenegro. I have been discharging my ministerial function successfully for two and a half years. My attitude towards culture is honourable if you consider I have a training and background in the arts, unlike several of my predecessors. I received a Master’s in dramaturgy and comparative literature – a degree generally associated with a life of poverty. My life is far from that. Applied dramaturgy has ensured me a comfortable life, a position and prestige. But I always dreamed of becoming a writer. A sharp, timeless wordsmith like Witold Gom-browicz, Danilo Kiš or Bruno Schulz. The realization that I couldn’t become even a middling hack paralyzed me and relegated me to making notes, writing drafts and sketches, which carved into my medulla. Yet a ministerial career took to the air on condor’s wings, and smiling acquaintances emerged from the clouds like birds of a feather. They were considerate, licked my plumes and all suggested the same: “Why don’t you write your memoirs?” I noticed at an early age that my nature flatters people, particularly when I don’t speak, and I’m silent most of the time. I learned from the prime minister to listen, although I often switch off and wander because the people I meet mainly toss around empty rhetoric, trite phrases and platitudes, which they ultimately use to frame a project and knock at my door with. As minister, I sometimes allocate them funds, some-times not. I’ll publish my memoirs the day I leave the helm so as to save myself from oblivion. I’m keeping them secret for now. I’m in the process of discovering social media and cyber language, and to say that announcing my memoirs through hashtags appeals to me greatly would be an understatement.

My phone jarred me out of my thoughts. It was Dragutin, the former minister of culture.

“Hello?”

“How did it go at the funeral?”

“Good.”

“Were there any reactions?”

“None. But I don’t know what happened after I left.” “I’m sitting here with the prime minister.” “It went well... tell him that.”

“How are you?”

“Tell him it went well.”

“I’ll tell him when we’ve finished. I asked how you are.” “I don’t know... Good, I suppose.”

“We’re playing on the weekend. Are you on board?”

“Of course. I need the exercise. You know... it keeps me on an even keel.”

“Call me again later. I’ve reserved a table at the Juta for this evening”.

“OK. Talk to you soon.”