Freud's Sister Read online

  8

  I was entering into death and I promised myself that death is nothing other than forgetting • I was entering into death and I told myself that a human being is nothing except remembrance • I was entering into death and I repeated that death is forgetting and nothing else

  I was entering into death and I repeated everything I will forget • I was entering into death and I repeated to myself

  I will forget how they brought us into this room • I will forget this bitter smell • I will forget how the old people around me are screaming fearful of their death • They scream or they pray • I will forget how I press my sister’s hand and how she presses my hand • That will be my death • That forgetting

  I will also forget Eva and her little daughter to whom I gave my mother’s name • I will forget how Ottla went to her death together with hundreds of children

  I will forget the years of fear • Years in which we were afraid that uniformed men would knock on our door at any moment and drag us off to the death camps • Or simply shoot a bullet into our old foreheads • I will forget how we hoped our brother would manage to pull us from Vienna • I will forget the day I learned that my brother had died

  I will also forget the woman nursing her child at the entry to Piazza San Marco

  That will be my death • That forgetting • I will forget

  I will forget how the Good Soul was dying and how she said to me • Kiss me

  I will forget that before she died my mother called me Mama • I will forget that this was the first and last time someone called me Mama

  I will forget Heinerle and our conversation about the mayflies • I will forget how Heinerle slipped the puppet I had made for him onto his hand and how he then wiped his bloody mouth with it

  I will forget how I found Cecilia with her hair spread on the pillow

  That will be my death • That forgetting • I will forget

  I will forget how I left my home • I will forget the years spent at the Nest

  I will forget my mother’s words • I will forget all my mother’s words

  I will forget how I cursed my father’s seed and my mother’s womb

  I will forget that bloody trace on the wall of my room • The bloody trace • The only remains of my unborn child • I will forget

  I will forget you as well my unborn child • I will forget how strongly and how briefly I was able to rejoice in you • That is my life • That is my death • I will forget

  I will forget that I told my brother • Beauty is the only comfort in this world

  I will forget that sweet pain and that bitter longing to give a new life • I will forget how I felt that my heart my womb and between my legs were beating together • Beating as one

  That will be my death • That forgetting • I will forget

  And I will forget you Rainer • I will forget how the water carried you away • I will forget your look filled with emptiness • I will forget my hope that life would return to that emptiness • I will forget that before your look was empty it was a look that cried inside and the tears fell inside you • I will forget that in the time between when you had those two looks you had a different look • I will forget that look of cruelty • I will forget everything Rainer • Both the tenderness and the cruelty • I will also forget your question • Who am I • I will also forget your answer • I am nothing • I will forget that because of you I felt I was nothing • I will forget my joy when I learned I was carrying your child • I will forget how we played with our shadows when we were children • I will forget how I tore the little red pocket from my dress and gave it to you for remembrance

  That will be my death • That forgetting • I will forget

  I will forget the quiet life and the quiet death of my father

  I will forget Sarah and her fingers that held the dandelion • I will forget Sarah and the clouds of butterflies around her • I will forget Sarah and I will forget with what bashful longing she looked at Sigmund • I will forget Sarah and her request • Do not forget Klara and help her if you can • I will also forget Klara • I will forget her care of the fourteen little Gustavs • I will forget her care of the dead • I will forget how her firmness turned to frailty • I will forget how she resembled a terrified bird

  I will forget my vulnerability

  That will be my death • That forgetting • I will forget

  I will forget you Sigmund • I will forget everything about you • I will forget everything down to my earliest memories from the time when many things still had no name for me and you gave me a sharp object and said Knife

  I will forget that at the beginning of my life there was love and pain • I will forget the first pain • I will forget the quiet dripping of blood from a hidden wound • I will forget the first pain and the first words I remember • My mother’s words • It would have been better if I had not given birth to you

  I will forget that I was born

  I repeated this while I waited for my death • I repeated that death is only forgetting and I repeated what I will forget

  I will forget

  Acknowledgments

  I WROTE FREUD’S SISTER over a period of seven and a half years, and I am immensely grateful for the support I received during that time from the following foundations and institutions: the Bellagio Center, the Rockefeller Foundation (Italy/USA); CEC ArtsLink (USA); the Central European Initiative (Italy); Château de Lavigny Writers’ Residence/Fondation Ledig-Rowohlt (Switzerland); Društvo Slovenskih Pisateljev (Slovenia); the European Cultural Foundation (Netherlands); KulturKontakt (Austria); Ledig House International Writers Residency (USA); Nederlands Letterenfonds (Netherlands).

  The novel has been edited for its English-language publication, and for this edition I would like to express my sincerest gratitude to Christina E. Kramer, for being so devoted to creating this beautiful translation; to Pierre Astier and Laure Pecher of Pierre Astier and Associates, for their care in helping the book find its way to the best publishers; to Peter Blackstock and Elena Mitreska, for valuing the novel; and, at Penguin Books, to John Siciliano, whose knowledge and love of literature find genuine expression in his work as an editor.

  Goce Smilevski

  IT HAS BEEN A tremendous pleasure and privilege to work with Goce Smilevski. I thank him for his careful reading of this translation and for his comments and suggestions. Thanks also to John Siciliano for his thoughtful editing and promptness in response to my queries. I thank Eleni Buzharovska, Rumena Buzharovska, Liljana Mitkovska, and Martin Sokoloski for help with queries on the Macedonian. David Kramer provided valuable editorial advice and the translation of excerpts from Mann’s essay “Brother Hitler” and Kafka’s story “The Bachelor’s Misfortune.” I thank Carol Anderson for her careful reading and numerous valuable suggestions, and Christina Santolin for research assistance.

  The novel contains numerous quotations from and references to the works of Sigmund Freud. Quotations from Moses and Monotheism are based on the English translation by Katherine Jones. Smilevski has adapted excerpts from other Freud works, including his letters, The Future of an Illusion, Civilization and Its Discontents, and other essays. My translations of these and other quotations are based on the author’s adaptations. In translating from the Macedonian, I have consulted the Penguin editions of The Future of an Illusion, translated by J. A. Underwood and Shaun Whiteside, and Civilization and Its Discontents, translated by David McLintock; Ernest Jones’s Sigmund Freud: Life and Work, volume 1; New Introductory Lectures on Psychoanalysis, translated by W. J. H. Sprott; and The Standard Edition of the Complete Psychological Works of Sigmund Freud, edited by James Strachey. I consulted A. D. Godley’s translation of Hippocrates and Francis Adams’s translations of Aretaeus, as well as Robin McKown’s Pioneers in Mental Health. The Goethe quotation is from Thomas Mann’s lecture “The Art of the Novel,” translated by Herman Salinger in The Creative Vision, edited by Haskell Block and Salinger. Quotes from Kierkegaard a
re from Either/Or translated by L. M. Hollander.

  Christina E. Kramer