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Table of Contents
DAŠA DRNDIĆ
DOPPELGÄNGER
Translated from the Croatian by S. D. Curtis and Celia Hawkesworth
First published in 2018 by Istros Books
London, United Kingdom www.istrosbooks.com
Copyright © Daša Drndić, 2018
First published in 2002 by Samizdat B92
The right of Daša Drndić, to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988
Translation © SD Curtis and Celia Hawkesworth , 2018
Cover design and typesetting: Davor Pukljak, www.frontispis.hr
ISBN
Print: 978-1-912545-13-1
MOBI: 978-1-912545-14-8
ePub: 978-1-912545-15-5
This publication is made possible by the Croatian Ministry of Culture.
ARTUR AND ISABELLA
Translated by S.D. Curtis
Oh. He shat himself.
An ordinary day, sunny. Soft sunlight, wintry. A view of the railway tracks. A view of the customs house, people in uniform. In the distance, a bit of sea, without any boats. A lot of noise: from the buses, from the people. This is what is called a commotion. Beneath the window – commotion. The panes quiver, the windows of his living-room. They’re quivering, like jelly, quivering like a small bird. The glass trembles impatiently. He watches. He listens. He’s very still while he listens to everything trembling. He places the palm of his hand on the glass. To check what is actually trembling: whether it’s a little or a lot, whether it’s trembling gently or violently, just the way it trembles – or might it be him that’s trembling? He watches what’s happening outside, down below. Beneath the window it is lively. His window-frame is peeling, the wood is coarse, unpolished. Women neglect themselves, become unpolished, coarse. Especially their heels. Especially their elbows. Especially their knees. Men less. Less what? They neglect themselves less. They take care of their heels. Take care of their heels? How do they take care of their heels?
There are three rubbish containers under the window. That’s where poverty’s gathered together, below his window. Drunken women gather, cats gather. Life gathers down below, beneath his window. HE is above. Watching. All shat up. His penis is withered, all dried up. The panes are loose. The wood is bare and rotten. Between his buttocks – it’s slippery. Warm. Stinky. It stinks. Sliding down the leg of his trousers. Down both. He squeezes his buttocks, he walks and squeezes, à petits pas. He puts on a nappy. Looks through the window. Here comes darkness. There goes the day.
Nappies. Incontinence, incompetence, incompatibility. He watches grey-haired ladies weeing in their nappies and smiling. They smile tiny smiles and they smile broad smiles. When they give off big smiles, old ladies quiver. Old ladies in aspic. In buses they piss and smile to themselves. In coffee shops, in cake shops, in threes, in fives, sitting at small marble tables nattering, some are toothless, nattering over cakes, secretly pissing and smiling. Great, happy invention. Nappies. Each one of them is warm between the legs. Just like once upon a time. In their youth. In joyful times. Long ago.
HE looks at his bulge, it’s bulging. Like huge artificial genitals. Inside the bulk there squats a tiny willy, his willy, all shrivelled. Dangling. Everything is little. Little meals. Little solitude. Solitude – decrepitude. When the rash appears he powders it with talcum, one should do that, yes, and baby-cream rubbed-in gently. He strokes the rash between his legs, the inside of his thighs, in circles, tenderly, his willy stands up. (He pomades his wee-covered sons on the island of Vis. Little willies). His hairs have grown thin. He has very little pubic hair. He’s no longer hairy. Transparent skin. All shrivelled. Bald. That’s your portrait.
Look at yourself.
Such silence.
As thick as shit between the buttocks. Dense.
He’s got his features, they have remained. They’re there. Look.
He’s happy.
Everything is so tidy.
SHE steps into the bathtub cautiously because she’s old. The tub is full of bubbles, the water is warm. She runs her hand over her flabby skin, she’s got a surplus of skin, with her hand she runs over her flaccid stomach, her tits are in the way, her tits are a bother, capillaries break, let them break, ah, she wees in the tub. The water is warm.
SHE has a collection of earplugs. The earplugs lie on the edge of the bathtub, neatly, in a little box. She plucks them out with her index finger and thumb. She takes the wax ones, the tiny round ones, dappled with yellow from frequent use, no, with dark-brown earwax. Yuk. This is my earwax. It’s not yuk. It’s my insides. That’s how she thinks. She kneads the earplugs with her thumb and her forefinger, moulds them, sticks one into her left ear, another into her right ear. Like when they push into your bowels, into your arsehole. Plugs for this, plugs for that. SHE is a carapace. A shell is all that’s left.
She leans back in the tub, the edge is cold. She shuts her eyes. She can’t hear any noises from outside. Outside there’s nothing but a white void. A hole. A white hole with a dot on the right. The dot is a passageway, an entrance to her head. A tight entrance. A narrow entrance, small. Through it her days wriggle out. In her head there is a rumbling, a silent rumble like the rattling of a 4 HP ‘Tomos’ motor bought on credit for a plastic boat bought on credit thirty years ago, oh, happy days. There’s music in her head, her head is full of tunes.
Astrid is a nice name. Astrid is wholesome and fun, Astrid is capable and not very spiteful.
Ingrid is like her, Astrid.
Iris is a nice name. Iris is strange and not very pretty, but she is
charming, yes, definitely.
Sarah is pretty and clever. Always lands on her feet. You could call her a loose woman.
Lana is short and bright. She has a wicked tongue. A sharp tongue.
Adriana is stupid.
Isabellas are good and gentle. Isabellas are special beings. Isabellas are sad because there are terrible people in the world. Isabella, that’s me.
Isabella likes to paint. Isabella loves colour. She doesn’t like brown. White doesn’t exist for her. Isabella has talent. Being an artist for a living was not something to be taken seriously.
Isabella loves acting. Isabella has been acting her whole life. My real self I keep only for myself, thinks Isabella.
Isabella loves photography. She believes that photographs are frozen memories. Isabella never smiles on photos.
Isabella loves running. She runs whenever she is in a bad mood. Running allows her time for thinking. When she runs she has the impression that she clears away her problems. She runs fast. Recently, since she turned seventy-seven, she isn’t