E-Book, Englisch, 284 Seiten
Roemer On A Woman's Madness
1. Auflage 2024
ISBN: 978-1-917126-08-3
Verlag: Tilted Axis Press
Format: EPUB
Kopierschutz: 6 - ePub Watermark
E-Book, Englisch, 284 Seiten
ISBN: 978-1-917126-08-3
Verlag: Tilted Axis Press
Format: EPUB
Kopierschutz: 6 - ePub Watermark
In 1966, at the age of 19, Astrid Roemer emigrated from Suriname to the Netherlands. She identifies herself as a cosmopolitan writer. Exploring themes of race, gender, family, and identity, her poetic, unconventional prose stands in the tradition of authors such as Toni Morrison and Alice Walker. She was awarded the P.C. Hooft Prize in 2016, and the three-yearly Dutch Literature Prize (Prijs der Nederlandse Letteren) in 2021.
Weitere Infos & Material
Although my only taste of the war was the piercing sweet flavor of canned chocolate milk, my mother was scared to death of making the journey on the because of the deafening military aircraft that continually patrolled the coast and, so it was said, occasionally sank the wrong ship. We headed inside.
My father, unable to sway her toing and froing, focused his objections around me: “If you absolutely must visit your sister at a time like this, so be it! But leave my child at home!”
“My child?” She cackled and, putting on a show of stubbornness, packed our things in two separate suitcases. Eyebrows raised, he brought out his leather military satchel, saying that traveling with a single bag would be easier. With only a veneer of courtesy, she shoved it back into his arms: each having her own bag suited her better. He shook his head as he watched us go from the wide pier, his green hat in hand, straight-backed, thin. I didn’t dare wave.
The next day, over a breakfast of cold cassava and fried herring at a crowded table in the ship’s mess, she made a few things clear to me: for the first six days, I’d be left with a close acquaintance in Nieuw Nickerie. She’d be with family in Guyana.
“Who is this close friend and why are you going on without me?” I grumbled.
She looked at me, the same way she’d often looked at her husband, with a who-the-hell-do-you-think-you-are expression, and said coolly, “Be nice to Lady Morgan. Help out if you can. Go to bed early. Don’t ask me any questions about this. Got it?”
I nodded, with a giant lump in my throat, and attempted to toss back as composed a look at her, but we only burst out into hearty laughter.
The house on Rivierweg was old-fashioned, not updated. The elegant interior remained, the moribund evidence of bygone glory. The tiled floor had gleamed in the old days. The candlesticks had once burned with white flames. I noticed the mirrors: they’d preserved every wet breath. And the porcelain ornaments…
I shuddered: pale and evil, the dancing men and women stared into the room. Only the lady of the house had bested the ravages of time, her skin and body unblemished – except for her malicious, aggressive hands, which belied her frail gentility. I kissed her. She kissed me back on both cheeks, held me at arm’s length, then hugged me to her again with pleasure.
“She’s practically a grown woman,” she mused aloud.
My mother nodded.
“She’s got the touch of womanly beauty, your Noenka.” She went on, switching from Dutch to English.
I heard concern in her voice and looked to see how my mother would respond: she gave another relaxed nod. Then she gave her a big kiss. We broke into loud laughter at the colored stigmata on our faces.
My mother wasn’t even two days gone when I started feeling, despite the daily little kindnesses from the hostess, so abandoned that I lost my will to live. I had no appetite, no interest in anything, and developed a bitter hatred toward Lady Morgan. She did so much, talked so much, so why didn’t she have anything to say about the boy in the strange uniform, the one staring into the room out of a large portrait? I wanted to know what had happened to my Prince Charming.
When I was five, I lived the dream at the lady’s house. Floors that gleamed like the mirrors in brass frames, furniture in dark wood with scroll legs, and colorful satin upholstery, cushions that smelled of flowers. Heavy portraits on the walls, a candelabra full of white candles, and scores of porcelain figurines, sadly locked away in glass display cases.
And there was Ramses. Dressed like a crowned prince from a Western fairy tale: white shirt, bow tie, slim trousers in dark velvet, pristine white socks, and black patent leather shoes, roaming the house when his mother wasn’t looking – playing the organ or reading from an English picture book under her watch. I doted on him with my eyes, my ears pricked up whenever he spoke, and I dreamed that he became a bird and flew away with me and his flock of parakeets.
When he turned ten, the education he had received from the lady and a stern reverend proved sufficient to qualify him for continuing education in the English territory.
Back then I also wandered around, just like now as I searched through the house, smelling, listening, pushing open the occasional door, chasing after my memories. I stroked the organ, paged through the books, posed questions to the parakeets, to the illustrations. They said nothing. He stormed in with his backpack, a dollop of bustling life, and I walked in on them hugging: a young man in a white boy scout uniform and a woman in pale pink. Surprised, I planned a retreat, but as he released her, he saw me standing there. At first, he didn’t say anything, then he looked at her questioningly.
“Hello you!” he said in English, hurrying over to me.
“Time for tea,” she announced, heading to the kitchen.
He didn’t reply. Curious, he sized me up, clucking his tongue, a resonant laugh rolling out of his throat. “Noenka, little bird, Noenka!” he exclaimed.
He’d finally recognized me. I don’t know what came over me. When I landed on the floor again, I was panting. So was he. As was she in the pantry in a more restrained manner. The silence of thoughts in between.
Her, in English: “Ramses, Noenka is no little bird anymore, even you can see that!” And he nodded in acknowledgment and carried his things out of the room as if fighting his way through molasses.
We walked the streets in silence. As if years hadn’t gone by, there was still the same thick fruit hanging on the sea grape trees in the back alley, the plain houses concealing deep backyards. The canal slept under pink waterlilies, and people were left alone to go about their business.
“You know what, Noenka, when I see you again, it’s exactly like I’m falling to pieces. It’s like it’s raining somewhere. Like old things dying, time making a detour, like I’m breathing in a new orchid.” He spoke slowly, more English than Dutch, pushing his umbrella deep into the sand with each step – and I remember that 14-year-old girl in a midi pinafore dress, two braids with bows, crocheted socks and open-toed sandals, walking next to a boy who was too old, with legs that were too hairy, a wild thatch of hair, and a backpack.
“Noenka?”
It was Ramses’s voice. I was startled.
“Yes…”
“Do you like fish?”
“No…”
Silence on the other side of the door.
“I wanted to take you out fishing.”
I opened the door. He stood there. Not shy at all.
“Fishing?” I asked.
“Not fishing for real, since you won’t have to do anything,” he chuckled. “The kwikwi bite even if there’s nothing on the hook, and the walapas jump into your basket all on their own.” I tried to laugh: I saw myself walking with fishing rods, baskets, and a gourd full of worms. He sensed my resistance.
“You don’t have to do anything if you don’t want to. You can just watch me fish, if you want, and eat mangoes, if you want.”
I wanted it all. Behind him on his white painted bike on one of the lady’s decorative cushions, my legs to the left, four fishing rods alongside me, a backpack dangling before me, my fingers holding onto his waist – I rode out of town with him, the grinning Nickerians watching us go.
I seem to remember everything about those days. The back room with Ramses’s startling voice. The rushed breakfast. The rustling of the lady and the doves. Biking in the wind and the sun. The smell of fish. The smell of grass. The smell of meadows. Strange sights. New feelings. Sensations that thrust their way into some dreams.
The feast was on a table some ten meters long, both sides lined with Javanese men on unusually low seats eating from platters passed hand to hand. I smelled alcohol and heavy tobacco smoke. Children wandered around or crouched down to watch from a distance. Women walked back and forth. The older ones had batik sarongs stretched around their bodies, their hair pinned up with glittering coins; the younger ones wore taffeta dresses. Their long, black hair shone. We were brought to a smaller table under the tent. Three girls giggled at the boys. Two were introduced to me. Annemarie, the younger one, came to sit next to me. She told me in Indonesian Dutch that I should just relax and be myself, that she’d seen Ramses and me walking at the market, that Njoen-Town was nicer than Longmay, that the food was coming. I liked her at once. She seemed older on the inside than her girlish demeanor suggested, and she appeared to know Ramses and his two friends well. When she left to help serve the food, Ramses shifted closer to me.
“Anne’s with August,” he whispered.
“How old is she?”
He shrugged.
“Does she go to school?”
“To the parochial one. She’ll be a seamstress.”
“Your friend’s lucky!” I said. We watched as she served various dishes with her parents and sisters. Ramses, nicknamed B.G. after his father Mr. B.G., and his friends were well received.
“Your wife?” asked a tall Javanese with a kindly look at me. Ramses nodded.
“Not true! He’s lying! His cousin!” Anne squealed.
I didn’t know what to do with myself and was glad when they handed me a plate.
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