Jón Kalman Stefánsson - The Sorrow of Angels

JN KALMAN STEFNSSON

Translated from the Icelandic by Philip Roughton

Also by Jn Kalman Stefnsson in English translation

Heaven and Hell (2010)

First published in the Icelandic language as Harmur englanna by Bjartur, Reykjavk, in 2009
First published in Great Britain in 2013 by

MacLehose Press
An imprint of Quercus Editions Ltd
55 Baker Street
7th Floor, South Block
London
W1U 8EW

Copyright Jn Kalman Stefnsson, 2009
English translation copyright 2013 by Philip Roughton Published by agreement with Leonhardt & Hier Literary Agency A/S, Copenhagen

This book has been published with the financial support of Bkmenntasjur/The Icelandic Literature Fund

The moral right of Jn Kalman Stefnsson to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988. Philip Roughton asserts his moral right to be identified as the translator of the work.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopy, recording, or any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.

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

ISBN (HB) 978 0 85705 165 3
ISBN (Ebook) 978 1 84866 293 3

This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, organisations, places and events are either the product of the authors imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or locales is entirely coincidental.

You can find this and many other great books at:
www.quercusbooks.co.uk and
www.maclehosepress.com

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Our Eyes Are Like Raindrops

Now it would be good to sleep until our dreams change to sky, a quiet, calm sky, an angel feather or two floating down, otherwise nothing but the bliss of the oblivious. Sleep, however, eludes the dead. When we close our staring eyes memories overtake us, not sleep. At first they come singly and even as beautiful as silver, but quickly turn into a dark, suffocating snowfall, and thats the way its been for more than seventy years. Time passes, people die, the body sinks into the ground and we know no more. Otherwise theres little of sky here, the mountains take it from us, as do the storms that these same mountains intensify, dark as the end, but sometimes when we catch a glimpse of the sky following a blizzard we believe we can see a white streak left by the angels, high above the clouds and mountains, above the mistakes and kisses of man, a white streak like a promise of great bliss. That promise fills us all with childish happiness and a long forgotten optimism stirs within us, but it also deepens despair and hopelessness. Thats the way it is, a great light creates deep shadows, great fortune contains great misfortune and human happiness seems condemned to stand at the point of a knife. Life is quite simple but a person is not; what we call the puzzles of life are our own complications and murky depths. Death has the answers, it says somewhere, and it frees ancient wisdom from its fetters; of course this is damned nonsense. What we know, what we have learned has not sprung from death but rather from a poem, despair and finally memories of happiness, as well as great betrayal. We do not possess wisdom, but what trembles within us takes its place, and is perhaps better. Weve travelled far, further than anyone before us, our eyes are like raindrops, full of sky, pure air and nothing. So its safe for you to listen to us. But if you forget to live you end up like us, this hounded herd between life and death. So dead, so cold, so dead. Somewhere deep within the lands of the mind, of this consciousness that makes a person sublime and devilish, there still dwells a light that flickers and refuses to go out, refuses to give in to the heavy darkness and suffocating death. This light nourishes us and torments us, it persuades us to keep going instead of lying down like dumb beasts and waiting for what might never come. The light flickers, and thus we go on. Our movements may be uncertain, hesitant, but our goal is clear to save the world. Save you and ourselves with these stories, these snippets from poems and dreams that sank long ago into oblivion. Were in a leaky rowing boat with a rotten net, and were going to catch stars.

Some Words Are Shells in Time, And Within Them Are Perhaps Memories of You

Somewhere within the murky snowfall and frost, evening is falling, and the April darkness squeezes between snowflakes that pile up on the man and the two horses. Everything is white with snow and ice, yet spring is on its way. They toil against the north wind, which is stronger than everything else in this country, the man leans forward on the horse, holds tightly to the others reins, theyre completely white and icy and are likely about to change into snow, the north wind intends to gather them before the arrival of spring. The horses trudge through the deep snow, the trailing one with an indistinct hump on its back, a trunk, stock-fish or two corpses and the darkness deepens, yet without turning pitch black, its April, despite everything, and they press on from the admirable or torpid obstinacy that characterises those who live on the border of the habitable world. Its certainly always tempting to give up, and in fact many do so, let everyday life snow them over until theyre stuck, no further adventures, simply stop and let themselves be snowed over in the hope that sometime it will stop snowing and clear skies will return. But the horses and the rider continue to resist, press on despite the seeming existence of nothing in this world except for this weather, everything else is gone, such snowfall wipes out directions, the landscape, yet high mountains are hidden within the snow, the same ones that take a considerable portion of the sky from us, even on the best days when everything is blue and transparent, when there are birds, flowers, and possibly sunshine. They dont even lift their heads when a house gable suddenly appears in front of them from out of the relentless snowstorm. Soon another gable appears. Then a third. And a fourth. But they fumble along as if no life, no warmth has anything to do with them any longer and nothing matters except for their mechanical movement, faint lights can even be glimpsed between the snowflakes, and lights are a message from life. The trio has come up to a large house, the mounted horse moves all the way up to the steps, lifts its right foreleg and scrapes vigorously at the lowest one, the man grunts something and the horse stops, then they wait. The lead horse is upright, tense, its ears perked, while the other hangs its head, as if thinking deeply, horses think many things and are the closest of all animals to philosophers.

Finally the door opens and someone steps out onto the landing, his eyes squinting into the obtrusive snowfall, his face drawn against the ice-cold wind, the weather controls everything here, it models our lives like clay. Whos there? he asks loudly and looks down, the blowing snow sunders his line of sight, but neither the rider nor the horses reply, they just stare back and wait, including the horse standing behind with the hump on its back. The person on the landing shuts the door, feels his way down the steps, stops just over halfway down, thrusts out his chin to see better before the rider finally makes a hoarse and rattling sound, as if clearing ice and muck from his language, opens his mouth and asks: Who the Hell are you?