Colette Fellous - This Tilting World

This Tilting World

This Tilting World

Colette Fellous

Translated from French by Sophie Lewis

Originally published as: Pices dtaches by Colette Fellous

2017 ditions Gallimard, Paris

Translation 2019 by Sophie Lewis

Edited by Ccile Menon for Les Fugitives and published simultaneously in the UK by Les Fugitives, London

Two Lines Press

582 Market Street, Suite 700, San Francisco, CA 94104

www.twolinespress.com

ISBN 978-1-931883-94-8

Ebook ISBN 978-1-931883-95-5

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Date

Names: Fellous, Colette, author. | Lewis, Sophie, translator.

Title: This Tilting World / by Colette Fellous ; translated by Sophie Lewis.

Other titles: Pices dtaches. English

Description: San Francisco, CA : Two Lines Press, [2019] | Originally published in French as Pices dtaches--t.p. verso

Identifiers: LCCN 2019016022 | ISBN 9781931883948 (pbk.)

Subjects: LCSH: Fellous, Colette. | Authors, French--20th century--Biography | Authors, French--21st century--Biography. | Jews--Tunisia--Biography.

Classification: LCC PQ2666.E47 Z46 2019 | DDC 848/.91403 [B] --dc23

LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2019016022

Cover design by Gabriele Wilson

Cover photo by Candace Milon / Millennium Images, UK

Typeset by Sloane | Samuel

Printed in the United States of America

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This project is supported in part by an award from the National Endowment for the Arts.

Photo credits:

: photos by the author

: photos by Marianne Malartre

All photos 2017

: MGM / BBQ_DFY / Aurimages; still from Pandora and the Flying Dutchman, 1951, Dir: A. Lewin, Pers: A. Gardner, J. Mason

For a long time, night after night, I welcomed it. It lived with me, loved me, enthralled me; I curled up inside my dream. And in the morning still I ached to sing out my joy. The scene: waves come crashing against the great bay window, the spray flies right over me but I laugh because Im protected, I live in a house set right on the waters edge, perhaps even in the water, besides I see nothing of this house beyond the light of the glass wall, a vast light. Its very windy outside, you can see the wind dipping into the waves, playing with them. Im not afraid, I am snug inside, right where I want my life to be, Im looking at the sea, its all I do, theres music in the room but you cant hear it, drowned out by the waves. For years Ive summoned this same dream, the sea and its roar, night after night. On waking Id say well, my lovely dream came back again, I would so like one day to find that house for real, then Id say again, rolling over and reaching out: I shall walk through life until I find it, without seeking, perhaps its already waiting for me? But where and when? I used to say that half jokingly, but still, I said it. A dream that seemed like an enchanted prince disguised as a house, a dream that brought me joy and made my eyes shine.

Now everything is clear, everything can begin, for this evening I am on the terrace of a house that looks a lot like the one in that dream, Ive just made the connection between the light in each of them, Ive just understood. The night is immense, superbly star-filled, the sea calm, still slightly violet, a border to the sky, its as if Im standing at the balcony of the world, of a vanished world. Thats practically a line from before, I think, a line rooted in yesterdays world, but now its over, my novel is damaged, the world is damaged, I too am deeply wounded, something has happened here, something real, but everything can still begin, everything can begin again, I firmly believe it, my heart believes, my eyes too. A white boat is gliding along the horizon, by the coast of Korbous, a tiny trembling point that shines in a straight line to Sicily, I half close my eyes to take it all in, it is Saturday and I love Saturday with a passion.

I must tell this before tomorrow, I must bear witness and right away, this book will be my nocturne, then Ill give back the keys and take my leave.

The phone rang, I heard the news and I collapsed. It was a Friday, two weeks ago, in the baking sun. I was down in the village buying a box of Safia water and raisins from Raf Raf, the ones that taste lusciously of roses. In front of the supermarket, the fish-sellers were stacking slender sea bream on piles of ice, the yellow taxis were circling the roundabout, a man was selling Barbary figs out of his cart, from her seat beneath a tree a woman was hawking tabouna flatbreads from an old La Marsa basket, her hands tattooed with henna, she rearranged a shawl with big purple and yellow flowers on it around her face. I answered after two rings, I think people hurried to their balconies when they heard my cry, they wanted to help, but I picked myself up, I said its nothing Ill be fine thank you. I always automatically say it will be fine even when it wont. I walked on down the alley, shaking, haggard, toward Avenue du 14 Janvier, utterly lost, I recognized the whine of the little train that goes to La Marsa, the one that almost ran me over a few years before. The heat muffled every sound, it was eleven in the morning and already almost thirty-five degrees, days and nights of the country barely holding out against the relentless furnace. I glared at my phone, it had played a foul trick on me: its my friend, in Greece, he was out on his boat, his heart, Ive just found out, thats why I screamed, forgive me. Thats what I wasnt able to say to the man whod appeared bare-chested on his balcony and wanted to come down and help me: Alain has just, hes dead, I cant, forgive me.

Thank you, I whispered it in Arabic, very politely, and I added still in Arabic: Life be with you. All day long here we repeat life be with you, its another way of saying thank you, we say it when we take our change, when we ask how are you, when answering someones smile, when its morning or when its evening, when were happy for someone elses fortune and we show it (then its they who say it to us), life be with you; magical, protective words, a talisman, as if upon speaking it we sense that a mere breath could blow us away, there and then, and that talisman, the words that say life be with you, will ward off death, we say it automatically, without really thinking, then one day a life is blown away for good. Thank you, I said it three times, for my father always insisted that I never forget to say thank you. I know I say it far too much and that it often backfires but its a habit, an old-fashioned way of holding on to him, of infusing all the lands around us with his presence, I mean that my fathers face was his whole life, his life was the air he breathed, it was everything he saw and everything I saw with him, all the gestures we made to each other, all the looks we exchanged too, and our silences of course, and perhaps even what I didnt think to see when he was alive or that I couldnt see when I wasnt there. It was what I forgot to tell him and all that I forgot to ask him when there was still time. Yet my father didnt have any great educational principles, and Ive no idea how my mother and he made ends meet while bringing up their five children, being themselves two urchins lost in the world, but those things, saying thank you, studying, honoring every moment, loving life, respecting others lives, laughing, never giving trouble, giving joy, these mattered to him and he imparted them to us in simple ways, by laughing too, by the odd little affectionate tap on the thigh, by shyly twinkling his eyes to show that nothing was very serious really, that everything would turn out fine, or by shrugging awkwardly, playing the clown: thats life, thats how it is, you have to say thank you, it cant be helped. We used to watch him and laugh, we didnt know what to make of it: Was he teasing us or for real? At the very top of his back, on the left, there was a little knob of fat that fascinated me and bothered me a little too, he also had a few long, straight hairs on his shoulders, like head hairs, I couldnt look at those for long, I preferred to focus on his smile.