Everything Is Illuminated by Jonathan Safran Foer Read Free Book Online Page B

not breathe. He did not know where he was. “Anna?” he asked. That was the name of my grandmother who died two years yore. “No, Grandfather,” I said, “it is me. Sasha.” He was very shamed. I could perceive this because he rotated his face away from me. “I acquired Jon-fen,” I said. “Um, that’s Jon-athan,” the hero said, who was observing Sammy Davis, Junior, Junior as she licked the windows. “I acquired him. His train arrived.” “Oh,”
    Grandfather said, and I perceived that he was still departing from a dream. “We should go forth to Lutsk,” I suggested, “as Father ordered.”
    “What?” the hero inquired. “I told him that we should go forth to Lutsk.” “Yes, Lutsk. That’s where I was told we would go. And from there to Trachimbrod.” “What?” I inquired. “Lutsk, then Trachimbrod.”
    “Correct,” I said. Grandfather put his hands on the wheel. He looked in front of him for a protracted time. He was breathing very large breaths, and his hands were shaking. “Yes?” I inquired him. “Shut up,” he informed me. “Where’s the dog going to be?” the hero inquired. “What?”
    “Where’s . . . the . . . dog . . . going . . . to . . . be?” “I do not understand.” “I’m afraid of dogs,” he said. “I’ve had some pretty bad experiences with them.” I told this to Grandfather, who was still half of himself in dream.
    “No one is afraid of dogs,” he said. “Grandfather informs me that no one is afraid of dogs.” The hero moved his shirt up to exhibit me the remains of a wound. “That’s from a dog bite,” he said. “What is?” “That.”
    “What?” “This thing.” “What thing?” “Here. It looks like two intersect-ing lines.” “I don’t see it.” “Here,” he said. “Where?” “Right here,” he said, and I said, “Oh yes,” although in truth I still could not witness a thing. “My mother is afraid of dogs.” “So?” “So I’m afraid of dogs. I can’t help it.” I clutched the situation now. “Sammy Davis, Junior, Junior must roost in the front with us,” I told Grandfather. “Get in the fucking car,”
    he said, having misplaced all of the patience that he had while snoring.
    “The bitch and the Jew will share the back seat. It is vast enough for both of them.” I did not mention how the back seat was not vast enough for even one of them. “What are we going to do?” the hero asked, afraid to become close to the car, while in the back seat Sammy Davis, Junior, Junior had made her mouth with blood from masticating her own tail.

The Book of Recurrent Dreams, 1791
    The news of his good fortune reached Yankel D as the Slouchers were concluding their weekly service.
    It is most important that we remember, the narcoleptic potato farmer Didl S said to the congregation, which was reclining on pillows around his living room. (The Sloucher congregation was a wandering one, calling home a different congregant’s house each Shabbos.) Remember what? the schoolteacher Tzadik P asked, expelling yellow chalk with each syllable.
    The what, Didl said, is not so important, but that we should remember. It is the act of remembering, the process of remembrance, the recognition of our past . . . Memories are small prayers to God, if we believed in that sort of thing . . . For it says somewhere something about just this, or something just like this . . . I had my finger on it a few minutes ago . . . I swear, it was right here. Has anyone seen The Book of Antecedents around? I had an early volume here just a second ago . . . Crap! . . . Can somebody tell me where I was? Now I’m totally confused, and embarrassed, and I always screw it up when it’s at my house —
    Memory, grieving Shanda assisted, but Didl had fallen uncontrollably asleep. She woke him up and whispered, Memory.
    — There we go, he said, not missing a beat as he riffled through a stack of papers on his pulpit, which was really a chicken coop. Memory.
    Memory and