Kaddish for an Unborn Child by Imre Kertész Read Free Book Online Page A

history presents to us and, furthermore,
whose
rationality looks rationally upon the world in order that the relation may be—as indeed, I’m sorry to say, it is—mutual, I most probably said; the explanation for Auschwitz, I most probably must have said, to my way of thinking the explanation for Auschwitz, I most probably must have said, since that was and indeed still is my opinion, is inherent in individual lives, solely in individual lives; Auschwitz, to my way of thinking, is a rational process of individual lives, viewed in terms of a specific organized condition. If mankind were to start dreaming as a whole, that dream would necessarily be Moosbrugger, the good-natured sex killer, as we can read in Musil’s
The Man Without Qualities
, I most probably said. Yes, individual lives, as a whole, and then the whole mechanics of carrying them through, that’s all there is to the explanation, nothing more, nothing else,
all things possible do happen; only what happens is
possible, says K., the great, the sad, the wise one, who already knew from individual lives exactly what it would be like when criminal lunatics look upon the world rationally and the world in turn presents a rational aspect to them, that is to say, is obedient to them. And don’t tell me, I most probably said, that this explanation is just a tautological way of explaining the facts with facts, because yes, indeed, this explanation, hard as I know it may be for you to accept, that we are governed by commonplace felons—hard even when you already call them commonplace felons and know them as such— nevertheless as soon as a criminal lunatic ends up, not in a madhouse or penal institution, but in a chancellery or other government office you immediately begin to search for what is interesting, original, extraordinary, and (though you don’t dare to say so, except in secret, of course) yes, great in him, so you are not obliged to see yourselves as such dwarfs, and histories of the world as so absurd, I most probably said; yes, so that you may continue to look upon the world rationally and the
world
in its turn may present a rational aspect to you. And that is entirely understandable, even entirely commendable, even if your method is neither “scientific” nor “objective,” as you would like to believe, it is not; it is sheer lyricism and moralizing insofar as it seeks to restore a rational, or in other words endurable, world order, and those who have been banished from the world subsequently edge their way back into the
world
again through these back and front doors—anyone, that is, who is inclined to do so and who believes that the
world
will henceforth be a place fit for people, but then that is quite another matter, I most probably must have said, the only problem is that this is how legends are born, we can learn from these “objective” lyrical works, these scientific horror stories, say, that the great man had an outstanding tactical sense—right?—as if an outstanding tactical sense were not precisely the means by which every paranoid and manic madman misleads and befuddles those around him and his doctors, and then that social conditions were such-and-such, while international politics were such-and-such, and then some, once philosophy, music and other forms of artistic hocus-pocus had corrupted people’s capacity to think, but above all that, when it comes down to it, the great man, let’s not mince words, was a
great man
, he had about him something of the disarming, the fascinating, in short: something of the
demonic
, that’s it, a demonic streak that was quite simply irresistible, especially if we have no will to resist, seeing that we just happen to be hunting for a demon; a demon is just what we’ve been needing for a long, long time for our squalid affairs, to gratify our squalid desires, the sort of demon, of course, who can be persuaded to believe that
he
is