‘Hell.’ ”
“We have come to see if we can help you,” offered Father Kristoforos, whereupon the Dog wrote “Yalniz kalmak isterim.”
“He says, ‘Leave me alone,’ ” said Abdulhamid Hodja.
“We will bring you food and blankets,” persisted the priest, and it was then that the Dog smiled, causing both of the visitors to recoil in alarm. “God have mercy,” exclaimed the imam.
CHAPTER 8
I Am Philothei (2)
Once when I was about eleven I heard that Ibrahim was ill, and we didn’t have any candles to take into the church, so instead I stole some bread from the table, and some figs, and I took them out and went out to find a beggar, but there weren’t any in the vicinity except for the one called the Blasphemer, and he was very abject because he was the most unpopular beggar in the town because he said filthy things whenever he saw a man of religion, and I didn’t want to give him the bread and figs, but finally I couldn’t find another beggar to give it to, and I said to the Blasphemer, “This is because Ibrahim is unwell,” and he was aware that charity cures the sick, and so he was good about it, and he said, “May the sick one get well, little girl, and may God make you strong as well,” and not long afterwards Ibrahim recovered, and after that I always gave alms to the Blasphemer as long as no one was looking.
This happened not long after the day of St. Nicholas, when all the young men who have gone to the cities return for the feast, and so this is the best time of year for the beggars, because the young men get drunk and become generous, and the Blasphemer was the only one who had received nothing until I gave him the bread and figs.
CHAPTER 9
Mustafa Kemal (3)
Mustafa Kemal is fourteen and has gone to the Military Training School at Manastir. It is 1898 and here beneath Mount Pelister the Greek and Slav bandit-liberators are still bringing chaos to the region, and even in the school itself there is vicious gang warfare. Greece sends irregulars to fight the Ottomans in Crete, and the Sultan declares war. The streets are crowded with soldiers, drummers, flag-wavers. Mustafa wants to run away to join the army, but the war turns out to be too short, and he will have to wait for another one.
At school Mustafa Kemal has a history teacher who enlightens him as to matters of politics, and there is a boy called Ömer Naci who writes poetry, and whose enthusiasm causes Mustafa to open his mind to literature. He learns the art of oratory, and dabbles in verse himself. He has another friend called Ali Fethi, also a Macedonian, who is crazy about French philosophy. Mustafa is ashamed of his poor French, but he knows that it is the key to European civilisation, and so he studies it in his spare time at a course run by French Dominicans. Before long he and Ali Fethi will be discussing the deliciously forbidden texts of Voltaire and Montesquieu.
At home in Salonika Mustafa’s social and sexual education proceeds with even greater élan than his academic. He shuns the Muslim cafés, and goes instead to the Kristal, the Olympus, the Yonyo, where he and his friends can play backgammon for five-para coins, drink beer and stuff themselves with meze in the ribald company of Greeks. He takes dancing lessons, and goes to the cafés chantants , where there is music and dance performed by Jewesses, Italian girls, all the feminine exotica of the Levant, and they come and sit at his table and flirt with him. He understands that infidel girls are amusing, mettlesome and intriguing because they are allowed to be, unlike the quelled, imprisoned and uneducated women of his own race, who are only exceptionally more companionable or interestingthan an ox. In the brothels, Mustafa Kemal is sometimes entertained for free, because the girls adore his fair good looks and his extraordinary blue eyes. A girl of good family, whom he is supposed to be tutoring, falls passionately in love with him.
One day Mustafa Kemal is
“We have come to see if we can help you,” offered Father Kristoforos, whereupon the Dog wrote “Yalniz kalmak isterim.”
“He says, ‘Leave me alone,’ ” said Abdulhamid Hodja.
“We will bring you food and blankets,” persisted the priest, and it was then that the Dog smiled, causing both of the visitors to recoil in alarm. “God have mercy,” exclaimed the imam.
CHAPTER 8
I Am Philothei (2)
Once when I was about eleven I heard that Ibrahim was ill, and we didn’t have any candles to take into the church, so instead I stole some bread from the table, and some figs, and I took them out and went out to find a beggar, but there weren’t any in the vicinity except for the one called the Blasphemer, and he was very abject because he was the most unpopular beggar in the town because he said filthy things whenever he saw a man of religion, and I didn’t want to give him the bread and figs, but finally I couldn’t find another beggar to give it to, and I said to the Blasphemer, “This is because Ibrahim is unwell,” and he was aware that charity cures the sick, and so he was good about it, and he said, “May the sick one get well, little girl, and may God make you strong as well,” and not long afterwards Ibrahim recovered, and after that I always gave alms to the Blasphemer as long as no one was looking.
This happened not long after the day of St. Nicholas, when all the young men who have gone to the cities return for the feast, and so this is the best time of year for the beggars, because the young men get drunk and become generous, and the Blasphemer was the only one who had received nothing until I gave him the bread and figs.
CHAPTER 9
Mustafa Kemal (3)
Mustafa Kemal is fourteen and has gone to the Military Training School at Manastir. It is 1898 and here beneath Mount Pelister the Greek and Slav bandit-liberators are still bringing chaos to the region, and even in the school itself there is vicious gang warfare. Greece sends irregulars to fight the Ottomans in Crete, and the Sultan declares war. The streets are crowded with soldiers, drummers, flag-wavers. Mustafa wants to run away to join the army, but the war turns out to be too short, and he will have to wait for another one.
At school Mustafa Kemal has a history teacher who enlightens him as to matters of politics, and there is a boy called Ömer Naci who writes poetry, and whose enthusiasm causes Mustafa to open his mind to literature. He learns the art of oratory, and dabbles in verse himself. He has another friend called Ali Fethi, also a Macedonian, who is crazy about French philosophy. Mustafa is ashamed of his poor French, but he knows that it is the key to European civilisation, and so he studies it in his spare time at a course run by French Dominicans. Before long he and Ali Fethi will be discussing the deliciously forbidden texts of Voltaire and Montesquieu.
At home in Salonika Mustafa’s social and sexual education proceeds with even greater élan than his academic. He shuns the Muslim cafés, and goes instead to the Kristal, the Olympus, the Yonyo, where he and his friends can play backgammon for five-para coins, drink beer and stuff themselves with meze in the ribald company of Greeks. He takes dancing lessons, and goes to the cafés chantants , where there is music and dance performed by Jewesses, Italian girls, all the feminine exotica of the Levant, and they come and sit at his table and flirt with him. He understands that infidel girls are amusing, mettlesome and intriguing because they are allowed to be, unlike the quelled, imprisoned and uneducated women of his own race, who are only exceptionally more companionable or interestingthan an ox. In the brothels, Mustafa Kemal is sometimes entertained for free, because the girls adore his fair good looks and his extraordinary blue eyes. A girl of good family, whom he is supposed to be tutoring, falls passionately in love with him.
One day Mustafa Kemal is
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