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THE SHORT STORIES OF ZAKARIA TAMER I didn’t reply but went to my room, blood staining the ground with every step I took. My mother followed me in, asking about my swollen, bloody feet. I replied: “The path to the peak is covered in thorns and the nation will never progress without victims.” And then I said to her: “If you want to light a fire with logs, it’ll flicker out, but you’ll succeed if you use kindling.” Mother shook her head ruefully and said: “What are you talking about? Have you gone mad?” I told her: “The world is mean, always siding with the demeaned.” Then grand Abdullah said: When my mother left the room, I sighed with relief, but then my little brother came in shouting: “You’ve been missing for three days. I long to hear your stories.” I said to him: “I’ll tell you any story you want.” He said: “Off you go, then.” I said: “A man went to the graveyard one day and came across a madman sitting on the ground, so he said to him: ‘What are you doing there?’ The madman said: ‘I’m sitting with people who will do me no harm.’ So the man left the graveyard, and headed for the desert. He met a boy wearing threadbare clothes, so he asked him: ‘Where are you going?’ The boy said: ‘I don’t know.’ The man said: ‘Where have you come from?’ The boy said: ‘I don’t know.’ The man was hungry. He saw an apple tree and stretched out his hand to pluck one of the apples, so the tree said to him: ‘Do not eat from me, because I am the king’s . . .’ ” My little brother interrupted me, saying: “What is this boring story?” So I said: “I’ll tell you another, then. Listen. A judge was rich, and, one day, a poor man came up to him and said: ‘God bless you, judge, I’m a poor man with dependants and have come to you for help.’ The judge gave him nothing. That night when the judge fell asleep, he heard a voice saying: ‘Raise your head!’ So the judge raised his head and saw a palace built of gold and silver bricks. He asked: ‘What is this palace?’ He was told: ‘This would have been yours if you had given some of what you own to the poor man.’ The judge stirred in his sleep from fear and regret.” Then my little brother interrupted me again, saying: “I don’t like your stories today.” 140 BANIPAL 53 – SUMMER 2015
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THE ARAB PRISON So I said to him: “I’ll tell you a story you will like. One day long ago, a king fell ill and sent for his doctors. They said to him: ‘There is a wholesome, God-fearing man in your kingdom who, if you send for him, will cure you if God responds to him.’ The king sent for the good man, and said: ‘Pray to God for me.’ The good man said: ‘How will He accede to my prayers on your behalf while in your prison there are so many innocent convicts?’ The king was angry and ordered the good man to be arrested, so the number of prisoners increased, and in time the king was cured of his illness.” My little brother said to me, on his way out of my bedroom: “Your tales are boring today.” He went out and I remained, trying to forget the last three days, still shaking as if buried under an iceberg. And grand Abdullah concluded: And I didn’t shed my fear until I turned into a fly. TRANSLATED BY JOHN PEATE from the collection Nida’a Nouh, (Noah’s Summons), 1994 The Old Gate Out of the tavern came a blond-haired soldier. Left behind him was the din of drunken men with brown complexions and downcast eyes; downcast, that is, until they spotted him, at which point they began to blaze with a savage hatred because he was one of the foreign soldiers who had invaded a city they had not been born in. The street outside was silent and empty. When midnight approaches, the city surrenders itself to slumber; lights in windows go out, streets are deserted, and it turns into a kingdom of vagrants, gamblers and drunks dragging themselves home. The foreign solder walked parallel to the river bank, a trifle unsteadily. A gentle breeze was blowing, bringing with it the scent of BANIPAL 53 – SUMMER 2015 141

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THE SHORT STORIES OF ZAKARIA TAMER

I didn’t reply but went to my room, blood staining the ground with every step I took. My mother followed me in, asking about my swollen, bloody feet. I replied: “The path to the peak is covered in thorns and the nation will never progress without victims.”

And then I said to her: “If you want to light a fire with logs, it’ll flicker out, but you’ll succeed if you use kindling.” Mother shook her head ruefully and said: “What are you talking about? Have you gone mad?”

I told her: “The world is mean, always siding with the demeaned.”

Then grand Abdullah said: When my mother left the room, I sighed with relief, but then my little brother came in shouting: “You’ve been missing for three days. I long to hear your stories.”

I said to him: “I’ll tell you any story you want.” He said: “Off you go, then.” I said: “A man went to the graveyard one day and came across a madman sitting on the ground, so he said to him: ‘What are you doing there?’ The madman said: ‘I’m sitting with people who will do me no harm.’ So the man left the graveyard, and headed for the desert. He met a boy wearing threadbare clothes, so he asked him: ‘Where are you going?’ The boy said: ‘I don’t know.’ The man said: ‘Where have you come from?’ The boy said: ‘I don’t know.’ The man was hungry. He saw an apple tree and stretched out his hand to pluck one of the apples, so the tree said to him: ‘Do not eat from me, because I am the king’s . . .’ ” My little brother interrupted me, saying: “What is this boring story?”

So I said: “I’ll tell you another, then. Listen. A judge was rich, and, one day, a poor man came up to him and said: ‘God bless you, judge, I’m a poor man with dependants and have come to you for help.’ The judge gave him nothing. That night when the judge fell asleep, he heard a voice saying: ‘Raise your head!’ So the judge raised his head and saw a palace built of gold and silver bricks. He asked: ‘What is this palace?’ He was told: ‘This would have been yours if you had given some of what you own to the poor man.’ The judge stirred in his sleep from fear and regret.”

Then my little brother interrupted me again, saying: “I don’t like your stories today.”

140 BANIPAL 53 – SUMMER 2015

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