'Apple-tree summers give birth to new ideas. People tread new paths'

Olga |A Deserving Winner

Right from the very instant when Polish writer Olga Tokarczuk’s name began flashing across our screens as the winner of the 2018 Nobel Prize for Literature - myself, like most of our tribe, badly madly wanted to get hold of one or a few of her writings, to get to know more about her!

By fortuitous coincidence, as luck would have it, I stumbled upon one of her novels, which is also unanimously hailed as her masterpiece, and it is titled, Primeval and Other Times.

It proved to be a real unputdownable read of sorts, and i bet you could really finish it off in a single sitting, what with just around 166 pages on it in toto! 

The novel brilliantly weaves into its fabric the lives of three generations of the Niebieski / Boski family of the little Polish town of Primeval. Alongside, Olga also simultaneously traces the experiences of the inhabitants of Primeval, a land that’s got such a harmonious interconnected relationship with Nature.

Yes, an Ecocritical reading or a Bioregional reading would sure click big time on this Olga read, you bet!

In Primeval, then, Olga gently leads her reader by the hand into a wonderful rural landscape, a community that lives in close harmony with Nature. Her descriptions of the rich flora and fauna of this rural community, are so intense and gripping. What’s so beautiful about her Nature-descriptions are the awesome analogies that she so casually strews across her passages.

Just giving you a sample snippet from Olga’s amazing magic wand in Primeval! I’m sure it would feel like walking into a fruit orchard live, with Olga walking beside you, giving you a connoisseur’s expert commentary on the fruit trees and their significance.

Added, I guess we’d have never come across such a writer of a rare-o-rare breed, with such an intense awareness of the region.

Phenomenal Olga! By all means! Let’s also thank the Nobel Jury for their amazing choice, and also for introducing to us all such an amazing writer! Most importantly, to Antonio Lloyd-Jones owe we a million thanks for taking the pain and the joy as well, of translating Olga into English!

Well, in India, amongst a host of writers who have foregrounded Nature as their predominant setting, and even while I am reading through Olga, one particular writer of our times keeps crossing my mind quite often! And she’s none other than the writer of the famous folklorish saga of the Naga, When the River Sleeps by Easterine Kire! Parallels seem to abound in such astounding proportions!

Thanks to Dr. Aparna Srinivas for introducing Easterine Kire to me!

Coming back to Primeval, yes! Olga is real super-awesome!

Here goes snippets from Olga –

The orchard has two times that are interwoven, succeeding each other year after year. These are the time of the apple tree and the time of the pear tree.

In March, when the ground becomes warm, the orchard begins to vibrate and digs its claw-like, underground paws into the earth’s flesh. The trees suck the earth like puppies, and their trunks become warmer.

In the year of the apple, the trees draw from the earth the sour waters of underground rivers that have the power of change and motion. These waters contain the need to push, to grow and spread.

The year of the pear is completely different. The time of the pear trees involves sucking sweet juices from the minerals, as inside the leaves they gently and gradually merge with the rays of the sun. 

The trees come to a stop in their growing and relish the sweetness of sheer existence, without moving, without developing. Then the orchard seems unchanging.

In the year of the apple tree the flowers bloom briefly, but most beautifully. Often the frost beheads them or violent winds shake them off. There are lots of fruits, but they are small and not very impressive. 

Seeds roam far from the place of their birth: dandelion clocks cross the stream, grasses fly over the forest to other meadows, and sometimes the wind even carries them across the sea.

Animal litters are weak and not large, but those that survive the first few days grow into healthy, clever specimens. Foxes born during apple-tree time do not hesitate to approach henhouses, and the same is true of falcons and martens. 

Cats kill mice not because they are hungry, but for the sake of killing, aphids attack people’s gardens and butterflies assume the brightest colours on their wings.

Apple-tree summers give birth to new ideas. People tread new paths. They fell forests and plant young trees. They build weirs on rivers and buy land. They dig the foundations for new houses. They think about journeys. 

Men betray their women, and women their men. Children suddenly become adult and leave to lead their own lives. People cannot sleep. They drink too much.

They take important decisions and start doing whatever they have not done until now. New ideologies arise. Governments change. Stock markets are unstable, and from one day to the next you can become a millionaire or lose everything. 

Revolutions break out that change regimes. People daydream, and confuse their dreams with what they regard as reality.

The Guardian in its exclusive feature on Olga goes on an impulsive overboard and describes her as ‘the dreadlocked feminist winner the Nobel needed!’

How true!

And this graceful and subtle feminist streak could be guaged in her characters’ dialogues that begin this masterpiece of sorts - Primeval and Other Times!

Just have a peek at these lines –

Genowefa knew no other world but Primeval, and no other wars but the brawls in the marketplace on Saturdays when the drunken men came out of Szlomo’s bar. They would yank at each other’s coat tails, tumble to the ground and roll in the mud, soiled, dirty and wretched.

So Genowefa imagined the war like a fight in the mud, puddles and litter, a fight in which everything is settled at once, in one fell swoop. Therefore she was surprised the war was taking so long.

Just before the holidays Genowefa set off to go shopping in Jeszkotle. As she was crossing the bridge she saw a girl walking along the river. She was poorly dressed and barefoot. Her naked feet plunged boldly into the snow, leaving small, deep prints. Genowefa shuddered and stopped.

She watched the girl from above and found a kopeck for her in her bag. The girl looked up and their eyes met. The coin fell into the snow. The girl smiled, but there were no thanks or warmth in that smile. Her large white teeth appeared, and her green eyes shone.

“That’s for you,” said Genowefa.

The girl crouched down and daintily picked the coin out of the snow, then turned and went on her way without a word.

Jeszkotle looked drained of all colour. Everything was black, white and grey. There were small groups of men standing in the marketplace, discussing the war – cities destroyed, their citizens’ possessions scattered about the streets, people running from bullets, brother searching for brother. No one knew who was worse – the Russki or the German. The Germans poison people with gas that makes their eyes burst. There’ll be famine in the run-up to harvest time. War is the first plague, bringing the others in its wake.

Genowefa stepped round a pile of horse manure that was melting the snow in front of Szenbert’s shop. On a plywood board nailed to the door was written:

PHARMACY

Szenbert & Co

sells only stocks of

top quality

Laundry soap

Washing blue

Wheat and rice starch

Oil, candles, matches

Insecticide powder

She suddenly felt weak at the words “insecticide powder.” She thought of the gas the Germans were using that made people’s eyes burst. Do cockroaches feel the same when you sprinkle them with Szenbert’s powder? She had to take several deep breaths to stop herself from vomiting.

“Yes, Madam?” said a young, heavily pregnant woman in a sing-song voice.

She glanced at Genowefa’s belly and smiled.

Genowefa asked for some kerosene, matches, soap and a new scrubbing brush. She drew her finger along the sharp bristles.

“I’m going to do some cleaning for the holidays. I’m going to scrub the floors, wash the curtains and scour the oven.”

“We have a holiday coming too, the Dedication of the Temple. You’re from Primeval, aren’t you, Madam? From the mill? I know you.”

“Now we know each other. When’s your baby due?”

“In February.”

“Mine too.”

Mrs Szenbert began to arrange bars of grey soap on the counter.

“Have you ever wondered why we silly girls are giving birth when there’s a war on?”

“Surely God …”

“God, God … He’s just a good accountant with an eye on the debit as well as the credit column. There has to be a balance. One life is wasted, another is born …  Expecting a son, I shouldn’t doubt?”

Genowefa picked up her basket.

“I need a daughter, because my husband’s gone to the war and a boy grows up badly without a father.”

Mrs Szenbert came out from behind the counter and saw Genowefa to the door.

“We all need daughters. If we all started having daughters at once there’d be peace on earth.”

Olga makes such an engaging read, enthralling our minds, enlivening our sensibilities and endearing to our hearts in every way, all through the way!

So yup! Ladies and gentlemen, let's together raise a toast to Olga, to celebrate the wonderful worlds that she has so beautifully crafted for us all through her words! A wondrous writer who, I’m sure has really gotta adorn the stacks in our reading rooms in the days ahead! - Olga Tokarczuk! Ladies and Gentlemen!

Thank you!

images: scrolldotin, amazondotcom