For Bread Alone Read online

  Mohamed Choukri

  FOR BREAD ALONE

  Translated and with an Introduction by

  Paul Bowles

  TELEGRAM

  eISBN 978-1-84659-131-0

  First published by Saqi Books in1993

  First published by Telegram in 2006

  This eBook edition published 2012

  © The Estate of Mohamed Choukri, 1973, 2006 and 2012

  Translation © The Estate of Paul Bowles, 1973, 2010 and 2012

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.

  TELEGRAM

  26 Westbourne Grove, London W2 5RH

  www.telegrambooks.com

  Introduction

  Because I have translated several books from the Arabic I want to make a clear differentiation between the earlier volumes and the present work. The other books were spoken onto tape and the words were in the colloquial Arabic called Maghrebi. For Bread Alone is a manuscript, written in classical Arabic, a language I do not know. The author had to reduce it first to Moroccan Arabic for me. Then we used Spanish and French for ascertaining shades of meaning. Although exact, the translation is far from literal.

  It has been my experience that the illiterate, not having learned to classify what goes into his memory, remembers everything. This too is a technique. Total recall is like perfect pitch: it means nothing in itself, but it can be extremely helpful to the writer who uses it professionally. It seems almost a stroke of good luck that Choukri’s encounter with the written word should have come so late, for by then his habits of thought were already fully formed; the educative process did not modify them. As a writer, then, he is in an enviable position, even though he paid a high price for it in suffering.

  Choukri grew up under conditions of poverty excessive even for Morocco. Eight of his brothers and sisters died of malnutrition and neglect. Another brother was killed outright by Choukri’s father in an access of hunger and desperation. Mohamed and one or two others managed to survive, even under these worst possible circumstances. For Bread Alone records his struggle for survival, up to the time the young man made the resolve to become literate. To have taken and implemented such a decision at the age of twenty is unusual.

  To have passed in the space of five years from learning the letters of the alphabet to writing poems and stories is even more unexpected.

  Paul Bowles

  Morocco 1973

  Glossary

  aaita: a card game

  alpargatas: old-fashioned Spanish canvas slippers

  baqal: a grocer or grocery

  bodega: a Spanish tavern

  cargador (pl. cargadores): a hand-porter

  dfin: a woman’s garment of sheer material, worn over the caftan

  djellaba: a long, hooded garment worn by men and women

  djinn (pl. djenoun): a spirit able to appear in human and animal forms, and having supernatural power over human beings

  fjer: the pre-dawn prayer at the mosque

  hammam: a public bath

  harira: a thick soup

  jefatura: the central police station

  kif: a type of hashish found in North Africa

  limonada: bottled soda water flavoured with lemon

  mahia: an eau de vie, generally made from figs or dates, distilled by the Moroccan Jews

  majoun: a paste made of hashish

  maricón (pl. maricones): an effeminate man; homosexual

  paseo: a walk or stroll; a drive

  qahouaji: a man who prepares and serves tea (or coffee) in an Arab café

  sala: sitting-room

  sebsi: a kif pipe

  surah (pl. surat): a version of the Koran

  taifor: a very low, round table

  tajine: a stew

  tapas: hors d’oeuvres served with drinks in Arab and Spanish cafés

  tas: a washing basin brought to the table before a meal

  tolba: Koranic students

  zib: penis

  zigdoun: a woman’s garment, akin to a Mother Hubbard

  A Note on Pronunciation

  English-speaking readers should note that the ch in North African words is pronounced as sh in English (e.g. Choukri and Larache are pronounced Shoukri and Larashe).

  1

  Surrounded by the other boys of the neighbourhood, I stand crying. My uncle is dead. Some of them are crying, too. I know that this is not the same kind of crying as when I hurt myself or when a plaything is snatched away. Later on I began to see that many people cried. That was at the time of the great exodus from the Rif. There had been no rain, and as a result there was nothing to eat.

  One afternoon I could not stop crying. I was hungry. I had sucked my fingers so much that the idea of doing it again made me sick to my stomach. My mother kept telling me: Be quiet. Tomorrow we’re leaving for Tangier. There’s all the bread you want there. You won’t be crying for bread any more, once we get to Tangier.

  My little brother Abdelqader was too sick to cry as I did. Look at your little brother, she told me. See how he is. Why can’t you be like him?

  I stare at his pallid face and his sunken eyes and stop crying. But after a few moments I forget to be inspired by his silence, and begin once more to cry.

  When my father came in I was sobbing, and repeating the word bread over and over. Bread. Bread. Bread. Bread. Then he began to slap and kick me, crying: Shut up! Shut up! Shut up! If you’re hungry, eat your mother’s heart. I felt myself lifted into the air, and he went on kicking me until his leg was tired.

  We were making our way towards Tangier on foot. All along the road there were dead donkeys and cows and horses. The dogs and crows were pulling them apart. The entrails were soaked in blood and pus, and worms crawled out of them. At night when we were tired we set up our tent. Then we listened to the jackals baying.

  When someone died along the road, his family buried the body there in the place where he had died. After we had set out Abdelqader began to cough, and the cough grew worse as we went along. Fearful for his sake and my own, I said to my mother:

  Will Abdelqader die too?

  No, of course not. Who said he was going to die?

  My uncle died.

  Your brother’s not going to die. He’s sick, that’s all.

  I did not see as much bread in Tangier as my mother had promised me I should. There was hunger even in Eden, but at least it was not a hunger that killed. One day when the hunger had grown too strong, I went out to Aïn Ketiout to look in the garbage dump for bones and ends of dry bread. I found another boy there before me. He was barefoot and his clothes were in shreds. His scalp was covered with ringworm, his arms and legs scarred with sores.

  The garbage in the middle of town is a lot better than it is here, he said. Nazarene garbage is the best.

  After that I wandered further afield in search of food, sometimes alone, sometimes with another boy who was looking for the same thing. One day I found a dead hen. I seized it and hugged it close, for fear someone would snatch it away.

  Mother in the city, Abdelqader propped against the cushions. His huge eyes, half shut, watched the entrance door. He sees the hen, and his eyes open wide. He smiles, his thin face flushes, he moves, coughs. I find the knife. I turn towards the east, as my mother always does when she is about to pray.

  I said: Bismillah. Allahou akbar. And I kill it as I have seen grown-ups do it.

  I drew the knife back and forth across its throat until its head fell off. I was waiting to see the blood come out.

  I massage the bird a little. Maybe it wi
ll come out now.

  A few drops of blackish blood appeared in its open gullet. In the Rif I had watched them kill a sheep. They put a bowl under its throat to catch the blood. When the bowl was full they gave it to my mother, who was sick in bed. They held her down and made her drink it. Her face and clothing were smeared with it. Why doesn’t the blood come out of the hen the way it did with the sheep?

  I began to pull off the feathers.

  I hear her voice. What are you doing? Where did you steal that?

  I found it. It was sick. But I killed it before it died.

  You’re crazy. She pulled it away from me. People don’t eat carrion.

  My brother and I exchanged a glance of regret. The hen was lost.

  Each afternoon my father comes home disappointed. Not a movement, not a word, save at his command, just as nothing can happen unless it is decreed by Allah. He hits my mother. Several times I have heard him tell her: I’m getting out. You can take care of those two whelps by yourself.

  He pours some snuff onto the back of his hand and sniffs it, all the while talking to himself. Bitch. Rotten whore. He abuses everyone with his words, sometimes even Allah.

  My little brother cries as he squirms on the bed. He sobs and calls for bread.

  I see my father walking towards the bed, a wild light in his eyes. No one can run away from the craziness in his eyes or get out of the way of his octopus hands. He twists the small head furiously. Blood pours out of the mouth. I run outdoors and hear him stopping my mother’s screams with kicks in the face. I hid and waited for the end of the battle.

  The voices of the night, far away and near. For the first time I realize that I can hear better at night than by day. I looked up at the sky. Allah has turned on the lights. Clouds sail across the face of the big lamp. My mother’s ghost appears. She is calling me in a low voice, searching for me in the darkness as she sobs. Why is she so weak? Why isn’t she strong enough to hit him as hard as he hits her? Men hit. Women scream and weep.

  Mohamed! Come here! There’s nothing to be afraid of. Come here.

  It gave me great pleasure to see her knowing that she could not see me. A little god.

  After a while I said: Here I am.

  Come here.

  No. He’ll kill me. He killed Abdelqader.

  Don’t be afraid. Come. He’s not going to kill you. Come on. But be quiet, so you won’t wake the neighbours.

  He was in the room taking snuff and sobbing. I was astonished. He kills Abdelqader and then he cries about it.

  They sat up all night, weeping silently. I went to sleep and left them sobbing together. In the morning we cried again, all of us. It was the first time I had seen a funeral. My father walked behind the old man who carried the litter, and I followed at the back, lame and barefoot.

  They drop him into the wet hole. I cry and shiver. There is a mass of coagulated blood beside his mouth.

  On the way back home the old man noticed the blood coming up between my toes, and spoke to me in Riffian. What’s that?

  He stepped on some glass, said my father. He doesn’t even know how to walk. He’s an idiot.

  Did you love your brother very much? the old man asked me.

  Yes, I said. And my mother loved him more. She loved him more than she did me.

  All people love their children, he said.

  I thought of how my father had twisted Abdelqader’s neck. I wanted to cry out: He killed him! Yes. He killed him. I saw him kill him. He did it. He killed him! I saw him. He twisted his neck around, and the blood ran out of his mouth. I saw it. I saw him kill him! He killed him!

  To ease the unbearable hatred I felt for my father I began to cry. Then I was afraid he was going to kill me too. He began to scold me in a low voice loaded with menace. Stop that. You cried enough at home.

  Yes, said the old man. Stop crying. Your brother is with Allah. With the angels.

  I hate even the old man who buried my brother.

  Every day he bought tobacco and a sack of white bread. He goes somewhere far from Tangier to barter with the Spanish soldiers in their barracks. Each afternoon he comes in carrying uniforms. He sells them in the Zoco de Fuera to workmen and poor people.

  One afternoon he did not come back. I went to bed, leaving my mother bathed in tears. We waited three days. I wept with her, certain that I did it only to console her. I did not ask her why she was crying. She does not love him, I know.

  I find out why she is crying only when she tells me. Here we are, all alone. Who’s going to help us? We don’t know anybody in this city. Your grandmother Rouqaiya, your Aunt Fatima and your Uncle Driss have all gone to Oran. Your father deserted from the Spanish army. They were looking for him. They must have found him.

  We learned later that this had been the case. He had refused to sell a blanket to a Moroccan soldier who wanted it at a very low price, and the soldier had denounced him to the authorities.

  She goes to the city in search of work. She comes back disappointed, just as my father used to do when we first arrived in Tangier. She sits biting her nails distractedly. She sobs. Sorcerers make her talismans to wear around her neck; perhaps my father will get out of prison and she will find work. She says her prayers and lights candles at the tombs of the saints. She looks for luck at the fortune-teller’s. There is no way out of prison, there is no work, no luck, save by order of Allah and Muhammad his prophet; this is what she says. I began to think: Why doesn’t Allah give us our good luck the way he gives it to other people?

  I passed the question to my mother. That’s something we can’t ask, she said. He knows much better than we do, and when he wants us to know, he’ll tell us.

  She sold some things we did not need, and sent me with some other boys of the neighbourhood to pick some rosemary for her. I was afraid the boys were going to hurt me. There was no friend among them who would come to my aid if they should all jump on me at once. It had often happened. I would get into a fight with one, and they would all attack me. They helped each other.

  I stayed well behind them in the middle of the road. Then I turned and went down to the city. I like the way it moves. In the Zoco de Fuera I filled my stomach with cabbage leaves and orange peel.

  A policeman is chasing another boy, older than I. Not much distance between them. I imagine I am the boy. I felt myself panting with him. People were crying: He’s going to catch him! He’s going to catch him! He’s going to catch him! There he goes! He’s got him!

  I trembled. I felt fear, as if I had been caught myself. I would have asked Allah not to let them catch him. But they have already caught him. I hate the people who wanted the policeman to catch him.

  A breathless European woman arrived and stood behind the small group of people that had been watching the capture.

  It was one like that, she said.

  All he left was the handle of the bag, someone was saying.

  A second later I felt the blow of a nightstick on my buttocks. I leapt into the air, crying out in Riffian: Ay mainou! Ay mainou!

  I imagined myself cursing the man. There were two other policemen now, beating the boys and pushing the men. Some of the more poorly dressed men got blows, too. I had thought that the police beat you and took you to jail only if you had killed or robbed somebody, or drawn his blood in a fight.

  I went to the graveyard in Bou Araqia. Large bunches of myrtle had been left on some of the richer tombs. I gathered them up and carried them to my brother’s grave. There were many graves without tiles marking them, and without myrtle on them, like my brother’s. A mound of earth and two stones of different shapes, one for the head and one for the feet. The sight of the neglected graves hurt me. I thought: Even here in the cemetery there are rich people and poor people.

  I found big clumps of rosemary growing there among the graves. There were three men passing a bottle from one to the other and drinking a dark liquid from it. One of them called to me: Hey! Come here, boy! Agi!

  I was afraid. I fled.

&n
bsp; At lunch she said to me: That rosemary is very sweet.

  We both had good appetites.

  Yes, it’s sweet, I said.

  Where did you pick it?

  In the graveyard at Bou Araqia.

  The graveyard!

  Yes.

  She stares at me open-mouthed.

  I went to see Abdelqader’s grave. I put a little myrtle on it. The mound is not very high now. If it stays the way it is, all the dirt is going to be gone, and we won’t be able to tell it apart from the others.

  She stopped eating and her features froze.

  I went on: There’s lots of that rosemary there growing around the old graves.

  Don’t you know you’re not supposed to eat anything that grows in a cemetery?

  Why not?

  She looked at me anxiously. I go on eating with relish. She is worried. Her appetite is gone. I thought for a moment that she was going to vomit. She seized the plate from which I was eating and took it away, saying in Riffian: Eat yourself up.

  After a moment she asked me: Where did you get the myrtle?

  Off some other graves. They had lots of it.

  She stared. Tomorrow you’re going back to the cemetery and take the myrtle to the same graves where you found it. Don’t you know what graves are? And be careful nobody sees you putting the myrtle back. We’ll buy our own myrtle for your brother. We’ll make him a beautiful grave when we’ve saved a little money.

  It was a great relief not to have my father in the house, but the small amount of money he had left there was soon gone. I longed to grow up quickly so I would be able to do the same sort of work he had done. In my fantasies it was taken for granted that he would never return. It was inadmissible that he should ever again have a part in the life I shared with my mother.

  Sometimes she takes me with her to the Zoco de Fuera. We buy a huge pile of dry bread from the beggars. We take it home to boil in water, sometimes with a little oil and pepper, sometimes without. Early one morning she said to me: I’m going to the market to buy and sell vegetables. You stay here. Take good care of the house. Don’t go and play with the other boys and leave the door open for thieves to come in.