{"id":14615,"date":"2018-03-31T18:20:54","date_gmt":"2018-03-31T23:20:54","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp0.vanderbilt.edu\/nashvillereview\/?p=14615"},"modified":"2018-04-03T18:29:41","modified_gmt":"2018-04-03T23:29:41","slug":"esther","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wp0.vanderbilt.edu\/nashvillereview\/archives\/14615","title":{"rendered":"Esther"},"content":{"rendered":"

Excerpt from the novel\u00a0<\/em>Ce pays qui te ressemble by Tobie Nathan, translated from the French by Joyce Zonana.<\/em><\/p>\n

From the very first night they spent together in the same bed, Esther loved Motty, the mysterious one. In the darkness, equally blind, they explored each other with their fingers, lost in the scents of their bodies. From the first night, Motty loved Esther, the wild one. They spoke little, whispering each other\u2019s names. He exhaled onto her neck; she inhaled from his mouth, each depositing a fragment of breath on the frontiers of the other. She called him \u201cmy eyes,\u201d she who was his eyes. He called her \u201cmy soul,\u201d he who was her name. At daybreak, she kissed his hands, thanking God for having made her a woman. At night, she lay down first. Reciting a verse from the Song of Songs, he approached the bed and took her face in his hands; he always ended by declaiming her name, \u201cEsther, Queen Esther . . . Esther, the divine Ishtar . . . Esther, the Astarte of my nights.\u201d In the morning, they rejoiced at the prospect of a day won from darkness. When the sun set, their bodies thrilled at the prospect of lying beside each other.<\/p>\n

While Motty worked on the jewelers\u2019 accounts, Esther, her chores completed, sat on their doorstep. Why did women come to talk to her? Most likely they sensed the strange calm that emanated from her since her marriage\u2014perhaps they sensed the earthly force that underlies everything. They brought cones of grilled watermelon or sunflower seeds with them, sat down, and told Esther, who\u2019d barely left childhood, their female problems. Without using their hands, they split the seeds with their teeth and spit the shells out between their lips, like parakeets. Esther smiled to herself, for the same questions always recurred: \u201cHow to restore desire when it was eroded by revulsion at pregnancies, everyday anxieties, morning cares.\u201d She always answered methodically. \u201cFirst touch it,\u201d she\u2019d say, \u201ctouch it!\u201d In Arabic, the word means \u201ctouch,\u201d \u201csensation,\u201d and also \u201cemotion\u201d; the language knows that the person who touches is also touched, that you cannot touch without love. \u201cYou have to take his bird in your hand,\u201d she\u2019d say. \u201cAll men are children. They all had a mother who washed them, didn\u2019t they?\u201d And the women would giggle, their noses in their zinc pots, which they called \u201czingo.\u201d<\/p>\n

One morning, one of the neighbors, looking at Esther defiantly, retorted: \u201cYou think I don\u2019t know how to transform the chicken\u2019s neck into a rod, the way our father Moses once did with the serpents before Pharaoh?\u201d Everyone laughed. Esther went further: \u201cAnd do you know how to put the red spice in the sauce that moistens the rice on Shabbat eve?\u201d \u201cThe red spice?\u201d \u201cWhat spice are you talking about?\u201d \u201cThe red spice, obviously!\u201d \u201cYou mean saffron? Or turmeric?\u201d \u201cOr maybe red pepper?\u201d another added. One woman, suddenly understanding: \u201cNo! She means the spice that flows from women when the moon is full, right?\u201d Another, the eldest, voiced her disgust: \u201cUgh. Stop talking about such filth.\u201d And they burst out laughing again. It was then that Esther revealed her recipe.<\/p>\n

\u201cOn the last of those five days, you have to take the final drops, when the blood is darkest, and expose them to the first light of morning.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cOn a plate?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cBut how can you talk about such things?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cYes of course, on a plate. You need to collect as much as the mark left at the bottom of a cup after you\u2019ve drunk your coffee.\u201d<\/p>\n

They drew closer to Esther, in low voices asking her to go on.<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd then?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cYou let it dry until you can reduce the blood into a powder, as fine as turmeric. One day is enough. Then you store the powder in a dark place. It must not see the light. And then, there you are!\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat do you mean, \u2018there you are\u2019? What do you mean?\u201d<\/p>\n

Esther let herself be begged. It wasn\u2019t enough to tell them that they knew what came next, that all you had to do was include the powder thus obtained\u2014which was called, she said, \u201cmoon powder\u201d\u2014in the sauce. The others demanded a detailed description. What sauce? With what ingredients? Did you first have to fry onions?<\/p>\n

She agreed to add a few more specifics. You had to spice up the sauce, so your husband would suspect nothing. Along with onions, tomatoes of course, some red pepper, some saffron.<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd then?\u201d they asked again.<\/p>\n

\u201cJust when you add the moon powder, you have to recite a sentence.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cA sentence? What sentence, my dear?\u201d<\/p>\n

She was silent. The women drew even closer to Esther, who finally breathed in a low voice, \u201cThe sentence from the Torah: \u2018You are a blood-groom to me.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

She repeated it in Hebrew. Respectful, deathly silence. A woman who quoted the Torah\u2014she must be either a man or a sorceress.<\/p>\n

And the women tried Esther\u2019s recipe, of course. On Friday, they prepared the dish without anyone\u2019s help, hiding from daughters and mothers-in-law. Then, they went to the hammam<\/em>, where they spent more time than usual. Slowly, they epilated themselves with caramel, rubbed their skin with a rough loofah sponge, made their hair sleek with henna, then perfumed themselves in even the most intimate recesses of their bodies with myrrh, frankincense, and oud. When they heard the afternoon call to prayer of the Muslims, they donned their blue dresses and burned incense throughout their homes. It is said that, on that night, the serpents proudly lifted their heads beneath the galabeyas of their husbands. The experiment, frequently repeated, earned Esther a solid reputation as a sorceress. Soon, many were the women who came to chatter on the steps of her house at the hour when the lizards stirred. They brought her the most difficult problems. Cousin Tayeba, who\u2019d brought five girls into the world, one after another, feared her next pregnancy. If another daughter were to be born, her husband would most certainly repudiate her.<\/p>\n

\u201cBut no!\u201d one of the women exclaimed. \u201cHe wouldn\u2019t dare. He\u2019s too afraid of his uncle.\u201d<\/p>\n

His uncle was also his father-in-law.<\/p>\n

\u201cOf course he would,\u201d another replied. \u201cHaven\u2019t you seen how he ogles the little Narguess? She\u2019s told me several times how he\u2019s tried to corner her in the hallway that leads to the kitchen. The hallway, can you believe it? Under his wife\u2019s nose. Of course he\u2019s already thinking about remarrying.\u201d<\/p>\n

And, turning to Esther, her youngest aunt, Tofa\u2019ha, \u201cthe apple,\u201d asked if she could make a son come into Tayeba\u2019s womb. What a question! The others acted shocked. How could she? If she\u2019d asked for such a miracle from a man of God, like one of those you sometimes met on Yom Kippur, who spent the whole day and night praying and lamenting . . . Perhaps to one of those men, God could grant such a favor. But to women, who knew of religion only the stench breathed by the old stones, and whose actions, if Rabbi Mourad was to be believed, were nothing but idolatry and offerings to Baal . . . \u201cIt\u2019s haram<\/em>!\u201d said the first, meaning, \u201csinful, forbidden.\u201d \u201cHaram<\/em>, totally haram<\/em>,\u201d added the other. And Tofa\u2019ha concluded: \u201cIt\u2019s because it\u2019s haram<\/em> that it might work, right?\u201d<\/p>\n

They no longer knew whether to laugh or to be frightened. And so the women drew closer to Esther. She pulled back her hair and breathed deeply. What emerged from her was a feeling of physical power. To impose a sex on an infant, she explained, you had to summon the strength of animals and of the dead.<\/p>\n

The dead? You didn\u2019t utter such words. You didn\u2019t say, \u201cthe dead,\u201d even less, \u201cdeath\u201d; it wasn\u2019t done. And when you spoke the name of someone who\u2019d died, you always added some protection. For example, you said, \u201cMy grandfather Soli, may God protect his soul,\u201d or even, \u201cOur-father-Soli-may-God-protect-us,\u201d as if, after death, his name had been modified, recomposed, augmented, transformed into a formula. It took some sort of demon like Esther to unleash such wild sentences, containing death and the dead, without worry, without fearing the wrath of God. To ask for help from the dead? To use the power of animals? And, what\u2019s more, how the devil did she know this, she who\u2019d never studied anything? It\u2019s that the earth thinks; the neighborhood, the hara, the Alley of the Jews, thinks; the ancestors think and there are sensitive souls that perceive all these thoughts. That\u2019s what was going through Tofa\u2019ha\u2019s mind.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m not sure I can succeed,\u201d Esther replied. \u201cYou\u2019ll have to help me.\u201d<\/p>\n

The women grew frightened. She was asking them to be her accomplices in sorcery. They sought other solutions.<\/p>\n

\u201cPeople say you should change the placement of the bed.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cYes! I heard that the head of the bed should face the first star.\u201d<\/p>\n

Tayeba shrugged. \u201cReally? Dozens of times, my dear, dozens of times, I\u2019ve heard that tale about the head of the bed. At my house, the bed faces the star, my husband looks at the star, and me, I\u2019m still searching for a son.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThey say you should make love on your side.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cYes! On the right sight if you want a son, on the left for a daughter.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cTo make love on your side . . . what nonsense. When you move in bed\u201d\u2014that\u2019s how they described the act of love\u2014 \u201cyou roll on all sides. And you always end by getting up, don\u2019t you? So, everything gets all mixed, don\u2019t you agree? The hot, the cold, the blood, the milk, everything. It\u2019s nothing but nonsense.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI heard you need to get the foreskin of a boy just after circumcision.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cYes! I heard that too. A boy from your family. You dip it in hot water and make a broth. You add nothing, neither salt nor spices. And you drink that broth right before welcoming your husband.\u201d<\/p>\n

The women affirmed this new proposal with a nod of their heads. Such a recipe, they didn\u2019t quite know why, must be effective. But it imposed certain conditions; above all, acquiring the primary substance.<\/p>\n

\u201cSo how do you get that foreskin?\u201d Tayeba asked. \u201cPerhaps I should steal it? Have you seen how the grandmothers surround a baby after circumcision? You might as well try to steal the sacred carpet destined for the Prophet\u2019s tomb on the day of his feast. Perhaps that way of having a child is effective, I\u2019m not saying it isn\u2019t, daughter of I don\u2019t know what\u2014but it\u2019s impossible to accomplish, more difficult than obtaining the penis of a wolf or a hyena. No, the child\u2019s mother would have to give me the foreskin as a gift. And I don\u2019t know anyone who would do that.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cShe\u2019d be too afraid her son would never marry.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cOr that he\u2019d become a \u2018follower of Lot\u2019\u201d\u2014she meant a homosexual.<\/p>\n

The women turned again to Esther. \u201cYou, Sett Blila.\u201d<\/p>\n

That\u2019s what they called her when they wanted a favor from her. Sett Blila, \u201cLady Boiled Wheat,\u201d because, they said, her wheat soup was the best in the neighborhood.<\/p>\n

\u201cSett Blila, you must have a solution.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cYes,\u201d Esther answered, \u201cbut I\u2019m not sure how it\u2019ll turn out. I\u2019ve never done it before.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd so? Even if you\u2019ve never done it. Does that mean you never will?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cYou\u2019re right, by my eyes! What does it hurt to try?\u201d<\/p>\n

On a Thursday, a little before noon, at the hour when they knew the men were assembled in the synagogue for the Torah reading, they left for the cemetery. Esther was in the lead, walking with a sure step, followed by her Aunt Tofa\u2019ha and Tayeba, the suppliant. They\u2019d also brought along Mahmoud, the ragman, who followed them, walking some steps behind. It\u2019s not acceptable for women to walk alone through the city. On their heads, they carried large pots of water to wash the tombs. Esther seemed to know the area. The other two whispered to each other.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s definitely not the first time she\u2019s been here . . . You see how she never once hesitated.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThey say she comes here at night.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cDo you think so? As for me, I\u2019d never come here alone in the middle of the night.\u201d<\/p>\n

Dark-skinned children were everywhere, darkened even more by running around barefoot on the burning sand. Women emerged from the tombs that were their homes. They spread their laundry out on the graves, holding it down with heavy stones. The area was inhabited by as many living as dead. Oddly, no one spoke. Despite all the activity, an unusual silence reigned.<\/p>\n

\u201cHere,\u201d Esther said.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhere?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cRight where you\u2019re standing. It\u2019s an unmarked grave.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIs it at least a Jewish one?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cOf course,\u201d Esther replied, \u201cit\u2019s the grave of your grandfather\u2019s maternal uncle, Saad the Long. He was skinny and stiff as a reed. I hear he died standing up, leaning against a wall, and that he stayed there until night. Everyone thought he was dreaming, lost in his hashish haze. And when they finally realized he was dead and they wanted to carry him, they saw he\u2019d been transformed into a wooden statue, truly stiff as a bone. So here\u2019s someone who died without living; his life was useless, as he didn\u2019t leave a child.\u201d<\/p>\n

The two women looked around. They sensed dozens of eyes following their slightest moves. Even if the tomb were not Saad the Long\u2019s, this was surely a Jewish section. They could make out Hebrew writing on the few scattered stones.<\/p>\n

\u201cAll right ladies, get to work!\u201d<\/p>\n

They began to scrub the slab covered with earth and sand. And Esther began to sing in a Judeo-Arabic lingua franca<\/em>, \u201cYou who sustain the lame, who open the doors of the prisons, who give life and death, who can resuscitate.\u201d<\/p>\n

An hour went by like this. Little by little, the slab regained some of its chalky color. They poured the water from the bottom of their pots and stood, immobile under the sun, watching the stains evaporate. Tayeba was thinking there are many more people below the earth than on it. Tofa\u2019ha was turning over in her mind this phrase from the Bible, \u201cFrom dust you came, and to dust you shall return.\u201d Most assuredly, God must know Egypt, this land where it was hard to distinguish men from dust. Esther was staring fixedly at the hole beneath the stone. She pointed to it. \u201cLook,\u201d she said, \u201cThere! You can see his tongue.\u201d<\/p>\n

The two others drew closer. She pulled them back. \u201cNo. Wait. You\u2019ll frighten him.\u201d<\/p>\n

Indeed, you could see a tongue coming out of the hole. It was long and agile, perhaps the tongue of a snake, flicking forward as if to taste the terrain before venturing out.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m afraid,\u201d Tayeba said.<\/p>\n

But Tofa\u2019ha couldn\u2019t help joking. \u201cWhat are you afraid of? A child also comes out of a hole, doesn\u2019t it?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd he too comes from the dead,\u201d Esther added solemnly. \u201cThat\u2019s why we give him a grandfather\u2019s name.\u201d<\/p>\n

They saw a head appear, a heavy, helmeted head, as big as a fist.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a warrior!\u201d Esther cried as she grabbed the pot.<\/p>\n

Drawn by the water, the chameleon emerged slowly, one step after another. He was exactly the color of the stone, even including stains and blotches. His eyes, mounted on turrets like cannons on an assault tank, explored the four directions.<\/p>\n

\u201cYour son will be a warrior, that\u2019s for sure.\u201d<\/p>\n

You need to know that \u201cwarrior\u201d is the Arabic word for chameleon, and the one emerging from the tomb fit the word well, with his helmet so much larger than his head. When he reached the center of the slab, Esther stepped forward and covered him with her pot. Tofa\u2019ha helped her wrap the prey in a rag, and there they were, all three, heading back to the Mouski. Along the way, they were thrilled to have conquered their fears of the dead and of snakes. They sang a sort of ballad, a love song, and the chameleon leapt in the pot, like a fetus in its mother\u2019s womb. That very night, Esther gave the tip of the tail to Tayeba and advised her to swallow it raw. The two women were not surprised by the prescription; they only wondered how Esther had managed to kill the chameleon. Had she slit its throat, the way it\u2019s done with a lamb, or had she cut off its head, like a dove?<\/p>\n

\u201cIn one month you\u2019ll be pregnant,\u201d she told Tayeba, \u201cand it\u2019ll be a boy. Don\u2019t forget, you must name him Saad, like your grandfather\u2019s uncle.\u201d<\/p>\n

Afterward, the two women often questioned Esther, asking her what she\u2019d done with the rest of the chameleon. Esther always answered the same way. \u201cA chameleon is like a woman. It hunts with its tongue. You\u2019d be better off holding yours!\u201d<\/p>\n

Tobie Nathan & Joyce Zonana<\/a><\/h6>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Excerpt from the novel\u00a0Ce pays qui te ressemble by Tobie Nathan, translated from the French by Joyce Zonana. From the very first night they spent together in the same bed, Esther loved Motty, the mysterious one. In the darkness, equally blind, they explored each other with their fingers, lost in the scents of their bodies. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1425,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"spay_email":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false},"categories":[56],"tags":[36],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/s6Jypy-esther","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp0.vanderbilt.edu\/nashvillereview\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14615"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp0.vanderbilt.edu\/nashvillereview\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp0.vanderbilt.edu\/nashvillereview\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp0.vanderbilt.edu\/nashvillereview\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1425"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp0.vanderbilt.edu\/nashvillereview\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14615"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/wp0.vanderbilt.edu\/nashvillereview\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14615\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":14709,"href":"https:\/\/wp0.vanderbilt.edu\/nashvillereview\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14615\/revisions\/14709"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp0.vanderbilt.edu\/nashvillereview\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14615"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp0.vanderbilt.edu\/nashvillereview\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14615"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp0.vanderbilt.edu\/nashvillereview\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14615"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}