Phoenician Myths, Zeljko Prodanovic [the beginning after the end read novel .TXT] 📗

is, the one who sold his soul to the satyr.
‘So, I spent the next two centuries in the library of Baalbek, copying the books from the Alexandrian library – which, by the way, had been brought by the satyr – trying to save what still could be saved. Then, in the year 391, along with the books, the satyr brought me the news that by the order of emperor Theodosius, the patriarch of Alexandria and his Christian hordes had really burnt the famous library!
‘Fortunately, the satyr had already brought to Baalbek most of the books, and I kept copying them in peace till the year 641. Then, something terrible happened. The bedouins from Mecca or the Prophet's robbers – as the satyr used to call them – first burnt the library of Alexand- ria, and then came to Baalbek and burnt my library as well! Of course, I was astounded. But what could I have done?
‘It was then that I cast doubts on the purpose of my undertaking – and literature in general – for the first time. ‘This is folly!’ I thought to myself. ‘Have all those books been written by some, only to be burnt by others? People are fools,’ I said, ‘and let them remain fools!’
‘I went to Last Chance, the famous tavern in Baalbek, and found company among the bohemians and the old wine from Phoenicia. Soon after that, the satyr built a new library and tried to persuade me to return to my work – copying the books – but it was all in vain. I did not leave Last Chance for the next ten centuries.
‘And then, in the spring of 1614, Domenikos Theotocopulos – better known as El Greco, the famous Greek from Toledo, arrived in Baalbek. And, to the amazement of all, he said that he wanted to paint a painting which would comprise all other paintings. As you can imagine, everybody laughed. I realized, however, that the Greek was absolutely right. If I wanted to protect from fools the beauty and the wisdom of countless books, I had to do exactly that: to write a book that would comprise all other books!
‘As you may have thought, I left the wine and my friends from Last Chance, took refuge in the silence of the satyr’s library and began writing the Last Psalm. Since then, almost four centuries have gone by, and I am still sitting in the library in Baalbek, writing. Unfortunately, El Greco quickly understood the absurdity of his idea and gave up. As for me…
‘As for me, of course, I have no intention of giving up, whatsoever. As I said, the book will have 666 pages. So far, I have written six.’

The Tale of a Singer

One day I sat in front of the temple of god’s tear in Baalbek, listening to the crickets singing joyfully in the crown of the cypress tree, when a young man came along riding on a two-humped Bactrian camel, a balalaika slung over his shoulder. As he came closer he smiled at me innocently, then got off the camel and sat down beside me. And as if we had known each other for years, I would even say for centuries, the young man sadly sighed and began to talk.
‘Dear friend,’ he said, ‘after all that has happened to me, I can’t tell you for certain whether what I am going to tell you has really happened. More precisely, whether it happened to me or to some other man who lived instead of me. In other words, I don’t even know whether I have lived at all.
‘So, if I have existed or if I still exist, then my name is Ashug-Kerrib and I come from Samarkand. And my sufferings began the day I met Alma.
‘Alma (Baal-ma or the crying tear) was – and you can take my word for it – the most beautiful girl under the sun and I was the best poet in Samarkand. As you may guess, love flamed my heart and warmed my soul.
‘But then shocking news came to me – Alma got married!
‘ ‘She went to Cordoba,’ they told me, ‘and there she became the sixth wife of caliph al-Gizah.’ At that moment it seemed as if I saw death itself, but I quickly pulled myself together and made a salutary decision: I left Samarkand and, firmly decided, set out to Cordoba. I had no foreboding, however, how long and troubled this journey would be.
‘First, I arrived in Shiraz where I met the famous poet and astronomer Khayyam and told him about the misfortune that had befallen me. He listened to me attentively, and when I finished, here is what he told me.
‘ ‘As far as I know,’ Khayyam said, ‘the distance between two stars is smaller than the distance between two hearts. So, your sufferings are in vain. But since Alma, as you say, is so beautiful, then you, Ashug-Kerrib, can with good reason be proud of the beauty of your sufferings, worthy of the best poet from Samarkand.’
‘I took Khayyam’s words as comfort, then left Shiraz. I went to Palestine with the intention to embark a ship that would take me to Cordoba, but soon a new misfortune befell me. Apparently, the Christians and Saracens were fighting over their holy land, but I didn’t know that.
‘As soon as I arrived in Gaza some brigands intercepted me and, with no explanation, clapped me into a dungeon. I tried to explain to them that I belonged to Zarathustra’s faith and that I had nothing to do with their war, but they told me that it would be much wiser to keep my mouth shut.
‘Among the prisoners, who, with no exception, were cruel and bizarre, I would single out one man, whose fate in a strange way interlaced with mine.
‘ ‘I am from the Sahara,’ said al-Korta, as the man was called, ‘from the proud tribe of Tuareg. When I realized that the Arabian bedouins had forced my ancestors to accept their faith, I raided the mosque in Fes and went abroad.
‘On the shores of the Red Sea I came across the Carmatians, who claimed that the Prophet was a liar and that the world was not created by Allah – but by Satan. I joined them and when the caliph from Baghdad captured our chief and put him to death, we ravaged Mecca and took the Black Stone with us. We threw it into the heart of the desert and the soldiers of Baghdad’s caliph found it only twenty years later.
‘Soon, however, I realized that I was neither a robber nor a murderer and that I am strongest when I fight alone. I went to Persia where I fought imam al-Sabah, because he was a tyrant, but I also fought the robbers who robbed his caravans.
‘And when these bedouins arrived, carrying the cross in one hand and the sabre in the other, I came to Palestine. They captured me in the battle by a purple river and that is how I got to the dungeon.
‘That’s my story,’ al-Korta said. ‘And you are going to Cordoba,’ he added, ‘and you will cover such a long way because of a woman. I’m not going to persuade you that this is folly, although I know perfectly well that love doesn’t exist. But I have to tell you this.
‘It was in this very dungeon that Samson, the great hero from Phoenicia, also spent his life. After leaving Baalbek, where he had spent a year as Alleluia, the one who carries the sun, he left his mistress Astarta and went out into the world. He wandered from town to town, flying from one woman to another, and then he arrived in Gaza and met Delilah.
‘And do you know what this bitch did to him? While he was asleep in her arms, she cut his hair – the source of his strength. The Philistines then blinded him and threw him into the dungeon, where he spun the mill wheel and ground Philistine corn. And so he who felt no fear when faced by sixty bedouins and six lions at the same time, was overcome by a woman! And now you go to Cordoba!’
‘I spent three years in the dungeon in Gaza. At the end of the third year we received news that the Christians had suffered a crushing defeat and that, in retaliation, they would put us to death.
‘The following morning they took us out and I watched with my own eyes as they cut off heads, one after another. When it came to al-Korta’s turn, he looked at me and smiled. ‘Death is a secret,’ he whispered, ‘just like love,’ – and then his black head rolled into the dust.
‘The next moment, a glittering sabre blade flashed towards my neck. I closed my eyes and when I opened them again… I was sitting in the Gaza harbour and, illuminated by the morning sun, playing the balalaika. That same morning I took a purple galley and sailed to Provence.
‘There I met a young man whose tragic fate will shadow my heart forever. His name was Jacques d’Avignon and he was a troubadour, or a rhapsode, who wandered Provence with a guitar in his hands, looking for love.
‘When I told him that I was on the way to Cordoba in order to find Alma, he was delighted. ‘That’s love!’ he cried and asked me to stay in Provence for some time, so that he could learn to play the balalaika (Baal-al-laik or string of the sun’s tear) and I could master the art of writing ballads.
‘ ‘Ballads (Baal-odes or the songs of love and death) originated in Phoenicia,’ he told me, ‘and were sung during the Phoenician holiday the week of debauchery. Young men, skilled in playing the flute or the balalaika, would sing a song and the queen of debauchery would decide which song was the most beautiful. The lucky performer would then spend one year in Baalbek, as Alleluia and the queen’s lover.
‘Ballads are the most beautiful poetical form,’ he added, ‘because one has to depict, in very few words, two biggest secrets in the universe – love and death.’ And then he sang one:

For centuries I seek a woman…
To give her my noble eyes,
my gentle soul, all my gifts.
Now I know that love I will never find.

For centuries I write a poem…
About love and beauty I sing,
as for the pain, I keep silent.
Now I know that death will heal all wounds.

‘And only a few days later the white Provençal road brought us to Albi. But we did not know that the soldiers of Pope Urban II had already arrived in this town, looking for some Cathari, who allegedly claimed that the world had been created by the devil and that in the eternal struggle between good and evil, evil would