The Absolute, page 24
Esau gave a polite nod.
“. . . The schema in which we’re included,” the director went on, “is a simplified and complete representation of the model of production that has imposed itself over the entire planet, and which bears the name ‘capitalism.’ This model proposes the multiplication of the identical, which was discovered—mark the paradox!—after the invention of the printing press. I wager on this model. In contrast, you . . . you are part of the lyrical reaction that dreams of the survival of the unique in a period unsuited to it. The revolution is a reactionary dream of artisans, displaced by the prevailing industrial logic. Note this detail: under the reigning system of reproduction at a global (and perhaps galactic) scale, we have all become identical, because in the hypothetical situation of possessing an equal value in bills or coins, we would be in a condition to acquire an equal quantity of products. Save for the detail of the amount of capital each individual actually possesses, which makes him rich or poor, isn’t capitalism the form of social relations that invokes primitive communism and perfects it? Think about it,” said the director, and prepared to leave, but Esau’s words kept him for a few more seconds:
“Well, the possibility also exists that in both this world and the cosmos, an infinite number of individuals exist who are just like you and me, but whose systems of relating to each other are different from the ones that join us. If that were the case, even though here it is you submitting me to the reign of your power, in another case (another world, another system), I or someone identical to me would at this very moment be eliminating you and all your alter egos, you and each of your masks and emblems, you and every single one of your horrible figures, and implementing the Revolution on an infinite scale . . .”
“The Universe as a catalog? A museum of endless rooms and objects and beings equal in appearance, but acting in different ways? What an adventure!” said the director of the institution, and left.
After that conversation, the director announced that every day Esau would carry out a series of activities linked to the hygiene and conservation of the penal institution, activities in which he would personally instruct him, as if his function were to supervise the routines of each inmate. Furthermore, he stopped addressing him by his name and number, and with great satisfaction began referring to him as “cretin” or “idiot,” perhaps seeking a reaction from his prisoner. Esau responded meekly to the provocations, as if he considered it appropriate to be spoken to like this. He even started to behave in a way that justified them, reacting with bewilderment to the presumed complexities of assigned tasks, even the simplest. In a refinement of irony, the director then began to address him including the customary insult, yet accompanying it with expressions of courtesy:
“By any chance, vermin, do you think you might clean the lavatories?”
Esau replied:
“I take it as a given that such a task would exceed my abilities. At most, I believe I’d be capable of sweeping the floors.”
Beyond the insults, the change in regimen was convenient for Esau; it was necessary to achieve a certain degree of visibility and give a proof of his survival, directed toward a network of solidarity that perhaps did truly exist on the outside. In fact, he had no doubt that by making him move about every corner of the institution, forcing him to polish the damp stones of the battlements and contemplate the melancholy twilights of the landscape, the director of the penal institution was using him as bait, exposing him to full view to check whether someone would make a bid for his liberation. Esau’s game, in turn, had to consist of putting himself on display without endangering anyone’s life. But could he send a danger signal without his captors noticing?
Soon the guards took over the business of monitoring his work and abusing him. Lacking the more refined methods of their superior, they did nothing but kick him, whip him, or smash him headfirst into the liquid and solid dregs he’d just binned. On one of these occasions, while picking the filth from his hair, my grandfather found a crumpled sheet of paper:
I remember every detail of our night together, each time I feel your children move about in my belly, Esau . . .
He was going to be a father.
7
The news changed everything. Thinking about the woman from that night of freedom was like emerging from a dream. Now he remembered the surreptitious ways he’d found to stay in contact; they’d never stopped communicating. The fact these clandestine methods, hidden even from his own awareness, surfaced only now meant the purpose of his confinement was to blur or wipe out his consciousness, a result that his captors had efficiently produced in him. The letter told him that his children would be twins, maybe identical, that an irregular band of paramilitants had entered her house and destroyed everything, and that she’d fled to save her life and the lives growing in her womb; he had to come look for them.
Naturally, given this new incentive, Esau discovered a way to escape the prison. It may seem strange that a man like him, who had meditated on every one of his steps until he was paralyzed by thought, now launched in search of the one who in his heart of hearts he called “my wife,” without stopping for a moment to check the direction he’d taken in flight. All at once, my grandfather gambled everything on instinct. Even so, he did have his warnings. One night, at an inn where he’d sought refuge, he was surprised by a messenger who told him that the director of the institution had ordered him to convey his private conviction that this escape was the start of an auspicious career.
“The gentleman, my superior, assures me he’s always believed in you, and wishes to express through my person the assurance of his unwavering sympathy. Best of luck!”
Having said this, the messenger withdrew.
Esau redoubled the speed of his search; he at least wanted to meet his children before he was trapped again. In any case, the farther he moved away from the prison, the greater his hopes grew. The landscapes also changed, from desert glare to barren fields. The mutilated limbs of dead warriors floated in the mist, hanging from trees. They might have been remnants of a past century or a testimony of the previous day’s battle; frost preserved the remains. Human flesh was a diet like any other; in any case, it was what was available. My grandfather moved forward in the cold, tracing furrows through the snow. It wasn’t unusual that in the immensity of the steppe he met with others as absorbed or concentrated as he was; the surprising thing was that others torqued their own paths to start following him. Maybe they took him for a retreating general.
Heat to cold, cold to heat. How much time passed? At some point, and even though his only thought was to unite with his family, Esau understood he had to take responsibility for the subsistence of this horde. They stopped on the banks of a river or canal. There were dozens, thousands; he gave up the count. He ordered a city to be built, since nights were harsh and the spectacle of open-air fornication upset him. As it turned out, there was barely enough material for tents. The inhabitants of neighboring populations, afraid of being looted, contributed food, materials and money. Esau sent missionaries from the settlement in every direction, with the objective of spreading revolutionary proclamations and determining the path the mother of his children might have taken. The missionaries returned in despair. He also had to take over matters of organization. While he and his people had been a sort of nomadic tribe, the illusion of variety provided by changes in scenery had reduced conflicts, but now the sedentary model made them worse. And once it became clear that the world wouldn’t yield to his command, he found his capacity for authority threatened. The citadel lacked drains and fountains, and people drank from the same water in which they defecated; constructions grew helter-skelter in total disregard of his instructions to comply with urban statutes. Inaction encouraged rebellion, especially among the strong-bodied youths who hadn’t been killed off by typhus or malaria. Sometimes his orders were not just flouted but done so with blatant impertinence. One day, seeing a boy playing in a swamp, he started to explain the dangers of the ooze; at first the boy seemed not to hear, then he lifted an arm as if swatting away a fly and said: “Quit bothering me.” Esau couldn’t understand this appalling behavior, run rampant. Had they followed him merely to scorn him?
Months passed that could be measured in years. Esau, who had imagined himself in this role—perfectly described and elucidated by his father—as the leader of an avant-garde party, now saw himself reduced to the pitiful figure of a dictator who must lead the rabble with a firm hand. Every so often he escaped for a few days and shut himself away in some caves at a half-day’s gallop; there, he meditated on his experiences. He returned with a noticeable improvement in mood. Sometimes he opted for internal espionage and summary executions, other times laissez-faire; no one noticed the difference, except the parties involved. Nostalgia for the children he’d never met consumed his soul. Where were they, where was his wife? There was no news. He dedicated himself to growing fatter, turning brutish and forgetting all he’d previously set out to accomplish from the order and clarity of his cell. In his slovenliness he ended up looking like a petty king from some port town, while his own city, which he’d expanded without improving it, transformed into a vast colony of savages . . .
Which had its consequences.
While Esau could attribute this disorder only to the failure of his illusions and the collapse of his mood, the rest of the planet, although it had gently wiped its bottom with his ideological declamations, now attributed an increasingly subversive character to his megalopolis. That hell he renounced, which he wanted to escape, was seen by others as the fulfilled dream of a nefarious political program. Having established this misunderstanding, they made up their minds to destroy him. Just as in the former period of the Holy Alliance, it was the Prussians who sent advance troops to the bloodbath.
Of course, as soon as the enemy troops had gathered, my grandfather knew that combat would be useless; they were doomed. He didn’t care too much: the experiment hadn’t come off and the citadel was far from being a revolutionary state, so its disappearance would do no harm. What did worry him . . . the idea to which he couldn’t bear to resign himself, was that the flames and blood would also annihilate the sign of the revolution that hadn’t taken place, but whose sketched outline would be filled in, come better times. With this in mind, in the days or weeks still left to him before the storming of the encampment by the Huns, the only possibility was to stage a goodbye: the aim would no longer be to create a new society, but to produce a new meaning, a demonstration. Something that would permanently engrave itself into the most lucid minds.
What came next can be told in a few lines. Although they were used to victories following just a brief struggle, the Prussians were surprised to meet with no resistance. The palisades, ramparts and battlements were deserted. First they thought that all the inhabitants had abandoned the citadel, taking shelter in the night; then they were drawn toward the central plaza by a sad augural sound: the overture to the opera written by Esau Deliuskin.
Against their will, the attackers found themselves enveloped by a dazzling phantasmagoria. The wardrobes were luxurious and the fragile panels illustrated with palaces and palm trees, recalling times unknown to them. The plot of the work spoke of wars and armies, countries and passions, love and death. Taking into account the little time he had and the minimal ability of the participants he supervised, as well as his very restricted literary, imagistic and musical training, it’s surprising that my grandfather was able to wield so many elements at once; his leitmotifs captivated the invading army, and under their plumes and helmets, the halberdiers had to hide their tears at this outpouring of beauty. The invading general and his officials (all of them music lovers) immediately recognized that in the entire history of the bel canto it was almost impossible to find another composition with as many arias and sung parts, so perfectly justified from the dramatic point of view, and with a mounting of such precision they could give the order to attack only by taking advantage of the impulse given to them by the triumphal march, in which regrettably the inhabitants of the citadel performed the role of the Egyptian army massacred by Nubian hordes.6
Esau was captured alive. At first he wasn’t recognized because the smallness of his body and the weakness of his gaze didn’t match the archetype of the leader, hero or demigod the winners had formulated of him. He was locked up along with the others in barns or sheds built from the remains of the set design. When his identity was established, they covered his eyes, leaned him against a papier-mâché palm tree and announced they would execute him. Esau removed the blindfold and shouted at the squad: “I want to see the dogs who are going to kill me!” The sergeant answered: “It was only a joke! We’re actors too.” Then, pretending he wanted to shake his hand, he grabbed hold of his fingers and broke them, while he said: “Here’s something for the letter to your wife.”
They beat him until he was almost deaf and blind. He stayed locked up for several days, until his right ear, which festered continuously, began to grow a giant blister, a flower of pus and blood. Then they let a chimpanzee loose on him, believing that in his defenselessness he’d be easy prey for the ape’s bite. Yet the beast hung from Esau’s neck, hugging and kissing him, and Esau returned the affection as he spoke to it. The guards told him: “This is what happens to your revolutionaries,” and tortured the ape in his presence and then killed it. Afterward they offered to let him kill himself, saying that if he didn’t have enough strength left, they could help him, but Esau said he wasn’t his own executioner. Then came the moment they brought him to the office of the general, who, still moved by the emotions the prisoner had produced in him, begged him to recognize how useless, harmful and stupid it was to dedicate his life to the cause of revolution.
Esau answered:
“You are mistaken. The concept of revolution in this period has the status of an abstract idea: it cannot be carried out under present conditions, and therefore, since it is impossible to gain such knowledge from experience, the imperative takes the form of thought. I am the living proof that the intellectual possibility of a concept does not testify to its prior existence, but can be a condition of its future necessity and realization; I have needed to make use of all kinds of provisional elaborations to compensate for something impossible to know beforehand. Here lies both the highly disturbing character and the fundamental nature of the epistemological leap that my effort implies: it was a first step toward action, which was not an experiment in translating theoretical materials, but a trial without any decisive proof beforehand regarding the truth value of the propositions—without even the certainty that any such theory exists at all. Structurally this riddle calls to mind the distinction between to know and to think: what cannot be demonstrated in the present still demands to be ‘thought’ in order to guarantee the work of political praxis. In this way, even if the objects of reason cannot be known—even if they do not enter the framework of information our time offers us—all the same they have directed my political actions, and will allow others to build the theoretical corpus . . .”
The Prussian general answered:
“In a remote cave in the middle of the desert we discovered an old press, its characters faded by time, and next to it a book titled Instrumental Anatomy of Political Praxis. Since our task is not to think but to act, we passed the book to our scholars, critics and theologians, who, after studying it, as well as the press, found a kind of relation between these dissimilar objects. The book, in effect, had been printed by that machine, but its typeface had been altered, so that anything printed there would produce a different meaning. Studying it in depth, we realized this press is a barely concealed torture device invented by your father to lead you to your death. Before submitting you to such a design, let me say that if your father planned this education, then his final achievement, which will simultaneously be the most exquisite condemnation for you, is that you will die without ever knowing the true meaning of his words.”
* * *
6 It’s obvious that Esau’s last invention—his masterpiece and most pronounced stroke of greatness—radiates the spirit of the proposal made by the director of the penal institution. And what does its origin matter? Emptied of its commercial content, the strategy is exceptional. Esau uses the world—the political spirit of the period—and forces it to act within his work: the Prussian army is to be understood precisely in this way, performing as Fate, the inexorable, as it enters the citadel with blood and fire, and emphasizes by means of its bullets and swords the catastrophe of an aborted revolution.
8
Was Esau Deliuskin ultimately a footnote to Andrei’s colossal endeavor? Or did he fulfill his legacy in a singular way? What can one do but attempt to strike a balance? At least a part of what he sought in life was granted to him posthumously, although obviously not to the letter, if his aspiration was to build on his father’s legacy through the construction of a solid political party led by an enlightened avant-garde. What did take place after his death was that his name became a kind of password, and his figure a myth within certain select circles. In these groups, Esau Deliuskin’s deeds and writings make him a part of the fertile tradition of utopians who valued the will for practical realization just as much as or more than theoretical effort. My grandfather secured a place in this line alongside names like Condillac, Campanella, Rousseau, Blanqui, Bergerac and Kropotkin, to mention just a few. In certain developments of the contemporary theater of denunciation and the taking of political consciousness, any scholar will also be able to recognize the impulse of a cultural-political tradition that merges art, ideology and life. Although the name of Esau Deliuskin remains—and perhaps will forever remain—hidden from the knowledge of the masses, his achievements are without a doubt crucial to the history of the last few centuries.
