"I was a good reader, sometimes I would read for him, when he was tired, I had a good look at the God book, whole pages at a time, some thrilling, some touching, I underlined some passages with my quills, I’d already heard some of the stories with my own little ears"
Porcupine
long before my master started playing with fire, while I was enjoying a few months' pleasant rest, just watching life unfold around me, fresh air in my lungs, a skip in my step, I ran, how I ran, and at the top of a hill I would pause, and look down at the bustling wildlife all around, I liked watching other animals, the rhythm of their daily lives, I was getting back to the bush, at times I just disappeared, with no word to my master, I'd watch the sun go down, and close my eyes and listen to the crickets, and wake next morning to the chirrup of cicadas, and during these periods of inactivity, or respite, I was constantly feeding, the more I ate, the hungrier I got, I can't remember now how many tuber fields I destroyed, bringing great distress to the peasants of Séképembé, who blamed a half-man half-animal, with a stomach as deep as the pit of their own ignorance, then at dawn I'd go down to watch the ducks bobbing about on the river, the reflection of their gaudy plumage shimmering on the swell, how funny they looked, gliding not drowning, then one of them one would give the signal for the end of play, or the approach of a hunter, and off they'd fly, up and away, then some time towards noon came the procession of zebras, followed by the female deer, then the wild boar, then the lions, roaming in groups along the river, the little ones at the front, the old ones roaring at the slightest thing, they never overlapped, they seemed to share out the day between them, and only much later, when the sun was already high in the sky, came the army of monkeys, I'd see the males fighting over a question of precedence, usually, or a female, it was quite amusing really, their gestures reminded me of humans, especially the anthropoids, poking their bogeys, scratching their genitals, then sniffing their fingers and expressing disgust, and I did wonder whether some of them might not be harmful doubles to humans, then I pulled myself together, I knew harmful doubles had to keep well away from communal life
yes, I was a happy porcupine back then, I'm putting up my quills as I say this, that's our way of swearing a pledge, another is to raise the front right paw and wave it three times, I know humans swear on the heads of their ancestors, or in the name of the God they've never seen, the one they worship with their eyes tight shut, they spend their whole lives reading His word in a big book which was brought here by white men in the days when the people of this country hid their absurd little organs under leopard skins or banana leaves, unaware that over the horizon there lived other people, not like them, that the world stretched on, far beyond the seas and oceans, that when night fell here, elsewhere the sun still shone, and as it happened, my master, Kibandi, owned this book of God, with all the stories men have forced themselves to believe, on pain of not deserving a place in what they call Paradise, you won't be surprised to hear I had a look at it myself, out of curiosity, since, like my master, I was a good reader, sometimes I would read for him, when he was tired, I had a good look at the God book, whole pages at a time, some thrilling, some touching, I underlined some passages with my quills, I'd already heard some of the stories with my own little ears, from the lips of some pretty serious people, with little grey beards, who attended the village church on Sundays, told with such precision, with such great faith, you could only think they must have seen these things with their own eyes, I should add that the bit of the story they tell most often, these bipeds, is the one about this mysterious guy, a kind of wandering charismatic, the son of God, they'll tell you, how he came to be here was all very complicated, there's nothing about how exactly his parents mated, he's the same guy that walked on water, and turned water into wine, and multiplied the loaves to feed the crowd, and gave respect to the prostitutes, when everyone else threw stones, and made the lame to walk, even the hopeless cases, and the blind to see, and he came down to earth to save the whole of humanity, including us animals, because, get this, even back then they wanted to preserve at least one sample of every living species, we didn't get forgotten, they put us all into this cage called Noah's Ark, so we'd survive a torrential rainfall, for forty days and forty nights, the deluge, it was called, but then many centuries later God's only Son was sent down to earth, men didn't believe him, they persecuted him, the bad people whipped him, crucified him, left him out in the blazing sun, and the day of his trial, at the hands of the very same people who accused him of being a public nuisance, with his spectacular miracles, they had to choose between him and another man, also accused, a wretch they called Barabbas who feared neither God nor man, they chose to set the brigand free and kill the other one, the poor son of God, but believe it or not , he came back from the dead, like someone just waking up after a quick siesta, and the reason I'm going on about this mysterious guy is not to get away from the subject of my confessions, but because I'm quite sure this guy, the son of God, really was something special, an initiate, like my master, but he must have been protected by a peaceful double, he never hurt anyone, it was others went looking for lice in his tonsure, well anyway, Kibandi had stopped reading those stories, and moved on to more esoteric things, probably because he thought the book of God would condemn his beliefs and practices, and seek to divert him from teachings of his ancestors, so my master didn't believe in God at all, particularly since God always put off answering his prayers till tomorrow, when he wanted concrete results today, to hell with the promise of paradise, that's why sometimes he cut short the hard core believers in the village, saying something like 'if you want to give God a good laugh, just tell him your plans', and it's all very well men swearing on the heads of their dear departed, or by the name of the Almighty, which they've done since the dawn of time, they never keep their word, in the end, because they know very well that a word means nothing, you only have to keep it if you believe.
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This is an extract from Memoirs of a Porcupine by Alain Mabanckou, published by Serpent's Tail
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Thursday, 21 April, 2011
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