Chinese Story and Other Tales
Language: English
Pages: 288
ISBN: 0806121343
Format: PDF / Kindle (mobi) / ePub
Book by Pilnyak, Boris, Reck, Vera T., Green, Michael
us some soda water. Every evening we put on monkey suits and go out of town in an automobile— to eat ice cream and to speed for hours on end through palm groves because only during this nightly ritual can we take a breath of air. Every other day I attend banquets. 32 CHINESE STORY 33 Man-man-ti! . . . During the past two days I learned what tropi cal heat is, when your body truly melts. Days pass as ordered. In China— it seems— religion has died: yesterday for the first time I saw a
in another hour the bathhouse was empty. The drunken women and the brothers Bezdetov had all gone home; at home the drunken girls were creeping quietly to their beds. A notebook had been left lying on the floor in the bathhouse. In the notebook was written, “Call parents’ meeting at six o’clock on the seventh.” “At meeting of Local Committee suggest everyone subscribe to government in dustrialization loan to amount of month’s salary.” “Suggest Alek sandr Alekseyevich reread A B C of Communism.”
“only when the entire economic life of the country is based on strict eco nomic consideration, on solid economic foundations. State sub sidies and the management of the national economy without regard for the budget will inevitably undermine a stable financial system.” 163 164 THE TALE OF THE UNEXTINGUISHED MOON In headline type appeared: “China’s Struggle Against the Imperi alists.” The foreign news section carried telegrams from England, France, Germany, Czechoslovakia, Latvia, America.
somewhere— white moon against blue clouds and black abysses in the sky. THE TALE OF THE UNEXTINGUISHED MOON 173 At that hour the unbending man in House Number One was still sitting in his study. Drawn curtains completely covered the win dows. Again a fire was burning in the grate. The house was steeped in silence, as if the silence had been hoarded for a century. The man was sitting on his wooden chair. This time thick books in Ger man and English lay open before him; he was writing with
success. About the automobile— yes, please, especially as I have to make a stop on business before the operation. Yes, yes, please— about eight o’clock.” The professor hung up and said to the woman, joyfully and with pride: “Get yourself dressed, my little lily of the valley; an automobile will be coming to pick me up; I’ll give you a ride and I’ll take you home. Hurry!”— and he embraced the woman, laying his head on her shoulder in the way that people do when they are very happy. It was already