The Shadow Girls полностью

Jesper Humlin drew a deep breath and launched into his lecture, the one that was closest to the truth and took twenty-one minutes. Afterwards he read a few poems from his latest collection that he thought would go over best. The whole time he was speaking he kept a surreptitious eye on the men in the front row. They listened attentively and he began to think with increasing satisfaction that he seemed in fact to have reached a new reading public. But the atmosphere in the room changed when he started reading his poems. One of the men in the front row shifted restlessly and started rocking back and forth in his chair as he sighed audibly. Humlin started to sweat. He skipped a whole stanza in the poem he was reading out of sheer nervousness, making the already challenging poem completely incomprehensible.

When he finished the poem, he looked up to find the men in the front row staring at him. None of them clapped. Humlin leafed through his book and hastily decided to change his approach and only read a few more of the shortest poems. At the same time his mind was ever more desperately trying to figure out who these men with their leather jackets and torn jeans could possibly be. The other unusual group, the immigrants, were staring at him impassively. They clapped dutifully but without enthusiasm. Humlin had the distinct impression that it was all going to hell, but without really being able to say why. He had never experienced a reading quite like this one.

He finished the final poem and wiped the sweat from his brow. He looked up at the people he considered his normal public and received their enthusiastic applause. The men in the front row were staring at him with what he now saw were glazed eyes. He lay aside his book and smiled, trying to hide his fear.

‘I am happy to take any questions that you may have. After that there will be a short time for book signing.’

A woman put up her hand and asked him to define his usage of the word charity. She felt it was a concept that underpinned the whole collection. Humlin thought he heard a low growl from the front row. He started to sweat again.

‘Charity, in my opinion, is simply a more beautiful word for kindness.’

The man who had shifted restlessly during Humlin’s poetry reading stood up so violently that his chair was knocked to the floor.

‘What the fuck kind of question is that?’ he shrieked. ‘What I would like to ask you, Mr Poet, is what you think you’re doing when you force us to listen to this stuff. If you like I can tell you what I think.’

‘Please do.’

‘I don’t understand how all this shit fits between the covers of such a little book, one that costs three hundred kronor, by the way. I have only one question I would really like to get an answer to.’

Humlin tried to control his voice as he replied.

‘What’s your question?’

‘What do you get paid by, the word?’

A shocked mumble arose among those members of the public who had enjoyed the reading. Humlin turned to one of the librarians who was sitting behind and slightly to one side of him.

‘Who are these people?’ he hissed.

‘They’re clients from a halfway house outside Gothenburg.’

‘What the hell are they doing here?’

The librarian gave him a stern look.

‘One of my most important duties is exposing people who have never previously had the opportunity, to the world of literature. You have no idea what I had to go through in order to get them here.’

‘I think actually I have some idea. But you see the kind of questions this man is asking.’

‘And I think he deserves an answer.’

Humlin collected himself and looked at the man who had still not seated himself. He was tensed like an angry wrestler.

‘I don’t get paid by the word. As a general rule poets get paid very little for their work.’

‘I’m glad to hear it.’

The woman who had asked about charity got up and thumped her cane into the floor.

‘I think it is indefensible and rude to ask Mr Humlin about these sorts of financial matters. We are here in order to discuss his poetry in a calm and civilised manner.’

Another one of the men in the front row got up. Humlin had noticed him earlier since he had been nodding off most of the time. Once he got to his feet he swayed and had to take another step to balance himself. He was clearly intoxicated.

‘I don’t know what that old bitch is talking about.’

‘How do you mean?’ Humlin said helplessly.

‘Isn’t this a free country? Why can’t we ask what we want? It’s all the same to me anyway. I’m with my pal Åkesson here. I’ve never heard worse shit in my whole life.’