Hella Haasse

Maja and Klaas met in the editorial office of a provincial daily newspaper; their falling in love was accompanied by endless conversations and much reading, > their world was made of printed paper, of taking stances, analyses, written and oral reflections . The birth of three children forced Maja to dedicate herself to the family, abandoning her work. A prosaic life lies ahead, from which to derive a decorous pleasure, a love slowly turning into an affectionate friendship. Until three events change the couple's lives. Klaas discovers an unknown poet, Bernard Mork. He comes into possession of his poems and is captivated by them, particularly by the progression of the themes addressed: in *Morning Songs for Eve* there emerges an outburst of sensual ecstasy, such that to Klaas "his very existence suddenly seemed dry and barren"; in *Principles of Order* one witnesses a gradual return to self-control; and the *Letters to Baucis* are filled with an austere serenity. It is the story of a love affair between a man and a woman, a kind of *Canzoniere*, in which, along the long journey through existence, Petrarch moves from erotic fantasies about the beloved woman to a muted nostalgia for the sweetness of Laura's eyes, and finally to a fearful inwardness before impending death. But who is Bernard Mork? While Klaas is absorbed in this investigation, Maja undergoes another experience, equally comprehensive and mysterious. During a journey relocating to the Côte d'Azur, they have a car accident: Klaas must stay behind to wait for the car to be repaired, while Maja and the children continue on aboard a truck. > In the dim light of the dashboard, the truck driver beside her was a mountain of shadow (...), a giant, a superhuman force, who had taken them under his protection . In a state of near-unconsciousness, an "insignificant cog in that colossus on wheels," Maja listens to the truck driver’s stories. In all of them, mysterious women appear—apparitions or human beings, malevolent witches or lost creatures: in any case, swept away by the desire for death. If Klaas's quest still bears the semblance of reality, even as poetry fuels fantasy, the truck driver's tales belong to the realm of the imagination, perhaps to Maja's own nightmares. What is unquestionably real, yet indecipherable, is what occurs in the splendid villa on the Côte d'Azur. Owned by a wealthy Russian aristocrat, absent because constantly traveling, it is looked after by the caretaker, a suspicious and irascible man, repeatedly caught selling off the villa's valuable items. In particular, the children are forbidden from playing near a small shed: merely a tool shed, or the hiding place for something far more unsettling, such as the corpse of the wealthy Russian lady? The three narrative strands develop in parallel, culminating in the discovery of the poet’s true identity: Bernard Mork is a woman! But how does a woman write about eroticism, how does she recount her love affair? For Maja, the answer is simple: > in her poetry she was both man and woman. (...) But in order not to wrong her daughter, Eva, she was forced to change. It was a conscious choice. That is the reasoning of a mother, not of a poet > , replies Klaas, who then sinks into a literary dissertation. It would not be enough to listen to truck drivers' stories > to understand that the real theme is the strength of the woman who wants to become the protagonist, at least in poetry. The novel remains suspended, closing almost out of weariness. If we strive to offer a unified interpretation of a narrative fragmented into its three storylines, we might make this observation: three spheres coexist within all of us—the real world, the ideal, and the internal. In the real world there may be crimes, even if unsolved; there are characters and places, and therefore realist descriptions and the order of events; in the ideal world there are literature, philosophy, and so forth; in the internal world there are feelings, nightmares, and dreams. Wherever we attempt to position ourselves (for instance, Klaas in literature, Maja in dreams), it is difficult to defend against the imagination, for its paths are manifold. By chance while you sleep/by an involuntary movement of the fingers/I tickle you and you laugh/you laugh without waking/so pleased with your body you laugh/you approve of life even in sleep/like that day you told me:/let me sleep, I have to finish a dream" (Luciano Porta, from the collection *Invasioni*). A major Dutch writer, Haasse develops the story with prose that is simple, elegant, and effective. It makes for pleasant reading, as one gets lost in details that are meticulous and evocative; yet, on their own, they are unable to sustain a plot that is slender, jagged, and rambling. The relationship between Maja and Klaas remains in the background, left unexplored by the syntax and the words: it stands there motionless, each spouse enclosed within their own incommunicable self, despite the imagination. What the story fails to deliver might have been offered by narrative style; such is not the case. Why read it? Pleasant