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The High Mountains of Portugal
Yann Martel
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The High Mountains of Portugal
Yann Martel
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THE INTERNATIONAL BESTSELLERLost in Portugal.Lost to grief.With nothing but a chimpanzee. A man thrown backwards by heartbreak goes in search of an artefact that could unsettle history. A woman carries her husband to a doctor in a suitcase. A Canadian senator begins a new life, in a new country, in the company of a chimp called Odo. From these stories of journeying, of loss and faith, Yann Martel makes a novel unlike any other: moving, profound and magical.A New York Times BestsellerAn Australian Independent Bookseller Bestseller#1 on The Globe & Mail's Bestseller List#1 on Toronto Star's Bestseller List#1 on Maclean's Bestseller List#1 on National Post's Bestseller List#1 on McNally Robinson's Bestseller ListAn ABA Indie Bestseller
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Literature GeneralHomeless
From his modest flat on Rua SĂŁo Miguel in the ill-famed Alfama district to his uncleâs stately estate in leafy Lapa, it is a good walk across much of Lisbon. It will likely take him an hour. But the morning has broken bright and mild, and the walk will soothe him. And yesterday Sabio, one of his uncleâs servants, came to fetch his suitcase and the wooden trunk that holds the documents he needs for his mission to the High Mountains of Portugal, so he has only himself to convey.
He feels the breast pocket of his jacket. Father Ulissesâ diary is there, wrapped in a soft cloth. Foolish of him to bring it along like this, so casually. It would be a catastrophe if it were lost. If he had any sense he would have left it in the trunk. But he needs extra moral support this morning, as he does every time he visits his uncle.
Even in his excitement he remembers to forgo his regular cane and take the one his uncle gave him. The handle of this cane is made of elephant ivory and the shaft of African mahogany, but it is unusual mainly because of the round pocket mirror that juts out of its side just beneath the handle. This mirror is slightly convex, so the image it reflects is quite wide. Even so, it is entirely useless, a failed idea, because a walking cane in use is by its nature in constant motion, and the image the mirror reflects is therefore too shaky and fleeting to be helpful in any way. But this fancy cane is a custom-made gift from his uncle, and every time he pays a call TomĂĄs brings it.
He heads off down Rua SĂŁo Miguel onto Largo SĂŁo Miguel and then Rua de SĂŁo JoĂŁo da Praça before turning onto Arco de Jesusâthe easy perambulation of a pedestrian walking through a city he has known his whole life, a city of beauty and bustle, of commerce and culture, of challenges and rewards. On Arco de Jesus he is ambushed by a memory of Dora, smiling and reaching out to touch him. For that, the cane is useful, because memories of her always throw him off balance.
âI got me a rich one,â she said to him once, as they lay in bed in his flat.
âIâm afraid not,â he replied. âItâs my uncle whoâs rich. Iâm the poor son of his poor brother. Papa has been as unsuccessful in business as my uncle Martim has been successful, in exact inverse proportion.â
He had never said that to anyone, commented so flatly and truthfully about his fatherâs checkered career, the business plans that collapsed one after the other, leaving him further beholden to the brother who rescued him each time. But to Dora he could reveal such things.
âOh, you say that, but rich people always have troves of money hidden away.â
He laughed. âDo they? Iâve never thought of my uncle as a man who was secretive about his wealth. And if thatâs so, if Iâm rich, why wonât you marry me?â
People stare at him as he walks. Some make a comment, a few in jest but most with helpful intent. âBe careful, you might trip!â calls a concerned woman. He is used to this public attention; beyond a smiling nod to those who mean well, he ignores it.
One step at a time he makes his way to Lapa, his stride free and easy, each foot lifted high, then dropped with aplomb. It is a graceful gait.
He steps on an orange peel but does not slip.
He does not notice a sleeping dog, but his heel lands just short of its tail.
He misses a step as he is going down some curving stairs, but he is holding on to the railing and he regains his footing easily.
And other such minor mishaps.
Doraâs smile dropped at the mention of marriage. She was like that; she went from the lighthearted to the deeply serious in an instant.
âNo, your family would banish you. Family is everything. You cannot turn your back on yours.â
âYou are my family,â he replied, looking straight at her.
She shook her head. âNo, I am not.â
His eyes, for the most part relieved of the burden of directing him, relax in his skull like two passengers sitting on deck chairs at the rear of a ship. Rather than surveying the ground all the time, they glance about dreamily. They notice the shapes of clouds and of trees. They dart after birds. They watch a horse snuffle as it pulls a cart. They come to rest on previously unnoticed architectural details in buildings. They observe the bustle of traffic on Rua Cais de Santarém. All in all, it should be a delightful morning stroll on this pleasant late-December day of the year 1904.
Dora, beautiful Dora. She worked as a servant in his uncleâs household. TomĂĄs noticed her right away the first time he visited his uncle after she was hired. He could hardly take his eyes off her or get her out of his mind. He made efforts to be especially courteous to her and to engage her in brief conversations over one minor matter after another. It allowed him to keep looking at her fine nose, her bright dark eyes, her small white teeth, the way she moved. Suddenly he became a frequent visitor. He could remember precisely the moment Dora realized that he was addressing her not as a servant but as a woman. Her eyes flitted up to his, their gazes locked for a moment, and then she turned awayâbut not before a quick complicit smile curled up a corner of her mouth.
Something great was released within him then, and the barrier of class, of status, of utter improbability and unacceptability vanished. Next visit, when he gave her his coat, their hands touched and both lingered on that touch. Matters proceeded swiftly from there. He had, until then, had experience of sexual intimacy only with a few prostitutes, occasions that had been terribly exciting and then terribly depressing. He had fled each time, ashamed of himself and vowing never to do it again. With Dora, it was terribly exciting and then terribly exciting. She played with the thick hairs of his chest as she rested her head on him. He had no desire to flee anywhere.
âMarry me, marry me, marry me,â he pleaded. âWe will be each otherâs wealth.â
âNo, we will only be poor and isolated. You donât know what thatâs like. I do, and I donât want you to go through it.â
Into that amorous standstill was born their little Gaspar. If it were not for his strenuous pleading, she would have been dismissed from his uncleâs household when it was discovered that she was with child. His father had been his sole supporter, telling him to live his love for Dora, in precise opposition to his uncleâs silent opprobrium. Dora was relegated to invisible duties deep within the kitchen. Gaspar lived equally invisibly in the Lobo household, invisibly loved by his father, who invisibly loved his mother.
TomĂĄs visited as often as he decently could. Dora and Gaspar came to see him in the Alfama on her days off. They would go to a park, sit on a bench, watch Gaspar play. On those days they were like any normal couple. He was in love and happy.
As he passes a tram stop, a tram rumbles up on its rails, a transportation newness hardly three years old, shiny yellow and electric. Commuters rush forward to get on it, commuters hurry to get off it. He avoids them allâexcept one, into whom he crashes. After a quick interaction in which mutual apologies are proffered and accepted, he moves on.
The sidewalk has several raised cobblestones but he glides over them easily.
His foot strikes the leg of a café chair. It is bumped, nothing more.
Death took Dora and Gaspar one unyielding step at a time, the doctor summoned by his uncle expending his skills to no avail. First a sore throat and fatigue, followed by fever, chills, aches, painful swallowing, difficulty breathing, convulsions, a wild-eyed, strangled losing of the mindâuntil they gave out, their bodies as grey, twisted, and still as the sheets theyâd thrashed in. He was there with each of them. Gaspar was five years old, Dora was twenty-four.
He did not witness his fatherâs death a few days later. He was in the music room of the Lobo house, sitting silently with one of his cousins, numb with grief, when his uncle entered, grim-faced. âTomĂĄs,â he said, âI have terrible news. Silvestre . . . your father, has died. I have lost my only brother.â The words were only sounds but TomĂĄs felt crushed physically, as if a great rock had fallen on him, and he keened like a wounded animal. His warm bear of a father! The man who had raised him, who had countenanced his dreams!
In the course of one weekâGaspar died on Monday, Dora on Thursday, his father on Sundayâhis heart became undone like a bursting cocoon. Emerging from it came no butterfly but a grey moth that settled on the wall of his soul and stirred no farther.
There were two funerals, a paltry one for a servant girl from the provinces and her bastard son, and a rich one for a rich manâs poor brother, whose lack of material success was discreetly not mentioned.
He does not see an approaching carriage as he steps off a curb, but the driverâs cry alerts him and he scampers out of the way of the horse.
He brushes against a man standing with his back to him. He raises his hand and says, âMy apologies.â The man shrugs amiably and watches him go.
One step at a time, every few steps turning his head to glance over his shoulder at what lies onward, TomĂĄs makes his way to Lapa walking backwards.
âWhy? Why are you doing this? Why donât you walk like a normal person? Enough of this nonsense!â his uncle has cried on more than one occasion. In response TomĂĄs has come up with good arguments in defence of his way of walking. Does it not make more sense to face the elementsâthe wind, the rain, the sun, the onslaught of insects, the glumness of strangers, the uncertainty of the futureâwith the shield that is the back of oneâs head, the back of oneâs jacket, the seat of oneâs pants? These are our protection, our armour. They are made to withstand the vagaries of fate. Meanwhile, when one is walking backwards, oneâs more delicate partsâthe face, the chest, the attractive details of oneâs clothingâare sheltered from the cruel world ahead and displayed only when and to whom one wants with a simple voluntary turn that shatters oneâs anonymity. Not to mention arguments of a more athletic nature. What more natural way to walk downhill, he contends, than backwards? The forefeet touch down with nimble delicacy, and the calf muscles can calibrate their tensing and releasing with precision. Movement downwards is therefore elastic and without strain. And should one trip, what safer way to do so than backwards, the cushioned buttocks blunting oneâs fall? Better that than to break oneâs wrists in a forward tumble. And heâs not excessively stubborn about it. He does make exceptions, when climbing the many long, winding stairs of the Alfama, for example, or when he has to run.
All of these justifications his uncle has waved aside impatiently. Martim Augusto Mendes Lobo is an impatient successful man. Yet he knows why TomĂĄs walks backwards, despite his testy interrogations and his nephewâs dissembling explanations. One day TomĂĄs overheard him talking to a visiting friend. It was the very dropping of his uncleâs voice that made him prick up his ears.
â. . . the most ridiculous scene,â his uncle was saying, sotto voce. âImagine this: Ahead of himâthat is, behind himâthere is a streetlight. I call over my secretary, Benedito, and we watch in silent fascination, our minds preoccupied with the same question: Will my nephew walk into the streetlight? At that moment, another pedestrian appears on the street, at the other end. This man sees TomĂĄs walking towards him backwards. We can tell from his cocked head that my nephewâs curious way of advancing has caught his attention. I know from experience that there will be an encounter of sortsâa comment made, a jest thrown out, at the very least a bewildered stare as he passes by. Sure enough, a few steps before TomĂĄs reaches the streetlight, the other man quickens his pace and stops him with a tap on the shoulder. TomĂĄs turns. Benedito and I cannot hear what the two say to each other, but we can watch the pantomime. The stranger points to the streetlight. TomĂĄs smiles, nods, and brings a hand to his chest to express his gratitude. The stranger smiles back. They shake hands. With a wave to each other they depart, each going his way, the stranger down the street, and TomĂĄsâswivelling round, moving backwards once moreâup the street. He circles the streetlight without the least trouble.
âAh, but wait! Itâs not over. After a few steps the other pedestrian turns his head to glance back at TomĂĄs, and clearly he is surprised to see that he is still walking backwards. Concern can be read on his faceâCareful, youâll have an accident if you donât watch out!âbut also a measure of embarrassment because TomĂĄs is looking his way and has seen him turn to stare, and we all know itâs rude to stare. The man quickly turns his head to face forward again, but itâs too late: He collides with the next streetlight. He hits it like a clapper hits a bell. Both Benedito and I wince instinctively in sympathy. Tottering, he grimaces as he brings his hands to his face and chest. TomĂĄs runs to help himâhe runs forward. Youâd think it would look normal, his forward gait, but it doesnât. There is no bounce to his step. He advances with great, long strides, his torso moving smoothly in a straight line, as if on a conveyor belt.
âAnother exchange takes place between the two men, TomĂĄs expressing great concern, the other man waving it aside while keeping a hand pressed to his face. TomĂĄs retrieves the manâs hat, which has fallen to the ground. With another handshake and a more muted wave, the poor man staggers off. TomĂĄsâand Benedito and Iâwatch him go. Only once the man has turned the corner of the street does TomĂĄs, in his usual rearward manner, resume his course. But the incident has flustered him, evidently, because he now smartly bangs into the streetlight he so artfully avoided a minute earlier. Rubbing the back of his head, he turns to glare at it.
âBut still, Fausto, he persists. No matter how often he bangs his head, no matter how many times he falls over, he goes on walking backwards.â TomĂĄs heard his uncle laugh and the friend Fausto join in. Then his uncle continued more somberly. âIt started the day his little boy, Gaspar, died of diphtheria. The boy was born out of wedlock to a servant here. She died of the sickness too. Then, as fate would have it, my brother, Silvestre, dropped dead a few days later, midday, mid-speech. Already TomĂĄsâs mother had died when he was young. Now his father. To be so assailed by tragedy! Some people never laugh again. Others take to drink. My nephew, in his case, chose to walk backwards. Itâs been a year. How long will this bizarre grieving last?â
What his uncle does not understand is that in walking backwards, his back to the world, his back to God, he is not grieving. He is objecting. Because when everything cherished by you in life has been taken away, what else is there to do but object?
He takes a roundabout route. He turns off Rua Nova de SĂŁo Francisco de Paula and starts walking up Rua do Sacramento. He is nearly there. As he swivels his head to see over his shoulderâhe remembers thereâs a streetlight aheadâhe looks up at the rear of his uncleâs grand residence, with its elaborate cornices and intricate mouldings and soaring windows. He feels eyes upon him and notices a figure at a window on the corner of the second floor. Given that is where his uncleâs office is located, it is likely his uncle Martim, so he turns his head back and strives to walk confidently, carefully skirting the streetlight. He follows the wall surrounding his uncleâs property until he comes up to the gate. He spins round to reach for the bell, but his hand pauses in midair. He pulls it back. Though he knows his uncle has seen him and is waiting for him, he tarries. Then he takes the old leather diary from the breast pocket of his jacket, slips it out of its cotton cloth, puts his back against the wall, and slides down to a sitting position on the sidewalk. He gazes at the bookâs cover.
Being the Life in Words
and the Instructions for the Gift
of Father Ulisses Manuel RosĂĄrio Pinto
humble Servant of God
He is well acquainted with Father Ulissesâ diary. Whole sections he knows by heart. He opens it at random and reads.
As slave ships approach the island to deliver their cargo, they have much accounting & housecleaning to do. Within sight of the port, they throw body after body overboard, both port & starboard, some of them limp & pliant, others feebly gesticulating. These are the dead & the seriously sick, the first discarded because they are no longer of any value, the second for fear that whatever illness is afflicting them might spread & affect the value of the others. It happens that the wind carries to my ears the cries of the living slaves as they protest their expulsion from the ship, as it also carries the splash their bodies make upon hitting the water. They disappear into the crowded Limbo that is the bottom of the Bay of Ana Chaves.
His uncleâs house is also a Limbo of unfinished, interrupted lives. He closes his eyes. Loneliness comes up to him like a sniffing dog. It circles him insistently. He waves it away, but it refuses to leave him alone.
He came upon Father Ulissesâ diary mere weeks after his life was irretrievably blighted. The discovery was a happenstance related to his work at the National Museum of Ancient Art, where he works as assistant curator. The Cardinal-Patriarch of Lisbon, JosĂ© SebastiĂŁo de Almeida Neto, had just made a donation to the museum of ecclesiastical and non-ecclesiastical objects accumulated over the centuries from across the Portuguese empire. With Cardinal Netoâs permission, TomĂĄs was sent by the museum to do research in the Episcopal archives on Rua Serpa Pinto to establish the exact provenance of these beautiful artifacts, the story whereby an altar, chalice, crucifix or psalter, a painting or a book, had come into the hands of the Lisbon diocese.
What he found were not exemplary archives. Succeeding secretaries of the various archbishops of Lisbon clearly did not dwell overmuch on the earthly matter of organizing thousands of papers and documents. It was on one of the open shelves devoted to the patriarchate of Cardinal JosĂ© Francisco de Mendoça Valdereis, Patriarch of Lisbon between 1788 and 1808, in a stuff-all section given the breezy title MiudezasâOdds and Endsâthat he spotted the hand-stitched volume with the brown leather cover, the handwritten title legible despite the splotchy discolourations.
What life was this, what gift? he had wondered. What were the instructions? Who was this Father Ulisses? When he pried open the volume, the spine made the ...