The Incorrigible Optimists Club
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Authors: Jean-Michel Guenassia
THE INCORRIGIBLE OPTIMISTS CLUB
Jean-Michel Guenassia was born in Algeria, 1950. His novel,
The Incorrigible Optimists Club
, won the prestigious Prix Goncourt des Lycéens. He is a prolific screenwriter and lives in France.
First published in France as
Le Club des Incorrigibles Optimistes
in 2011
by Editions Albin Michel.
First published in Great Britain in 2014 by Atlantic Books, an imprint of Atlantic Books Ltd.
Copyright © Albin Michel, 2011
Translator's Copyright © Euan Cameron, 2014
The moral right of Jean-Michel Guenassia to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act of 1988.
The moral right of Euan Cameron to be identified as the translator of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act of 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.
This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author's imagination and not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities, is entirely coincidental.
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
Trade Paperback ISBN: 978 1 84887 541 8
E-book ISBN: 978 1 78239 404 4
Printed in Great Britain
Atlantic Books
An Imprint of Atlantic Books Ltd
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For Dominique and for Andrée
Contents
Translator's note
Some readers may be puzzled by the term âbaby-foot', a
faux anglicisme
for the football game played so remorselessly yet so effectively by Michel and many of his contemporaries in this novel. Known variously in different parts of the world as âtable football', âkicker' or âfoosball', in France âbaby-foot' has its own federation, tournaments and rules. In the Paris of the 1960s the game became a craze and no self-respecting café could be without a âbaby-foot' table or two.
I should like to express my particular gratitude to Sara Holloway for her sensitive editing of my text. My thanks, too, to various friends who have offered suggestions or advice on specialized terms used in the translation: Irina Brown, Mark Eisenthal, Ben Faccini, Hélène Fiamma, Jeremy James, Agnès Liebaert, Nelly Munthe, Joséphine Séblon. I should also like to thank Adélaïde Fabre, Julie Etienne and their colleagues at the Villa Gillet in Lyon for their kindness and hospitality during the month I spent there working on this translation.
Club:
Klub
/noun; a place at which one meets for social, political, athletic or other ends. [Middle English]
I prefer to live as an optimist and be wrong, than live as a pessimist and be always right.
A
NONYMOUS
APRIL 1980
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A
writer is being buried today. It's like a final demonstration: an unexpected crowd â silent, respectful and anarchic â is blocking the streets and the boulevards around the Montparnasse cemetery. How many are there? Thirty thousand? Fifty thousand? Fewer? More? Whatever they say, it's important to have a lot of people at one's funeral. If anybody had told him that there would be such a multitude, he wouldn't have believed them. It would have made him laugh. It's not a question that can have concerned him much. He expected to be buried hastily, with twelve faithful mourners, not with the honours of a Hugo or a Tolstoy. Never in the past half-century have so many people paid tribute to an intellectual. Anyone would think he was indispensable or had had unanimous support. Why are they here, all of them? Given what they know about him, they ought not to have come. How absurd to pay homage to a man who was wrong about almost everything, was constantly misled, and who put his talents into defending the indefensible with conviction. They would have done better to attend the funerals of those who were right, whom he had despised and poured scorn on. No one went out of their way for them.
And yet, behind these failures, there was something else, something admirable about this little man, about his passionate desire to force the hand of destiny with his mind, to press on in the face of all logic, not to give up in spite of certain defeat, to accept the contradictions of a just cause and a battle that was lost beforehand, of an eternal struggle, constantly repeated and without resolution. It's impossible to get inside the cemetery, where they are trampling over graves, climbing on top of monuments and knocking over tombstones in order to get closer and see the coffin. You would think it was the burial of a pop star or a saint. But it's not just a man they are interring: an old idea is being entombed with him. Nothing will change and we know that. There will not be a better society.
You either accept it or you don't. We have one foot in the grave here, what with our beliefs and our vanished illusions. This is the multitude as absolution for wrongs committed out of idealism. For the victims, nothing is changed. For them there will be neither apologies, nor reparation, nor a first-class burial. What could be worse than to do harm when you intended to do good? It is a bygone era that is being taken to the grave. It's not easy to live in a world without hope.
At this moment, no one is settling scores. No one is taking stock. We are all equally to blame and we are all wrong. I've not come because of the thinker. I've never understood his philosophy, his plays are heavy going and, as for his novels, I've forgotten them. I've come for the sake of old memories. But the throng has reminded me who he was. You can't mourn a hero who supported the oppressors. I make an about-turn. I shall bury him in a corner of my mind.
There are disreputable districts that take you back to your past and where it's best not to loiter. You think you've forgotten it because you don't think about it, but all it wants is to come back. I avoided Montparnasse. There were ghosts there I didn't know what to do with. I saw one of them straight ahead of me in the side road that runs beside boulevard Raspail. I recognized his inimitable pale-striped overcoat, Humphrey Bogart 1950s-style. There are some men you can spot from the way they walk. Pavel Cibulka, orthodox, partisan, king of the great ideological divide and two-a-penny jokes, haughty and proud in his bearing, was striding along unhurriedly. I overtook him. He had grown stouter and could no longer button up his overcoat. His tousled white hair made him look like an artist.
âPavel.'
He stopped, looked me up and down. He searched his memory for where he had seen this face. Surely I conjured up a vague recollection. He shook his head. I did not remind him of anything.
âIt's me⦠Michel. Do you remember?'
He gazed at me, incredulous, still suspicious.
âMichel?⦠Little Michel?'
âEnough of that, I'm taller than you.'
âLittle Michel!⦠How long has it been?'
âThe last time we saw each other was here, for Sacha. That's fifteen years ago.'
We stood there in silence, confused by our memories. We fell into one another's arms. He clasped me tightly.
âI wouldn't have recognized you.'
âYou haven't changed.'
âDon't make fun of me. I've put on a hundred kilos. Due to dieting.'
âI'm glad to see you again. Aren't the others with you? Did you come on your own?'
âI'm off to work. I'm not retired.'
His Bohemian drawl had become even more pronounced. We went to the Select, a brasserie where everyone behaved as though they knew him. Hardly had we sat down than the waiter, without his having asked for anything, brought him a strong coffee with a jug of cold milk then took my order. Pavel leant over to grab hold of the basket full of croissants from the next table and gleefully wolfed down three of them, talking with immense elegance and with his mouth full. Pavel had fled Czechoslovakia almost thirty years ago and lived in France in precarious circumstances. He had escaped in the nick of time from the purge that had removed Slansky, the former Secretary-General of the Communist Party, and Clementis, his Minister for Foreign Affairs, with whom he had worked closely. A former ambassador to Bulgaria and author of a reference work,
The Treaty of Brest-Litovsk: Diplomacy and Revolution
, which no Paris publisher wanted, Pavel was the nightwatchman in a hotel in Saint-Germain-des-Prés, where he lived in a small room on the top floor. He hoped to find his elder brother, who had made his way to the United States at the end of the war, and he was waiting for an American visa, which was refused him on account of his past.
âThey're not going to give me my visa. I won't see my brother again.'
âI know an attaché at the embassy. I can talk to him about it.'
âDon't bother. I've got a folder that's as plump as I am. Apparently, I'm one of the founders of the Czechoslovak Communist Party.'
âIs it true?'
He shrugged his shoulders resignedly.
âWhen you were a student in Prague in the thirties, the alternative was clear. You were either for the exploiters, or for the exploited. I didn't choose sides. I was born into one. I was young, convinced that we were right and that there was no other solution for our country. It's true: I was one of the leaders of the party. I had a law degree. I believed that electricity and the education of the masses were going to give birth to a new man. We couldn't imagine that Communism was going to crush us. Capitalism would, we were sure of that. During the war, it was clear-cut. You either supported the Communists, or the Fascists. For those who had no opinion, it was their bad luck. We made enthusiastic progress. I never questioned myself. After the liberation, nothing happened as we had hoped. Today, they couldn't give a damn that my friends were hanged, or that my family was harassed until they disowned me. They're not interested in an old Commie, and I've decided to be a bloody nuisance. Every year, I submit a request for a visa. They refuse. It doesn't matter, I continue doing it.'
âTell me, Pavel, are you no longer a Communist?'
âStill am and always will be!'
âIt's a total disaster. It's collapsing everywhere.'
âCommunism is a beautiful idea, Michel. The word comrade has a meaning. It's the men who are no good. If they had been given time, Dubcek and Svoboda would have got there. Mind you, my luck's beginning to change.'
âWhy?'
âWell, believe it or not, I've written to Cyrus Vance, Jimmy Carter's Secretary of State. He's replied to me. Can you believe it?'
From out of his wallet, he carefully extracted a letter that was in its original envelope and handed it to me to read. Cyrus Vance was replying to his letter of 11 January 1979, telling him that he would forward it to the appropriate department.
âWhat do you reckon?' he asked.
âIt's a standard reply. He's not exactly committing himself.'
âIn twenty-five years, it's the first time they've done anything. It's an omen. Cyrus Vance is not a Republican, he's a Democrat.'
âDidn't you get a reply before?'
âI was an ass, I wrote to the President of the United States. He doesn't have time to reply to those who write to him. It was Imré who advised me to write to the Secretary of State.'
âYou may well have knocked at the right door. If they refuse again, what are you going to do?'
âI'm no longer Czech. I'm not French. I'm stateless. It's the worst scenario. One doesn't exist. I do have a glimmer of hope of seeing my brother again. He's American. We phone once a year to wish each other a happy New Year. He's a foreman in the building trade. He has a family. He lives well. But he can't afford to come to Europe. I'll put in another request next year. And the following one.'
The brasserie had gradually filled up with a crowd of people who had come to take a break after the funeral. One group made its way over to our table. A woman tried to invade our bench.
âMay I?'
âIt's taken!'
The woman drew back, surprised by his aggressive tone. The little group moved away.
âGod, it's like a bad dream! Did you see the bunch of idiots who have turned up for the old bugger? Are they screwed up or what?'
âHe was a symbol.'
âI'd go and piss on his grave. He deserves nothing less. He's got nothing to be proud of.'
âHe couldn't retract.'
âHe knew. Ever since Gide and Rousset. I told him about Slansky and Clementis. He said nothing. He knew about Kravchenko. He condemned Kravchenko. How do you explain that? Howling with the pack. Despising the martyrs. Denying the truth. Isn't that being party to it? He was a shit.'
He remained pensive, his head bowed, his face tense.
âI'm in no position to preach; I shouldn't have said that.'
âI don't follow.'
âIt's the least you can do, not to bite the hand that feeds you. We survived on the cash they handed out to us. Without them, we wouldn't have got by.'
âWho did hand out cash to you?'
Pavel gave me a sidelong glance as though I were playing the fool. He saw that I was being genuine.
âBoth of them. Kessel and Sartre. They used their connections to get us translations, to get small jobs. They knew lots of people. They recommended us to magazines, to newspaper editors. We wrote stuff. If we were broke, they paid the landlord or the bailiffs. How would we have got by? We didn't have a bean. We'd lost everything. If they hadn't helped us, we would have ended up being homeless. It was harder when he became blind and he no longer left his home. Two years ago, they helped out Vladimir, do you remember him?'
âAs though it were yesterday.'
âHe had some problems.'
He was itching to tell me. In my mind's eye I could see Vladimir Gorenko in the rear room of the Balto, passing his food around.
âWhat became of Vladimir?'
âBefore coming to the West, he was in charge of the oil wells in Odessa. When he arrived, he was given political refugee status. He didn't find work. No oil company wanted him. Even the people he knew and who had done business with him. Nobody lifted a finger to help him. Do you know why? They were frightened of Moscow. If they took him on, it would mean getting on the wrong side of them. They harped on about the Commies and they did business with them. Marcusot, the owner of the café, do you remember, he was a decent man, and he found him an attic room above a delicatessen in rue Daguerre. Vladimir looked after his accounts.
âHe paid him in kind with sausages and cooked meals. Well, paying him is overstating it a bit, Vladimir complained because he gave him the leftovers he would otherwise have thrown away.
âWe did well out of it. Vladimir shared everything with us. Other shopkeepers asked him to look after them. Gradually, he built up a clientele.
It was going well. It didn't please the accountants in the area, who complained. Vladimir has loads of good qualities except that he's a know-it-all. He's always right. He's not a diplomat, if you see what I mean. When the cops arrived, instead of playing dumb and keeping a low profile, he got annoyed and was high-handed with them: “I wasn't afraid of the KGB and I came out of Stalingrad alive, so I'm not scared of you. I work, I pay my taxes, so fuck you!” He wouldn't listen. He carried on in spite of the warnings. You won't believe me, but they put him in jail. For illegally practising the profession of chartered accountant. He argued with the examining magistrate. He was remanded in custody for four months. Can you believe it? A guy who speaks six or seven languages. They closed down his office. He went bankrupt. Who do you reckon helped him out? Kessel went to see the judge and Sartre paid the fine.'
âAnd what's he doing now?'
âHe's working for the accountant who informed on him and he's got his customers back. He's not allowed to take his degree.'
âSacha mentioned him once or twice. I hadn't realized they were helping you.'
âI didn't know you were a friend of Sacha's. I thought you were a friend of Igor's. No one liked Sacha. He wasâ¦'
Pavel stopped when he saw the way I was looking at him. We sat there in silence, amidst the hubbub, with the memories that had come back to haunt us.
âI was friends with both of them.'
âYou couldn't be friends with both of them. It was impossible.'
âFor me, it was possible. Sacha told me one day that Kessel had paid the rent on his attic room. He was late again and he didn't dare ask him.'
âKessel had a kind heart. Right up to the end, until last year, he helped us out. You see, I can behave like a little shit, too. You shouldn't expect anything from anyone. You do the right thing and they spit in your face. I can't help it, I'm unable to forget what Sartre said, what he allowed to be said and, above all, what he didn't say. That's why we didn't much care for him. He was an arsehole, an armchair revolutionary. He was generous, but money doesn't make up for things.'
